I’ve been struggling to determine how, exactly, I want to talk about Centum. Not in terms of basic stuff, like genre or developer or “it plays like X meets Y.” Those are fairly easy to tack down. No, it’s the next layer down that has had me thinking a lot about Centum since I hit the end of its preview build: the how and why.
So let’s start with the easy parts. Centum is a narrative adventure, largely falling within the point-and-click genre, from developer Hack The Publisher and publisher Serenity Forge. Most of its gameplay consists of interacting with objects, selecting dialogue choices, and unlocking new interactions through flowchart-like experimentation. Move an object, find a new thing to put in your inventory, test it out on all the other interactable spots on-screen. If you’ve ever journeyed with Guybrush Threepwood or Putt-Putt, these parts will feel familiar.
Where it starts to feel less familiar is all the mini-games. Or the sudden art style switches. Or maybe even with the creepy ghost kid who seems helpful, for now. This is where Centum starts to make it clear that it’s not just another adventure game.
Even before you’re in the swing of pointing and clicking, Centum starts you out in a computer interface. It’s an old-school, chunky interface that reminded me of the colorful iMacs we used to use in school. I will never be able to resist a good fake desktop; poring over files and folders is a guilty pleasure, and much like Telling Lies or Cibele, Centum leans into that. Although rather than deriving some gratification from digging through personal details, it builds a lot of terror over discovering what exactly a file or folder might contain.
Let me put it a different way: Centum imagines that you are interacting with this computer. But what does it mean that you, the player, are interacting with it? What is this computer, exactly? Where, when, and why does it exist? And what happened to the people that used this interface before?
As you read over notepad clues and hints towards your situation, it becomes a little creepier. Names start to drop, and you only have vague understandings of their importance. Also, can a machine be haunted? This one sure feels haunted. If ghosts could plague the living, what spirits can manifest in the binary ones-and-zeroes of Centum‘s PC?
These are the thoughts I had running through my mind as I clicked and prodded my way through Centum‘s first two chapters. Both are closed-room puzzles, where the player needs to discern a way out, while also running up against several different roadblocks. In the first chapter, for instance, you’re trapped in a cell. A Judge berates you, asking why you’re here, what you did, and who you are. It reprimands you when you answer incorrectly, and I was always wrong.
Again, these moments feel a bit familiar: a locked room, filled with philosophical and psychological quandaries surrounding how you’ll get out. Hack The Publisher even has a little minigame that’s similar to the Giant’s Game from Ender’s Game, eye-gouging and all, that feels like a little nod towards players that notice the similarities.
The ways to get out are similarly gnarly and surreal. I talked to a wall, grew a tree, and observed the city. A small box played music. And at one point, I trapped a demon with mirrors. I don’t want to get too deep into the “how” of it all, as that’s a big appeal of Centum‘s in-the-moment puzzle-solving, though I also think it’s where Centum struggled a bit for me. Some solutions, like the aforementioned mirrors, felt a bit unclear at times. And you’ll need a good tolerance for picking up objects and testing them on various other items; some were a bit straightforward to figure out, while others were head-scratchers.
The mini-games are also a little hit-or-miss. I enjoyed them in a few cases, and there’s an element of simplicity and tedium that feels textually important. It did mean, though, that when I accidentally restarted one of the games, being locked back into beating it was a bit frustrating. Not a major gripe, just a small wrinkle.
What really, really works for Centum is its art style. Really, it’s a multitude of art styles. At some points, it looks like a point-and-click classic. Then, it will introduce a creepy apparition. Then, it might peel off into a seemingly hand-drawn, winding line art of white-on-black. These segues can feel sudden and jarring in a really good way. And man, the cat-phone. I am haunted by the cat-phone.
By the end of the preview, I felt I was starting to grasp what Centum is about, and the story it’s trying to tell. It’s an incredibly fascinating one. I think if you like the general gist of exploring artificial intelligence, man-made horrors, and maybe a heaping helping of both guilt and family drama, you’ll dig what Centum is concocting.
Really, Centum feels like a reminder of what this year is turning out to be. The usual wave of AAA releases has slowed to a trickle, and indie studios are finding a lot of room to appeal to niche interests, to eschew broad appeals in favor of making something a bit more unique.
That is Centum, to me. It might not be for everyone. But the fact that it isn’t makes it all the more appealing to me. I dig its thoughts about ghosts in the machine. I vibe with its art style. Maybe I do like cat-phone, after all. But I do think, if any of this made you sit up a bit in your seat and go “hm,” then Centum is worth keeping an eye on.
Centum is currently planned for Xbox Series X|S and PC sometime this summer.
