Omen Exito: Plague: The Fist-Fighting Doc Does a Dumb-Dumb

There's definitely a "Ruh-Roh" feeling from essentially the get go, and even without the expectation of Lovecraft hijinks a lot of sequences just scream bad news.

If there's two things I like in games, it's role-playing and meaningful choices. So why am I generally not a fan of choose-your-own-adventures, which are essentially this concept? No clue, but Omen Exito: Plague is a CYA that I had a good time with, with a few minute reservations. A wholly original tale that acts as a big love-letter to HP Lovecraft, Omen Exito succeeds at creating a grand web of questions, answers, drama, intrigue, and satisfying conclusions. With limited spoilers (otherwise what's the point of playing?), these are my thoughts on Omen Exito, and why it's one of the better CYA's to try, so let's get into it.

I wish that more of Jake's friends stuck around in the narrative, it would have helped in my investment in the world of Omen Exito, and it's always better with friends.

Omen Exito's story is essentially one big homage to Lovecraftian storytelling, complete with mysterious happenings, otherworldly creatures, a tragedy-prone protagonist, and so on. It's not particularly focused, having a little bit of everything Lovecraft, but what doesn't these days.

You play a doctor who has enlisted in the British army after the tragic death of his wife, and who stumbles onto the trail of a frightening disease that drives its victims mad before killing them. Of course, there's more to the disease than meets the eye, and the larger story of this CYA unfolds at a nice pace filled with triumphs, complications, and failures. I particularly liked the paranoid atmosphere created by the story, which made me second-guess and doubt much of what I was told, which I like. What I did not like was how characters, or more specifically, important characters, are handled in the game's story. If you know anything about Lovecraft, you know that people in those kinds of stories aren't really long for this world, and death is an omnipresent threat, but Omen Exito's handling of important characters and their relation to the narrative is bizarre at best. I'll cover it more in the gameplay section, but it'll get mentioned here first. In your diary, which helps you keep track of where you are in the story, there's a section for important characters, your relation to them, and so on. There's a good number, but how many are vital to the story? Not many, roughly the number of fingers I have on my left hand, and that's a stretch. Sure, some die tragic deaths, but most only appear in a single scene or two before disappearing forever. In all honesty it feels a tad dishonest, but the game's system does reward meeting new people, and in Omen Exito's defense there's a lot of characters. It would be peak galaxy brain for each and every one to come in at the end, or for all of them to even matter to the final conclusion of the game, which seems to be influenced more by your own choices if anything. Yeah, I got the 'bad' ending too, getting the world destroyed by an eldritch horror, but if anything it was my fault for being such a trusting bastard. Truth be told, I was pretty shocked when I found out that I got the 'bad' ending, but to be honest I did find it to be a satisfying conclusion to Jake's investigation of the mysterious plague.

And here I was thinking that I would go the entire game with only strange dreams and people to show for it, let's dance!

In terms of gameplay, or what little of it there is, Omen Exito is something of a blend between a CYA and an adventure story. You read the text, see the accompanying picture along with matching music or ambiance, and make your choices as you encounter them, simple as that. It's really a good way of presenting the game, especially in its 2-d format. There's also no jarring transitions from the various menus (except the pause menu), with everything being a smooth pan to that part of the interface, which I'm always a fan of. Speaking of choices, there's a ton of them to make, and there will rarely be an event that you don't have control over; that's a good thing. Along with the choices you make there's also a skill system that actually matters when it comes to succeeding in your efforts depending on your approach. You level up these skills by earning experience, which functions akin to points in the board game Tokaido, which rewards you for experiencing new things, meeting people, and testing (succeed or fail) your skills. Achievements achieved (or missed) are listed in your journal as well, which makes it easy to note what you missed and should have done to check that virtual box. Most of these are locked behind skill checks though, and quite often you'll definitely end up regretting your upgrade choices. You won't be able to max out all stats in a single game, which further helps with more replayability, though some skills felt more useful than others. I mean come on, I'm being forced into the sacrificial pool, how come my max fight stat doesn't do anything? Jake your life is on the line and you're like "My time has come", get real man, at least have the common decency to go down swinging or spit on Cthulhu or something. It's not the most dazzling game in terms of gameplay, but as a CYA with tons of meaningful choices, so there's a lot of replay value to be had here for certain.

You can't go wrong with points in medicine, and outside of a failed check it helped me feel like, you know, a doctor.

Among the CYA's I've played over the past month (which seems to be a lot), Omen Exito: Plague stands on the other end of the spectrum from Ord., with not just a much longer playtime. It's a good introduction to the CYA genre, with good appeal and variable pace for those who might not be so into sitting and making choices as a game. I'd recommend it, it's a nice change from the seemingly endless visual novels I see around the Steam community on top of being a generally fun game to play, though it could do with a touch up here and there. A part of me wonders if there's a sequel or new entry in the works, but I'd be fine either way to be completely honest, CYA's aren't generally my preferred genre. My play through clocked in at around four hours, and I'll definitely be keeping this installed for a plane ride in the future.