8 Video Games That Did More With Less
5. Her Story
When a new game is touted as offering a groundbreaking spin on video game narratives, you probably imagine something extremely complex. But Her Story - an FMV detective game from future Immortality director Sam Barlow - basically goes in the other direction.
Players are tasked with investigating a man's disappearance by sorting through a database of police interview video clips, primarily with his wife.
Beyond the video clips being of low quality, enough that anyone with a camcorder could basically pull them off, Her Story ditches fancy technical bells and whistles and instead encourages the player to do a most unexpected thing - get a pen and some paper out.
Given that you'll spend most of the game searching for words which might be spoken in the interviews, you'll want to keep track of everything you've searched for, and also note down worthwhile information which is usually offered up in non-linear fashion.
Her Story's lack of an in-game note-taking system paradoxically proves more involving, as players end up getting more into their character through the tactile experience of taking actual notes for real. It's a feat of sly genius, really.