Pinstripe

Steam title card.

Pinstripe is a horror-themed Metroidvania with various puzzle elements developed by Atmos Games and published by Armor Games for Linux, Macintosh, and Windows on 2017-04-24, and then later ported to the Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and Switch. The game uses a typical side-view platformer display and incorporates many action and puzzle elements. In the game's story, you play a minister in the early 1900s riding on a train with his daughter. However, you quickly realize that all your baggage has been thrown off the train and the only other passenger is a creepy man in a pinstripe suit who has a strange interest in your daughter. The strange man kidnaps your daughter and is more than he initially appears to be, having dark supernatural powers causing the train to crash. You are left alone in a cold wilderness looking for your daughter.

Personal

I bought this game as part of a Humble Bundle. I played it because the graphics looked really interesting. I first beat the game on 2020-02-09 and then played it again to unlock more achievements. It was quite enjoyable.

Status

I own this game on Steam and have beaten the regular game and the new game plus and unlocked 9 of the 12 achievements.

Review

7	4	8	7	6

Best Version: Windows

— This section contains spoilers! —

Good

• The game has enjoyable characters. George is a funny sidekick and Pinstripe is wonderful villain. Mr. Dicky, Birdie, Happy, and the others all have their moments as well.
• I enjoy the story. It's dark, mysterious, and has a good climax and ending.
• The art style is fantastic, the graphics are beautiful, and the user interface is clean.
• There is nice ambient music and sound effects throughout the game and the voice acting is really good.
• There is a decent variety of puzzles throughout the game including multiple forms of physics-based puzzles, word jumbles, spot the difference, a couple observation puzzles, jumping puzzles, and reflex puzzles. Nothing unique or difficult, but enjoyable.
• The game includes a new game plus with unlocked content and multiple endings which makes a second play-through worthwhile.

Bad

• The controls to shoot the slingshot with an analog joystick are quite cumbersome, using a mouse is much easier. When slingshot accuracy is necessary, you're much better off simply switching to your mouse and keyboard. If you're playing on a video game console, you're out of luck! This hurts the game a second way because the designer no doubt had to make the game much easier to accommodate people using an analog joystick, so, if you're using the mouse, you'll have less of a challenge. For example, the red balloon race and the battle with Pinstripe are trivial with a mouse.
• The game's story is about redemption: Ted the minister got drunk on Pinstripe whiskey, crashed his car, and killed himself and his daughter Bo. After spending some time in hell, and confronting the manifestation of Pinstripe, you're reunited with your family. However, your actions in the afterlife aren't all that redeeming. You rescue Birdie, George, and Bo from Pinstripe, but that's about it. What I would have liked to see it, since the game features several other substance abusers, there could have been something in the game about helping them kick their habits. Instead, you have to give Happy a huge supply of drugs.
• The game could have taken advantage of a random number generator for the three combination locks, or random words from a list of possibilities for the jumbles. This would have made the game more realistic than simply preventing a player who already knows the correct answer from being able to open the locks until they find the necessary clues.
• At about 2-hours for a new player, and 35 minutes for a speed runner, the game is a bit on the short side for its genre.

Ugly

• When using the D-pad or analog joystick for left and right movement, you stop moving if you angle your direction up or down. This is especially annoying because it will often halt your momentum at very inopportune times, even mid-jump! I can only assume the game wasn't play-tested very well with a gamepad to let such a control problem slip through the cracks.

Media

Box Art

The game wasn't released on physical media. The digital covers have several variations on a common theme.

• 

  The original Steam title card which contains a rather controversial tagline.

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  The Xbox One digital box doesn't have the tagline, but adds a creepy-looking Pinstripe in the background.

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  The PlayStation 4 uses the Xbox One image, but has a better title logo placement. This is my favorite.

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  The Australian Switch cover has Ted looking less haggard.

Videos

Longplay.

Links