Tokyo-based game creator Ichijou Takaaki has announced his upcoming mystery adventure Back In 1995.
In the announcement, Takaaki talks about how most retro-style games made these days are still made to look like pixel art games on the NES and SNES. He, however, grew up playing the original PlayStation and the Sega Saturn, so he wants to honor those systems with his game.
This is why Back In 1995 is rendered with a low-poly style that’s deliberately rough around the edges. He’s trying to recapture the excitement of those early 3D spaces that he explored, which didn’t reveal much of their world, and that left a lot of the work to the player’s imagination.
Takaaki says that he’s aiming for Back In 1995 to be an eerie mystery adventure that may touch upon some horror vibes too, but that’s now his primary concern. This can be seen in the test video above, which sees the main character reading a letter that says only “Come find me at the tower…” – who wrote this and why is all left as a mystery.