Old release: Dreams Chapter One

Hey folks! I’m going to tell you about a little game called Dreams Chapter One. This isn’t a new release; in fact, it’s pretty damn old. And I don’t have a “new to me” excuse to offer here, since I’ve known about this game since the day it released, way back in 2006. But you know what? This title is pretty neat and not that well-known, so I’m going to tell you about it anyway.

Dreams features a surreal art style with some noticeable influence from Salvador Dali. It’s rare to see an RPG with a setting so deliberately odd, so it stands out. The combat system is really interesting as well. In battle, you switch between two characters with drastically different ways of fighting: one shoots in first-person with a rifle, while the second runs across the battlefield in side view, smashing enemies with a hammer. Every turn is timed, so you have to parcel out those precious seconds wisely.

It’s a little hard to describe, so I took the liberty of recording a video of Dreams gameplay (so far as I know, this is the only video of the game currently in existence). I don’t claim to be particularly great at playing Dreams, but this should give you the idea:

Dreams has that optimistic “Chapter One” appellation, which might lead you to believe that there is a Chapter Two. There isn’t–or at least, there isn’t one yet. The developer, Leo Dasso, has been working (sporadically) on a follow-up for years, but he appears to have taken a shootery, side-scrolling detour with the successful funding of his Kickstarter project College-Ruled Universe. Here’s hoping he revisits the Dreams universe afterwards. In the meantime, you can play Dreams Chapter One for free right here.