Headliner: NoviNews

 Xbox One
Headliner: NoviNews Image
Metascore
67

Mixed or average reviews - based on 4 Critic Reviews What's this?

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  • Summary: Award-winning adventure where you control national news. A stack of news article sits on your desk. It’s time to make decisions. After work, emerge on the streets of Novistan, shaped by the very news you publish. Watch the city change day by day and influence the lives of the four main characters.

Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 0 out of 4
  2. Mixed: 4 out of 4
  3. Negative: 0 out of 4
  1. Generación Xbox
    Jan 20, 2020
    73
    Headliner: NoviNews will be a recommended option for anyone looking for an interesting and adult story that leads us to ask certain questions about our daily lives as consumers of information. Although extremely short in duration, the title of Unbound Creations has a hook and will satisfy anyone who wants to give it a try.
  2. TheXboxHub
    Dec 11, 2019
    70
    There is a very interesting and intriguing premise to Headliner: NoviNews; one that is a comment of the power the media have over world events. It’s also well implemented in how the media make editorial decisions that can help or hinder governments in power.
  3. Xbox Tavern
    Dec 13, 2019
    63
    For those who persist with it, Headliner: NoviNews will likely draw you in and surprise you by how the characters react to every choice you make and the multiple ways their fates can be altered come the endgame. The brevity may put some off and the day-to-day repetition will get old fast, but the control you possess is very engrossing and will be the main reason for you to play through the game multiple times. You may not be plugging at it for long, but Headliner is worth a shot because it makes players feel like their actions matter. What with many mainstream games going through the motions of diminishing returns and marginalising your status, a modest indie title like Headliner will likely remind you that players should be placed at the epicentre of control – so thus, we doth our caps to Headliner as it aptly headlines the crucial component of empowerment in video games, even it comes with a side of a few irksome kinks.
  4. XBLA Fans
    Jan 8, 2020
    60
    The idea is really good. I just love being able to put myself in a job that I normally don’t do. I think that’s why the simulation games are so popular. I wanted more out of it. I didn’t mind it being short, but sometimes it felt there was less control than you should have.

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  2. Mixed: 2 out of 2
  3. Negative: 0 out of 2
  1. SenorKoquonfaes
    Oct 29, 2020
    7
    The adage: “The pen is mightier than the sword.” and how it ties into the current media landscape has never been more poignant than it is now;The adage: “The pen is mightier than the sword.” and how it ties into the current media landscape has never been more poignant than it is now; we’ve never had mass media like this compared to any other point in history.

    Headliner decides to tackle this premise more directly. You play as the titular Headliner for NoviNews, the primary major news outlet in the fictional nation of Novistan: a dystopian world where most, if not all, of it’s citizens have been genetically modified before birth, government surveillance is on every street corner and a mysterious plague is sweeping through the nation. Your job is to fill news slots for that night’s broadcast on topics ranging from healthcare to government to law enforcemente etc. Choosing what stories you run has a major influence on the events that happen in Novistan; the citizens take what you publish as gospel. Do you stay objective even if the truth is uncomfortable? Do you keep a consistent message throughout even in the face of contradicting evidence? It’s up to you!

    The core gameplay loop revolves around getting briefed in each day by your boss before being seated at your desk with a number of articles in front of you to either publish with a green “checkmark” or reject it with a red “X”. What makes the game kind of thought-provoking and even mildly challenging in my initial playthrough is that I wasn’t really sure which stories were true or not as you’re never given much context for Novistan’s backstory, so I was kind of just trusting my instincts when publishing or rejecting articles. On top of that, there are days where you have a certain quota that you have to hit (publish 1-2 articles, publish a maximum of 3 articles etc.) as well as being presented two articles that are stapled together; you can only approve one of them, the other is automatically rejected. The gameplay reminds me of a very rudimentary take on Lucas Pope’s “Papers Please”. While “Papers Please” had a number of different elements that factored into an acceptation or rejection state, Headliner: NoviNews is very binary in it’s decision making. You still get a sense of there being multiple branching paths and factors that impact your decisions for every playthrough, however, the game forces you to publish a number of articles that land on opposite sides of rather polarizing topics with virtually no room to nuance things.

    Each day after you finish your shift, you make the short walk home to your apartment where you get to the see the results of your decisions play out around you. These segments of the game present strong, visual results that do a wonderful job of illustrating that every choice you make matters. Along with being able to see your decisions play out in the broader world, you also have a few NPCs that you can interact with over the course of the game: Evie, your co-worker and potential love interest who immigrated to Novistan. Justin, your aspiring comedian brother who is battling mental health issues and Rudy, the friendly owner of a family-owned local business. These NPCs offer up a more humanized and in-depth look at the consequences of the articles you publish throughout the game. I felt that all of the characters came across as likeable and even relatable in some instances and you’d be forgiven if you wanted to do right by them. Conversely, you can also royally **** them over and the game isn’t afraid to go to some dark, unpleasant places as a result. Factor in that you also need to keep your boss happy, secure your own income and avoid NoviNews losing corporate funding and you get a tough balancing act that illustrates that decisions are never made in a vacuum.

    After completing the game, the end screen states that it’s meant to be played multiple times and given that different choices can lead to a number of different outcomes, that’s understandable. What I found to be a bit unexpected was that during my second and third playthroughs, there’s an interesting Groundhog Day-style meta narrative emerging. I breaks when you hit your fourth playthrough, but it still offered up some incentive to replay the game just to see where this narrative would go.

    My biggest criticism with Headliner would be the heavy-handed and lacking-in-nuance way it presents it’s story and your decisions that influence it. The story takes place over the course of just 2 weeks, so it has to severely escalate things in order to reach certain plot milestones.

    The game’s graphics are a bit of mixed bag. The 3D characters are these low-poly models that look ugly, it’s very clear they only made like a half dozen or so character models and just copied and pasted them throughout the world. The characters that appear in dialogue screens all have an anime art direction to them; it’s not bad by any means, it’s just not for me. However the art direction for the city background and overall night time atmosphere is well done.    … Expand
  2. Xbox_Alive
    Jan 25, 2020
    6
    Headliner: NoviNews is a News Channel Simulator. You are the Headliner, it's your job to chose what goes on your channel or not. Every choiceHeadliner: NoviNews is a News Channel Simulator. You are the Headliner, it's your job to chose what goes on your channel or not. Every choice you make affects the game in many different ways, from the way your co-workers, family, or neighbors react to you, to your paycheck, and the channel's overall wellbeing. The game features multiple endings, and multiple headlines for different stories, making for good replay value. The game is loaded with characters, all with their own opinions, and attitude towards you. You also have your apartment, you live alone and can purchase different things to place in your home, some with minor intractability, giving a bit of depth to the main character. The act of choosing the headlines is neat, and being able to move and stack the papers, and even stamp them with approval or disapproval made the act of choosing the headlines that much more fun and immersive. This game is rich with decisions, creating another positive for replaying the game over. The game avoids political bias, giving you both sides of most stories to chose from. It also isn't trying to sell and a certain point of view, so if that was a concern, then stop worrying. Headliner: NoviNews is a strangely fun game, and kept me pressing forward to read more headlines, and see how they impact the game.… Expand