A Fold Apart Review – These Stars Will Guide Us Home

Long-distance relationships are extremely difficult. Months—sometimes years—may pass before you have the chance to be with your partner, and what time you do get to spend together you pray isn’t interrupted. You text, call, or video chat as much as possible but that’s not enough to silence the nagging doubt and depression. A Fold Apart tackles the hardships brought on by long-term separation, using puzzles as the therapeutic medium.

A Fold Apart Review – Lonely Hearts Club

A Fold Apart shares with us the trials and tribulations of a couple living through a very rough patch in their relationship. One partner has taken a contract position far from home in order to advance their career. It’s supposed to be a fixed contract, but even then, the distance and limited occasion to fly home for holiday breaks has put a strain on both of them.

Their story is shared with us via text conversations and inner monologues as each partner deals with the loneliness, doubt, and bouts of depression that are often part of long-distance relationships. I would know; I spent almost two years apart from my now-husband since we lived in different countries. And because of just how close to home this story hit, I found that I couldn’t play more than two chapters in a row without needing a break. I fully admit that Chapters 1 and 2 made me cry and I had to rinse off my contacts to clear away that lingering cloudy tear-fog.

A Fold Apart Review – Mountains and Valleys

Every relationship has its highs and lows, roadblocks and warning signs that perhaps we need to sit down and better communicate with our partner. A Fold Apart presents us with a problem on a single sheet of paper which we must manipulate in order to proceed. At first the puzzles are simple. You can flip the page over and fold from the left and right sides of the page. Later on, top and bottom folds are introduced, then corner folds, and finally the ability to rotate the page.

Making the correct creases will form pathways for you to reach the stars, those bright shining moments you hold dear. Don’t worry if you make a mistake. You can always unfold or even reset the puzzle without having to restart from the beginning of a chapter. This came in very handy for me on one occasion. I overlapped a walkway and barely clipped the edge of a star. I was able to move the character to the star and it registered that I obtained it, but the next page did not fall into place so I had to reset and try to solve the puzzle another way.

Thankfully, A Fold Apart checkpoint saves quite frequently. I ran into a second glitch when transitioning into an elevator. No matter what I tried I couldn’t enter the elevator, so I was forced to reload my game. I was thrilled to discover the game had saved right when I had entered the scene and was able to get on the elevator this time.

There’s one thing I am really torn up about with this game. On one hand, I want more puzzles. They were challenging but not so tough that I ever found myself frustrated or searching the internet for answers. That said, I don’t think that I would have enjoyed dragging out the story. It was already such an emotional rollercoaster, and stretching it out further would dishonor the struggle of these two characters. A Fold Apart is a near-perfect indie game and one every person with a beating heart should experience.

A Fold Apart review code provided by publisher. Version 1.03 reviewed on a launch PlayStation 4 console. For more information on scoring please see our Review Policy.