Consume Me Review

You Are(n’t) What You Eat

I’m really eating good during the latter half of this year. There are so many games that I’m interested in coming out during this half of the year and that includes a lot of games that I actually played the demo of and loved. I’ve played a lot of demos and I’d say Consume Me was one of the demos that I’ve been looking forward to the full release the most. When I saw that it got a release date, I was so excited and counted the days down. Now that it’s out, how was Consume Me’s full release and did it live up to my expectations after playing the demo?

Oh, and I just want to say that since the main character and one of the developers share the same name, assume that I’m talking about Jenny the game character unless I state otherwise.

Consume Me has us jump into Jenny’s shoes right when summer vacation starts for her in 2011. All she has planned is to relax all summer before her senior year of high school starts, however her mom thinks differently. As Jenny goes down to eat some lunch, her mom comes in jumpstarting Jenny’s insecurities about her weight and looks. Telling her she eats too much, she’s getting fat, has no self control, and compares her to one of her friend’s daughters. While we’re not sure whether her mom has done this in the past, it seems to really get to Jenny this time. Jenny decides to weigh herself and, after seeing that the scale agrees with her mom, decides to go on a diet. Jenny can’t even relax and laze around like she planned as her mom stops that too, with even more comments that puts Jenny down. Though, I guess this did allow Jenny to meet and start crushing on Oliver, a boy who lives in the same apartment complex as her and graduated high school.

Jenny weighs herself again after a couple days of her diet and it seems to be working. Not to mention that Jenny is starting to get the hang of it. Combined with learning about a party that’s happening soon, Jenny decides to stick to her diet as she tackles other various goals and obstacles during her summer vacation, senior year of high school, and college life. We don’t see everything, but only carefully picked snippets that show us how Jenny is during that time period. Well, good luck.

I really loved the story here and I’m glad this game was made. I really enjoyed following Jenny throughout the various points in her life and I loved not only the writing style here, but the way the story was told. Even though you’ll be skipping to the notable parts of Jenny’s life, I never felt that I was missing anything. Not to mention that all the scenes were really fun to read through and see. The story here also is really relatable and funny. Thanks to Consume Me having a mainly lighthearted tone, with the subject matter it depicts being subtle, it really helped this game have a lot of jokes, references, and humor without it affecting the tone of the game. There were so many moments where I laughed or smiled, happy to see Jenny happy. And talking about the tone, it’s perfectly done here. Sure, it’s mostly lighthearted, but there’s that gnawing in the back of your mind (as well as the little things you’ll notice within the game) with how concerning all this is and there are moments that bring that stress down hard or break your heart. Consume Me does a wonderful job of connecting you to Jenny and having you feel the same feelings that she is. There are so many moments I don’t want to spoil, so I’ll just leave it at that.

Oh, and I also really love how Jenny’s love life is depicted. I won’t spoil it, but I love how on the surface level it seems so picturesque, but there are those little moments where you see that it’s not so perfect. On both sides. Making it feel even more real.

I also really liked how subtle Consume Me is with its depictions of disordered eating and dieting. I’m sure there will be those that wished it was more obvious, but I really appreciate the way Consume Me approaches this subject matter. I felt that it made it more relatable and nuanced. Even if you might not have gone through or have the same things that Jenny did, there is a lot to relate here. I’m sure a lot of us had people in our lives say little comments that they thought weren’t a big deal, but actually dug into your self esteem. Or had points in their life where there’s so much to do, but so little time, so some things (even things that you’ve had no problem making time for before) kind of just fall to the wayside a bit. I did also feel the way disordered eating and dieting here was more relatable as well. You might not think about your weight or how you look until someone close to you comments on it. And then you become your biggest critic. And while someone might go to the severe end of disordered eating, that doesn’t mean it’s still not concerning. Not a lot of people see it as such, nor does the media depict it as concerning. Not to mention that it is really easy to go from dieting and counting calories healthily to the unhealthy territory where it’s all you think about like it’s depicted here. This is a little off topic, but a webcomic I’m reading has the main character show some concerning thoughts that I feel are in line with Jenny’s, but all the comments I saw didn’t notice it and even praised her for not making a big deal of it. I guess part of it was because I felt I kind of dipped my toe into that line of thinking too. Anyway, I guess what I’m trying to say is that I really appreciate that Consume Me went the subtle route and showed that it also isn’t healthy.

Consume Me ending is really good too. It does feel like there’s a little something missing, but I really loved how it ended and it did make me emotional. I was a bit worried when it first started, but I really liked where it ended up heading and showing that while life often doesn’t go in the way that you planned, that doesn’t mean it’s a bad ending. It’s even better that this does get teased a bit earlier. It does seem that Jenny is happy now and doing a lot better and that’s all that matters.

Now onto the gameplay. You wouldn’t suspect it, but there is a lot here. I talk about how the cutscenes take on an interactive approach later in my review as I’m gushing about the visuals, so I’ll skip that and straight to the meat of the game. Every chapter has you control Jenny for one week where you’ll be challenged to completing the various goals that she set up for herself. You’ll take it one day at a time until the end of the week where the game checks to make sure you did all that’s required of you to progress. This might not sound a lot right now, but trust me it is.

The majority of the game has, I’d say, a third of the screen taken up by what I’d call your hand dandy planner. No need to constantly have to bring it up as it’s designed to always be visible (and now that I think about it…might also represent Jenny’s change of thinking). There, you’ll be able to see the daily schedule, the To Do List, the monthly calendar, Jenny’s bag (where you’ll be able to see all the items Jenny has, a bit more detailed look at her stats, and her skills), and the usual pause menu. This is not only handy as you’re going through the game, but also handy for me as this gives me a nice outline on what order I should talk about the gameplay aspects.

First up, Jenny’s daily schedule! This basically tells you what you should expect for that day and usually this doesn’t change once you’re in the chapter proper. The day starts with Jenny waking up, which that scene will auto-play after you do it the first time, and getting dressed. Getting dressed is pretty important here as it can really help you out. Not only are the various outfits that Jenny can wear really cute, but they give bonuses depending on the outfit. Low on Energy and possibly planning on having Jenny exercise? There’s an outfit that will increase Energy and has a perk for whenever Jenny exercises. Have low Mood and you need to do some studying? There’s outfits for that! Though, there are a few outfits that have a negative impact or neutral impact on Jenny. After that, you’ll be eating lunch and this is where one of the minigames comes in. There are actually two versions of the eating minigame, one before she learns about dieting and one after. They both share the same base of you filling up Jenny’s plate, but after learning about dieting one lets you be more precise with placing food on her plate. Here, Jenny’s plate takes the form of a grid made up of hunger spots and empty spots; with the food taking up the shape of tetris blocks. Your goal here is to fill up all of the hunger spots with food while also keeping your Bites, this game’s version of calories, below your daily Bites goal. Every food has its own unique block shape and amount of Bites. The order the food blocks will come in and the placement of the hunger spots are randomized; but there are some things that help you out here. You can cover up empty spots if needed, you can get food blocks outside of this minigame and save them to use them here if you find that you need (or want) a specific block, and Jenny’s dog will also occasionally pop in so you can get rid of a food block by feeding it to the dog. If all hunger spots are covered and you’re under your daily Bites, that’s considered a perfect meal. However, uncovered hunger spots represent Jenny still being hungry and thus affecting her Guts stat; while going over your Bites will require you to exercise and burn them off unless you’re fine with using up a cheat day (which you only have a limited number of).

There will be at least one random event that will happen. It depends on what it is, but it’ll also either have a positive or negative impact on Jenny. Like, Jenny can find money on the ground, be tempted by free samples, or her train will end up shutting down forcing her to walk home. Each random event affects Jenny in some way that fits what happened. It might mean that you gain something, have a stat increase or decrease, or even gain a status effect. This can really help you out or drop a sudden hurdle on your plans. Depending on where you’re at in the story, there also may be a story event that’s happening as well; whether it’s at the very end of the chapter or during the chapter.

Then, finally, Jenny has some free time! This is where a lot of the time and stat management comes in. During free time, Jenny has limited time to do things that she wants or needs to. You get two time slots with activities ranging from taking up 0-3 time slots to do. It just depends on the activity you do and there are a few ways to lower how much time activities take. Anyway, during free time you’ll be in a cute 3D diorama of Jenny’s room where you’ll be able to spin it around. Aside from the spot that Jenny starts on, every spot that she stops at is a spot that houses the activities that correspond there. Most activities also have their own minigame that you’ll be doing, which determines how well you did and how it affects your stats. You can see how it’ll affect Jenny before you commit to it as well, which is great. You can go to the corner store to buy consumable items like snacks and you can choose when to eat the snacks (well, unless you get the munchies). You can also go to the bookstore and buy books that will most likely take more than one reading session and some of one of your stats, but will give you experience for the skill(s) that the book is about (with some even being for pleasure, increasing your stats). Talking about reading, that’s a minigame here. Jenny’s head spins continuously here, with the book hovering and moving around Jenny’s head. Your goal is to keep Jenny’s eyes, which her eyesight is represented by light beams, on the book by clicking to change the direction Jenny’s head is rotating in. However, you have to be careful of the various thoughts that come floating in as it’ll distract Jenny for a few seconds if she sees them. Each book has a certain page length and even if you don’t finish it in one go, you’ll pick up where you left off the next time you read it. You can exercise to burn some Bites, which has a minigame that is a bit funny. The minigame will ask you to match poses, represented by boards showing where Jenny’s head and hands should be, and all you need to do is grab Jenny’s head and drag her there. Granted, though, her arms are some wild cards which can do what you want or cause you some problems (though relaxing Jenny can help reset them). The exercise minigame doesn’t say how many poses you need to match to get a good score, but the score you get determines how many Bites you burn so try to match as many poses as you can! If you have makeup, you can also do Jenny’s makeup. Jenny will be in front of the mirror and you’ll have the various makeup tools set out in front of you. You can use these makeup tools in any order and all you have to do is grab it, move and hover over the part of Jenny’s face that it’s for, drop it, then move on to the next tool. If you do a good job you’ll be able to select a today only bonus that can really help you out and, if you do a perfect job, you’ll have one more bonus to choose from. Like decreasing how much time your next chore will take. However, there are *shivers* cockroaches that will skitter around and cause you to drop your tool and freeze for a few seconds if you overlap with them. It can be a bit weird controlling Jenny here, but it’s the same as the cleaning minigame where it’s not with your cursor and vibrates in a circle. Once you get the hang of it, this minigame is pretty easy to do.

You also have various chores that you can do to earn money. You can walk the dog, which has you alternating between Jenny and the dog circling each other with a click. You just have to time it right so you’ll be “walking” along the sidewalk. There is also money that you can have Jenny pick up, banana peels to slip on to go faster for a limited time, things your dog can pee on to get bonus experience, and poop that you have to dodge or else you get penalized for a few seconds. Jenny will also be able to clean the bathroom, where you move your cursor to clean all of the dirty spots. It can be a bit weird in the beginning, with it being off center from where you clicked to hold onto the tool and it vibrates in a circle to simulate scrubbing, but it’s easy to get used to. Just like any parent or guardian that is hard on cleaning, Jenny’s mom only pays out when you clean the vast majority of it and very rarely says you did a perfect job. She said it to me once *cries*. You will have to wash your own clothes though, but luckily it skips the wash and just has you folding them by clicking when you overlap with the outline. This does put you in a tough spot as you don’t exactly want to wear your dirty PJs, but you might have other things you want to do.

And finally, you can laze around to advance time. If you’re intending on adding more time so you can do more things, I do suggest doing it before you do an activity that will make your available free time to go to 0 as the game will progress to the next day automatically.

Oh, and did I mention that most of these minigames are on a timer? So yeah, don’t expect to be on easy street. The game does give you a bunch of tips, which one is randomly selected and displayed before you click to start the minigame, and has cute tutorial drawings to go along with the explanation if you need it again.

As you progress, more activities will unlock. Most of them are different variations of an activity, but more in a sense of what stat it affects, how much it affects stats, the time it takes, and maybe how long the mini game is and the threshold of it being a good session. Which I didn’t mind. There are some completely new activities that get added in though, with some having a minigame or a scene tied to it. There are some other minigames that come in, but I won’t go into those as they are only situational and these minigames are the ones you’ll be doing the most.

Well, I mentioned stats a little bit before now, but just now getting into it haha. Jenny has three stats: Mood, Energy, and Guts. What Mood and Energy are self explanatory, but Guts seem to be a combination of how gutsy Jenny is feeling and how full she is (like if she’s feeling hungry or not). Mostly everything that Jenny does will affect these stats either positively by increasing it or negatively by decreasing it. You have to do a balancing act between doing the things you need or want to do, while also keeping these stats up and healthy. You don’t want to go to bed with your stats low too many times or, even worse, completely empty. Nor do you want to end up with a stat too low to do something you need to do.

Jenny also has four skills that she can level up: Diet, Athletic, Academic, and Chore. Most of the activities you can do correlates with one or two of these skills and gives some experience depending on the activity. Once you level up a skill, the corresponding stat will also slightly increase and you’ll be able to choose between three rewards. Those rewards either being a new variation of an activity, a new activity, or a helpful permanent item like a new outfit. These rewards are pretty good though and it can be pretty hard to choose which one you should take.

Of course, everything you’ll be doing is going to be towards completing at least the required tasks that’s on Jenny’s To Do list. There are required tasks and extra tasks. Required tasks, as you can guess, are tasks you need to complete so you can progress to the next chapter. Each chapter has a goal or event that Jenny wants to accomplish or do and these tasks are what’s going to let her do them. Every chapter has you abiding to Jenny’s diet, but other than that it just depends on what Jenny wants to accomplish that week. Like you might need to save up money or do an activity like reading (and completing) a book. There are required tasks that are more specific, but I don’t want to spoil anything that happens past Chapter 1. I will say that it may seem like a lot, but trust me you can do it. Just plan it out and take it one day at a time.

Then there are extra tasks which you don’t necessarily have to do, but it’ll be nice if you did. Granted, most chapters do require you to do some extra tasks, but you do have a good list to choose from, there are more than you need to do so you can pick and choose, and I’d say most of them are doable. These just ask you to do various other activities like doing an activity so many times or raising a stat or going to bed with a stat above a certain level. The only extra tasks that I didn’t complete were the ones that ask you to burn a certain amount of Bites and the one that challenges you to do 24 actions in one day (though mainly since I was already so busy with other things). Once you complete an extra task, you’ll be given a consumable item as a reward. I’m not sure these are random or not, I kind of feel like they are, but they can be pretty helpful. Especially if you got makeup as a reward. Sadly, coffee is not a reward you can get here.

The day ends with Jenny going to bed and then waking up to do everything over again. Making progress towards the required tasks, making time for extra tasks, and then seeing if you successfully did everything required to progress to the next chapter. Which continues the gameplay loop, but with some added elements to it that also progressively makes the game harder. After all, Jenny’s goals and situation changes as time passes. It’s simple, but it’s a lot to juggle. It can be a bit overwhelming, but don’t worry, you can do it! It certainly helps that a lot of things carry over to the next chapter, as well as your stats filling back up.

There are multiple endings, with the game boasting about 13 possible endings, but don’t worry this doesn’t mean there are 13 different endings that lead to the credits. Consume Me only has one ending, but has a handful of game overs, or early ends. You can get an early ending if you go to bed with one of Jenny’s stats at 0 or fail to complete any of the required tasks. The early ending you get is unique to what caused it. Don’t worry if you end up getting a game over, as the game treats it as Jenny having a nightmare and you can restart that day or restart the whole chapter with or without leveling up one of your skills. I only saw a few of the early endings, as I was pretty curious about them, and they’re brief but pretty good.

In addition, there will also most likely be scenes that you won’t see in your playthrough. Whether it’s because you couldn’t afford it when the time came, it just wasn’t picked when the game was randomly selecting it from a pool of possible scenes, or you just didn’t pick that option; you’ll most likely won’t see everything. Like, there’s two scenes I didn’t see during Chapter 2 and I didn’t see the scene where Jenny soaks in a bathtub because I didn’t unlock that activity.

I really enjoyed the gameplay here as well. The game is really fun to play and has a really good, addicting gameplay loop. I did worry a little bit that the game would feel a bit repetitive or old towards the end, but it honestly didn’t. There is so much to like here. I liked all of the various minigames here as they were all fun to do, pretty easy to get the hang of, and balances being easy enough to where you’ll get things done but hard enough that they’re engaging. I did also like the various random events that could happen and how they call for you to improvise if it happens to be something that negatively affects Jenny. I also liked how there were some random events that become more likely if you do something too many times and how these random events change as you progress chapters.

Consume Me particularly does a really good job in gamifying real life things. I found the minigames simulate how the actions are in life really well. Like even though we don’t literally read the way the minigame is like, it does simulate how much attention you put into the task and how easy thoughts can come in and distract you. It especially depicts how you go from not needing to do a lot to having so many things to do and so little time and how stressful it can be really well. Which also plays into how well the game connects you to Jenny as you feel the same stress Jenny is feeling. Not to mention how hard it gets to stick to your diet as more things are piled onto your plate and the situation changing (like going from eating at home to having to eat school lunches).

The stat and time management are difficult here, and gets more difficult as you progress to the next chapter, but it’s honestly really rewarding. You start out thinking there’s so much to do and there’s no way that you’ll be able to do even your required tasks, but then you end up nailing it so much that you also end up doing most or all of the extra tasks. It’s so rewarding checking something off of your To Do list, seeing them be checked as completed at the end of the chapters, and confirming that you did what seemed impossible. Even when the game gives you something helpful to make the more stressful chapters not as bad, it doesn’t take away from that satisfaction as it acts more as an anti-frusturation tool. It doesn’t make the game easier, but does give you a helping hand.

Heck, I’ve been thinking about getting the achievements that I missed. I’m someone that aims to not go for a 100% unless I really love a game and I think it’s doable, so that’s some high praise right there. I’ll probably end up doing it after Next Fest passes.

I don’t really have any negatives for Consume Me other than it has *shivers* roaches and spiders in the context that they’re in. I’m not a squeamish person usually, but just…the context that these guys are in just gets to me a lot. Luckily, the developers have said that adding in a no bugs mode is on their list of features to add in the future.

Consume Me’s sound and visuals are perfect here. I loved the music and the various sound effects that were in this game. The music gives each scene or location a vibe that goes perfectly with what’s happening. Like Jenny’s room has music that just gives off a chill, laidback vibe; there are tracks that are energetic and lively to not only have Jenny wake up to and stay awake throughout the day, but also give the minigames a semi-hectic feel to them; and you can feel the distress that Jenny is feeling when you hear the song that plays during those scenes where she’s stressing out or at a low point. The sound effects were also perfect. It balances being one of the game’s distinct features and not being too annoying that you’re like “man I need to turn this down”. One aspect that could have gotten really annoying was the fact that all dialogue has a typewriter-esque sound effect, but it isn’t at all annoying. In fact, I did really like how everyone had a different sound effect for their dialogue, simulating everyone’s voices. I also really love how sound effects are used to emphasize the more cutscene-like scenes. It’s hard to explain unless you see it, but while there isn’t that much animation here, the sound effects really help bridge that gap and give it a unique oomph to it. So yeah, all in all, music and sound effects were perfect here.

I think the only sound effects that will probably annoy you are when the morning routine gets sped up after you do it the first time, but that’s mainly because they all happen in quick succession and are pretty loud (though the fact that I was wearing earbuds probably made it worse).

One of my favorite outfits ♥

The visuals, though, were my absolute favorite and were what originally drew me in when I first learned about this game. I absolutely love the way Consume Me looks. I love the art style that was used here. I don’t really know how to really explain it other than it gives off the feeling that everything was drawn with markers and, combined with using no outlines, kinda gives the game a youthful feel to it with a touch of nostalgia. It also works really well no matter how detailed or simplified something is. This game does vary in how simplified or detailed things are and no matter what it still felt like it was within the same universe. Like the backgrounds are the most detailed aspects of the game and it fits well with the simplified style that Jenny is in. Everything is also so colorful, which I loved, but the game still experimented with lighting which made for some striking moments. There are some 3D models here too that do match with the art style well.

There are so many things that I loved about Consume Me’s visuals and I honestly looked forward to every new thing that would come my way. All the outfits were so cute and I love all the unique poses that Jenny does for each, I loved the different Jenny artwork for when you’re still in her room picking what activity you want to do, I liked all of the various backgrounds and items, and all of the various scenes here were so good. I love how the morning routine changes for (almost) every chapter and I love the way the cutscenes are here. The cutscenes here take an interactive approach as you’ll mostly be “dragging” various different elements around. It’s mainly Jenny, there are the occasional moments where it’s not or not just her, which also does help you feel what Jenny is feeling. I didn’t catch this when I played the demo, but it also tracks with the rest of the game since you do also control Jenny during the activity minigames. Other times, you’ll be clicking to advance scenes so you can go through them at your own pace. There are also various different things I also really love the way the game did them, but I think I yapped on far enough. There’s just so much I could praise, I can go on forever.

So, yeah, the visuals were absolutely perfect here. I had so many screenshots when I only played the demo and I have so many more screenshots now that I played the full game haha. You best believe that if this game ever gets an art book DLC I’ll be buying it. And if by some miracle it gets a physical art book? Instant purchase. Merch? Hell yeah give me some merch.

Verdict

I knew I would love Consume Me after I played the demo and man, I was not wrong. I absolutely loved Consume Me. This game absolutely knocks everything out of the park. The music and sound effects are perfect, the art style is so cute and the visual design of everything is absolutely perfect, the story is fun, engaging, and relatable, and the gameplay ended up being so fun and addicting despite how hard this game can be. I’m so glad that Jenny (the real person) decided to make this semi-autobiographical game as it turned out to be a beautiful game that I really enjoyed playing, experiencing the story, and how disordered eating was subtly handled.

If you’re able to handle the subject matter, I highly recommend picking up Consume Me. It may be a difficult journey, but it’s one that is rewarding and worth it.