Melatonin. an indie game from the creators at Half Asleep about rhythm, is a surprise, but a good one. It’s been addicting to play and try to get the best score I can, which has been a little tough because I’m not the best at rhythm, but I still have fun.

A game that’s all about patterns and timing, it’s alluring and honestly, makes you doze off a little because of the rhythmic and hypnotic beat from it. Across five nights, you travel across four different dreams, for a total of 20 dreams, that all have a unique song and beat to it, where you have to try and time it perfectly so it syncs and delivers instant satisfaction. 

This game is an instant favorite for me because of the simplicity of the game and just the design of it. Melatonin takes either the arrow keys or “wasd” and the space bar, that’s it. Somehow, Half Asleep was able to make an absolute pleasure of a game that only takes five keys to play. Another reason as to why this game is so enjoyable is the art design being detailed yet simple as it’s all hand drawn, and how it seems to fill up the whole screen but still not be distracting to notice.

Half Asleep really came through with the uniqueness in this game, they wanted to explore the relationship between the dreams we experience and the reality that we go through, and it’s pretty spot on. I love how every level is so different from the next, in pretty much every aspect. A level can be about going through social media and seeing if the likes and reactions are what you hope for them to be with a beat that picks up quickly, which I sort of see as social anxiety when you don’t get the reaction you hope for. Then there will be a level about going to the gym with a slower paced beat to show patience and really getting into that workout. 

It’s a fun game that was made by a lesser known group of developers, but they put as much effort and passion into it as a respected game development company does into some of their games. I thoroughly enjoyed this game, however it was a bit short overall. However that shouldn’t stop you from giving it a look, especially if you enjoy music, patterns, and rhythm.