The most scared I’ve ever been while watching a Disney cartoon was seeing Beauty and the Beast at the cinema when I was about five years old. I remember crying my eyes out during the ending sequence where Gaston “killed” the Beast (soz for spoilies). Now, in the context of where I am in life, that's still the benchmark, but Bye Sweet Carole tries its best at getting me there.
With a mid-20th-century Disney animation art style, this adventure game from Little Sewing Machine pulls on those nostalgia heartstrings, then ties them in knots and takes scissors to them. Ever since I watched the trailer for Bye Sweet Carole, I knew that I was going to try it out, even though I’m not a huge fan of horror video games. But did this grow my love for them, or kill it in the crib?
Lana (LANNAAAAAAAAA) Benton, a girl who lives at Bunny Hall Orphanage, is worried about her friend Carole. She “ran away” and has never been seen since. But, when she begins to find fragments of letters Carole had written, she starts to believe something more sinister happened. Searching the grounds, Lana rediscovers the fantasy world of Corolla, a somewhat imaginary land that transforms features of the real world into twisted and horrific monsters. The worst of them is the mysterious Mr. Kyn, who wants to dethrone “Princess” Lana as the ruler of Corolla and acts as the main antagonist.
The story takes place in the early 1900s, at the beginning of the Suffragette movement, and that throughline becomes more and more prevalent as the story progresses and we discover the real reasons for Carole’s disappearance as well as the creation of the kingdom of Corolla. Sometimes it feels like it’s shoehorned in rather than specifically baked into the narrative. Yeah, sure, there’s a bunch of female empowerment here where Lana becomes gradually more confident. However, for a game about the rise of girl power, there is no point in this game where Lana is allowed to fight. She can only run and hide. In fact, the little combat there is in Bye Sweet Carole is performed by an imaginary man called Mr. Baesie.
I applaud the message the game was going for, mixing a mystery with gender politics of the early 20th century, but the execution seemed a little out of sorts.
Bye Sweet Carole is primarily a 2D survival horror game. Think of the Resident Evil series with fewer enemies and one less dimension, and you’re round about there. There are puzzles, hulking stalkers in the same vein as Mr. X or Lady Dimitrescu, chase sequences, boss fights, and, for some reason, a rhythm game. Ok, that’s the outlier here with regards to Resi, but it fits into the narrative quite well, so I’m ok with it.
Starting with the positives, I really liked the puzzles in this game. They didn’t take a lot of thinking, but I enjoyed exploring the environments to find objects or passcodes to open up a new area or unlock the next sequential key. The sequences where you can switch between Lana and her friend Mr. Baesie were a highlight, with Baesie’s head being more malleable and sometimes flammable for interesting interactions in the level.
The chase sequences and some stealth sections were also good. They reminded me of Little Nightmares, where you just have to get away or hide until the overpowered enemy isn’t looking. Deaths can result in unique Game Over animations, which are super cool and creative, making use of that terrific art style.
Now the bad stuff.
Bye Sweet Carole has some of the most infuriating mechanics I’ve ever experienced. The stalkers are so dumb and I hate them. It would be different if you were fast enough to run away to get to a safe room, but nooooo. Lana is slow; her bunny form (she can turn into a bunny because, why not) is faster, but it doesn’t let you get far enough away to find a hiding spot and wait everything out. And, if by a miracle you do, the hold breath stealth controls only work some of the time. I audibly sighed when a new stalker was introduced. They sucked.
Similarly, the balancing mechanic is hit-or-miss. I swear, I almost lost it in one section where I thought I was stuck and unable to progress. Five straight times I fell off that ledge, and it was absolute bullsh*t. I had to be dead center on the balancing scale before it would allow me to pass to another section… straight into another freaking STALKER! Ah, well. At least there weren’t many of those.
I’m not gonna lie, it was the art style of this game that really drew me in. It looked so cool and different to what I’m used to in video games, and it definitely did not disappoint. The Disney-like animation from the '50s and '60s was totally awesome and brought something intangible to the game. For all the frustrations and low moments in Bye Sweet Carole, I really didn’t mind that much because of how pretty it was. Most of the game isn’t vibrant or colorful, but I was just in awe of what I was seeing.
The vocal performances were more mixed in terms of quality. I realise that this is an indie and budgets are what they are, but I couldn't help but be distracted by the tinnyness of Lana’s dialogue and inner thoughts. That can work pretty well sometimes, but unfortunately, it didn’t work for me. The quality of the actual performances was good, though. I can see why some people may think they were sub-par, but I felt that the delivery, floaty and odd as it may have sounded, fit in with the aesthetic Little Sewing Machine was looking for.
The music and sound design did its job pretty well, exploding in drama when a stalker sees Lana or just adding tension when something is lurking beyond the threshold to the next room. The noises that the game makes when you find an important object or solve a puzzle were good feedback to ensure I knew I was on the right track, and everything fit in so well with the game’s style. The consistency of direction is on point.
For the most part, Bye Sweet Carole ran beautifully for the eight-ish hours it took me to roll credits. There was one puzzle that had me scratching my head for a while because if you solved things out of order, you don’t get the correct dialogue. I had to undo the solution and redo it before Lana recognised that I had done what needed to be done. That hiding and balancing mechanics felt like they were unfair, bordering on buggy, but I believe that’s just how it was designed. However, I didn’t have any issues with frame drops, crashes, or general performance degradation whilst playing on my PS5.
Bye Sweet Carole is filled to the brim with personality and style. The art and animation are something I’ve never experienced in a video game before, and it’s beautifully done. The point-and-click puzzles are straightforward, yet satisfying to solve, and the story is intriguing. That doesn’t excuse the game’s misgivings, with a story that sometimes doesn’t fit in with its own themes and some stealth mechanics that almost had me throwing a controller at a wall in disgust.
But, I have to say, Bye Sweet Carole is a video game experience worth having. I’ve never played anything like it, and I doubt that I will again anytime soon. Just be prepared for a little internal rage every now and again.
Bye Sweet Carole is out now on PlayStation 4 and 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series S and X, Nintendo Switch and PC right now for around $25.
