I feel weird reviewing Camille and Laura because I primarily review video games. And while Camille and Laura is a game on Steam and has Point & Click elements, it’s really more of an experience. And I mean that in the best way possible. I like interactive fiction; I often review games that have little interaction involved. Camille and Laura is a wholly unique experience, with a bespoke art style and narrative that shows even the humdrum can be terrifying.
Camille and Laura
Developer: Bonjour Borzoi
Price: $10
Platforms: PC (reviewed)
MonsterVine was provided with a Steam code for review.
Camille and Laura is a hand-drawn point and click adventure game about a mother and daughter. Camille, the daughter, is beginning her first week at school. At five years old, it’s an important milestone to strike out on your own and attend elementary school. Camille and Laura live in Quebec and, like graffiti on the side of a truck in an 80s comedy about Canada, the game jumps between French and English regularly.
Though I selected English as the primary language, both languages are present in the game. I imagine this is a choice made to reflect what life is like in Quebec, balancing the two languages. Camille is in a primarily French-speaking school, and Laura works for a company that receives emails in both French and English. The choice to balance between the two languages was welcome and enhanced the experience rather than detracted from it.
Laura is a single mother, working a monotonous job that requires her to reply to important emails, trash unimportant emails, and avoid the tricky reply-all button. Every day, the player must go through e-mails and sort them appropriately, or receive a call from their boss. You’ll only spend a minute or two a day responding to e-mails, so it’s not particularly offensive. And the e-mails will pile up if you ignore them and spend too much time watching videos on your PC.
Hilariously, the dreaded reply-all button will result in receiving a LOT of e-mails, making the day even more stressful. The juxtaposition between the mundanity of sitting at a desk and replying to emails all day, only to have that number inflated and causing a panic response, gave a little juice to the gamification of doing something so simple. It also prevents you from reading the e-mails, another little treat that Camille and Laura let you gloss over.
What makes the e-mails funny isn’t that they’re necessarily funny e-mails; they’re actually a little true to life.
“Do you think they will have vegan options at the pizza party next week? Last time they didn’t have anything and did not warn anyone, so I ended up starving.”
Add on that this is an important e-mail that Laura must respond to, and it adds a little color to an otherwise drab and dreary day in Laura’s life.
Of course, it’s not the same every day. One day, Laura must go shopping to stock food at home. Another day, Camille needs more school supplies, and if you skimp, you’ll hear about it. It’s all skin-deep though; the story itself is simply about a single week in this woman’s life.
I chose to tell Camille a bedtime story every night. These are small choices you can make throughout the game to color your experience. Buying food and keeping it in the home allows you to get creative with what you serve Camille for breakfast and dinner.
Laura does not make enough money, and the stress in her life is apparent. Camille is a good kid, but even good kids have bad days.
What I especially like about Camille and Laura is the slice of life style the story has appropriated. What we’re experiencing is an unfiltered week of a single mother and her child as they struggle to survive. Things happen, but the narrative persists beyond the small window we’re given to experience Camille and Laura’s lives.
I loved Camille and Laura, but I dig these types of experimental stories with minimalist styles pulled from other media. I also really love human stories, and this is most assuredly a human story. My first playthrough was just over an hour and a half, and I plan on going back very soon.
The Final Word
Those looking for experimental games made with minimal budgets and offering deep human stories and experiences, Camille and Laura is the game for you. Camille and Laura is short and sweet.
MonsterVine Rating: 4.5 out of 5 – Great
