Watching the World Burn in Headliner
Price: $13.99, Platforms: Switch and PC
Headliner: NoviNews is a choice-based adventure game where you’re cast as the Headliner- the person who gets to edit and curate the news. Based on what you choose to publish, anything can happen: riots, revolution, hate crimes, economic booms, police brutality, and so much more. And not only do you have the fate of your nation on your shoulders, but also the fates of those around you- the cute girl you work with, your brother, your pets, and your favorite shopkeeper.
All of them can have various endings based on what you choose to focus on- including yourself.
The brunt of the gameplay involves dialogue choices and you approving and rejecting articles. Your day tends to follow a schedule: go to work, see the boss, choose articles, walk the town, talk to who you want, and go home.
My biggest and highest compliment for Headliner is that it avoids many of the pitfalls of other games like it. It is not just a visual novel- where you choose dialogue occasionally but it’s mostly reading. It doesn’t suffer the same fate of many choice-based games, where the impact of your decisions feels subtle or easy to predict. It also doesn’t take on too much for a simulation or dystopian game- instead focusing on the exact elements and piece of the world it wants you to experience.
The game’s inherent design is pure genius, balancing every potential flaw a game like Headliner could experience.
And how does Unbound Creations do this? Through clear stakes, solid writing, a complex world, and well-designed replayability.
By far the strongest element of Headliner is how high the stakes feel and how much you as the player encounter these stakes. Even though the main gameplay is dialogue choices and stamping articles- you feel and you know the impact of this. And if you haven’t figured out your impact by the second day, then you are either blind or not doing anything. The city will change, the streets will look different, people on the streets will say different things, characters will react differently, even the view from your apartment will change.
As you progress, the stakes get even higher as riots, assassinations, suicides, or terrorist attacks all become potential consequences of your decisions.
And the stakes are two-fold. Not only do you hold the health, safety, status, and atmosphere of your nation- you also hold the fates of your personal relationships. Sometimes you know by publishing something or taking a side that you’re doing the right thing by your nation but hurting your brother. Or, you can risk your nation by making choices to better your brother, your coworker, or your favorite shopkeeper.
Sometimes money is at stake. Sometimes your brother’s mental health. Sometimes even your life can feel at risk. And sometimes you just like watching the world burn- so forget the stakes.
You can feel all of these in one playthrough. And therein lies the genius of Headliner- everything has a clear, palpable, understandable consequence. Nothing ever feels like it didn’t matter in some way or another and because it all feels like it matters- every detail becomes important. Talk on the street becomes important, the lines for the hospital become important, the things your coworker says after work are important, and even what the billboard outside your window says is important- because they’re all clues to how your choices are impacting the world at large.
The second biggest strength of Headliner is the writing. It’d be incredibly grating if every detail felt important but then was terribly written- and luckily that isn’t the case here. The clear stakes help the text feel meaningful and important, but the quality of the writing makes it all even better. Dialogue reveals details of the world, different character’s quirks and personalities, and helps set the tone of the game.
My favorite dialogue by far comes for your pet drone- who’s snarky AI humor is the perfect laugh while the world’s in chaos.
The writing of the articles also is important- requiring you to pay attention to what exactly you’re publishing.
Everything about the writing in this game feels polished, cohesive, and engaging- pulling you further into the story and experience of Headliner. Both the writing on-screen and off-screen is what allows Headliner to be the masterpiece of an experience it is. The storylines are interwoven and intriguing, the world is detailed and alive, the conflicts are thought-out and complex, and the overarching narrative brilliantly highlights video games as a story-telling medium.
The pacing, structure, and writing of Headliner is top notch, allowing the world and issues of Headliner to feel full-bodied and real.
The writing ties into my next point- which is the complex world of Headliner. You’re the Headliner in the nation of Novistan, a neighbor to Learis and Galaxia. You’re far into the 2000’s, with genetic modifications being the norm, impacting modern science, technology, and healthcare issues. Your government is run by a Prime Minister and definitely has some autocratic bents to it. There’s no Bill of Rights in Novistan- that’s for sure.
How much your nation feels like a police state, a dictatorship, an anarchist state, or like a democracy is entirely up to your choices.
There’s so many layers to the world of Headliner. There’s a genetic pandemic on the rise, a new potentially dangerous drug called BetterBuzz coming out, increasing tensions between Learis and Novistan, growing debates over foreign versus domestic industry- and honestly that’s just the surface. There’s mental health, immigration, economy, science, drug use, privacy, surveillance, police brutality, racism, crime, propaganda, false information, and conspiracy theories.
This is not a black and white, easily predictable, or true versus false world- not at all.
Every choice you make in any of these issues always has a winner and a loser and sometimes you’re not even sure how your choices will impact all these aspects of Novistan. Also, you’re never clearly told what is actually true. Never.
Nothing is clearly, beyond reasonable doubt, the absolute truth unless you just saw it happen yesterday. Even then, it could just be your interpretation of events.
In my first playthrough, I had a clear agenda- creating a revolution and securing national healthcare. But even though I achieved these goals, there were a lot of consequences I couldn’t predict and a lot of variations I could have chosen. In my second playthrough, I was very wary of any clear agenda. However, even with my marked indecisiveness and refusal to pick a side on issues- I still wound up creating a police state because of how often I’d report on crimes.
There’s so many ways things can go based on every choice you make- and I absolutely adore that.
And that fact is why Headliner is endlessly replayable. It’s a rather short game anyway at about 2 hours for a slower playthrough, but all the other solid elements of Headliner make it entirely repeatable.
The game acknowledges you’ve played before, with characters remembering the previous Headliner in various ways and varying their dialogue.
Headliner also adds a new murder mystery subplots in subsequent playthroughs, which also makes the experience a little different each time. But even without these new additions, the complexity of Novistan and the consequences of your different choices make it worthy of a replay. The options are endless and it would likely take 100 playthroughs to explore every possible outcome. I’m sure the dialogue would eventually get predictable- but only if you chose similar options every time.
Also, the pace of Headliner is entirely up to you, so if you want to ignore everyone and just post news- do it. If you want to go super slow and see every detail- do it. You don’t have to sit through very much of Headliner if you don’t want to, which helps the replayability even more.
You can even run right by your leader’s assassination if you really can’t be bothered. Choice is yours.
The only negative note I have for Headliner is that while the overall world is well-designed and thought out, the people themselves can sometimes feel stiff. Watching my character pet their dog is like watching my grandma bend down to pick something up. But other than that- 10/10 experience.
I’ve previously reviewed Beholder, which is similar in how they both explore the delicate dance between individual and government. They both require you to make hard choices and define your morals on issues. Headliner is also comparable to Papers, Please, which has a similar motif and has very similar gameplay to Headliner. However, Headliner surpasses both of its gaming relatives in that the stakes feel real and it doesn’t get monotonous over playthroughs.
It perfects the political question game.
It puts the player in a genuine, semi-realistic scenario where they are the mediator between the government and its people.
The questions Headliner raises around the power of media and the importance of free press and speech are timely and poignant. It’s a playable exploration of how politics impacts people, how information is vital to navigating the world, and how truth can be relative. I’d 100% use this game in a government class to educate on political issues such as media, misinformation, healthcare, economy, foreign relations, and crime. It raised points and counterarguments that I’d never thought of about these issues.
It isn’t an educational game- that’s not the point. It’s not a political game with a real world agenda or message.
However, Headliner is a perfect example of a game that raises real world political questions, inspiring the willing gamer to consider their own relationship with media, the press, and politics.
It was up to me, as the Headliner, to give people opinions, to pick a side, to tell people what to think- they’d get upset if I gave them both sides or let them have a choice in the matter. That helps me, as Sydney, reflect on how I engage with media and reminds me that I shouldn’t be the same way. And that’s real.
Overall, I’d highly recommend Headliner to anyone interested in choice-based, gritty, or well-written games. I’d write papers on this game, I’d bring it up in a dystopian literature class, I’d reference it in my political discussions because it’s that poignant and well-crafted.
You can have a purely fun time watching the world burn, you can try to fix everything, you can learn from it, you can screw the world and protect your loved ones- whatever you want. The world is under your control because you’re the Headliner. And for $13.99 on Steam- there’s no reason not to go become one.
