clicked on Clickolding, thinking it was about cuckolding – a term I’ve heard of but have no idea what it means, and was selflessly researching the term. Perhaps it was the thumbnails that were so alluring, not just the title or even the alluring manspreader in a mask asking you to… click. Joking aside, the title was an excellent play on words.
Enough for me to click…
This Clickolding review is relatively brief, as the game will take around 30+ minutes to finish. It’s like a highly polished game jam with an excellent concept. How do we translate that into something interactive? By making you a puppet in control, having the option to stay or leave. It’s up to you.
Clickolding Review: I Like To Watch
The idea can trigger some – there’s even a warning at the beginning. It doesn’t take much from your emphatic gland to recognise that being in a seedy motel room with a figure wearing a mask and asking you to repeatedly click a clicker until it reaches 9,999 is unsettling. However, you’re there by choice as there’s a financial prize at the end.
With only the four walls of the motel room, yourself and the… antagonist, Clickolding is claustrophobic and unnerving. Without any voice acting, the ambience consists of distorted noises from the masked one, the white noise of a TV, plus the whirling of the AC. Oh, and don’t forget that clicker. You’ll be seeing and hearing a lot of that.
An underlying story is tucked into the experience in the form of a monologue, typically interrupted by a request for you to click facing a painting, change the temperature, or find a way into the bathroom. It’s disconcerting and entangling simultaneously, as you want to know what happens next. Even if you’re not the type to slow down at the sight of a car crash, you’ll be loitering around here in a voyeuristic fashion for some closure.
Clickety-Click
Alas, there is a downside to this: it’s a clicker without any gains other than the narrative. In similar indies such as Femdemic or My Name is Mayo, there’s some element of progress, even if only cosmetic. There are no short-term goals, such as reaching 100, 500, 1000. You’ll be asked to speed up, slow down, or even stop. Understandably, it gets monotonous and, with little to do, a tad irritating. However, look over at the masked one’s chest as he switches from deep to erratic breathing, and it’s wildly hypnotic.
Strange Scaffold has conducted more or less of a scientific experiment here. How many of us would leave this situation – literally walking out of the motel room to reset progress – when we have the choice? Most, if not all, will stick it out and be fascinated as if binging on another serial killer doc on Netflix.
Clickolding Review Summary
Conceptually, Clickolding is fantastic. It’s so great on the ol’ RSI, but worth the asking price is justified. The developer/publisher is one to bookmark, as they’re the same team behind the excellent El Paso, Elsewhere. Go on, you perv – go check out Clickolding on Steam. You know you like to watch. And click.
