The former set of comments parodies part of the usual gameplay in video games, simulating how Gone Home would look like if that kind of video game logic was applied to it. The latter uses irony to ridicule Gone Home and its premises as a game. Both of them made me laugh.


Narrative and mechanics in Gone Home: misleading the player?
Most of the tension in the debate with regard whether Gone Home is considered a video game or not relied on two elements that seems to be fundamental in video games: the way Gone home unfolds its narrative and through which mechanics (or the lack of them). But how are both evaluated by video gamers?

When it comes to approaching the narrative, there is a heated controversy in relation to the story that is being delivered. Adolescence is in the eye of the storm, whether it is ferociously criticised as a narrative resource...
I didn’t like Gone Home not because of its project type (I firmly refuse to call it a game) but because it’s a cliched love story told in a ham-fisted fashion that gets rammed down your throat. It’s all the more frustrating when they did manage to deliver a much more interesting sub-plot with a lot more subtlety, but chose instead to run with the teenage love drama with shitty storytelling. That’s why I hate Gone Home (Soldant in Rock, Paper, Shotgun Comments).
... or it is praised because of the accurate depiction of a subject normally neglected:
I liked it. A lot. (...)  I am fed up to the back teeth with the sheer number of books, films, anything painting everything people get up to in their teens as “Oh my God, how can kids be so stupid (...)” etc., etc. It is nauseating. Gone Home is one of the few pieces of creative media I’ve experienced recently to allow that teenagers can be stupid, impetuous, self-centred and all the rest of it but also brave, determined, courageous, thoughtful and you’re damn right compassionate at the same time. It’s easily one of the strongest facets of the writing and what made me tear up as much as the actual plot, maybe more. (Eight Rooks in Rock, Paper, Shotgun Comments). 
I find very interesting to read these mixed opinions on the main story: is it a cliché or is it an unusual good representation of teenagers? Was the correct decision to make the teenage love drama the central story of the narrative or should the developers have followed other lead?

This controversial scenario about the narrative becomes more complicated when new factors are taken into account, especially those related to the game's atmosphere and mechanics:
On one side, this is a beautiful (seriously, just beautiful) analysis of teenage infatuation – something many people have been through and, as John mentioned, is somewhat devalued. (...) Flipping the coin, when your entire hook is predicated on ‘what has happened to everyone?’, having your story finish with everyone basically running away from home for a while is a bit of a cop-out. The peals of thunder and flickering lights used to give the impression of atmosphere are poor window-dressing for such a dis-satisfactory denouement. (...). And let us not forget, it achieved this through the primary mechanic of picking up bits of rubbish in an abandoned house. (Magos in Rock, Paper, Shotgun Comments).
It’s an important step up in the right direction for new themes to take over games, but it’s also a pretty mediocre game., which is what I look for in a game, quality of gameplay, not a “progressive” plot (Dskzero in Rock, Paper, Shotgun Comments).
These users praise the story of Gone Home, considering it a beautiful analysis of teenager's feelings of love, but criticise the frame that contains the narrative, how it ends and the mechanics used to deliver it. Magos, for instance, refers to the unimpressive effects to create a sense of atmosphere and the disappointing final where the big question - what happened to your family - is just answered with a "we'll be back soon". There is also an adverse criticism of the main mechanic of the video game, depicted as "picking up bits of rubbish" without "quality of gameplay". These gamers are not alone:
I found the story utterly entrancing, but I’m baffled as to why the game spent so much effort in making me feel that it was going to be a horror game. I have such a mixed response to the game, because it seems to have an identity crisis. The first half is incredibly creepy, but that creepy atmosphere has nothing to do with the actual story arc. I don’t really understand the point of misleading the player in that way – it’s as if the devs didn’t really have faith that the story (and substories) were interesting enough on their own. And yet they were totally engrossing, without needing thunderstorms or the ‘psycho house’ story. (Puggy in Rock, Paper, Shotgun Comments).
According to this player, the story is entrancing and engrossing by itself, without wrapping it in a creepy fashion. Puggy assumes the developers have intentionally misguided the players because they didn't believe the story could directly arouse interest among them. Again, good central story but not very well dressed.

However, there are those who lament that the horror elements we find in Gone Home have not been incorporated in the story in the end: