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Beyond: Two Souls - A girl and her poltergeist
Mr_Grinch
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
Couldn't see an existing thread for this and there was a bit of discussion in the PSN thread so I thought it might be worth having a place specifically for it.
SPOILERS
Given the nature of the game this thread is likely to contain a forest of spoiler tags. PLEASE try to give a spoiler-free indication of whereabouts you are in the game outside of the tag so we all know if it's 'safe' to open it or not.
And be aware that given the game's "branching" nature (see, that 'forest of spoiler tags' bit was a pun!) even if you're passed that bit of the game you may still spoil a future play through.
Anyway, with that out of the way, what's this Beyond: Two Souls game all about?
Well, it's developed by a studio called Quantic Dreams who have made some other rather excellent games; the gorgeous Heavy Rain and the utterly non-sensical but still brilliant "Fahrenheit" (or "Indigo Prophecy" in the States, because otherwise you guys might have confused it with that Michael Moore film 'Fahrenheit 9/11'). Their games aren't really games in the traditional sense, they're more like interactive movies. Akin to the recent Telltale Walking Dead games, or to those old 'chose your destiny' books you could get.
Fahrenheit was a game about...well, actually I forget. It started with you committing a murder in a trance and then I'm pretty sure towards the end the Internet came alive. Whilst being utterly ridiculous, plot wise, it still managed to pull you in and keep you on edge with some insanely tense moments, leaving your controller sticky. With sweat. Hopefully. There WAS a sex scene. It also had a black detective with his own funk soundtrack for whenever he was on screen.
Then came Heavy Rain, which was an improvement in practically every way. In Heavy Rain you played as four different characters, with interlinking stories. There's a child abducting serial killer on the loose, will you be able to do what you have to to identify him? And can you stop from audibly groaning when the big twist is revealed? Jokes aside, it was bloody excellent and had a fairy large number of alternate endings.
That's not to say the games haven't received their fair share of criticisms. Some people don't like the controls, some can't roll with the frankly terrible plot developments in both games and some people complained the acting in Heavy Rain was awful.
Those people are right. The acting was fucking terrible. That takes us quite nicely to Beyond: Two Souls.
Starring Ellen Page of "The Last of Us" fame, and Willem Dafoe from the hit movie "Odd Thomas" the acting is good. In fact judging by the demo it's bloody great. Not an awful lot has been revealed about the plot as of yet. You play as Jodie a young girl linked to what I suspect is a supernatural entity/demon thingy called Aiden. The game follows Jodie from age 8 to 23 and according to wikipedia "features psychological, spiritual, and thriller elements, is centered around questions about what happens after death."
During the course of the game you control both Jodie, in traditional Quantic Dreams style, by directing her with the left analogue stick and maddly mashing buttons, twirling the right analogue stick and shaking the controller during action scenes to do cool stuff.
Different to the norm, however, is Aiden. He's controlled from a first person perspective. Being an 'entity' he's not so fussed with doors and walls and things and can fly straight through them. He can also knock things over, make people shiver and other cool stuff. But mostly he seems to knock things over.
Anyway, that's enough of me rambling, here's some eye candy:
and here's a trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DLQUBTOLmE
I'll add some more pictures and videos to the op when I have a little more time. And I'll contribute to the thread a little more when I actually get the game (hopefully on Friday).
Oh, that's another thing. The Special Edition has an exclusive 30 minute scene. It's probably nothing important, but I'm a sucker for not wanting to miss out on things, so I've bought it. Also the EU release has had about ten seconds cut from it to obtain a PEGI 16 rating, rather than an 18. The developers say it's nothing important and if you didn't have the scene pointed out to you there's no way you'd realise.
SPOILERS
Given the nature of the game this thread is likely to contain a forest of spoiler tags. PLEASE try to give a spoiler-free indication of whereabouts you are in the game outside of the tag so we all know if it's 'safe' to open it or not.
And be aware that given the game's "branching" nature (see, that 'forest of spoiler tags' bit was a pun!) even if you're passed that bit of the game you may still spoil a future play through.
Anyway, with that out of the way, what's this Beyond: Two Souls game all about?
Well, it's developed by a studio called Quantic Dreams who have made some other rather excellent games; the gorgeous Heavy Rain and the utterly non-sensical but still brilliant "Fahrenheit" (or "Indigo Prophecy" in the States, because otherwise you guys might have confused it with that Michael Moore film 'Fahrenheit 9/11'). Their games aren't really games in the traditional sense, they're more like interactive movies. Akin to the recent Telltale Walking Dead games, or to those old 'chose your destiny' books you could get.
Fahrenheit was a game about...well, actually I forget. It started with you committing a murder in a trance and then I'm pretty sure towards the end the Internet came alive. Whilst being utterly ridiculous, plot wise, it still managed to pull you in and keep you on edge with some insanely tense moments, leaving your controller sticky. With sweat. Hopefully. There WAS a sex scene. It also had a black detective with his own funk soundtrack for whenever he was on screen.
Then came Heavy Rain, which was an improvement in practically every way. In Heavy Rain you played as four different characters, with interlinking stories. There's a child abducting serial killer on the loose, will you be able to do what you have to to identify him? And can you stop from audibly groaning when the big twist is revealed? Jokes aside, it was bloody excellent and had a fairy large number of alternate endings.
That's not to say the games haven't received their fair share of criticisms. Some people don't like the controls, some can't roll with the frankly terrible plot developments in both games and some people complained the acting in Heavy Rain was awful.
Those people are right. The acting was fucking terrible. That takes us quite nicely to Beyond: Two Souls.
Starring Ellen Page of "The Last of Us" fame, and Willem Dafoe from the hit movie "Odd Thomas" the acting is good. In fact judging by the demo it's bloody great. Not an awful lot has been revealed about the plot as of yet. You play as Jodie a young girl linked to what I suspect is a supernatural entity/demon thingy called Aiden. The game follows Jodie from age 8 to 23 and according to wikipedia "features psychological, spiritual, and thriller elements, is centered around questions about what happens after death."
During the course of the game you control both Jodie, in traditional Quantic Dreams style, by directing her with the left analogue stick and maddly mashing buttons, twirling the right analogue stick and shaking the controller during action scenes to do cool stuff.
Different to the norm, however, is Aiden. He's controlled from a first person perspective. Being an 'entity' he's not so fussed with doors and walls and things and can fly straight through them. He can also knock things over, make people shiver and other cool stuff. But mostly he seems to knock things over.
Anyway, that's enough of me rambling, here's some eye candy:
and here's a trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DLQUBTOLmEI'll add some more pictures and videos to the op when I have a little more time. And I'll contribute to the thread a little more when I actually get the game (hopefully on Friday).
Oh, that's another thing. The Special Edition has an exclusive 30 minute scene. It's probably nothing important, but I'm a sucker for not wanting to miss out on things, so I've bought it. Also the EU release has had about ten seconds cut from it to obtain a PEGI 16 rating, rather than an 18. The developers say it's nothing important and if you didn't have the scene pointed out to you there's no way you'd realise.
Mr_Grinch on
+1
Posts
PSN: SirGrinchX
Oculus Rift: Sir_Grinch
Ellen Paaaaage! I'm going into this completely blind outside the basic premise. All I needed to hear when the game was first announced was Quantic Dream and Ellen Page. I did allow myself to watch a short preview video on the YouTubes, but that's it. All I know is that the Green Goblin is some kind of scientist government guy who is terribly interested in Juno and her ethereal buddy.
Man, dem screens is pretty.
PSN: SirGrinchX
Oculus Rift: Sir_Grinch
I really want to get this game, dang it. Unfortunately, I have no idea what I might be getting into. No one played it yet? Someone must have messed around with it!
There's a demo up on PSN.
Guess I'll pick this up today.
PSN: Beltaine-77 | Steam: beltane77 | Battle.net BadHaggis#1433
Though I hear Ellen Page and Willem Dafoe were not untouched by David Cage's tenuous grasp of English idioms.
3DS Friend Code: 2165-6448-8348 www.Twitch.TV/cooljammer00
Battle.Net: JohnDarc#1203 Origin/UPlay: CoolJammer00
Heavy Rain, as a, "Let's sit down and really think about what just happened" exercise is less phenomenal. To put it mildly.
But I still enjoyed the hell out of it and feel like QD deserves some love for making attempts to really mesh gameplay and story. And take risks.
It's a shame they couldn't stick the landing. Or the in-flight movie. ...Pretty much everything besides the take-off went into "what the hell just happened" territory.
It's fun reading the blurbs for the top reviews then scrolling to the bottom and reading those. Cage is one of those guys where reviews don't seem to matter; you either like his stuff or don't. It doesn't feel like there's a middle ground there.
'For all its promises of representing a change from the usual (supposed) shoot-bang zeitgeist, Beyond is just as nonsensical as any Call of Duty. It's a thriller without any intrigue, a character study bereft of character, and a game short of actual gameplay.' - 4/10
'Beyond: Two Souls is one of the most poignant and enthralling stories we have encountered in a video game, capable of stirring up the same depth of emotion as great works from the mediums of film and literature.' 10/10
Plotholes, lazy storytelling devices, bad handeling of human relationships, unessacary inclusion of sci-fi and other stuff going into the pretentious, bad handeling of female charachters....
I could go on for hours, but that counts pretty much for the writing in any David Cage game.
I actually do think he's a great director and unmatched when it comes to creating an atmosphere, I just think he's his own worst enemy when it comes to gameplay and writing. (And No, I don't consider QTE's to be the pinnacle of integrating story with gameplay)
Or for short: Showers
Every single Quantic Dream game seems to suffer from overambition and then heavy culling and editing due to lack of funds. There were entire segments where you play through Ethan's blackouts cut out. The entire ending of Indigo Prophecy was cut, I hear.
To me, it's more that the acting is usually awful. And for Heavy Rain, people saying the writing was terrible makes me think of a few scenes of note:
3DS Friend Code: 2165-6448-8348 www.Twitch.TV/cooljammer00
Battle.Net: JohnDarc#1203 Origin/UPlay: CoolJammer00
Having strong opinions either for or against them is probably the best thing about QD, at least nothing they do is forgettable
Cage should maybe stick with directing these things as project manager or some such and let more capable hands do the writing. I can't see that ever happening though.
There was a supernatural-ish sub-plot cut out where
I'm not saying it's a good explanation, but it was their original intention.
PSN: SirGrinchX
Oculus Rift: Sir_Grinch
Edit: After 25 minutes of black screen it finally decided to work. Soooo a 25 minute hard drive install with no indication of what its doing whatsoever? No clue.
Dude. She's a solid actor. Any actor worth their salt can still ACT around some bad writing.
The Star Wars Prequels would like to have a word with you.
Come on. Lucas made Liam Neeson look like a bad actor.
Hah!
Well, at some point, you look at your director, your writer and your contract and decide, "I'm a working actor, I'm being paid for this and I'm FUCKED if I try to back out. Also, money is really nice. Let's see how much of a shit they give about my perf...oh, none at all? Very well, then. Paycheck gig, all the fucking way to the bank."
And then Ewen goes and drives motorcycles all across the world and shit.
Falls apart might be mild.
Explodes into flaming tatters might do it.
Also I love how incredibly detailed Page's face is next to the not so detailed textures of her clothing. Looks like one of them photo prop dealies with the cut out hole so you get a real face on a cartoon cowboy.
I can appreciate the concept of what Cage is trying to do with games, but great googly moogly he needs to hire a story editor already. I've said it before, but 80% of what was wrong with Heavy Rain could have been fixed with very minor tweaks that wouldn't have changed what he was going after at all.
From the setup i just had to do, it would appear that this game can be played couch co-op.
Holy shit... This game's stupidly gorgeous.
People complaining that this has "terrible writing" have bad opinions, in my book. Same goes for Heavy Rain.
They didn't just use the LA Noire tech on this, did they?
3DS Friend Code: 2165-6448-8348 www.Twitch.TV/cooljammer00
Battle.Net: JohnDarc#1203 Origin/UPlay: CoolJammer00
Diving in now.
Edit: Holy crap, I don't know what it's installing, but GTAV didn't take this long.
PSN: Beltaine-77 | Steam: beltane77 | Battle.net BadHaggis#1433
"Jodie, stop! You can stop now! The experiment is over!" "Oh God, please let me out! She's a monster!"
But... I'm not doing anything. I only pushed over the water bottle, lady!
PSN: Beltaine-77 | Steam: beltane77 | Battle.net BadHaggis#1433