Two Best Friends Play:

Connor thus far seems like the only character with interesting sci-fi/speculative fiction stuff going on.

Yeah, it's a shame his plotline is so cliche.

One character's a hardline veteran police officer who doesn't want a new partner

Here comes a new robotic partner that said police officer doesn't want

Officer and robot begin bonding.

It's not the most original plotline ever, but the two actors for Connor and Hank give such strong and nuanced performances, even if they had to fight Cage on it, that it ends up becoming far more compelling than it would've been otherwise.

Although to the script's credit, it does touch on some genuinely interesting concepts with Connor's infinite lives and the way they affect him and his burgeoning relationship with his human partner. It's the closest the game ever comes to approaching the sublimity of NieR: Automata, even if a lot of that is borne through the acting rather than anything deliberate on Cage's part.

Detroit part 19

Now the wheels start to come off. Alice was an android all along. Which just raises a bunch of questions. Like, why did her dad buy her? He hated his daughter. all he ever did was beat her. Did he just buy a robot child just to beat her? What happened to her LED? Why did her drawing from way back show her bleeding red blood when she's an android? If she doesn't know she's an android then why did she say "Why do they hate US?" Implying that she knows she's an android?

Edited by WillKeaton on Jun 26th 2018 at 6:55:34 AM

I used to not mind the Alice twist, but it does ruin Kara's plotline and I can't in good conciseness ignore it. I still really liked this game but that brings it down a lot.

Edited by VeryMelon on Jun 28th 2018 at 3:46:38 PM

I guess the intended takeaway from that twist was "You had an emotional connection to Alice before. Are those feelings less valid now that you know she's an android, not a human?" But that question's impact is rather undermined since the game has already taken it for granted that android/android relationships are just as valid as human ones (see: the two Tracis at the Blue Eden Club, and the android couple at Rose's house). In any case, I feel like that switcheroo would have worked better with a different character, or in a different plotline altogether. Exploring a relationship between an android mother and human child seems more interesting than a relationship between two androids who were programmed for their roles.

@Alley Ooop: Funny you mention Nier Automata, since Yoko Taro tweeted he's big fan of Detroit and is legit surprised that people in the west don't like it much.

People in the West have a greater emphasis on narrative consistency.

Oh dear. I'd definitely heard about the robot concentration camps in the path they seem to be opting into as Kara. If the Markus riot chapter is any indication it's going to be exactly as hamfisted as it sounds.

Why did they blow up/sink the Jericho? How does being on a sinking ship make it easier to escape from said sinking ship?

Gotta admit, I'm legitimately surprised that Pat made Connor go Deviant. Based on how he's acted and what he's said throughout this LP, I thought for sure he was gonna stay loyal to CyberLife.

Apparently he did it so he could shoot North of his own will? But going Deviant meant actively opposing the ability to stop her. I'm confused by his logic here.

Pat said that after a certain point, his main motivation was to make Hank like him. So I assume his logic was "Connor go deviant, so Hank go up."

Seems Bryan Dechart, AKA the guy who plays Connor, well he did a let's play of Detroit. Apparently he was shocked at the Alice twist. He really didn't like it.

So they finished it at part 20. They all admit it was David's best game, and even Pat calls it a good game, but they do take care to remind you how bluntly handled the racism allegory was handled.

To quote one of the earliest machina episodes, Pat literally fails everything. Connor is killed because Pat forgot Cole's name, Hank is Driven to Suicide, North's revolution fails utterly, Android rights are worse than ever, and Amanda and CyberLife basically get everything they wanted and come out on top of everyone. Literally the only glimmer of light is that Matt somehow managed to get a goodish ending for Kara and Alice by having them successfully escape.

Wow. Just wow. This LP was a total fuckthrough. And it was glorious.

Oh it was a glorious sight, and it made me appreciate how much even a minor choice can matter in the end of this game.

It's amazing how badly they fucked up. This is their specialty is it not?

I'm surprised they still liked it after everything. I hope they realize that the ending feels the way it does in part because they literally cut themselves off from the last third and that they reevaluate it on that basis, whether they still end up liking it or not.

They basically said they'll be redoing this as a Stream sometime. And I can imagine Pat'll be forcing Paige to play this relatively soon. So it'll be interesting to see how things differ later on.

They admitted there were parts they really liked, and parts they didn't. They aren't above criticizing the game, considering Cage.

I'm just surprised there was anything they really liked at all.

I'm genuinely surprised at how positive the Best Friends' final assessment of the game wound up. "It still falls apart in the last 40 minutes, but it doesn't fall apart as badly as Cage's other games." And then they still said it was a good game on the whole.

I love the irony that people keep saying Kara's story matters the least in the game—but in the SBF playthrough, she's the only one to survive to the end.

That final bit of irony is vintage Best Friends.

Were they at least remorseful at getting such a shit ending? XD

I think they knew they might be heading for a bad ending as far back as Woolie killing Markus, so they weren't surprised by it. If anything they were happy at the end because this is easily the best David Cage game.

Does anyone have a copy of their bingo card with all the relevant squares marked off?

Edited by WillKeaton on Jun 28th 2018 at 5:06:13 AM