\"The only character with significant depth is William Prince, if only because he\'s supposed to the game \"antihero\" in a sense.\"
William Price is Chloe\'s late father. I\'m guessing you mean David Madsen, her stepdad.
I\'m sorry, I did in fact mean David. I had a complete mind blank.
-Enter Witty Signature Here
I don\'t like making complaints along the lines of \'Well, you just don\'t get it!\' but the part where you complain about the characters is... well, it sounds like someone who\'s half-watching a movie but not really paying attention, and then at the end they complain about all of the stuff they missed. Every description you gave of the characters is pretty inaccurate, as if you missed all of the moments where it\'s made pretty explicit that there\'s more to them than meets the eye.
It\'s also really hard not to sound like I\'m saying you didn\'t play the game right when you complain about how much you hated the ending, when there are, in fact, two endings. There\'s another ending where everything you complained about doesn\'t happen. And it\'s 100% the player\'s choice which one they see, so... you chose to finish the game in a way you didn\'t like?
This isn\'t a bad review but it does sound a little bit like you just watched all the cutscenes from a single playthrough in a row. It could also use a spoiler warning.
First off let me apologize if the review is not amazingly written...my first language is not English and yesterday I was very tired from general lack of sleep...so that was a thing.
If we have different opinions...ok? These are my subjective thoughts and if you disagree then there is not much to say otherwise as these are not objective measures by any means.
The majority of the character I didn\'t see much depth in. The characters seemed one-note to me. Every action they took seemed to me to be traced back to a single motivation. If you saw more in them, great. I\'m happy for you. I am stating my subjective experiences. And I didn\'t see it. I didn\'t see much complexity in the characters, they acted almost always as I expected them to in every circumstance (obviously besides the twist of the Antagonist). Maybe you have a different metric fro depth, maybe you saw something I didn\'t, maybe you have to do multiple playthroughs to see the depth, maybe you are just smarter. But regardless I didn\'t see it.
Likewise this is entirely subjective but again I didn\'t like the writing, it felt (again TO ME) that I was being talked down to. Concepts would be explained in ways that were seemingly very heavy-handed to me without reason. If it didn\'t seem so to you, great. I\'m happy for you. There is no work that I would want to make someone dislike if they previously liked it, I am merely stating my subjective opinion in a review as we all must.
It is true that there are two endings. You could theoretically sacrifice Arcadia Bay to save Chloe. If I am honest I did not consider that in the review because honestly I didn\'t consider it much when I played. When I played that was one of the shortest decisions in the game, as a moral Utilitarian It seemed morally obvious to sacrifice one person to save a city, morally obligatory even. I found it rather odd that anybody would choose the other option. I don\'t feel this negates the problem I saw though. It is my opinion that giving a character what is essentially a superpower and then saying that they must either never use it (even when that means watching a friend get gunned down in cold blood) or an entire city will be destroyed as a consequence still retains my contention, (and is also unrealistic, but that\'s not a huge concern really). That you can sacrifice the city to save one person turns the moral from my review from \"Don\'t use your superpower to change things towards a more favorable outcome\" to \"You can use your superpower to cause a more favorable outcome...but it will inevitably lead to the mass destruction.\"
Now again, these are ALL subjective views. If you disagree, then that is great. I am glad you enjoyed the game more then I did. I can not review something objectivity, and I am not currently of the belief any human can. I am merely stating what my experience was playing the game. If my experience is unique, if the characters had more depth to others then I experienced then the best way of showing that would be of course to see that reflected in the majority of reviews. I can not be expected to account for the majority of views, merely my own. My own experience of playing led me to my conclusion. The game might improve on a second playthrough, but when a single playthrough takes a fairly significant amount of time as this one does, then a single playthrough should also be satisfactory and this was not a satisfactory game to me.
You seem to be a fan of this game, in which case I hope you will not hold it against me that I do not like. I don\'t like arguments and I don\'t like making people angry, and so I hope that despite this we can remain on good terms.
Best Regards, Imperator
-Enter Witty Signature Here
I know it\'s a year late but I never replied to your comment and now I feel bad because I disagreed with your opinion but I don\'t want you to feel like this was a bad review or anything and your reply was really well-mannered and nice and makes several good points, especially about the ending. I can see why you chose the ending you did even though you didn\'t think it was great. It is a really difficult choice.
Also Best Regards, Me.
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Life is being Reviewed (Alt Title: This Review is Strange)
I have a pretty simple system of scoring. "5" Means I love it, "4" Means I like it, "3" means I thought it was ok or am conflicted, "2" means I dislike it (usually because it bored me) and "1" means I hate it. I rarely give out 1. I don't hate much.....
This game seems....designed to to anger me. It's primary game mechanic is interesting enough but the whole thing feels so little like an actual game. I had a similar problem with "Gone Home" and "Dear Esther" (If you want to do a game with minimalism in the gameplay...I would suggest looking at the Stanley Parable, one of my favorite games). The game is more like a choose your own adventure, but with the added effect of being able to go back a previous page...sometimes.
So ok, gameplay isn't impressing. How about the story and characters? Ughhhhh, if I had to describe this game in one word, it would be "pretentious". This game thinks it's smarter then it is. It paints the world in overtly simplistic black and white terms; This guy is the evil jock whose rick and an a-hole, this guy is a dork and therefore cute and good. This girl is stuck up and a know-it-all and we hate her except when we don't she's on our side, this girl is a misunderstood rebel. This guy is a drug dealer, this guy is a sadistic tortured artist. The only character with significant depth is William Prince, if only because he's supposed to the game "antihero" in a sense. The game keeps spouting out somewhat defiant sentiments without any kind of overarching purpose. Forgive me for stereotyping a bit, but it's like if Tumblr was a game.
But through all this, I would still only give it a "2" and say it's not my cup of tea. Oh well. But the ending....the ending essentially has Max no longer even attempt to prevent her friend Chloe from being shot. The game's apparent message is that you simply must accept some bad things as necessary.
This is a personal thing to me. This message is one I can't stand....this whole idea of "We can't change it, just accept it." The main character Max via unknown forces is given the tremendous power to travel in time...and the game basically states she shouldn't use it because somethings are just meant to happen. I cannot in any good conscience abide this. Imagine if Max was given a cure for cancer by an advanced alien race, but decided not to use it because some things just have to happen. It is a fatalistic defeatist thought process, this antithesis of progress. If we are to make progress as civilized human beings it is necessary that we fight this exact train of thought. We should not just accept any kind of suffering as necessary. As a Utilitarian, an Empathic Person, as someone who wants to be able to sleep with herself at night, I must protest. No matter what, we MUST not let ourselves be ruled by this kind of thought process, we must not allow ourselves to view terrible things as somehow necessary or inevitable. To deny that thought, is the root of all human progress.
1/5