Beyond two souls. Was it judged too harshly

[waj9876]

I don't have a problem with the game itself. I like the game. I like Jodie. I like Aiden. And I like what was done. The mechanic of switching to Aiden and moving around and doing stuff was cool.

What I don't like is how much Cage hyped this game up. From the way he spoke about it, you'd think he was breaking new ground in terms of how much the player changed the story. He went on and on about how choice matters, how choices in video games should have consequences. And then it didn't live up to that expectation. It doesn't even seem like they tried to live up to the hype they went on about.

He just seems like the kind of guy who would get mad at players for not playing his game right, is all.

 

[sXeth]

The gameplay perhaps is a tad over-savaged, as anyone going in with any foreknowledge knew it was gonna be like that, and similar style (gameplay wise) games like Walking Dead certainly haven't caught nearly the flak for it (not that they've gone unscathed).

The storytelling was an absolute mess, and appeared to be cobbled from multiple ideas. At best, Cage is in serious need of an outside editor to apply some kind of filter to his work.

 

[Seracen]

Now, if they could turn in into a proper adventure game, I think it has potential. The DLC (don't get me started on that mess), and the Middle East level were indicative of true gameplay, and should have been capitalized on. However, it simply wasn't, and that is its biggest failure.

The problem with the level in Africa (and it was Africa, not the middle east) is that David Cage thinks that "game over is a failure of the game designer" meaning that nothing you did during that gameplay mattered. It didn't matter if you broke stealth and got spotted, it didn't matter if you fought the militia, none of it mattered because you couldn't lose. If the game is designed so that you can't lose then what's the point of playing? It completely removes any sense of danger and drama from the sequence.

Ah, like a faux-Sudan, rather than faux-Arabia. That's cool.

I actually never realized you COULDN'T lose that sequence. I just assumed I'd get killed if I ever entered combat. Having played MGS4 on Big Boss (or whatever was highest) difficulty, it isn't as if B2S provided some amazing challenge.

Conversely, I am now even more sad. I thought I played that scenario perfectly b/c I was a badass, not b/c the difficulty was gimped. Now I feel sort of cheated.

Well, it further proves my point...passable enough experience, terrible game.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

The gameplay perhaps is a tad over-savaged, as anyone going in with any foreknowledge knew it was gonna be like that, and similar style (gameplay wise) games like Walking Dead certainly haven't caught nearly the flak for it (not that they've gone unscathed).

The storytelling was an absolute mess, and appeared to be cobbled from multiple ideas. At best, Cage is in serious need of an outside editor to apply some kind of filter to his work.

At least The Walking Dead had some actual exploration of the environments (small as they were). In the case of Beyond Two Souls in many of the areas when you were playing as Jodie you could just push the left stick forward and sit back while the game literally maneuvered you to the objective.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

Now, if they could turn in into a proper adventure game, I think it has potential. The DLC (don't get me started on that mess), and the Middle East level were indicative of true gameplay, and should have been capitalized on. However, it simply wasn't, and that is its biggest failure.

The problem with the level in Africa (and it was Africa, not the middle east) is that David Cage thinks that "game over is a failure of the game designer" meaning that nothing you did during that gameplay mattered. It didn't matter if you broke stealth and got spotted, it didn't matter if you fought the militia, none of it mattered because you couldn't lose. If the game is designed so that you can't lose then what's the point of playing? It completely removes any sense of danger and drama from the sequence.

Ah, like a faux-Sudan, rather than faux-Arabia. That's cool.

I actually never realized you COULDN'T lose that sequence. I just assumed I'd get killed if I ever entered combat. Having played MGS4 on The Boss (ie highest) difficulty, it isn't as if B2S provided some amazing challenge.

Conversely, I am now even more sad. I thought I played that scenario perfectly b/c I was a badass, not b/c the difficulty was gimped. Now I feel sort of cheated.

Well, it further proves my point...passable enough experience, terrible game.

You can't lose any sequence in the game. No matter what happens there are no game overs. The worst that can happen is messing up the training mission in the CIA facility (the part where they teach you the stealth), and being told to do it over again. So any part of the game that was supposed to be tense and dramatic, the police chase, the fire, Africa, the underwater base, etc, any point that requires you to feel a sense of danger is completely ruined if you realize that there is nothing you can do to fail. If there's no way to fail then beating a section doesn't feel rewarding. There's no feeling of relief after going through a tense section if all tension is removed from it by having no possibility of failure.

You can literally put your controller down during all the "fighting" sequences and they'll play themselves and let you win. The only one you can't do this with is (again) the CIA training one, where you'll be told to start over. What's the point of a game when you don't even need to play to win? This is like a child's sports team that gives trophies for participating.

 

[Bluestorm83]

I never played it because I felt that the people who were always talking about it made SUCH a huge GD deal about Ellen Paige. And frankly, I can't stand her. It's totally irrational. She's pleasant enough, not hot but definitely not ugly, and she can act.

And yet I just want to take a cinderblock to her. Nah, that's a bit harsh. But if I did meet her, I'd just go, "Ugh," and shake my head and walk away.

So hell yes, it was judged too harshly. By me.

But I do think that we should have some GAME in our games.

 

[Furioso]

This basically sums up my thoughts on the game way more eloquently than I could put into words

Others also mentioned that David Caged ripped off a lot of ideas, and holy hell he does. Pretty much each part of the game can be directly tied to some famous movie or game, it gets ridiculous. Also, Cage seems to have an obsession with throwing Jodie into near rape scenes, I mean there are at least 3 that I know of, it's pretty disgusting.

 

[Raggedstar]

I'm not a huge fan of Heavy Rain or Indigo Prophecy. I'll admit it, but I don't hate them for being with minimal gameplay. Walking Dead and Journey were some of my favourite games last year, so I take great offense that some would lump me into a pile of "people that don't get it" and "are just whining it's not COD". HR and IP had good bits that used the medium quite well (like HR's trial sequences), but it just comes down to one problem...and Beyond has it too. They're just not written very well. When you have a story driven game, you best have a good story or mechanic to fall back on...and it doesn't (unless you count visuals and good acting from Page and Dafoe). Without even going into the "gameplay sucks" territory, here are issues I had with it.

-It's a collection of tropes and popular movies strung together to a non-linear narrative. It's actually kind of jarring and rather than feel like a flowing narrative it just feels like Jodie is The Littlest Hobo (the Canadian tv show, not just noticing on how she's a hobo) roaming around and fixing everyone's problems and doing stuff.

-The non-linear storyline doesn't work. There's no connections, mucks the pacing, and it's done for no in-story reason (ya she says her memories are jumbled, but it doesn't say WHY. The prologue doesn't even have context even after you beat the game). The Embassy is the second playable chapter in the game, and you don't get context for it until about 5 hours later. Even playing it in order, you still feel like you're missing key relationships and context (I understand that Jodie and Dawkins are supposed to be tight, but you see so few moments with them together being friends/family. The game just tells you they feel that way and asks you to believe it). It doesn't do the game any favours. Oh and don't get me started when it starts to time-jump within it's own chapter towards the end. And before anyone says "Pulp Fiction did it", it's important to note that Pulp Fiction is also less than half of Beyond's length. There is no 5 hour wait for payoff or context because the movie itself is only 3 hours or so.

-The emotions are so dull that it becomes tiring to see all Jodie do is cry. There's more than one emotion than sadness (especially when there's no payoff). Contrast is important. Shadow of the Colossus is depressing and lonely, but the contrast comes from the quiet of the landscape, to the bombastic colossus fights, and then to the solemn death of the beasts. It's why I feel more emotional attachment to Final Fantasy 9 than the misery of Final Fantasy 7. The characters in Beyond are feeling sadness and such, but I have no emotional connection. Not to mention that most of the people in this game are cartoonishly evil (or saintly), from the kids at the party, to the people beating up the hobos and recording it, to the army. Not to mention Jodie is pretty boring and drones on too much in monologues (especially in the endings. Doesn't matter which one you get).

-No, Mr Cage, Ryan is a dirtbag. You can't make me honestly believe Jodie sees good in him the scene after Ryan threatens to kill her if she won't go with him. All playthroughs I've seen try to off Ryan as soon as they can or tell him to fuck off. Considering they're treating him as the canon love interest, this is a problem.

Pretty much all these points are entirely based on the story and characters. If we're going into gameplay then you can argue the lack of agency and consequence, how Aiden is treated more as a plot-sensitive tool than a character, the lack of and poor projection of choice, and all sorts of goodies like that.

So nope, I think a lot of these reviews are bang-on. Are there good bits? Ya, but certainly not good enough to carry it. It's not because people don't "get it" (not accusing the OP. Just it's a common defense of some fans of the Cage). David Cage needs an editor, or at least someone to keep him on a good leash and whack him with a newspaper.

EDIT: Wow, watched that ProJared video. He's 100% right and explains it so much better. Cookie to him.

 

[nondescript]

I played a demo and thought "This looks cool." So I replayed it. And noticed that the QTE is really heavy, and no matter what I did, I always went to certain scenarios again. People whined Mass Effect 3 was too linear - I urge them to play this and shut up.

Seriously, though, I haven't read all that's been said about Cage and Beyond: Two Souls, but we need games that try to be more like games, not like movies. No gamer wants to play a movie, so stop trying to make the game one long cinematic.

 

[bug_of_war]

After my initial play through which I enjoyed.

I went back and replayed it this week.

And I still very much enjoyed the experience of living Jodie and Aiden's life.

Yes the game play was minimal. Yes there were some Wtf is happening here. But if you had played the games previously released by the developers you knew what you were in for.


I enjoyed the story. I loved the differences I could make depending on who i wanted Jodie or Aiden to be.

Too many people heard an unfavourable review and decided to not play it. myself and quite a few of my friends don't regret playing it through to the end . It may just surprise you.

For those of you that did play would you give it another shot?

It's great that you enjoyed it, and you're right about it being a good game...for you. For most people however the game is just a very poor attempt at either a game or an interactive story.

You know how people hate the hand holding pop ups that are becoming more prevalent in games? Well that is what most people find in Beyond: Two Souls, an inability to deviate in any way what so ever from Cage's strict script. You literally cannot loose the game, you very rarely have to push a button or move a stick and when you do it's 99% unnecessary. The use of a non linear story progression showed everyone that Cage has no fucking clue about writing mechanics as when telling a non linear story the time jumps are supposed to link together and show a pattern. There was no pattern in Cage's time jumps, there was no link, it was just, "Hey look at me I am not being linear aren't I so intelligent and forward thinking". Aiden's powers vary from weak to powerful and we're never told why, Jodie has no back bone and gives into situations even if you flat out REFUSE to do so, and the relationship they try to build between Jodie and the CIA dude is so poorly done that it's hard to see what either of them see in each other. There are points in the game where in which Cage forgets that Aiden could easily have stopped/dealt with the situation, inconsistencies such as why the ghost shield that was supposed to protect people from the ghosts straight up didn't work, and an end product and creator that are so full of themselves they put in a scene that is supposed to generate sequel bait.

In the end Beyond: Two Souls fails at the technical level of poor game play and poor writing. This just goes to show how poor David Cage is at being both a game director and film director and what's worse is that he thinks he is better because he is using motion capture and Hollywood actors. When you charge someone AAA rates for minimal game play and story line being the focus, and a game with similar intentions only cheaper and less realistic graphics (looking at Walking Dead/Wolf Among Us) does it better, you need another profession.

 

[JonnyHG]

I was expecting the game to be harshly criticized for starring a female who constantly had to depend on a male. I am pleasantly surprised.

 

[Racecarlock]

I watched two playthroughs of the game, and despite the players having different choices, the story ended up being the same damn thing with slight differences. And then a "Choose your ending" ending that would give you a bad ending if you mess up some quicktime events before getting to the ending choices.

Incidentally, there's another sort of linear choice based game I watched a playthrough of recently. It was called the stanley parable. You know what the big difference is? I still want to play the stanley parable, because despite having watched all the endings, I still want that "Lolz" experience of pissing the narrator off myself rather than watching someone else do it.

But despite only seeing two different let's plays, I can tell you that I have seen all of beyond two souls that I need to. Sure, I heard people pressing buttons in the background, sure, I heard people wonder why the prompts in the action scenes aren't clear. But for all intents and purposes, I feel like I might as well have been watching someone flip through chapters and alternate endings on a DVD menu and showing them to me. Oh, but occasionally you get to be a ghost who can sometimes knock over furniture or hack devices or possess people covered in orange soda, but by god don't think you can possess them for too long as anything louder than a mouse will wake them up and they will be forever unpossessable. And for the record, I have played a game that has done the ghost that can possess people and use pseudo-telekinesis already. It was called Driver San Francisco and it did that mechanic way, way better. If only because the people don't wake out of their trance before you're done with them and you're causing 70 car pileups on the golden gate bridge instead of just knocking over furiture.

Don't get me started on the story. Sometimes you're experiencing the horrors of war. Other times, you're being homeless. That would be fine, except in between those segments you end up in david cage's creepy pasta bad dudes fantasy where "only you can save the president from ghosts". It's half a documentary on homeless people and african child soldiers and half ghostbusters where only you can stop the evil government military hell portals that people keep building despite a SHIT TON of evidence that it's probably not a good idea to build portals directly to the world of the dead which happens to contain a bunch of evil ghost squidwards. And THEN there's the whole thing where you fight off a native american sand demon. I'm pretty sure that boss fight was ripped straight from a final fantasy game. How in the hell am I supposed to take david's world seriously in any way when at any moment you could go from giving birth to a homeless woman's child to fighting an evil native american demon with native american harry potter spells?

So no, david does not get another chance and neither does his choppy, nonsensical, interactively devoid piece of crap game that I didn't even need to play to know how garbage it is.

 

[Casual Shinji]

I played a demo and thought "This looks cool." So I replayed it. And noticed that the QTE is really heavy, and no matter what I did, I always went to certain scenarios again. People whined Mass Effect 3 was too linear - I urge them to play this and shut up.

Seriously, though, I haven't read all that's been said about Cage and Beyond: Two Souls, but we need games that try to be more like games, not like movies. No gamer wants to play a movie, so stop trying to make the game one long cinematic.

It doesn't really matter what it is as long as it's good. The great thing about games is that they can be anything we want them to be; They can be gameplay centric, or story centric. Or they can just be a text based adventure. As long as whatever it does is of quality.

The problem with David Cage games isn't necessarily that they have QTEs or that they're linear, The Walking Dead proved that. The problem is that Cage just seems to wanna take his favourite movie scenes and throw them in a big pile, without any sense of tone or pacing. A spooky ghost here, a submerged Chineese base there. A rape on a pool table there, some date preperation shenanigans over here.

And apart from that it's really badly written and performed. Even with the likes of professional actors, you still have Cage's hand directing their actions, and awkward face mo-cap translating their performance.

The only good thing to come out of Cage games are the Two Best Friends Let's Plays of them.

 

[BrotherRool]

If I wanted to watch a film pausing occasionally I have probably 40 DVDs with better movies where I could do this, and if I wanted a game with choices and meaningful interaction I'd play one of the many RPGs out there with some actual gameplay in it as well.

So despite not having played it, I'm also not very interested in doing so and think reviews have been pretty fair given the low content of actual gameplay said to be in the game.

You haven't really said anything very helpful in any direction of the discussion right? This kind of game is an established genre, The Walking Dead, Dreamfall: The Longest Journey, Grim Fandango are all games of the same type, so if I were to read them and the reviewer said 'I'd rather watch a DVD or play an RPG' that's already not very useful for judging how good the game is. It's like Yahtzee panning multiplayer games because he hates playing with other people.

But beyond that you haven't even played the game =D So you're saying 'based on the low amount of gameplay I heard some of the reviewers said it has I conclude that the reviewers must have been right to criticise the game'

You're literally giving us an opinion based purely on the stuff that this thread is trying to decide the legitimacy of =D

 

[MeChaNiZ3D]

I haven't actually played it, largely because it seems like it would be a waste of money, but one thing you said I can disagree with. David Cage having made a history of games with hopeless gameplay does not make more hopeless gameplay acceptable. Every David Cage game with shitty gameplay can be criticised for that justifiably.

 

[Objectable]

No, it wasn't.
Though I have to say, Beyond Two Souls is the greatest Supernatural fanfic I have ever seen!

 

[seditary]

I'd really enjoy a David Cage style game if it was made by people who could write a good story and made the player really matter.

 

[GundamSentinel]

Overall I liked playing it, but it had some huge flaws. The biggest obviously being that the story was such a huge mess. Some scenes were great, but others were so incredibly awful. Honestly, many of them were a horrid cliché mess that shouldn't be in that game. What the fuck was that Chinese Bond-villain base about?

And for a game that was supposed to have player choice, it really doesn't have any. Any story differences are in the end inconsequential. All the endings are interchangeable. Also, fuck Ryan.

But in the end, I don't regret playing it. Some scenes worked well on their own, be it because of the suspense, great character moments or because they just flowed well.

I can't blame anyone for being harsh about it though. It was an ugly mess of a game, with some bright spots.

 

[Padwolf]

I didn't think it was that good. I thought it was a bit of a mess. I can say it was well acted though, and some scenes made me feel things but because of there being no explanation or development I didn't know where my feelings should be. The homeless scene in particular, it really made me feel but I just didn't know where or what or why. There isn't any good pacing and it feels like Cage just wanted a set of situations and he threw them all together.