Zero Punctuation: Beyond: Two Souls

[Blood Brain Barrier]

You know, games like this actually do a good service in reinforcing how wrong psychologists are about human "free will" and the agency with which we appear to control our bodies. Is human behavior really like David Cage presents it? A disembodied agent surveying the scene and acting independently according to its wishes? Or is it possible that in real life events play themselves according to external and internal circumstances - without a "controller"?

Buddhists might have a strong case, considering how disfunctional, awkward and impossible it is to have one person (us, or the "soul") inside another (Jodie, or the "body"), as Beyond: Two Souls haves us believe real life is lived.

 

[Alfredo Jones]

David Cage thinks he's making some new unexplored genre of games when really all he's doing is making a western AAA budget version of Japanese visual novels. And I can name a few visual novels that have way better stories in them than anything Cage made (at least in my opinion).

 

[hentropy]

David Cage thinks he's making some new unexplored genre of games when really all he's doing is making a western AAA budget version of Japanese visual novels. And I can name a few visual novels that have way better stories in them than anything Cage made (at least in my opinion).

Most VNs have significantly more choice than these games do, but it depends.

 

[Flunk]

Wow, I actually thought this game was called "Beyond Two Souls" until I watched this video. The whole thing sounds terrible so I was already giving it a miss anyway. Doesn't even sound like a game at all, more like a boring movie you have to keep kicking to keep it playing.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I think David Cage is a good writer. Perhaps not a brilliant writer, but a good writer nonetheless. I don't see what makes his writing worse than so many other video games. I cared a lot about the characters in Heavy Rain, especially because your choices had a profound impact on which direction the story took. It all adds up. If anything, the biggest problem with Beyond: Two Souls seems to be that it's just more of the same.

I haven't played Heavy Rain, but Fahrenheit was awful. Or rather, it started out a promising noirish tale and then became a Matrix-esque tale involving a Mayan prophecy, a secret hobo network, angel attacks and the end of the world. Not to mention, one of the three main characters is suddenly and inexplicably dropped out of the picture 3/4 into the game, just because. Lots of good building, pay-off sucks.

 

[Two-A]

Even though I didn't enjoy Heavy Rain too much, I definitely prefer that over Beyond. I agree with Yahtzee with every criticism he has with the game, and more.

Funny how everyone just calls Jodie "Ellen Page" now, they just can't be arsed. =p
See what you've done, David Cage?

(Still think Omikron: The Nomad Soul is Quantic Dream's best game)

It's definitely the only one with actual gameplay on it.

haha, I guess Beyond will forever be remembered as "that game with Ellen Page on it."

I'm starting to wonder if David Beige has ever actually talked to a real woman before.

This review is actually a lot like trying to play through any of David Beige's games: Soul crushing.

Cage

David Cage

Buddy, I think that was intentional.

Unless your post was acknowledging the joke. (Now I'm confused, I wonder why that sarcasm pink idea never took off)

 

[Branindain]

Well, David Cage has improved my day. He released this shite game, causing Yahtzee to review this shite game, causing me to remember that I haven't listened to Bullet with Butterfly Wings for 10 years, causing me to Youtube it, causing me happiness. Thanx 4 the emotions, Mr. Cage!

 

[RicoADF]

Looks like nobody plays videogames for emotions anymore. Just for the shooting.

Is Beyond: Two Souls disappointing in its gameplay? Oh yes, VERY disappointing.

Is Beyond: Two Souls satisfying in its story and emotions it can convey? Oh yes, VERY much so.


People play stuff like Japanese visual novels all the time, and what we have here is - a much, much, muuuch higher budget visual novel, with a more serious plot.

I absolutely loved Heavy Rain because it had excellent characters and atmosphere. I didn't even care the gameplay was so very simple. I like Beyond: Two Souls a lot, but it does feel less effective in its narration than Heavy rain was.

Hey, people loved Dragon's Lair, and still do, since they keep re-releasing it. And Dragon's Lair gameplay sucks. But it's a game with a very high quality and an excellent artistic value and.... gameplay or not, it's very entertaining.

Heck, people play mmorpg and those things have a much worse gameplay than David Cage's games, and they don't even have a compelling story or excellent graphics attached to it.



In short: I understand the shortcomings of David Cage's videogames, and I realize they're not even quite videogames. But I still prefer to play Beyond: Two Souls than yet another generic shooter.

I'm with you mate, as much as I enjoy ArmA, Star Trek Online, GTAV etc there are times when I want a story driven game and not have to worry about quick reflexes or thinking a lot. I'm suprised yahtzee didn't like it since he loves Silent Hill 2 and that also puts story over gameplay. Oh well each to their own.

 

[Rawbeard]

When the plot in Indigo Prophecy went coocoo bananas, I was like "oh, that is so cute, whatever that is". Now I can't shake the feeling Quantic Dreams can't write a plot without coocoos and bananas to save their life.

 

[Miroluck]

Good video. That final joke had me ROFLing.

 

[Ovrad]

Well, this, I think, it's a good way to put it.

It's a good interactive story. It's like a movie that lasts ten times the amount of a normal movie, plus it has you interact with it to change the ending. I like it, especially since movies nowadays are so soulless that you need to turn out to videogames like this to enjoy a new inventive story that isn't a remake, a reboot or a sequel.

Yes, if you come here to expect challenging gameplay, go play Demon's Souls. But does this make Beyond inferior? No, because it offers what it's set to offer: a good interactive story.

Seems to me certain reviewers are too close minded to understand that, and criticize the game only on account of the limited gameplay it offers. It's like criticizing a book because you can't listen music with it.
Then again, those same reviewers who love gameplay so much are those who will high-score a TellTale game or even a mmorpg (which are the real scum of gameplay).

I'm going to assume you haven't played a Telltale game. Both David Cage and Telltale make similar games in terms of the genre, however, Telltale games are just sooo much better. Allow me to explain.

In terms of gameplay, they are very similar. They both are mostly quick time events, limited exploration, and giving you mostly illusions of choice. I say illusion because most of them don't change much as the story always goes to the same place. While both offer immediate small consequences, Telltale games also have longer term consequences, often coming back in later scenes. In David Cage games, the only long term consequences you get might be a slightly different ending.

The characters, which should be one of the main focus of the game, are really shallow in David Cage's, and barely have any development. You can sum up all the characters in B:TS in 3 words..or less. Telltale do a very good job at creating complex characters with real emotions, often threading the line of morality. No one is purely good or purely evil, because that's boring and cliché as hell.

Now both of these developers focus on the story, as it's the heart of this genre. I admit David Cage is pretty good at creating emotions, that's his strength. However, emotions alone don't make a good story. His games are FILLED with plot holes. There's just so many in every scene it's baffling at times if you stop and think about it for two seconds. Also his 'plot twists' are extremely predictable. I believe I saw every single one of them coming in B:TS. However, Telltale games have just as much (or more) emotions in them, but the rest of the story isn't sacrificed for it. Now I know some people will be happy to ride the emotional train and not care about the rest, and that's fine, but others, like myself, get really pulled out of a story if the plot is predictable, doesn't make sense, and feels like a bunch of scenes stitched together.


If you did enjoy the game, I'm honestly happy for you. I wouldn't personally say it's a bad game, there was some stuff I found enjoyable, but there's also so many things that irked me that it sapped my overall enjoyment. And if you haven't yet, try out The Walking Dead game or The Wolf Among Us, it does everything a David Cage game does, except better.

 

[blackrave]

"Will cry for food"
I had orange juice in my mouth
Now I have an orange flavored keyboard
THANK YOU VERY MUCH YAHTZEE!!!

 

[Nico4]

I also heard an argument, that the unlinear story telling is thanks to Jodie (if you finished the game, you might know what I'm talking about), but that doesn't fly with me. It does make the story intersting, but it's also cheating, because without it, the story wouldn't really work and it would have had a horrible pacing

Interesting. Did you feel the same about Memento and Pulp Fiction? If you have seen them, of course.

Of course the story wouldn't work had it been told consecutively. It was built this way. Just like not many stories told straight from A to Z would not work if the chapters got re-shuffled.

Not targeting you specifically, but I really wish people would stop stating opinions as facts. The game is not broken, the story never contradicts itself. I have played it 4 times from start to finish and replayed some chapters even more (even though Cage said it's exactly what one shouldn't do) and I never found any disrepancies in the plot and character developement.

Also, I don't know about the rest of you, but what I liked most about the game is how relatable Jodie was. Remember that we always see her at the most important points of her life. It's perfectly understandable that she'd be emotional. And noone is cool as a fucking cucumber every second of every day, despite what Hollywood, Naughty Dog and their likes would like you to believe. Every now and then people say silly and cringeworthy stuff. You call it awkward, I call it as close to reality as I've ever seen in a game.

As for her kissing all the pretty boys - there were only two. As rhodo said before me, shock and fucking gasp at a female seeking some comfort in her so far kinda shitty life.

Yea I've seen them, and maybe with the exception of Memento (which served the film's story and especially since the film makes it clear from the beginning), I feel that Pulp Fiction (to put an example)'s small stories could work well enough without the nonlnear story telling. I still stand by the story method in Beyond as cheating, it comes off to me as a decision that was made near the end of the development. I can see the defense for it, but it does leave perhaps one or two things to be desired... That and the fact that it somewhats puts a continuity error, when it puts the prologue at the end of the time line, even though it happens way earlier in the time line (which one of the levels does build up to). (NOTE: My mistake, started a new game to be sure, and the prologue was the point where she was talking about her life. My bad!)

I agree with you on the point of her kissing those boys, though... it is strange that one scene shows one of them taking her screaming away from Willem and cursing him off and hating him... only for the next scene to show that she now fancies him. Some may call it "we're only seen important moments of her life," but it falls a bit flat when the game suddenly tells us to dislike him one moment, then liking him the next

And Jodie... yea she is relatable, and if it weren't for that, I probably wouldn't have finished the game at all (the Indian section would have killed the game for me completely)

 

[Schadrach]

His Hobo-Love actually started way back in Fahrenheit, when he pulled a Hobo-Rebel-Force out of his ass to fight the mayans and the internet, 5 minutes before the ending.

Also obligatory "X is a failure of the game designer"-joke here.

The sad part about Farenheit was that is was actually not bad until the third act. Then came the third act, which I was expecting an "all a dream/the powerful hallucinogenics just wore off" reveal from. Unfortunately, that never came. Seriously, the third act could have been explained away as a hallucination and the plot would have made more sense. Think about that.

 

[Slash2x]

Well it can not be as bad as all that *checks Metacritic* see it has an 8.1 right now.... With 301 positive reveiwers, most of them giving it a 10........ Wait.... *checks an entire page of reviewers profiles* yeah they all have only one game on their review history.... ok the game dev is artificaily inflating the score.... Yeah fuck this game.

 

[mechalynx]

His Hobo-Love actually started way back in Fahrenheit, when he pulled a Hobo-Rebel-Force out of his ass to fight the mayans and the internet, 5 minutes before the ending.

Also obligatory "X is a failure of the game designer"-joke here.

The sad part about Farenheit was that is was actually not bad until the third act. Then came the third act, which I was expecting an "all a dream/the powerful hallucinogenics just wore off" reveal from. Unfortunately, that never came. Seriously, the third act could have been explained away as a hallucination and the plot would have made more sense. Think about that.

The sad part is that the third act would have made sense if the team had not run out of money 2/3 through. There were supposed to be a whole bunch of content explaining Lucas's resurrection and why he is not really a corpse (he is in the game). If I recall correctly around 1/4 of the game could not be completed due to money problems. I don't know if it's because they mismanaged the money or if they had unexpected expences during the development, but there you go.

Not an exuse for shoddy planning, but an explanation why the game looked the way it did. I remember getting so excited when starting it, with the sweet graphics and Cage's hard on for Angelo Badalamenti. And then you know what happened.

 

[Slash2x]

Well it can not be as bad as all that *checks Metacritic* see it has an 8.1 right now.... With 301 positive reveiwers, most of them giving it a 10........ Wait.... *checks an entire page of reviewers profiles* yeah they all have only one game on their review history.... ok the game dev is artificaily inflating the score.... Yeah fuck this game.

Are you quite sure?

Because the big Italian websites I come from all gave high scores to Beyond, and none of them is an inflated trick.

Actually.... scratch that. If you need metacritic to buy something, don't ever buy anything please.

Yeah...... I am going to keep going to metacritic and making informed descisions based upon the median score and seeing what the issues are. Instead of just throwing money randomly at games....

 

[MarsProbe]

I like Ellen Page, but I honestly can't tell if Yahtzee is criticizing her, or just can't remember the main character's name. Ah well, if I need a decent ghost game I can always dig out Geist.

Might be because all the promotional stuff I've seen for the game has made a big stink about having Ellen Page in the game. Like it is literally all that it says about it...

If you didn't know any better, you could probably be forgiven for thinking this was a film of some sort, given that the posters are extremely keen to tell you that this game has Real Actual Actors in it and that it was the "Official Selection" for the something-or-other festival.

I preferred Ellen Page in Super anyway. And Willem Dafoe, in, er, Family Guy, maybe?

 

[Cybylt]

As a woman, I am so very, very, very annoyed by comments like yours.

For once, I get a game in which I feel I actually am in the shoes of a female such a myself, and not in the shoes of some sexed-up male fantasy blowup doll. And now you come to say this game is soooo totally full of disgusting fetish.

Because really.... Catherine, Bayonetta, Ivy, they're all realistic women and not pandering fetishes. Let's be horrified by Jodie! She even dresses like a normal lady, and even dares to kiss boys! How does she dare to not pander to my entitled male privilege fantasies? She's an awful female character!

As for the photos of Ellen Page as a child. I would have done the exact same thing. When I'm developing a game which shows the main character as a child for an important part of the it, and I have to choose an actress for the role, I would definitely look up images of that person as a child. And then show them to the actress in the interview, while discussing her role.

This soooo makes me some kind of pervert fetishist, is it? Even if I'm a straight woman.

Then again, maybe I shouldn't get so pissed. After all, hate talk like this comes exactly from the game daring to stir up issues. It's the same reason you see so many people hating on anyone who calls out on gender issues.

First of all, Bayonetta was taking the piss out of all of the standard videogame female stuff. I am shocked at how much campy as all hell comedic approach flies over people's heads. You may as well try to say Red Dwarf was a serious and dramatic look at the future of mankind.

The others though, yeah pretty much, Catherine at least has the plot reason of being a succubus sent to tempt men into luring them to their demise... but still.

As for the problems with Beyond's romances - People aren't necessarily upset that she's kissing boys or that she's not filling into some fetish, it's that they're purported to be something substantial when they're not.

Spoilers ahead:

CIA Guy -

First time you see him, you're working for the CIA and he just says, "Get the job done." and you're at a party. Second time you see him it's during the training montage where he just nods approvingly in the background when you do stuff right.
In his third scene he's calling you an angsty brat and no amount of your whining will change the fact that he's dragging you from your like second adopted family. That scene immediately transitions to one where he's coming over and Jodie says she's falling for him and wants to impress him on their date.
It's implied that they're working relationship is the reason or something, but you dont' see any of it. There's a lot of tell and don't show which is the weakest style of writing for any visual media.
The man man goes from just straight calling you a brat and being cold, then to calling Jodie special at dinner and she can fuck him. Soon afterwards he sends her on assassination missions where he lies and emotionally manipulates Jodie into killing a democratically elected president for American interests.

Cut to their next date when he's apologetic, asking for forgiveness and if she's still made for it. Following that he says he loves her.

THOSE ARE THE ACTIONS OF AN ABUSIVE SOCIOPATH. Yet Beyond would have you believe he's the perfect gentlman and lover to Jodie.

Anyway, onto Romance two, the native american dude.

This guy doesn't even really have a character, you speak to him six or seven times and at the end you can choose to run off with him.

That one follows the Quantic method of the woman suddenly and without any indication completely falling for some guy she's had little to no interaction with. It's weak and shallow. But who cares, he's a swarthy handsome fellow, right?


Everything good about the game was the Willem Dafoe plot, and that's all shoved into the last act to make room for weak ass romance and the government trying to get into the ghost world for spirit oil to make stronger soldiers. And even that plot is gets screwed up with the native american demons bit at the end.

Going light on gameplay for the sake of plot and characterization is fine, just Quantum can't seem to help themselves from doing stupid, stupid plots with little to no actual character development.

 

[FFP2]

There's only one thing you need to know about this "game"... There's a bit of dialogue that goes like this:

Dafoe: It's over, Jodie.

Page: It's never over.

So yeah, fuck this terribly written, pretentious, plothole-ridden piece of shit.