Quantic Dream’s upcoming Beyond: Two Souls might not have everything in common with Heavy Rain – the story extends through 15 years; our protagonist, Jodie Holmes, explores connections to the afterlife as well as the physical world; and the action, judging from the gameplay footage released so far, has been markedly magnified – but the two share at least one common thread: David Cage’s desire to immerse players in another life.
And in life we only get one playthrough.
That’s the logos behind the director’s latest comments to Videogamer, where he suggested that gamers play Beyond: Two Souls once – and then never again. It was the same prescription Cage gave years ago for Heavy Rain: Decision making and choice are great. They allow players the freedom to chart their own course through a character’s life. But just how could that illusion, that sense of real connection with the path we choose, possibly hold up if we explore every conclusion in a multi-ending story?
“It’s the same approach as for Heavy Rain: Play it once and then don’t replay it. You can if you want, but I think the best way to experience the game is really to make choices and then never know what would have happened if you’d made a different choice. Because life is like this, and Beyond is the life of Jodie Holmes.
“For me, it’s more interesting to have players defining the life of Jodie – this is your version of the life of Jodie. And you can talk to other people and see their versions, and compare what you did, what you missed, what you saw, but never know what would have happened if… I think that’s the beauty of the thing.”
And we’ve heard before how seriously Cage is approaching Beyond’s weighty themes. The director was inspired to write the story of Jodie Holmes after losing a close relative, and in the interview he explains how the game is driven by the concept of explaining what comes after death, albeit outside of religion:
“Death is something really strange. I mean, you have the concept of death when no-one around you has died, and you understand that it’s very sad. But when you lose someone close, you have a totally different approach to it. Suddenly it takes on a whole different light. I have never been very interested in religions, I just say that they are nice theories. And one day I was thinking about what death could be, without religions, without God sitting on a cloud, or whatever. Can we have another explanation for that? This is what drove me to write Beyond.”
For most gamers, however, deciding whether or not Beyond deserves another playthrough will likely be harder than Cage lets on. Because at the end of the day let’s face it: the game is still with us, still staring us down from the shelf or the coffee table.
The replay choice is easy for an engaging singular narrative like Assassin’s Creed, a sports simulator like Madden, or game devoid of storytelling altogether such as Words with Friends – but is it really worth knowing “what could have been” in a Mass Effect, Heavy Rain… or Beyond?
Beyond: Two Souls releases in early 2013, exclusively for the PlayStation 3.
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Follow me on Twitter @Brian_Sipple.
Source: Videogamer
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soo, don’t buy it, just rent it… or charge $10 for it because heavy rain was crap.
crap b/c the story had meaning and you weren’t mindlessly killing everything in your path right pft typical current gen gamer. go back to your call of duties and gears of war, the gaming industry is stuck at spoon-feeding trashy shooters to gamers b/c of sad degenerates like you that dont want to have their minds tested or to think beyond ‘what should i shoot next’.
on topic:
he obviously doesn’t use the internet that much b/c if he did then he would know that it doesn’t matter how many times you play a multi-ending game, the internet will always ruin any and everything thanks to eternal life sucker referred to as youtube
For one, while the Gears story isn’t on par with Heavy Rain, I was still emotionally involved with the story. Hell, anyone sticking with the story for 5 years like I did would have welled up at a few parts of the third game. It may not be on par with your games, your highness, but I wouldn’t fit it into the same category as Call of Duty either.
As for another thing, I can understand why he says Heavy Rain is crap. Video games are supposed to be fun, correct? Hell, GAMES are supposed to be fun, right? David Cage said before that he is not interested in making Beyond: Two Souls a fun game. If a game isn’t fun, why make it a game? Why not just produce an interactive movie instead? Why call it a game? If he called it an “interactive experience,” that’d be okay, but the fact is that games are played for fun (unless you’re in Jigsaw’s traps), and the creator of this game specifically said it’s not supposed to be fun. So yes, I can understand someone not liking this game or Heavy Rain. You’re too uninformed and closed minded to get that though.
you contradicted yourself by saying you felt emotional during gears of war 3 but play games for fun.
im not going to buy or rent the game cause its going to suck
I’ll just rent it then.
The gamer in me won’t allow me to play only once.
It is a game and I want to know every possible outcome………………
I can spend ten bucks on a movie and be okay with seeing it once, but don’t expect me to buy a sixty dollar game and play it once. Does this guy even understand that his “ideal” makes no sense?
Soooo, zero replay value then. Gotcha.
Can someone PLEASE tell me what is going on with game the gaming industry and HORRIBLE marketing lately? THis is the fifth article in the last month where someone at a developer has come out and said the exact wrong thing to say in order to increase sales. Are they getting so egotistical thast they think that can say anything that comes to mind and not see fallout from it, or did none of these guys take marketing classes alongside thier programming and coding courses? Marketing divisions across the industry must be losing thier minds trying to compensate for all this completely unthought out commentary on yet to release games.
I feel sorry for the Marketing guys behind Beyond Two Souls because now they have to come up with a marketing plan that counters “This game is only worth playing once because if you play for the other endings you’ll just not care for the game as much.”
“Can someone PLEASE tell me what is going on with game the gaming industry and HORRIBLE marketing lately?”
There will be questions or comments like this every generation, THAT will never change. Each new generation will accept what they’ve grown into and then claim the industry has gone to sh*t once it changes. The new generation after will rinse and repeat.
Adapt or die.
Whatdoes adapting and changing have to do with poorly made comments? Your statement has nothing to do with what i was asking. I can understand if Iasked why do modern games suck, but i didn’t. I asked whyis marketing getting worse? it has nothing to do with adaptation or change.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hfYJsQAhl0
Loosely related, one thought led to another.