I beat DEADLY PREMONITION tonight and made the confident announcement that it was, barring any last-minute wonders, very much my Game of the Year for 2010. It won’t be everyone’s Game of the Year for 2010 by any means, for various reasons. But personally speaking, it’s very much the most satisfying gaming experience I’ve had all year. Which is nice.
Throughout the course of this post, I am going to spoil the crap out of the game, so if you haven’t beaten it and are intending to, you may wish to skip this one. If you have no intention of beating the game, feel free to stick around. And if you have beaten the game, you’re probably in a similar position to me right now.
I can pin down DEADLY PREMONITION‘s appeal to me on a personal level very simply. It takes elements from two of my favourite game series of all time—Silent Hill and Persona—and blends them together to produce a game which skitters precariously along the boundary between madness and sanity and somehow doesn’t ever completely fall into the trap of “indecipherable nonsense”.
First, the Persona angle. DEADLY PREMONITION‘s world of the town of Greenvale is a well-realised one. As you progress through the game, you get to know the layout of the town and the routines of its residents. You also get to know each and every one of the residents throughout the course of the story. If you choose to take on the 50 “side missions”, then you get to know many of the characters very well indeed. This is just like Persona‘s Social Link system: optional material which fleshes out the game world and its characters enormously. If you take your time to enjoy this material, then events which occur later in the story take on much greater emotional significance as you really “know” the people concerned. It also means that when the time finally comes to say goodbye to Greenvale at the end of the game, it’s a difficult thing to do.
Next, the Silent Hill angle. It becomes very apparent early in the game that protagonist Francis York Morgan is not all he seems. For starters, he spends a huge amount of his time conversing with someone you can’t see named Zach. For much of the game, it seems that “Zach” is a cypher through which York can communicate directly with the player. Indeed, it certainly seems that way when York asks a question of Zach and it’s up to the player to choose Zach’s response.
But the wonderful thing about DEADLY PREMONITION‘s story is that we get to know York very well as the narrative progresses. It becomes apparent that he is scarred mentally by something terrible which happened in his past—his father killing his mother, and then himself. As the investigation into the murders in Greenvale proceeds, it becomes apparent to York why this incident took place. He accepts why his father did it when he is put into the exact same situation—the person he loves is “soiled” with the red seeds the murderer is so obsessed with. With this acceptance, York also admits who he really is—he is Zach, and York is the dual personality he invented to deal with the situation, not the other way around.
York’s mental scars show themselves in other ways, too—any time he begins profiling the killer and tracking down clues with which to determine what happened, he lapses into a dark “Other World”, much like Dark Silent Hill. It’s never explained exactly why this happens, but my belief upon beating the game is that the things seen as York and Zach aren’t to be taken literally. We can tell this by the fact that Zach fights a giant, monstrous version of Kaysen at the end of the game as the town’s iconic clock tower lies in ruins, yet when everything gets back to “normal”, the clock tower is perfectly intact. Similarly, after fighting George as a giant, muscular “immortal” monster, he dies as a normal man. My guess is that York and Zach view these monstrous people simply as monsters, perhaps to distance him/themself from their “humanity”. This is also borne out by the fact that when York visits Diane’s art gallery with George and Emily and Greenvale apparently becomes “Other Greenvale”, they don’t comment on it at all—because they don’t see it.
Of course, a question is raised when Emily has to rescue York from the clock tower—she sees the Other World and the creatures. Why? Is it because she has come to understand and love York and is seeing things the way he does? Perhaps. The fact that this isn’t explained may be unsatisfying to some people, but I like the fact that there are some questions which are open to interpretation.
I could be wrong about all of this, of course. I’m sure there’s plenty of interpretations all over the web by now—I haven’t looked at them yet. But the fact that a game offers such scope for discussion and interpretation is admirable.
Deep part over. Let’s also talk about some of the quirky things that make DEADLY PREMONITION such a memorable game. For one, the music. There are several points throughout the game where the only rational explanation for the choice of music is to be as inappropriate as possible. Take, for example, Emily following the dog Willie to track down the missing York. This sequence is accompanied by what can only be described as Latino J-hip-hop-electronica. Somehow it works.
By far the most striking use of bizarre music, though, is a flashback sequence where the player controls the Raincoat Killer, who is running through the town of Greenvale slaughtering anyone who gets in his way with a gigantic axe. The musical accompaniment to this scene? A really quite beautiful version of Amazing Grace. The juxtaposition between the music and the horrors taking place on screen actually ends up being profoundly emotional, and sets the tone for the last part of the game, which is a veritable rollercoaster of drama and emotion.
I think my favourite thing, though, is that despite the fact the game appears to be a horror/crime story, there’s a convincing love story element to it, too. The growing feelings between York (or, specifically, Zach) and Emily throughout the course of the game is handled incredibly well. The love story reaches its peak just as Emily is killed, making what could have been a ridiculous scene—she pulls a whole tree out of her stomach, for heaven’s sake—one with considerable impact and shock value, and one which spurs the player, York and Zach on to see the whole debacle through to its conclusion. It’s also refreshing to see a game which isn’t afraid to end some of its story threads in tragedy for principal characters.
I could rabbit on about this game for hours, but at a little over 1,000 words I’ll end that there. Several members of The Squadron of Shame are interested in recording a special DEADLY PREMONITION podcast at some point. If you’ve beaten it and you’re interested in joining us for some discussion (I’m looking at you, Raze, Schilling) then let me know and perhaps you can be a special guest. You can also drop by the Squawkbox and share your thoughts there, too.
So with that, then, it’s back to Fallout: New Vegas as the next entry in the Pile of Shame, I believe I said.
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Emily seeing the zombies actually really disappointed me. It’s the only part that doesn’t really’work’ with the metaphorical interpretation (which is otherwise 100% accurate, as far as I’m concerned). And obviously there’s the whole ‘original raincoat killer’ stuff, which if Kaysen and Harry are to be believed, is definitely supernatural in origin. Plus there’s a photo of Kaysen from 50 years ago, at the end, and he looks the same, but those (and the flashback to Zach’s parents’ death) are all seen from the perspective of York/Zach so could mean something else. The only other possibility is that when you’re playing as Emily, you’re still really Zach, and he’s just imagining what she’s doing, rather than it being an actual account of events.
Also, did you notice when Kaysen is telling Emily about his past, all the stories he tells about himself are just paraphrased versions of the other Greenvale inhabitants’ stories?
Oh yeah, who do you think was the original Raincoat Killer?
Hmm. That’s a tricky one. Could it perhaps have been Harry? He was there at the time, and he knew all about what happened back then. Perhaps he bought up the town and helped York/Zach to try and atone for the past. Harry appears in York/Zach’s dreams, too, suggesting there’s some sort of connection there too.
I couldn’t say for sure. There’s a scene I’d need to check again to be sure, but Harry certainly seems to fit time-wise if nothing else.
Myself and Lewis had the theory that Harry killed his father that night and took over the persona of the Raincoat Killer from his father in order to stop the madness, but due to the fact he killed townsfolk on the way, glossed this bit over. This would explain why he says his story wasn’t 100% true as well. So I reckon it was both of them, but Harry when you’re playing as him.
Could well be. Interesting theory. The killing townsfolk thing is optional, remember—it’s up to the player to choose whether or not to give in to those primal urges and kill people. In that way, it’s reflecting the Raincoat Killer’s struggle to control his murderous urges in an interactive sense—when in fact, he’s trying to stop what’s going on.
On that page I linked to (http://planetredwood.webs.com/endgameqaspoilers.htm for anyone else reading) I really like the idea of the story being told from the perspective of an unreliable narrator. It’s a really interesting way to explore the game.
What would have been potentially interesting would have been a New Game+ mode where you’re Zach all the way through seeing things as they REALLY happened, though that would undermine some of the main parts of Morgan’s story.