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.
We're coming up on holiday season. If you're American, it's already started with Thanksgiving. And you know what that means if you're a gamer: Steam sales.
I've been somewhat short of what one might call "victories" recently. In fact, most of my endeavours for the last I-don't-know-how-long-now have ended in what could politely be called failure. As such, I've been in a bit of a funk recently, getting very tired of… well, everything, really.
As I have mentioned once or twice previously, the Xbox LIVE Indie Games Marketplace is a veritable treasure-trove of unappreciated hidden gems of gaming.
Somehow I don't think that anyone who is reading this blog will fall into the category that I'm about to talk about, but I'll direct this at everyone generally just in case.
Nearly everyone I've spoken to has had an absolutely terrible day today. If you are one of those people who has had a terrible day, I offer my sympathies, condolences, fistbumps, high fives, whattups, hugs, manly nipple tweaks or cock-punches (take your pick) and understand entirely if you're currently feeling a bit less-than-optimum.
Ladies and gentlemen, we are afflicted with a plague of the Information Age. The plague of "Google/the search bar is your friend". A plague of laziness, if you will, as this is a catch-all response which makes it look like you're being vaguely helpful and/or knowledgeable when in fact all you're doing is being an arrogant asshole and trying to get out of answering a question as quickly as possible.
How much time do you think you waste every year waiting for things to happen? Whether it's waiting for the phone to ring, the response to an email, the answer to a question, an alarm to go off, someone to call you into their office or for your delicious improvised curry sauce to thicken, chances are you spend a good proportion of your time waiting for things to happen or for other people to do things.
My brother was good enough to send me a copy of the new Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit. It arrived this morning and I've spent a fair amount of time putting it through its paces today. I shall now share my thoughts for the benefit of those of you considering it.
I was watching a programme called It's Only A Theory the other night. It's an entertaining and thought-provoking show hosted by Andy Hamilton and Reginald D Hunter in which they bring on a series of experts, get them to argue the case for their theory then make an arbitrary ruling on whether to accept or reject it.
Someone had "tipped off" Hot Topic that "Rage Guy" was actually a racist comic featuring a guy called "Race Guy" and promptly set about creating a lengthy back catalogue of racist comics. Hot Topic, as a company in the public eye, did the only thing that they could do in the situation—withdrew the stock.
As mildly amusing as all this was, it goes some distance to showing that user-generated media is probably never going to topple properly-produced, accredited and protected media. Both will undoubtedly exist side by side. But while the children of the Internet fight over what is "theirs", play childish pranks on each other, throw their toys out of their respective prams and call each other "faggots", the professionals will continue doing their thing, the same as they've always done, and be paid accordingly. Those with nothing better to do will tear each others' eyes out over who came up with the concept of producing shitty comics in MS Paint first.