What happens after death, what is there in the beyond? These are the questions that Quantic Dream's new title tries to ask. Beyond Two Souls is an incredibly beautiful game with a very beautiful and emotional storyline with a few surprising twists thrown into the mix. Is this game really worth your time? Well... it really depends on what your looking for these days in gaming. If you expect some AAA gameplay in this game, its not here (The Last of Us is a great alternative of storyline and gameplay). Also if you hated David Cage's previous title Heavy Rain due to the QTE's and slow gameplay then chances are you won't like this title either, this is stuff you should expect in a Quantic Dream game.
Beyond tells a story of girl named Jodie Holmes through her life ages 8 23. All her life she is attached to an entity named Aiden that protects her throughout the entirety of her life she tries to understand her entity's purpose here and understanding more on what lies beyond. This game is purely made for its story and the story here is exceptional, in addition, the performances by Ellen Page as Jodie Holmes and William Defoe as Nathan Hawkins are both amazing. The storyline here doesn't have as many plot holes like Heavy Rain does so that's relief. The story is very emotional and even more so with Heavy Rain and touches on a lot of sensitive subjects such as death, losing loved ones, and reconnecting with those we have lost (which I'm sure will make many shed some tears, I sure as hell did). It has an awesome plot that will keep you hooked for hours until the very end. However the only problem I had with the story was the way it is told. The game starts out in medias res and from there the story starts to jump around the place. For example, you would start out with Jodie in her childhood then jump into her in the military, then back to a kid, then teen and then suddenly you're wanted by the police. I kind of understand what kind of direction David Cage is going for doing a Tarantino style of direction, but all that does is make the story a little bit inconsistent. The connections between the story line is comprehensive yet I feel that the story being told in a linear format would've been a lot concise.
Beyond Two Souls was meant to be played as an experience and not for its pulse pounding gameplay which I'm not sure why people expect this from someone like David Cage. You have everything you expect from a game like this: linear structure, QTE's and button prompts to do certain thing around you. My favorite addition and mostly everyone else's favorite addition to the gameplay has to be Aiden. You are able to switch between Jodie and Aiden at any time during the game and as Aiden you are free to travel through matter, move objects, possess things and even suffocate people. This leads to test your morales in this game, for example, I was given a choice to get back at some kids that were bullying me. You have the option to get revenge or simply stay out of it. I chose to get revenge, while it was power inducing at first, let's just say there were a couple fatal and unfortunate events that have occurred. Even with Aiden's freedom you can't travel too far or else it hurts Jodie because of the entity connection and all that (I guess everything had its limits, right). Also the quick time events have been changed, everything has been moved to the right stick of the controller. The scheme is that you follow Jodie's movements with the right stick. At times it is hard to tell where Jodie is moving at time and can be frustrating for some but it didn't bother me the least because even if you fail all the QTE's the story still goes on. Since this is a Quantic Dream game, your actions can affect the entire story so there is some replay value within if you're interested in finding out what happens in another way of playing the game. There are also confirmed 12 different ways you can end this game (which is the same amount in Heavy Rain) and if you're a trophy hunter, good luck with a lot of playthroughs and grinding.
If you pre-ordered this game at Gamestop (or wherever you pre-order your games) you were promised to receive extra content, right. Yes we did let's list what we got: Additional gameplay, PS3 Theme, Avatars, and a Soundtrack (containing four songs, umm....) kind of a lackluster pre-order if you ask me and the soundtrack while beautiful and haunting but really...only four songs. I remember in heavy rain there were at least sixteen songs and that's four times the amount than in Beyond. I expected a bit more from my pre-order other than a steelbook case.
Overall, Beyond Two Souls is well polished game with only a few bugs and texture pop-ins that isn't enough to break me out of the experience. Amazing and emotional story, memorable characters and haunting score. If you love games with a rich emotional story, I recommend Beyond Two Souls.
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I plan to make it big as an entertainment reviewer / critic, much love would be appreciated. :D
