For this week’s Jumping the Shark, we’re coming at you with Holly’s on the ground reports from this year’s PAX Prime. There was drama. There were new announcements! Except, no. No, there was none of that. But she was there and she’s here to rap with us about it, also chicken pot pie! Later in the episode Todd ducks for cover under heavy threat of Satellite Reign and Brandon gets his horror show on with the PS4 exclusive, Until Dawn.
Thanks for listening! (You can contact Brandon at [email protected]/@misterbinky, Todd at Tod[email protected]/@toddsfoolery and Holly at @winnersusedrugs.)
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I had to duck out at the start of the Until Dawn conversation just in case of spoilers, but now that I’ve finished I can come back and agree with everything Brandon said. It’s harrowing in a way that very few games achieve. Things you say, things you see, and the forks you choose to explore in Chapter 2 may have ramifications that won’t be clear until Chapter 5. Some could be knocked out of play by other decisions further down the line — I had two Butterfly Effect panels that terminated at the first wing, while others laid out a chain of events that played out over half the story.
The stat screen for each character constantly measures things like how Brave and Funny you’re making them. Is it better to be Charitable or Curious? My personal theory is that the baseline marker is there as a clue for how each individual will best navigate the narrative, but considering that like five of my characters had their Honesty bars completely drained at different points, I may not be an authority on the subject.
I also have to echo Brandon’s comment about the ease of armchair quarterbacking the decisions of horror movie characters from behind your popcorn bucket. Everyone thinks they’re the Survival Girl, but when you’re in the thick of it, the choice between “Run” and “Hide” isn’t so intuitive.
My final tally was four survivors and four fatalities…two because I sincerely started to panic near the end. Those DON’T MOVE! segments, with the controller pulsing in your hands like a human heart, will suck the oxygen right out of your veins.
I absolutely adored Until Dawn. I hope it’s a enormous success for the developer so they can continue to evolve this breed of storytelling, and I’m really looking forward to hearing what Todd thinks when he plays it too!