Platform: Playstation 3 exclusive
Released: Oct. 8
Developer: Quantic Dream
Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment
Grade: B
The first few minutes of Beyond Two Souls are proof that David Cage has finally created the opus he has always talked about - making a video game seem like an interactive movie. But the game rarely lives up to its potential.
Beyond Two Soulsis the tale of Jodie Holmes (Ellen Page, Juno) and Aiden, a paranormal entity that has been tethered to her since birth. The game takes place over the course of 15 years and follows Jodie from her traumatic childhood - where Aiden torments her -to her adult life, where she controls her paranormal protector.
Her transformation from adolescence to adulthood is told through a series of non-linear vignettes, which jump around through different stages of her life. The first 10 minutes of the game follows a very young Jodie as she performs a series of tests using Aiden to spy on someone in another room, but then it jumps to her as an adult where she is helping a CIA operative uncover hidden documents in a sheik's mansion.
Despite being reminiscent of Heavy Rain - David Cage and Quantic Dream's previous endeavor - Beyond Two Souls offers an entirely unique, dark, deep and emotional experience with its own set of problems.
The story is laid out on a timeline, with each chapter marking an important moment within Jodie's life. Although the way in which the story unfolds is a bit confusing at first, it creates an experience that is engaging from start to finish. Beyond Two Souls' narrative also provides a refreshing take on how story and narrative within video games can be developed.
Unfortunately, the lack of any linear structure within the story often undermines the game's heavy emphasis on choices and consequences. Unlike in Heavy Rain, which progressed in a linear fashion and made the effects of each decision immediately clear, Beyond Two Souls' structure facilitates a narrative in which decisions feel forgettable and arbitrary at times.
The only sense of an immediate impact on the story comes in the form of interacting with other characters. Conversation and interactions can have a significant impact on how any vignette unfolds, but not on the overall story; interactions become an experiment in pushing the boundaries and limits of each situation.
As the game progresses, Jodie faces increasingly dramatic and important decisions that have a tremendous impact on the story. The player, however, won't realize what the impacts of the choices are until the untimely ending of the game.
Just like its predecessor, Beyond Two Souls features a multitude of endings and will require many play-throughs to discover how each ending is reached.
In a similar fashion to character interactions, controlling Aiden can become another experiment in testing the game's boundaries. There are parts of the game in which you can play poltergeist and terrorize people. These are some of the most enjoyable moments in the game, especially because the player can make Aiden go far beyond what Jodie tells him to do.
As Aiden, players can manipulate objects, possess or strangle various people or simply travel through walls to explore. The boundaries of what Aiden can do and how he interacts with Jodie become some of the most interesting aspects of the game. Because he plays such a vital role, it's annoying that control of Aiden is often taken away in service of the plot.
Unlike controlling Aiden, controlling Jodie can feel cumbersome and slow. White dots on the screen indicate points of interests, while button presses control actions and dialogue. Although the majority of the controls work well, the quick-time events (QTEs) do not.
QTEs in Beyond Two Souls occur during combat; the game slows down and the player must press the analog stick in a way that matches the motion of Jodie's body. If she is kicking toward her right, then you move the stick right, but if you move it the wrong way she gets hit.
The problem with this system is it feels like a contrived way of prolonging the player's interest, especially when it isn't always clear what direction the player needs to move the analog stick to get the correct response. That being said, the QTEs bring a lot of tension into the experience.
Visually, Beyond Two Souls is one of the most impressive looking games of this console generation. The meticulous detail brought into the game's world keeps it feeling realistic, despite the paranormal events that occur throughout the game.
It's impossible to play the game without noticing the unparalleled voice acting and character animations by Page and Willem Dafoe (Odd Thomas) - who plays a father-like figure to Jodie who studies her from a young age.
As a whole, Beyond Two Souls is an exceptional technical achievement in game development, but it feels like a missed opportunity to break new ground. Although the game delivers on the emotional weight of its story and has a refreshing take on narrative structure, it hardly outweighs the shortcomings of its plot and controls.
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