Editorial: They will remember that

They will remember that

          You know what’s cool? Choose-your-own-adventure books. As a kid, I was all about these. I loved how there were different ways the story could end, and I loved going back and reading through them over and over to take different paths and see where they’d lead me.

          As games evolve, we’ve seen them use more and more aspects from these books. Now it’s commonplace for a game to have a dialogue wheel, and even occasionally choices that will change the flow of the game. We’ve seen games like Until Dawn, Undertale, Life is Strange, and pretty much every installment from Telltale Games do this.

          Last week, thanks to YouTuber ProJared, I discovered and played through a little-known indie game from 2013 called Moirai. The game is incredibly short (it can be beaten in about 2 minutes if you know what you’re doing), very simplistic, but it begs replay just to see how different the game will be each time.

          See, beneath its retro graphics and Doom-style controls, Moirai holds a secret. Towards the end of the game, you meet a farmer covered in blood, who you interrogate. After hearing his answers, you decide whether to kill or spare him. A minute later, you’re presented with a similar choice, but one that ends up covering you in blood no matter what your answer is. Then, finally, you meet with another farmer, who asks you the same questions you asked earlier.

          This is when the twist comes in. Your answers to the questions are saved, and the next person who plays the game will decide whether to kill you or not. You are e-mailed your fate every time, and it’s interesting to see the results of your different actions.

          Moirai is completely free on Steam, and I’d recommend it if it sounds like an interesting concept to you. I feel like this could be the start of something really interesting.

          While the choices in Moirai really don’t have any consequence (it’s more of an experiment than a game), there are games out there that bend their story entirely to your will. Sometimes your choices will prove to be completely arbitrary, with the same ending every time, like in Minecraft: Story Mode. Other times every little decision you make will follow you to the end, with several different endings, like in Undertale.

          But the thing is, as people have said, it’s hard for developers to add choice to games. Why program something that only half of the players will see, especially if the ending is the same every time? I feel like we sort of saw this in Uncharted 4. In that game, every once in a while you’d get a dialogue wheel where you could choose what Nate said next. This had no impact on the plot whatsoever, and at the end of the game it felt like a weird thing that was just sort of there.

          In the end, as much as I love choice, I feel like there’s really a time and place to allow the player to dictate where the story goes. In Until Dawn, it works because the game is smaller and built entirely around choice. But if you added choice to a story focused game like Uncharted, it might not go over as well, because of how large the game is, and how much programming it would take to do that.

          Personally, I have high hopes that Detroit: Become Human will be the next evolution of choice based games (although it is a David Cage game). I love getting to choose my own path, even if the end goal is always the same. I feel like you build a stronger bond with characters if you’re the one deciding their fate.

Song of the Week

          This week I’ve chosen It’s Raining Somewhere Else from Undertale. I just finished replaying it, and the scene where this song plays really sticks out in my mind, during your dinner date with Sans. If you haven’t listened to this phenomenal soundtrack or played the equally fantastic game yet, what are you waiting for!?