Outstanding game. Easy recommend if you haven’t played it
It’s a great game, but not the masterpiece everyone told me.
Same.
The writing wastes a LOT of time. Yes, I get it, that’s the vibe they want to set, but the vibe was set like 5 minutes ago, and all you’ve done since is print synonyms for “drunk asshole.”
It’s also paraded as pro-communist media, and it really isn’t at all. People are so capitalist-brained, that any game which places communism and capitalism on equal footing, pointing out the faults in both and mocking them relentlessly, is somehow “pro-communist.” In particular, the games plot-relevant example of a die-hard communist is not someone to aspire to. Neither are the capitalists or fascists, but that’s kind of the point: it’s hard to say it supports any political viewpoint when it shits on everyone fairly equally.
Honestly, I wanted and expected a lot more out of it. Particularly in the ending.
Though it was absolutely worth the playthrough. It’s a fantastic game, just not this pinnacle of writing the way the internet plays it off to be.
The game was made by communists, and they do make fun of themselves and other communists a lot and try to be even handed with the satire. That being said, if you’ve completed all four political vision quests you do notice how pro-communist the authors are. I always recommend people do the communist path on their first playthrough, because it is the political quest that injects a necessary piece of hope into the game. It feels almost like the “canon” choice considering how well it balances out certain other elements of the story.
Communist vision quest spoilers
Not only do you have some gorgeous lines in the book club about their motivations, like:
“I guess you could say we believe it because it’s impossible.” He looks at the scattered matchboxes on the ground. “It’s our way of saying we refuse to accept that the world has to remain… like this…”
But then the scene also ends with irrefutable proof that infra-materialism works. Ideas can change the world if you believe in them.
