Deadly Premonition pt.5
Posted on Mon 23 January 2012 • Tagged with Video Games
To be honest I was tempted to start this post with the same “Welcome back to Let’s play Deadly Premonition” that supergreatfriend always used in his videos. Though I figured that a) might be kind of mean and b) I already did that in the last post. Anyway I’ve returned with another bunch of typed out notes. Frankly I’m already quite fed up putting these into long form but on the other hand I’m not particularly inclined to let my notes go to waste.
Scenes
Forced to Fishing
There’s this one scene where the game introduces one of its bonus mini games via a forced sequence in which you have no other possibility than use the fishing mini game. At least not if you want to advance the story since this is one of the game’s few linear passages.
True to his style however York does not simply fish for fish. And no, neither is he fishing for compliments. Agent York fishes for stolen files which are more to his taste than Emily’s cooking are needed to investigate further.
York’s Car
It would’ve been a cool idea to use a functional GPS system in York’s car considering that the game is using an ingame map as well as a minimap and there is a GPS already in the car. To use that as a nice replacement for the minimap while driving might have been a little weird in terms of usability but a nice touch nevertheless instead of putting a static image on the screen of the navigation system.
Subs
The subs were mismatched at one point near the ending. That just shouldn’t happen. At least, it shouldn’t unless it’s done to be funny, but I still think that mismatching subs - even for the sake of humor - shouldn’t be in a game. They are distracting, not helpful for a person not fluent in the language and way worse for the hearing impaired playing game.
Hunting Statues
You see, during the otherworldly visit of Mr. Steward’s mansion the whole rifle holding statues could’ve been used for something. I admit that it might have been quite hard to fit that into the game’s lore but I have an image in my mind of these statues shooting shadows or something the like. Deus ex Machina.
Evil birds
Of course no Twin Peaks based horror game seems to be complete without the Hitchcockian evil birds. Honestly I don’t know what to make of them. Do they scare you? No. Are they relevant to the plot? No. Are they annoying as hell? Yes. I mean, look at Alan Wake. They subverted this point during the DLC by transforming the birds into actual book pages. I’m still impressed by the idea whenever I think back.
Hold your breath!
It’s a real pity that you only get to understand why holding your breath is helpful against the dead so late in the game. It’s not a terribly good explanation but it’s an acceptable one. At least for a fictional game.
Cigarette scent
I’m no expert concerning dogs and their abilities. I do however doubt that an ordinary dog which is not trained to be looking for missing persons is able to pick up a scent from a burned down cigarette butt. No offense here but I just don’t believe so. Basically the own smell of the cigarette might be what the dog will be looking for (IF he will be looking for something) but not the personal scent of the person who’s been smoking the cigarette.
Hidden Specials within Hidden Specials
One thing that is way more common among console games than PC games is hidden unlockable content. Now I’m not talking about content which is already on the disk and only has to be unlocked via the one time use of a card packaged with the game. I’m talking about content which has to be unlocked the old school way: By achieving certain things in the game. The great thing about Deadly Premonition is though that there’s even unlockables with in the unlockables. Color me impressed.
Quotes
- “We’ve found a way to keep your pot really warm, Sigourney.” - sgf after obtaining the flame thrower
- “Here we are and there’s a flashlight that doesn’t exist.” - sgf
- “Was that a chainsaw Keith had? Probably still mad we took his guitar” - sgf
Again, I’d like to say a big thank you to supergreatfriend who’s done a superb job on the LP playing, filming and posting the videos for about 6 months. Also I’m pretty sure by now Agent York’s favorite video game is the Guitar Hero franchise.
Next time when I’m talking about Deadly Premonition: The lessions that can be learned.
Deadly Premonition pt.5 is part 5 of Deadly Premonition (Let's Play):