Telling Lies

It's not a perfect game by any means. The ending sequence is cringeworthy, and I couldn't connect with the main character - he was so annoying at the beginning. Immortality is better on all fronts. Still, I liked my time with this one. Not many games make watching "cutscenes" the core mechanic while keeping some real player agency. Can't wait to see what Sam Barlow does next!

Нас пытаются заинтересовать необычностью сюжета, разнообразностью сцен и персонажей, что добавляет некоторой динамичности, в отличие от предыдущей игры, Her Story, где все сцены были интервью с одной актрисой. Но здесь жирный минус в том, что сцены составлены из диалога между двумя персонажами, причём показывают нам только одного отдельно от другого, сцены с которой мы должны найти, и поэтому большую их часть мы должны смотреть как один слушает пустоту, и это, мягко говоря, не впечатляет, особенно когда по другую сторону экрана сочится неведанный монолог. Первая игра была неограниченной по времени и с неочевидным концом, а здесь всё делается в скором порядке на время, что мы обнаруживаем внезапно, когда игра заканчивается ни с того, ни с сего. В общем, суть как в первой игре, только другой сюжет с другими персонажами, фрагментарный с многим лишним, но чуть привлекательнее, чем в первой игре. Здесь хотя бы мы увидим чем заканчивается ложь. 3,0/5,0

I loved this. It's making some small mechanic changes from Her Story to build on those mechanics and hit on what this game is doing differently: where that game was focused on diving into one person's story, this one is interested in how one person's story entangles with the stories of others. Thoughts on mechanics for this and Her Story that aren't exactly spoilers since you find them out early, but I think the discovery of those mechanics is worth experiencing fresh: [spoiler] With Her Story, if a text string was found in a video and it was one of the first 5 videos with that text match, that unlocked the video and put you in at the start of it. The videos themselves were mostly very short (usually under 45s) and in series, based on a premise that someone had already sliced up the larger videos into meaningful small segments, so the challenge was in figuring out terms that would be repeated or emergent later in the story, and finding your way into less common text strings to dig later. The mechanics push you to find out what happens next, and to find the details in between what you know. With Telling Lies the text string search and first 5 video cutoff is still present, but the videos are whole segments in the form of one side of two-sided calls, and intentional recordings (usually 3-5 minutes, some nearing 10 minutes); searching for a particular piece of text jumps you to that part of the video where it is present, allowing you to backtrack and fast forward within that video for context (something I missed at first, oops). What's new is that you're usually looking at one side of a call, getting the hints on how to find the other side. The mechanics best equip you to find out other people's perspectives; finding out what happens next and in between is also there, happening along the way. The way you think about likely useful search terms has to be changed a bit.[/spoiler] A non-spoilered mechanics note for this game, because I started this assuming the mechanics were identical to Her Story: in this game you can rewind a video to before your start point, and fast-forward through the points where no one is talking. Yes, it would be nice to one-click jump to the start of the video, but I think the absence of such a feature highlights that [spoiler]the point here isn't to unlock a series of videos like in Her Story; it's to sift through those videos for the important parts, and not all of what you'll see is important[/spoiler]. As with many sequels, if you're looking for exactly the same game but more, this isn't it. It's definitely doing different things. If you liked the mechanics of the first and are flexible to those different things then I think this is rewarding, and the rest comes down to how much the story and characters compel you to learn more.

Deixou a desejar. Após ter me apaixonada pelo primeiro jogo do desenvolvedor Sam Barlow, Her Story. Mal pude esperar para jogar este jogo. Um jogo maior, com mecânicas melhores, atores famosos etc. Mas, maior não quer dizer que é melhor. Achei decepcionante... faltou algo, não sei explicar. Mas, eram muitas histórias e personagens, nem todos eram interessantes. Depois de zerar o jogo, eu estava aliviado e sem desejo nenhum de jogar novamente para conseguir outros zeramentos. Diferente do primeiro jogo que até hoje é o único jogo que fiz questão de ter 100% das conquistas.

Exclente história, o modelo de jogo, amei, perdi uns dois anos de vida com o sustão que tomei [spoiler] quando ele levou o tiro! [/spoiler] Mas é insuportável conseguir a palavra do minuto 7 do vídeo de 8 minutos, voltar tudo de forma absurdamente lenta pra depois descobrir que o video não acrescentou nada.

Tbh I get the frustration with the rewind system. No question about it, they could've made it a bit more functional. However, right here in the reviews there is a person who made a perfectly functional plugin that allows you to skip videos back and forth in one click. Should the devs have made that? Absolutely, but we all know that no game is perfect and that's why modmakers exist :D Now, with that out of the way, I will say that I thoroughly enjoyed the game. Yes, it is not the same as Her Story, but it is just different because it was designed to be different. It's a slow burner: Her Story got you hooked immediately, but also felt like a quick burst, while this one adds on and on as you keep playing. It is not that easy to crack as it was in Her Story where the main reveal can be discovered pretty fast. Here you can discover David's occupation pretty fast, but it is not even remotely the biggest reveal of the story. Different layers of the story add more and more questions, most of which are left unanswered, but even better since you have just enough space for speculations and guesses. I really liked the timing mechanic where you got interruptions every hour at night (the cat one was obviously my favourite :D). Actors are great, all of them! Personally for me, the only thing that could potentially be considered a minus, is a few videos lasting 7-8 min and not having much in them. But even then it made perfect sense because you just need to find the matching vid where you will get loads of content in those 7-8 min. Overall, I definitely consider the game underrated. The story is insanely interesting and keeps you invested until the end. For those frustrated about the rewind system, just look up the plugin here in the reviews.

I don't like to say that some work is bad, it's just that there's no "mixed feelings" button. The game interface is really inconvenient: rewind, pause, speed up, long videos. But I liked the idea of the plot. Although I had to watch videos for 8 hours for this

Acabei de zerar, achei uma história surpreendentemente boa, na verdade. Ela demora a engrenar no que de fato ela quer contar, mas enquanto isso o mistério sobre o que se trata te mantém envolvido e é ótimo. Se você tem tempo e disposição, elabore suas próprias anotações num caderno próprio ou no bloco de torna. Fiz isso e minha jogatina foi ainda mais divertida e creio que a jornada tenha sido melhor que o fim (o que não quer dizer que a história seja ruim). Minha ressalva é a mesma de outras pessoas: o player de vídeo e forma com a qual ele lida com as palavras. Podia ser mais dinâmico, mas acaba sendo difícil de se engajar, mas não desista por isso. Eu recomendo sim o jogo, ainda que eu creia que Her Story seja melhor. Esse é mais profundo e, com paciência, você tem resposta para basicamente tudo. Bastante ter paciência e buscar todos os nomes e palavras que vir. Por fim, a narrativa é intrigante e cheia de camadas, além de diversos "vai e vem" que sempre nos surpreendem. Me senti bastante imerso também com o reflexo, ainda que eu tenha achado um pouco demais, em certos momentos. Enfim, recomendo aos que gostam do estilo, mas se você tem preguiça de só ficar sentado e ver vídeos, pode não ser para você. Abraço!