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Dreamfall chapters sjw3/28/2023 ![]() Zoë’s hometown is a notable offender, with the framerate dipping down to a sluggish single-digit at the oddest of times, even on the more powerful Playstation 4 Pro. ![]() Occasionally unresponsive controls and a subpar framerate can make even the briefest of sessions an exercise in patience. ![]() I’ve overlooked a number of important pieces of evidence just by not standing in the right spot, an exercise that cost me quite a bit of time as it added up across my playthrough. In order to interact with the world and its colorful citizens, the player must move their cursor to highlight them in a contextual fashion that can be difficult to trigger unless the player stands in the right spot. Standing around and spinning yarns about daily life can be quite enjoyable, but when it comes time to step away and focus on the next objective, that immersion can be stripped away. Where Dreamfall Chapters falls short is in its actual gameplay. One decision that I felt was aligned to Kian’s personal beliefs (which did result in a character’s death early on) wasn’t as well received by other players and I was shocked to see the support of less than ten percent of other players for that resolution. Upon completion of each chapter, players are presented with a list of their most critical decision points and can compare their resolve against other players. An immediate feedback notifies players of a critical decision that can send rippling effects throughout the story, even for minor events that would change little more than flavor text in other adventures. Taking a page from the recent playbook of Telltale stories, there is a transparency to the choices that the player makes throughout Dreamfall Chapters. One early choice gave Zoë the opportunity to designate her vocation in the early chapters, while not immediately present by the dialogue given at that time, that helped to build into how the player perceives Zoë and her motivations within the world. Even minor choices can steer the story in varying directions that can completely change the player’s motivations. Player choice can be the biggest draw into story-driven adventure titles and the story to Dreamfall Chapters can easily be molded to the player’s whim. For as dull and monotone as Kian sounds in his side of the Dreamfall adventures, his counterparts, Enu in specific, help to liven up the setting with (often vulgar) banter between the heroes of the resistance. ![]() The idle banter between characters and the dialogue choices that present themselves each give the cast more life and reputability. The character writing in Dreamfall Chapters well exceeds what I have come to expect from the adventure genre and not only does it give life to the world, it also makes the characters far more believable. As a direct follow-up to Dreamfall: The Longest Journey, many of the character’s motivations might not be clear to the player without first brushing up on the story’s synopsis. The other tale focuses on Kian, a disgraced Apostle that joins up with a resistance group filled with all manner of magical humanoids and Zhidlings. ![]() For the main heroine Zoë, her journey resides within a cyberpunk dystopia filled with political intrigue and machines that can lull the general populace into lucid dreams and melancholia. Dreamfall Chapters consists of two ongoing stories of honor and humanity that couldn’t be farther apart from one another (plus one more of story significance that runs between). ![]()
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