Well, I've finished a few playthroughs, and looked at the walkthrough once. First obvious comment: Chap. 2 is even better than Chap. 1, in all kinds of senses: suspense is kept high, the stakes are raised, and more is revealed about every character, suggesting something more akin to a psychological study of people under the prism of power than to the post-apocalyptic power struggle story that I had first thought might emerge from it. I had feared that the final message would be simply, to quote a writer I like, "bare your teeth, and bite, if you have to, or else you may lose your whole mouth." There is a lot of that in the game; but it may be that we will be offered an insight into the doubts, motivations, and inner struggles of every character, from a non-naive perspective. Very well done, Tess. You have dug some quite impressive holes as your foundation here; I am curious to see the ideas you will fill them with.
The narrative of the game thus far suggests that one has to know what one wants and understand what one needs to do in order to obtain it; the point is hammered in several interactions throughout both chapters (e.g., Elena's conversation with Kane in her car; Patricia's two conversations with him on the outside stairway). It suggests a "golden mean" approach to power, equidistant from the extremes of untrammeled domination and unconditional submission. The extremes of course have obvious shortcomings (the former: ultimate pointlessness and consequent unbearable lightness; the latter: ultimate ego dissolution and consequent unnecessary self-erasure; Hegel's master-slave dynamics suggest both are simply aspects of the same fate, namely, suicide). This approach is also visible in the walkthrough, where one sees that what for lack of a better word one could call the "interesting" choices (those that lead to more philosophical/psychological exposition and exploration, or to less cliché'd events for the MCs) tend to be those that don't maximize specific variables (Sub, Dom, Good, Evil, Slave, etc.). It is good to to see Sub/Dom and Good/Evil treated independently, by the way, but interestingly, the game also seems to subtly imply a connection between these two axes (e.g. in the existence of Slave as an independent variable between them; if I understand the walkthrough correctly, it seems that the only way to get K6 status [= more power / Dom ] is to keep Slave at 0, which implies not having to sprint or jog during the run, which implies acquiring SelfishEater by keeping the good food for ourselves [more Evil]). Still, if my life experience has taught me anything of interest, it is that the "golden mean" middle path has serious intrinsic problems of its own, and it will be interesting to see if the game touches upon them and what kind of conclusion it will draw from them.
The meat of the game so far is in the little pieces of information it delivers about the main goal and the main characters, and how it teases us for more to come. This makes the pacing seem nervous, full of suspense, which, in this kind of narrative, is perhaps exactly the goal. And it makes us wonder about the extent to which we know the characters we already think we know. (To quote from a work of fiction I like very much, "How could I ever hope to know a man... from three commands alone? I... I never even knew the hearts of those who served me well...")
A few more comments, suggestions, and ramblings are perhaps best put inside a spoiler tag, so as not to affect the experience of those who haven't yet played this game. I'll do this in a separate post. Here, I'll add a few remarks on a few details of minor or no importance, just on the off chance that Tess also cares about details.
- Alessandra Karlsson's name is spelt a couple of times as "Allesandra" with two "l"s and one "s" in Chap. 1 (e.g., in the computer text on the Karlssons that Kane reads in the storage room where he meets his friend Jake), but only as Alessandra in Chap. 2. This should probably be made consistent.
- I had once mentioned that it seemed weird for Alessandra to bring Olivia to her home just to tell her that she was busy so they would have to talk the following day. Chap. 2 suggests a possible solution: Alessandra is clearly evaluating Olivia all the time, so maybe something could be done to suggest that the point of bringing Olivia in at that time was precisely to make her judge the kidnapper servant so Alessandra could begin to understand what kind of person Olivia was even before making the job offer. (Alessandra could imply in a conversation with this servant, after she leaves Olivia, that "things went as planned" or that he "followed her orders well").
- Looking at the walkthrough, it turns out that, in the facesitting sequence, if Patricia chooses to let loose some gas into Kane's mouth, his Sub and Slave variables are increased. But this seems inconsistent with the overarching rule of making variables depend on the player's (MC's, Kane's) choices: it was, after all, Patricia's choice to do this, not Kane's. Unless this has some internal meaning (e.g., as a way of showing that, in life, sometimes our "variables" are indeed affected by factors outside of our control?), maybe it would be better to have Patricia ask Kane (this could still be done in a domineering way, e.g. "Ah... I seem to have a little surprise... Would you like to get it?" + Yes/No choice screen; if No, then his variables aren't changed but Patricia goes "What? So let me punish you!" and again falls on his face).
- In the Patricia worship sequence, Kane's tongue often looks impossibly long; in one case, about twice as long as his nose, which I think is impossible. It might be better, if at all possible, to redraw this part of the pictures. (Really not a big deal, but I thought about mentioning it anyway.)
Now, on some comments/ramblings/suggestions/hypotheses concerning the characters and plot (in spoiler tags, so as to protect anyone who hasn't played the game yet)...
When I play honestly, I also get K4, but I don't find that bad, since it would please me to see the MC get the "worst possible fate," which to me is kinda the best fate as far as my subby tendencies go. When I play as a moral agent, I end up getting K5, and when I went for what looked like the more interesting/intriguing options, I got one spontaneous K6. Reading the walkthrough, those results made sense in hindsight. I have some guesses about where this is going... I want to see if they end up being right.
