Before keeping any game from any bundle, I sift through reviews on several "go-to" sites, but that will be more clear in a moment. I almost didn't keep this one. I almost traded it away.
I just remember reading a lot of reviews that had me questioning my interest in this game versus my mental stability, or how much I could "handle."
They were all discussing how "emotional" the impact was for them from playing through the eyes of a hardened soldier, spiraling out of control from a dissociative disorder into full-blown PTSD. Now, as someone who deals with PTSD on a daily basis.. I was both intrigued by how well the devs may have done with this game, and concerned by how poorly they may have handled it.
After some pretty intense eye-rolling at how "immersive" and "emotional" the story was, with as few spoilers as possible, I walked in 95% blind and took a stab at it.
No regrets.
Except for the eye-rolling. I
adored the story; this was the first story I ever really felt immersed in, in any game!
I loved everything about Walker's character; even with how "close to home" it hit sometimes.. He was written so much better than I expected. The whole game was written so much better than I expected.
A lot of people complained that they didn't really give you any "choices" in the game, but honestly, I believe that's what the game was trying to convey. They weren't done in the form of branching dialogue options, instead you were basically forced to assess the situation and look for an alternative path; they were much more organic this way. Sometimes there wasn't a "better" path. It's supposed to convey the horrors of war.
Simply put:
you can't save everyone.
The game even tells you: you always had the choice to
just walk away, but you kept pushing forward. Bad decision after bad decision, and consequently, you hurt some innocent people along the way. Got no one to blame but yourself, Mr. Walker. :P
And that one ending, omg.
