Remember Me - JRD's first impressions

[JRD]

I just realized where I read about this game before, it's a post from Jim di Gris from over two years ago.

Anyway, I've put my hands on a copy and will post a few impressions from this game.

The whole premise is about a dystopic Paris in the year 2084 (a reference to George Orwell's 1984, perhaps?) wehre memories are traded like commodities creating a black market for illegal traders and addicted citizens looking for a fix (one of them is heard saying "please, fix me a memory, any memory, I just want to remember something").

You start the game as your character has her memory wiped out at a facility. As you are about to finish the wiping process a communicator shows a guy named Edge on the top right screen who will help you escape leading to the obvious tutorial of the game and introducing the mechanism through which the story is told. Just a trivial game level design, nothing especial, nothing to complain here. The first episode (Episode 0) just presents you to the basic movements and navigation over Paris.

Here's you, a.k.a. Nilin, a former memory hunter who can also manipulates memories leading people to believe what she wants them to believe. Having you memory partially wiped out means you will have to learn your skills all over again.

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The place is truly Blade Runner-ish and you can tell right from start that this is a very linear game with invisible walls and little exploration;

The Sacre Coeur in 2084

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What is left from the Arc du Triomph

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Random places

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You have some climbing and leaping to do but you can only follow a path shown to you so if you want to go Ezio, forget about it, it's a corridor game so no parkour and adventure allowed  :-\\

As you go through Episode 1 you are driven to a place called "The Leaking Brain" where you will meet old colleagues, learn a little bit about your own past and retrieve some of your gear. You get introduced to the combat mechanics on the way. All very simple. LMB punches, RMB kicks, space bar dodges an incoming attack from an enemy with a large red exclamation mark on their head. A very dumbed down version of the very addictive fighting mechanics I learned to love in the Batman games. The difference here is that you can combine the so called Sensen into your fighting slots creating combinations of the two basic moves (punch, kick) with a few different outcomes like strength or regeneration. Get the combination right and finish enemies faster or regenerate some energy as you finish them off. It feels a bit satisfying but unless it evolves into something challenging, fighting will be quite monotonous along the game.

As you get to the Leaking Brain you are finally introduced to one possible highlight of this game... memory manipulation.  8).

Here you are attacked by a bounty hunter who is about to take you in but you manage to use your recently retrieved memory hunter glove to invade the mercenary's memory. As you flash into her memories you learn why she is after you. Her husband is going trough some sort of expensive treatment as she gets an offer to go after you (the whole Paris is aware of your escape in the beginning of the game by now  >:( ) who will pay a large sum and help her pay for the expenses.

You then can fast forward and rewind her memory to find a few glitches you can change in order to make her believe her husband died in the hands of the medic instead of remembering why she went after you, all quite subtle like the position of an object of the way the medication is given to the guy. As you let the memory run again you can see the result of the changes applied. This is where it feels also a bit stiff. It seems that there is only one possible outcome for your memory manipulation and finding which combination of changes will lead to it is a bit of trial and error. I was hoping you could get two or maybe three possible solutions to the manipulation thus branching the storyline. But apparently the linear concept also applies here  :-(

Graphics are good, not excellent. Characters are really well made. Lip sync is also very well done but the scenarios are not so impressive. Lighting is just ok as well and no flare, shadows or post effect impressed me so far.

I'll give it another couple hours later today and will get back with my impressions!

Here's the medic in the bounty hunter's memory... excellent facial model and lip sync!  :)
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[Art Blade]

nice post, JRD  :) Haven't seen such a long post about a game in a long time, here's +1 :-X for you.  :-()

This game.. you know, I checked YT for playthroughs and found one that I liked which I watched to the end. So I have seen the whole game play. What you said about the combat sensen, I watched quite a few different playthroughs until the uploader (player) started to fight. You wouldn't believe how much crap there is on the net, or, players who don't get it right. The one that I liked got it right and therefore it was fun to watch. However, that goes for the whole game: for me it is only fun to watch but it doesn't interest me enough to play it. I hope, as you already got it, that you enjoy it as much as possible.  :)

[PZ]

Indeed; +1 from me too.  Excellent write-up on first impressions!  :-X