Battles of Prince of Persia - An interesting Tactics and Cards game

 

Battles of Prince of Persia (which I'm going to now refer to as BPOP) is a 2005 DS exclusive game that's a spinoff of the Sands of Time Prince of Persia games. Instead of a traditional platformer like other POP games, this one is a tactics game in the same vein as something like Fire Emblem. This is a bit of an odd choice for a spinoff given that the prior POP games have mostly been solo affairs for the Prince with very little to manage (my vote for a POP spinoff would have been a puzzle game but regardless). So BPOP relies more on POP's lore for the context of its battles. This does mean if you're not that into POP lore, you're not going to get much out of the story and characters since they rely on you really being somewhat familiar and interested in it beforehand.

Let's talk about the gameplay. Like other tactics games, there are 2 sides on a map, each with their own units and have objectives to complete in order to win. The objectives can be asymmetric. One side may be tasked with defending a point while the other capturing it. One side may have to play normally and just kill all enemy units to succeed while the other side has to either kill all enemy units or one specific unit. Each battle also has a point system that tracks how close each side is to victory and points are earned by completing objectives in battle. For example, in one battle, the first side to reach 20 points wins. Killing an enemy regular unit may earn 2 points. Killing a general may earn 7 points. Defending a location for a certain amount of turns may earn 2-3 points etc. How a player gets to 20 points in this case is up to them. Some missions may change how points are awarded, for example, not award any points for killing regular units so the only way to win is to complete specific objectives. All this means is that how a mission is approached may be different. On missions where units don't count for points, you're free to be more aggressive or have to work around them to get to a goal. Whereas if they do, you may have to be more defensive and pick off enemy units to rack up points.

The big new gimmick of BPOP compared to other tactics games is the card system. Now, in most other tactics games, both sides have a handful of units and make their moves in turns. Every unit can make a move in every turn. Not so for BPOP. Prior to every battle, both sides have to bring in a deck of cards. At the start of the match, both sides draw around 4-5 cards. There are 2 kinds of cards, movement and effect cards. Movement cards let you issue orders to units like a traditional tactics game. However, movement cards generally range from 2-4 moves. So if you play a 3 movement card, you can only make 3 moves that turn regardless of how many units you have. Effect Cards can be played on units to cause an effect to happen like healing them or having them move again or buffing their attack or nerfing an enemy unit, or being able to make 2 moves but be unable to do damage, or make just ranged units get 2 moves plus an attack while making 2 melee units unable to attack for the rest of the hour, or have every unit next to particular unit take 3 damage every turn, or sacrificing a unit to deal 12 damage etc. There are a lot of effects to play around with. You can only play 1 kind of card per turn. Any unit that moves or has an effect card used on them is considered "used" and cannot be moved or given orders until an in-game hour passes (though certain effect cards can still affect them). Once a player has completed their turn, the other side gets their turn and this repeats. When every unit on both sides is used or when there are 3 passes in a row with no cards played, an in-game hour passes, every healthy unit becomes active again and players can discard any cards in their hands to draw more. You unlock more cards for every level you complete in the main campaign or you can trade with your friends through the DS wireless play but I never had any use for the latter.

For the battlefield, like other tactics games, you can have your unit fight an enemy unit if they get in range (which is right next to each other for melee units and somewhat close for ranged ones) which can deal damage. There is something of a "matchup system" when you prepare a unit to fight another. The game tells you how good your unit matches up against an enemy unit based on a variety of factors like weapon, terrain, facing/orientation, size, health, stats, morale etc. The better a unit matches against an enemy unit, the more damage they'll do and the less they are likely to take in return. So sending in armoured foot soldiers against a group of archers from behind to melee in a forest is more beneficial than sending in a group of archers to melee against armoured foot soldiers from upfront. The game summarizes matchups with "awful, poor, fair, good, great, excellent and overwhelming". An Awful or Poor matchup means your unit will take more damage from the fight while the enemy may take no damage at all. You should avoid using this unless there is no other option. Good and Great Matchups ensure you'll come out better than the opponent and Overwhelming guarantees the enemy unit will be destroyed. Fair means the fight could go either way. I'd recommend avoid relying on Fair matchups if you can because it's possible you could come out worse for wear.

The mechanics as a consequence of battles are interesting. If a unit takes a decent amount of damage, their stats may get lowered allowing once Poor or Fair matched units to now have Good Matchups against them. A unit that takes a lot of damage may get pushed back a tile. If their way is blocked they will take extra damage. If they take more damage, they may prematurely end up being "used" and thus unavailable for that hour. If they take a ton of damage instantly, they will become "broken" and the defending player loses control of that unit. That unit will then move away from the fight on their own and may attempt to permanently flee the battle, counting as a kill for the attacker or "rally" and return in control of the defending player. A broken unit is almost always an instant kill for the next unit to attack.

So with the combination of different unit types, cards, terrain, objectives and the mechanics and consequences of battles, BPOP is a solid tactics game. The card system allows each side to have massive 20+ unit armies without having either side completely squash another with 20+ units at once. This also encourages players to have to prioritize. Suppose you have battles going on in 3 different fronts and you play a 3 card. Simply having 1 action per front is unwise since you'd do a moderate amount of damage and the enemy will then counter so you have to choose which front to prioritize. The card system allows for more variation and options per fight beyond rushing down an opponent as well as planning and saving cards. You don't want to use a 4 move card when you only have 3 or less active units left. And since cards are independent of units, you can replay older levels without completely overpowering or breaking the enemy (a criticism I have of Lord of the Rings Tactics).

However, there are some negatives.

Firstly, the card system often makes opening parts of battles (and also many early battles) drag as you have to play a lot of movement cards just to get your units in position so the fighting can start for real. There are also no tutorials or many demonstrations for the effects cards so I never ended up using them much as a kid and just stuck with movement cards and brute-forced my way through them as a kid. Looking at them now, many cards are quite good and I wish I had gotten more into them earlier as they can make all the difference as an opponent could disable or weaken my units safely from afar, heal their own and then stomp me.

Secondly, the control scheme is unintuitive and annoying. This is a Prince of Persia game on the DS so sadly it's going to make you use the touch screen regardless of how much better buttons would be. Now, you can't use the D-Pad or Face buttons to select units or cards. You have to use the touch screen for everything here. To Scroll across maps (including the level select and card menus), you need to hold the Up button (or X if you're left handed) on the D-Pad and then hold on the touch screen the direction you wish to travel. The only other buttons that work in some capacity are L and R. Holding either when tapping a unit or terrain gives you info on them. Left and Right or Y and B just cycle through your objectives and state of both players.

If I had my way, I'd make the following changes. Firstly, you can move and select stuff with the D-Pad. A and B are accept and back respectively. To scroll around the map, Hold L and use the D-pad. To cycle through your units, use Y and X. To see additional info, hold R and select an item of interest. You can still use L+ Touchscreen to scroll and use the options menu or even the select button to toggle between control schemes. This Touchscreen only approach I find, is annoying, unintuitive and uncomfortable.

Presentation:

The game looks good. It's easy to distinguish between different kinds of terrain. The 2 sides have different colour schemes for their units and UI (I imagine colour blind folk are going to have a much harder time given how much red and green the Daeva and Indian sides use). Individual Units have symbols on them to distinguish them. Their status can be quickly determined by seeing the square that makes up a unit (the more little squares in the big square, the healthier the unit. Additional effects like being used or broken can be shown by the units losing colour or having the little squares jiggle around followed by smoke effects). I did find it a little hard to read card text and descriptions.

Units who get into fights have a battle animation showing the units fighting. It can be quite satisfying seeing your overwhelming units crush another unit or be heartbreaking seeing an enemy cleave through yours. The detail of the sprites and animation is great. However, I did find it started to drag after a while and I did turn off battle animations eventually.

The game has a story. Here's the Wiki to summarize it in full:

https://princeofpersia.fandom.com/wiki/Battles_of_Prince_of_Persia

Here's a quick review of the story, it's fine. I'm not going to fault it too much or dock marks for quality.

It takes place between the events of Forgotten Sands (which funnily wouldn't be released for another 5 years) and Warriour Within and covers the Prince looking for a way to deal with the Dhahaka who has recently started hunting him down. His target is the "Box of a Thousand Restraints", an artifact which can trap anything and in his attempt to acquire it, he releases the Deava (an ancient supernatural race of warriors that were imprisoned in the Box). The story is split between multiple characters including, the Prince himself, Sharaman, The Vizir, and even Deava Generals as we see different sides of the various battles and plans.

The story itself, like I said is fine. It's told through these simple cutscenes in between battles. There's not really much to sink into. There are some neat moments I found engaging, like the Prince trying to tell the events of Sands of Time to Sharaman who doesn't believe him. Or the Prince, in his haste to open the box, gets the Indian Army a chance to get near Babylon to kill the Prince's mother and how horrified the Prince was at this. Or how the Vizir deals and manipulates the Deava for his own bidding. The stuff outside of that isn't that interesting, like the Indian Campaign missions since Kelim isn't very interesting. Though, there is some interesting drama to explore there since he is Farah's Brother and despite a few clashes with the Prince, that's never mentioned or elaborated upon.

But seeing as the story is mostly told through quick stills in between battles, it's too brief to really be engaging on its own. There are those handful of moments I mentioned prior that were engaging, but they were mostly engaging because of their context rather than them being amazing pieces of storytelling on their own merits. Like, the Prince telling Sharaman about Sands of Time is neat because I played Sands of Time and am familiar with the Prince and Sharaman's characters. But if this is your first POP game or you don't really care for the lore, you won't get much out of the story. For example, the game quickly brushes over the Dhahaka's presence as the motive for why the Prince is so irrational and paranoid. To fans of Warriour Within, they are already on board with this. But I can imagine a new player being a little confused about the characters' motivations and actions.

Regardless, if you aren't a POP Lore fan, you can skip the story and have a neat tactics game. And if you are, you get a bit of a bonus. I do wonder if this concept could have been taken further though? Perhaps with Fire Emblem style dialogue during battles depending on specific criteria?

In conclusion, BPOP is a good little Tactics game with a neat gimmick with the cards system. It's held back by the somewhat awkward controls. Its story only really appeals to POP lore fans. I can't say if it's an underrated gem or great in the pantheon of tactics titles since it's a genre I'm unfamiliar with (based on reviews I've read, BPOP seems to be more of a solid but otherwise unremarkable title). But I can say I enjoyed my time with the game and would recommend it on its own merits. This may be an unfamiliar genre for the POP series but I believe this is a well done attempt for it. I wouldn't be opposed to a modern remake as I don't believe the cards approach is used much in many tactics games.

 

Next up for me is either Shadow Fight 2 or Assassin's Creed 3 Liberation. See you then.

Final Fantasy 7 Remake - An interesting Reimagining, for better and for worse.

 

Final Fantasy 7 Remake is a remake of the first 6 hours of 1997's Final Fantasy 7. Or more accurately, it's more of a reimagining as instead of being a direct translation of the source material for current hardware, it rearranges, changes and adds a lot of material, making something that's not quite a modern replacement for the original.

Firstly and briefly- The presentation - The game looks and sounds gorgeous. But it does come at a cost. In addition to taking up 80GB on your Hard Drive, expect a lot of slowing down the player's movement to give the game more time to load and only being able to play in Midgar. I suspect if the game wasn't aiming for such high graphical detail it would be easier for the game to create more and varied content.

Now onto Gameplay:

-Combat- The recent FF games have had a bit of rough time picking how they wanted their combat system to be. They didn't want to be fully turn-based like the older FF games nor do they want to be fully action based. FF15 tried to be something in between and didn't quite stick the landing with how it was too automated to be a fun action game and too easy to cheese to allow some strategic decisions of a turn based system. The FF7 remake nails this aspect. When you enter combat, you fight normally with basic attacks, blocks and dodges like an action game. Damage dealth fills up an ATB meter which allows the use of more powerful attacks, spells and items. You can assign these actions to a hot-key or use a menu which slows down time to a crawl allowing you to make decisions with more space to breath. You can also swap characters with the D-pad or use L2/R2 to issue commands to other characters without swapping. In fights, the main tactic is to fill up an enemy's stagger meter by exploiting their weakness, either by using specific attacks or spells. And since enemies have different patterns and ways to exploit weaknesses, it keeps encounters varied. Filling up a stagger meter renders an enemy stunned for a short while and increases the damage an enemy takes while stunned (starting from 60% extra damage and can be increased).

There are 4 playable characters- Cloud, who has a basic and balanced offense set and counter-attack stance. Tifa - who specializes in close range damage and stagger bonuses. Barret - who specializes in long range and is the tank of the group. And finally Aerith - who has the highest magic pool and ability but the lowest health.

The combat system does a lot right. Unlike FF15, it's not fully automated and requires the player to consider positioning and their regular attacks. Using items and spells are balanced by the ATB system preventing the player from just spamming their way through challenges. And the tactical side is preserved by having to swap between and use the abilities of different characters. You need to choose where and when to use certain spells or abilities as they can be interrupted, wasting the resources that were used to charge them up. It can be rush to co-ordiante 3 characters to use their abilities in spells in the perfect way or get one character to draw attention to allow the others to function. It's great. I especially love using Lifesaver on Barret to allow him to soak all damage for the party allowing Cloud and Tifa to wail on enemies without worry and letting Barret stand by and heal himself. I do have a few issues. Firstly, they can be a lot of particle effects and other visual effects when the hits and spells start flying which can make it a little hard to see certain attacks. The game does try and tell you the name of enemy attacks beforehand which does help alleviate this somewhat. Aerial Enemies are a pain to deal with using melee characters. Audio barks are also repeated a lot which gets annoying.

Secondly, against less threatening foes, your teammates don't really get a chance to shine. There are a lot of weak filler monsters in between the major ones that often barely pose a threat. And there's no way to customize each character's AI when not being controlled. I can't command Tifa from a distance to suddenly ignore all self-preservation and go all out on a measly were-rat that doesn't pose much threat to her, especially if she doesn't have any ATB. I can't tell my crew to play defensively or avoid getting in close for a while so they can be healed. This can make some fights feel more like babysitting the AI. There are some ways to tweak the AI with Materia but it's not really a good substitute. I'd like if there was an option in the command menu to assign a few AI commands like balanced (the current system), aggressive (get more hits in and take more risks), defensive (only go in for attacks if safe), Priotize Healing (if a party member gets weakened, use a healing spell on them) etc. I'd argue these would work fine for the game rather than automate everything as the player would have to choose beforehand when to assign what AI to work. An Aggressive AI may be a bad fit for a fight or phase of a fight where aggressive play is punished. Prioitize Healing may seem broken until you realize that some enemies can knock you out of a heal attempt if you're not careful and you may end up wasting MP.

Speaking of Materia, this is the game's spell system. They are specific items you can equip onto gear to gain their effects. For example, equipping a fire materia on Cloud's wristwear lets him use fire spells. Same for healing, ice, wind etc. Spells require MP to cast which some characters don't have a lot of. Some Materia can amplify other materia. For example, magnify Materia can be linked with Fire Materia to hit multiple targets with a single blast. Or Maginfy can be linked with Cure to heal multiple party members at once. Some Materia instead use just abilities so no MP usage but require more set up and time to use. Materia can also gain experience and level up. Levelled up materia allows the user to choose a different version of the spell or increases its potency depending on the materia. For example, A Level 1 Fire Materia only lets you use a Fire Spell for 4 MP and a quick charge time. A Level 2 Fire Materia gives you the option to use Fire or the much stronger Fira for 12 MP and a longer charge time. A level 3 gives you the choice between Fire, Fira and the even stronger Firaga for 24 MP and even longer charge time. Some Materia like Pray which restores 10% of all party member's HP at level 1 just increases a higher percent at higher levels.

This system is great and gives a lot to experiment with. It also keeps weaker spells somewhat relevant later on. You may want to use a quick Fire Spell to interrupt an enemy's attack or to help stagger them rather rely on just Firaga. It also affects equipment choice and some pieces of gear may have worse stats but make up with more Materia slots or better synergy between slots.

Sadly, while combat is great, everything outside of it is more mixed.

Most levels are basically corridors with very little room to explore or deviate. Navigation is even automated with Cloud and co automatically jumping or climbing as needed and slowly shimmying. I disliked it in God of War 2018 and FF13 and I dislike it here. It makes the game feel dull outside of combat. So much time is wasted slowly walking around. If this is because the game is having a hard time loading all this stuff then I'd rather there be an option to knock down texture and lighting quality significantly just to speed the game up or something.

The only time I felt the loop of exploration and combat worked well was in chapter 4 in the sun lamps level. Here, Cloud and Co must disable 4 sun lamps over Sector 4 to allow them to power an elevator. The level is divided up into many criss-crossing platforms with branching paths to explore, a few puzzles and other challenges to solve and only a few healing benches with some somewhat tough enemies which requires some resource management. You can see the lamps early and need to find the routes to navigate to them. This is the only point in the game that I felt it used its limitations to its advantage and made a good game around them (despite technically being filler with regards to the story). I wish there were more segments like this because as the game currently is, I feel that you could replace everything outside of combat with a cutscene/movie and swap over to combat when the time comes and have the same result. I understand the original FF7 wasn't exactly much for gameplay in these sections but at least those were far more brief.

Some chapters like 3 and 6 take place in a Hub-World where you can do side quests. On paper this makes sense. Since Midgar is now 30-40 hours instead of the 5-7 it was in the original, it makes sense to expand the areas in the original to give the player more of an attachment to it and to tell more stories in it. However, the execution is lacklustre. Most of the hubs aren't that interesting to explore, being boring corridors next to each other. There's not much to interact with regards to civilians or characters. The side quests here are also generally not that interesting, being basic kill or fetch quests with NPCs with not much of a story. Plus, you already fight many of these enemies as part of the main story anyway so them being side quests hardly makes them novel or interesting. I understand that for games like this, there aren't many mechanics that a side quest has to play around with. It's not like, say, an Elder Scrolls game where there can be 10 different ways of solving a quest based on your build and dialogue choices. A Game like FF7R only really has going to a place and combat as the mechanics a side quest has to work with. For the "going to a place" side, the game could either take some cues from chapter 4 and test the player with having to navigate an area or introduce some puzzles. But the game does still demonstrate a few neat ideas that shows it can work. I'd argue the best way to make combat focussed side quests interesting from a gameplay perspective is to twist the rules or enemy the player is fighting. This is why Chadley's VR Bosses and the Collesium are good. The bosses are a great test of your combat skills and the colosseum is a gauntlet of somewhat distinct foes that require you to manage your resources well. One Side quest in Chapter 9 has the squad going to a place in Sector 5 to stop Corneo's goons and they bring out this single Frog thing that walks really slowly but can 1 shot you with a single knife strike. If you try to fight it from range, it can freeze you in place and slowly waddle towards you. It's great because of how much it twists a regular encounter while still being fun and novel to fight. If there were more enemies or encounters like this, the side quests would be more interesting. Of the 27 side quests, I'd gladly cut most of them if there were like 7 good ones. The mini-games like darts and squats are decent fun though but take too long to restart if you want to 100% them. The motorcycle levels go on for too long. They could be shortened by half.

Regarding the story - a big aspect I've seen online is the decision to set the game entirely in Midgar. There are issues as a result of this: Much of the game is padded much more compared to the original. Levels like the Trainyard, the second return to the sewers, Hojo's place are much, much longer which can be boring to play and halt the momentum of the story. I've seen many proposed solutions like "set the ending after Midgar or up until the end of the first disc. However, I feel those have their issues.

After Midgar, the original FF7 essentially became a full open world game and the story also slowed down considerably to allow the squad to slowly pick up clues on Sephiroth. From a game development standpoint- how do you deal with that? The remake already took 5+ years and a huge budget just to develop Midgar in 3D and higher fidelity than as it takes 80GB. In order to end where disc 1 ended, the remake would need to develop a massive open world but also have minimal story development for much of chapters 19-22 minimum before ending. So ending where it currently does is the best option out of all possible ones. Setting it after Midgar is likey too much to develop in the timeframe, but setting it before isn't enough. But it's easier to pad something smaller out than it is to make more first.

As an aside, If it were up to me and if the game had to be set in Midgar no matter what, I'd propose the game be 15-20 hours with bonus challenge modes and the like. I'd rather have a short and sweet game that feels padded. But I imagine doing that would get backlash as well from players.

As for the story itself, I'm mixed on it. I love the characterizations of the main characters. Some side characters are expanded considerably like Jessie or have more screentime (with limited character development in the case of Biggs). The presentation and cinematography of many sections look and feel incredible. And many aspects of the story like corporate monopolies, class inequality and environmentalism are just as important now as in 1997. But much of the execution has some issues.

The big new aspects is the Whispers, The "arbiters of fate through the will of the planet" that keep the events of this story in line with the original. For example, when Cloud is about to kill Reno, something that doesn't happen in the original, these ghost things appear and knock him and Aerith away. When Cloud and Tifa prepare to sit out the second bombing mission, The Ghosts show up to injure Jessie so Cloud and Tifa have to come along like they did in the original. I've heard the reason for their inclusion is two-fold, the first is to offer a meta-commentary on fans of the original FF7 who refuse to have any changes. The second is how it canonizes the remake and any changes coming forward. That since the Whispers are gone by the end of the game, the "gloves are off" as it were going forward. Anything can potentially happen in the story. Maybe the player, upon realizing this, tries to save Aerith in FF7R Part 2 and Tifa dies instead. Or some other wacky thing. The ending implies Sephiroth knows he lost in the original timeline (i.e The 1997 FF7) so he's trying to change fate to let him possibly win. That's honestly quite cool.

I have a few issues with this. Firstly, in-universe, it doesn't really make much sense. The characters don't seem to think or care much about the Whispers until they show up. They also are inconsistent when they do show up. Which makes whenever they show up feel closer to an in-universe Deus Ex Machina. In Chapter 18, Aerith gives this whole speech about how Sephiroth is now the bad guy and is trying to use the Whispers and the whole squad follows along and it feels so out of character for them all. Why now are they caring about Sephiroth or how do they know what's even going on or stopping the Whispers or facing Destiny? Especially Barret who gives his "I Spit in the face of Destiny" line despite literally only being alive because of Destiny. The characters shift from being quite grounded in the world to feeling like they are in a Kingdom Hearts game for an entire chapter. Even thematically, this is odd because our heroes are supposed to be on the side of the planet yet they are fighting the literal will of the planet.

Secondly, even from a meta-sense, I'd argue it's too messy. It makes an already somewhat convoluted story even more so since you now have to factor time-travel and alternate realities as part of the story itself. A new player would be even more confused by what's going on and would probably need to be told the full story of the original to grasp what's going on which potentially spoils the story for them. If the goal was to deviate from the original game and show that would be a thing, I'd argue it would be cleaner to just deviate from it and use that as the primer for the audience. The story already has characters like Biggs and Wedge survive when they didn't in the original so that aspect was already placed. This would already indicate to returning fans that the story would be different while still being easier to follow for new players while still keeping the original FF7 intact and parallel should they ever want another take on this story.

The story also feels somewhat sanitized if that's the correct word? Like, in the original FF7, when the Sector 7 Plate fell, it was this sombre and depressing moment. The cutscene itself was quite silent except for the screams of people. And of course, there were no known survivors. In FF7R, the scene is made much more bombastic with Cloud and Co escaping with intense music. The named side characters from prior chapters all survive which does somewhat limit the story. Even Biggs and Wedge survive which, while helping with that idea from earlier that the game is free to tell whatever story it wants, does somewhat lessen the idea of loss and consequence that FF7 was about. Also, what are Biggs and Wedge even going to do in Parts 2 onwards? They're in Midgar when the rest of the crew are elsewhere.

The story is also expanded and padded in some areas. Some feel worthwhile like Jessie's backstory or climbing Shinra since they either explain more about the characters and world or build up anticipation for what's coming next while still fitting in and continuing the story. But some feel like they got the wrong set of priorities. Like in Chapter 9 when the squad need to get info from Corneo and have to travel the sewers with Leslie and thus learn more about him. Ignoring that the sewers are already reused from a prior chapter, complete with the same boss as last time, why spend time on Leslie? He's not important to the overall story going forward and the whole ordeal gets us grappling hooks. Hell, I'd rather the story reuse Wedge or someone who had more screen-time so at least his survival gets more used here (it's also odd how he gets into Shinra HQ when it was so difficult for the squad).

In Closing, I'm quite mixed on FF7R. The game looks fantastic and the combat is great and some parts of the story are good. But the rather boring navigation, padded nature and messy new stuff drag it down. Still, since the Whispers are gone now, I'm looking forward to how Parts 2 onwards handle the game. Will they be open world and address the rather boring navigation? How will more party members affect the gameplay? How will the story change going forward? I just hope more severe improvements are made even if I have to wait 6 more years for it and on a console that finally comes in stock by then.

Next up for me is either Battles of Prince of Persia or Assassin's Creed 3 Liberation. See you then.

The Last of Us: Left Behind

 

The Last of Us Left Behind is the only major Singleplayer DLC for 2013's The Last of Us. Left Behind was released in 2014. The DLC is divided into 2 sections. A "past" section with Ellie and Riley that takes place around 3 weeks before the start of the main game where they explore a mall in Boston. This section is mostly story focused with very few gameplay challenges and obstacles the player has to overcome. There's not even a health meter for most of this. The second section is set "in the present" between the Fall and Winter Chapters of the main game where Ellie must search a Colorado Mall to find medical supplies to treat Joel. This section is more gameplay focussed given the player must fight more enemies and manage resources and has to retry segments if they fail or die. It plays like Ellie's sections from the Main game. The story here is much more minimal.

I'm going to discuss the Present Section first. The thing about its gameplay is that it's exactly like Ellie's sections from the main game. I wasn't that fond of playing Ellie's sections in the main game for a couple reasons. For one, TLOU's gameplay loop works by having the player spend some time collecting supplies, then having to do their best to manage them going forward. But Ellie's sections in both the main game and Left Behind are so brief that the loop doesn't really get a chance to shine. You already have most of the resources you'll have a short while in and it's not long enough to really test the player in being careful in managing those resources. Even on Grounded Mode, it's much easier than the main game because of this. The second issue is that Ellie lacks the moves and abilities Joel has in the main game. I understand it doesn't make sense for Ellie to be able to grab enemies and move them since she's not an adult but it does make the gameplay less interesting as a result. And add in that Ellie's switchblade can be an easy 1 hit kill even on Clickers and there's not a lot to really sink your teeth into. The one new gimmick is that Infected and Hunters will now interact with each other. In the main game, these 2 enemy types never came into contact. In Left Behind, the player, in certain rooms, can throw a bottle to get both groups into fighting each other to be able to make progress. It's a neat idea but really shallow. And it wouldn't be until TLOU2 where this concept really gets its due with how you can dynamically get humans and infected together in different ways, how you can grab a human/infected and feed them to another. Normally, I prefer it when DLC provide an experience I can't just get a better version of in the main game and Left Behind doesn't do that.

I understand this DLC probably was made on a deadline and not given a massive amount of resources. But in a hypothetical and magical example where that wasn't a problem, I think it would have been more interesting if this section was more of an open world/metroidvania type game. One of the Metro Last Light DLCs did something like this. Like, the player is dropped into this small mall map with a scant few resources. They need to find medical supplies. There can be a few different places where these supplies can be and the player just needs to reach 1 and then get back to the start and there are puzzles and enemies along the way. The Map is open in the sense the player can explore and it's not linear but still roughly the same size as the current mall. There are hunters and infected wandering around the player can either avoid or play around by having them fight each other. There can even be a time limit system where if the player takes too long or attracts too much attention to themselves, the enemy, be they Hunters or Infected, could find Joel and result in a game over. Now all of the negatives I listed about Left Behind turn into positives. The short runtime and map works as a way to put pressure on the player to move quickly but still be careful without becoming unmanageable like in a longer game. The shallow mechanics get more of a novelty on them as the player has to weigh the pros and cons of their actions. I understand this would certainly be a difficult undertaking for a DLC that came out a couple months after the main game with less than half the staff working on it that requires some significant tweaks that TLOU2 would eventually end up implementing. But it would still be an improvement over this current section and make it worth playing.

In terms of story, the current section is quite minimalist. Ellie explores this mall, gets the medical supplies from a military chopper that crashed into the place, fights a comical amount of hunters and infected and then treats Joel and prepares to set out. It's not a lot and there's not a lot of story beats in between that make it very interesting. The story with the military chopper and its crew is the same kind of fare that's already in the main game so it's not very novel. Ellie is 100% focussed on her mission so there's no nice character interactions. We know what happens next given so there's no real tension. It's very to the point. Which isn't why the main game's story is so adored. This also makes many of the combat sections with Hunters feel like padding when a comically large amount of guys come in to kill Ellie.

Initially, I was expecting this section to be more of a parallel of the past. Like there's a sequence in the past where Ellie and Riley have to power on the mall and a sequence in the present where Ellie needs to power on a gate. I was expecting the present to have more of this as a way of showing how far she's come and how much of a contrast there is. Like, Ellie in the present would need to chuck bricks at a car or ride a Merry-Go-Round or even turn on a bunch of TVs in different contexts from the past as a better way to connect the 2 sections. But no. Aside from Ellie being in a mall and needing to find power initially, the 2 sections are pretty much disconnected which I feel doesn't help the DLC.

Switching over the Past, this section is mostly story focussed. The banter between Ellie and Riley is quite charming, Seeing a younger Ellie that still has her innocence is a neat contrast. The way the girls see different parts of the old world can be quite funny. It even works as a prequel since the audience is aware that Ellie and Riley may not have a good ending so that builds anticipation and tension. It's good stuff. And the few gameplay sections that reframe existing mechanics, like the brick throwing race and the water gun fight, are neat but can feel boring on second playthroughs. Oh, and LGBTQ rep is good. Especially back in 2014 of all things.

But to be negative for a second, part of me wonders why the DLC is structured like this? You have a good story half with some arguably not that interesting gameplay. And you have a lacklustre gameplay half with no story backing it up. It seems more logical to double down on the story half since you'd have a DLC doing one thing right the entire time for longer. My main guess was that since this DLC was originally sold for around $15 upon release, Naughty Dog had to add something to justify it which resulted in the present section that feels more like padding. So I wonder, why make Left Behind a DLC instead of a movie? developing a 2 hour game is still harder than making a 2 hour movie given all the complexities that have to go into modelling and debugging areas, cutscenes etc whereas a movie just needs to have enough made that can be shown. I feel that the story of Left Behind would be better served with even a 40-60 minute movie of just the Past Section. You wouldn't have the expectation of gameplay bringing the experience down. A DLC generally needs to be released close to the original game in order to main interest but a movie can be released whenever.

To conclude, Ellie and Riley's story in Left Behind felt like it was worth my time. Everything else didn't. To the point where I feel a short film focussing on just the Ellie and Riley stuff would improve the experience. The gameplay is done better in the main game which makes an entire half of this DLC feel like filler at best. If this was 2014 and you asked if I'd recommend buying this DLC, I'd say no. Watch it on Youtube. There's not enough going on to make it worth buying as an interactive experience. If you have the remastered or complete edition of TLOU where Left Behind is bundled in, I'd say it's worth a playthrough then since it's already there and quite short.

 

Next up for me is probably the Final Fantasy 7 Remake or Battles of Prince of Persia. See you then