First I'd like to state I don't consider 6 a bad score. 6 is above mediocre which is in my opinion worth a rental. Now what you won't hear me say in this review is that "this isn't a game it tries to hard to be a movie". That's a bunch of crap. I'm a big fan of David Cage and whenever the man comes out and says something in an interview, his views on games are spot on to mine. A game can be whatever the hell it wants to be. As long as the games audience can interact with it through controls, its a game. And we should be encouraging developers to try new things. I'm honestly getting bored with the same old formulas over and over.
Now onto my review. We all know cages games are all about the story so they should be reviewed mostly on story, and secondly the interactivity to the games world. The story of beyond two souls is just lacking. It starts off fantastic but just becomes really dull and you start to lose interest in whats even happening in the story. There are parts of the story that are pretty good but it's all those parts in between, that make up the majority of the game, that are dull. It's more like a series of decently written short stories than a full complete story. Another problem with the story is most of the characters are under developed. It focuses on the main characters development and ignores all the others. The results in dramatic situations where we don't really care what the outcome will be. The only person we care about is the main character. Heavy rain had me hooked from the start cause the story had mystery to it and as I progressed I discovered more and more about that mystery. What drives you to keep playing beyond two souls is hoping something more than mildly interesting will happen.
Now onto the interactive side of the game. The best part about this games interactivity is the stealth system which at times is pretty fun. it's definitely the most "game like" and a step up from heavy rain. However everything else is a step backwards. There seems to be less choices you are able to make as the player. The tense combat scenes are boring as hell. Heavy rain threw all sorts of button combinations at you quickly. It was very tense and kept you on your toes. There were also consequences for not executing those combinations correctly. In beyond two souls you use the right analog stick...thats it. And not once was there any real negative consequence for me pushing the stick in the wrong direction.
Graphics are really the highlight of this game. I was absolutely blown away it was even running on the ps3.
If you want to play a good story game this year check out gone home. Some people may not like the type of story gone home is, so its not for everyone, but It's good writing and I really enjoyed it. Also much more immersive than beyond. I'm really disappointed in Cage for this one. He just didn't spend enough time on the script plain and simple. If the game would have had a great story I could have got passed the interactive downgrades and given the game a much higher score. All writers have their weak stories. Let's just hope Cage can redeem himself with his upcoming ps4 title. I'm rooting for you Mr. Cage.