What Did We Play Yesterday?

I finished Dishonored 2. It's a great sequel. It has clever level design and some of my actions in-game affected the game world in a way I didn't anticipate. I'm a little underwhelmed by the ending, which is a brief epilogue that doesn't resolve much, leaving things open for the third game.

Like, the ending was maybe a minute and the ending credits were closer to 10 minutes? That's how it felt, anyway. I think we should have at least gotten an individual slide for each target based on whether they lived or died. I think there are about 4 titles you can get at the end, I got Emily the Just (non-lethal) and Emily the Clever (apparently I was ghostly enough).

There is a plus game feature that allows you to retain your runes and unlocks all the powers for purchase, which is cool. As with the first game, I immediately wanted to do a high chaos run, and then a few hours later... kinda didn't. Partly because 30+ hours is already a lot of quality time with roofs, and partly because I'm not super interested in fucking everything up, which is what the high chaos run ostensibly does. I like discovery a lot, so I enjoy finding new places I missed the first go around, but there are sections of the game that I don't enjoy retreading. I prefer interiors and don't like the open areas and rooftops as much.

I did pretty ok on my mostly-pacifist run until I got back to Dunwall Tower. We've seen a lot of brutality throughout the game, but the thing that finally did me after seeing all the carnage in the streets and lawn was that the witches murdered the staff. Maids and butlers, the people that worked in the pump room. So I killed over 20 of them and it wasn't enough to mess up my low chaos rating which I appreciated.

The non-lethal way to dispose of Delilah kinda sucks, because by imprisoning her in a fantasy world of her own making you have essentially rewarded her for everything she's done. So while I felt like in some way I owed her, because of what Jessamine did to her, this was really not what I had in mind.

I liked the Outsider's reveal that Delilah originally (and perhaps still) wanted things to be better, but as she achieved the power to make it her vision became twisted. She was definitely an interesting antagonist.

I watched the high chaos ending on YouTube. I had no idea you could kill Sokolov and Meg (apparently this makes you Emily the Butcher) but doing so just means you don't get a slide for them. You can also fail to resurrect your family member from stone. I'm not sure if this is just high chaos or requires a specific act.

The cheevs in this game are downright crazy. Like, take out Jindosh without him even knowing you're there? He lives in a SMART HOUSE he freakin knows how much I weigh jfc

Rarest cheev: "Cast Possession once, chaining between human, hound, rat, fish, and bloodfly" Yeah ok u guys keep tellin urself that.

Something I found interesting is 25% of players beat the game with Emily and 17% beat it with Corvo. I think the fact that the game starts from Emily's POV probably helps. 80% actually play it, and it's hard to tell by the cheevs but I'm gonna say 30% beat it at least once.

It turns out that unpleasant feeling I get when I play Dishonored 2 is motion sickness. Messing with head bob and v-sync helps a bit but I haven't fully resolved the problem.

Short version: Great game, and so far it's been an improvement over the original in every way.

Long version: The game has some clever level design. Partway through a level like say, Clockwork Manor, I want to start over because I bumbled my way through it and now I can see so many elegant solutions, but I also don't want to start over because initial discovery is such a magical thing in this game. To discover a vent and realize it goes exactly where you need to go is a special feeling.

The levels usually take a while to traverse and I am bad at remembering to save my game, but I've managed to get through half the game without any huge mistakes. The accidental body count is um, kinda low? Actually, 0 is low, so no, not really low at all. Once you hit four you're a mass murderer according to the FBI and it's definitely more than four. The game takes sword fights pretty seriously, a few hits takes a person down (including you) and I'm sorry to say I've cut off more arms than I care to remember.

I think the NPCs are smarter. The Overseers have been very persistent and perceptive and I've found getting spotted by even one of them can immediately complicate my stealth strategy. That being said, I once dropped into a room I thought was empty and began rummaging through the drawers only to realize there were two of them praying at an altar in the corner that hadn't noticed me. So if their perception is lower when they're praying, well, that's a cool detail.

One of my gripes with the first game was the non-lethal target removal options were often cruel, in some instances almost sadistically so. The targets tended to be really horrible people and I suspected this was done so players wouldn't feel cheated out of vengeance by taking the non-lethal route. Dishonored 2 provides sympathetic and unsympathetic targets and so far the non-lethal options have been appropriate and poetic. The most I can say in a non-spoiler post is if the target has a resource that they use for ill-gain, that resource is taken away to neutralize the target. There was one level where I appeared to have two choices that were bad for the area, and civilian ambient dialogue confirmed this. It just didn't feel right. So I kept digging around and, yep, there's a third solution. Bit of a PITA, but if you want it done right... The choices in this game are a lot more nuanced.

The game keeps dropping hints that spared targets will have a impact on the endgame. Think of the leadership-vacuum that occurs when high-level military personnel are purged after a takeover. These people have turned on Emily Kaldwin for various reasons, not all necessarily sinister. Given the nature of the antagonist, I would not be surprised to find some future targets were pressured or otherwise forced to move against Kaldwin. It might be satisfying to gut them all, but where does that leave Dunwall when its over?

I finally picked up Dishonored 2. I wasn't quite in the mood for a stealth game but I went ahead and played a bit to make sure it worked since it has notoriously bad performance. It actually runs okay after driver updates, but it has the longest pre-load (????) and developer splash logo sequence ever.

I am very bad at this game. The first mission you have to get out of the city and as soon as I was outside I just ran like hell and jumped into the ocean. I prefer a pacifist run as much as possible, so my terribleness is somewhat mitigated by going to great lengths to avoid enemies.

Dishonored was a sausage party, but Dishonored 2 has a high ratio of female characters so far. I get the impression Corvo is playable just in case dudebros can't handle having virtual tits, because this is actually Emily's story. You have a female MC and her right-hand general is female, female main antagonist, female boatman, the second mission is about a lady doctor I have not met yet because I SNEEK GUD and there's at least one other main female support character for the antagonist. I haven't read anything about the game's development and whatever goals they may have had but that's too many lady bits to be a coincidence.

I like the game but the Dishonored world is gritty and dirty and it makes me moody.