Blogging the experience of gameplayhttps://www.gamelog.cl/gamers/GamerPage.php?idgamer=1961https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6671Ok, day 3 has turned into day (76?) as the game's days begin to chunk forward. I figured this would happen at some point and I'm glad that progression happens this way. After sleepily having a conversation with "Julia" and seeing the first big fire of the season, I admit my feelings to Delilah and we talk all night. I like her. There's still guilt about leaving Julia but Delilah really cares (For now... it's possible she's involved in a weird bating murder scheme maybe?) BECAUSE.... I got knocked out while investigating for a bear around the lake. Someone has been tapping into the radio frequency I use with Delilah and keeping notes on our relationship. The game's narrative so far has been delivered by interaction with Delilah as well as notes in the supply caches. I have reason to believe a disturbed former lookout is on some kind of mission, but I don't know his manifesto yet.Fri, 30 Mar 2018 00:59:39 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6671&iddiary=11824https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6671Day 2: I awaken to my ransacked lookout post, the whiskey I took possibly a bit emptier than the day before. I'm tasked with checking out a downed comms line, which I discover was sabotaged. Carrying over some critical thinking from This is the Police, I still suspect the random guy. These teens have no reason to have broken my place, nor known I was the guy from the lookout tower. The plot thickens as the same mysterious person has also harassed and scared off the teens, and I am now opening up to Delilah about Julia. The way this game presents the story is brilliant. The way dialogue can really affect relationships in the game is astounding, and I really feel like I get to put my own personality through in the gameplay. I am a very open person, and so I've been opting to dive right into my issues at home. I am fully prepared to see where things go with Delilah but perhaps things can be mended with Julia-- only time will tell. Day 3....Thu, 29 Mar 2018 00:37:13 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6671&iddiary=11793https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6671Day 1: The opening story is pretty heartbreaking. The player must go through a series of dialogue and action choices that affect how the story of the main character (Henry) and his wife Julia as they build their life, and as it falls apart with her early onset dementia. I probably would've cried a little had she full on died, but the slow decay of the relationship and the terrible coping mechanisms kinda removed me from it all. Henry is hiking out to forget about his problems. Perfect. My kind of guy. After settling in, we meet Delila who is a bit forward, but I get the idea we'll be falling in love purely over the radio. The next day, some rascals are shooting fireworks so I head into the forest to go teach em a lesson. After being cut off from the main trail I clean up the beer cans of some young teenagers and follow a trail of clothes to a lake. (I should mention they left an unattended fire too.) I can't beat them up although I asked if I could, but it turns out two young ladies decided to bring alcohol and fireworks into the forest and go skinny dipping. I was confronted with a decision to just yell at them, or to pick up their jukebox and... drop it in the lake. I decide to do the latter for multiple reasons: I'm 40+ years old and tired, they littered, shot fireworks illegally, and left a fire unattended. I figured I can't get in trouble cause my ass ain't a ranger, as far as they know I'm just a dude who passed through. Upon returning via a grueling hike and running into an unkown man coming from the direction of my tower. I find it's been ransacked. Day 2....Wed, 28 Mar 2018 01:00:01 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6671&iddiary=11766https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6621My officers are dropping like flies. Some are quitting to "spend more time with family" (boooo) and so many want the day off because they drink too much. They fail academy training, get killed in petty theft crimes, and generally fail their assignments and it's barely been two weeks in game. I briefly abandoned my mission to remain moral to settle a personal vendetta I had as a player. Officer Burch was a sad, drunk failure on the force and I was tired of him. I did not have an immediate way to fire him, however, so I sent him on a mafia request where they asked no officers be sent. When he called for backup, I sent none and he was promptly killed. At this point I'm not sure if I want to continue my descent into darkness and go full Walter White but it seems like a fun way to experience the worst of the moral spectrum.Fri, 16 Feb 2018 01:52:05 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6621&iddiary=11704https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6621Starting this game, I was attempting to take a Kantian approach to the decisions, choosing not to fire my black officers illegally and to avoid force at a feminist protest, but I soon succumbed to the pressure by the mafia. I saw the heads on the fan and I wasn't looking to join them. Slowly, my officers were being stretched thin and many were dying (RIP officers Purdy and Jay J Boogie) and the mayor was no longer happy with me and began taking away department funding, leading me to fall further into the monetary support of the mafia. As the plot thickens I decided to choose the Sand family over the Vargas family in a crime war and am currently in the thick of it. I am now finding myself dealing in very low-hanging utilitarianism where most choices seem to come down to "what is the lesser evil" while trying to maintain my personal safety and that of my officers.Fri, 16 Feb 2018 01:36:34 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6621&iddiary=11703https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6621This is the Police is a gritty game about managing a precinct as a retiring police chief. In your last 180 days in the position, you must make decisions to appease the mayor, as well as manage mafia connections (that are not necessarily wanted) while maintaining the safety and success of your officers. Early on in the game I was confronted with a task from the mayor: fire all black police officers. Wow. The order was given out of concern for their safety due to the rising influence of a supremacist group in the city, but to accomplish the task you must either illegally fire some, or put them in positions to be killed. Immediately extremely complex moral decisions arise; for example, I was confronted by my former deputy who asked me to take over his mafia responsibilities. I decided to take the Kantian route and did not help him because that would be morally wrong and while I felt bad for his family being in danger, it really was his choice to put them in danger in the first place so to me he was garbage. Unfortunately, this resulted in a photo of his and his family's heads swinging from a ceiling fan being delivered to me. Oops.Fri, 16 Feb 2018 00:30:28 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6621&iddiary=11697https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6554For some reason, my third log was never posted even though the page confirmed that it had submitted. Whether or not I can get any late points I'll still repost what I recall from playing, as I remember the main points. Ohhh boy did I mess up. Playing where I left off I was in a darkroom in the revolution cinema headquarters, and to be honest I could not hear too well when there was talking because often directions are given on the screen. Unfortunately this did not seem to be the case this time. The darkness of the game and the fact that I had to slide a magnifying glass with my finger meant I couldn't see waht or who was in each individual photo, and pressed pictures until one got circled. I hoped it wouldn't be important. Meanwhile, Jafar who had previously been rude and aggressive to me, made further comments about my loyalty. This is where it was brought up that I had found photo evidence of Abbas' attacker and was given a lineup to choose from. This turned my real-life lapse of attention into an incredibly dire moral decision. I was told to directly accuse a man, many of whom I did not recognize. Because Jafar was abrasive to me, I picked him because at least I had some reason to? Rather than chane killing a truly innocent man. Of course, just because Jafar was kind of a d*ck didn't mean he deserved to die and he was in fact, innocent. I won't lie, I actually felt really bad after that. Other than this outlier of a circumstance, however, I found that while the game did not look or operate the best, it was incredibly effective at getting me personally invested in the character of Reza. I did my best while playing to play not making choice I would necessarily make, but choices I felt were in line with the true intentions and character of Reza. Often choosing to be impartial to just take photos, or not to participate in violence. This all culminated in the cliffhanger decision to save either my brother, Houssein, or the alleged terrorist Ali. Although I felt Houssein was misguided as a member of the SAVAK, I decided to save him because A.) He's my direct family, and B.) while I disagreed with his membership in the SAVAK, I had gathered that he is truly well intentioned and a good person, doing what he believed he needed to in order to protect the people he cares about. I was rewarded for this decision because Houssein called the firing soldiers to cease fire, and the act ended with the group moving Ali to get medical attention.Wed, 24 Jan 2018 23:32:54 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6554&iddiary=11576https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6554(Disclaimer: I’ve had a couple really long continuous days but I promise I’m taking time to space out my game logs! In the future I’ll start them sooner so that I won’t be down to the last three days.) The art style and mechanics of the game feel simple, but they’re incredibly effective at delivering a serious story with realistic portrayal of real-life events. After a rally broke out into chaos between army soldiers and protestors, I was made to remove GLASS from a bleeding revolution leader, Abbas. The game depicts torture, of the main character as well as his brother, the secrecy of hiding from secret police, they ways media influences how ideologies are spread, and sexist motifs of the time. The game exposes the player to a lot of potentially objectionable content with the purpose of showing what really happened. It uses the sense of discomfort to deliver the impact of the events that occurred, and the fear and uncertainty of living in Iran during the revolution.Thu, 18 Jan 2018 01:33:32 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6554&iddiary=11530https://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6554The game is not exactly what I expected. Much more of an interactive story and experience than a traditional game so far. It reminds me of a telltale game where the story progresses based on your choices. I’m this case, the story is a true experience drawing from real events and people of the 1979 Iranian revolution. Within the first ten minutes, I had already been captured by soldiers and was being interrogated, making choices like “should I tell the interrogator about bombing plans” and “should I betray those I work with,” which are incredibly real and tough moral choices. The remainder of the time was spent in a flashback with (your brother? I need to check, he was described briefly in dialogue. This is where the player begins to get more background on which side supports the new religious leader, and we get to see a run in with some communist supporters. This further complicates the story when considering how current standings are today in Iran. The intro to the game is hard hitting and chock full of moral choices as you experience risky journalism in the Middle East.Wed, 17 Jan 2018 09:04:00 CDThttps://www.gamelog.cl/logs/LogPage.php?Log_Id=6554&iddiary=11487