Digital Verisimilitude: Let's Play Catherine - Chapter 3

This game will make you want to 1) never have a one night stand and 2) never go to sleep again.

Welcome to your nightmare, round 2.

Last chapter, our hero ended up drinking alone at the bar...or was he?

Apparently we blacked out, because now we're back in his dreams..er...nightmares.

Well this sounds like it'll be fun...

As if this game wasn't nerve-racking enough, you have to play through thee levels each night. So you greatly enjoy the little social breaks it gives you.

So all we really remember is...

Someone's BAC was more than a little elevated last night...

Okay, so now (as should be expected of any puzzle game) the difficulty is going to steadily ramp up as we progress upward. Our first new obstacle:

Several? Shit...

We also learn some new mechanics to help us survive this perilous climb

So, we're just getting inundated with moves right now..but you pick it up pretty quickly. Luckily, if you do die, you don't necessarily have to start all over.

So we climb, again... it's easy enough.

The big "checkpoint" in between each level is called "The Landing" and it's where we're headed next.

We get up there and find ourselves mobbed by a bunch of sheep...who are all extremely convinced that everyone else is a sheep BUT them.

They also all think they're doomed to perish here.

But...there may be hope.

So...that kind of makes sense. We already have "bells" on our list of "things of symbolic significance" but let's throw "churches" and "sheep" on there and move on.

Everyone on The Landing is freaking out about being surrounded by sheep and having to climb a collapsing tower of death. Which is kind of understandable.

You can fluctuate your "morality" meter slightly here, by talking this sheep off a ledge...either nicely or not so nicely.

Bear with me...we're getting to the morality gauge. It's a lot more complicated than it appears.

Some sheep are dealing with their anxiety by taking it out on the other sheep they come across.

You're going to be running into a lot of these psychopaths, so learn to deal with him now.

(I really wish they'd let you push him off.)

Some sheep are quite pensive and level-headed. These sheep tend to brainstorm ways of surviving the tower and naming all their clever little techniques they share with you.

Some of them are helpful..but I don't think I ever remember all of them.

Listen to what they have to say because oftentimes the tricks they tell you are the key to beating the next area you enter.

What is that at the top of The Landing? A confessional box? Well...this imagery seems blatant enough to not bother putting in the symbolism section but ehh...let's do it anyway.

Let's go inside.

We are obviously not the first...

Well...there doesn't really seem to be any option given to us here. We will definitely be killed regardless of how we answer this question. So don't stress over it, okay?

Now, immediately I'm sure you're like "what the hell?" because that question is so fucking loaded, my girlfriend might as well have asked it to me.

For bonus points, try answering these questions when your boyfriend/girlfriend is in the room.

Obviously the choice isn't going to be an enjoyable one to make with any of these questions, but you have to remember a few things before you start bitching about it.

1) As I have said before, this is Vincent's story. Not yours. So even though this question is sort of breaking the fourth wall and asking the player directly, there is no slot to bubble in "Well, I played dress up in the 3rd grade and Tommy Arnold proposed to me by the swingset and so I really matured into a woman at that point so marriage..." blah blah... it's annoying just to try and make up B.S. answers like that. Rationalize it how ever you want. Just pick.

2) This isn't a Myers-Brigg test to test your emotional or romantic capacity. This is probably about as accurate as the love quizzes in the back of your cosmo-girl magazine (Or whatever the guy version of that is, if you're a guy...GQ?)

3) This game is about giving you two polar opposite extremes and not letting you weasel your way around either of them. You can be indecisive, and there's the capacity in the game to choose neither girl, but you aren't going to get out of addressing these tough, maybe impossible, questions.

That being said... pull the rope

So I'm going to try and go the "good boyfriend" route here and impress Katherine. She seems to be hinting about marriage, so fuck it...I want to get married too.

You can see my "paragon" went up in the meter and a got a little more "good".

This meter is still making sense so I'm going to hold off on it a little longer until I'm forced to question the validity of the good/bad structure.

Vincent is getting a little pissed about these choices too.

But now for the M. Night twist...the little voice in the box tells us that he didn't bring us here.

Oh, shit...who could it be? No way to really tell at this point....

The game gives us a brief moment to see what other people's choices to the same question were. And then you can compare men's choices to women's choices. For funsies.

However, it should be noted that these answers were from an Internet Poll and not from other people playing the game. That's important because it can skew the results due to:

1) Different demographics (computer user v. console gamer, adult v. kid, male v. female, etc.)

and

2) People not choosing based on the emotional context of the game they're playing through but instead choosing after a long day at work or something.

Still...kinda nifty.

Now we get to go up to the second level! yay us!

I really have no fucking clue, Vincent...

Finally, the coins are explained to us (think this would have happened sooner..)

So coins are apparently a big fucking deal. Collect them all...I guess.

That's not so easy to do in later levels, unfortunately. So we now knows coins:

1) Inherently make the game more challenging for people who want the best score and winning just isn't good enough.

2) Buy you items to help you beat levels (but lose points).

3) Unlock bonus content.

...I'm making a lot of lists in this chapter.

Regardless of that...I'm still going to hunt down the symbolic significance of coins because they could have used gems or anything they wanted, but they chose coins.

Even if that's because games like Mario Bros. have conditioned us to hunt coins, thats still significant.

Also, notice that the female symbol is stamped on the coins and not the male symbol. Hmmm....

Anyway...transitioning into death.

Yep, the very things you use to save your life can kill the shit out of you if you aren't careful...so be careful.

Also, the sheep you're trying to help and inspire to continue the climb also become obstacles in your path that need to be dealt with.

So yeah...get to the top by any means necessary. Even if you have to kill some sheep in the process.

After that, we get to the top and escape onto the next landing.

It keeps telling me that...but I'm still in a nightmare -_-;

Guess who else escaped? Our favorite sheep in a neck tie.

He gives us some startling news.

As if we didn't feel guilty enough about having to push other sheep off the cliff. Now you have the satisfaction of knowing you're murdering other men in their sleep.

This information is beginning to dawn on the other sheep...

Bet you feel like a total dick now, don't you? Just jump.

That other dude probably pushed them...

But some sheep are still keeping their wits about them, and we're getting clues to their real life personas

We should probably make an effort to find out who these guys are in the real world and why they're here.

Still other sheep won't listen to reason and are still blissfully ignorant of the dormant humanity within each of the other "sheep".

So let's try and knock some sense into them...

It doesn't go so well. You can choose to either acquiesce...ish...or stand up to the crazy man-sheep. Now we're beginning to see gray areas. Is the tone in which you say something the determining factor on whether it's a "good" statement or an "evil" statement? Cuz neither phrase is condoning his idiocy. One is merely a firmer stance.

Saying it with conviction = good. Saying it like a little bitch = evil.

It'll get stranger as we go.

The final sheep we meet is a thick old sheep obsessed with those coins that hold absolutely no value other than the weight he attributes them. Since he's the sole investor in this currency, I'm not sure what he's going to do with it, but whatever...he let's us buy stuff from him for it.

So...let's not buy stuff then. Because my statuette of the Midnight Venus looks so much better in Gold.

Let's take a moment to discuss The Landing now in terms of a double edged space of oppression and liberation.

The landing exists to save your game, catch your breath, buy items, and strategize for the next section.

Most importantly, it doesn't fall away.

It serves as a liberating force in your nightmares, but also oppresses. You are forced to deal with other men as sheep, buy survival items based on a one-man economic system where he can set whatever prices he wants, and most importantly: you are trapped on that platform with your only way off being to head into the next deadly puzzle.

You can stay on the landing and be safe, but then you'll be trapped in a nightmare forever.

That being said, let's go confess again.

Oh boy, what could it be?

Now...this seems like it should be fairly easy to answer. Katherine is dedicated to her career..I'll say I'm dedicated to mine too. Unfortunately, choosing "Yes" pushed me over to into the red zone.

Now, typically people call this scale "Order" (in the blue) and "Chaos" (in the red). I don't necessarily agree with this scale because being career-oriented would be the "Order" or "Lawful" or "Good" end of the spectrum (socially).

So why is it dipping us into the red?

Without getting too off track or giving too much away, I think we need to analyze this from the perspective of the Japanese social order. Currently in Japan, there is an overemphasis on work and not much of a focus on propagation.

Vincent does not want to marry which is "Evil" and any act he chooses that hinders his ability to be a good candidate for a solid family dynamic is "Evil".

But, this game is not about "Good" or "Evil" or "Chaotic" or "Lawful" spectrums, but whether or not Vincent is a fit candidate for marriage. Again, without giving too much away, just remember that this game is not about love, or lust, or even strength of character, but it's about matrimony.

Anyway, moving on...

The voice deigns to elucidate our situation ever so slightly at this point.

You can always hope...

Now we get shot up to the "Final Floor"! oooohhhhh.....

But first we get to see what other people thought. Apparently no one agrees with me...

Time for the boss fight.

What could possibly manifest itself in our subconscious?

Holy shit.

Hello Katherine.

The boss is titled the Fist of Grudge, but it obviously looks familiar somehow, doesn't it?

It's Katherine from when Vincent ate dinner with her and she tried grilling him about settling down and working overtime and...well...really everything.

Vincent may not have picked up on her frustration, but his subconscious sure did and now we're being stabbed at with dining utensils. Sweet.

Thankfully...she wasn't too mad. And as a result, this boss isn't too tough.

All she does is make blocks immovable. Usually you're too far out of range for it to matter, but if you ever do get stuck, there are enough white blocks lying around to help you out of that jam.

Now you're finally at the top.