Set for release in just under a month’s time, Quantum Break is the next in a line of story-driven thrillers that Remedy Entertainment has become so well known for. Recently, we were invited to a press event to go hands-on with the game and get some early impressions of it.
Before diving in, we were given a quick introduction by Thomas Puha, Remedy’s head of public relations. One of the key points to Puha’s briefing was the claim that Remedy placed player experience at the forefront of all else, which I later found to have certainly been the case. On that same note, Puha also stated that the focus during development had been on ‘feelings over features’, with the game aimed towards evoking emotion from players.
I must commend Remedy and Lifeboat Productions for assembling such a stellar cast to bring Quantum Break to life. Both the in-game and in the live-action element feature some noticeable names, such as Shawn Ashmore and Brooke Nevin (Animorphs), Aiden Gillen (The Wire) and Lance Reddick (Fringe). Interviewing Puha later on, it was said that these people had been hired not for their fame, but for their talent and ability to act both on screen and for motion capture.
Branching off that, Quantum Break’s narrative is quite non-linear in nature. Having a soft spot for great storytelling, I rather admire the fact that Remedy offers players such a great deal of agency throughout the game. From early on, players have the ability to manipulate the way that events play out both in the game and in the live-action episodes, leading to quite a bit of replay value.
For a game whose premise is so grounded in theoretical physics, it was good to see that Remedy had achieved a blend of not completely dumbing down the science, but also making Quantum Break easily accessible to the masses. Certainly, there is quite a fair amount of scientific talk in the game, but it is for the most part relegated to ‘Narrative Objects’ scattered throughout the world. Such objects are visible by an on-screen indicator, and are completely optional. Being that they generally take the form of items like radios and computer tablets, their purpose is to shed more light on occurrences in the game and provide more background information. Having managed to progress into Act 2, I was informed by Puha that the team had actually gone so far as to change what information these objects presented, depending on the actions of the player. On that alone, it would certainly be worth it to replay the game over and over again to see just how much things changed.
Quantum Break is ground-breaking. It does an amazing job of bringing together a video game and live-action TV narrative, and particularly more so with the player’s ability to affect how it all plays out. Described to be a ‘summer blockbuster’, the game is a cinematic thriller that does not shy away from its scientific roots, but still remains able to keep players hooked until the end. Having made my way quite a fair bit into Quantum Break, I can safely say that it certainly stands out from the rest.
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Im Sorry but this is not as groundbreaking as you think, it borrows allot elements from other games. It does look good though.
I seriously cannot wait for this game.
This is Defiance all over again >.<
Yeah but it's not a shitty MMO.