We recently got a look at 20 minutes of gameplay of the upcoming mystery thriller Twin Mirror which is DONTNOD’s (Life is Strange) next game that’s releasing in 2020.
The gameplay takes place in a third-person camera angle and follows former Investigative Veporter Sam Higgs who is returning to his hometown of Basswood located in West Virginia. Sam is described as having a forensically analytical mind, which is evident in the fact that almost every object in the game provides a nice chunk of information.
For example, the demo begins in a lookout area, and Sam starts providing in-depth information about things such as closed paths, animals in the area (by looking at a wildlife board) and other things that appear to be quite trivial, but will obviously play into the mystery later on.
Sam is back to attend the funeral of his best friend Nick, which quickly triggers a memory that takes him to a dream-like state. This portion of the game is called the ‘mind palace’ and lets Sam reconstruct memories from his life.
At the end of this ‘mind palace’ portion of the game we get a brief look at Sam’s time with his ex-girlfriend, Anna, who he proposes to, but then is quickly shut down. Oddly enough, being in the mind palace causes Sam to miss the funeral that he was back in the town to attend.
The game’s pause menu shows off current investigations, character bios (which are updated every time Sam makes a choice in-game) and the memento section, which houses collectibles that are related to the story and characters. The first memento shown is Sam and Anna’s initials carved into a tree, and in the demo a long passage of text giving a background of the memory is shown.
Sam’s decisions impact the story of the game. The next part of the demo shows off a mobile phone text converesation, where you can dictate how the entire conversation goes down. I’m not sure how this will affect what happens in the future, but I’m told that it will.
The next part of the demo shows off Sam talking to Nick’s daughter (who is Sam’s god daughter). Nick’s daughter seems to think that his accident wasn’t an accident. We get our look at Sam’s alter-ego, but nobody else can see him and he appears to be there to help Sam make certain decisions.
We then get a look at the first significant choice. As Sam, you can choose to look into it or keep her out of it, and this will impact the relationship going forward.
The demo wraps up there, and it’s not much clearer exactly what the mystery surrounding the game is, but it definitely looks interesting enough to the point that I want to know more, and DONTNOD have delivered time and time again on compelling stories, so this is definitely one to watch when it releases in 2020.
