This is a review of Deadly Premonition: the Director’s Cut. This is going to be an unusual review. It’s not really a review. If you want to look at a numerical score, don’t bother scrolling down: it’s a five out of five; it’s a gold star. This is a game I love. The rest of this will be justifying that.
This article is going to have a few spoilers in it. Small ones, minor ones, more like little hints. This is because I’m not preaching to the converted. If you were going to play Deadly Premonition, you already played it on XBox 360.
Otherwise, there are some legitimate reasons to choose not to play it. Maybe horror’s not your thing at all. Maybe you don’t have the hardware, since there’s no PC version.
But maybe you haven’t played the game, but have heard things about how much it sucks. Or maybe you played the game for about an hour, and gave up before giving it much of a chance. If you fall into either of those categories, this article is for you. I’m going to try to convince you to give the game that chance. What you’ve heard about Deadly Premonition is probably wrong.
Most people will tell you that Deadly Premonition is bad. Its reputation is that it’s a game like a B-movie. It’s the game “so bad it’s good.” That was certainly how the game was presented to me my first time trying it, when a colleague bought the game based on the heavily polarized nature of its reviews.
I am a huge fan of things that are “so bad, they’re good.” I’m even a fan of Uwe Boll movies. I started playing Deadly Premonition under the expectation that it would be so bad, that it was good.
Deadly Premonition is not so bad it’s good.
It’s really, really good.
What it also is is unpolished, and that’s easy to mistake for “badness.” It makes a terrible first impression. Many early reviewers on the title may have based full reviews on that first impression. They couldn’t see the forest for that one tree model, repeated over and over again. This is understandable but is the wrong conclusion to draw from the game. This is a problem with the process by which most games are reviewed, and it is a problem with the expectations that we have about games. Deadly Premonition defies expectations. It’s a very different kind of game.
A contrast with Alan Wake, which Steerpike recently praised, is apropos here. I’m sure we’d both admit these are two very different games. But the similarities, especially regarding their underlying inspirations and other media they reference, are just close enough to make the comparison logical. I do find Deadly Premonition flawed but I still find it to be a superior game in every way that mattered. I think Alan Wake is very successful and workmanlike but Deadly Premonition is madly brilliant.
The team behind Alan Wake set out to make an open world horror game. Somewhere in development, it occurred to Remedy that they weren’t going to be able to make an open-world horror game and devote to it the level of polish they felt it deserved. They made the very sane, rational game development decision to scale back, to deliver a tight, polished linear game instead.
The team behind Deadly Premonition set out to make an open world horror game. Somewhere in development, it occurred to Access that they weren’t going to be able to make an open-world horror game and devote to it the level of polish they felt it deserved. SWERY and his team of geniuses then made the mad decision to never mind the polish.
As a game educator I would never give this advice. In writing, they always tell you to be willing to “kill your babies.” If something doesn’t feel cohesive or logical, just cut it out, trim the fat. SWERY would never give this advice. SWERY’s advice would be this: It’s your game, man. It’s your one chance. If it seems cool, just do it.
The result is the kind of game that David Lynch might make if he made games. Twin Peaks comparisons are more obvious in Deadly Premonition than even in Alan Wake, but to its credit, Deadly Premonition doesn’t stand on the street corner and scream “hey, check out what we’re ripping off here” quite the way Alan Wake does. Also to its credit, unlike most Lynch films, Deadly Premonition will actually make a sick kind of sense in the end.
Yeah, you’ve seen the clip, right? “FK in the coffee.” That’s ridiculous.
People, there’s an actual in-story reason there’s FK in the coffee.
In Deadly Premonition, you play as FBI Special Agent Francis York Morgan. He is a crazy man. Wait, let me try again.
In Deadly Premonition, you play as Zach, a voice inside the head of FBI Special Agent Francis York Morgan. Sometimes, as his helpful head-voice, you take direct control of his body. Sometimes he takes control, particularly in conversations with other NPCs, though he occasionally consults you, Zach, for advice. It’s an artistic and unique exploration of the real relationship between a player and that player’s avatar.
Wait, that’s not even what’s happening. You know, let me try it one more time…
Okay: what you need to understand is this. Francis York Morgan — Call me York, that’s what everyone calls me — is quite possibly the most unreliable video game narrator of all time. Unreliable narrators aren’t totally uncommon in horror games; Alan Wake does it, Silent Hill does it. But York is something special. The very game is lying to you, and it will lie to you constantly.
Have you noticed that some people do a double-take when York flashes his badge at them? Some people dismissed this as a weird quirk of the game’s acting, I think. Look again. What do you think that badge says? Does it say what York is saying it says?
Can York be trusted?
Lots of people in Deadly Premonition can’t be trusted. That’s not unique in games, either. The infamous swerve in Bioshock was discovering that the person giving us missions turned out to be our nemesis. System Shock 2 did it. inFamous did it, and basically for no reason. Sorry if I spoiled a bunch of old twists for you, but this twist generally tends to all be the same. What all these games have in common is that, even if you were suspicious of the person leading you around, you had no choice but to do what they said and stick to their schedule until the time of the inevitable reveal.
People in Deadly Premonition will tell you to do things. For maximum enjoyment — and, basically a requirement if you’d like to see all of the game — you should just blow off anyone you don’t care about, as much as you like and for as long as possible. Yes, you’ll have to listen to them eventually, but you’re on your schedule rather than theirs. The game will give you the impression that the story missions happen on a deadline. All it’s really telling you is you have a window of time during any given day to do that mission. If York is late to an appointment — any appointment — he can pick up that appointment tomorrow. Or in a week. There’s no rush. Go fishing.
The game clock in Deadly Premonition runs on a one-to-one basis with real time. You can advance it in a hurry by sleeping, or by smoking a cigarette. (The E3 trailer for Metal Gear Solid 5 seemed to depict a sneakily similar system. I’d say Deadly Premonition and MGS also have some of the same DNA.) Playing Deadly Premonition properly involves doing these things a lot, and exploring outside the boundaries you’re given. You can still enjoy the game even if you’re just bouncing from point A to point B, but you will miss a lot of it. Sidequests can be very rewarding. In particular, sidequests will give you access to the game’s strongest weapons, which will make the combat in the game a breeze.
You’ll probably want that because the combat otherwise sucks. The combat in the game is one place where Deadly Premonition lives up to its reputation. It’s bad, tacked-on combat, stuck on the game only because publishers were convinced a horror game without some action would never sell.
The Director’s Cut version isn’t that different from the original game. But one major change is the disappearance of difficulty levels. This is a good change. The presence of multiple difficulty levels in the original Deadly Premonition may have lead some people to believe that there was a point to having multiple difficulty levels. There was not: if you happen to own the original XBox version, play the game on Easy. The primary difference is how many shots enemies in the game absorb. They do not need to absorb any more shots than they already do on Easy mode. Play on easy and don’t feel ashamed. This will solve a lot of reviewers’ biggest problem with the original game.
Another thing that’s infamously bad in Deadly Premonition is the game map. The map is in fact really bad. It’s slightly altered in the Director’s Cut but it is not substantially better or more useful. The map is bad on purpose. A bad map forces you to navigate the town of Greenvale the way you would a real world town, instead of the way you would a video game town. You find yourself mumbling phrases like “okay, then take a right at January Way…” like you would if you were navigating in the real world, because you have no choice but to do that with the bad map. Eventually, if you drive around enough, you’ll just memorize the important landmarks in the town.
If that’s a problem, there’s a device that will essentially let you teleport around, if you can find it. That’s going to take some sidequesting, of course.
Early on in the story, George Woodman specifically says to York, “This case doesn’t really involve you, so don’t bother learning your way around the town.”
In most games you’d take whatever advice an NPC gave you, even if you knew that NPC ultimately wasn’t to be trusted. Right?
Man, screw George Woodman.
Learn the town. Learn everyone in it and talk to them as often as possible. Drive around town and listen to York ramble about old movies: that alone is worth the price of admission.
There’s a Director’s Cut change I do not like, in that the PS3’s disc system adds some noticeable lag to some cut-scenes. This gives the dialogue an occasionally stop-and-go quality that I’m not a fan of. The Director’s Cut has enhanced graphics, but that doesn’t necessarily push it up to the graphical quality of most games on the system (nor should it have to). There are also a few additional story sequences, but I don’t feel like they add a lot that the original was lacking. If you have the original version of the game, but haven’t finished it, don’t run out and buy The Director’s Cut. But The Director’s Cut is great if either A) you haven’t experienced the game before, or, B) like me, you’re in love with the game and just want more more more. In either case I’d recommend this version.
Like many games I have liked, this one was just weird enough that the standard review process doesn’t do it justice. It’s actually fascinating to me how much the standard opinion of this game has morphed. As I was wrapping up this review I took a look at some older ones, comparing the way the original was written about to the way reviewers discuss the Director’s Cut. Even if the Metacritic scores are roughly the same for both versions, even negative reviews are written in a way that shows respect for the remake. Low scoring reviews are no longer deriding the game for “sucking” but angry that The Director’s Cut version doesn’t live up to the original. That’s a heck of a sea change to me.
Deadly Premonition is not a game to be rushed through. Deadly Premonition is a game to be savored. The audio balance is really bad, the graphics are sub-par last-gen, the combat balance is awful, and the acting is just a little weird at times (the result of a Japanese director directing English Language audio). This won’t be the first time I say this about a game and this won’t be the last: it’s all worth it for the story.
Do you have a strong stomach and an appetite for insanity? These are requirements and I wouldn’t take the plunge without them. The game is weird, and it is gruesome. But if you qualify, play this crazy, crazy game at once. On Easy, or in the low-difficulty Director’s Cut version, whichever applies.
Developer: Access Games | Publishers: Ingition Entertainment, Rising Star Games | Released:Feb 2010 (Original) ,Apr 2013 (Director’s Cut)
Available on: XBox 360 (Original), Playstation 3 (Director’s Cut) | Time Played: 50 hours (across both versions)
Email the author of this post at aj@tap-repeatedly.com.
I have never been as wrong in my original assessment of something as I was in my original assessment of Deadly Premonition. Honestly it probably would’ve been stranger for me to get it right the first time, but today, near the end of the Director’s Cut, and I can only shamefacedly admit that I was completely mistaken, unfair, and foolish in my remarks about Deadly Premonition, both in the Alan Wake piece and in my 2010 impressions. Not only can it not be compared to Alan Wake, it is not a broken game, not a flawed game, not a bad game. You just think it is.
Trust me. Everything AJ says here is true.
It’s one of the darkest, most complicated games I’ve ever played. It’s so weird, but the more you get drawn into the world, the more sense it makes; the more invested you get, the more it becomes clear that SWERY is not a crazy person. Practically everything, every subtle little thing that I thought was a bug or a bad translation or a shitty actor, is intentional.
I hate doing this, I find this very argument offensive, but just this once I’m going to use it: most people are not smart enough or patient enough to understand Deadly Premonition, so they say it’s bad or broken. I was one of those people!
I always wanted to like the game, the original 360 one, but I needed the (very thin) coat of added polish this reissue has. I also needed time to convince myself that this was a game I needed to play – the time between when I tried Deadly Premonition for the 360 and the time when I started the Directors Cut a couple months ago. I needed to mature.
Waitaminute…
THOSE DEADLINES JUST MEAN THAT WINDOW ON ANY DAY?!?
No wonder I’m in the last act and the log says there are sixty unfound sidequests! God dammit!
…
For someone who praises Dark Souls to the sky, in part because it doesn’t spoon feed you, I could kick myself for almost missing Deadly Premonition. It is even more obscure and mysterious, and even more rooted in a very well thought-out world. It is awesome.
And weird, yeah, but weird for a reason. It’s all there for a reason.
To quote someone I know:
Deadly Premonition is not so bad it’s good.
It’s really, really good.
THOSE DEADLINES JUST MEAN THAT WINDOW ON ANY DAY?!?
Ha ha. Yup. Great news, isn’t it? Now you have to play it again. 😀
Though you can also repeat chapters from the starting menu if you don’t want to do that. But you can completely blow off appointments and just run around following people in the town doing their routines and stuff if you feel like it.
I was already sold on Deadly Premonition but, well, PC. Thank you for making me want to play it some more, Amanda. Thanks so much for that.
Sorry HM!
I will say that, for people who want to experience the thing but can’t play it, there are Let’s Plays to the rescue –
The Giant Bomb one is pretty well-known, but I haven’t actually watched it – http://www.giantbomb.com/videos/endurance-run-deadly-premonition-part-vj-01/2300-2281/
SuperGreatFriend also did a 100 percent run that’s pretty entertaining (I’ve caught clips)
http://lparchive.org/Deadly-Premonition/
Some of my friends swear these are an adequate replacement for the game experience itself, but I kind of disagree since I think just watching it leaves out the thrill of discovery. But if there’s no console available you can at least get a good sense of the story and characters this way.
Yeah, watching wouldn’t quite be the same. The doing of it all is part of the experience – little mini-games like sorting the liquor store’s back room; getting breakfast in the morning; interpreting how creepy Polly actually is – you wouldn’t be able to immerse quite as much if you were just a spectator.
I’ll say, HM, this generation is over but reasons to buy a PS3 are pretty overwhelming at this point. Deadly Premonition, Demon’s and Dark Souls, Uncharted, The Last of Us, Valkyria Chronicles… not to mention PS+.
Looks like the PS4 will offer the entire PS3 game library as a streaming service (this is why Sony bought Gaikai a while ago), though I’m sure the games won’t be free. That too is an option, and would keep you current.
Yeah, watching wouldn’t quite be the same.
I dunno. I never played the game, but I have watched people (well, a person, well, in fact, Steerpike) play this game and thoroughly enjoyed it. I am not sure watching a video would have the same effect, however, since part of the fun was being there in the room while all the madness was happening. And it’s weird, freaky madness.
“There’s a Director’s Cut change I do not like, in that the PS3’s […]”
Four paragraphs from the end and I suddenly realise I can now play this! Whoop!
Excellent write-up Amanda; I’m as intrigued now as I was when I read Steerpike’s impressions piece but this time more convinced I’d want to play it. I’ve got to say, it does irk me when decisive conclusions are drawn from a first impression. Steerpike, your write-up was an impressions piece so don’t worry! How long did you play it for back then?
@HM: I’d be totally willing to lend you my PS3 at some point as it’s mainly used as a inadequate dust cover for my TV stand at the moment.
I played for about… oh, nine hours. The old version of the game takes a lot longer to play because the controls are such a slog to get used to, and one interesting (probably smart) aspect of DP’s design is that the beginning hunk of the game isn’t really representative of the rest. The first hour is standard survival-horror combat, to familiarize you with that part of the experience. The next 2-3 hours structurally resemble the actual game, but they are much more hand-holdy than the “true” gameplay. It’s not until your third-ish day in town that things really open up and you see the full breadth of ambition. I got about four hours into that part, so I did experience it before I wrote the impressions, but some other game was coming out and I got distracted. I should have known not to start something complex at that time, but there you go.
As “open” as Deadly Premonition is, it’s also rather linear in some ways. The game never tells you what Amanda revealed – that your deadlines for accomplishing tasks are windows within any given day. I was under the impression that if I missed an appointment I’d get the dreaded INVESTIGATION FAILURE sign, so I trundled from story quest to story quest, only doing sides when I found them (they’re sort of hidden), and when I was absolutely sure I’d be able to get where I was going in time.
In this way it is like Pathologic, the game I’d say it shares the most with structurally. Both tell you what’s next if you want to progress the story, but Deadly Premonition has a lot more clarity to it, believe it or not. In fact, the more I think about Deadly Premonition, the less I believe that it is unpolished. I’m beginning to suspect that it’s exactly what SWERY intended it to be… he just gave the audience more credit for willingness to plumb the depths than it deserved.
Once I got the Director’s Cut I was hooked pretty quick. The weirdness is so infectious you begin thinking like the people in this crazy town, which is convenient because your character is even loonier than they are. I’m pretty close to the end, but some other games sidetracked me. I’ll get back to it as soon as I finish The Last of Us.
*to my credit, I guessed the identity of the killer pretty early on because of a crucial mistake that character made. To the game’s credit, every time I became convinced of my theory it would do something to change my mind. To no one’s credit, I didn’t guess something central to the killer’s identity because I was thinking like Steerpike rather than York at a key moment. To SWERY’s credit, just finding the killer’s identity is a lot like dealing with the king’s ghost in Daggerfall. It’s just the beginning of the end.
When I say it’s unpolished, I think it’s just as polished as SWERY decided to make it. He just concentrated that polish in areas that most game developers would not choose to concentrate it in.
It doesn’t hold your hand about the appointment thing at all. Some characters say “be sure to be on time” and others say “take your time and don’t rush.” It takes a playthrough to understand who might be lying to you.
I’d love to read more post-mortem on it than just the GDC session you referenced.
You’re right, it’s polished where it’s supposed to be, and clunky in aspects he didn’t deem that important. SWERY doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy who cares if the trees look that great. But I never found a break, a bug, a badly translated line, nothing. That’s rare in open world games.
You’ll think certain things are buggy or badly translated because the game delights in misleading you, but actual breaks? None that I can think of. It’s funny, Deadly Premonition was out in Japan as Red Seeds Profile for a year before it got localized to the West, yet in many ways it feels like a game that was always intended to be written in one language and translated to another, because it constantly tricks you into thinking it’s a clumsy localization when it’s not.
I also find it kind of interesting the actors who played the three primary characters have not worked since, and most supporting actors had robust careers before Deadly Premonition and only one or two credits after.
A post mortem you say?
I got you covered.
http://shshatteredmemories.com/greenvale/game-developer-magazine-interview/
Oh, please be warned that post mortem will have all the spoilers.
sweeeeeeeeeeeet. Thank you!
Great write up, AJ. I bought DP the original merely as a Lynchian curiosity and recalling Steerpike’s impressions, but now am genuinely excited to delve into it.
Good of you to call out the claims of “just a weird b-movie” and such.
So is this actually coming to PC now or what?
It’s on Greenlight! http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=160687506
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