In May, they released Pathologic 2 or just More – like a Romek of the game “Mor (utopia)” 2005. [At the time of writing the text for the original game, I only planned to take up, but even then it was clear that this is a difficult matter and this could be written a separate voluminous text. After.sch
The reaction to the game turned out to be ambiguous. In particular, it was scolded for poor optimization, a large number of bugs and high complexity. The developers tried to fix it all, but the game did not ask for sales. The history of the creation and promotion of Mora is generally a sore theme for conversation. At first, due to the costs of the budget, the “Ice Bosses” decided to release a non-full-fledged game with three characters, as it was in the original, but only with one. Then, due to low sales, the development of two other scenarios was frozen. At the moment, “ice axes” seem to be going to saw something simple, but profitable to make money for the pre-trial of Mora. If this is the second tuk-knuck, why not, if not, not another cargo that scares away with one kind. But let’s move on to the game itself.
Part 2, one -day
When trying to talk about the Second Sea, I want to share a lot, but then most of the text will be full of spoilers and tastes. I also want to lower too detailed descriptions of the gameplay, since they are not so important. Therefore, I decided to talk about how I met the game myself. I’ll tell you about the first in the in -game day in the world of Mora. Perhaps the game will also meet you, like me, but it’s not exactly. The game is extremely great in the variability of the development of events, and it is far from always possible to track the causal relationship. And therefore, the passage of two people may vary. So, let’s go.
[Before we rush to jump – another movement in the game is unthinkable and I tried to convey this stylistically – a little explanatory information. The game takes place in a small city in the middle of the steppe. The only message with the world is through an iron single road. Presumably, the time of action is the 1918-1922s, and the scene is Russia. But all this is not exactly, and most importantly – it does not matter. There is only this city, and the semi -mythical world behind the fence. The city itself has only a conditional name along the river-a city-on-g. A city with its customs, special miracles and rituals. The local attraction is the “multi-party” tower that violates physical and logical laws, in addition to people, worms-Odongi walk along the street, and tinctures from local grass called “Twir” can work miracles. And all this is only a small part of the local originality. For the locals, this is all in order of things and they will rather be surprised that for you it is in the novelty. Well, I’ll be going to give you a basic performance, because the train with our gero arrives at the station. Rushed.sch
You have to play for Artemy Burah. A native of the steppe city-horshone, he has not been at home for a long time-he studied at the surgeon in the capital. In his native town, his father calls him-something greatly worries him, but he does not want to entrust the details of the letter or cannot. And then the game begins. Or not? The game precedes a series of dreams, while the body of the Burach is shaking in a commodity car-the only thing that goes to the native land. In these visions, the player is introduced to the atmosphere, surreal and gloomy, as well as with the interface and some gameplay features. All this will find a meaning only later. I would even say – very then.
Finally, you arrive at the station where you see a small video in which three local residents attack Artemia. The fight ends with the death of the attackers, and immediately after you are left to yourself. The city has taken up the city-they say you killed someone. Someone except those three at the station, I mean. Every second will try to beat you or slaughter you. You recall – gameplay, through the Burakh thought magazine – about three childhood friends who can help. One of them just loved to spend all his free time in warehouses near the station. Having hung up somehow to the desired door, you find an old acquaintance, vulture. It turns out that today he leads local crime and warehouses – his patrimony. He will try to put in a word for the Burakh, but you just see what kind of business – one young man’s heated sharpening and he will soon be bleeding if not help. Where? Yes, here, not far, about ten minutes walk – game minutes, of course. Having given the Burakh tools – a rusty scalpel and bandages – the bar leads the hero, on the way familiarizing with the local way to persist. In the city in key locations, watches are placed that allow you to make huts in computer memory. This is very important, because madmen who are trying to beat or slaughter you will soon begin to run around the city. Moreover, the mechanic of death here is a separate story, about it a little further.
Looking at the map, where the house with the fellows of the vulture was celebrated, you notice that the house is another of your friend, Stah Rubin, along the way. Sneaking, looking around, you run to his hut, parallel to the local topography. You can only go to the house to Rubin from the yard, and to get there, you need to go around the house in a wide arc and find a gate. Well, okay, go inside … op-ps. But no rubbish. Instead of him, some metropolitan whip smugly declares that you have. Like, so and so, Rubin considers you guilty of the death of your father and wants to send you to the next world. Yes, your father is really dead, Bakalavr Dankovsky – this is the name of the capital’s whip – this confirms. And he asks somewhere to bury, because "you will still come in handy".
We leave the house and we are catching a couple of kids. They say that they poisoned friends and need urgent help. Being a surgeon, you say that wait a minute, there is a metropolitan doctor, now I will give him. Return to the house, only to hear the stiff "not for that my diploma was written in order to help some homeless people". And the oath of Hippocrates Dankovsky apparently did not give. Okay, you decide, I will figure it out. You promise the children to drop up if you succeed and are faced with a choice-go cut sharpening from the bandit or try to do something for children. Both choices are doubtful – what can you do with your bare hands for poisoned kids? But also darn the bandits – is it necessary? These are bandits, wolf. Okay, you decide, children of the flowers of life, we’ll figure it out there.
However, upon arrival at the place, it suddenly turns out that not children, but their animals, pets were poisoned. And that these pets have already died. For a children’s gang, this is a matter of life and death. They are called double -eaters and animals for them – familiarians and crucifixes at the same time. Kill the animal means killing a closest friend, part of you. And children demand retaliation. Animals poisoned a guy named Lisa. What you object in the most logical way – wait, the murder is not an option. To which the children promise to teach Lisa differently – you are, they say, give the main black label to him in the form of a strap.
Again, what will you do? What exactly will children do with a marked guy? I started the game three times again. The first time I managed to overcome this whole story, and in both other cases I went to talk to him. Lisa declares, they say, to beat his double -players is useless, it is necessary to beat them on the patient, and this is animals. Deciding that in front of me is a guitler guy, I both gave him a strap without any special hesitation. No curiosity in my eyes justified the freely walking monster.
Upon returning, it turns out that the children-dedicated people came up with something more terrible than death. As a result, we find Lisa on their base, with washed brains and not particularly thinking. Children say that they showed him the earth. Either buried for some time, or something else-it is not clear. And the secret of transformation will remain unknown to you. So – it seems like a lousy guy was, but in the end he became an idiot. And you will have to live with this. Well, the time to do the bandits of the neck if they still breathe. Moreover, their house is on the shortest route to the last friend of the childhood of Burakh – Lara Rael.
At some point, the game suggests that if you press “control”, then you will illuminate people with whom you can talk. And now you see that you can talk to one of the passers -by. And he says that the murderer of Isidore Burah, his father Artemy, caught it-they turned out to be Shabnak-Adyr, a local analogue of Golem. A passerby also adds what to burn a girl generated by the earth.
A mark appears on the map where they plan to burn the girl, and again she is along the way. We hasten to place – and … we see a heartbreaking scene, as the unfortunate savage in rags burns alive. Herbal bride, as they are called here. Because there are urban ones, but there are steppe – a strange people, among which women often become such "brides". They do not belong to anyone except the Earth, and dance, forcing her to “give birth” to flowers and wheat. And the meager state of their clothes is somehow connected with this.
In any case, you are late, and not only you. Upon arrival, you find a crowd of people, but they are not lynchis – after talking, we find out that they tried to save her, but she already burned with might and main when they came. Well, then, the time is still to take up the bandits of the neck. At this moment, by the way, the city becomes completely hostile to you and you have to run away from angry residents. Fortunately, you just have to go into the house, how they lose sight of you and go their own way. This is explained by a special pet before the holiness of other people’s chambers.
Run to the house where the thieves of the neck settled. An abandoned house, which you must be embraced. Nobody needs this khabar, and you will only come in handy on the road.
In one of the rooms you find the subordinates of your old friend. And it turns out that they found it and set fire to Shabnak-Adyr. Actually – burned an ordinary girl. And is it worth it to treat such scum? The choice is yours. I, having given my word, decided to follow him yet. Here, by the way, you are introduced to the operating interface. Explain for a long time. In short, you cut sharpening from the bandit from the belly … well, or the master, is not important. They use such here. They will help the door to open, but they can open people – however, very few, the tool quickly breaks. But they are much cheaper than a knife or scalpel.
Having finished with the bandits, get out and … flanching https://captain-spins.co.uk/ from passers -by. Because there are many of them, you are alone, and the mechanics of the game are not on your side. And you get to the Death Theater – a strange place where you are taught by a certain Mark Immortal – the director, supposedly, performances. Yes, the very one where you play Artemy Burakh. And since you can’t cope, then returning to the game, you will be burdened. How? Well, this time – a decrease in a strip of life. And continue – it will be worse for you and the world. About the consequences of the second, by the way, it is not completely clear.
It is important to understand that at sea You can’t help but die. It is simply impossible. In each of the three attempts to pass the game, I fell from five to twenty times under the bullets, a knife or just fists of the crowd. It is possible to reduce the number of deaths to a minimum, but it is almost unrealistic to exclude them at all. However, you can reduce the difficulty if you are very tender. No one will condemn.
The most annoying thing is that upon returning to the game world, you roll back to the house of Rubin, where the clock is also standing and you can survive. Or in the "Clotes’ Castle" – which is also not the closest path. So, again look at the burning of a herbal bride, again cut a master key from the bandit and surpass the house … Well, okay. Finally, you guess that you can pay the local boys-Odong-strange squat beings with a bald spherical head-to be transported to the house of Lara, your childhood girlfriend. There, finally, you can take a breath.
Here. I told you only the first day of staying at sea, trying to show what awaits you. The most interesting thing is that this is only the beginning of the day. There are at least three important solutions ahead – and all on this day. And then there will be another ten days, each of which will increase bets and complicate the rules. You need to go to the western quarter of the “mountains” and talk with George Judge, then running to go to the eastern quarter “battleships” in order to explain to the commandant Saburov there, then how, then there will be another five seats – and time will ride, like a frantic.
By the end of the second day, the game will introduce you to the local ritual of healing. And this is again only the beginning.
Every day it will prepare a choice, and not one that you are not ready for. You often have to see the boot screen on which the inscription regularly appears: "Do not save everyone".
Part 3, explanatory
At this place, you should move somewhat from the game itself and talk about what it is for. Because playing for mora for entertainment is a very, very dubious idea. Although of course, pleasure is part of what the game is doing with you. Through pain and suffering, you are trying to straighten the disharmony surrounding you, and when your efforts change something, the delight of achieving genuine. But here is the first part, about pain and suffering – I’m never joking, even if we are talking about the pain and suffering of emotional, metaphysical.
The Ice-Pick Lodge philosophy in the development of games was primarily determined by one person, Nikolai Dybovsky. In 2005, he gave a lecture on what principles he and his team are guided by creating games. Summarizing everything that is said there and what I saw in the game, I will say so. The game should not be comfortable for the player. The game should not entertain. The goal of the game, like any art is to achieve changes in himself from the reader. And computer, video games, have a unique tool for this that is not characteristic of other forms of narrative. Only the game allows you to get used to the role, to become a direct participant in history.
Dybovsky assits a key role in the game to conflict. The player must suffer from a clash of interests. At sea, the player is placed in a situation when the whole world is against you, and the tasks are also facing you. Which you want to fulfill because you love local people. Yes, the characters in the game are such that it is not a shame to worry about them. When the Stah Rubin died during the second passage in one day, I precipitated so much that I restarted the game. I could not save him, rolling back in time ago, I needed to start the whole chain of events from scratch in order to have time to understand at what point he needed to help and what. Because this bastard, frankly hostile to Burach, that is, to me, a wonderful person, and he did not deserve death. What, contradictory? Well, get used to it, at sea people are alive and torn by internal contradictions no less than in the real world.
But not by the characters one. Another point that I will quote almost from the lecture of Dybovsky is the disharmony of the world in which the player is placed. For Burach, it all starts with bandits at the station, and then the murder of the father. Who killed, why? Find, punish, hand over to the authorities, at worst! But it’s all at first. Already on the second day a disease comes to the city. Sand ulcer. And now the player is offered to observe the degradation of the city under the influence of the disease. To which our father also has something to do-in the sense, the father of Burach. Well, you remember, getting it in the image.
The world is wrong, the world of violated justice and broken balance. In which the main character, a surgeon by education, and the healer by inheritance, can bring the order. Potentially – find a panacea, save everyone. Or save yourself. Or take up the search for the killer of the father, if it seems to you priority. The game does not force specific actions, honestly offering to choose.
And due to this, the return is colossal. Starting the game one evening, I did not notice how I drowned. Steam says I spent 56 hours inside. I don’t know how to evaluate it. On the one hand, this is much more than on average. Say, in Batman: Arkham Asylum, I spent only 14 hours, and this is the average duration of such games. Bioshock Remastered, recently traveled, took 12 hours. However, I am ready to argue that in the previous game from the "ice axes", namely, in Turgora, I spent no less. But this is impossible to check, because Steam has only an amusing “color voice”.
On the other hand, I do not feel the time spent at all. And on the third party, it seems to me that I spent too little in the mysterious city-on-gorkhona. He still keeps secrets from me. And there are many of them.
But I was distracted. The key that I actually wanted to say – that the mor, or Pathologic 2 – is one for a million game. There are no such games and it is very difficult to compare it with others.
And also this is a game that will charm your life. Allow you to look at everything from a new angle. And I would even say – make you choose. Or look at a different angle-or "scary-cut". Something like that.
Part 4, about Stah Rubin
There would be a conversation about the sea and finish. BUT! How can you finish talking about the sea in principle? What are you there … There is just a ton of material that you can think about.
Well, for example, given that in the game a metaphor on metaphor and metaphor is driven, we can assume with an equal degree of truthfulness, that the city-gorkhone city is a model of society and at the same time-a model of human consciousness. Characters can be endlessly laid out into components, guess who is a representative of which archetype and what is guided.
However, it is not for me with three grades of the parish to climb into a structural analysis. I’d better tell you on a simple example of how personal stories stem from the game, how the characters come to life in the mind of the player. An example will be an old ruby. By the way, characteristic, he is not Aristarchus, as it seems stubbornly, but Stanislav. Well, but not the point. In this part of the text there are few spoilers for the game, so if you are from those who are afraid, proceed to the final, fifth part.
What kind of person is this old? What do we know about him? As a child, he, along with Burach, Grif and Lara Rael, played in the city-gorkhona city. Childhood in this place is a very special thing, small people have their own city, visible by different eyes. Miracles, gloomy games, strange places. It is also worth understanding that according to some hints, the action of Mora unfolds against the backdrop of the Civil War of 1918-1922. So it is worth doing more in this regard. And therefore, often mentioned games in “Put the cartridge on the rail so that it rushes when the train drives” should not cause much shock. Yes, and already in our time these games exist, even if they have modified in “put a coin on the rail and see what it will turn into after”.
And together with friends, the Stah spent a lot of time both a child and a teenager. Everything changed the county of Burakh. Isidore, dad Artyom, sent his son to the capital – to see the world, show himself, another look at things get. In his absence, the steam, apparently, a much closer friend of Artyomka than the vulture, decided to replace his son to Isidore. He began to study his medical business. Only in the secrets of the art of local doctors Isidore did not let Stakha. Knowledge of Menhh, what the name of the stepnings of their doctors were called, were inaccessible to him. About how to cook healing infusions from local herbs, how they work with the human body, how the lines work – a special semi -religious discipline, known to the end, it seems, only Isidore himself – all this was devoid of all this. However, the desire to become a worthy successor to the only doctor of the city had. Fierce, beating for the face.
It is impossible to say from what the game gives, but the old man clearly received somewhere else education. Most likely, he took medical books everywhere where he could. Kainins probably picked up something, ordered the works from the capital. In his house you can find racks with literature. And the more the old found out about medicine, the more he was removed from the Hemhamant’s science of Isidore. But meanwhile, the desire to become his successor has not taken anywhere. And therefore he continued to study with him – to the extent that it was available to him. Isidore clearly saw the efforts of neophyte, but did not want to trust him – or could not. By that time, the old man had already tormented their demons associated with the degradation of the city and the inability of the steppes and the city to get along. Then the first outbreak of sandy ulcers happened and think about the fate of the poor fellow of Stah Isidor.
And now Burra returns from the capital. In the eyes of Stakha, betraying all memory of his father. He was not in the city for seven years, seven! While the agricultural steam was glorying, trying to become a doctor, he seemed to be cooling somewhere there, far away. It seems that they did not correspond with letters, and for the city-gorkhon the son of Isidore seemed to be dead. God knows what was happening in the Stakh in the soul in connection with this. Envy to how Isidore speaks of his son – he also wanted to be worthy of praise! Envy to how Artemy escaped from the city and he does not need to see a split in society, growing contradictions between the three main families of the city – Caines, Olgimsky and Saburovs. In the head of Stakha, it seems to me, the picture of the artyomka, who ate the fish, was clearly formed – he received the praise of his father, and lies on the stove – far from the torment of the city.
And then the artyoma returns. Before what Isidor Burah is especially fiercely fighting his demons. And when a rumor passed-the son was overwhelmed by the Daddy’s Dad-the Stah believed for a second or two to him. Allowed the envy to play his role. However, then the infection penetrated the city and this was aggravated. Unique information and materials fell into the hands of Stah – perhaps the key to the panacea. And he fiercely rushes along this path – he will prove to them everything, Burah, people, himself, finally! Burning himself from the inside, lacking his own principles, he finds a way to delay the infection. After that, exhausted, closed at home, watches the agony of the city and throwing Burach. Stakha’s results are amazing, but do not give salvation. He is eventually brought by the son of Isidore, and Stah leaves the city with the army that he cordoned him off on the eighth day from the beginning of the sandy ulcer. The country has war and such desperate doctors as an old will be useful to it.
So for me was an old ruby. A desperate student who is eager to get in front of a deceased mentor. His main thirst is to prove to the world and to himself that he is not mediocrity. That he is able to treat, that he can save life. At the same time, for a long time, I would personally say that the stah is an ideal representative just the lack of talent. Being Artemy Burakh, getting into his skin, the player can see firsthand how much more he manages to do, while the Stah is busy with one single version. By the fifth day, when the Stah makes his version of the medicine, having initially more knowledge than the son of Isidore, Artyom will catch up with him.
[In fact, of course, questions regarding talent, the matter is muddy. Someone will say that it does not exist, except in the form of hard work and passion. Someone will say that everyone has their own fate and in the plot of Mora The Six that performs its function, like Burah himself, no more, but no less. Again, there is still a moment that talent is usually a thing of highly specialized. And the stach has a very specific specialization indicated by the game. And we can also say that if he had the same seven years of preparation in honey. the institution that Burach has, and he would show himself much better, but history does not know the subjunctive mood.sch
I really like the old, but I understand perfectly well that under no circumstances could he become the hero of this story. His self -immolation is worthy of respect, but he would be boring to live him. His path is to beat his head against the wall until it breaks. The path of Burakh is to beat your head on all four walls, to jump into the ceiling, hoping that it is wooden, try to fly away and, making sure of futility, digging an undermining and dumping into Mexico, where to expect on the shore of the Pacific Ocean when the Black Staha sets off his lifetime conclusion.
I found such characters in the second sea two. There is also Katerina Saburova, a morphine and oracle, who is desperately trying to become a mistress, which is a special status of women from the ruling families of the city-gorkhone city. And just like an old one, Katerina does not cope, and her fall to the bottom of life delights no less. But this is another story.
Part 5, finally ration
Here he is, Mor. Or Pathologic 2, as you are more convenient. Very briefly, trying not to spoil, I tried to convey impressions of the game. There is much that I would like to talk more about, but these are thoughts for another text, much more freely related to the detailed retelling of the plot. For example, about the endings, of which there are several, I would like to talk especially.
In general, I want to recommend mor to everyone and everyone. The game is phenomenal, unique and unique. Moreover, what is characteristic – after passing I took up the original game of 2005. And I must responsibly declare – there are many discrepancies, and they are striking. The first game was much more demanding on the study of details. Demanded to crawl around the city, study every pebble. The second game is much more organic and alive, and on this, too, maybe somehow it is worth talking about separately.
So, I just wanted to note that if the first Mor was more a philosophical treatise, then the second is a quality science fiction that can teach the new one and entertain. And therefore, if you have been frightened by the first pestilence before, detonate doubts – this is something completely different, and beautiful. I hope a pleasant personal acquaintance with the game, but on this I have everything. Thank you for your attention.
Leave a Reply