To the Moon - Total Recall-meets-Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

silentsod wrote:

Serious spoiler:

Spoiler:

The game ended with the same flashing pulse as encountered earlier which suggests that you're not actually in John's head, but in Neil's. Remember the pills from earlier?

I'm unconvinced. I'd need to check it out on replay. That's getting into real Inception territory though, where it seems to me people are looking for levels unsupported by the text.

I'm not dismissing it, just dubious.

silentsod wrote:

Serious spoiler:

Spoiler:

The game ended with the same flashing pulse as encountered earlier which suggests that you're not actually in John's head, but in Neil's. Remember the pills from earlier?

My tinfoil hat theory returns!

Seeing 5 new posts in this thread this morning made me smile. I think it's been long enough. I will have to run through the game again soon.

I agree with you about where the "real" ending of the story is, MrDeVil909.

Spoiler:

There are sort of two stories going on at the same time. One is about the Doctors and John, and the other is about River and John. The more interesting one about the extremely complex relationship between River and John wraps up at the Carnival IIRC as you mention or at least around that point in the story.

MrDeVil909 wrote:
Spoiler:

For me the climax of the game was at the carnival, basically everything after that was a coda.

Spoiler:

Tears were literally streaming down my face during that scene, as just about every crazy and baffling loose end in the story suddenly clicked and made absolute perfect sense... and then immediately putting it into the context of how so many YEARS had gone by that such a key defining point in their relationship was completely forgotten? Man, how heart-wrenching! Heck, I'm getting misty just thinking about it now.

After reading some of these posts after the sale, I decided to add it to my wishlist to remind me to pull the trigger next sale instead of debating it with myself. I looked it up and discovered I had already purchased it.

I guess the awesomeness of the Steam Sale temporarily overloaded my short term memory. Just another "what the hell, brain?" moment.

Started and finished it today. Very interested to go through this thread tomorrow because it'll help shape my opinion of the tale. Right now, I'm of mixed feelings. I feel most of their execution (story) was very good, but how they got there, and the decisions they made, I can't say I love. Technically, it hampered my enjoyment of the game just like in The Walking Dead. *Oh, it's a game. Yup, it's a game.* I'll give them the benefit and blame RPG Maker. The things that constantly bothered me were the cursor bugging and not displaying correctly, and the characters might stop moving when I've given them a command.

All and all, time well spent; a nice, sometimes-touching story.

Spoiler:

The reveal of the platypus, damn that made me verklempt.

Seeing this thread jump by 17 posts put a huge smile on my face after the end of another long day.

Spoiler:

The part of the story that really gets to me is not so much River and how John loves her so much that he wants to find her again but that River loves John so much, in her special way, that she's the only one that remembers/recognizes him for being him, and not someone with all the traits of his dead brother sub-consciously imprinted over his own.

In the beginning, there is this sense that there is something not quite right with John that slowly grows as we walk backwards through his memories; he's wishy-washy and unsure of himself and even River, even though he clearly loves her. I first brushed it off as him being a weird old man, then somewhat of an ass in adulthood. Then we find out about River's condition and suddenly it all makes sense! Except it doesn't. It explains most of River's behavior but not all the reasons behind it. Likewise, explains most of the reasons behind how John relates to River, but not for the rest of his behavior.

Then we hit on the real reason John is the way he is, it's not because of River's condition; it's because he's some horrible hybrid of his dead-brother imprinted over himself and he doesn't even remember or realize it. And that River doesn't just love him in spite of it, but loves him for who he really is; which only she remembers or realizes but yet can't tell him or explain it to him because of her condition.

It's Tragic!

So when the manufactured ending came about where the shadow of his dead-brother is lifted off him and John is allowed to experience a life finally as his true self, and still meet and fall in love with River and at NASA no less, I pretty much cried in relief throughout that sequence (it was 6am and my eyes were tearing anyway).

Awesome experience. Everyone should play this.

Picked this up during the Steam sale and played through it today in one sitting. Emotionally devastating, right in the gut. You can add me to the teary eyed club.

What a charming and beautiful experience.

I like Crimeny's tinfoil hat theory...

Does anything change if you do the puzzles efficiently?

BNice wrote:

Does anything change if you do the puzzles efficiently?

I don't think so. I think that the puzzles are mostly there just to give you a break from the story.

Hurray! The next game has been announced. A Bird Story.

To be clear, this is supposed to be a short game, bridging the first game with the actual sequel.

I am excited about it, though. Especially this:

Despite being story-based like most of my games, there are essentially no dialogues throughout.

Should be interesting.

Fired this up tonight finally. Just had about half an hour or so but it's very interesting so far.

The most annoying part was the resolution. Not sure why there wasn't just a simple 2x option, like most emulators and other sprite-based games have. I ended up just modifying the resolution on my 2nd monitor temporarily and going that way to keep it windowed. When I tried alt-enter for fullscreen it stretched and looked horrible.

Anyway, once I got that sorted the best I could, I settled in to play. Hopefully can squeeze some more time in tonight/tomorrow.

So I picked this up in the last steam sale (at Christmas was it?) anyway, just got around to playing it, would have done it in one sit in but tea got in the way.

Anyway I just wanted to share my love for it, one of the most beautiful games I have ever played. A true work of art.

Nice! It's always fun when people finally get around to playing it. I went and checked Freebird Games for news updates and came across this:

IMAGE(http://cache1.bigcartel.com/product_images/106360749/1.png)

They're all sold out. It's kind of a fun idea.

I forgot that that song makes me cry manly tears of manliness.

To The Moon only 3,99$ this weekend on GOG.

Kan Gao released a free holiday mini-sode that continues the story.

You can find the download at the link below or, if you bought the game through Steam, it should have auto updated with the mini-sode. just browse into your Steamapps folder and look for the SigCorp - Holiday Special (Bonus Game) folder inside your To the Moon Folder.

http://freebirdgames.com/2013/12/31/...

Sweet! I'll have to check that out.

I liked it. Nice little piece of To the Moon action. I sure wish he'd get them sequels out the door, though.

Glad I found this thread, It was one of my top games this year.

Finished that holiday mini episode. That was cool!

Sounds cool, I'll put it on my wishlist. Aaaaaand I already own it. Looks like I got it in Humble Bundle X this week.

I need to try remember the minisode. Is it a tear jerker?

MrDeVil909 wrote:

I need to try remember the minisode. Is it a tear jerker?

not at all. I thought it was fairly weak compared to the actual game, it did bring up a decent question towards the end of it.

Thanks to the Humble Bundle, this game was finally ported to the Mac, and I could play it. What a delight! I loved how the layers of story revealed themselves and how it all came together.

I played this game last night. I enjoyed it immensely.... it evoked the same sort of feelings that Gone Home did for me, complete with the dread as things appeared to be going a very bad direction.

I love how interactive fiction has been evolving more and more recently.... I would have been quite happy "playing" To the Moon without the hidden object mini-games, or the light puzzling, but they didn't really hamper the experience at all. I think that if the gameplay (so to speak) had been any more challenging or time consuming then it actually would have hindered the experience instead of improved it.

I'll spoiler this next part, just in case:

Spoiler:

I clued into River's condition early on due to Isabelle's use of the term "neurotypical" - I've only ever heard the term used used when autism of aspergers are being discussed, and so Johnny being called that really tipped me off. This knowledge gave me a window into River that I wouldn't have had until much later, although ultimately she was a much deeper character than the template that I immediately assigned her.

As the game wound down, and the reveals started coming about Johnny, and the significance of all of the mementos that I'd been chasing sunk in (the rabbit and platypus especially), I was more and more emotional. Damned game.

I just noticed the other day that To The Moon now has Steam trading cards (as opposed as when I played through it a while back). Was a great excuse to do another playthrough, and it's still as emotionally stirring now as it was last year.

Eleima wrote:

I just noticed the other day that To The Moon now has Steam trading cards (as opposed as when I played through it a while back). Was a great excuse to do another playthrough, and it's still as emotionally stirring now as it was last year.

All those goddamn paper rabbits gave me goosebumps.

ThingumBob wrote:
Eleima wrote:

I just noticed the other day that To The Moon now has Steam trading cards (as opposed as when I played through it a while back). Was a great excuse to do another playthrough, and it's still as emotionally stirring now as it was last year.

All those goddamn paper rabbits gave me goosebumps.

All those goddamn paper rabbits gave me completely emptied tear ducts, once I got to the narrative climax.

Just started and finished this tonight, and cried like a baby. The scene at the carnival most of all -- Merphle nailed it -- it was like being hit by a bus.

What a tour de force of storytelling! Just.. everything. Wow, wow, wow.

I know I'm not saying anything that hasn't been said before, but it's just that is the most affecting game in.. ever?