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Beyond: Two Souls players will never do the same thing twice, says Cage

Beyond: Two Souls will offer variety to players, which will provide them with different different situations on each play through. Simply put, they will never do the same thing twice.

Speaking with Eurogamer, Quantic Dream's David Cage said the game isn't based on "patterns and levels," instead, each moment is "different."

"Each scene offers you a different challenge. Each scene is unique, like you see in a film," he said. "The game's story is told in chronological disorder, like in the film Memento. It creates an interesting dynamic. Sometimes you can see the consequences of something before seeing the cause."

This could mean in on scene the player is met with a teenage Jodie, in the next she is an adult, and the next a child. Each scene contains part of the plot and a line to occurrences in the game, but the full story of the scene may not come into play until a while later.

"It's about asking the player not just to watch the story passively, but contribute to the story at a macro level - to try to understand it and put the pieces of the puzzle together," explained Cage. "It creates another layer of interactivity that is quite interesting.

"Beyond is the story of two characters. It's the story of their relationship. It's about being tied to someone for all your life and having to cope with that, and accept it."

Because of what appears to be a convoluted and complex story, Cage and his team wanted to do more than just hire actors to apply their voices to the title, nor did the developer hire such high-profile Hollywood talent as Williem Dafoe and Ellen Page just to put a "shiny name" on the packshot. Instead, the team spent 12 months shooting mo-cap which resulted in 300 characters and 23,000 animations when all was said and done - a number Cage called "absolutely, totally insane."

"It was a crazy amount of work. I was looking for a creative collaboration with talent," he said. "We did not pay some actors in Hollywood to do a couple of voiceovers in a soundbooth... It was about scanning the face and body of these people to recreate their perfect clone in the game, in realtime 3D. We don't only have their look, we have their movements and their expressions. Their entire performance is recreated.

"That means we need a specific animation for pretty much every single action in the game. If you open a door in an action game, you just open a door. In a narrative-driven experience, opening a door can be done in many different ways. You can be in your apartment just opening a door, and that's it. But if you fear what's on the other side, then it's a different way of opening the door."

Beyond: Two Souls is slated for an October release on PS3.

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Beyond: Two Souls

PS4, PS3, PC

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Stephany Nunneley-Jackson

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Stephany is VG247’s News Editor, with 22 years experience (with 15 of them at VG247). With a brain that lacks adhesive ducks, the ill-tempered, chaotic neutral fembot does her best to bring you the most interesting gaming news. She is also unofficially the site’s Lord of the Rings/Elder Scrolls Editor.

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