Review of République

République is an indie episodic action-adventure-stealth video game originally developed for iOS devices in 2013 and since then, expanded to Android devices in 2014 and finally to Windows/OS X systems in 2015. The game's story is takes place in a "dystopian" world, to be more precise, within a facility called Metamorphosis, which revolves around a pseudo-NPC named Hope, who is a “Pre-Cal”, a person who is born and raised in the facility, and she is seeking a way to safely escape from Metamorphosis. The first episode, “Exordium”, starts with the player's phone ringing, an unnamed girl is calling you and she seems frightened. You don’t know who she is, why or how she chooses you or from where is she calling, but you know from her voice she is desperate for help. With that strange call starts the quest to help Hope escaping from Metamorphosis.

Easy, right? Well, no. Neither of you know that much about the facility and your role moves from a normal phone call to be in control of the surveillance system in Hope’s “detection room”. Thank goodness Cooper, a sort of double agent who is working undercover in Metamorphosis, is willing to help you save Hope, with his hacking know-how. The game seems to give you control of security cameras and this is the only interaction you have with Hope. The game plays like Watch Dogs, in the way that you hack into security doors and and interact with electric devices in the environment which will help Hope maneuver through Metamorphosis. One cool thing about controlling cameras (as if controlling cameras wasn’t cool enough), time freezes when you move from one camera to the next one. This allows the player to take some time to analyze the room around Hope and choose the best path to avoid guards, read hacked emails, answer phone calls or look for information. Knowing what to do now, the player has to guide Hope room to room to her safety, avoiding guards, picking up stuff such as pepper spray, useful to distract the guards, hacking devices and even pick-pocketing guards and passing through rooms safely. All of this will make you feel like a bad-ass secret agent! And the controls are really simple and easy to remember, you just click on objects that you want to hack like for example, computers or cameras, you click areas in the environment to move Hope forward.Everything in the game is context-sensitive, for example if you point Hope toward a door, she will go through it. Being the first episode in a planned five episodes’ series, Exordium, sets up the world of République and the paranoia, the surveillance, the censorship, the oppression that characterize it. Exordium during the whole gameplay poses us with tons of eye-opening question and just when I was sure I was going to know what was going on, the game ended with a cliffhanger! The second episode “Metamorphosis” starts just moments after Exordiums' cliffhanger. The gameplay is relatively the same as before although few things changed. In this episode guards wear Taser-proof vests and move in more unpredictable patterns, making you constantly moving around, quite an improvement from the first episode. Another improvement is seen in navigation system, thanks to a new map and improved help system. Through Metamorphosis' gameplay, we are going to uncover details about the Overseer, the government’s shady and murderous leader. The Overseer felt like a distant threat in the first episode but as the story progresses, you see him as a chilling figure that has played a huge role of the darkest parts of an alternate history. The size and scope of the world Hope explores grows enormously as the episode progress, making this game tedious to actually play, but apart from that, Metamorphosis refines and improves République’s approach to stealth and storytelling, which is a good point. In the third installment, “Ones and Zeroes”, as in Metamorphosis, you reprise the role of Hope’s guide. During this episode, you finally get to explore the true nature of Metamorphosis facility as the environment gets much more "sci-fi" with technical offices and futuristic looking hallways while Hope acquires a new ability, she is now able to see where guards are on the map and she also finds a new kind of weapon, a landmine that puts the guards to sleep. Let’s say, "Thank goodness we have the landmine!", because guards now wear body armor and helmets and they are immune to pepper spray and Tasers. Ones and Zeroes, more than Episode 1 and 2, takes the invasion of other people’s privacy to a new whole level. Hope, in order to escape, will need to frame guards by crafting fake news report based on their personal data and information. Despite bringing some innovations, thankfully Ones and Zeroes doesn't completely change the winning formula for République. I am so happy to see how the game has grown from another stealth app to this beautiful and engaging game, episode by episode! During the first three episodes, the mechanics of the game completely changes and it becomes easier yet frustrating. The environment changes how you use the surveillance system, what items are available and even the "aide" that you have access to. Making it tougher since the way you have been playing you have gotten used to. The world become a little more complex than listening to phones, reading emails, etc. Hope has to position close to the object and take a picture with her new found camera. But the game gives you some slack by lowering the number of enemies you have to sneak pass. But isn't saying that mammoth size bad guys ( hint, hint ) will not try to stop you dead in your tracks.The game continues to be difficult and yet playfully challenging. The gameplay is similar to previous episodes, I would say maybe a bit easier because now, with a lot fewer enemies and less 'unlockable obstacles' in your way. God's Acre is a really focused episode, it has very little backtracking and can be completed just under 2 hours instead of the average 3-4 hours of the past episodes. God’s Acre continues to provide a great story for the République series and the ending was absolutely....shocking. I can proudly say I love République, is one of the best episodic stealth game I've ever played and I am eagerly waiting for the final episode! If you guys never played it, GO PLAY IT!!

#marvitz #jennifer #republique #dystopian #hope #buy