Emily is Away Too

Love the early internet nostalgia aesthetic, hate how the character conflicts are written, do like how a happy ending actually exists.

Told one I didn't want kids immediately after college. Told the other girl I might want kids in the future. Apparently I'm now a liar and manipulator because I was suppose to know first girl didn't wants kid ever even though we had talked about how it's so far in the future and things can change. 10/10 I'm annoyed irl now.

me and emily just might be doomed in every timeline

I'm taking a break from my usual heartfelt reviews in order to let you all know that the accuracy in this game made my girlfriend cry right in front of me. Go ahead and shatter my heart into a million pieces, it hurts way less.

Emily is Away so far is a very dishonest franchise. This iteration expands upon the original in a very clever way by integrating the actual desktop of your PC into the gameplay for an approach to immersion, but I found this game frustrating, and a failure to encapsulate a strong message that lingers. Not for any reason beyond the actual game mechanics being hard, but because of the game's insistence on the obfuscation of important details with regards to the branching pathways in dialogue. There's some unapologetic aesthetic deception when it comes to making a choice, and it's a distinction that boils down to the carelessness of online texting, and in making decisions I wish the approach was handled in a way that felt like it actually comments on how authenticity can be obscured or manipulated even though we're saying exactly what we intend to. Instead the approach is to give me the choice to say "You're a sweet person," when the progression will actually be "Heyyy, you're such a sweetie, what r u doin this friday?" Each and every time the illusion shatters. It's fundamentally different even with small, seemingly insignificant changes and that enters a realm of ludonarrative dissonance where now instead of me being on AOL in the 2000's, it's me influencing the choices of whoever this complete schizoid wants to be in the 2000s, and that contradiction within the game doesn't service it's story or it's message, because I can blame the dishonesty of the game for interactions I should feel the responsibility for. Therefore, I feel no internal conflict for these emotional beats. I am at a complete disconnect with whatever journey the game wants me to take. It's fake and phony, and the game never even needs to do it because organic sentences with full intent of communication can easily be misinterpreted anyway. It's deeply disappointing, because as a concept, this can work, but the writing isn't strong enough to communicate it's themes without betraying it's core mechanics, and the player.

Far better than the first game! Really glad this iteration rewards and/or punishes you for your authenticity, and glad that it actually branches into many different endings. Got the happily ever after ending with the GOAT Evee first try ! She's got insane taste in music. Speaking of which, the game's art direction is super cool. I discovered a new song thanks to it : When I got the three choices of songs to send to Evee in Chapter 5, I hadn't heard of "No Cars Go". So I started playing it in the background when playing. The ending became 20x more epic and beautiful !