Tell Me Why Review (Xbox One, PC)

It's 2020 and it's still quite rare to see trans representation in video games. Tell Me Why is a step in the right direction. It demonstrates a well understanding of how to craft a story not only including transgender characters but putting a trans character at the forefront as the leading role. Continuing developer Dontnod's tradition of advancing the modern adventure game genre, Tell Me Why is a three-episode adventure game taking place in rural Alaska. In the small town of Delos Crossing, a pair of twins reunite after a decade apart. Understandably so, the twins are overjoyed to see themselves again but on the sad note of having to go through the belongings of their now-deceased mother. Over the course of the next 9 to 10 hours, I saw the twins reunite their close bonds from when they were children as they go through the experience of learning more about themselves, their memories, and what caused them to separate in the first place. It's a story grounded in reality though like this developer's stories beforehand, it features a touch of magic. In tell Me Why, that magic is in its writing and the twins' ability to telepathically communicate and recreate shared memories together. That ability creates interesting moments for the twins' mystery journey. What I want to applaud Dontnod for is its ability to write an authentic feeling trans character, especially in the lead role. While yes his trans experience shapes his character, it's not the only thing that defines him in this story. He's a confidant, strong and multilayered character that just happens to be trans. Likewise, the story doesn't use it as a drama plot device that focuses on trauma or negatively focuses on the trans experience. Sure you'll hear about two misgender moments but you'll never hear a deadname be said nor the use some sort of transphobic crime as a narrative plot device. In the same tradition as its previous games, Dontnod's latest title continues to be an episodic video game. However, instead of partnering up with Square Enix, they've partnered with Microsoft and thus Tell Me Why is free on Xbox Gamepass. As an episodic video game, it's an interesting concept when titles are released a week apart while all part of gamepass. As opposed to TellTale games model of episodes being released months apart and purchased separately, the climatic build-up for this new series no doubt will be better organized for it. As part of my review coverage, Microsoft provided me with a code to play all three chapters ahead of their release and while I'll be covering the series as a whole, I'll mainly focus on points from chapter 1 for spoiler sake.

Chapter 1 focuses on setting the building blocks of the series narrative like introducing characters for the first time. While it pays off as a whole, it fails to deliver on some characters and makes for an occasionally slow start to the series. With that said, it doesn't tarnish the entire package. Sure I would have loved to see more layers of the mother develop more organically but for just about the rest of the cast, they deliver on being well thought out additions to the story. In fact, Tell Me Why mixes the aspects of reality and fantasy in such clever ways that feel seamlessly woven into the story. The twins' ability to recreate memories is particularly interesting as an individual's memory will always be subjective because of their point of view. Likewise, when we see what the twins remember, we occasionally get different accounts of the situation. As the player, we get the choice to select which memory we believe the most. It's a bit of a two-sided sword as while I think its an interesting gameplay mechanic, I think it can also belittle a character. With that said, these choices don't seem to have big changes to the actions of the characters but instead, the relationship between the twins. Arguably that's a bigger effect as they're the stars of this story and are largely the most compelling part of this narrative. Along with its story beats, I found myself consistently having to solve puzzles and mini-games that felt like great rest periods between the heavy-handed topics. This story has a lot to unpack and these tranquil moments of using childhood memories to solve riddles or just fishing with the locals in town, it was a nice break from the usual story revelations. Tell Me Why continues dontnod's visual style that they developed with Life is Strange. Characters feel a lot less stiff in this iteration with a bit more life present on the cast of characters. I think what particularly stood out to me with this series is the camera work for scenes that had characters having active conversations where my input was required. These moments felt a bit more intelligently framed, coming off as a real cinematic experience that I was able to interact and give my input to. It's needless to say that Tell Me Why isn't the most realistic looking game but the way the camera work is handled helps it shine as a realistic experience. While playing on both PC and Xbox, I didn't notice any frame rate dips or weird glitches. Performance seemed stable and much better in general than the studio's previous projects. With a game so focused on its storytelling and characters, it's important for the project to have a solid cast that can bring these characters to life. Tell Me Why more than delivers on this front with both August Aiden and Erica Lindbeck delivering great performances as Tyler and Alyson respectively. It's great to see a transman play a trans character, a no brainer move on paper but one so rarely seen in media to this day. I applaud the developer's choices in going what should be a standard for stories around this subject matter. Music is also well done with a mostly somber feeling soundtrack that fits the melodramatic moments on screen. It's an earnest depiction of these characters that are better executed because of the tranquil and almost melancholy tunes playing behind them. Tell Me Why is a refinement of Dontnod's craft as an adventure game studio. Their ability to handle difficult to talk about situations and generally just stories that rarely get told, is a testament to their writing. Tell Me Why is a great demonstration of how much-untapped potential there is in adventure games and I hope we see this studio continue to evolve. The memory mechanic with different points of view is a remarkable idea and I hope it's brought back in some shape or form in the future. Though I think there are some characters that could have been given more time to shine and develop, Tell Me Why was a great story to go through and one I recommend checking out, especially to those with a gamepass subscription.