REMEMBER ME

A melancholy trip down memory lane.

- Robin Valentine

Poking fun at forgotten brawler Remember Me's name is low-hanging fruit, but it's hard to get anywhere without acknowledging the irony. These days, developer Don't Nod is instead remembered primarily for the first two Life is Strange games. Remember Me is lucky to be a footnote.

In retrospect the studio's debut game seems like the truest expression of its original identity - creative, stylish, off-kilter and so French. But its middling reception and disappointing sales left the company in dodgy financial straits that only Life is Strange saved it from, ensuring it would never get a sequel, direct or spiritual - and setting Don't Nod on a very different path. The game is set in Neo-Paris, essentially a dystopian, sci-fi version of the view the developers would have had out of their office window. In this dark future, memories have become a commodity - they can be traded, shared, erased, or even altered via a device called a sensen. The rich and powerful hoard knowledge and experience, while the poor are left with jumbled brains, slowly losing their humanity as they devolve into cannibalistic leapers.

With that set up, I can for once forgive the amnesiac protagonist trope. Hero Nilin wakes up as a prisoner in some sort of memory laboratory, having just had her mind wiped of all but scraps. Before long she's escaping the facility, rediscovering her past and, of course, turning out to be some kind of memory-power chosen one of the revolutionaries trying to bring down this corrupt society.

MIND GAMES

I found