Preface D:BH is the fifth game to be developed by Quantic Dream since it was founded in 1997. In July of 2021 it reached 6 million sales, making it Quantic Dream’s number one bestseller.

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Gameplay

Impactful and interesting throughout

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Detroit: Become Human is very clearly a story-driven game, which is confirmed by the 2000 page script that details every outcome of the story through your interaction. But this isn’t an interactive movie, like Black Mirror’s Bandersnatch. It’s an even more immersive and interactive version of this concept. The ability to literally move your main characters in the story, whether that be deciding which building to enter to achieve a certain goal, or dealing with quicktime-events that could dictate life or death, combined with the fact that all your choices matter to the outcome of the story, creates this unparalleled immersive experience. More mundane actions like walking from point A to B are regularly varied by tense quicktime-events, that being decisions of what to do in a situation or performing a certain input to succeed in a hasty move, thus never making the main mechanic of choice and inputs under pressure boring. Another important gameplay element is the ‘detective-mode’. We once again find ourselves investigating in a Quantic Dream game, this time through the eyes of an android detective. Because of its robotic nature and superior intelligence, it can activate ‘detective-mode’, which effectively stops time and enables you to analyse things related to the investigation. Through investigating, you gain a better understanding of what occurred, opening up new paths to follow throughout the game. This mechanic is in essence nothing too hard or complicated as a concept. But Quantic Dream have done a good job at maximizing user input while not making the whole thing an arduous task. Because of the possible need for information later on, and the mysteries surrounding the things you will be investigating, this mechanic is also a fun addition, and one that also sees its interest and use being kept until the end.

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Audio-visuals

Original and industry leading

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The prime redeemer for Kojima’s frankly bizarre Death Stranding were the visuals. The beautiful landscapes and different settings were masterfully crafted, and the cutscenes were the closest to real life we’ve ever been in a video game. The acting translated amazingly, with the visual horsepower to present it to us. Detroit: Become Human is on par with that level of beauty, and translating actor’s performances to the computer-generated characters on screen. And it’s clear with which mindset they achieved this. Quantic Dream is a company that doesn’t force themselves to replicate the same formula every year-or-so, in order to make the most amount of revenue. It tries to make an original IP that adds something to the industry, instead of merely copying whatever works consistently or is popular. And I would be remiss not to condemn this money hungry policy that certain game companies have internalized, never really improving or innovating, just trying to attract the largest audience that would hand them money. In contrast; Quantic Dream showcased a technical demo in 2012, six years before the launch of D:BH, called Kara, who later plays a main part in Detroit: Become Human. The demo’s contemporary nature, and the fact that a main character from the game was already conceived in 2012, underlines the commendable fact that Quantic Dream strives to make outstanding games.

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Story

Questionable depth and execution

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As the name suggest, Detroit: Become Human is a story about the emancipation of robotic beings, androids, on their road to ‘become human’. They are endowed with a sub-human intelligence and are simultaneously modelled to be as human as possible, to make them more acceptable in people’s homes. The game explores a world in which these (artificially) intelligent beings break free from their programmed boundaries, granting themselves free will. This causes you, the player, and the rest of the world, to question how to relate to this new lifeform. The above described is of course not entirely unexplored. Questions like, could a machine with intelligence granted by humanity ever feel emotions, or form meaningful relationships, are debated more commonly as we approach such a technical marvel. D:BH sets us up in a future where these questions have become reality. Androids have essentially become slaves to humanity, from doing exactly as they’re told, to being mercilessly beaten for no apparent reason other than the immediate lack of a non-sentient punching bag. Such a sight creates an imminent feeling of sympathy towards the helpless robots that cannot seem to comprehend or process why they’re being abused. It is incredibly obvious that the game draws inspiration and parallels from the civil rights movement in America that protested against segregation in the 50’s and 60’s. With mantra’s like ‘We have a dream’ and separate places on the bus for androids, the writers are consciously trying to call upon your historical and personal sense of injustice that is related to that period in America. The main problem with this uprising of the androids, is the pace at which it happens. There are very complicated plans that get executed with minimal time to plan or rehearse. An entire network, that apparently airs across the entire country on every screen, is hijacked by a handful of androids with a plan that they conjured up in no-time. For the player, you suddenly feel very disconnected to your character, because you played no part in the creation of this intricate scheme. This problem persists throughout the story. You do get to choose in what way you fight for your rights, but the time it takes to follow up on all the revolutionary ideals is too short. The story clearly has very poor segments, where you’re disappointed by the lack of depth or thought that was put into how something unfolds. No doubt this is a repercussion from the multitude of paths the story can take depending on your choices. It is commendable and interesting that this game offers such a huge amount of variety on how the plot ends up, but if it diminishes the quality of all these different story lines, it’s not worth it. Storylines that are focused on interaction and character building do shine. The relationship between the troubled cop that has a dislike for androids and the android that he has to partner with for the investigation he’s conducting, is very enjoyable, even though it relies on some clichés. There’s also a brilliant moment in which a group of abandoned theme park androids interact with one of our main characters. It’s a strong moment that very cleverly showcases human indifference to the wellbeing of their androids.

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Conclusion

By thinning out the storyline, figuratively slicing them up into little pieces so that you have more servings but less to offer per serving, Detroit: Become Human has made an interesting plot too weak to be a highly meaningful work. But its stunning visuals and interesting gameplay still make it an outstanding game. If you don’t critique the story as much while playing, and let yourself be immersed into the world, there is a highly enjoyable experience to be had with Detroit: Become Human. With less variation in where the characters end up, and more attention to the logic and course of individual storylines, the next game Quantic Dream develops has all the prerequisites to an absolute masterpiece.