Game Review: Hate Plus

March 2nd, 2015

Most of us take it for granted that our society is getting ever more liberal. Our parents were more tolerant, inclusive and equal than their parents, and we are yet more tolerant than they. There's no telling whose rights our children will one day fight for, or even their children. But if you look at various cultures throughout history, there are actually many instances of relatively egalitarian societies slowly morphing into socially stratified class systems, often drastically reducing the quality of life for a large segment of the population. Few people talk about the fact that this is something that can happen, and even fewer talk about why.

This is just one of the many uncomfortable questions that Hate Plus, the sequel to Analogue: A Hate Story, raises.

Having been originally planned as DLC before morphing into a half-sequel, half-standalone-expansion, the story of Hate Plus is deeply interwoven with the one of Analogue. It would make very little sense to play this one before the first, and in fact, I would go as far as saying that you should play Analogue before you read this review if you wish to have the best spoiler-free experience. I will also draw more comparisons and make more overt references than I would for most other sequels, so if you are unfamiliar with Analogue, much of this review might be useless to you. You can find my review for Analogue here.

The plot of Hate Plus picks up right where its predecessor ended, with you, the space investigator, having recovered the documents and one of the A.I.s from the Mugunghwa. You can either continue from an existing Analogue save file, or you can start a new game and decide right then which of the two A.I.s you brought with you. In either case, that A.I. will accompany you on your three-day journey back to Earth. Instead of sitting around and being bored for that time, she offers to investigate with you the contents of some mysterious files she'd found in her own code. As it turns out, these files detail the fate of *Mute's previous instance from before the computer crash and the Mugunghwa's descent from a thriving postmodern society into a despotic and totalitarian implementation of Joseon-inspired principles. They cover several individual lives throughout the years as well as some of the changes in the political machinery and the intentions of the people pulling the strings into different directions, and of course, how their political actions lead to societal consequences. Your job is, once more, to find out the truth.

Compared to Analogue, this game makes a much stronger immediate visual impression. Instead of the black-on-white look from before, it goes with a rather striking (if still largely monochromatic) color scheme, mostly using lighter text on dark tinted backgrounds. The character sprites have seen an expansion of their palette of poses and facial expressions, making them even more expressive than before. Long documents are no longer paginated, instead there is free-form scrolling. Texts are imbued with hyperlinks pointing you to “photos” of the important characters, which is certainly a big help in keeping track of the abundance of political actors. You no longer have to activate the A.I. after reading a document, instead she always accompanies you throughout the texts and comments as you go. Even though plot contrivances still prevent you from any bidirectional free-form chat, this change produces a more noticeable aura of companionship and teamwork from which the emotional investment strongly benefits. The soundtrack is unobtrusive but on point and comes with a wacky, ironically self-aware theme song.

The player freedom regarding the order in which the story is explored is so much bigger that it is almost impossible to overstate. If you felt artificially constrained by Analogue, you might be happy to hear that (with one single exception) the game gives you no direction or guidance whatsoever. You just pick some files whose titles sound intriguing and hope that you can piece together the events and causalities after the fact. I would argue that the pendulum may have swung a little too far into the “player freedom” direction, as it is rather easy to ruin any dramatic arc and feel completely lost by choosing the wrong files early on or skipping some important ones for too long.

Your companion A.I. choice has a significant influence on the delivery of the story. Since the events documented in Hate Plus take place while the Pale Bride is still in cryogenic sleep, *Hyun-ae only has a very vague knowledge of the circumstances and a low personal investment, which manifests itself in a more easily distracted and less attentive demeanour that is occassionally detrimental to the investigation. I would recommend *Hyun-ae's route if you really liked her in Analogue, if you are looking for a more playful and cute experience, or if you have difficulties focussing on one thing for long periods of time. If Analogue is *Hyun-ae's story, Hate Plus is *Mute's. The former security A.I. has a noticeably better (but still fallible) grasp of society before and after the drastic political changes, and she is much more strongly invested because her previous instance is a main character in the story. Even if you were initially put off by *Mute's behavior in Analogue, I would recommend her route in Hate Plus if you really want to dive in and get the full experience.

One interesting mechanic that bears mentioning if only for its controversy is the real-time break enforcement. Since you are reading the files throughout your trip back to Earth, you are twice met with a mandatory break time of twelve real-world hours, to sleep and recharge the ship's batteries. I could see good arguments being made in favor of players being in charge of when and how much they play, and from what I've seen many people seem to be understandably critical of this design choice. However, I personally believe that I benefitted from the extra time I had to let the details sink in and mull everything over in my head. After all, that is how humans learn, and Hate Plus contains a lot of information that needs to be internalized. I also know myself well enough to say that I very likely would have binge-played it if this mechanic had not been in place, and as a result I would be remembering it with less clarity right now. I understand how it might feel a bit weird to not be solely in charge of your game pace, but I would encourage you to go along with it instead of trying to circumvent it (which happens to be not very difficult).

With much of the game being rooted in plot exploration, there is little of the story that I would want to give away here. It is more or less like Analogue, but even more intense, detailed, and shocking. The stronger focus on political intrigue (which the Pale Bride was mostly shielded from in Analogue), the engine improvements detailed above (even if the scrolling often feels rather jerky), and the overall more competent writing leave me in a position where I have to conclude that I liked Hate Plus even more than Analogue. Both titles have strong character writing and a compelling mixture of moods, but the sequel stands out thanks to the extra portion of effort that went into it. Don't play it before Analogue, but if you liked that one, I can't imagine you being disappointed by Hate Plus.