The Few Games Where the Story Is So Good, You Need to Experience It Again

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I recently started playing The Fall Part 2: Unbound, the follow-up to one of my favorite sci-fi stories in games. (It was also part of the first piece I wrote for Waypoint.) The Fall came out in 2014, and Part 2 seems to have taken longer than its developers anticipated, marking nearly four years in-between releases. In that time, my brain went to mush, and while I remember the broad arc of the story, the nuance is long gone.

Fortunately, Part 2 opens with a “previously on” segment, going over the major beats, but it functions as little more the a visualized Wikipedia entry. By its very nature, it can't convey why The Fall made such a lasting impact on me. It's a summary. It wants to make sure you know where the story picks up; Part 2 doesn’t spend a lot of time retelling what’s happened.

In a world with more time, I’d sit down with the first game, giving myself a refresher course, the same way I try to watch every season of a TV show I adore before the finale (The Leftovers), or sneaking in every installment in a movie series (Cloverfield) where I’m invested.

That’ll be possible for most people, though. The Fall isn’t long—maybe four hours, at most? If you have any interest in the sequel, you should check it out ASAP!

While time is an obstacle, especially as a parent, it’s not be the chief reason I rarely revisit old games for story purposes—I can find time, if needed. There just aren’t that many games where the character beats and plot movements are compelling enough to demand a second experience. Often, you get everything on the first round.

Maybe I’m an outlier, though. Are there games you’ve revisited before the sequel? Why?

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