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    Hotline Miami

    Game » consists of 12 releases. Released Oct 23, 2012

    A top-down shooter game with an 80s aesthetic, a brutal style, and a thoughtful, slightly surreal philosophy underlying the story about the nature of violence.

    Surprising Narrative (SPOILERS)

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    Maajin

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    #1  Edited By Maajin

    I went into Hotline Miami for the blood, style, music and combos, I stayed for the surprisingly gripping, dark as hell, weirdly affecting story.

    I have yet to see the "true ending" or whatever you find out in that computer when you have the whole password, but I kept playing and might have finished most of the game in one sitting because I needed to know what was going on and where all that weird shit was going to take me.

    I found especially interesting the way the game tells the story and evolves your "relationship" (or lack thereof) with that girl you save, I grew really fond of her. After all the craziness, the way you could always go back and find her was pretty cool, and the complete lack of any kind of interaction between them served as a pretty effective reflection of the dude's troubled psychological state.

    Also, at the moment, my favorite song is this one:

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    Animasta

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    #2  Edited By Animasta

    don't get the true ending it's kinda shit. I saw it as more of a meta commentary on people who are obsessive collectors and have to get 100% of all games.

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    bvilleneuve

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    #3  Edited By bvilleneuve

    Get the true ending because it's an excuse to go through all the levels again. It is a meta-commentary, though, just not on obsessive collection. It's more about motivation.

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    zaccheus

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    #4  Edited By zaccheus

    @Maajin said:

    I found especially interesting the way the game tells the story and evolves your "relationship" (or lack thereof) with that girl you save, I grew really fond of her. After all the craziness, the way you could always go back and find her was pretty cool, and the complete lack of any kind of interaction between them served as a pretty effective reflection of the dude's troubled psychological state.

    I didn't really care about the rest, but I found this very effective.

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    ectoplasma

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    #5  Edited By ectoplasma

    @bvilleneuve: I didn't read it like that at all. The dudes say "if you threaten people, they'll do whatever you want". I kinda didn't get threatened into seeing the true ending (Unless the thread is not having the achievement or something)?

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    bvilleneuve

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    #6  Edited By bvilleneuve

    @ectoplasma said:

    @bvilleneuve: I didn't read it like that at all. The dudes say "if you threaten people, they'll do whatever you want". I kinda didn't get threatened into seeing the true ending (Unless the thread is not having the achievement or something)?

    I didn't mean in that way (that would just be a commentary).

    It's a meta-commentary in that it flips your thoughts on the character's motivations. At first you're thinking "this guy's a psychopath, who could do this," then I started thinking "well, these guys are mafia, so killing them maybe isn't all that bad in a sort of vigilante justice way?" (though do note that I never felt fully satisfied by that justification), then the hidden ending tells you that it wasn't based on vigilante justice, it was based on hardcore nationalism, which is not a good impulse.

    It just plays with the player's reactions in a really interesting way, much like the rest of the game.

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    Nadril

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    #7  Edited By Nadril

    I said it in another thread, but this game was one of the biggest surprises for me of 2012. It actually had quite the story, which I didn't expect. I also really liked it's take on violence, especially the awkward silence after each level.

    That being said, a few things confused me:

    Your main character dies twice. Once, when the guy in the mask kills you (and you just respawn and look at your dead body), and then a second time near the end when you played the guy with the motorcycle, and end up killing the main character. (where the motorcycle guy dies originally).

    I'm curious if that actually means anything as far as the story goes. I wonder if the hospital section, and the section where you kill the cops (btw, did they turn into the white suit guys when they died for you people too?) were fake, or if the part where the guy in the mask kills him was part of a dream or his coma.

    Also curious what the deal was with the world around him changing near the end. All of the hipster guys were changing into that weird bald guy, and there were a lot of dead people around instead of alive. Maybe just a product of him being mentally unstable, or something else?

    Either way it was a really interesting game. Even if the actual narrative doesn't make sense I thought it's take on violence was really interesting.

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    Dingofighter

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    #8  Edited By Dingofighter

    Here is some interesting discussion on the story of the game, with a few hints given by the developer as well: 
    SPOILERS
    Really interesting to see that the story had some more depth than is apparent in the beginning, and the fact that the developer is giving hints suggests that it was actually planned, and not just fans overanalysing everything.

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