Hey everyone, (SPOILERS follow)

I just finished Firewatch and find myself feeling different about my emotional experience after putting some distance between me and the game. When playing the game, I embraced my character's emotional investment. At the end of this game, my Henry had a deep need to actually see Delilah. She was his touch stone, and I found my self rushing towards her firewatch tower as fast as I could so as not to miss her even as I guessed correctly that you really don't have control of the actual story beats of this game so it really didn't matter. She wasn't going to be there when you arrive. Nonetheless I was sad that my character didn't get his need fulfilled enough that it was an actual let down for me.

After finishing the game and looking at what happens analytically, I didn't personally like Delilah very much at all as a person, not because of her personality traits (i.e. overly snarky or abrasive) but because of the choices she keeps making. While both characters choices are in line with the theme of "I don't want to deal with my real life issues" she really struck me as selfish to a fault. Her first decision about the kid and his Dad might be passable, (but it's definitely a borderline one), but the ease at which she doesn't report what she knows about two missing teens, and how quick she is to want to burn a place down to spare herself potential trouble later were the decisions of a sociopath. To the designers credit, you are at least given the chance to express this in dialogue.

This brings me to two questions:

Have you ever felt this split between what your character wants or needs, and what you would feel were it really you?

I think this is the first game I played where I have trouble deciding what the authors framing of these characters are. Usually, whether you agree with it or not, you can infer the writers position on the characters by how he or she frames there actions. This is the first game where I really don't feel the hand of the writer too much, and I love that. Can you think of any other experiences like that?

If I was in Henry's place, I'd have demanded an evac first when my place got trashed and then again if I was still around to be attacked.

@robert_fayz: I just tried a playthrough where I encouraged more romance and lied about Julia. It still worked pretty well as a story. That's real hard to do. And it led to an amazing moment where Henry reveals his fear that he's falling into dementia with all this craziness too--just shockingly sad and I had no idea it was there.

For me, I tried to think about what was best for the character, and I think it's what's best in general: while we all need to escape sometimes, we can't run from those we care about, from our responsibility, so Henry has to return to Julia and be with her. If she gets so bad that there is no memory of him, no connection, or maybe before then if she and he can divorce, perhaps that's best, but don't cheat on your sick wife, right?

It's a hard game, but it's a good game.