Cycle

I don’t know if I’m especially atypical in this, but every once in a while I notice how there are certain allegedly-universal elements of the human experience that I’ve actually never personally experienced. I went to a boarding high school, for example, so the prototypical John Hughes version of one’s teenaged years is unrecognizably exotic to me. Or there’s the fact, which is not unrelated to the prior point and is related, finally, to the game I’m reviewing, that I’ve never been broken up with. That’s mostly just a factor of having had fewer, longer relationships rather than because I’m some amazing catch or anything, and of course I’ve read and watched plenty of breakups from both perspectives, but the result is still that my primary personal reaction to breakup conversations is just wanting them to be over and done with, rather than replaying them over and over in my mind to try to find just the right thing I could have said to get a different result.

Boy howdy is Tiel, the protagonist of Cycle, not in that boat. This is the choice-based original upon which How Dare You is based, and among the myriad differences between the two is that in this iteration, you are nearly compelled to replay the breakup sequence, trying myriad different strategies and exploring the tides of cause and effect; Tiel is frankly like a dog with a bone, unable to let go and accept Heron’s word that their relationship has run its course.

Another difference is that where the parser-based version of this story presents it almost as avant-garde theater, a nearly wordless tableau where the scenery reveals the merest hints of the context of the fight and gesture and action carry the plot, Cycle is not nearly so minimalist. The opening narration here is three or four paragraphs that provide more information on Tiel’s living situation, what he enjoys about his relationship with Heron, and creates a spirit of optimism that’s suddenly ground to a halt by his soon-to-be-ex’s “we need to talk”, whereas in How Dare You there’s only a bare sentence or two before hitting that moment. And in addition to the backstory and detail, there’s a lot more dialogue – I got a much clearer sense of both Tiel and Heron this time, and why their relationship is probably doomed.

Cycle also does some interesting things with its gameplay and potential branching that I don’t think are mirrored in its remake, but they’re sufficiently spoilery that I’ll hide them for the rest of this paragraph: (Spoiler - click to show)so the “cycle” of the title, and the esprit d’escalier that I understand often accompanies being broken up with, are made quite literal here through the device of the watch Tiel can use to rewind time and try again. I was really taken by surprise by this pot twist, delightedly so – I’d gotten a sense of why Tiel was a bad partner, but seeing him manipulate Heron via undetectable means, and reading the implication that he’s been doing this from the very beginning of their relationship, makes this story something far more memorable than a quotidian breakup. I also really liked that the game doesn’t just make every option available to you from the get-go; each loop adds only one or two new options, based on what didn’t work or almost worked the previous time. This means that there’s a sense of progression even as events are repeating: structurally, we’ve got a spiral, not a circle. And the possibility of reaching one of the endings is withheld long enough for the player to have no illusions about the stakes for their choice.

All told I have to say I enjoyed Cycle significantly more than How Dare You, though I respect its radically different approach. I’m also now very curious how I would have felt about it had I come to it assuming its characters are the same as the ones in this game; the subtle push towards making Tiel physically violent in the latter game makes a lot more sense to me now. Regardless, Cycle certainly stands on its own as well as being part of an interesting pairing – though it’s definitely cemented me in my belief that the best breakup is the one everyone walks away from as quickly as possible.

Ever fudged so badly in your relationship you wished you had a time machine/trinket to go back and fix your mistakes by actually doing and saying the right things to save what is almost lost?
This is something that Tiel doesn't need to worry about, as his grandmother left him a neat little pocketwatch, allowing him to save his relationship... if he plays his card correctly.
Through a thread of choices, your actions will determine which ending you will receive, and whether you will manage to save your relationship.
Still, regardless of the end post, Heron's criticisms only resonate ever so louder with every new cycle. Sure, you may be acknowledging eir hurt and needs, but are you truly doing this selflessly? Don't you invalidate eir choice, the one triggering the story, by going back in time until you succeed in your goal or relent in your defeat?
The game does not just do time loop incredibly successfully, it also raises quite the moral questions about slippery slopes when rewinding time...

Played: 7/25/24
Playtime: 10min, 3/3 endings

It is kind of gratifying to watch an artistic arc. So much art is consumed one-and-done in this day and age. Honestly, that does seem to be the model that makes the most sense anyway. Artists spend inordinate time and energy refining and honing a piece of art to stand on its own, encapsulating a complete artistic vision, and hopefully resonating with an audience in an engineered way. (Art IS engineering. Fight me.) While repeated engagement may be deeply gratifying to the artist, its impact on the consumer is usually dominated by that first encounter.

There is serialized art of course. Novels and comics have long engaged in serialization, most famously pulpy entertainment of recurring characters in genre adventures. I am not talking about a FICTION or STORY arc, however, I’m talking about an artistic one. When a single artist is behind serialization for an extended time their intellectual and artistic growth can become part of the story, a compelling subtext to another round of puncheminnaface. If you’ve never read Dave Sim’s complete Cerebus, it is a rollercoaster of artistic preoccupations and before-your-eyes evolution. Its latter half in particular is so dominated by the artist inventing Bad Takes (TM) before our eyes as to be equal parts mesmerizing and repellent. That arc ultimately overwhelmed the fiction it was nominally creating.

This is not what’s happening here, to be clear. I invoked it as one type of artistic arc. Another, more relevant arc is when an artist returns to some theme several times, exploring it in different ways and to different effect. This work seems to be connected to two others by this author, as a trilogy of sorts, all exploring the intersection of entitlement and romantic relationships. The author acknowledges this work’s debt to a crackerjack earlier work that I personally really enjoyed. It also shares overt similarities to a subsequent work I reviewed this 'Thon. The artist of course has naming privileges, but absent their input I will call this “The Entitled Heart Trilogy.”

This strikes me as a middle work both thematically and temporally. The first ‘entry’ engaged a troubled but redeemable relationship with a dangerously biased power dynamic. The third delivered a cold ‘masks off’ condemnation of full on toxicity. This one bridges the gap by using fantasy time loops to explore the surprisingly grey border between romantic manipulation and earnest will-to-change. In some ways it is the most subtly challenging of the three, particularly when exploring all possible endings. The author ultimately has some specific ideas about where things land, and in the construct of their fiction of course is the authority. I nevertheless appreciated that prior to the endings, the language remained open enough to challenge the player’s presumption of protagonist motives, conscious or otherwise. The fact that the ambiguity doesn’t extend to (one of) the endings is kind of a cutting rebuke of self-delusion lurking in the border tension. The fact that there are three endings further muddies the waters - toxicity is not fore-ordained!

I really enjoyed the first one. I appreciated the third one, which was much more straightforward, terse and confrontive. I may have liked the fleeting ambiguity of this one best of all, and the damning but open ending space it carved out. I really like all three of these together, and the artistic arc they collectively describe.

And unlike Cerebus, the artist is not reduced by their arc!