Her Story sells itself as true detective simulator. One where you have to non-linearly follow clues to solve a mystery. Based on the premise and marketed you might assume this is some sort of unsolved case where it will take actual critical thinking even with all the clips, but the whole last section of clips explains exactly what happened, so its less of a game about actually solving a mystery but more about simply finding the right clips to tell you the answer.

Its the initial thrill of discovery which really makes this game. The stream of consciousness feel of jumping from key word to key word. Yet its all too easy to just discover the twist early on leaving the game just an endless trough of details, repetitive clips, and foreshadowing for events you already know.

Worst of all is that the actual story is terrible. Its a mess of melodrama and nonsensical twists which utter break the suspension of disbelief all barely kept together by a decent central performance. The "symbolism" is so forced it becomes obnoxious as its clear Sam Barlow has very little to say. There is the vague allusions to bigger ideas about societies obsession with crime and gossip or the way in which women are fetishized and forced into archetypes. Any sense of grander themes are ruined, however by the soap opera tier narrative which seems more interested in shocking the player with stupid plot points and nasty details then actually having depth. If anything it reeks of Medea syndrome.

It really says a lot about gaming culture and press that something this bad could be so wildly praised as on the level of cinema or TV (or even better then cinema according to some critics). The actual film making parts of it are so cheap and the plot is ripped straight from a bad soap. Its just embarrassing really.