Deadlight - Ch.6 - Revelations (Ending & Reading Randall's Diary)
5“Love, which absolves no one beloved from loving,
seized me so strongly with his charm that,
as you see, it has not left me yet.
Love brought us to one death.”
- Dante Alighieri, The Inferno
And so ends Deadlight. I covered most of my conclusions regarding this game in my closing commentary for this episode. However, I realized afterward the extent of the story's allegorical reference to Dante Alighieri's work, The Divine Comedy, and that I was correct in suspecting that all of the IDs scattered across the levels are indeed those of serial killers, even if their photos actually depict members of the development team.
I actually enjoyed analyzing the narrative and parsing out its many references in post, even from the very first moments of the game, over playing the game itself. There's simply so much more in the subtle setup and structure of Deadlight than there is in its face-value presentation, which is a real shame, as there was actually some rather elegant writing involved in that, even if its dialogue was less than inspired at times. However, it's possible that even that was intentional, as, according to Wikipedia, there is an alternate ending to the game which confirms my suspicions regarding Randall himself:
"In an alternate ending, unlockable by completing "Nightmare" mode, it is revealed that Randall is a murderer. He killed Karla even though she wasn't bitten, he smothered Sam upon finding him in the shop, and he choked Ben in the helicopter. The game ends with Randall struggling to come to terms with who he really is."
Since, as I realized very early in the game, we're seeing the world through the eyes of an unreliable narrator, even the game's poor dialogue could, as a cop out, come from Randall's mind conjuring up alternate versions of events sourced from his subconscious opinions of the people he meets. I simply wish this kind of character depth were more evident in the story as presented, and that the game itself was more polished, such that its flaws didn't constantly keep one from appreciating the premise at work in the story.
And prior to anyone asking: No. I am not playing Nightmare Mode. I know what that entails: one only has one life, and any player death resets one to the start of the game again. No.
-Kinsmarck
Deadlight official website: http://www.deadlightgame.com/
Deadlight is available on Steam: http://store.steampowered.com/app/211400/
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