LaurentheFlute has a bad time with Stray #3: Rooftops (and cat distress)

Channel:

Lauren the Flute

Subscribers:

11,200

Published on December 30, 2022 5:26:17 PM ● Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A48s6EZPbUM

Game:

Stray (2022)

Duration: 2:22:34

224 views

7

So I have sat on this video for, uh, a month and a half? The reason is that I wound up having a really hard time with this game. At first it was just that I have a hard time emotionally with cat distress — it's literally a triggering thing for me, as we discovered early on, and it comes back in this game in ways that were pretty upsetting to me. Also, the game becomes survival horror! It outright pulls from survival horror visual tropes and gameplay elements. So there's an almost half-hour section of this video in which I put the game on PAUSE and talked myself through my feelings before I was ready to give the Zurk sections another try.

I did go through and finish the rest of the game, but my complaints eventually changed from "this genre of game is not something I can handle" to "I think this game is deeply, maybe unforgivably flawed" ... so I will go through the rest of the Stray videos and upload them, but please be warned, because if you expected me to love this game — and _I_ expected me to love this game!! — you may wind up disappointed. But I tried to be constructive in my criticism of the game, rather than mean, as much as I could. (I am so, so worried that people are going to be upset about this playthrough. I'm so sorry! I tried very hard to love this game!)

Broadcasted live on Twitch -- Watch live at https://www.twitch.tv/laurentheflute

0:00 Apocalyptic themes in contemporary games
6:36 Talking about villains
8:52 Bringing this back to Stray
12:05 Running around rooftops (diegetic buckets?)
22:06 Returning to Momo
28:47 "Rooftops" chapter marker
32:37 Second try after game over
36:56 REMEMBER: "The city is full of neon"
42:58 Introduction to puzzles
43:56 IS THIS A HORROR GAME
46:40 In which Lauren has a bad time (and eventually progresses)
50:55 DISCUSSION: Can I actually keep playing this game?
1:03:39 DISCUSSION: The emotional side of cat death & horror
1:11:10 Tangent: Other video games
1:14:31 PLAYING STRAY AGAIN
1:16:35 Next attempt
1:19:57 REMEMBER: "Neco Corporation"
1:23:34 Successful "boss fight" elevator encounter
1:26:15 Observations about this location
1:32:17 CUTSCENE: Placing the transceiver
1:36:26 Back to Momo's and the village
1:39:00 SOPHIE CAT BREAK
1:40:21 Back to playing
1:44:00 Sophie the cat plays Stray
1:47:08 The Guardian is TOO COOL
1:48:30 Translation of "the ancient stories"
1:50:33 BAR CUTSCENES: Using the transceiver
1:56:26 Seamus's house
1:59:11 Oh no, they look like Back to the Future
2:01:57 Doc's secret lab
2:07:57 Elliot and the tracker
2:12:05 My theory: they have phantom memories of being human
2:15:45 Giving Seamus the tracker
2:19:40 I'm going to steel myself up for the next section!

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