Good evening! I hope you’re all doing well!
Today I am back with a fun little post that I have been working on for a really long time and I’m so excited to share! 🙂
It’s no secret that Jennifer L. Armentrout is one of my all time favourite authors, considering the fact that I rarely shut up about her books. Her Lux series is one of my favourite series ever, so when I got wind of the fact that the first book, Obsidian, was being turned into an interactive story on the app Chapters, I just had to see what it was all about! Admittedly, I’m a little nervous going into this because I am worried that it will be horrible and I don’t want to be let down. However, I also feel like I will love anything to do with this series, so I’m willing to give it a shot. I thought that it would be fun to document my thoughts and progress as I went along to share with you all!
Since there are a whopping 27 chapters in this interactive story, I decided to break it down into three separate posts.
Hope you enjoy!! 🙂
Chapter 1:
It’s definitely too early for me to decide how I’m feeling about this. I’m honestly scared it’s going to ruin my favourite series for me, but on the other hand, how can I not play a video game version of my favourite book series?
I’ve always thought that these choice games looked ridiculous and I never imagined that I’d be playing one, but alas, here we are. (Admittedly, I did play one once when I was 14. Oddly, I chose a bachelor reality show type of story on the app Episode – a strange choice considering I’ve never watched The Bachelor and have not intention of doing so. From what I can recall, it was actually somewhat entertaining, even if it was really stupid at times. I know that at the time, one of my friends was borderline addicted to the game and played countless stories, but I thought it looked absolutely ridiculous, so I have no recollection of why I ended up trying it. But for whatever reason, I downloaded the app, played one story, and then deleted it. And now here we again.)
You can design Katy and Daemon’s characters to look how you want (though there are extremely limited options), so at least the characters look sort of accurate. I am, however, very disappointed in Dee’s lack of curly hair.
The music changes depending on the type of scene, and whenever Daemon appears, this weird sort of rockish guitar comes on. It’s like they’re trying to make the scene kinda sexy or something but I simply find it to be comedic.
So far, the storyline seems relatively accurate. I don’t really understand what they’re doing with this dramatic backstory with Katy’s dad. It was much less prominent in the book, I think, so I’m not sure where they’re going to be taking this. The relationship between Katy and her mom also seems weird because of this, which is unfortunate because I loved their relationship in the book! I do really like that they kept some of the dialogue the same, like Daemon referring to Katy as a looking like a vacant-eyed doll. They also still have Katy as an avid reader, book blogger, and gardener, which is good! However, they have changed some dialogue so horribly that I’m honestly at a loss for words. For instance:
What on earth was that about?!? This part had me in tears from laughing (but also cringing) so hard. Who decided that it would be a good idea to start throwing memes into this? It was bad enough when her character was named “Entitled Mom”, but when she said ” Don’t talk to me or my son ever again” I lost it. Why, why, why, why, WHY?
It’s scenes and dialogue like this that makes me fear that they will ruin my precious Katy and Daemon, but I’m trying to have hope.
Onto Chapter 2 we go!
Chapter 2:
Okay, so, things are not looking good. First of all, WHAT IN GOD’S NAME IS DAEMON WEARING?
My boy would never be caught dead in such a thing! I get that they’re trying to portray him as a “bad boy”, but in the books, Daemon was always a simple jeans and T-shirt kind of guy. This jacket coupled with that weird rock music had me WHEEZING.
The relationship between Katy and her mother is still on the weird side. For instance, Kat’s mom would never say this:
There was also some more weird dialogue Katy’s part:
Handsome as the devil? Really???
At least they did keep some of her lines:
I’m beginning to see how the choices that I get to make are going to be an issue down the line because I often don’t even get to make a choice at all unless I purchase it with my diamonds. I only have a limited number of diamonds, unless of course I would like to purchase more for a ludicrously high price. Which I do not want.
Unfortunately this means that Katy will be a boring and often kind of rude character but I can’t afford to choose the interesting options. I can’t even give her cute clothes to wear because the nice outfit options keep costing diamonds too!
Chapter 3, here we come!
Chapter 3:
Man, oh man, I really can’t take it with Daemon’s outfits. I mean:
His head looks so oddly tiny.
Also, so much for Daemon being subtle about the fact that he and Dee are not human. This is definitely NOT suspicious or anything:
(I must admit that sometimes the book was kind of bad with this too where Daemon was always making comments about how Katy wasn’t like them, but it was never this awful.)
Chapter 4:
Oh my God!! They’re making me use diamonds to pick the red bikini! That was an important part of the book. Ugh!! Guess I’m going with “dark and moody” instead.
All of the choices are such extreme reactions; it’s ridiculous. For instance, when Katy trips in the forest and Daemon catches her, the options are to hug him and thank him (a hug would be really weird because they aren’t even friends at this point) or push him away (he just saved her from falling – what kind of jerk rudely pushes someone away for that?). Why can’t she just say thank you like a normal person (and the Katy that I know) would do?
At least the general story line has been accurate thus far. I hope I’m not jinxing that!
Chapter 5:
The way that these characters are supposedly being secretive is making my eyes roll. Real subtle.
I also can’t say that I’m a fan of the writing style. There have been some analogies and phrases, and some things that just don’t really make a whole lot of sense. Like, how can you be describing what his eyes look like when his back is to you?
And again, what the hell is Daemon wearing now??? His costume designer needs a serious talking to. The only time he even looks somewhat like himself is when he doesn’t have a shirt on at all.
Of course, I know that I can’t expect this thing to be word for word from the novel; I understand that – really, I do. But screw it, THAT’S WHAT I WANT!! If you’re going to include my favourite quotes, for the love of God, do not change them! Either include them or don’t. There is no in between! These weird versions are tainting the original ones for me.
Honest to God, one of my (many) favourite parts of this book was the inclusion of the myth about Snowbird that Daemon told Katy when they went to the Seneca Rocks. I found it to be a very fascinating legend and I love that I learned something new about West Virginia’s history. It would be an understatement to say that I was excited when Daemon started telling Kat the story in the game. Oh, but then, BUT THEN, Daemon asked Katy what she would have done if she were Snowbird. And these are my options:
WHAT KIND OF HEARTLESS, HORRIBLE PERSON ARE THEY TRYING TO MAKE KATY OUT TO BE!?! I have to spend these stupid fricking diamonds if I want her to be a decent person?!? Ridiculous! I’m only on the 5th of 27 chapters, so I’m saving these things for when it really matters later on, and I’m sure as hell not paying for more. So heartless Katy shall be. She’d let him fall.
Chapter 6:
This was pretty uneventful, other than Dee being weird and overly suspicious.
Chapter 7:
This chapter was filled with a lot of WTF moments, such as when Katy suggests bringing pocket lint with her to the library.
Or, even better, when Katy goes to checkout a book at the library but instead of a librarian, there is a cat at the desk? Wearing a painting smock? And with artistic hopes and dreams in her eyes?
And this is somehow perceived to be normal???
I AM SO CONFUSED!
Also, Daemon apparently looks like this in his Luxen form:
I’m sorry, bu is he an alien or the Heat Miser? And what the heck has he got around his neck?
Not gonna lie, I’m starting to get a little worried about what the next chapters will have in store for us, but on we go!
Chapter 8:
Well, that was rather boring and uneventful. I have literally nothing to say
Chapter 9:
Okay, first of all SMOKE HOLE DINER IS NOT ’50s THEMED!!!!
Second of all, Daemon would not say this:
Also, Katy almost seems a little bit too suspicious for this early on in the game.
And I am so upset that my screenshot didn’t work at the part when Kat called Ash “bitch face”. Katy can do so much better than that! I feel like this game is seriously missing out on her creativity when it comes to that kind of stuff. For instance, I’m seriously missing Katy’s signature lines, like “holy alien babies everywhere” and “crap on a cracker”. 😦
Final Thoughts on Part 1:
Honestly, I’m disappointed, but not all that surprised. For the most part, this game has stuck to my original beloved story pretty well, but there have been a few details that have been removed or added, which I can’t say I’m too pleased with. I honestly don’t see why they couldn’t have kept dialogue identical to the actual book. In some circumstances, such as movie adaptation, that isn’t possible due to time constraints, but it would be perfectly doable in a game.
One of the many reasons why I love Obsidian so much is because of the quick pace and entertaining writing style, which are two things that this game is seriously lacking in. I feel like I’ve already spent so long plying this game, but hardly anything at all has happened.
So far, the element of making choices, which is the entire point of this app, hasn’t played a strong role. I am frustrated that the vast majority of decent options cost “diamonds”, but at the same time, it doesn’t seem that the choices made actually make much of a difference in the long-term story.
To put it simply, this game is just missing the magic that makes the Lux series so fantastic. If this weren’t based on a story that I love so dearly, I know I wouldn’t have been able to make it past the first few chapters. For the sake of, um, science (?), I will keep on going!
Stay tuned for Part 2 coming soon!! 🙂
Have you read the Lux series? How do you think this game compares to the original book?
Have you ever played one of these interactive games before?
I would love to hear from you in the comments down below!! 😉
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