Her Story spoiler discussion

December 30, 2015

If you've played through Her Story, let's talk about the case...

I finally played through Her Story, and you can find my review right here. The short version is that I liked the game a lot.

THIS POST CONTAINS SPOILER DISCUSSION, AND SO MIGHT ANY REPLIES, AS THE TITLE SUGGESTS. READ NO FURTHER IF YOU HAVEN'T YET PLAYED THE GAME!

One thing I noticed when I looked online after playing through it (finally freed from the threat of possible spoilers) is that my idea of a plot summary is slightly different from the one you'll currently find on Wikipedia. I wondered how many who have played the game here at HonestGamers agree with that other summary, and how many might agree with me when I say that Hannah and Eve are in fact the same person.

Basically, I think "Eve" is the bad version of Hannah, and every event in the story can easily--even more realistically--be explained by a split personality disorder, rather than the existence of twin girls who improbably spent a great deal of time together but were never seen together by their parents or anyone else. A lot of people seem to believe, however, that there were two girls and that the person the police interviewed was somehow two separate individuals, rather than one.

I believe also that Sam Barlow left the actual truth ambiguous on purpose, but I'm also fairly certain the "real" truth is the split personality thing. Do you agree? Disagree? I'd love to hear what you think, and this seems like a more appropriate place to discuss those things than in or at the end of my review...

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honestgamer - December 31, 2015 (08:51 AM)
The tattoo seems like a temporary tattoo, and basically only shows up on one day, even though "Eve" and "Hannah" would have each been interviewed multiple times. The alibi has holes shot in it. The police make a big deal of how she was speeding, and she goes out of her way to stress that her presence in Glasgow gives her an alibi and that the watch stopped at a certain time so clearly she couldn't have been there. But the body wasn't discovered for days, making time of death uncertain, and she could have adjusted the watch after the accidental killing.

honestgamer - December 31, 2015 (09:24 AM)
I believe there were a set of fingerprints that didn't match, but the point was made extensively that they could have been left at any time. When the police requested fingerprints in one of the reviews, Hannah agreed readily but remarked that she had burned her finger on the coffee, with the implication being that it would result in different fingerprints.

Another thing that just occurred to me: one of the two personalities--I believe it was Hannah--denied quickly any silly notion of twins and was also seemed to be confused about mentions of Eve, suggesting very strongly that Hannah was the actual person, and Eve was an alternate personality that was trying to break out and take control. In one scene, the suspect is tapping on the table (which she said elsewhere was how they sometimes would communicate). By that point, she is the Eve persona, and she apparently taps out "Byd Hannah," which other people who believe the "split personality" thing naturally see as her tapping "Bye Hannah." The Eve personality has taken over at the end, presumably.

Plus there is the game ending itself. The player is the "daughter" of the murder suspect, and I beleive the one that had the daughter is Hannah. The officer says "your mother," which means that the police either interrogated Hannah and Eve and arrested Hannah, unaware that there were two of her, or they never bought the twins theory in the first place (which is what their line of questioning suggests in the tapes).

Nightfire - December 31, 2015 (05:12 PM)
As far as I could tell, the clips when Viva is wearing conservative clothing and has her hair pinned up are the clips where she is Hannah, and the clips where she is more outgoing and her hair is down are all Eve (but remember, in the early clips, even when it is Eve, she is masquerading as Hannah and doing a bad job of it).

The story pretty clearly communicated that we were dealing with two different people, and while that's great for providing a twist in a story, I will admit that it is a little far fetched. As a person who has known many sets of twins (and triplets) during his lifetime, I happen to know that there's no way that a mother would mistake one twin for another if they were swapping places, so Hannah and Eve's younger years didn't make a lot of sense to me. I felt that this was a weak point of the story, and figured that maybe Sam Barlow doesn't know that identical twins aren't precisely identical.

Anyway, the tattoos and fingerprints aside, the fact that we were dealing with two people was abundantly clear during the lie detector tests. We find out that the only thing Eve was lying about was her name, and since she didn't actually kill Simon and is "invisible" to the system (because she has no formal identification and was raised in secret), she knows that the cops can't nail her for anything (which is why she's so arrogant in the final interview).

I suppose I'd have to review the entire game again to see if a split-personality theory adds up, but my impression from watching all the clips (and I did unlock ALL of them, and watched them again, in order) was that we were dealing with two people.

Either way, Her Story is still an intriguing story told in an unconventional way, and I give props to Sam Barlow for pulling it off. :)

honestgamer - December 31, 2015 (05:21 PM)
The lie detector test didn't mean anything, really. The only question she failed, apparently, was when she gave her name. She presumably gave her name as Hannah. But she could easily have failed that if there was subconscious conflict in her mind about her actual identity. She could have been saying she was Hannah, for instance, while believing that she was Eve and was framing her fictional sister. That would have led to a negative result on the test, if she actually believed it. As for me, I saw around 95% of the clips--some of them numerous times, even though I knew they were repeats--so I'm quite confident in my understanding of the events. There's a lot of stuff like the reflection in the mirror--when she first "realized" there were two of her, around the time she was reading fairy tales and supposedly making up stories along with her sister--that seems to further support the split personality angle, as well. I welcome suggestions for other stuff that might prove there really were two sisters, but all of the evidence to me fits the split personality angle.

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	honestgamer - December 31, 2015 (08:51 AM) The tattoo seems like a temporary tattoo, and basically only shows up on one day, even though "Eve" and "Hannah" would have each been interviewed multiple times. The alibi has holes shot in it. The police make a big deal of how she was speeding, and she goes out of her way to stress that her presence in Glasgow gives her an alibi and that the watch stopped at a certain time so clearly she couldn't have been there. But the body wasn't discovered for days, making time of death uncertain, and she could have adjusted the watch after the accidental killing.
	honestgamer - December 31, 2015 (09:24 AM) I believe there were a set of fingerprints that didn't match, but the point was made extensively that they could have been left at any time. When the police requested fingerprints in one of the reviews, Hannah agreed readily but remarked that she had burned her finger on the coffee, with the implication being that it would result in different fingerprints. Another thing that just occurred to me: one of the two personalities--I believe it was Hannah--denied quickly any silly notion of twins and was also seemed to be confused about mentions of Eve, suggesting very strongly that Hannah was the actual person, and Eve was an alternate personality that was trying to break out and take control. In one scene, the suspect is tapping on the table (which she said elsewhere was how they sometimes would communicate). By that point, she is the Eve persona, and she apparently taps out "Byd Hannah," which other people who believe the "split personality" thing naturally see as her tapping "Bye Hannah." The Eve personality has taken over at the end, presumably. Plus there is the game ending itself. The player is the "daughter" of the murder suspect, and I beleive the one that had the daughter is Hannah. The officer says "your mother," which means that the police either interrogated Hannah and Eve and arrested Hannah, unaware that there were two of her, or they never bought the twins theory in the first place (which is what their line of questioning suggests in the tapes).
	Nightfire - December 31, 2015 (05:12 PM) As far as I could tell, the clips when Viva is wearing conservative clothing and has her hair pinned up are the clips where she is Hannah, and the clips where she is more outgoing and her hair is down are all Eve (but remember, in the early clips, even when it is Eve, she is masquerading as Hannah and doing a bad job of it). The story pretty clearly communicated that we were dealing with two different people, and while that's great for providing a twist in a story, I will admit that it is a little far fetched. As a person who has known many sets of twins (and triplets) during his lifetime, I happen to know that there's no way that a mother would mistake one twin for another if they were swapping places, so Hannah and Eve's younger years didn't make a lot of sense to me. I felt that this was a weak point of the story, and figured that maybe Sam Barlow doesn't know that identical twins aren't precisely identical. Anyway, the tattoos and fingerprints aside, the fact that we were dealing with two people was abundantly clear during the lie detector tests. We find out that the only thing Eve was lying about was her name, and since she didn't actually kill Simon and is "invisible" to the system (because she has no formal identification and was raised in secret), she knows that the cops can't nail her for anything (which is why she's so arrogant in the final interview). I suppose I'd have to review the entire game again to see if a split-personality theory adds up, but my impression from watching all the clips (and I did unlock ALL of them, and watched them again, in order) was that we were dealing with two people. Either way, Her Story is still an intriguing story told in an unconventional way, and I give props to Sam Barlow for pulling it off. :)
	honestgamer - December 31, 2015 (05:21 PM) The lie detector test didn't mean anything, really. The only question she failed, apparently, was when she gave her name. She presumably gave her name as Hannah. But she could easily have failed that if there was subconscious conflict in her mind about her actual identity. She could have been saying she was Hannah, for instance, while believing that she was Eve and was framing her fictional sister. That would have led to a negative result on the test, if she actually believed it. As for me, I saw around 95% of the clips--some of them numerous times, even though I knew they were repeats--so I'm quite confident in my understanding of the events. There's a lot of stuff like the reflection in the mirror--when she first "realized" there were two of her, around the time she was reading fairy tales and supposedly making up stories along with her sister--that seems to further support the split personality angle, as well. I welcome suggestions for other stuff that might prove there really were two sisters, but all of the evidence to me fits the split personality angle.

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