You have twelve days in the town, you are told. There's no pretence that it's not defined. The people don't know, but they only exist because of you, you're told. But you knew that too. You're the player. And this is no one-off smug reference at the start. Every night, after midnight, your quest log clears, and the Masks at the local theatre puts on a play based on your day, and your internal turmoil.
Each day lasts a few hours of real time, with key events occurring when they occur, whether you're there or not. If you're not, someone important might not survive.
(...)
I busy myself until then, visit some areas I'd not yet checked out. It's 9.30pm so I head over to the overgrown train yard. No one's at the entrance, so I walk around the back of the vast building, to where a couple of carriages sit on a track leading out of town. And from out of the mist, three patrolmen and... the Executor. Silently shaking his beaky head at me. My heart sank. "Oh shit," came out my mouth. And I told them I'd not try to leave again.
That's Pathologic.
(...)
The understanding of the theatrical works of Bertolt Brecht is so very clear. This is a game that wants to create critical self-reflection in its player. It's always a game, and you're not allowed to forget that. It wasn't a mysterious bird-figure blocking my exit at the train station. It was the Game, telling me no, this was an edge, a literal and metaphorical invisible wall past which I could not cross. This is a game of metaphor made literal, that hopes you'll listen and explore the metaphor in your own world. It's Brecht's Verfremdungseffekt. (Yes, twice in a week. Random events segregate non-randomly). And it does this not to try and look clever, but because it is clever.
