A director comment about Chris dying during his chase + more about Chris’s death opportunities
I was watching an old Q&A with the director of Until Dawn, and he was talking about how complicated branching narratives can be and that, if you’re not careful, you’ll get plot combinations that don’t make sense.
Then he said that there’s a continuity mistake in Until Dawn. If Chris dies when running from the shed, then the plot for the rest of the game doesn’t make sense:
I have a few ideas about this that I’ve considered before, but they aren’t so terrible. They’ve just crossed my mind:
Chris has information that he ends up dying with if you fail his chase. I’d wondered before how Mike puts together that Josh is in the mines and thought “Well, Chris could have told him, while they walked back to the safe room, that Josh was taken.” But if Chris dies, this is kind of funky.
I’ve tried to see if I could find the story’s original skeleton. Though there’s no true “golden route,” in UD, it feels like it would still have a starting point or backbone. I’ve noted a few things like that Jess’s death is more baked into the story, but Chris’s survival is more in line with the story. Then there are minor things that you can tell were plotted one way then edited to create a branch, like Chris saving Josh in the saw trap merely cuts content (like when he picks up the beam in the shed) so this scene could have been crafted first by the idea you picked Ashley then tweaked for if you picked Josh.
But the few things that made me feel like Chris’s survival was part of the plotting were these:
The scene after the gun trap indicates Chris didn’t shoot anyone—regardless of what you did. When Mike and Sam hear him, he’s shouting “I can’t decide!” Then when the Psycho approaches him, he starts shooting and is surprised nothing is happening. The Psycho explains the gun has blanks. This happens every time, even if you shot Chris or Ashley—in which case Chris should know the bullets are duds. So, for my original path search, I ruled out Chris dying by Ashley locking him out. That branch is not where this duo’s building arc is leading either and just oddly implemented for Ashley in particular.
Sam tells Mike that the others are waiting at the lodge. This implies that either Chris or Emily didn’t die on the way back to the lodge. At the very least, for this line to work, you need Sam to believe plural people are alive. It can work out a few ways, but at the bare minimum you need one of these two to have survived his/her chase.
At the end, Chris runs past Mike, and Mike makes a motion to avoid him. If Chris is dead, Mike still does this, which is so minor but you can tell the initial thing here was for Chris to be alive. It’s a bit different than Jessica where you get dialogue/motions more leaning into the fact she died. An example is when the heads of those you’ve killed roll out from behind the mine door. You can tell the part where Mike sees Jess’s head was filmed first then edited a bit if she didn’t die.
Sometimes it’s just a behavior thing. Jessica’s death continues to weigh on Mike throughout the story, and he brings it up again multiple times—even if he didn’t expressly see her die (since the player saved her). Chris’s death does not have that weight. Everyone really reacts in the moment but Chris dying doesn’t continue to inform the characters’ attitudes or dialogue at all which is strange. The story keeps going with a tone that’s the same as if Chris is still there.
So, I’ve always felt Chris living was more baked into the story, even though I think the popular opinion is him dying since he’s so quiet in the safe room.
Trying to figure all this out was just for fun, not to be like “ONLY ONE ROUTE IS REAL.” Jessica and Matt lean more into dying, but them living makes for a fuller game. I can tell Jess’s death, in particular, was part of the original narrative idea (fun fact: She wasn’t even going to be save-able early in development. Byles has talked about this too), but her living also doesn’t break my immersion, and it’s cool to save this character who would be, by her trope, monster fodder in a movie. Having the ability to do surprising things makes this game what it is. I also think Chris can save Josh or Ashley, and it’s fine despite some seams. The gun trap thing ruins my immersion a bit, so I like having Chris do nothing.
I’m just really wondering what in particular Byles is pointing out here since he seems pretty adamant the game doesn’t work around Chris’s chase deaths. If I had to say, it would be about how Mike knows Josh wasn’t in the shed.
