Forspoken’s new trailer sounds like Joss Whedon wrote it

On Monday, a trailer for Square Enix and Luminous Productions’ forthcoming title Forspoken was shared by the game’s Twitter account, and promptly went viral for less-than-flattering reasons. Frey is seen moving effortlessly through fantasy settings, showing her skill in fighting dragons and other animals. Her adventure in the world of fantasy looks thrilling and her power is impressive. But here’s the catch — she also narrates through the entirety of the trailer in a “well, That just happened” style. Frey declares in the trailer:

“So, let me get this straight. I’m somewhere that’s not what I would call Earth… I’m seeing freaking dragons, and… oh yeah, I’m talking to a cuff. Yes, I know that’s something I do. I do magic, kill jacked-up beasts — I’ll probably fly next.”

Twitter users took to the platform to parody the trailer’s ridiculous voiceover by using its tone to describe the plot of other popular games.

In the past day, Joss Whedon, who is not involved in this project, began trending on Twitter as people pointed out the similarities between the trailer’s tone and Whedon’s tendency to pepper the dialogue he writes with quips.

It’s not uncommon for protagonists to talk to themselves in video games, whether it’s for wayfinding, story progression, or quest line purposes. This can be annoying, unobtrusive or even helpful. For example, Aloy, from Horizon, talks to herself about ways to defeat particular enemy machine machines. It’s true that people do not actually talk like this, but the dialogue offers valuable strategic intel that I’ve found helpful when playing those games.

The Forspoken’s trailer … is not that. This trailer feels like it’s a TikTok voiceover or the Marvel (or Big Disney Franchise) school. The protagonist focuses on expository details viewers can identify and not simply describing them. Feeling things. It’s the difference between screaming “help, I am falling off of a building,” and “AAAAAHHHH” when you’ve been pushed off of a building.

Polygon first pointed out our overstuffed dialog. The Forspoken preview. According to the developers, these remarks are Frey’s way of coping with a traumatic experience. “It’s what most people do when things are hard or absurd,” writer Allison Rymer told Polygon. “You meet it with humor.” In fairness, comedic timing is difficult to nail, and it makes sense that the protagonist of a fish-out-of-water story would express continued disbelief. There’s no way to know how the final product will sound until we actually play the game. Dishonored 2’s Heart made me a sucker for talking items, so I wonder what they’ll do with Frey’s cuff.

That being said, Tom Keegan (motion capture director) used disturbing stereotypes to describe Frey who is Black. As reported by Kotaku, Keegan said her walk was “hip hoppy,” and described her as “being very angry,” and “on the verge of prison” before being transported to Athia. According to the report, Stephen Totilo (Axios reporter) followed up with a question asking whether Black consultants or developers were involved in the project. However, this question was not answered during the preview. He later received an FAQ that included this statement from Square Enix: “We worked closely with a number of consultants from BIPOC backgrounds to help portray Frey’s character and tell the story from her perspective.”

The ForspokenAfter delays, the game is expected to release on January 20, 2023. It will be available on PlayStation 5 or Windows PC.