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It's difficult for me to recommend Beyond: Two Souls simply because it's the pinnacle of David Cage's tremendous pitfalls in his writing and direction. The only thing that holds up this game is Elliot Page and Willem Dafoe's incredible acting. There are great anthological narratives, and this is not one of them.
David Cage's perception of women really taints Jodie's narrative. Jodie is constantly pushed into bizarre romantic subplots that add little to the game's story. The worst example of these bizarre love chronicles is that Jodie is pushed into a romance with Ryan despite choosing every player choice to avoid that. Ryan is literally a predator that treated Jodie like shit when she was a child and then years later tried to have sex with her the moment his ex wife dropped out of the picture. Huh? This dude is literally pushing 40 and knew Jodie since she was literally a child? The normalization of grooming here is LITERALLY INSANE! And what makes it WORSE is that their sex scene is dependent on if you stop Jodie from going to the bar in the "Not Like Other Girls" chapter in the first place. If she goes anyway and Aiden saves her from being raped, he acts like a whiny bitch due to Jodie not wanting to have sex with him due to her trauma. WHAT THE FUCK LMAO? Despite this occuring, if you choose EVERY OPTION to push Ryan away, they will still inevitably kiss at the end. What a scumlord! To add insult to injury, you then have a final choice at the end to choose to spend the rest of your life with Ryan. Fuck off!
Besides that, Jodie lacks characterization despite us seeing many points throughout her life. She's a factitious stereotype of a teenage girl, and that really shows in the "Not Like Other Girls" chapter where she dresses EMO! (Cx xD) and wants to go hang out with her friends with at a local bar. The only real personality we ever see of Jodie is when she's wearing a cool edgy outfit and when she plays the electric guitar, which is later referenced in the "Homeless" chapter when she talks to Stan about being a former guitar player after panhandling doing it. From chapter to chapter, she's isn't a person with a personality... she's... just a shell. A shell that each chapter projects its goal on, terribly so. You can't create a good game with a protagonist that lacks an identity when they need one for the story! The plot armor is so incredibly dense to the point where it makes the narrative seem like a joke. I imagine that Jodie is David Cage's own personal teenaged girl Mary Sue and he makes that clear through the way he uses Jodie's power, Aiden. He's the answer to everything! Obviously. But that just feels so... flat? and disingenuous. It doesn't feel like there's any real grief or conflict in this game because of that. Oh, let's just have Aiden do everything all the time! Yeah!
All of these issues culminate into a game that's just BORING. Even the plot doesn't make up for this hideous mess of a game, even though it's interesting at a first glance. But it's executed POORLY. And that's the main issue. It literally feels like a generic clone of The Epic of Gilgamesh and Stranger Things combined in its current state, which is baffling. No substance at all. Oh yeah the quick time events? Highly annoying and extremely difficult to complete. No consequences if you miss them. Little to no consequence if you make different decisions either. Laughable! The ending isn't all that great either. Beyond: Two Souls would have probably been better as a TV Show where David Cage doesn't have a single lick of involvement and Jodie is given a chance to flourish as a character. After doing some research, Elliot Page is producing a television adaptation of this game, which I look forward to. Hopefully he can undo all of the slop present in its current state.
This is the worst David Cage game, skip this one. Watching a few episodes of Stranger Things would give you a better experience than playing this hogwash from start to finish.