No; I’m afraid you’ll always be found out.
Is that what I’ve been doing wrong so far? 
I think this may be part of the problem: an early idea for the dream was that it would have been the MC’s “wish”, but that would have required me to force the MC into regretting their power, which I didn’t want to do, and so it evolved from there…
So then you decided to craft my nightmare? 
Well, it was never supposed to be a very “fun” dream… 
I dislike that part, I just skip it to go back to the main story.
I tend to skim through it too. It really seems to assume that I am at all emotionally affected by all these people I don’t care about dying. Especially Sammy. I just want to shake him and say “dude, you’re almost a legal adult. Grow a spine and quit being so clingy.”
Also, this might just be me, but I’m really disappointed in my “allies” if they can’t even put up a half decent fight without me to hold their hand. If these guys can’t be asked to take care of themselves for more than one chapter, then what makes them think they deserve to be saved? I’m more urged to leave it up to natural selection.
That to me sounds like it’s the whole problem–the dream feels like a holdover from an earlier draft. For a certain subset of characters and readers, it’s really good–people who are close to Sammy, people who have conflict over their powers, people who fit into what I said earlier, since none of that is really EXcluded from the game, it’s just optional.
But for anybody else it’s just clutter. Again, trying not to repeat myself too much, but it’s basically just a chapter of nothing but Sammy content, just expanding his character arc of “dealing with not having powers” onto you and then retelling the whole game with him as basically your only companion.
So, that looks like another two votes against… 
@Interestedparty, you’re forgetting: in the dream they were fighting without The Power of Friendship
, so it’s no wonder they failed.
I think the main question you need to ask yourself when looking at the dream is “how much is relevant?”
Kurtesh it seems like will come back up, and I really liked the part with him that was kind of abstract and included some interesting questions of morality. So that part is (probably) good.
The part where you play as your totem briefly was also interesting enough, and it felt like it led smoothly into the Kurtesh sequence. I think the main issue is just the bulk of it where you’re revisiting the game sans powers. And that could very, very easily be compressed, since most of the choices just don’t really matter, you’re going to get to the same end regardless. You could just compress it down to “you wake up without powers, monsters attack and people get hurt, you end up huddling with Sammy awaiting the apocalypse and find yourself looking through the ruins of the totem facility …” I mean, I’m not a writer and it wouldn’t hurt to make it a bit longer. If you’re going to have a break in the plot like that, it just needs to be something that doesn’t lose your forward momentum.
The only way to succeed is zero empathy, unfortunately @ParrotWatcher makes it so I need 10 at least…
I guess I’d say that I found the introduction of this theme valuable because it wasn’t the main theme previously… it ends up showing the other side of the story we’d been seeing so far.
I get this point, though While I myself am a major Sammy fan, I can see that the pacing would be less balanced for those who aren’t. So I wonder if there might be a way to balance it so it’s more responsive to player preference? Perhaps making it so the material reacts a little more to what character(s) you’re closest to? (With obvious exceptions like Kay 
)
But basically I’m wondering if instead of trimming the material, a better approach might be making some of it more skippable… so it’s still there and available for those for whom it’d be more valuable (maybe characters who are spending more effort on trying to keep Sammy safe?) but wouldn’t hold back for the people who feel differently. Because I really wouldn’t want you to just throw out what I consider to be some of the most thought-provoking material you have.
People don’t deserve to die just because they can’t save themselves.
Also, I’m pretty darn sure that the main character would be dead all over if it weren’t for the other characters as well. It goes both ways… seeing how the other characters would’ve died or failed without a powered version of the main character doesn’t mean the main character is the only necessary one.
That’s a big part of my issue–we’re so far into the story already, it’s way too late to be bringing in entirely new themes. Like I said, if this was something that had been dropped in a lot before that’d be one thing, or if it was something it felt like the story had been building to, but for a good amount of characters it’s completely irrelevant to their development.
And again, like I said before, I feel like the other side of the story has already been well-demonstrated with Sammy and his entire character. Most scenes with him once you get a ways in are based on his conflict of not having powers and still trying to feel like a useful part of the team. I can definitely see where you’re coming from with your enjoyment, but I think for the most part the whole sequence is just very redundant.
Having it skippable is a solution, but I’m not sure how effective it would be … I’m sure the author is better suited to trying to solve that issue than I am, since I’m much less invested in keeping much (if any) of it intact.
Well, they should
Just kidding, that’s what heroes are for, right?
I’m not so sure about this one, iirc, the only one to be of some use is Kay(saving you after you’ve been blown sky high, though physics dictate that, assuming you’re travelling in a hyperbolic trajectory, if you could survive the ‘launch’, you could survive the ‘landing’, so, not so much help there), Anara is just kill-stealing me (true, eventually worked together during and after the festival), Ryu and Akira just stands there all mysterious like (yes, Ryu did gave us clues, but that’s nothing that we can’t gather ourselves, except for the first one), and Chi’s first act after getting his power is try to kill me, not a very good rap-sheet if you ask me.
Tell that to the dinosaurs.
We really are kind of doing all the work here.
Oh no, I believe @TSSL has taken over your mind (or your forum account) again. Time for an exorcism.
Did someone call this desktop dinosaur?
.
I liked the dream. Also the most recent chapter with the Man. Very well done btw.
darkness = 3
Very well written (and I like that you use “its”). Thanks for making it.
Some of your word/phrase choice makes me wonder if you have read Chinese (mostly just east Asian) history stuff. But it could be an illusion. 
Just as a general aggregate, there’ve been enough grombie attacks and monsters and everything that I don’t think the main character would’ve managed to hold them all off solo. Everybody’s done something to help.
Deserves to die =/= does die.
@ParrotWatcher will be assimilated 
Okay! Okay! I’ll see if I can trim the dream down a bit… 
(I’ll just have to add even more unmissable Sammy scenes elsewhere… 
)
Also, for those of you claiming that the other characters are useless, that’s mainly so that I don’t have the MC knocked out at the start of the fight, and then the other characters winning it without them (are you really telling me you want that?) Remember also that in the dream, Anara/Chi managed to be pretty effective on their own, and only died in the same explosion that (spoiler) would have killed you if you hadn’t landed in water (which isn’t soft, but is still a lot softer than buildings). Heck, they didn’t need Kay to save them, so arguably they were better than you (just less lucky).
I believe in you @ParrotWatcher … just remember my original feedback about the dream and you’ll be ok.
You could always just kill Sammy off in a way that is entirely not my fault…
I decided to mix things up and just played through dating Kay and being rivals with Anara. Now I see what people were taking about with the rival path leading to a more natural romance and really wish Phil would have said something about me dating his sister.