Our City Will Burn
We. The Revolution is a historical political simulation where players take the role of Alexis Fidèle, a tribunal judge with the task of overseeing the many trials of late 18th-century Paris... smack dab in the middle of The French Revolution. As tensions rise and the situation becomes rougher, Alexis needs to develop a balance between searching for justice and fighting for himself and his family.
The game utilizes a wide of gameplay styles that players switch between as the game goes on, from the courtroom trials Alexis judges to the Intrigue mechanic where Alexis places his allies throughout the city to take down his political enemies and decides how to spend his time outside the courtroom, and even more opens up as the game goes on. There are also 3 major groups vying for power in this difficult time; the common folk, the revolutionaries, and the aristocrats, and Alexis needs to be careful to stay in favour with all of them if he doesn't want to lose his power... or his life.
This game provides examples of the following tropes:
- All Crimes Are Equal: The removal of imprisonment has this effect, making every crime a capital offense.
- Alternate History: Even when Alexis is judging historical figures he can give them a different fate than they received in real life, though it's usually against his best interest to do so. For example, it's possible for him to acquit Maximillian Robespierre or even King Louis XVI. The exact order and timing of events has also been switched around a bit (as one example, the Flight to Varennes occurred one year before the lynching of the Mayor of Etampe in real life, while in-game the Flight happened only a few days after the lynching).
- An Arm and a Leg: Bruno was forced to gamble his limbs during his capture, resulting in the loss of his right hand. He later forces Alexis to gamble the hands of his elder son in this same manner.
- Apocalypse Anarchy: The background scene for the hierarchy chart alludes to this. It features angels descending with swords in hand, people falling into a rift to Hell, and all the while a guillotine continues to behead condemned men.
- Blackmail Backfire: One case involves a lesbian woman who murdered her lover after the other woman tried to blackmail her.
- Broken Pedestal: At the start of the game Alexis is already one to his wife and eldest son due to his alcoholism, though he can become a Rebuilt Pedestal by choosing activities they appreciate. The pedestal is broken again following the death of his younger son, being forced to gamble with his elder son's hands, and Marat publishing a report of all Alexis' backroom deals.
- Bury Your Gays: There's a lesbian couple in the game, but one of them attempts to blackmail the other and is murdered by her in retaliation. Alexis can defy this at the murderer's trial by letting her go free.
- Cain and Abel: Bruno Fidèle, Alexis’s brother who was presumed dead, turns out to be the mastermind behind the games events. He constantly lampshades this trope, likening himself to Cain and Alexis to Abel.
- Central Theme: Freedom. The French Revolution was, at least on the surface, all about freedom - and the game proper opens with the protagonist monologuing about how the new era was marked by "[the people of French all being] enchanted by the idea of freedom". As a judge, Alexis and the player have death and freedom in their hands, and symbolically, the gameplay revolves around the player's freedom of choice. Yet, in the end, those who fought for freedom turned into tyrants little better than those who came before them; the ultimate conclusion of the game is Napoleon showing up and declaring himself Emperor of Europe, and none of the player's choices ever truly mattered. Freedom was an illusion. As Tinville often comments while playing dice, nobody truly chooses anything, and the only certainty is chaos.
- Chekhov's Gunman: A new game begins with a speech from an unknown man lamenting his father abandoning him. We later learn this is Alexis' brother Bruno, the Big Bad who has been masterminding the majority of Alexis' problems throughout the game and openly opposes Alexis in Act 3.
- Children Are Innocent:
- Alexis younger son still looks up to him as a heroic judge, and will send pictures to him.
- Zig-zagged with the child-defendants in minor cases. The things they're accused of range from pretending to be royal musketeers to drowning cats for fun.
- Death of a Child:
- Later in the game, Alexis is charged with judging a midwife who murdered a baby she delivered moments after birth. Every single faction expects her death, and everyone in the courtroom is clamoring for her blood.
- Some of the minor cases, which Alexis only judges after the imprisonment option is removed, have defendants that are younger than ten.
- Alexis' younger son is murdered early on in the game, one of the major conflicts is trying to get vengence on his killers.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Some of the minor cases, in which the only choices are acquittal or execution, involve offenses as petty as children pretending to be royal musketeers during play or an old woman claiming her quality of life got worse after the revolution.
- Distant Finale: The epilogue takes place a few centuries after the game, with a mother and child visiting Alexis’s grave. Though most of the scene does not indicate a particular time frame, a person in the foreground wearing earbuds places the epilogue in the present day.
- Everyone Has Standards:
- Alexis finds out about the murder of his son in the middle of trying one of the men responsible. As soon as Alexis accuses him of this new offense, the jury immediately votes for the death penalty and everyone in the courtroom clamors for the defendant's blood.
- Later when Alexis is stabbed by his wife, and when it's revealed she cheated on him, your decision of whether to execute or acquit her has no impact on relations with the three factions despite all of them expecting you to execute her. Despite expecting any man to kill his wife after that, and finding her actions wretched, nobody faults Alexis for choosing to spare her life.
- Good Adultery, Bad Adultery: Up to player decision; several adultery cases come before Alexis to decide whether or not the cheater deserves to die. His wife also cheated on him, and attempted to murder him, but during the trial she claims it's because he turned into a megalomaniac and destroyed her family by gambling with the lives of their sons.
- Hard Truth Aesop: Life isn't fair, choice is an illusion, and the only certainty is chaos. Great or small, poor or rich, king or urchin, judge or criminal - whether you live and die is outside your control.
- Hold the Line: The third and final act has Alexis command an army to defend against Bruno's forces until Napoleon's reinforcements can arrive.
- Homophobic Hate Crime: At one point Alexis commits one. He and his thugs kidnap a woman who is the lover of the mayor's daughter and threatens her with death and rape to make her sign a confession so Alexis can hurt his political rival.
- Kangaroo Court: You run one!
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: After being stabbed by Mathilde, Alexis finds himself being patched-up by a mysterious figure referred to as "the Puppeteer" who very clearly doesn't belong in the story and, while looking at the player, delivers a speech that's clearly addressed at them much more than Alexis about how the lives of nobody in the story is truly theirs to control because they exist for the amusement of the player, whose choices are just as meaningless for the same reason.
- Luck-Based Mission: Some of the most important key moments of the story, including the ending, are literally, decided by a game of dice that you as a player have very little control over. While some players found this annoying and unfair, it very much seems to have been an intentional choice by the developers in line with the game's message.
- Miscarriage of Justice:
- As Alexis is judged by the factions in Paris, the best way for him to thrive is for the player base all his judicial decisions on that rather than on whether or not the defendant is guilty. The result can be a dangerous criminal being exonerated or an innocent person going to the guillotine.
- Even if a player refuses to let public opinion influence Alexis' decisions, criminal investigation at the turn of the 18th century were such that it often can't be determined with surety whether or not the defendant is guilty.
- The minor cases are an extreme example. In these cases you don't get to see or question the defendant in person, only read a summary of the case provided by the arresting officer and make a decision.
- Press X to Die: When the first week is nearing its end, Alexis is assigned King Louis trial and everyone is calling for the accused's blood. Attempting to simply imprison the accused will result in a large hit to everyone's reputation, and trying to declare him innocent will almost certainly result in a game over.
- Pride Before a Fall: By the time Alexis presides over the trial of Robespierre, it's possible to have high relations with all his living family-members as well as high reputation. Then Marat airs all of Alexis' dirty laundry, causing his reputation to plummet and his wife and surviving son to despise him.
- Railroading: Early in the game, both the gameplay itself and the narrative emphasize the importance of choice. In fact, you might even argue that the core of the gameplay is all about making choices as a judge. Yet, as the player may soon realize, virtually none of their choices truly matter for the plot, and the ending is determined by a literal roll of the dice. This is all part of the game's message, which is all but explicitly delivered to the player in a late game dream-sequence wherein they're essentially addressed by the game about this.
- Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil: A few of the defendants Alexis must judge are accused of sexual offenses, and typically these men are despised by the whole courtroom. In such cases not only do the commoners tend to expect an execution, but your family does as well.
- The Revolution Will Not Be Civilized: The game does little to pretend the French Revolution is anywhere near clean. For some examples, Alexis will get murdered by an angry mob if he makes some poor choices and a guard will have a similar fate if Alexis doesn't allow him to defend himself.
- Stay in the Kitchen: French society is portrayed as this, with women being expected to quietly keep house and sire their husband's children.
- To Be Lawful or Good: Midway through Act 1, Maximillian Robespierre eliminates imprisonment as a punishment option for criminals. This means that in addition to deciding whether or not the defendant is guilty, a player trying to be as just as possible will also have to decide whether or not a guilty defendant's crimes really really deserve to be punished with death. A player who chooses to be lawful all the time will inevitably have to execute petty offenders and even children. Eventually one of the powerful women in Paris tries to use Bruno's attack to force Alexis to pass the Declaration of the Rights of Women, and Alexis must decide whether or not to support it.
- Tragic Dream: It's possible for Alexis' eldest son to have one. He wants to be a viola musician, and it's possible for his evil uncle Bruno to cut off both his hands.
- Unexpected Gameplay Change: Act 3 unceremoniously dumps the intrigue system out the window, complete with the entire intrigue menu getting a big, red "X" drawn over it, switching instead to using the map to run a very simple military strategy game, with the player moving forces and building fortifications throughout the besieged Paris and resolving battles through a new (though previously foreshadowed, via Ramel's flashback) turn-based tactical combat minigame.
- You Lose at Zero Trust: It's important for Alexis to forge strong relationships with the various groups in the city. If he makes too many choices that anger a particular group (placing a verdict they disagree with, for example), it's Game Over: the People will lynch him, the Revolution will have him fired, or the Aristocracy will assassinate him.
- Vigilante Execution: If Alexis' relationship with the commoners or nobles reach zero then he people from that faction murder Alexis.
- You Bastard!: During the fourth-wall leaning conversation with the Puppeteer, the player is accused of not truly caring about the lives of anyone in the game or any of the supposedly important choices they're making because to them, it's just a game or a story and the only goal is amusement or an emotional response. When the Puppeteer asks Alexis if he really wants to continue living considering that all of France hates him, his family has been destroyed, his dreams are gone and he's a broken shell of a man, he's simultaneously asking the player if they don't feel bad forcing a character to continue in such a living hell just because it'll get them to the end of the game, making them feel like "heroes".
