It'll take you a couple hours to get into the meat of the experience and for things to really pick up, but once it does, you'll be on the edge of your seat until the end and you won't want to put the controller down. In other words, if you stick with it, Heavy Rain will give you a ride like you rarely see in games. Having said that, it's also worth quickly pointing out that I'm going to keep this review completely spoiler-free , so feel free to read it without fear of anything being ruined for you and trust me, you don't want anything ruined.
Quantic Dream's last title, dubbed Indigo Prophecy in North America and Fahrenheit pretty much everywhere else, tried to bridge together intricate storytelling with gameplay by using what were essentially quick-time events think Dragon's Lair.
A button prompt appears on the screen, and if you press it in time, the game continues and you get another one. If you don't, you fail and usually wind up staring at the words "Game Over". You can't ever actually fail in Heavy Rain. There is no Game Over screen, and nothing will force you to have to replay anything. No matter what you do, the game, its characters and the story move on.
This has multiple effects. If you're in an action sequence, missing one prompt might not mean much other than that the fight or chase would play out a little differently. Rather than taking out the bad guy right then, you might get knocked down but get another chance right after that. Miss too many and the bad guy might get away, but like I said, the story will continue on, no matter the result.
In other instances, these options as there is often more than one button available to you at any one time will decide what a character says, how they react to something, what you interact with or so on and so forth. The result is that although you're still matching button prompts, Heavy Rain feels much more like you're choosing and influencing what happens in the game, rather than simply reacting to it.
This is a major and key element of the control mechanics that separates Heavy Rain from the likes of Indigo Prophecy, Dragon's Lair or even God of War's boss takedown sequences, and it's really what makes the actual gameplay work quite well.
What's really interesting is that Heavy Rain manages to always keep you on your toes, and if you don't pay attention and keep your cool, you'll pay for it.
There are action sequences that happen when you least expect them, and if you're not ready, you may "fail" them. In other cases, the opposite is true: events can happen very quickly and your gut instinct may be to react to them, when the best option may have been to wait for a better opportunity or not react at all. The first time this last bit happened to me, I had to stop playing for a minute and think about what I'd done and what the consequences would wind up being.
Things can get pretty intense, to say the least. The great thing about all of this, and the reason that Heavy Rain may not have worked with any other control scheme, is that everything in the game revolves around the story. This isn't something where Quantic Dream came up with some cool scenes and then wrapped a story around everything to tie it together; the story is the utmost focus, and everything that you do and everything that happens directly feeds into it, without exception.
Without having a "defined" control scheme that only allows you to perform a set number of actions, the changing control options allow the mechanics to adapt to what makes sense for your character to do at any point to keep the storytelling as unopposed as possible.
My one complaint about the control scheme is that it's sometimes hard to tell what you're supposed to do. When your character is frazzled, the button or text options that pop up can be blurred and jittery to show that the person is tense as well as make it a little trickier to choose the right thing you might say something wrong if you're not careful, like in real life.
The problem is that button prompts will also pulse if you're supposed to tap them quickly rather than hold them down or do a single, quick tap, and distinguishing between these variants can be tricky. It's not a game-breaking problem, but I messed up in a few places where I wouldn't have had the prompts been clearer.
Now, as I mentioned, the controls do a great job of allowing the story to shine through, and what a story it is. Each of the four, main playable characters is interesting, developed well and important to the story.
The way that everything comes together and winds up feeding into the story progression is nothing short of fantastic. My guess is that you'll see a lot more variety and consequences related to the choices or mistakes you make in the final game. They have to limit what they reveal about the plot in a demo because it's very much a story-driven game. You could always just not get in the fight. Excellent score.
I am sure I will be completely satisfied with this game. Oh, so they liked it then? Seems the zombies have yet another one to try and forget ever happened in order to keep their house of cards from collapsing. Heavy Rain PS3 i The story is too old to be commented. Zedux d ago gr8 score but it doesn't hide the fact this guys are crap when it comes to reviewing PS3 only titles! Agree 6 Disagree Agree 5 Disagree 0. Agree 5 Disagree 5. BeaArthur d ago Edited d ago Zedux Agree 7 Disagree 3.
Agree 2 Disagree 0. Agree 3 Disagree 1. Lifendz d ago I thought their 8. Agree 4 Disagree 0. OGharryjoysticks d ago and most games are actually very predictable too. Agree 1 Disagree 4. Agree 0 Disagree Lifendz d ago What mainstream media outlet has said the consumer is dumb when a critically acclaimed game doesn't sell as well? Agree 1 Disagree 1. FragGen d ago Edited d ago While I'm impressed with some of the positive reviews this game is getting, it is still begging for a demo I'm in NA and do not have a Euro acct or a rental I have gamefly so will probably go that route before I'm committing 60 smackers to it.
Agree 0 Disagree 0. MastaMold d ago Great review I really don't care for reviews nowadays i'll pass juggment on my own. Jamegohanssj5 d ago Nix - That's what she said. Hakimy d ago why does Heavy rain get many "review explanations"? AKS d ago It's pretty unusual and will be polarizing in a lot of ways. BeaArthur d ago Hakimy Agree 0 Disagree 2.
Jackel d ago well it sounds like he enjoyed it! Agree 2 Disagree 1. Bill Gates d ago. Agree 0 Disagree 1. Diamondwolf d ago Ray William? Danteh d ago yeah he's doin' ur mom ; Agree 1 Disagree 1. Diamondwolf d ago knowing the reference! The Maxx d ago Edited d ago Great score. Lirky d ago What if DLC includes like wardrobes free like you can go to the characters apartment anytime to change clothing. Agree 6 Disagree 7. Agree 7 Disagree 1. Agree 10 Disagree 1.
DaTruth d ago I love it when that happens! DJ d ago It was f-ing incredible. Just flatout amazing. I found no absolute answer but solutions emerged from the writing. In every situation, many logical things can happen based on the decision made by the player or the fact that he succeeds or fails in making something.
These actions have natural consequences on the plot but do not interfere with the characterization. The technique behind this is to create narrative bottlenecks, strong contexts for choices, where I can predict what the player will want to do.
It creates a very fluid experience where it seems that you can do whatever you want. I also discovered that many players integrate some role playing attitudes in the way they behave. As they identify themselves to the characters, they want to do what they believe their character would do in the context and not necessarily what they would like to do as players.
By doing so, players also actively participate to the consistency of characterization. A good example of this is the forced strip-tease in one of the scenes we presented: most male players were exclusively focused on trying to find a way not to get naked in front of this ugly guy, which means they felt they were Madison and they behaved accordingly.
Right now, Quantic Dream is the only developer making games in this style, focused so intently on story and character. Our industry is entirely focused since its creation on creating games for kids and teenagers.
What this audience wants is simple instant fun with guns, cars and explosions. Some video games managed to make incredible things based on this paradigm and it is today the most secure choice on a financial standpoint for a publisher. Quantic Dream has focused for twelve years on new ways of triggering different types of emotions with interactivity.
We have a tradition of working on innovative titles and taking risks on new ideas. We were fortunate enough so far to meet publishers understanding and sharing our vision and giving us the possibility to develop our ideas. This combination of things put Quantic is this position today but it is definitely a rare luxury to have the budget of a AAA title to work on an original IP and concept.
In a certain way, we are probably the most expensive indie developer in this industry… On a separate point, I think that few publishers understand today the importance of narrative and emotions even in first-person shooters, although cinema has proved for a long time that special effects and action alone do not make good movies if there is not a good story and some exciting characters.
The industry is also very slow to understand that our customers are not exclusively 15 years old anymore, but according to recent surveys they are 35… We seem to ignore this point and continue to make games for kids. By doing this, we limit our audience and let older gamers quit playing and move to other entertainment platforms like internet, cinema, music, iPhone, etc.
But in order to reach them, we need to raise the quality level, add creativity and meaning and change some of our core paradigms. This is not a simple step to make for this industry, so we continue to do the same things the same way as long as it keeps selling.
We may end up being a cultural ghetto for kids and geeks when we should be a major entertainment platform in the coming years. This is really what is at stake. I wish that more developers will have the possibility to be creative and bring new concepts to the table.
More publishers need to understand the importance of innovation in our industry and take risks accordingly, but consumers also have a responsibility in this situation. By buying more original games rather than sequels of sequels, they send a message to decision makers about how they want this industry to evolve.
Do you see this style of game becoming more prominent in the future? Again, this is not a personal fantasy, it is an absolute necessity for our industry and a natural way to evolve. Think of the first movies that were made a century ago: very spectacular scenes that were shown in fun fairs to impress people and entertain kids.
Cinema successfully evolved from a fun fair attraction to art. Video games were also born in fun fairs. We still have to evolve and become an art. Heavy Rain features multiple playable characters. Can you talk about your approach to making these characters believable and making gamers care about them? I have a very simple technique for that: I usually start with an archetype, a type of character that players will quickly feel they know by the way they look, talk, behave.
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