Some Pretty Heavy Rain

[Seil]

Heavy Rain

Now I've been interested in this game for a bit, since I heard of it a year or two ago. Now that the demo is available over the PSN, I'm able to play it, and it's pretty interesting. I didn't know what I was expecting, but it plays out like a Choose Your Own Adventure book, only instead of having two options at the bottom of every page, you can flick the analog stick while you're having a conversation with a prostitute whose son was recently murdered (girl from "Rain" link) and knock on the door, pay her for information... Seemingly mundane things you wouldn't completely remember from a movie, but in a game make for pretty heavy immersion. It's worth a look.

Originally Posted by Control Alt Delete

The demo for Heavy Rain hit the PSN yesterday, for those of us that didn't care to play the ARG for early access. I've been keeping Heavy Rain on my radar for the last few years, as I was a big fan of Indigo Prophecy. Now that it's a mere couple of weeks from release, there's been a lot of coverage and early reviews, and all signs are pointing towards a solid, unique experience.

I'm mostly drawn to the game for what it does different. If you've played the demo, you know that the control scheme is something fresh and new, and for the most part, works beautifully. It does suffer from Resident Evil syndrome due to the fixed camera angles. You'll be walking in one direction, and then the angle changes and then you need to reorient yourself. As an additional quirk in the mix, a trigger causes your character to walk forward, with the analog stick only pointing him left or right. I have a feeling you're going to spend the first twenty of minutes of this game making your characters look like idiots walking in circles and into walls.

Rather than a HUD, or a universal action button, everything in the game is accomplished via a pretty nifty integrated UI which suggests button presses or analog stick directionals or even movements of the entire controller to accomplish a variety of tasks. In this way, the game plays out like a giant, elaborate quick-time event, and it works. For the most part, you're able to guess what actions the simple commands will perform, which is a great testament to the design.

The demo deposits you in a couple of sections of the game, the same ones you've probably seen two or three times over by now if you've been following the game at all. While this gives you a great glimpse at the gameplay and the UI, it does absolutely nothing to draw you into the game. If you don't go in with an idea of what the whole game has in store for you, I don't think the demo will turn you into a believer.

For those asking the question "What's this game about", the big draw is choices. It's one of those games that advertises choices, and different outcomes based on those choices. However it doesn't bridge those choices with lots of action gameplay, like Mass Effect might. Instead Heavy Rain seems to be all about choices. And people. Apart from the occasional quicktime fistfight that gives you a dose of action, Heavy Rain's gameplay seems to focused at a much slower pace.

And this is one of the other things that intrigues me about the game. It's trying something different with no apologies. The idea of walking your protagonist through brushing his teeth, or setting the dinner table is not one that immediately shouts "fun". But in the context of a murder mystery with interwoven characters, all of whom are drastically affected by the choices you'll make in the game, this slower paces seems to offer a chance to know and appreciate your characters better. I'm looking forward to finding out if the game's focus creates a more emotional experience that might otherwise be lost in "gotta get to the next quest, gotta get the next big gun".

And finally I'm interested in seeing how drastically the choices feel like they change the game. A lot of games advertise this nowadays, and to be honest, Mass Effect is the only title that really made me feel like I was changing my story. And even then, it was only recently with Mass Effect 2 that I felt like "Wow, I'm making a lot of decisions here that could be effecting not only this game, but Mass Effect 3 as well." If Heavy Rain can deliver even more of that, I'm anxious to see it.

[Azisien]

It's the first PS3 game I've been interested in for months! Though on the other hand I'm not sure I want to play a game that is purely QTEs for however many hours the game is. I got bored of Guitar Hero years ago.

[Seil]

It's not really QTE's in the definition of QTE's. Quick-Time-Events are when you jump on something and press SQUARE TRIANGLE SQUARE CIRCLE in quick succession in order to ride a cyclops like a bull, to use God-ish, War-ish game as an example. If you end up failing this, you lose a bit of health and have to try again.

In HR, you walk up to a door, and a small box pops up, indicating that you should flick the right analog stick. You can stand there all day and if you do nothing, nothing will happen. If you decide not to, you just walk away. It's like pushing X as the action button for most games - the action buttons are just there.

For conversations, options swirl around your characters head while you talk - and in real time, the person you're talking to will wait for you to answer, and get impatient when you don't for a few moments. Check out some in-game play - this is from the demo:

Only one part of the demo, you choose a section you want to play

Presumably, yeah, there are going to be actual quick-time-events, but that's probably coming in with the combat or dodge things. From what I've seen, it's pretty much just tap a button to perform an action, like any other game. This is just more immersive in its presentation.

[Azisien]

Hm, that's actually kind of cool yeah. Chalk me up to a little more excited. I like the story-driven games. How I'm going to afford the game, on the other hand...

[DFM]

Game makes me wish I had a PS3.

[TDK]

http://www.gametrailers.com/video/ex...avy-rain/61347

As the trailer plays "Hm, this game looks really immersive, though I don't know how fun it would be but its definitely a neat idea, something innovative unlike all th-OH GOD ITS THE CLOWN FROM DEAD RISING KILLITKILLITKILLIT!"

[The Artist Formerly Known as Hawk]

Basically it plays exactly like Fahrenheit (Indigo Prophecy), assuming anyone here ever played that. And yes, there are standard quick time event things; in the demo you get into a fight with this one guy, but the good thing is even if you mess up, the fight contiues uninterrupted. I messed up a few times in that scene, continued fighting, got in some good shots at the guy, but then ultimately lost and... the game continued. Afterwards the dude you fight storms off, you pick yourself up and dust yourself off and presumably go hit the bar.

In fact from a story standpoint losing might actually garner more sympathy from the woman you're protecting, since you don't act like a douche after losing, and the very fact that you even tried to fight off the other guy shows you're a good guy.

Last game had a karma system that made you more or less depressed depending on what you did, (for instance, you could decide to NOT save a kid who falls through a frozen lake, because you might get caught by a nearby cop), so I'm assuming this one has something similar. You could probably not start the fight with that guy and the women might end up dead or something and whoops, there goes a possible source of info later. There will be tons of scenes like this.

Yeah, you can tell I'm more interested after playing the demo now.

[greed]

Just found out this and White Knight Chronicles are coming out the same day down here. Now I have no idea which I want. On the one hand, cool looking adventure game. On the other a Level 5 RPG. Ugh.

[Kim]

Originally Posted by greed

On the other a Level 5 RPG. Ugh.

Everything I've heard about White Knight Chronicles from people who have played it suggests it's actually pretty disappointing.

[Osterbaum]

Any word of this coming out on PC?