The Art of (non) Interaction
Overall, I am glad to see the next generation of point and click adventures. After all that is basically what Heavy Rain is. Instead of static backgrounds, there are beautifully rendered environments to walk through. Instead of clicking on an object with a mouse, there are some of the best quick time events (QTEs) seen in video games. But how well does this game pick up the torch of graphic adventures and does it offer anything new to bring this genre back into the forefront of gaming?
The games design is also purely non-RPG adventure because you never collect any objects or change your character over time through skill or experience points. The character advancement is entirely based on these quick time events (QTEs) either based on a decision you can make during the QTE or based on your skill at completing the QTE. Of course, that does not always happen and you could quit and play the chapter again but that way of playing is certainly not what the developers had in mind. I think the developers wanted you to make some mistakes and keep you guessing. It can and will do both if you are the type of gamer who really likes games where the story is important. And that is the key here. The story and/or characters must be compelling to keep you immersed in the game. For the most part, you enjoyment of the game will be nearly 100% based on if you enjoy how the story unfolds.
The problems with the game will also come from the story as well. If you are not interested in the story your mileage will vary. For my part, I felt the story competent but still lacking in many ways. Its certainly difficult to make a branching narrative work well in all its permutations and they did a formidable job here, but at times the story suffers from this disconnected nature.
As an examples, towards the end of the game (no spoilers I promise) the story presented a scene that made very little sense based on the outcomes of the previous QTE. I am not sure if it was a bug or just a branch of the story they did not quite think out but it really spoiled the ending for me. That being said, I am going to play it again and hope the game truly delivers on the replayability. If it does, the game certainly deserves a lot of credit but with one playthrough the game left me a bit under whelmed.
What I did enjoy about the game was the style of presentation and story. At the same time, I was hoping Quantic Dream would come up with some new ways of doing "interactive drama" but this game breaks the same ground as their last game "Indigo Prophecy" and does it will a film noir story and less super natural garbage sci-fi that kind of spoiled Indigo Prophecy.
I was also a bit surprised to find some simple and glaring bugs during gameplay. Sound would cut out at times and the input would seem to be locked out for a few moments while the game engine seemed to be catching up. Also, some of the QTEs were a bit touchy and the action required did not match the icons that were supposed to represent the actions. In a game that has so little input from the user, it was disheartening to see these issues. While the sound glitches did not ruin the game, they could spoil the otherwise effective immersion that game was striving to achieve.
So, while the game did not necessarily forge new ground, it does present one of the best looking graphic adventures in a long time and its nice to see that an adult game may be something other than just mowing down enemies for 10 hours.
UPDATE:
I did play through the game again and did get a much better ending sequence that was much more fulfilling. The different QTE outcomes did have direct impact on cut scenes and even revealed entire branches of the story I had not seen the first playthrough. On the negative side, I also have to state that this game is the buggiest big title I have played in a long time. Sound cutout very often, I had 3 lockups in about 8 hours of play. Not terrible but not great.