inFamous

It’s hard for me to decide where I should start when discussing Infamous. As opposed to a conclusion that wraps it all up I’ll put it in the intro. The game is okay. At most, you should really only play this game once, in my opinion. Despite the fact that everyone says that with the good and evil choices being a factor in replay value, a second playthrough really isn’t worth your time. In fact, having witnessed both sides of the coin, I can safely say that the slight differences in the way things play out actually hinder the storytelling of the game and just make me think of how little difference there really is between the two. For this situation, ignorance is bliss.

There are ideas that the developers had for Infamous that are there or hinted at, but never really came through and it’s unfortunate because this game could have ended up so much better. But in the end, it all culminates to mediocre.

Story

You play as Cole, a messenger/delivery boy who wakes up at ground-zero of a mysterious and devastating blast. After a brief movement tutorial, you are taken to the hospital where you wake up with electrical powers and after that, it’s pretty much a sandbox scenario with a long series of missions to tie the game together. The government has locked off the three islands that make up the city because of a mysterious sickness that sprouted up after the blast, forcing you to remain in the city and in the particular districts, until the game deigns you worthy of inter-island travel. This plague has either been killing off citizens or turning them into nasty gangsters called Reapers who have developed powers of their own, providing fodder for Cole’s abilities. As you progress you, naturally, encounter different groups of enemies and factions, so it’s not just the same group the whole time.

Along the way you meet characters whose roles, for the most part, encompass bossing Cole around and telling him to take care of stuff for them. As a character who is supposed to be either feared or respected, you are little more than an errand boy (he even says this in the game). Granted, what would a super hero game be without doing favors for people and randomly rescuing pedestrians from gun-toting psychos? I suppose that it’s a necessary part of the action to move the game along, but all I ask is that your actions make more of a difference in the way the quest-givers receive you. Rather than rely on someone else to tell Cole what is going on, let him come up with his own missions or investigations; this is, technically, already done but not often enough to make an impact. If he took the initiative more often, I’d respect Cole a little more, especially on the dark side. The only moments where he takes charge, are when he’s anxious to get a new power or to exact some type of vengeance. This is the only time I actually feel interested in his character, because the rest of the time he plays himself off as either a badass or a misunderstood badass, which only goes so far.

As for the other characters: F— them. Both the allies and villains are either whiny or cliché (sometimes both). The FBI agent who briefs you on most of your missions is never meant to be likeable, I suppose, because the whole time I wanted to kill her rather than the terrorists running through the streets. She just presents herself as a control-hungry bitch who would double-cross you if it proved beneficial to her. 

Trish, Cole’s “girl of his dreams” starts off bitchy for one reason or another and depending on which side you choose, she either hates you or loves you in the end. In reference to the slight differences between the good and evil paths, in one sequence Cole says, “She tells me how (proud) of me she is.” In the bad path, replace “proud” with “ashamed.” Her dialogue with Cole is the material that is most affected by the good or evil paths, but it feels so much like a cookie-cutter scenario that it loses its impact. Not to mention being able to substitute single words so easily on the polar differences, comes across as lazy.

 But beyond that, the way she acts as the superhero girlfriend prevents me from caring about her. She talks tough and talks down to Cole most of the time but then puts on the pouty face for help. Even when she’s respecting Cole for being a hero type, her interest in him feels flat and empty. And when she hates you, well she was another one I wanted to add to the hit-list. She actually bitches and yells at you for being “evil” after you did a required mission that saved her and countless other people. Nothing makes you feel more impotent as a superhero/villain than to have your girlfriend talk down to you like a kid who just drew on the wall. She was one of the reasons why I couldn’t see myself intimidated by Cole at the end of his dark journey.

And speaking of characters that use you to their advantage: that brings us to the coup de grâce. Zeke is widely regarded—by people I’ve spoken to about this game as well as video game journalists alike—as the biggest douchebag of the game. What’s really sad though is that despite all of his selfish actions and talk, I found him to be the most believable character in the game. He was an archetype through and through as the best friend who thought more himself than anyone else. It’s been seen all before and the game almost tries to be obvious about it, yet in the situation all the characters are involved in, he seemed the most believable as a fat lazy bum who blamed the government for problems and involved himself in the wrong crowd. The shining moment for him was when he used Cole to find the brother of a girl so he could possibly get laid.

As for the main villain, I suppose he plays his part as the ruthless cunning type.

In this instance, the journey needed more work than the end. But I suppose, what I liked most about villain was that he was a type that tried to be justified in his actions. He wasn’t as one dimensional as I had thought, though again, that could have been more interesting had there been more clues to who he was.

Gameplay

The gameplay is where I’m truly conflicted about the game. On the one hand, you can really see where the developers wanted to implement some creative tools and elements to the game that would really bring out the superhuman experience. On the other, most of these goals are unachieved, leaving a sense of a missed opportunity.

For instance, the powers are rather unique. Yet, despite the impressive nature of lightning, the electrical powers often feel like they never reached their potential. I liked that he could ride train rails quickly, or throw sticky grenades that could tie down your enemies, or throw an EMP wave that could launch your opponents into the air. In fact, most of your abilities prove rather useful and practical, but their growth never becomes very impressive. 

What I think part of the problem with the powers was that they were inspired too much by shooter-type games. Aiming your regular lighting bolt attack goes into an over-the-shoulder perspective similar to Uncharted. Many of the upgrades and new powers are similar to the arsenal of the action heroes of other games, but with an electrical twist. You get: the ability to “snipe” opponents from a distance, sticky grenades, and a rocket launcher ability that shoots out an explosive ball of energy that can be shot in a straight line or redirected much like a guided missile. Practicality takes the place of impressive prowess. The “rocket launcher-ish” ability feels like a wasted slot to me because I already had grenades by the time I got it. I never felt truly powerful until I got the “lightning from the heavens” ability. Call me picky, but when the superhero doesn’t really feel super, I lose interest.

That isn’t to say the game isn’t fun or all the powers were bad. Infamous manages to keep my interest in gameplay for most of the first play through. The more creative abilities like riding rails, hovering, the electromagnetic shield, and sending arcs of electricity off objects and enemies, do a good job of showing Cole’s potential as a hero/villain. With your arsenal of abilities, you can and do take on hordes of enemies; and the feeling of destroying the armies of Reapers with some energy to spare, or blasting cars directly into squads of enemies, is quite enjoyable. 

Playing off the concept of being good or evil, the developers wanted to show a change in Cole’s abilities based on the choices you make. It was a good idea and an opportunity for the developers to get really creative, but the end results fell a little flat. I was a little disappointed that the only difference between the good or bad side of the pulse wave ability was that the good version made your enemies float, while the evil electrifies them (without doing much damage). If your opponents become electrified, could other objects fly into them via magnetism? Just a thought.

As for the gameplay beyond simply the powers, it had the right idea but needed a little fine tuning. Cole has the ability to grab almost any edge and climb to the top of buildings; however, the edges he can’t grab can be extremely misleading. At first it seems like wherever there’s a ledge or crack, Cole can just attach to it, but when you run into area after area that defies those rules established, it becomes a little frustrating. The magnetic pull of edges and objects that Cole can interact with, can be frustrating as well. I’ll be running past an inactive train and in an attempt to jump to the street below, he gravitates toward the train the instant I jump. This magnetism has nothing to do with his powers either, it’s simply a system within the game to make free-roaming quicker and more accessible. It works when you’re trying to jump from high areas and land on a small point at the top of a telephone pole, but can also be rather problematic. This wouldn’t be such an issue if the enemies weren’t such hot shots with their guns, thus killing you when you are incapable of getting into a better position. 

A cover system exists but would work better if you couldn’t get shot so easily behind cover, rendering it practically useless. I found it more effective and fun to keep on the move and jump into the line of fire if it meant sucking away some electricity to replenish health and energy. Traversing the city, seamlessly jumping from one rail to another, then crashing down into the fray and taking the enemies by surprise helped make the action feel intense. Sometimes I found it fun the run away and try to find some means of replenishing energy before coming back for another round. And as you progress, you develop new means of escaping quicker, as well as recharging your batteries faster.

The point where the gameplay hits the wall is with some of the side missions. The main story missions do a decent job at introducing new scenarios to Cole’s situation. But having to repeat the same missions on the side, more than just a few times gets a little tedious. Nothing kills the action quicker than coming off an epic mission of rescuing your friends and being told, not asked, told by some random citizen to get rid of surveillance boxes attached their building (this mission requires you to monkey about the sides of the building and destroy each box one by one). It slows everything down to a crawl. None of the side missions really made me want to go through and play them again in my second run. Also, it was a little disappointing none of the missions branched from the choices you made as good versus evil beyond the 15 that were labeled “good missions” and “bad missions.” If you’re truly an evil badass, are you going to stop terrorizing the citizens to help this random person get some devices off her building? This is part of the reason that playing through a second time was so disappointing.

Presentation

The last thing I’ll say about Infamous is its presentation. Sound is rather well-done. I’ve seen the footage of how they went out to junkyards to capture the sound effects as well as make the industrial music that emanates in the background. Sheets of metal wavering or soft surfaces rubbing off glass created an eerie sound that worked well as the music to the city, giving it a very mechanical manufactured feeling. And being a character that feeds off electricity, it makes the environment feel like it was meant for you to play with.

The visuals are hit and miss unfortunately. Cole’s movements as he climbs buildings look good but also come across as floaty and slowed. The electrical effects as you attack look good and the explosions from vehicles that get in the way get the adrenaline flowing. I didn’t personally care from the over the shoulder view; not because it didn’t work but because it restricted Cole’s movements. With such impressive power, I would have liked him to be more creative with his movements than the stiff arm at the 90 degree angle.

The city itself looks okay. Lots of blurry textures and much of the setting feels recycled. The three islands that make up the city all have particular areas that stand out from the rest, but none feel all that different from the other. Even the buildings feel manufactured from an assembly line. There really only felt like there were 8 to 10 buildings that made up most of the districts on the islands. 

The characters and their animations is where the presentation really falls flat. During the in-game cinemas, I was completely taken out of the moment by the fact that the characters looked so stiff. Every time someone spoke, their lips would move, and they’d make the appropriate facial expression. But as soon as they were done talking, they’d reset to a starting position with their arms at their sides and a blank stare. The reset wouldn’t be smooth either; the character would suddenly jump back from their posture into the starting position. I couldn’t feel the emotion I was supposed to feel at that moment; instead I was chuckling at how bad it looked.

When a character is supposed to be doing something in particular they look okay, but the rest of the time, they’re just ugly. The textures on the characters are blurry and bland. Trish looks surprisingly similar to many of the other women of the city. All the citizens have a very watered down look to them and it doesn’t help when you get up close. It’s especially bad when they start an animation that makes no sense. I was always a little curious as to why someone would suddenly start backing up with their hands over their heads, while relaying the mission objective to me when the situation didn’t even require that action. The only time a citizen looks good is when Cole grabs them and sucks the life out of them. The fact that they try to fight back, flail, and inevitably scream as the energy is sucked away, was a nice touch that made them, at least, a little more than dust in the wind.

Cole was the only character that had much detail to his face, certainly the first time you see him in the game. But even he is not immune to the reset button everyone seems to have. I understand that this is a sandbox game, and it’s tough to make characters in a massive world look too good or unique. But Grand Theft Auto did a decent job at making everything look smoother at least. I actually preferred when the game went into the mode that Cole started to narrate everything, because the comic book style was drawn well and I didn’t have to worry about the expressions on the characters randomly resetting. There wasn’t much movement but the stiffness of the drawings seemed more natural than the stiffness of the three-dimensional characters. This brings me to a suggestion to the developers for the sequel. 

If the idea comes up to develop a new engine for the next game, make it cell-shaded. A lot of people complain that it takes away from the detail of games, but if you are going to make a massive game that has a high emphasis on comic book inspiration, I think it would be beneficial to Infamous to make it cell-shaded. Since it uses less memory to render, the smoothness on the characters will feel more intentional than unfortunate, and the comic book vibe will be able to thrive in the presentation. Borderlands is an example of how its cell-shaded style helped it stand out from other games like it, and there’s plenty of exploring to do in that world.  

Conclusion

The game’s okay. Not bad. Not great.