Some people will argue that the major shining gems of the last console generation were MGS3, Shadow of the Colossus, Knights of the Old Republic and Beyond Good and Evil.  However, to me, there was a single game that, at the time, seemed to get completely overlooked: Indigo Prophecy.

Acting more as an “interactive movie” than a game, it was a great thriller.  It told the tale of Lucas Kane -- who killed a man while possessed by a Mayan searching for what amounted to the savior of all mankind -- as he searches for answers. Think about how insane that concept is, and then realize that people didn’t think that part was as insane as much as the introduction of computers trying to take over the world, Skynet-style, and the fact that the protagonist died and was brought back to life by the same machines.

Much of the game’s action takes place in the form of quick-time events.  By “much,” I basically mean that almost everything you did was controlled by a QTE. Want to go to the bathroom? Want to eat a Chili-dog?  Want to drop kick angels that are attacking you in a church?  All of it was done with quick-time events.

So when Quantic Dream, the developers of Indigo Prophecy, announced Heavy Rain, naturally I was excited.  The first “Casting” trailer showed off a great level of polish, even for the game being extremely early in production.  Eventually, we learned that Quantic Dream was shaping the game around player choices and that the story would change depending on whether or not they failed.

Now that the game has launched, can it be anywhere nearly as good as the hype surrounding it?

Hold L1, circle and X, then release them to hit the jump for the full review.

Heavy Rain is the story of four characters that are brought together by a series of killings by a being known only as the Origami Killer.  While the player does control each of these characters, the primary plot is about Ethan Mars.  As the game opens, Ethan is a successful architect with two children and a wife.  Soon after, though, he and one of his sons, Jason, are hit by a car.  His son dies and he is put into a coma.  He awakens only to have his life spiral out of control, with the culmination being that his other son is abducted by the Origami Killer.

The Origami Killer puts Ethan through several trials, similar to the Saw series of films, in order to see how far he will go to save one of the few people he still loves.  It’s an interesting, if not totally original, concept that serves the story fairly well.

Norman Jayden is an FBI profiler, brought onto the case to try to solve the mystery of the Origami Killer.  Through the game, Norman investigates several crime scenes, searching for evidence as to who the killer is.  Using a pair of high-tech glasses, Norman can find DNA evidence, fingerprints and all sorts of other clues at a crime scene with a great deal of ease. These sections would, in my opinion, have been better served with some more puzzle-type elements, though.  While there are some areas that try to make you think, they tend to come off as fairly shallow and are fairly easily solved.

Scott Shelby is a private investigator, hired by the families of the victims of the Origami Killer .  Eventually, this path leads to a trail of intrigue and mystery, as he finds a potential connection between major government players and the Origami Killer.  Eventually, his actions lead to the game’s major plot reveal.  Overall, Scott Shelby is the most interesting character in the bunch.  He’s well voiced and, for the most part, you have a fairly good understanding of him.

Then we come to Madison Paige.  While I tend to feel that most of the characters in Heavy Rain have a real purpose, for the life of me, I can’t seem to figure out what hers is.  It appears that Quantic Dream is trying to create some sort of love interest here, but she comes off as shallow and completely uninteresting.  Add to that some gratuitous nudity and it becomes clear why she was included.

It’s such a shame too, because most of the ensemble cast is fairly interesting.  These range from families of the victims to major government figures.  As characters, they each feel fairly real, save for one major, undeniable flaw:  much of the voice-cast for Heavy Rain is French.  That’s not so much a problem except that the characters are supposed to be American.  Add to that the fact that, from time to time, I could barely understand what some characters were saying, and this becomes a huge problem.  I found that, more often than not, this took me totally out of the experience.  In some cases, huge emotional scenes were totally ruined by the fact that the accents were so thick.  In one particular scene involving two children, it got to the point where I finally just turned on the French language track and English subtitles.

From a “gameplay” perspective, aside from Indigo Prophecy, I’ve rarely seen anything like it.  You walk around the world holding R2.  You then use your left analog stick to aim yourself in the direction you want to go.  While I did get used to it after a while, it’s hard to image any real reason that these tank-type controls were needed.  They were not terrible, but they took a lot of getting used to.

As you are walking around the world, you may interact with other characters.  When you do, you will see up to four short choices floating above your head.  You choose which one you want and the scene will play out depending on your choice.  In essence, it’s similar to the simple dialog options in Mass Effect, and it works just as well.  It should be noted, though, that similarly to Mass Effect, you may not totally know what your character is going to say.  This can cause some frustration, especially when you really didn’t want your character to say something.

Every so often, your character may be required to do something drastic, and this is where the game’s quick-time events most often pop up.  Let’s say you’re playing as Norman and a bad guy is running from you.  You may need to hit a direction on the right analog stick to move out of the way of a car on the road you are chasing him on.  Maybe you need to hit a face button on the controller to avoid being shot at.  Both of these actions are fairly intuitive and have slight variations.  Sometimes, you will need to hold multiple face buttons to perform some actions and, at times, you may need to move the analog stick in a very specific way, such as moving it slowly or rotating it in a circle.  If you don’t like QTEs, however, the game will most likely not be your cup of tea.

While these actions work fairly well, it’s the clumsy Sixaxis controls that kill these sequences.  It isn’t so much that the use of the Sixaxis motion controls don’t make sense (such as shaking the controller to get rid of the pulp in a jug of Orange Juice), but rather that sometimes they react correctly and then, for no real reason, they seem to totally fail.  In one sequence, I had to drive down a road and, at given times, tilt the Sixaxis in a certain direction.  I had multiple times in which, despite my performing the correct actions, I would fail.  It was, to say the least, annoying.

The third major component to the game is the idea of consequence.  Through my first playthrough, I felt that my second playthrough would be vastly different.  ‘If I make different choices,’ I thought, ‘the game will be totally different.’

While I was somewhat right, there are some choices that, no matter what you choose, will yield the same outcome.  For example, in an early scene, Scott Shelby has the chance to help the mother of one of the killers victims from being beat up.  If you help her, later in the game she will provide you with vital information about the killer.  If you don’t, later in the game… she will provide you with vital information about the killer.

The illusion of choice is ruined in multiple playthroughs.  When you begin to see the inner workings of the game, you realize that there are actually very few paths until near the end of the game.  While there are several smaller choices that you can make to change events, until you hit the half way mark, your choices make little to no real difference.  Choices will, however, affect the way that the game ends.  It’s a nice touch, but in reality, each of the games ending sequences feel out of place.  The game takes your choices and then selects certain videos to play at the end of the game.  It’s interesting the first time through, but past that it feels completely fake.

Now, with that said, the game does a fairly interesting job of dealing with character death.  The game, basically, continues without the other characters.  It’s an interesting concept and in reality, it actually works quite well.  It’s only too bad that there are actually very few points in which you can die.  In one sequence, I literally had a group of people shooting at me and, despite my best efforts, there was no real substantive difference between when I was getting shot and when I wasn’t.  Again, the illusion of choice is ruined.

Graphically, Heavy Rain is hit and miss.  On occasions, characters look extremely lifelike, giving off a good sense of realism.  In one scene in particular, a character had been crying and his eyes give off a bloodshot appearance to them that looks extremely convincing.  On the other hand, some characters appear bland and lifeless.  This culminates in an extremely awkward sex scene between two characters that, in all honesty, should have been scrapped because of how ugly it looks.  Environments, however, are relatively well designed.  Lighting is well placed and everything looks almost exactly like it should.  There are some instances, though, where the grass looks a bit like AstroTurf, though this might be a bit nit-picky, at best.

With that said, my initial play of the game did feel very fresh and unique.  If anything, this is a game that you can play once and feel fairly good about.  The story is fairly well crafted and Quantic Dream is really trying to make a title that stands out from the crowd.  If they had only gone a bit further, it would probably be a real masterpiece.