Heavy Rain demo

[ScoopBrady]

Credits rolled for me last night and I have to say that Heavy Rain was one of the most refreshing video games I have played in a loooooong time. I will definitely replay this one again at some point and see what changes. There's some things I would like to change in the ending I got. I hope this spawns a new genre because I'm a big fan and if this is what they can do with a first effort I can only imagine what could be made in this genre.

[LAking]

I finished the game last week. It's pretty much exactly what I expected. I liked how they are trying to make an adult game and aren't relying solely on violence as gaemplay. I also expected the story to be somewhat cliched and sub par when compared to a good film. That is exactly how I felt it turned out.

I won't give away any spoilers but the killer just didn't seem very believable to me. There are multiple endings and I think that hurts the story. They have to come up with all these lame explanations and different ways for the climatic scene to play out as well as "where are they now" type epilogues for every single character.

I don't know if anyone read what Roger Ebert wrote about video games about a few years ago but he basically made the argument that you can't have multiple endings and come away with the same emotional impact. I think he's right in that regard. The game would have been much better off if the "director" had a more focused vision for the ending.

Here are Ebert's words. It's actually a response to Clive Barker's opposing opinion.

"Barker: "We should be stretching the imaginations of our players and ourselves. Let's invent a world where the player gets to go through every emotional journey available. That is art. Offering that to people is art."

Ebert: If you can go through "every emotional journey available," doesn't that devalue each and every one of them? Art seeks to lead you to an inevitable conclusion, not a smorgasbord of choices. If next time, I have Romeo and Juliet go through the story naked and standing on their hands, would that be way cool, or what?"

[webdanzer]

I finished this last week and loved it, but to be fair I think it requires a good amount of emotional 'buy-in' for someone to feel the same way. If you are not grabbed by the characters and/or the situations by about, I don't know, maybe an hour after the first big game changing event, I doubt things will change all that much for you.

I'd also like to say that -if it's possible- those of you who haven't played it but still want to should avoid ALL conversation about the game...gameplay, plot spoliers, etc, as I know for a fact that if I knew some of these details beforehand I wouldn't have enjoyed it nearly as much.

Also, I don't think this is the sort of game that you want to push it on regarding difficulty level. I strongly recommend choosing a difficulty level that you feel comfortable with.

I probably should have rented instead of buying, however, as I too don't think I'll play through it again. I also think that this particular game is something that they could only do once, unless they make some significant changes to some things for future installments.

[Sport73]

I finished it on Sunday and loved it; I've had a conversation with RallyMonkey about it (he also finished) and we had radically different endings. There was nothing too cheap or insufficient in my ending, so I was surprised at the variety expressed by his.

This is a big step forward for the genre of 'interactive story-telling' and deserves to be played by everyone.

I'm looking forward to the obvious sequel hinted in the ending.

[dbdynsty25]

I'm looking forward to the obvious sequel hinted in the ending.

Don't you mean in YOUR ending?