Heavy Rain

[B-Ri]

Im downloading the demo right now, and will capture and post it on youtubeeeee

[FirstBlood]

people will go on and on about this as an example of 'gaming art'

Anyone who goes on about "gaming art" should just kill themselves already.

[Yoshi]

I believe that games can be art, but that claiming one's game is art is similar to claiming that one is hip. Once you go there, it's bullshit.

[kingoffighters]

I really couldn't care less if HR is considered art or not. It looks like a lot of fun and hopefully, it will tell a compelling murder mystery (with various branches of resolution).

[Hero]

If it's like the first scene of Indigo and better, I'll eat my words. So far all indications have been "holy shit, you 'play' the sequence of brushing teeth! Brillance!" so I won't hold my breath.

[B-Ri]

Ok just played the demo twice. Possible spoilers, but ill also be posting the playthrough videos soon.

Asking different questions to the prostitute in the first scene the second time i played provided more details as to the origami killer. The first time she got more emotional about her son passing, and didnt give me much details, i also frustrated her by being silent for a little while. The first time i paid her, the second time I did not, i dont know what it changed.

The camera focuses on a digital camera she has when you walk out, I wonder the significance, and how to get to it? Some guy comes to beat her up, and depending on how well you do on the QTE you leave ok or you leave pretty beat up (i bet this will change things in scenes in the final game, outside the demo scope).

The second scene was with the detective, and the second time around i definitely found MUCH more clues. You can leave without finding much evidence at all, or you can find a breakthrough in the case.

Its got... interesting controls, but Id assume after a few hours on the game youll get the hang of them. Its an interesting game for sure, gonna have to think about this one.

anyway, videos incoming.

[Frogacuda]

I don't think it'll be like Dragon's Lair, but if IP is any indication it will be of the story-over-gameplay camp, championing the idea that videogames are just interactive movies and anything that's not should be embarrassed of itself. They've already proudly quipped that Heavy Rain transcends videogames, as if being a videogame first is a terrible thing.

Adventure games more or less by definition ape conventional narrative media within the confines of gaming. This is neither revolutionary nor is it anything that should be derided.

and the fact that my 'part' in the game is regulated highly to interacting with only the things the devs want me to, only in the way they want makes me not like it.

It's as if you've never seen an adventure game before in your life.

[epmode]

Best genre ever. BBL, Gabriel Knight

[Hero]

Adventure games more or less by definition ape conventional narrative media within the confines of gaming. This is neither revolutionary nor is it anything that should be derided.

Their approach that Heavy Rain transcends gaming, as if the game part is an inconvenient circumstance, should be derided. If they wanted to make a CG movie, they should have. If they wanted to make an 'interactive movie' then it's only to serve the movie part, not the other way around. True, adventure games are also story heavy...

It's as if you've never seen an adventure game before in your life.

But in adventure games there's at least another layer of context into them. The way a character comments about the situation, an object, the fact that there are ways to 'solve' situations. If it weren't for the puzzle solving, thinking up solutions, and the cleverness in that game aspect I wouldn't be a fan of adventure games. In IP so far it's been walk to this guy, talk to this girl, pick responses, go into QTE...no real 'solving' of anything. Do people think it's a stronger game because of the immersion? I think the opening scene has hints of how the two (immersion and gameplay) can coexist, but seem to ditch it in favor of tell a story first, give you things to interact with second, and letting you, the player, be an active participant, a distant last.

(Not to mention the overarching issue of making a story-heavy, gameplay-lite game is; if I don't give a shit about these characters, story, world, what's to compel me to keep going?)

[B-Ri]

the other scene is currently uploading.