Heavy Rain Review

I know I’m months late with writing this review, but here it is nonetheless! Heavy Rain was one of the highest anticipated games released on PS3 so far this year. Garnering buzz from critics with the early Casting Call tech demo showcasing the PS3’s potential at an E3 years ago, the game it spawned is here and worry not, it’s actually a spectacular title

Gameplay – 8/10.

Although everyone’s been wrapped up in the eye candy, it’s nice to know the game itself presents a solid experience. After a tragic event relatively early on, one of the main characters children is kidnapped, plunging you straight into the center of the mystery of the Origami Killer. In order to unravel everything, the player alternates between 4 different characters throughout the experience, each contributing in their own way. Most games would have used a point and click interface for an experience like this, but Heavy Rain relies heavily on creative controls using the six-axis and button combinations, along with a timer to keep dialogue moments moving while feeling fresh. On one hand, you could look at the game as being a gigantic QTE exercise, but that’s only a perspective that the most cynical could ever take. One of the most interesting things about the game is that it is completely possible to mess up too many QTE’s or just make a few bad decisions and one or multiple characters can die, while still allowing the experience to go on. There are also normally multiple solutions to many of the sequences, offering tons of branching paths if you choose to go down them in subsequent playthroughs. While a lot of the sixaxis movements contribute to the immersion, there are times where you’ll fail something due to shoddy movement detection. The movement controls are also very untraditional, leading to a few annoying moments as you adjust to having to use R2 to move forward and the left analog just for steering your character.

Graphics – 10/10.

The wait was completely worth it. When the tech demo was first shown, it was considered one of those graphical benchmarks that showed what the future could hold for Sony’s console. With the release of Heavy Rain, the bar has been raised for every other console game on the horizon. While some games would be satisfied with having some amazing looking cutscenes or some incredibly fleshed out areas, while ignoring some of the minor ones, every single location of every place you visit in the game is jaw dropping. Since there is now a game instead of just something to look at, the graphics might not be exactly as good as the early footage of the game, it still is easily one of the best looking games of this generation. The character facial animation does wonders for breathing life into every character that you come across, so much so that Quantic Dream felt the need to include a close-up of different characters during some very awkward loading screens.

Sound – 7/10.

With the game offering a solid experience with some of the best graphics to be found in any title since the launch of this console generation, it’s sad that these lifelike characters do have some incredibly strange tropes in terms of voice acting. The most cited example is during an early moment in the game where you essentially “Press X to ‘JASON,’” turning what should be a tense experience into one of the funniest things I’ve probably ever seen in a game. Most of the voice acting issues stem from the fact that it sounds like they hired French actors to pretend to be Americans, leading to over enunciation of every syllable, or just an awkward pacing to some of the speech. While the voice acting is a bit strange at certain times, the sound effects and musical themes are all expertly done, making the VO discrepancies are definitely a minority that is made more jarring when compared to how well other moments are.

Overall – 8/10.

Contrary to most of the other big name PS3 releases, this is one game that I feel every single gamer, and even many non-gamers should experience at least once. With the excellently crafted story, emphasis on realism, making QTE's a compelling part of the gameplay, and breathtaking graphics, it's guaranteed to draw in even the most skeptical person. The story is brief enough to keep you going until the end, and ends at just the right time to feel like you had one of the most unforgettable experiences you'll find on the console. The downside to the brevity of the game is just that; while you feel completely satisfied by the end of the game, it's worth mentioning that it's probably going to clock in at around 6-8 hours for most people, but the multiple endings, plus the possibility to have any of your characters die at any time due to a bad decision more than make up for it. I'd give the game a higher score if those jarring voice acting issues weren't present and while I loved it, I could see some people being put off by how cinematic of a game it is, sacrificing rocket launchers, double jumps, and world-threatening terrorists in favor of a dad that just wants to save his son from harm, even if it means sacrifing his own life. If you don't pick it up for full price, make sure that if you're a gamer to at least give it a shot whenever you get the chance, you won't be disappointed.