Heavy Rain

Heavy Rain is drastically different to probably any other game you've played before. Even David Cage's previous game - the eventually ludicrous Fahrenheit - doesn't truly compare to what Heavy Rain attempts to deliver. The danger of creating something so alien to what we're used to with video games is that there is every chance that some people won't like what you're doing - even if others might. I fall into the group that thinks Heavy Rain should have stayed a concept - and if you read on, you'll soon know why.

The first 30 minutes or so of Heavy Rain involves coaxing the main character into the shower, into some clothes and into losing your son. Showering is simple - walk (more later) to the bathroom and near the shower and floating in the air will be the move needed to instigate the shower. Flick the right thumbstick in the direction indicated and you can watch a cut-scene of Ethan (your current vessel) showering. Once he's done with his four second shower, you dry him off with the SixAxis controls - waggle your controller up and down to dry his hair, left and right for his body. Now you walk him back into the bedroom to put some clothes on. Heavy Rain uses the R2 button to propel players forward, so you'll take more time getting back to the bedroom than you did actually showering.

Basically you're looking at perspective sensitive control - you hold the left thumb stick in the direction you'd like to go based on where the camera is currently looking and then press R2. If the camera changes perspectives he'll turn to walk in the direction you're holding which is contextually appropriate according to the camera. Basically - if the camera changes to the opposite side of what it was previously, he'll turn about face and walk back the way he was going. It's close to the single most annoying aspect of video games, and Heavy Rain revolves around it.

Part of me wants to forgive Heavy Rain for this - it is possible to send your character in a direction and then simply let go of the left thumbstick while holding R2 - (s)he'll continue to wander that way. The game trains you to hold onto the left thumbstick however, as this is how you'll investigate areas for more context sensitive right thumbstick flicks. You wind up permanently manipulating your character to walk into walls so you won't miss any action triggers - looking at a music box or a clock or some other typically irrelevant thing lest you miss something relevant.

The control scheme isn't helped thanks to vague implementation. A lot of the time you'll have a number of actions available to you, none of them described. What am I grabbing from this cabinet? A bottle of flick right thumbstick up? Perhaps a couple 'flick right thumbstick rights' will cure what ails me. Until you actually commit to each action you can't really be sure what your character is doing.

Finally you've dressed Ethan and made it downstairs using the automotive-esque controls to deal with Ethan's ***** wife. Setting the table (once you find the plates) and carrying the groceries (if you're quick enough to combine the numerous buttons) won't stop Ethan's wife from inevitably leaving him when you throw his body in front of a car to (not) save Jason - one of Ethan's idiot sons.

Why the hate for the supporting cast? A combination of poor voice acting and awkward scripting makes anyone who isn't a lead character in Heavy Rain either dull or annoying. Even Norman Jayden - the FBI agent you eventually control - destroys the illusion with curious accenting. Ethan's sons and his wife are lifeless doll characters - except when your wife is annoyed at you for placing plates roughly, when suddenly she becomes a gorgon (figuratively speaking).

The poor voice acting and scripting turn the emotional scene of Ethan's son playing in traffic while you try (and fail) to stop him from dying into just another cut-scene in a game full of them. Worse, the game is supposed to be something of an interactive movie - sort of a choose your own adventure film. Ethan's son, however, dies when he walks away from his father in a crowded mall (down some escalators, out a mall and across the road). Ethan attempts to catch up with him (slowly, because running is illegal or something), calling out "Jason" in one of three variations each step of the way. As the player you can see Jason in the crowd at the mall because he has a red balloon - but if you catch him, he disappears and is shown further away like some sort of white dragon.



Instead of allowing you to catch Jason and working things out from there, the game cheats and stops you from saving him at all. It feels like a cheat as well - if Heavy Rain is supposed to be a game where your choices matter, you'd imagine that your actions would as well. The game cheats in other ways as well - though not in ways I can reveal without spoiling the story.

The death of Ethan's son turns out to be the catalyst for Ethan and his wife to split up, though from their earlier relationship interactions it seemed like she just needed the excuse. As Ethan you spend the next part of the game tending to your remaining son, Shaun. You get him pizza, decide if he can watch TV or must do his homework and fetch his teddy bear for him. The game is attempting to create a connection between you and Ethan's son - it's important when he gets kidnapped by the game's antagonist, the Origami (pronounced to rhyme with either army or hammy at different times during the game) Killer.

Unfortunately the exploratory nature of the game means you'll probably draw this 15 minute scene out to 25 minutes or more as you walk into the walls around the house, trying to find things to interact with. Drink some juice, look at a clock, open a medicine cabinet and get cold and flu tablets - all of these things are there for you to experience. In a movie this scene would be done in five to 10 minutes, and the connection would be established. It seems Quantic Dream decided that for players to establish a connection with Ethan and his son, sequences needed to be extended - the exact opposite is true.

The very nature of video games creates immediate connections - especially between the player and the player character. No establishing plot is inserted for Norman Jayden, Scott Shelby or Madison Paige, and they're simply not needed. Norman Jayden has a pretty heavy drug addiction - to a drug which doesn't exist and is never fully explained - and yet I still cared enough about him as the player character to try to stop him from getting killed. This isn't to say character development is a bad thing - it's simply misused in Heavy Rain, and the game suffers as a result.

Eventually Ethan puts Shaun to bed before heading there himself - beginning the next chapter. The impact is lost - after spending so long as Ethan (an extended period of time if you're an explorer) you're relieved to be someone else, not emotionally connected to what Ethan feels. The line between interactivity and progression is heavily skewed here, resulting in an altogether slow start to the game.

Page Two - The thrilling conclusion