I should probably start out by saying Quantic Dream, developers of Heavy Rain, should be commended for trying something new and innovative. Sadly their efforts comes up short. I wanted to like this game but I couldn’t ignore it’s flawed control scheme and game design.
Problems 1) The voice acting is rubbish. 2) The fixed camera is a fucking annoyance. It’s 2010 for pete’s sake. 3) The controls are rubbish.
A) I understand Quantic Dream was trying something different but for all the “innovation” it’s still employing a quick time event-driven control scheme.
B) Forcing me to hold the controller in odd ways to create a sense of urgency, panic or difficulty isn’t innovation it is poor game design. When 99% of the games on a system use a certain control scheme forcing users to use a different and unnatural control scheme is ridiculous. It’s like asking a person to drive a car only using his feet. Sure it can be done but that doesn’t make it a good idea.
Imagine playing DDR or Guitar Hero with a controller? Sure you could but instead developers opted for a controller that felt natural and more importantly complemented / heightened the game experience. Now I’m not suggesting Quantic Dream bundle a new controller but maybe they should have opted for a different control scheme or perhaps a different platform. Cough cough, Wii?
4) The dialog system is silly.
For over twenty years games have employed a dialog tree and the simple act of making them spin around the screen on a 3D plane to simulate thoughts flying around a characters mind is a novelty. All you accomplish is frustrating the user.
The Critics
I know this game has gotten a ton of critical acclaim but this is an example of game critics failing to be objective. I think it is safe to say we all want the medium to experiment and try new things but rewarding / praising broken games doesn’t foster that so much as encourage bad game design.
Conclusion
Heavy Rain isn’t entirely bad. It has some fun moments but so did Dragons Lair. The many quarters lost at the arcade serve as proof that quick time events are fun and addictive.
A few days ago Sony decided to make flOw available for FREE on PSN. My initial reaction was to hate the control scheme but after a few minutes of getting acclimated I found it deceptively simple and beautiful.
What is flOw?
Created by Jenova Chen and Nicholas Clark. The game involves the player guiding an aquatic microorganism through various depths of the ocean to consume other organisms and to evolve their organism as the player advances.
Attended a Sony sponsored Sade, Soldier of Love album listening party at Taj Lounge tonight. She hasn’t released an album in 10 years and I can’t wait to get my hands on a copy. Yes I’m old.
After years of neglect I finally decided to try God of War. So far I’m unimpressed. It’s your standard 3rd person action game. Released around the same time as Ninja Gaiden I cant fathom why it was so popular. Wait that’s right, Sony fanboys. Now before I get accused of being a game snob or Microsoft fanboy, I admit to enjoying God of War’s brainless button mashing fun.
Consumed with a desire to spend money frivolously I decided to purchase a copy of Resident Evil Director’s Cut on the PlayStation Network. The whole experience felt tedious and clunky. Thankfully I discovered my PlayStation actually plays games. For a while I thought it was just a BluRay player.
Part of the coolness factor with owning an Xbox 360 and PS3 are the media capabilities they posses. Both can stream media from any PC running the Windows operating system but not OS X. Since I’ve made the switch to my MacBook Pro I’ve begun to miss the streaming capabilities.
Determined to stream my movies, music and pictures I decided to pick up copies of
Your Xbox 360 is capable of playing back your music and videos and viewing your digital photos. With Connect360, your Mac’s ready to share.
Connect360 automatically indexes your iTunes and iPhoto libraries and shares them to your Xbox 360. You can then use the Xbox 360 Dashboard to browse and play your media, organized in the exact same way that it is on your Mac.
Your PlayStation 3 has been craving the media on your Mac. Finally, complete Macintosh and Playstation 3 integration is upon us.
Enjoying your media through the PlayStation 3 has never been this easy, on any platform — and the Mac isn’t just any platform. Its our favorite platform, so we’ve taken great care to create a seamless solution.
