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They're a bit like the last couple of Fallout games in that they can be played as straight shooters if you wise but there's more going on (in the first one especially) if you want. They're story driven and have multiple paths to every goal.

Not total sandboxes but very intelligent and hard to categorise - Part action, part RPG, part Stealth

The recent Alpha Protocol was in the same vein but Obsidian missed an open goal with that buggy mess.

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"Critics are like eunuchs in a harem; they know how the Tatty 100 is done, they've seen it done every day, but they're unable to do it themselves." - Brendan Behan

So, I've borrowed Yoda's brother's PS3 and am playing Heavy Rain ... and once I get past getting used to the controller (I'm a PC gamer myself), I might actually get into the game. I spent about an hour figuring out how to get the guy to take a shower....

Well, okay, I just like laughing at the naked man standing the bathroom looking at me as if I was supposed to be doing something. It's not often I get a look like that, you know.

So far, I'm liking the game, but as I said, I'm not too far into it. Now I'm some other character who's investigating a crime scene ... in the ... (wait for it, wait for it)... heavy rain.

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I just finished Heavy Rain last week and haven't gotten around to posting my thoughts. I'm torn over whether or not I think the story was successful, but it's one hell of a tense and captivating game to play... to its benefit, I think.

The movement controls are pretty awkward, but thankfully most of the action that matters is straight QTE or choreographed button moves. Hopefully, you'll get into a rhythm after playing it a while.

And until you finish it and look back over the potential endings, you really have no idea how greatly (or how little) decisions you're forced to make affect the outcome.

Well, I'm not a big fan of FPS games, so my son thought this might be a console game I'd actually like. I've played some dark and/or eerie adventure games, but PC games only. Have never owned a console, unless you count when the kids lived here and had Nintendo boxes (Yoda's favorite console family) or other devices.

So I'm still struggling a little bit with the movements. It's kinda funny to see my detective character meandering around in the rain because I keep missing the curb. Well, it's not quite THAT bad, but it's been helping me keep things light and funny because sometimes it looks so silly.

I was just glad to get the other guy out of the shower safely and get myself through that game-oriented tutorial.

I don't know how anyone can do one of those crazy fast FPS and keep his sanity. When I watch my son play a fast-paced action game, he's casually shooting zombies (or whatever), blowing stuff up, and talking to me about something entirely different at the same time. His brain must just work differently from mine.

Years and years of lazy afternoon practice.

I liked Heavy Rain a lot but didn't have any inclination to play it a second time until the Move patch came out. I felt the motion controls actually made it even clumsier to control.

It's been discussed before (most notably on Zero Punctuation) but a big problem is that, no matter how you play it, the killer is always the same. It would have taken a lot more effort but if each of the main characters could have had their stories plotted in such a way that a different one of them was the culprit depending on how certain situations panned out.

Ok, it might make things a bit random but replay value (which is what the devs surely intended with their multiple ending scenarios) would have been greatly enhanced.

Games as movies just don't work. The technology just isn't there yet and the writing/acting talent? They're off somewhere else.

Making movies.

Yeah, I don't have much interest in playing through again. I'm content to look up the alternate endings and read about them (especially considering I was able to snag the happiest of endings).

The developers may have wanted to increase replay value with the endings, but to me all they really did was increase possibilities. I think that's what made the experience so great, because you have to live with the choices you make and accept what comes at the end. A lesser would have simply carried you through pre-ordained situations and cutscenes. I might never play Heavy Rain again, but at least during my one playthrough, I had some options.

Yeah, I get what you're saying but you can still replay each chapter as many times as you wish once you've completed it for the first time. If they didn't give you that opportunity, so you really have to live with your actions, I think that would have added to the immersion.

I suppose when looked at coldly, Heavy Rain is just a much prettier Fahrenheit. Don't get me wrong, I loved Fahrenheit but there wasn't as much progression between the two games as I'd hoped for.

Last night I actually enjoyed playing a video game not from the '80s for the first time in probably 20 years. The oldest got Lego Rock Band for his birthday. It was lots of fun for everybody, and I stayed up way too late pretending to play drums.

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I got Assassin's Creed from my sister for Christmas, it's really insanely fun, and a good way to reconnect with my favorite sibling (and ask her for help on the hardest bits).

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I enjoyed Heavy Rain and looking back it was something I'm glad I played. Is it worth a purchase? Doubt it. It's a rental, but I give props to the developers for going the extra mile.

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"A laugh can be a very powerful thing. Why, sometimes in life, it's the only weapon we have."

Suspect's Reviews

Great game, beat it then went back and collected all the riddles.

The only frustrating part of the game is the combat challenges. As fun as they are, it's damn near impossible to beat the target scores.

I seem to keep stumbling onto old defunct tech recently (which chime slightly with my fears about Kinect ending up as nothin' but novelty )

These two NES failures are odd enough to be worth a quick gallery. I'd never heard of 'em. The second one was in '3D'

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Virtual Reality chatter on a movie site? Got endless amounts of it here. Reviews over here

Wow, dude, how have you never heard about those things? Man, that Virtual Boy is taking me back to my 90s! Stop!

As for the Power Glove...

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"This is that human freedom, which all boast that they possess, and which consists solely in the fact, that men are conscious of their own desire, but are ignorant of the causes whereby that desire has been determined." -Baruch Spinoza

I've got a feeling they never made it beyond the US & Japan

It's weird tho, there seemed to be a more ubiquitous gaming culture in the US compared to the UK back then. I came over in '88 for a few weeks, and NESes seemed to have a lockdown on kid/teen culture. Maybe you guys were comparatively wealthier or something at the time, or just had better supply lines / bulk-buy possibilities, but it seemed like everyone and their dog had a NES.

That said, I do remember the megadrive ('Genesis') doing quite well UK side, so who knows. Just one of those things maybe, where a console won out more in some regions than others?

There's loads of these things! (I swear I have no recollection of any of these being advertised UK-side. Anyone else remember them??)

The 90s were the Golden Age for gaming in the US, IMO.

So Kinect is the new Power Glove, gg? I'm generally a sucker for useless sh*te like that and vaguely remember it.

I also vaguely remember not wanting one.

My Move controller is gathering dust (watching the guy trying to play Castlevania with a Power Glove reminds me trying the Move Vibrator on RE5 - dire) so I'm either gonna have to eBay it while it's still fetching reasonable money or hang on in the vain hope a killer app type game appears.

Capitalism, baby!

I'm hoping it's the new Powerglove & Activator combined! Imagine, both hands and feet being shoddily tracked!

Yeah, it's killer apps that are in short supply. (In fairness to both bitsa modern tech, at least they do work. The question is just whether we need them to )

*EDIT* Did get to try the Kinect out in a 'party' environment the other day. Everyone was far too spannered by that point to play anything properly tho. It did faithfully capture our drunkeness at least, bless it

I've just been reading the wiki on 'The North American video game crash of 1983', which has pointed out why we had such divergent gaming cultures during the 80s - Europe had gone the PC route. (Altho lord knows, many of those were rubbish too )