Game Heavy Rain from sony

Product Details Heavy Rain From Sony List Price: $59.99 Price: $54.96 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours Ships from and sold by Amazon.com 13 new or used available from $50.01 Average customer review:  Product Description Experience a gripping psychological crime thriller filled with innumerable twists and turns, where even the smallest actions and choices can cause dramatic consequences. The hunt is on for the Origami Killer, named after his calling card of leaving folded paper shapes on victims. Four characters, each with their own motives, take part in a desperate attempt to stop the killer from claiming a new victim. Product Details Amazon Sales Rank: #2 in Video Games Brand: Sony Model: 711719816423 Published on: 2010-01-31 Released on: 2010-02-23 ESRB Rating: Mature Platform: PLAYSTATION 3 Number of items: 1 Dimensions: .30 pounds Features A PlayStation 3 exclusive featuring accessible gameplay via intuitive, contextual controls and interface. An evolving action adventure thriller featuring mature content, reflecting a realistic world setting and powerful themes, in which you shape the story with every decision made. Action featuring four playable characters that allows you to continue playing as one of the other characters if your initial character is killed. Savable chapters that allow you to replay the actions of the past, while maintaining the continuity of the events of earlier chapters. Stunning graphics, animation and technology support an emotionally driven experience. Heavy Rain is an interactive, single player, action adventure game in which every decision players make influences the evolution of a desperate quest to catch a deadly killer poised to strike again. Featuring a complex and dark storyline meant for mature audiences, the game is a PlayStation 3 exclusive featuring a variety of possible endings, advanced crime scene analysis, replayable chapters, four playable characters and the ability to continue play as remaining characters in the event of your current character's death. Story How far will you go to save someone you love? In Heavy Rain each player discovers their own answer to this question as they experience a gripping psychological thriller filled with innumerable twists and turns, where choices and actions can and do result in dramatic consequences. Spanning four days of mystery and suspense, the hunt is on for a murderer known only as the Origami Killer - named after his macabre calling card of leaving behind folded paper shapes at crime scenes. Even more chilling is the fiend's well established pattern of killing his victims four days after abducting them. The public is gripped with fear as the police seem powerless to stop the carnage, and another potential victim — Shaun Mars — has gone missing. Now four characters, each following their own leads and with their own motives, must take part in a desperate attempt to prevent the killer from taking yet another life. Discover how far you will go to protect a loved one as you join the search for the Origami Killer. View larger. Gameplay Heavy Rain is a single player, action/adventure game with a particularly strong emphasis on a player-influenced storyline as a means of facilitating the evolution of action towards one of many possible conclusions. The game features four playable characters: a father, a photographer, a FBI agent with a special skill set and a retired cop turned private detective. Each have different paths, means and motives to ending the reign of terror that the Origami Killer has imposed on their city. As players follow the path laid before their character of choice, they are able to explore, interact with and view their surroundings in a variety of ways using their controller's left and right sticks. At crucial times players are given a series of choices relating to how to proceed in various situations, with the outcome of these choices revealing both benefits and consequences. Benefits can be important to progressing through the game, while possible consequences can in turn pose a very real danger to characters, including death. But unlike other games, and because Heavy Rain features four playable characters that exist independently of each other, yet simultaneously within the same the story arc, this does not end the game. Players are instead able to play as one of the other available characters, with appropriate changes to possible outcomes due to the absence of the deceased character(s). Key Game Features An evolving action-adventure thriller in which you shape the story with every decision you make. Action built around four playable characters that allows you to continue playing as one of the other characters if your initial character is killed. Savable chapters that allow you to replay the actions of the past, while maintaining the continuity of the events begun in earlier chapters. Mature content reflecting a realistic world setting that explores powerful themes. Stunning graphics, animation and technology that support an emotionally driven experience. Accessible gameplay via intuitive, contextual controls and interface. Customer Reviews Heavy Rain (SPOILER FREE!!!) Review REVISED VERSION I am now on my second playthrough of Heavy Rain, and it feels like there is so much more to explore in the world that Quantic Dream has created. A detailed review of the story and characters would be out of place for this game, as you will want to experience everything they entail for yourselves. Instead, I'm going to give a list of pros and cons for this game. + Great story! Kept me guessing who the killer was until the end. There are also a few set-pieces that really took me by surprise. + The pace of the game keeps changing to keep you hooked. You'll be running, fighting or surviving one moment, the next moment, things will slow down to reflect, converse and review the clues you have found. The latter is done very well via the use of Norman Jayden's sunglasses. + despite the worries people have had, this game does have replay value. After you finish the game once, you have so many 'what ifs' going through your head, you'll barely feel finished at all. + While the basic structure (scenes, locations, timeline) of the story is relatively consistent no matter what choices you make,your decisions to have an outcome, mainly on who knows who, how they feel for that person, but more importantly, who will still be alive at the end. + Graphics and sound are top class. I was particularly impressed with how many characters could be on screen at once. + You will feel for the characters, and I'm sure everyone will have their own favorite. + Great trophy support. Gotta get 'em all! - In some scenes, the amount of interactivity felt too low, making you feel like you weren't in control. - The first hour or so of the game is incredibly slow. Ok the first time round, but the second time, you will be tearing your hair out. However, if it's not important to you to start from the beginning, there is a chapter select menu. - Some of the voice acting is terrible. This is due to using mainly non-American actors for American characters. - Some of the characters are cliched, but Norman Jayden makes up for it. As an FBI agent, he could have just been a 2D emotionless 'spook'. Instead, in my opinion, he was the most human and vulnerable character in the game. All round a good game. Hopefully just the tip of the iceberg for the future of 'interactive movies.' Oh, and I'm a pretty harsh judge, so 4 stars is very high in my opinion. ***EDIT*** I did originally give this game 4 stars. However, I think the most influencial thing for a potential buyer is Amazon's average review score. I have just noticed that some moron called 'M. Anderson' has just given this game a 1 star review because he expected it to be "the sequel to 'singing in the rain'". Therefor, in the interests of being fair to this game, its makers and the people who want a realistic account of how good this game is, I have added an extra star for balancing purposes. After all, M.Anderson did remind me of one special point... dumb x-box fanboys can't play Heavy Rain ;) *** thanks Beautiful, interesting but has one minor flaw. (NO SPOILERS) Overview (no major spoilers): You play several different characters in hopes to track down a serial killer that targets children. There are many twists and exciting plot reveals as the game goes on. Most of this takes place in rainy or dismal settings, so get used to your characters being wet all the time. Ok lets talk about the issue I have with the game so that we can get to the good stuff. The video is choppy. No two ways about it. I have the new PS3 Slim and the video jerks and stutters just enough to be annoying over time. You can tell its pushing the system pretty hard. Other times its smooth and beautiful. Most of the time the jerky video is not during anything fast or major, just when the character may be walking it looks like Monty Python sketch about silly walks. Ok thats my major gripe, now onto the game. Interface: Fantastic and feels very immersive. At first the interface seems really clunky and weird until you get the button combinations down then it is very smooth and easy to figure out. Eventually you really dont have to think about it at all. This game is rewriting what interfaces are in video games and even though it is cutting edge it sometimes feels a bit like Dragon's Lair. If you find that you just cant keep up due to whatever reason you can change the difficulty setting by selecting how comfortable you are with the PS3 controller. They attempt to use the sixaxis controller like it was meant to be used but it feels a bit, eh, ok. Its not as intuitive as say, Flower [Online Game Code - Full Game]. Load times: The load times do take a little longer than I would like, however they use it as a chance to show off the incredible facial modeling and motion capture. The characters look around and you can see the really fine attention to detail. Adult themes: One thing I like about this title is its frank dealing with adult themes. Its not overt sexuality, but there is nudity both male and female, and also psychological illness and struggle that most children would not be able to handle. I recommend this for people over the age of 18 and also with sound mental capacity. Reason being is, the story has some very dark imagery that is both disturbing and essential to the thriller. There are graphic depictions of drug use, and it is not pretty. Fight sequences: At times in the beginning you can practice fighting with doing other mundane things such as juggling and playing with one of the children in the game. It shows you through a very inventive way the skills you will need later on to fight. One thing that I like is that the producers offer this in a subtle way. Once you have this hit X now - Up - now Triangle, Now down sort of timing it becomes second nature. If you remember Dragon's Lair then you will find yourself right at home here. Imagery: The game is dark, its almost always raining, there are times though when you can escape through a virtual environment in the game to lush areas. It is always beautiful and quite breathtaking to see some of these vistas. After playing for several hours to see the sun was very refreshing and almost brought my spirits up. Then it was back to the case. The visuals are spot on. There are pieces of plastic caught in the barbed wire of the fences, cans roll around the street, there is dirt under and over a light switch on the wall. In the beginning you are in a modern home with fantastic architecture and it looks just like a movie set. Textures, reflections, water all play very integral members of the cast. At times I forgot to move because I thought I was watching a movie, not playing one. Vocals & Storytelling: I am playing the US version and the voice acting is very good. I appreciate the vocals at times more than the graphics (which is saying alot). They are actual actors and not the textures guy doing a voice for the game. What you get is a compelling story told through many peoples viewpoints. Think Steven King or Dean Koontz with regard to many characters telling the whole story. This is not a hero quest layout and often I had trouble finding who to root for. That in itself makes it a very powerful story. I never felt that the story was out of hand or too deep to grasp. I really felt as I was integral in many ways to what was going on the screen. Replayability: There are so many different ways to go in this story that it could mean infinite replayability, although I doubt its that much. Even so it could be like 200+ different ways to play it meaning it is a very good value. Just do what you think the characters would do and live with the decisions, or go back and try again. Synopsis breakdown: Pros: >> Motion capture is some of the best I have seen, only sometimes seems too stiff (like going up stairs) >> Interface is easy to use once you get the basics down >> You can change the difficulty based on how fast you think you can pull off the moves, so it doesn't penalize older players with slower reaction times. >> A true adult game (no sex), but with real life issues and themes. >> Gritty and holds no punches Cons: << PS3 Slim with plenty of HD space had jerky motion and felt a bit pushed << Harkens back to old school movie games with the controls based on timing and buttons (its ok not much of a con but thought I would mention it) Overall this game will touch you in many ways. It is both wonderful to look at, yet you will find yourself wanting to look away when the bad stuff happens. You become very attached to each character and the smallest decisions you make may change the whole conclusion of the game. Matter of fact there is no guarantee that anyone will solve the case, so, be wise with your choices. Highly recommended. Thank you for reading my review. Redefining "Video Game" Playing Heavy Rain, I couldn't help but think of the original NES Super Mario Bros. (duh-doo-doo duh-doo-DOO!). I thought of this not because they have anything whatsoever in common, but for exactly the opposite reason: while a classic, Mario (and most other games to follow) was crystal clear about what being a "video game" meant. You control the movements of a cute little character, he jumps, squashes some bad guys, and saves the princess. Yippee! What Heavy Rain does is to risk venturing into new territory for video games. The result was, to me, simply astounding. "Interactive movie" is the term I've heard used most often to describe this title, and I think that comes close to capturing the essence. Imagine a movie--along the lines of a drama/murder mystery/psychological thriller . . . think Magnolia meets a really good episode of Law & Order SVU. Now imagine that you're involved with the characters on a deeper level, because you haven't merely watched their story unfold on the screen, but you've also controlled them brushing their teeth, handling a life-changing crisis, and fighting off an attacker. Then imagine that you not only control those actions, you also CHOOSE many of those actions--and sculpt your unique version of the story. As you'll likely read from others, much of the interactivity comes from Quick Time Events (timed button presses following onscreen prompts, a la God of War or the zillion other games that employ this device). What's different here is that, in many cases, whether you perform these timed presses "successfully" or not, the game goes on, and the story adapts accordingly. In fact, much of the time, there isn't a clear definition of "success" in these situations--as the tiniest decision in this game can have lasting (and unexpected) repercussions in the unfolding of the narrative. For me, this is the true accomplishment of Heavy Rain: you're not only watching the movie, you're also playing the lead roles and writing the screenplay all at once. The graphics are incredible. I've never seen video game characters that look and move this realistically. The controls are unconventional, but, in my experience, well-suited. In addition to the timed button-presses, you're often moving your character in a more traditional way, finding objects in the environment to interact with (similar to old-school adventure games like King's Quest or Broken Sword). During dialogue with other characters, you'll often be given a choice of several different tactics to employ (ie, to reason, to threaten, or to surrender). These decisions too determine much of how the "script" of this "movie" will play out. Another thing I've heard a lot about Heavy Rain is, "It's not for everyone." I most definitely agree with this; it's for mature audiences. Not in the way that Grand Theft Auto is rated M for Mature, because in those games (brilliant in their own right), you can either be very mature or you can be very immature and there's still a good chance you'll enjoy the $&@! out of them. Heavy Rain requires maturity not just because it has sex, violence, and profanity (it does), but also because it deals with adult themes in a very different sense. These characters live in a harsh world of regret, heartbreak, and love: a love that goes far beyond rescuing Princess Peach. If, after reading this, you're still curious about this boldly original video game experience, my advice would be to go for it. It just might be one of the most thrilling and provoking pieces of entertainment you've come across in some time. Additional Screenshots: 4 unique playable characters. View larger. Advanced crime scene analysis. View larger. Story influencing actions. View larger. Stunning graphics quality. View larger.