Heavy Rain, so heavy!

 Warning: spoilers all over the entry!

When shipped in February, Heavy Rain brought a much needed fresh air in the PS3 catalogue. Sony sold console bundles themed around the game, and the reception for the Quantic Dream masterpiece was as warm as ever. But, what were the players actually doing, by purchasing that game? They were taking distance from interactivity, they were showing how tired of the usual games they were, they were just trying to mutiny to the hardcore gamers cliches which forced them to sink into a spiral of plain and old gameplay mechanics in order to play a non-casual game.
But, were they doing it the right way? Is Heavy Rain a real masterpiece just because it is so different from everything else around?

The game is an 8-hour adventure, which uses "on-rail" investigation sections alongside QTE sections to guide four different characters to the epilogue, which can vary based on what they do or achieve during the adventure itself, which lets the player go on even if he doesn't solve every aspect of each scene or also if the character dies or is jailed. So, there is plenty of freedom, and that's something Quantic Dream must be praised for, because granting freedom using such techniques is hard and the main reason why graphic adventures are nowadays abandoned. Identifying where you miss something or where your character mistakes is easy, and the player will always be aware of what to change in order to reach a different ending (there are like 5 different endings per character, and sometimes they are combined each other). Then, when he completes the game, he can take on his previous session from where he missed something and go on from there, completing the game in a different way.

The plot is good enough to make you come back and try to reach the perfect ending for anyone, but there is a series of flaws which is worth considering before evaluating the game as a gem in the market. First of all, let's say that out of 8 hours, you play half of it, or maybe 5, because cutscenes take a good share of playing time. So, if you replay 2 hours, you end up watching 60 minutes of cutscenes, changing half of them for a 30 minutes of new content. Next time you play, maybe the 30 minutes will be 20, then 10, and so on. You are basically forced to get bored, and constrains kill fun and the real replayability value of the game, which is now just relying on an amazing plot to survive.

Heavy Rain gameplay also decreases the chanches of it getting away with murder from this entry. For how well it is programmed, for how varied it can be, QTE does not guarantee identification, especially when you are set to play with 4 different non-evolving characters. The pair of exploring section are a good alternative, and fun, but the imaginary boundaries set spoil the experience. In conclusion, in movies you identify with a character that has your same behaviour, or profession, or mindset. The same happens in Heavy Rain, and if you are not an architect who lost his first son and has the second kidnapped, or a hot journalist who cannot sleep, or a killer, or an FBI phenom, you won't fully identify with anyone in the game.

Quantic Dream made a great game, shipped it at the right time on the right market, created a legend because Heavy Rain is so different from the rest that users will end up adoring it. But, besides the huge scripting effort and a remarkable cinematic flow, fails in being the beginning of a new era. The title will remain unique, don't expect anything quite like that. A single sparkle in a land of shallow fun and involvement. But it is actually nothing really revolutionary, and has too many flaws to pave the way for clones. Since the same happened to much better games like ShenMue or Fumito Ueda's works, there is no reason why Heavy Rain would succeed in this particular aspect.