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Games Convention 2008: Heavy Rain

By Lorand Koncz on Friday, August 22, 2008 at 1:30 PM East
Filed Under Games Convention 2008 & Previews  

Sony’s biggest unveiling at this year’s Games Convention was the first live gameplay demonstration of one of the most anticipated and secretive titles of the PlayStation 3’s line-up, Quantic Dream’s Heavy Rain. Directed, produced and penned by David Cage, the title features a wide variety of digital actors and situations that the player gets to interact with and explore.

Heavy Rain is an unconventional game in every aspect: There is no main character, there is no game over screen, and there are no cutscenes. Everything that happens is controlled by the player, except for the camera, which has a life of its own: an AI ‘cameraman’ has been implemented to give the game a cinematographic feel that makes the most mundane tasks, from walking up a staircase to opening a trash can, look like a meaningful act.

The story of the game is told through these playable sequences. “Imagine the story like a rubber band. It stretches, but it can also pull back” Cage explains. You don’t just interact with these scenes; everything and anything you do actually changes the outcome of the game.

The scene on display at Leipzig began with a female journalist riding a motorcycle over a bridge in, fittingly, a heavy downpour. After arriving at a mundane suburban house, she walks up to the door and presents the player with his first choice. He can now either knock on the door or ring the bell - we decided to try both, but there was no answer. A little dialogue indicator pops up in the bottom left corner, which lets us choose what to say. This is done with the SIXAXIS motion sensor, so that we can talk, or as in this case, lead an inner monologue, while doing other things.

“We never tell you what to do,” says Cage, who is notably excited about what he is
demoing today.

The way the scene played out for us was relatively straight-forward: We snuck into the house after finding an open window to look for clues inside. After failing to do so in the living room, we moved on to the garage where - to the visible disgust of our protagonist a trail of blood led outside. Back in the house, we moved upstairs to a hallway with a creaky wooden floor and found a triple-whammy of shocking revelations: A dead body in the bathtub — how clichéd — stuffed women in the upstairs living room and, to make bad worse, the taxidermist’s car appeared in the driveway.

Luckily, we left everything untouched - we can safely escape from the house through the garage, while the taxidermist, who is now a prime suspect, kicks back with a beer and some good old fashioned American Football.

“This is, of course, only one way for the events to turn out,” explains Cage (born de
Gruttola) with a thick French accent.

We go back to the bathroom crime scene, only this time, the taxidermist heard our footsteps on the creaky floor. Hastily trying to hide in a closet turns out to be one of the best demonstrations for the control scheme, which tries to evoke emotion in the way input is handled: Here, we have to assume a very complex position on the controller that leaves our hands vulnerable to any sudden input: L2, R1, X and triangle - a game of ‘Twister’ comes to mind.

Apparently, the place chosen to hide in was not the safest: the taxidermist pried the
doors of the closet wide open and is now chasing the reporter through the entire house.
The scene, which is probably as cinematic as you would expect from a game like Metal
Gear Solid, except this time around, it’s entirely the player controlling the screaming,
panicky woman through the house while fending off the taxidermist’s attacks with
tactfully placed quick-time events.

We still manage to escape from him, but Cage adds: “It is entirely possible to kill him — or to die yourself,” which will change the story accordingly.

As the demonstration draws to a close, I ask Cage “Will it be possible to fail often
enough to reach an unsatisfactory ending?”

“I would hope so!” he says smiling, while shaking my hand.

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