I'm shocked that I didn't know about this game sooner than last month (I was vaguely aware of "Fahrenheit," which is the game's European title still, I believe), but now that I've played it, I think it's probably my favorite game that I've bought this year.
The story, for those of you who've never heard of it, is that you play two sides of a murder case, Lucas Kane, the murder, and Carla Valenti and Tyler Miles, the cops investigating.
The game's control scheme (mind you I'm playing the PC version) is kind of iffy. Keyboard and mouse control is kind of sloppy. I'd bet it was better on PS2 or X-Box, but I'm so used to playing this type of game on PC, I bought it for that. I would have liked to have seen a smoother interface. Actions are performed by holding the left mouse button and sliding it in the direction indicated at the top of the screen. It sounds complicated, but you get a pretty good feel for it as the game wears on.
Action sequences, like chases and fights and such are played out through Simon Says minigames, which are timed to the action on the screen. It's kind of neat, though it can get irritating during particularily long stretches.
The voice acting is for just about every character in the game (except Tyler, who is good, but sounds like he was pulled straight out of a 70s blacksploitation movie, and has the theme music to match), the music is great, especially the Violins of Mystery, and the cinematic camera angle are great. Graphics themselves are ok, but a bit rough.
It's fun to see what kind of impact your choices have later in the game (mostly it's just superficial, but there are one or two bigger ones). I've had some fun making Lucas into a complete asshole and Tyler and Carla into the world's worst cops. But eventually, you arrive at the same place. Which is the problem. The story and storytelling are fantastic until about 2/3 of the way through the game when you're approaching endgame, and they basically give up trying to make sense of anything they're telling you. Especially
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The Matrix/Deus Ex/Sci-Fi Cliche infused ending sequences melding poorly concieved AI characters who just, suddenly appear, a shadowy Mayan Ubergovernment, and a band of hobos rallying against both sides.
Plus, I'd like to know what the hell is up with Carla and Lucas' romance, which came out of absolutely nowhere.
Anyway, despite the kind of choppy finish, the game is well worth picking up, especially for the interesting initial story. It's got some gameplay issues (the action sequences and "stealth" missions especially need tweaking), but it's an interesting shot at a new genre and I hope people give it a chance so, at the very least, they get another shot at it for an Indigo Prophecy 2.
(edited by Excalibur05 on 30.9.05 0112)
(edited by Excalibur05 on 30.9.05 0113) Tonight I wanna ruin my life, I wanna throw it all away, In a spectacular way
I just beat this game and you're totally right, the last third is crap. It makes no sense logically and came out of no where.
When I played the first few chapters I thought it was of the coolest things I ever played. The opening sense was so tense and it made you feel it to. I think if the developers are able to capitalize on that gameplay throughout a whole game, they'd have a really amazing game.
But even throughout everything, it was a great experience and I look foward to more from this company.
One thing that bothered me was that to see some of the alternate endings you had to lose on certain parts of the game, which is fine...but the game is so easy it will never happen.
I haven't had a chance to try this yet, but I liked quanticdream's first game (Omikron) way back when it came out, despite its sloppy fighting and shooting engines, and am hoping this game can be carried on the strength of its atmosphere, as well, since that seems to be their strength. ^.^
Bought it day one. I have the majority of the trophies. I just finished the story tonight. I still need to collect the film reels, drive all of the cars, finish off the last five side missions, and 100% the game.