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InFamous When the Playstation Network crashed and was out for over a month, PSN offered the download of two free games to welcome people back to the network. Depending on your area, a different selection of games was offered, but several games were common to all areas. The first game I downloaded was what I believed to be a PS3 staple: Little Big Planet. I was torn between a few games for my second download, but I had downloaded and played a demo for InFamous only days before and it seemed kind of fun, so I went with InFamous. I assumed that I would love a platformer like Little Big Planet and be generally indifferent toward InFamous, which seemed like it would just be one of those interchangable third-person shooters. As I began to play both, I found it almost the opposite as Little Big Planet was not my kind of game and InFamous was really dang fun! InFamous is far from a perfect game. The story is not great, the missions are repetitive, and there are some very glitchy aspects to the game, but all of that aside, the underlying theme of this review is that InFamous is a game. It reminds me in essence of old video games like Super Mario Bros. and Metroid in the sense that they don't need to have a stellar story to be fun. InFamous is about a man named Cole, who is delivering a package as normal when, suddenly, the package bursts into this blue, electric explosion and kills thousands of people. Cole survives and gains superhuman electricity-based abilities, while the city falls into chaos and is quarantined by the government. Cole becomes a superhero for the city, trying to stop the gangs and such that have taken over the city while also trying to patch things up with his girlfriend, who is upset just because you kinda killed her sister with your explosion.
Your friend, Zeke, thinks your powers are awesome and immediately puts you to work helping out the city. What he doesn't realize is that you may, or may not, be completely evil. It's up to you! Yes, just like Fable, there is a morality meter in this game. Depending on your actions, you might end up a hero and you might end up infamous. At several points in the game, you are given a Karmic Moment where you can determine if you would like to handle a situation in a good way or an eeeeevil way.
Personally, I like the Karmic Moments, but I wish that Cole didn't tell you exactly what dictates being good or evil; I'd like to decide for myself and see what it gives me. I suppose it's helpful for if you're trying for the good or evil ending (yep, there are two endings) and becoming a true hero or a true anti-hero, but I like the idea of deciding for myself. It's not a big issue though; the way they handle it is just fine, I just might've enjoyed the freedom to choose for myself. Like with his Karmic Moments, Cole likes to talk in his gruff voice film noir format. The game tries to handle cutscenes almost entirely through semi-still images and Cole's voiceover to give the game a comic book-like feeling. It's stylistic and fun, though I don't think it tells the story as well as it could have. Still, I enjoy it, especially since it makes a very basic, cliche plot more interesting. But that's a compliment and a put-down at the same time. The plot is simple and would be very boring, but at least it's told well enough, I guess.
This game's story may not be great, but the progression is fun. As I said, it reminds me a lot of older games like Metroid, because it's a very freeform game that you progressively uncover new powers and unlock new areas of the map. It's a mission-based game and there are story missions and side missions. The story missions progress the plot and unlock sections of the map, while the side missions help the citizens and keep the resident gangs from entering those areas, for the most part. There are three districts to the map: the Neon, the Warrens, and the Historic District. Each area has its own gang dominating the area and they get harder as you go, plus each area ends with a boss fight. It's very similar to old format games like Metroid because you fight progressively harder enemies, but at the same time, you also unlock awesome powers as you go. How? Electricity!
Since the explosion, the power has been knocked out of several areas, which means good things for the gangs, but terrible things for you. As an electric man, you feed on electricity. It restores your electric battery cores, which is basically this game's MP, so if you need to use special abilities and you're by a transformer, you can suck the power from it and restore your battery cores. Also, the game doesn't explicitly tell you, but it also restores your health. It hints at it, but it's hard to notice since this is one of those games where if you take damage, you hide for a few seconds and your life regenerates. But now, better than hiding, you just find a nearby electrical source and suck it. It's great because you can jump right back into combat and you don't have to waste your time hiding.
Maybe the gangs are hiding from you, or maybe they just hate lights and TV, but the dark areas of the city have extreme numbers of enemies and lots of firepower. You can wander into these areas and rack up the experience fighting, but it is hard. Not only are there powerful trucks with turrets and some of the strongest enemies of that game, but the region is also powerless, so you are very limited on power and health regeneration. So generally, they draw some borders to restrict you from going to certain places. But then those missions come up where you restore power to a section of the city, and these missions are awesome. Why? You get more power!
When you restore power to an area, it means a ton of electricity surging through your body, as seen above. Then, like Prince of Persia: Sands of Time, you see a vision of how to use the power and be awesome with it (just like he saw images of what was going to happen in the stage). If you don't see Prince of Persia: Sands of Time qualities to InFamous, then you've probably never played Prince of Persia: Sands of Time. It has a lot of the same qualities, including the protagonist's strange ability to do anything he friggin wants. Run up a wall? Sure! Climb a tall building? Why not? And in both games, it adds to the fun. Is it realistic? Meh, I dunno. Maybe there's something about being electric that allows Cole to climb sixty-story buildings, but I really think Cole is just a badass. It may not make sense that Cole can climb better than Spiderman, but who cares, it's awesome! This game has extreme playability. You acquire so many unique abilities tied to your electrical powers like shock grenades, shockwaves to toss cars into people and grenades back into enemies' faces, grinding on power wires and train tracks, thrusters that let you glide like Aladdin in the hit video game for the SNES. The game is so damn fun that you forget about the repetitive side missions and the not-terrible-original plot.
If you're only doing story missions, you can probably beat this game rather quickly, but this game has a lot of optional things to do. The side missions are fun, though redundant. How many times do I really need to follow a courier or uplink satellites? And how does some genius taking pictures of me make a section of the city safe from Reapers? Also, there are some optional things to do like Dead Drops and Blast Shards. Both of these are Easter Egg hunts, basically, which I normally hate for pointlessness, and while I'm not terribly fond of Blast Shards, Dead Drops are neat. Dead Drops are satellites with audio recordings of a man named John, who has been uncovering the evil going on in the city in an undercover operation. They add to the plot and they're easy to find. When you push L3, which you normally do to find electricity sources, blast shards, or enemies, you'll also get a sonar-like bar that gives you an indication as to not only if there's a Dead Drop nearby, but also how close it is and what direction is it. It's fun and easy. Blast Shards, on the other hand, aren't so nice.
Again, they show up on your mini-map if you push L3, so it's already better than most hunts for hidden packages or anything like that. Plus, finding x shards will get you another battery core, allowing you to use more special abilities without recharging, so there's a benefit to them. The problem is, there are three-hundred and fifty of them! When there are so many of these things, it means they're everywhere. And it's really easy to believe you checked a location for shards, but didn't. Or maybe you're in an electric-heavy area and there are a bunch of lightning-bolt symbols covering up that tiny blue dot meaning "blast shard here." But either way, it's easy to miss a few. Now, there isn't a huge point to getting all three-hundred and fifty. In fact, once you are up to just above three-hundred, there are no more rewards except a worthless PSN trophy, but there are just too many of them.
To wind down, there are two more big issues to hit. One is how awesome the enemies are. I don't want to say too much, but the enemies are awesome. I love conduits. Conduits are these difficult enemies that have their own superpowers, basically, and some of them are just so cool and intimidating. The first time seeing a Reaper Conduit, I was kind of scared. They teleport in front of you and use this ground attack that busts up the ground and follows you. You try to zap them, but nope! They zip away! They do their job of making you go "uh oh, conduit!" when you see one on a mission. All the enemies are pretty cool though, and The Warren is the best for enemies and plot. Two words: psychic hobos. One of the biggest downsides and upsides to this game is the auto-adjust to everything. Normally, it's pretty tough to do some of the things Cole does. Climbing buildings, hopping around on tiny platforms and railing, it's normally tough. But this game has an auto-latch so that he almost always hits his mark. He'll grab anything near him, he'll stand on anything stand-on-able. It's the biggest blessing and curse. Blessing because it's so fun to run around on railing, hop over to a roof, climb here and there and whatever you need, he does. Curse because he grabs everything! Sometimes you're trying to drop to the street from a tall building (no fall damage--woo!), and time is of the essence, but then he finds a ledge near the building during the fall and he has to grab it, ruining everything. There needed to be some sort of manual pilot mode so that you can say "don't touch anything." It would've been easy enough to program circle to make him not latch on, since that's the "let go of the ledge" button. Just hold it to tell him not to grab! But no. Instead, there are sometimes some strange glitches as a result where he'll try to auto-latch onto two different ledges, so he gets stuck somewhere. It isn't "reset the game" bad, but in a heavy fire fight, the last thing you want is a couple seconds lost because Cole got confused. Whether it's because of the auto-latch or not, I have seen some absurd glitches. I've randomly fallen through the train tracks before, just because. I've tried to jump over something and been launched into the air about ten-times higher than Cole can jump on his own, just because. And my favorite glitch was when my wife was playing. She was running down the street and jumped (I can't remember why, either enemy or car or something else). Suddenly, she was whisked away down the street, over the ledge, and into the water, killing her in one swift, strange move. The spot she was thrown to was probably about a block away, so this was no ordinary glitch. It was hilarious, and lucky she wasn't on a mission or anything. Plus, dying doesn't do much since you just re-spawn at a nearby medical facility. We just looked at each other and shrugged, then she continued playing. I was very surprised to find that I enjoyed InFamous so much, but it's no surprise once you start playing. The game is so fun and playable that it's a game I highly recommend. They story leaves some to be desired, plus there are some glitches and other things that are aggravating, but it's so fun to play. It's fun to fight, fun to climb, fun to jump off tall buildings and try to perform in-game stunts and combos and so much more. There are great abilities, fun melee combat, and a third-person shooter than handles magnificently. And as a side note, I know it's not important, but I love that the game has strayed away from guns. Yeah, the bad guys use them, but you don't! Your gun is your electric fists and hitting them in the head isn't a "head shot" but instead a "head shock." Ha! I know it's not huge, but I like that it is a shooter without guns. It's original and less violent, though I suppose leeching the bioelectric soul of your enemies isn't exactly petting a pony. But you only do that if you're evil...right? ...Right?
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