No. Not outside.  In fact it was a lovely day.  So lovely Chris and I were able to take a longer than usual walk around the area, which was refreshing.  I'm excited for spring when there is no snow on Kent Trails and the trees are green!

I spent much of Thursday excited to get home and play Heavy Rain. I'd initially been annoyed with the controls in the demo but came to appreciate what the game was trying to do over time.

The is more or less an interactive movie where your actions affect things later down the story.  While games like Dragon Age and works by Bethesda do this as well, this game is much more laden with cutscenes and more mundane, everyday like tasks.  Honestly - that sounds horrible but it's not.

If you enjoyed Shenmue, you'd likely enjoy this game (in fact I'd have replayed that game several times if I wasn't missing disc 1 ><). There are some similarities but Heavy Rain does a lot more because in 11 years technology has grown.

So the game is designed for you to basically put you in an emotional connection with each of the main players (there are 4 people you can control I believe).  When you're at a tense scene the controls are designed to be tricky and the music intense so that you're on edge too.  When you're trying to climb up a slippery, muddy embankment you have to press a series of buttons and hold them as your character strugges up.  If you dont, they slip back down, now coated in mud, and waiting to attempt it again.  This is a departure from a lot of games that just require you to press "X" and everything is automated for you.

The beginning started out kind of dull.  But, I understand to tell a story about characters in which a tragedy occurs you have to kind show life before that.  That and the combination of using the beginning portion as a tutorial for the controls made it amusing to me and no doubt odd to Chris who was watching (at one point you have to shave your character's stubble off).

This game is designed for an older player - there is no doubt about that.  The pacing is slow (which will not appeal to most 13 year olds), and some concepts and themes would be lost on most younger players.

It is very much like having input in a movie, or akin to a choose-your-own-adventure book.  Some people will loathe it, and others love it.  It's received pretty high ratings (though honestly, the last several Final Fantasy games have as well, so those ratings are kind of a joke) for a game that plays much differently than a lot of ones out there.

I'm looking forward to playing more. :D

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