Heavy Rain has a lot of hype to live up to. When the first teaser was unveiled at E3 2006, gamers were impressed but skeptical that French developer, Quantic Dream, could pull off such photorealism. However, as time went on, the game began to innovate on more than its graphical prowess. Yes, the game looks good, but there’s so much more to it than that. Heavy Rain is the brainchild of videogame director, David Cage. Cage has spoken outwardly about his desire to create games for adults. Not mature games in the usual videogame sense of mayhem, destruction, and potty mouths, but titles for adults to experience with genuinely mature themes like love, fear, betrayal, and death. It’s the way that Heavy Rain wholly embraces and handles these themes that makes the game mature. In addition to the kind of story it tells, it’s the method of storytelling Heavy Rain uses, entirely unique to videogames, that makes it significant. Quantic Dream’s latest game indicates a seachange in the way story in videogames is set to evolve. Bear in mind, Heavy Rain is not perfect. There are control issues, plot-holes, and typical gaming nitpicks on graphics but the experience is fresh, haunting, and completely worthwhile.

Set in a dreary, precipitous city, Heavy Rain follows the story of four, flawed protagonists. Each is connected to a string of murders perpetrated by a serial killer known as the “Origami Killer”. There’s Ethan Mars, a broken man and troubled father, Norman Jayden, an FBI profiler, Scott Shelby, a private investigator, and a mysterious woman, Madison Paige. The less said about how these characters are linked to the killings, the better. Just know that the story of Heavy Rain puts these people in touch with one another in a number of ways, often depending upon how players interact with the game. Heavy Rain is broken into chapters. As the story progresses the game jumps back and forth between these four narratives, further intertwining them. However, the story itself is typical crime thriller fodder. It doesn’t do anything as revolutionary for the thriller genre as a work like Memento did for film, but it’s a huge step forward for interactive drama.

Heavy Rain innovates in a number of ways. Not just in terms of trying to tell a mature story in a videogame- it defies certain tropes of the medium. For example, characters can die in Heavy Rain, permanently. Unlike most games, when a character falls into a pit, gets shot, or gets eaten by the monster, the people of Heavy Rain don’t come back. If Norman Jayden dies during his investigation, he stays dead. There is no reset, there is no game over, there is no ‘Try Again’. The game employs an auto-save system to ensure player’s decisions stay that way. The story simply moves on and adapts to the change. While it is technically possible to go back and try things differently, players who do this are not just belittling the bold step taken by Quantic Dream, they’re doing themselves a disservice. Simply embrace what happens, take the good with the bad, and enjoy the ride. Remember, there is no right or wrong way for the story to unfold.

While it plays with the conventions of game design in that regard, Heavy Rain also does something with storytelling entirely unique to videogames. In films or novels, the story is the same no matter how many times it’s experienced. Being an interactive form of storytelling, videogames have the ability to change depending on how players interact with them. The story of Heavy Rain is set with a series of branching paths. Decisions made, characters lost, clues uncovered, these factors all add up to craft an experience that differs for each player.

Anyone who has played Quantic Dream’s previous game Fahrenheit (Indigo Prophecy in North America) is already a little bit familiar with the controls of Heavy Rain. While there is far less emphasis on quick-time events (QTE, for short) the controls and button prompts are an evolution of that idea. Fight scenes and action sequences are punctuated with timed button prompts. If a character is careening down the highway or chasing a thug through a crowded market, button prompts will appear periodically. But the prompts are often meant to mirror or, in some way, be a close facsimile of the action occurring on-screen. If you take the example of running through the crowded market- flicking up on the right-stick, when prompted, will cause the character to jump onto the counter, press O to dodge the object being thrown at you, etc. The action plays out like an interactive cut-scene. Players don’t control the scene but the button presses guide the action. Fail to press one of the buttons and the character slips, falls down, or gets hit by the object. However, that’s not something entirely new to videogames. What is fresh is the way in which the developers use the buttons of the controller to convey a sense of urgency or tense emotion.

Often, players are tasked with holding down a series of buttons for a prolonged sequence. It’s usually used to convey the difficulty of what’s occurring on the screen. For example, early in the game, a character must walk up a slippery, muddy hill. A series of buttons must be held down as he makes his way up. It’s often like playing a game of Twister for your hands and just when you think you can’t hold on, they add another button. Usually, these sequences aren’t too taxing but the mechanic does get more challenging during certain parts of the game. It’s a simple design choice yet one that’s never been used so effectively.

However, not everything in Heavy Rain controls they way it’s supposed to. The developers made some odd choices when it comes to moving the characters around the environment. During the non-cinematic, free-roam segments, when players actually direct the characters, the controls are a bit unconventional. Holding R2 moves them forward in whichever direction they’re facing while the left-stick directs their gaze. Turn the character’s head to the left and they’ll turn and start walking that direction. Unfortunately, it feels very awkward. As I played the game, I was hoping that, by the end, I’d get used to the controls and would understand the decision. That didn’t happen. Even by the end of the game, I was still getting my characters turned around and frustrated when they didn’t go where I wanted them too. In a game with such high presentation standards, the hackneyed controls often broke the illusion of the storytelling, reminding me that, yes, I am playing a videogame.

Speaking of presentation, Heavy Rain’s production values set a high standard. Character models, particularly those of the main characters, are beautifully detailed and motion-captured realistically. It’s not often a review points out the motion capture work in a game, however, Quantic Dream took great efforts to stage out these scenes and the hard work has paid off. While occasionally falling into the uncanny valley, the world of Heavy Rain is gorgeous and, at times, incredibly lifelike. The story is set against a musical score that, like any great film soundtrack, reenforces the story and pulls all of the elements together. While the game looks amazing, the audio- particularly the voice acting- is a mixed bag.

While many characters sound believable, some of the actors portraying them are clearly working with English as a second language. In a story centered on the “Origami Killer” it was a little troubling to hear so many people unable to properly pronounce the word “Origami”. Again, in a game with such high production values and such an emphasis on creating a dramatic experience, it was disappointing to hear. None of it is a deal-breaker, it’s just odd when many of the supposedly American characters are voiced by people with French accents.

Yet, none of these quirks were remotely close enough to keep me from enjoying the game. Heavy Rain’s charm comes by way of many little moments, strung together, to create something wonderful. There’s a scene deep into the game, as Madison Paige, players must enter a nightclub- The Blue Lagoon. The mystery is building, the stakes are getting higher. Madison enters the club, the music is overpowering, lights are flashing, and the club is full of people. This isn’t a nightclub from any other game, it’s entirely believable. There aren’t five people in the club dancing, there’s close to a hundred. The scene is so engrossing, it’s here that players realize- they have arrived in an experience unlike anything that’s come before. Nothing incredibly dramatic has happened but there’s a powerful, tangible effect. Other moments like this are more thoughtful, more tender. Taking care of a baby in one scene- feeding it, changing it, rocking it to sleep. Again, other scenes may offer something far more frightening. These are the parts that build this world of interactive drama and make it something truly remarkable. The game has its flaws but players willing to overlook them will be given an innovative, exciting, even haunting experience.