Soccorro: And i just read your whoile text...thanks for spoiling -.- (I know, i've done it myself but i apologised so it's ok because i say so)

neurasthenya: Yeah, lucky for him to be able to make games (because somewhat the standards are lower), because if something like Fahrenheit, Beyond, or HR were movies, Roger Ebert would be laughing and pissing himself xD

ScotchMonkey:

tomimt: No amount of shine will make Fahrenheit a good game. It has a good first half. The whole escaping the crime scene bit and that, but then it pretty quickly turned into such a dumb QTE fest that I stopped playing and haven't looked back since.

jefequeso: Yup, now that you mention it, you are exactly right. Japanese Auteurs are super good at making things like that work.

Oh man, Swery... if Swery had made Indigo Prophecy... that would have been amazing.

F4LL0UT: The question is which scenes you're referring to. "Hammy emotional manipulation that often borders on pornographic" and "just for the hell of it" - yeah, I absolutely agree with these descriptions for certain scenes in the game but for me this mostly applies to the implausible over-the-top moments like the torture maze, the self-mutilation, the shootout with the mobsters and everything related to the FBI agent's drug addiction. But I must admit that IMO moments like the intro where you play with the kids in the back yard, the playground scene, the evening the second kid disappears (whose name I forgot) were some of my favourite parts in the game. For one moments like these are uncommon in games and thus fresh input that I welcome, secondly I think they do contribute to both the plot and experience despite being seemingly unnecessary for the plot. They do help you identify with the protagonist and they do add an insane lot of suspense.

F4LL0UT: I think that's a bold statement. Well, for one I think that he's a decent storyteller but terrible writer. I think his ability to deliver a crappy story in a manner that a huge portion of players will enjoy is kinda proof of it (and that despite the shoddy acting). And I also very much disagree with your statement that his games completely rely on writing and storytelling at least as much as I would disagree if someone said such a thing about movies in general. Also movies largely rely on aesthetics, atmosphere etc. and are sometimes so good in this respect that they are worth watching despite badly written implausible plots. And I think Heavy Rain does deliver when it comes to this. Additionally Heavy Rain experiments a lot with the format and is (or at least was) technoligically quite impressive, things that maybe won't turn this badly written mess with sucky acting into a masterpiece but do hugely contribute to Heavy Rain being an interesting gaming experience that is worth your time.

And the thing is, Heavy Rain is a game that needs just a few out of context moments to mesmerize you (well, maybe not literally you but many people out there). IIRC the demo consisted of three unconnected moments (the PI's first scene, the first crime scene investigation and the home invasion), there wasn't even really any plot going on there and the game managed to shine. I think the stuff that made the demo an impressive experience that made many people long for more perfectly captures everything that also made the full game worth playing.

jefequeso: *snip*
Keep in mind that I'm not arguing that people shouldn't ENJOY Heavy Rain, or that Heavy Rain isn't a unique game. I'm arguing that it's poorly written, and shouldn't be held up as a shining example of videogame storytelling. Which I think we basically agree on.

stg83: Well to be fair you did initially say that you were dumbfounded how some people find Heavy Rain to be any good. There is no doubt that David Cage is really full of himself but atleast he tries to experiment with new things in videos games even if it is to make up for his ambitions of being a proper film maker. :)

*Following section contains a mild SPOILER*

In Heavy Rain the ARI glasses used by the FBI Agent made for some pretty nice game mechanics even if it was added as a gimmick. Not to mention the recent HoloLens technology introduced by Microsoft pretty much seems to be exactly the same thing which was presented in the game and it really surprised me to see that technology becoming a reality. Not saying David Cage invented the idea for the technology but his interpretation was really cool.

*END of SPOILER*

Now coming back on point pretty much everyone agrees that David Cage is far from a perfect storyteller but he is an innovator and his game has also been an inspiration for the modern Telltale adventure games like The Walking Dead as well. So I am still always curious to see what he comes up with next on a new project especially with PC like processing power of PS4 at the disposal of Quantic Dream.

Austrobogulator: I've just been watching Nerd Cubed's video on the game. It's reminding me that the game is just generally bad - even the beginning and the tutorial. It's definitely not just the last 33%/50%/66%.