The game Heavy Rain is as close to a movie as any other game. It's an interactive cutscene, really. The game puts you in place as multiple characters during an investigation of a serial killer known as The Oragami Killer. You live out different parts of the investigation with different characters, figuring out different clues from each side, except for one character, the main character, Ethan Mars, who is on the quest to save his son from the killer rather than just trying to figure out who the killer is.

The game's story is quite good, and well told, and it can be changed iny many ways depending on how well you perform in the different interactions for each character, as there is the possibility that you may die as some of the characters. It is nice to play a game where some things are actually changed based on the decisions you make, instead of many of the games that claim your decisions will change the story but don't actually do anything.

The disappointment is that the game is not really all that great otherwise. The graphics are not awful, they are just nothing to scream out happily about. The voice acting was not very good, and it didn't help that the actual moving of the mouths was not very good either.

The controls got a little annoying too, in that a camera angle would suddenly change and you were sometimes confused (well, I was) and would walk into walls and passed targets, etc.. As well, interactive gameplay can sometimes get rather tedious and boring. By the end of the game, or even just midway, pressing a button here or there as if you are actually in the fight just doesn't cut it, and you feel like you're not actually doing anything; it just seems unecessary.

Really, the game is not bad, I just feel it might have worked better as an actual movie and not this game. I know the whole point was that you shape the story, and it was a good try, it just didn't really work terrifically.

The combat is merely just pressing a button when it tells you to (in different ways: tapping, holding, repeatedly pressing, etc.). You do not walk around with weapons pressing different buttons to attack different ways; any weapon used is during the "cutscene" that you interact in and are usually not used for long. In other words, the weapons are not manually used.

There is nothing partucilarly mature about the game in terms of the violence. There is blood and people can die in some gruesome ways, however there is not much gore nor are there any unwatchable parts.

What I will mostly give this game credit for is both soundtrack and the ability to make you feel. The music is ominous which works in a game like this, and along with the story, it can make you feel very badly for the main character in all he has lost, and for times when you're either scared and panicking or whatever other emotion is conveyed in the characters. 

Really, the game is not bad. It is an okay game, with a good story and music which is enough to at least give the game a try. 

Recommended: Yes