InFamous is Sony's most recent interpretation of a sandbox-style video game. InFamous was developed by Sucker-Punch Productions, the same team that created the Sly Cooper series on the Playstation 2.
In InFamous, you play as bike messenger Cole. Well, little does Cole know, his simple bike messenger job will soon change his entire life. Cole is commanded by an anonymous instructor to deliver a package that is secretly a bomb. The bomb, of course, explodes, creating mass chaos. The blast was so devastating, that it destroyed six blocks of city. However, instead of being blown to the inevitable abyss, Cole develops unique electricity-based powers. Upon returning to his residence in Empire City, Cole discovers that gangs and thugs have planned a complete take over to an already bleak city. With your newly acquired powers, will you fight back for peace, security and justice, or will you terminate the weak that are left?
Each action you take either negatively or postively effects Cole's karma. When you have reached a full positive karma, you have become the so-ever-cliche term in a "hero." On the opposite side of the table, when you killed one too many innocent civilians, your karma will reach, you guessed it, infamous. Regardless of how you handle your first play through, creating two options for the player, certainly envokes a replyability factor. Progression in the story leads to Cole developing more powers, which can be upgraded on either a Hero side or an inFamous side. However, do not get too excited, these upgrades are very shallow and lack any forms of depth.
The movement of Cole's character is heavily influenced on platforming elements. The three islands in Empire City that you will be conquering all rely on plunging from roof tops, riding the train track rails, sliding along telephone wires, and everything and anything in between. It is very reminiscent to Assassin's Creed, in that it does not take a complex button scheme to manuever through the areas. The movement is not always too well done, although. Cole will get stuck many times, whether its in between buildings, hanging off ledges, or even jumping across simple platforms. The problem can be so severe that it may have to cause you to restart the game. The combat is actually very well done. For all the lightning you unleash, you must find electrical outputs to recharge Cole. When you do not possess any lightning at the time, Cole is extremely vulnerable. Shooting lightning never gets too old, and with a steady camera, you cannot help but get addicted. The graphics are certainly a mixed bag. The facial textures need serious work and the voice acting is terrible. The city does suffer from some pop-ins and framerate issues. Do not get me wrong, though, Empire City as a whole is extremely varied in terms of environments, which helps create a personality, as though this city could really exist.
The main story missions are a lot of fun. They all bring something new to the table. The pacing between learning a new power and using it in the actual game is perfect. The story will put you on an emotional roller coaster; you really do not know what will come next. Unfortunately, since this is an open-world game, there are side missions, and the side missions in inFamous are horrible. They lack any creativity or imagination. Sure, some of them are fun, but you will not be saying that too much after you are asked to do the same mission for the tenth time. I guess you can look at side-missions as a little incentitive to keep playing, like a hidden multiplayer, but really, they do nothing but hinder the awesome story of inFamous.
I did not want to end this review on a bad note, so for my final comments, I say to try inFamous. Out of all the Playstation 3 games that have been released in 2009 thus far, inFamous packs the biggest punch. There are virtually two campaigns to play through, lots of collectibles, and three islands to completely pass. InFamous is about as good as it can get for a sand-box game. Although it is a good game by any means, the frequent glitchy character movements, the lazy graphical finishes, and the repetitive side missions really prevent inFamous from being a great game.
Final Score: 8/10
-Eric
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