inFAMOUS - Playstation 3

This is an A+ title from the PS3 if you enjoy the sandbox/open world game genre. Here is a quick breakdown:Story:The story in this game is solid after playing one playthrough on good. I still have yet to play on 'evil', however the ending/storyline is well worth the effort. By that I mean it is a great payoff without giving anything away. It drags at points, as some of the main story missions do not advance the story more than a little bit at a time but with that being said it must be noted that this is par for the course for a sandbox game. The delivery of the story is very effective in my opinion, as they rely on a graphic novel/comic type delivery with stills and wonderful color delivery in this manner.The ending alone has made me want to play through the game again to see another ending/storyline unfold. If story is your thing in a game, this game is above average in this capacity, short of great.Graphics: Very well done as the game is broken up into 3 'city portions' and is basically a nuclear-waste looking city. The atmosphere by the graphics are well done, however it suffers with a drab looking palate most of the time relying on greys/browns and mostly dark cool and warm colors but nothing flashy. This is the mood they wanted to go for no doubt, but it does become a bit repetitive. The character models suffer from a blocky look aside from the main character but given the capacity of this game, as are with most sandbox games, this is excusable in my opinion and is not why I play sandbox games. If you get hung up on character models, this might be a problem for you.As stated before, the cutscenes are delivered through a comic/graphic style that fits the game perfectly. The reason for this is because it suits the drab/dark mood of the game well. What is nice about many of these scenes is that they do utilize flashy colors at times which helps these scenes stand out apart from the game.Sound: The techno-type beats during missions and fights are well done and not intrusive. Not much during the game in terms of "theme" or 'mood' music as there are in other games, but, again, this quite par for the course in sandbox games. Not a problem. The sound effects are great with your powers of electricity.Gameplay: This is where the game shines, as it is more than fun to jump around throughout the city, scaling walls, sliding on tracks (train and telephone lines) and the progression of the powers you get as you progress is wonderful. They allow you to travel the city portions faster as your progress and are actually very fun throughout the game, though you will backtrack throughout the city much (especially if you are collecting the shards and other stuff).The powers are very fun to use as well. While you have one type of power/weapon, this is also the 'hook' in the game. The lightning powers you utilize are varied and fun to use. The enemies do get much more difficult as the game progresses (on hard anyway) and the power ups you recieve accordingly (both spending points on and normal game progression power ups) make the reptitive fights very fun. By repetitive fights I mean the enemies follow the pattern of "fight here, move to another point in the city and encounter more fights". This is just fine and this is contrasted to one of my big gripes with GTA 4, for example. There is not enough city-wide fighting in between missions in GTA lest you provoke fights with cops. There is not enough "territorial" type attacking going on against your character in GTA - on the contrary, this game has plenty of this and makes the player want to progress their character to have more powers to handle this.This is certainly not an exhaustive review, as there is much more to mention, from choices your make and the karma-path mechanic.This is a gem of a game if you are into the sandbox genre, if you like action and a gratifying play-control mechanic that is plain fun to scour the city.9.5/10

I just finished doing everything you can possibly do in Infamous. The game is definitely a good one, one of the best games of the current console generation (on any platform).GRAPHICSThe graphics are good--on par with most AAA games; naturally, the physics of the electricity are particularly nice. There are very rare instances of slow down when you are facing off against a bunch of enemies, with a bunch of pedestrian-bystanders scurrying about, and blow up a few too many things. The game actually froze on me once, and I fell through the ground into an endless pit of doom twice, and jumped through a fence I should not have jumped through two or three times. However, these glitches rarely occur, and thanks to today's constant checkpoints and autosaves, it's never a very big deal.CHALLENGEThe game has two difficulty levels. Depending on how you play the opening of the game, which serves as a sort of tutorial, the game will assign you a difficulty (Normal or Hard). Normal allows for a low stress experience. Hard is really not much more difficult (it takes longer to improve your abilities because you get less experience points for the enemies you kill), though the final boss fight is a tad on the obnoxious side. All in all, the two difficulty levels allows fairly casual gamers to be able to make it through, and provides enough challenge for the "hardcore." (And don't worry, you can choose the difficulty no matter what the game assigns you).GAMEPLAYUsing all of the different abilities are fairly satisfying. It's both entertaining and beneficial to perform the stunts in the game (to perform a "stunt," you kill the enemy in certain ways--like sticking him with an electric grenade, knocking them off a high roof, or finishing them off when they're in midair from one of your shockwaves). What's surprisingly fun is grinding on power lines and gliding around Empire city--I'm not sure any other game I've played makes it more fun to move from point A to point B (aside from racing games and Spider-man games with workable web-slinging).PLOTWhen you really look at it, the narrative is fairly short even though the game takes quite some time to finish (if you do all of the side missions). The meat of the plot unfolds when you play the story missions--with most of it in the form of comic book-esque cut-scenes. However, as you go through the game you collect "dead drops," basically recorded messages left around the city by a character in the game. These messages also unravel the story a bit more, and it makes the game's story much more fulfilling if you paid attention (I ignored most of these my first play-through, and that was a mistake). The story is fairly interesting, with the ending being quite good. Though it definitely is a setup for a sequel (very much like Assassin's Creed).GOOD VS EVILThe publishers of Infamous have made it a point to emphasize Cole's ability to choose between being Good or Evil. Like it has been said, whenever an opportunity to make a moral decision comes up, Cole's rationale is actually sensible whether or not he chooses the good or evil path (survive in order to save more lives, or greatly endanger yourself in order to save a few lives). If your aim is to get all of the Trophies and get all you can out of the game, you definitely will go all Good on one play through, and all Evil on the other. Playing as Good or Evil has a great effect on the gameplay, because your abilities develop differently depending on whether you are Good or Evil. Good abilities have an emphasis on accuracy, pinpoint damage, and health regeneration (a single, stronger electric grenade that automatically restrains the enemy); Evil abilities have an emphasis on mass destruction (a grenade that splits into seven grenades and blows everything up).OVERALLI found the gameplay and story to be fun and engrossing. Aside from a bit of time working on getting Trophies (this game was my first Platinum Trophy), the game has always made me want to play more.