Now that I am finally in possession of a Playstation 3 again (what with the trading in of my old PS3 back in March and the subsequent early purchase of my PS3 Slim last month), I’ve recently decided to go through a backlog of games that I might have missed on the system during that brief period that I was away. Naturally though, my backlog at this point is pretty large consisting of two “sandbox games” (InFamous and Red Faction), and an immense amount of PSN titles. Still, I have to start somewhere, so, why not start with the game that a large number of my fellow GamingVice writers have been telling me is a must-play experience: InFamous.

That said, I haven’t read anything on InFamous since its release and while many of my buddies here at GV have been telling me all these good things about it, truth be told, I wasn’t always listening. And, I’m sure many of you reading this have probably already beaten InFamous, tackled the game as both a Hero and a Villian and have even recieved the coveted 100% platinum trophy for your acheivements (I’m looking at you, Colton). But, depite these hurdles, I’m going to try by best to share with you all my impressions of the game as well as my problems with it.

First and foremost, I have to make note of the fact that InFamous has one of the single most aggrivating “sticky jump” features of any video game I have ever played. For those of you who aren’t aware of what I’m talking about, Cole, the protagonist of InFamous, has the ability to climb up buildings and make extraordinary jumps onto various platforms and ledges throughout Empire City and, because of the precision needed in many of his jumps, the developers have included automatic landing feature that draws Cole toward whatever ledge he is closest to. This allows the player to avoid the frustration of trying to make a precise jump and in many situations, this can be extremely helpful. However, scattered throughout Empire City are these little blue collectibles called “blast shards” that are placed on the sides of buildings, on various rooftops, and in many other harrowing places.

At first this all sounds well and good; one would think that the “sticky jump” feature would help players easily jump towards these “blast shards”. Sadly, this is not the case and in many situations, I found myself having to actually fight the the game to try and grasp at some of these elusive power-ups. One in particular “blast shard” that was stuck on a billboard took me, no exaggeration, twenty minutes to collect due to the fact that every time I jumped off of the nearest building toward the relatviely close billboard, the “sticky jump” feature would attach me to the billboard’s ledge and not allow me to jump off the ledge the extra inch that I needed to jump to in order to reach the power-up. Mind you, this was an extreme situation but the problem with the automatic landing feature is still present. I have to question why Sucker Punch, inFamous’ developer, didn’t program in a feature where if you were close enough to a blast shard from a jump, Cole would automatically leap toward it. That could’ve easily saved me from this ultimately minor frustration and I am certain I would’ve enjoyed the platforming sections of InFamous more.

But, I digress. While, my tone up until this point in the article has been relatively negative, I want to make one thing clear: I think InFamous is one of the best games on the PS3 and, without a doubt, the best sandbox “superhero” game since Ultimate Spiderman on Gamecube and PS2 and Crackdown on the 360. The sheer amount of side missions in InFamous easily makes the game worth a purchase but the fact that Sucker Punch has so lovingly crafted these side-quests to be varied and interesting make the game that much more enjoyable. One minute I found myself rescusing hostages from a gang of the game’s thugs, the Reapers, and the next I was blowing up cars with my electrically powered shock grenades for a photographer to snap a photo of.

On top of all that, Sucker Punch has also done a phenomenal job with the game’s power upgrade system. While I know many people have argued that it was a poor decision for them to not allow players to unlock all the powers if they were playing as solely a Hero or a Villian but I actually think that having certain abilities locked once many of your moral choices have been set allows for a large amount of replayability and I while I am almost complete with my first run-through of the game playing as a Hero, I know for a fact that I am going to go back and try the game as an “InFamous” villian in my next play-through. Either way you play the game however, Cole will still be infused with some awesome electrically-infused super powers such as the “shock grenades” I mentioned earlier, the ability to rail grind on top of electrical wires to traverse through the city quicker while charging up your battery cores, and even the ability to glide throughout Empire City using an electrical hover.

Oh, and did I mention the fantastic combat? The fluidity of attacks in InFamous really allows the game’s combat to shine and in many of the later encounters with the street gangs, Cole is given a wide variety of options on how to take down the baddies. The combining of many of Cole’s powers such as his electrical homing missles and his shockwave blasts can make for some extremely satisfying and enjoyable combat experiences unlike anything that I have previously experienced in a game of this genre. And on top of that the fact that you can literally scale anything and everything in the city and InFamous becomes a must-play experience.

A final thing that really hasn’t been touched on in many of the other InFamous editorials I’ve read is just how great the game presents itself. The music, brilliantly scored by Amon Tobin (the guy who did the soundtrack for Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory and well as the films The Italian Job and 21) perfectly suits the “urban desolation” mood of the game and the moving graphic novel cutscenes are extremely well drawn and act as an interesting means to further the story.

Also, as a little off-topic note, has anyone noticed the growing trend of games’ protagonists being fed information via cell phones, PA systems, PDFs, earpieces, and radio recordings in games? The recently released Batman: Arkham Asylum has the Joker feeding quips and taunting Batman over the asylum’s intercom as does Valve’s hit Portal (though GLADOS is leading Chell through the test chambers, not the Joker, despite how cool that would be). Dead Space, Bioshock and InFamous all have their respective protagonists being led by those around him through earpieces and recordings scattered throughout the environment. Even Personal Trainer Cooking has a floating head chef telling you how to long you should leave French Onion Soup in the oven (Okay, I admit, that one is a bit of a stretch). Even so, I think this trend acts as great way to further a narrative-rich game’s story along without forcing the player to sit through extremely long cutscenes (I’m looking at YOU, Metal Gear Solid 4).

Back on topic, I think it’s pretty clear that I have fallen in love with Sucker Punch’s first big PS3 outing and I simply can’t wait to see what they’ll have in store for the inevitable InFamous 2. But, in the meantime, I’ll have to make due with trying to find every power-up and clearing every side-mission in this absolutely fantastic game.

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