toblix

Heavy Rain

Recommended Posts

I highly recommend it man. It's a shame you already know the twists and stuff, but I'm still pretty sure you'll find some of the scenes pretty nerveracking!

At least the love scene. WHAT ARE GIRLS?

Speaking of, have you all looked up the Heavy Rain sex scene on Youtube? The comments are hysterical. Someone said "Wow. That was actually beautiful" in all seriousness. Uhh.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
At least the love scene. WHAT ARE GIRLS?

Speaking of, have you all looked up the Heavy Rain sex scene on Youtube? The comments are hysterical. Someone said "Wow. That was actually beautiful" in all seriousness. Uhh.

I played it in-game, I don't need to sit through that again xD

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I can tell what EVERYONE thought right before the sex scene:

"Shit, I don't have the time for this, I gotta save my son. Still I really wanna see how this pans out..." *press X to kiss her*

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

I don't think there are nearly as many plot holes in the game as people are saying. From the conversations I've heard, everyone seems to think the entire narrative falls apart because it's like a swiss cheese of plot holes, I found one or two minor ones, one of them being a strange conflict caused by the epilogues, but for the most part, the "plot holes" can be explained without stretching too much. I think the narrative holds up fine. It's a decent story.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
I could see how someone with kids could get really stressed out by the first chunk of the game.

Does Molyneux have kids? If so, it must be weird for them. "Your birthday party is gonna be so AMAZING!!! There will be 1000 elephants there and they will sing to you and we're having a 'bouncy-bounce' specially made that will cover the whole city!!!!!111!!!1"

Then the birthday party happens, and...well Molyneux did rent his kid a bouncy-bounce (albeit, not as big as promised) which is pretty cool. The only bad part is the kid will forget about this and not temper his expectations a year later when Molyneux says "WE'RE GOING TO HAVE UR PARTY ON DA MOON!!!"

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
I don't think there are nearly as many plot holes in the game as people are saying. From the conversations I've heard, everyone seems to think the entire narrative falls apart because it's like a swiss cheese of plot holes, I found one or two minor ones, one of them being a strange conflict caused by the epilogues, but for the most part, the "plot holes" can be explained without stretching too much. I think the narrative holds up fine. It's a decent story.

I found this listing of supposed plot holes. I don't know if they all hold up, since I never notice plot holes. Well, at the end I did wonder how the typewriter stuff could take place, but I chalked it up to not paying much attention.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

To explain why Ethan was having blackouts, I thought that the Origami killer could've put some kind of chemical inside the letter (right before he goes to the train station and starts tripping balls), or in the water bottle that magically appears in the always empty fridge in the hotel room after the car sequence... but the game never addressed that.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Well let's talk about the plot holes in that story you linked to, spoilers ahead, I'll go step by Step

#1 Madison knowing who Shelby is despite having never met- This one is true, the mom tells her that it was Shelby, and she walks out of the room with a look of determination and knowing on her face, when she has never met shelby, that is a little odd, and probably a poor choice of a facial expression, because when she gets to the apartment, she talks like she doesn't know who shelby is. But I'll admit, minor plot hole/ bad direction

#2 Victims parents not giving evidence to police

These are things like the origami figure in a box or a letter, Maybe the figure I could see, but I can easily see someone not bothering to give the envelope the killers note came in to the cops, the letter sure, but not the envelope

Plot Hole #3: This one I agree with, it's tough to see how Jayden could ever actually sneak Ethan out, but he did disguise him and everything, and no one actually looked at the disguised Ethan on the way out, but it is a plot hole that no one would question Jayden about it for sure.

#4: Ethan even admitted himself he thought he was the killer, he had the figures in his hands because of his blackouts, his story didn't fit, he was hiding from the cops, he admitted to the psychiatrist about his dreams of drowning children, plus Blake is just the kind of asshole cop who would jump to a conclusion like that, as evidenced by the earlier encounter with Nathaniel.

#5 Ethan was obsessed over the origami killer, he thought he was him, reading all the newspapers about him, trying to figure out what was happening during his blackouts, I don't think it's such a stretch to think he could have at one point learned origami and made the figures under his blackouts

Oh man I just noticed there are like 15 of these things in that article, I don't want to do them all but you get my point I think. A lot of these things are explainable, and while the plot isn't airtight for sure, it's not nearly as bad as I think that article makes it out to be.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

It's an episode of Scooby Doo with a bunch of average 90s DVD thriller tropes thrown in.

There are only two people that matter in this story. Dad Dude and Killer Dude. Set up the situation, introduce killer's gimmick.

Direct attention to one theory. What if killer WAS the Dad? Introduce a conceit to make this plausible/possible... blackouts. Brilliant, doesn't rely on anything else in the world to serve its purpose. Dude didn't do it, turns out he was just having stress blackouts.

Very very very carefully towards the end throw in enough fiction so that the reveal makes a little sense, in this case childhood flashback. Child is obviously the killer, has a good motivation for killing. Who is the killer? Its the other guy.

Bait and Switch.

That is the story. Then throw in some completely incidental and expendable characters and narrative lines. Fill up the time, distracts attention from tenuos plot detailed above.

Heavy Rain used those last things to add strings that can be cut or tied with no consequence to the core story. Layered over the basic permutations of dad/kid/killer lives or dies, these allow for the 23 "endings." You cut or tie the strings based on whether you can mash some buttons as fast as they say you have to. = video game.

Does Molyneux have kids? If so, it must be weird for them. "Your birthday party is gonna be so AMAZING!!! There will be 1000 elephants there and they will sing to you and we're having a 'bouncy-bounce' specially made that will cover the whole city!!!!!111!!!1"

Then the birthday party happens, and...well Molyneux did rent his kid a bouncy-bounce (albeit, not as big as promised) which is pretty cool. The only bad part is the kid will forget about this and not temper his expectations a year later when Molyneux says "WE'RE GOING TO HAVE UR PARTY ON DA MOON!!!"

This was fantastic Groucho

Edited by SoulChicken

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
I found this listing of supposed plot holes. I don't know if they all hold up, since I never notice plot holes. Well, at the end I did wonder how the typewriter stuff could take place, but I chalked it up to not paying much attention.

So you're done with Heavy Rain.

Is it wrong, Mr. Toblix, that I have a hard time imagining you finishing a game?

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Is it wrong, Mr. Toblix, that I have a hard time imagining you finishing a game?

He seems to finish lots of games, he's just better at documenting his rage quits than his satisfactions with endings. I wouldn't have it any other way.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Though there's a lot of issues with Heavy Rain's writing, the largest one - and the one that I think goes unnoticed - is the killer's motive. Let me explain.

A serial killer will murder for a certain fulfillment. Ted Bundy, for example, murdered women of a certain age, look, and most importantly hair style - features that reminded him of his mother [edit: or some girl he was in love with; I don't remember, really]. Ed Kemper did something similar, and his own career ended after he actually killed his mother. He handed himself in; he was done.

There's loads of ways people to reach that point; it's usually a long, consistent process of abuse. You stuff a child into the cracks and keep him there long enough, he'll crawl out a monster.

In Heavy Rain, however, Scott is busy "testing" fathers. This is important. There is no apparent scene of Scott just living out a fantasy; he simply wants to find the father that'll do what his own (to be honest rather two-dimensional) father could not do. He's putting them through trials. I've noticed that most killers have so much rage inside them; Scott is just calm.

Is he angry with his dad? His brother? Why is he doing this?

Unfortunately, Heavy Rain's baddie doesn't jive with any serial killer I've read about, and while I'm hardly an expert on the subject, I have read a few books, one or two of them technical. I got the impression that Scott was formed less out of real life and more out of B horror movies David Cage takes too seriously. Saw's cute, but it isn't true to anything

.

Not that most of this would be a problem if the game weren't taking itself so seiously.

PS:There's a flashback set in 1977, but with a character that says "Yippie kie yay". How come?

Edited by Kroms

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Cool, I was wondering about that while walking home last night, I don't think many serial killers could hold down a career as a police officer for any length of time either.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
I don't think many serial killers could hold down a career as a police officer for any length of time either.

Some do, but if memory serves they don't keep the job for long. A large percentage try to get involved in the case by one way or another, though.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Spoilerific interview with David Cage by Joystiq:

http://www.joystiq.com/2010/03/19/interview-spoiling-heavy-rain-with-david-cage/

Highlight for me was:

When you're playing as Ethan, you get the choice of killing the drug dealer or sparing his life. I was curious as to why, when you kill the drug dealer, there didn't seem to be a consequence at the end. You get the code, but shouldn't Ethan go to jail?

Well, there is no reason for him to go to jail if the drug dealer is found dead. Nothing leads directly to him.

Doesn't he throw up next to the body?

Yes.

That's not enough to get him in trouble?

... Why?

----------

WHAT THE FUCK. The first thing I thought and even said out loud when he throws up is: DNA!

For shame Mr. Cage, for shame...

---------

Another highlight:

How about the Origami figure in Ethan's hand when he wakes up? I can't explain that.

I can. [laughs]

Would you like to explain it to me?

Uh ... no.

... Okay.

Actually, no, because this is what Hitchcock calls a MacGuffin. He said a very interesting rule is that you can only have one MacGuffin in a story. A MacGuffin is something that is not explained. And one is okay -- if you have three, then that story doesn't make any sense. But if you have something where you leave the audience space to, you know, try to understand and make up their own answers for that, that's fine. And I thought that worked in the context of Heavy Rain, not to explain but have people figure it out.

Okay.

[laughs] I don't know if you're happy with this answer.

----------

What a condescending SOB... I hope he climbs even higher in that pedestal just to fall harder on his face when the time comes.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Actually, no, because this is what Hitchcock calls a MacGuffin. He said a very interesting rule is that you can only have one MacGuffin in a story. A MacGuffin is something that is not explained. And one is okay -- if you have three, then that story doesn't make any sense. But if you have something where you leave the audience space to, you know, try to understand and make up their own answers for that, that's fine. And I thought that worked in the context of Heavy Rain, not to explain but have people figure it out.

What the fuck.

A MacGuffin is an object or goal that the characters are chasing after - it's the papers in the spy's suitcase, the cursed treasure the pirates are seeking. It's what moves the plot forward. It doesn't need to be explained, but that's only because it isn't essential to the surface of the plot. An origami appearing in Ethan's hand is very much essential to the plot...

Here's

of Hitchcock explaining it better than I can.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
David Cage has no fucking clue.

yeah, figured that out half way through Indigo "get ready" Fahrenheit.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites
Not to make this thread about me, but I've made a conscious effort not to just whine about all the games that suck:

Awesome, I'm totally bookmarking this post so I can read through all of it later.

Share this post


Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now