I Played Heavy Rain

It didn’t age as well as I originally remember. First time I played this game was 15 years ago. Back then I thought of it as a unique experience that I enjoyed for its earnest attempt to bring the language of cinema to a video game. But now I can’t help but see it as an extremely messy story that feels mostly like a weirdly paced compilation of forced stress for the sake of maintaining a steady flow of engaging entertainment. This is also its biggest strength when played with a group of friends like I did this time. It was a constant source of bewilderment and laughs at how absurd everything was.

Heavy Rain Screenshot

The whole game is comically sad. You’re constantly put into tense and violent situations. It’s relentless in how much it wants you to feel bad for all the characters. Ethan, one of the many characters you control, is put through so many plot-hole horrifying moments that your sympathy starts turning into exhaustion. The man can never catch a break.

But where we felt that exhaustion most was with Madison, another character you control that helps Ethan throughout the story. Quite possibly one of the worst written women in a video game. Almost all her scenes involve some type of objectification or violence enacted on her. Luckily you can skip a lot of these scenes with the right choice. It’s a “Choices Matter” type experience. But I also like to think of this game as the player being both the editor and viewer of a film.

Heavy Rain Screenshot

I’m more interested in the smaller choices that have no perceivable effect. Repeatedly getting up and sitting down on a couch, not washing your hands after using the toilet, frantically pacing around a room, standing outside in the rain for a long time. You piece together your own strange interactive film with all these actions that the game does not aggressively prompt. The art direction in many scenes is visually impressive, they are joy to just walk around in. It’s where doing these small actions as the viewer/editor felt most special.

Heavy Rain Screenshot

I did enjoy the game on my second playthrough. But like most things, almost all that enjoyment came from sharing the strange experience with friends. There’s a lot to deconstruct with this game. It’s one of those standout titles of the era that really wanted to be taken seriously, but ended up fumbling at what it tried to achieve in many ways.

Maybe it tried too hard to be both a film and game, that linkage constantly being jarring as serving one would fail the other. It did win a Bafta for best story which is wild to me. As speculated by my partner, maybe it was for the attempt at a new format and less for the execution? The best technical innovation and original musical score win I understand - there’s a lot to appreciate there.

In the end, it’s the perplexing unintentional effects of what it strived to do that ended up being its best feature for me. An experience best shared with a group of friends to bond through a steady stream of collective confusion.