Heavy Rain and Loading Bars

3/10/10- I just finished a 10-hour play-through of Quantic Dream’s “Heavy Rain.” Self-dubbed an interactive drama, it has totally changed how I thought of videogames. The entire interactive drama is represented by cutting-edge graphics and phenomenal voice actors, creating an incredibly realistic experience. Every action the player makes is reflected in the story, which has over 25 endings and thousands of in-game variations. The story itself was very dark and asks the question, “How far would you go to save someone you love?” You play four characters all hoping to solve a murder before it happens. Ethan, arguably the main character, is the father of the little boy who is kidnapped, and he has 4 days to find his son alive. The Origami Killer has left him 5 tasks to complete to save the life of his son, including driving 5 miles in the wrong direction on a freeway, crawling through a long tunnel on broken glass, cutting off his finger, killing a man and poisoning himself. The marvel of the game is that the player decides how far they are willing to go. I personally went as far as the final test before not being able to go through with it. The game does not spare any of the visuals and makes you feel the pain of every injury and the mental anguish and guilt of the main characters. It was truly a phenomenal experience and one I recommend to anyone who owns a PS3.

3/13/10- I realized just the other day how much I love loading bars. I don’t know what it is, but I love watching them fill up as they take me to my ultimate goal: anything from burning a cd, to installing a new game on my PS3. I think I enjoy the loading bar so much because it takes the guessing out of knowing what is going on. The bar tells me that my computer is working on the task, no matter how long it is going to take, and assures me that it will be done eventually. It also helps avoid the human fear of the unknown. Humans have always been afraid of the unknown throughout all of history, leading to pointless conflicts, in the case of the Native Americans, and the destruction of valuable knowledge, in the case of the Aztecs. The loading bar avoids this issue by keeping everything relatively known by the computer user. He may have no idea what the computer is doing, but he knows when it will be over and he knows that it is getting done.