PS3 Review – inFamous
The robustness of the fighting system becomes apparent when you start creating your own combos, such as flying off a skyscraper, shooting enemies your Lightening Bolts while in midair, and finishing them off with a Thunder Drop as you hit the ground. Or even send enemies flying with the Shockwave Blast and letting them land on your Shock Grenades. The awesome traversal system works well with the combat system. Regardless if he’s running on the street, climbing the side of a building, or hanging off the rooftop, Cole can still aim and shoot at anything around him.
The traversal system deserves a huge amount of praise, as this game completely lacks a grab button. Instead, the game engine has some sort of voodoo A.I. that accurately predicts what you intend to do, whether it’s land on a power line as you fall through the air, or grab a particular beam sticking off a building. Climbing is effortless, and there’s a huge amount of trust that builds between you and that A.I. And should the A.I. somehow mess up and miss something you wanted to grab, it’ll look for the next best thing. No harm, no foul. This huge accomplishment by Sucker Punch actually makes other open world games seem absolutely limiting in terms of what you can and can’t do.
Sucker Punch has taken the concept of the “game level” and taken it in a new direction. Every building in the city has a unique design that require increasingly elaborate actions to properly climb. A lot of care has gone into the placement and size of pipes, ledges, light fixtures, poles, and electrical boxes. What the level designers have essentially done is turned every building on each island into a Micro Level, with each island serving as a Macro Level. It’s a brilliant idea, and is further enhanced by the fact that the city will steadily change as enemies build new structures and destroy old ones.
The bosses in this game are interesting in that they have a constant presence by altering the environment and affecting the evolution of the enemies that you fight against. You’ll notice as the game progresses though that the enemies start to wear armor that becomes more and more resistant to electricity, which forces you to become more creative and efficient in how you take them out. And in fact, the boss who controls the Reapers, Sasha, ends up becoming sympathetic (if your actions are more evil) and lends a helping hand in the Evil Side Missions. Her telepathic booty calls are always welcome, and the Evil Side Missions prove to be a lot of fun.
43 Responses to “PS3 Review – inFamous”
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May 25th, 2009 at 4:18 PM
@John Draisey
well Written, it was a Good read.
first i thought that Sev has wrote the Review, cause he submitted to N4G.
PSLS sould do more Reviews.
Infamous is in my opinion the best open world game yet.
May 25th, 2009 at 4:20 PM
Great review, John!
May 25th, 2009 at 4:22 PM
Great review. I wish more sites used the 5 scale system instead of 10 or 100. Less arguments over how a game deserved a 9.3 instead of an 8.9 would be great.
05/25/2009 at 4:25 PM
Glad to make your lives easier.
May 25th, 2009 at 4:23 PM
Awesome review. Getting this game Thursday … I was suppose to get it tomorrow
May 25th, 2009 at 4:25 PM
Thanks, guys! =]
May 25th, 2009 at 4:43 PM
Great Review John
May 25th, 2009 at 4:47 PM
Thanks for the well written review John, much appreciated. Have been playing the demo and thoroughly enjoying it. Definitely a first day purchase for me, although we don’t get it in New Zealand till the 4th June.
May 25th, 2009 at 6:10 PM
I can’t wait till tomorrow! Good review!
May 25th, 2009 at 6:37 PM
@jasperloons
I’m sorry but i’d have to disagree, i hate the ‘out of 5′ system the most. 100 is too nit picky as well. i find out of 10 is the best (as long as you keep it as whole number, i totally agree with the whole 8.9 or 9.3 thing) it allows a broader and closer representation of the score your trying to get across. A 9 out of 10 is more valuable to me than a 4/5, it shows perhaps there is near perfection but the effort put in makes it worthwhile but 4/5 to me sounds as if there is definite room for improvement
May 25th, 2009 at 7:12 PM
Sweet! Nice review, John. Can’t wait for tomorrow.
May 25th, 2009 at 7:13 PM
Good review, hope to get this baby tomorrow
May 25th, 2009 at 11:02 PM
great review. The evil side looks stronger as always.
May 26th, 2009 at 1:13 AM
Excellent review. The demo sold me on this game, I am picking it up tomorrow for sure.
May 26th, 2009 at 1:15 AM
This is such a great review! Keep up the good work John!
I want to play so badly now!
May 26th, 2009 at 3:50 AM
Good review, young padawan
I’ll be playing InFAMOUS very soon, and I am almost positive my sentiments will echo these.
May 26th, 2009 at 4:14 AM
Thanks for the review, looking forward to Friday when I get my SE copy.
May 26th, 2009 at 8:08 AM
Good review. I think I need to play the Demo again. I thought the graphics were fantastic and I like Cole’s ‘weapons’ I just wonder if the game will get a bit repetitive.
May 26th, 2009 at 9:37 AM
nice review
May 26th, 2009 at 12:19 PM
Great review – I liked the demo and will possibly pick the game up this week.
May 26th, 2009 at 4:16 PM
I’d say make it out of 7 -
that you’d piss everybody off
May 26th, 2009 at 4:21 PM
God this review was horrible, j/k
loved the review and I will be playing this baby 2nite as it is in my posession right now.
But yeah Draisey Great Review!
May 27th, 2009 at 2:30 PM
I have preordered this game from play.com (I’m European, Portuguese to be more specific) and I’ll be getting it by monday or tuesday
May 27th, 2009 at 3:07 PM
This game for sure looks very interesting … can’t wait to get my hands on this one!
May 31st, 2009 at 12:45 AM
I don’t think this game should get a 5 out of 5 at all. It is not even close, the graphics weren’t that amazing, the story mode was kind of just the same thing, the game also got boring kind of fast. Don’t get me wrong it is a good game but It is not 5 out of 5 maybe a 3 or 3.5
June 2nd, 2009 at 1:49 AM
So I finally got around to freeing up some space on my OS3 so I could play the demo. From that demo, I’d rate it a 4/5, but then again… I’m just rating a demo. I’ll definitely get around to renting this before Terminator Salvation.
June 4th, 2009 at 9:54 PM
I have to agree with bond2e2, this is a wonderful game and one of my new favs on the PS3. However, there are some graphical glitches such as pop-in and clipping that hold the game back a bit and keep it from being a 5/5 game, I would say its a solid 4/5 imho. Nice review overall though, good work.
June 6th, 2009 at 2:27 PM
I’m glad I own this game! The only issues I have with it are fences. They just tick me off!
June 8th, 2009 at 9:28 AM
good review im in love with this game its just so awesome cant wait to play it again
June 22nd, 2009 at 6:33 AM
Excellent review, I have played the demo this weekend and will be looking to pick the full version up soon! Although Prototype seems tempting too, but allas, no demo
July 4th, 2009 at 1:57 PM
[...] Crowsaw, creator of the renowned Zero Punctuation films, did a special video comparing inFamous to Prototype and came to the conclusion that they were different games with different strengths and [...]
July 9th, 2009 at 2:01 PM
Thanks for the feedback, everyone! =]
July 19th, 2009 at 12:46 PM
[...] $49.99 [Review] Amazon PS3 Dualshock 3 – $42.99 Madden NFL 09 – $29.99 inFamous – $44.99 [Review] Fear 2: Project Origin – $49.99 Killzone 2 – $49.99 [Review] Guitar Hero World Tour Band Bundle [...]
August 2nd, 2009 at 3:33 PM
[...] PS3 Dualshock 3 – $42.99 Madden NFL 09 – $17.79 inFamous – $53.99 [Review] Killzone 2 – $49.99 [Review] MotorStorm $18.59 [Review] Resident Evil 5 – $49.99 [Review] Guitar [...]
August 9th, 2009 at 12:29 PM
[...] Bruce Oberg, co-founder of Sucker Punch, has confirmed that there are no plans on having DLC or multiplayer for their upcoming open-world action title, inFamous. [...]
August 9th, 2009 at 9:56 PM
[...] signed up for official PlayStation newsletters have been receiving a newsletter stating that the Infamous demo unlocks a free Cole costume for your Home Avatar, The newsletter itself was not completely [...]
August 16th, 2009 at 1:50 AM
[...] demo of Uncharted 2 at this year’s E3. Heck, maybe you were lucky enough (or simply bought inFamous) to score a public beta key for that glorious month of online fun. Would you like more Uncharted [...]
August 16th, 2009 at 1:28 PM
[...] PS3 Dualshock 3 – $42.99 inFamous – $53.99 [Review] Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood – $39.99 [Review] Killzone 2 – $49.99 [Review] Resident Evil 5 – [...]
August 17th, 2009 at 2:13 AM
[...] PS3 Dualshock 3 – $42.99 inFamous – $53.99 [Review] Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood – $39.99 [Review] Killzone 2 – $49.99 [Review] Resident [...]
November 3rd, 2009 at 9:58 PM
the price is also drooping on Dec from what i hear its a greatest hits in less than 1 year.
November 15th, 2009 at 8:20 PM
[...] – $53.99 [Review] Batman: Arkham Asylum – $51.99 [Review] Infamous – $52.99 [Review] Beatles: Rock Band – $49.49 NBA 2K10 – $52.49 [Review] Pro Evolution Soccor 2010 [...]
December 4th, 2009 at 3:59 PM
[...] you are still unsure weather to get the game or not, check out our review, of why we thought it was one of the standout games of 2009. Share the [...]
December 7th, 2009 at 5:17 AM
[...] $49.99 [Review] DJ Hero Bundle with Turntable – $99.99 [Review] inFamous – $36.99 [Review] Fight Night: Round 4 – $26.99 [Review] Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena – $19.99 [...]
December 20th, 2009 at 7:09 PM
[...] year for gamers as many blockbuster titles were released on to console. Games like Killzone 2, inFamous, Uncharted 2: Among Theives, Batman: Arkham Asylum and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. With 2009 [...]