L.A. Noire Rockstar Game Review

L.A. Noire PlayStation 3

Release Date: May 17, 2011

L.A. Noire ReviewRockstar Games takes the side of the good guys in its risky new police procedural.May 16, 2011

Noire is remarkably different, so far I love the graphics and can see guys in the game that absolutely look like a few of my friends. Rockstar has complete made this one unlike its other games. Usually, In a rockstar game I am an outlaw that loves to cause some rakus and get the police to chase me around before I can shake them. When my "outlaw adrenaline" is pumped up, it is time to run wild, the crazy-ness kicks in because I am usually free to kill, steal, and cause destruction.

However, in L.A Noire, you're a cop. The kind of cop that is, determined to restore order to the violent streets of 1940s Los Angeles.
It is one of those where the mission fits the action, the car chases are amazing, the gunfights are for justice, and there is even a point-tally to judge the quality of your police justice!! LEGIT I say.

If you aren't the patient kind, your curiosity will be peeked and you wont be able to withstand the slow-paced, meditative experience. The focus isn't on how good you are at scoring headshots with a pistol but instead your ability to read a suspect's face and determine if he or she is telling the truth, holding something back, or flat out lying. Yes, the graphics and facial expressions are to the Tee. This was greatly achieved by the use of a brand new technology called Motion Scan where every wrinkle, twitch, downward glance, grimace, smirk, or those revealing hard swallows is from an actor playing a part, and not just some good graphic animator manipulating things from the pixar studios.

The effect will certainly help push video games closer to true cinematic experiences. If you even fall into the old gaming habbits like checking your phone while listening to a line of dialogue, or turning down the volume when that good ole' song plays, you are setting yourself up for failure. The actors' tells are in their facial expressions, their body language, their eyes contact and other cleverly hidden cues.. and– rarely is it revealed in what they say. This is true gaming! This reality brings to the gamers a realization that L.A. Noire shines. The badassery of the interrogations are like lengthy dialogue scenes you'd see in an RPG only that this time they are soo damn captivating. This is the foundation of L.A. Noire and that aspect is very good.
Everyone should be able to enjoy this game. Not just gamers! It takes some sleuth especially when you are a detective to scour crime scenes searching for clues and questioning witnesses, you have to think less like an ordinary gamer. It's not easy and I like that, the fact that it is a real challenge to judge the trustworthiness of a witness' statement. The line between "doubt" and "lie" is very narrow. In addition, the accuracy of this game can teach us some good social dynamics with what people say in real life and their silent cues.

Even though your intuition can play a vital role, its easy even for L.A. Noire's hero, Cole Phelps, who is regarded as one of the best detectives ever, one would still be able to falsely accuse suspects, doubt witnesses who are actually forthcoming, and use the wrong clues to try and catch killers in lies. :)
You can select questions from Phelps' notebook, and when you ask, you get a response from the suspect. Then that is where you play the game and choose to either believe, doubt, or accuse them of lying. When you are on the right track, the suspects open up give you more clues. And of course on the wrong trail, and they offer less. So in this case I can say that if you do well while "detecting" a case, it will be easy for you to understand the suspect's motivations. The worse you do, the tougher it is to get at the truth. However, there isn't any possibility of failure in any conversation. How cool is it that the game will not come to an abrupt end if you can't tell whether a killer is lying to you or if miss an important clue. so the SPOILER ALERT is that the bad guy will only get away if that is the way it is meant in the story. Be sure that if you die, or let a fleeing suspect escape. You will get a GAME OVER screen. This makes you less of a real detective and more of a page turner, destined to always reach the next chapter so long as you make a choice -- any choice.

There is a point I reached and lost focus because I got exhausted of interrogations and fights and the mission, this has nothing to do with the game but I just wanted to explore L.A. The game is still an open-world game. You're free to deviate from a case, explore faithfully recreated 1947 Los Angeles, and tackle more action-oriented missions. Being a cop you can't do the crazy wild stuff like in Grand theft Auto, but there are some other things to do. Forty "unassigned cases" come in as calls on the radio. These aren't random; they're single-scene missions where you'll stop a bank robbery, chase down a bat-wielding lunatic, or shadow a crook to his hideout. I think of that as being the cops that were always trying to bust me in GTA only that this time its in the '70's and the graphics are excellent and more intelligent.

Find the famous L.A. locations and earn a few points, discover over a dozen hidden cars and earn points towards leveling up your rank. With each new rank comes new clothes, hidden car locations, and intuition points. you can use your intuition points to reveal clues and narrow choices when interrogating a suspect . This is the "game" portion of L.A. Noire, the part built for those who aren't ready to release their old needs as gamers. Even if Rockstar would want to stick to the tradition of exploring places around town which is cool, L.A. Noire would have been stronger with greater focus on the experience and less concern for including traditional game elements.

L.A Noire

"Each time I'm fully concentrating and I'm submerged in the L.A. Nore world, i am reminded "you're taking part in some sort of game" with unnecessary text popping up on the screen or a score tallying my lie-detecting ability." says one of the players.

A review from amazon states "What an amazing game this is so far. The environment is so vivid. Graphics are up to par. This game was made for the Ps3!

Being a Rockstar Game, the controls are very similar to Grand Theft Auto & Red Dead Redemption. The controls also reminded me of Mafia II. Very smooth and fluid. There's also a map on the bottom left corner just like in the other Rock* games.

This game is not as fast paced as Grand Theft Auto. It is not a shoot first ask questions later type of game. Keep that in mind before buying. I'm enjoying it but I can just imagine some people hating it for be slow paced.

Investigating crime scenes can be so exciting as you do not know what or where your next clue will be. You are given the freedom to walk around and find clues with the assistance of vibration/music as you get near them.

There is no multiplayer for this game, which can be good or bad. I for one will be way too busy solving crimes around Los Angeles to even notice.

The PS3 version of the game comes with an exclusive DLC card to download a case called Consul's Car.
I pre-ordered from Best Buy so I received The Sharpshooter suit also.
And I was there for the midnight release so I received the nicholson electroplating DLC.

I will update as I get farther in the game & notice more helpful tips/details

Update:

The characters in LA Noire look so real. When they speak, it is shown in their facial expressions. No lip syncing here, it looks like they are actually talking. When a victim/witness is upset you can notice how their eyebrows kind of fold in.

Interrogation
When questioning a victim/suspect/witness you can choose from accepting it as the truth, lies, or doubt. Choose wisely. There's a score system which will provide you with experience points if you ask the right questions. These points can help you find clues easier.

Driving
I've experienced that some of the cars start to swerve if you're going too fast. Also even though you have destinations, you can just cruise the city limits. If you get lost, your partner will be more than glad to give you directions. "Make a left, take the right" kind of thing.

Fist fights
Some guys just don't give up without a fight. Team Bondi provides a nice block and punch system to knock some sense into them.
I've noticed you can use the block to make your opponent attack & opening himself for a nice right hand hook.

Cover system
By going into cover, the player can look around to see where the bullets are flying in from. This way you can pick the enemy out one by one. The Cover system allows you to regain health if you need to. Sometimes you will be outnumbered and outgunned. So this is where the cover system comes in handy. Cover and peek out when the enemy is reloading if they have serious fire power. The first time I ran into a shooting. I caught a bullet in the back. You've been warned!!!

Health

There was an actual opened bloody wound on my back for a while. But as my health recovered it went away. so you can restore your health by staying out of harm's way. I like this system better than Grand Theft Auto's health packages. "

L. A. Noire comes together brilliantly, when the substance from the various cases lead to a darker ringleader. But more often, things are perhaps too true to real police work – repetitive, redundant, and unsurprising. Despite having 21 cases, some of which can take more than an hour to complete, L. A. Noire drags at times because it recycles the same drama. After about 10 cases, you kind of know what to expect next. go to a crime scene, search for some clues , those clues open some new locations, go there, investigate. When you get there you find a suspect- foot and car chase, then an interview with a suspect in the police station interview room, here, even screwing up completely may still leads to an arrest.If I think the guy is innocent, which has been on rare occasions where I'm just going through the motions and have no control over the end result. But when the routine is broken.. IT IS STUNNING like when Phelp is almost done and he is on the Homicide desk, and you don't have the usual case work and instead have to solve riddles! In come the landmarks across Los Angeles. This point is refreshing, startling and different.
L. A. Noire is still entertaining. has "great voice acting, amazing new technology, great performances. the mannerisms, the way someone's mouth thins after telling a lie, the unease of a wrongdoer being grilled in the box, the way an Adam's apples move when people talk or throat muscles tense when someone almost says too much, It's fascinating to watch a sort of hybrid between an action game and an episode of Law & Order.

With that gift of having detailed, human faces, Rockstar and developer Team Bondi have the vehicle to deliver an incredibly emotional and engaging story. L. A. Noire falls short, though. Despite great performances, some killer dialogue, and one of my favorite game soundtracks in years, L. A. Noire left me cold. Cole Phelps begins as a paragon of the LAPD, but his true past is eventually revealed. Whether hero or pariah, I just never liked him that much because his story is told at times haphazardly.
There's an omniscient narrator in the early missions of L. A. Noire who disappears halfway through and never returns. Cole has a wife he almost never talks about until the plot needs a complication to Phelps' pristine image. There's a confounding "twist" with three cases left that changes the focus of the story and left me scratching my head and wanting to buy the books to find out.

The core gameplay mechanics work -- no issues with driving, chasing perps across town, taking cover, shooting people, figuring out what to do next, or understanding how to interrogate a suspect. The various elements never come together at the same time to create something spectacular, but there are a lot of good things going on. Some will love L. A. Noire for being different and others are going to find the slower pace a deal-breaker.
Crime is always Black & White

because at times I love it, yet it has some notable flaws. As a noir fan, I find moments that really get me grinning. There are certain cases that draw me in and side characters who eat up the scene. But it never adds up -- amazing pieces that don’t quite amount to an incredible game. At the same time, no one’s ever played a game like this before. And unless there’s a sequel, I doubt anyone will again for some time. Credit Rockstar for taking a huge risk, for succeeding in many areas, and for offering something fresh and different. L. A. Noire may not reach the emotional heights of a game like Heavy Rain, but it’s something everyone must try out. It reaches high and almost succeeds as a brilliant new type of video game narrative.