L.A. Meh

I know the following opinion is going to be very contrarian to the popular one, and being that those types of opinions don't seem to be generally well received I'll just post it here.

I wish I'd rented LA Noire instead of purchasing it.  I've given it a shot, I'm well into the 2nd disc.  And its not that I'm saying its bad, although it has the hallmark Rockstar problems that make me avoid their games for the most part, it actually has some really cool elements that make you smile a bit as you play.  I don't see the point in replaying this aside from achievement farming, and that doesn't really count as legitimate replay value to me.  Here's a list of my pros and cons:

PROS:

* Very nice graphics.  The facial technology is pretty cool, and the overall look and feel of the game is excellent.  I tried the "black and white" option but didn't care for it, although I can see that some people would so its cool they added it.

* Good writing.  I like the banter between Phelps and his partners, as well as some of the lines during the interviews/interrogations.  The story has me interested so far, and although since I haven't finished the game I can't comment ultimately on the story I can tell you its the only reason I'm still playing the game.

CONS:

* The controls.  This is a problem I have with most Rockstar games anymore.  There's a sense of clunkiness when moving Phelps around especially when trying to use cover or chase after a suspect on foot.  The driving is terrible.  This aspect was far worse in GTA4 than here (R*'s assertion that the cars controlled like they did because they handled realistically was laughable...apparently they never played the Forza series) but its still a big enough pain to bum me out.  When I'm moving Phelps around either by foot or by car I want to feel like Sam Spade, not Frank Drebin.

* The AI.  This kind of ties into the issue I have with the controls.  In a game where your successes and failures are measured in part by damage to person and property, better AI (and controls) are a must.  How many times have you turned on your siren while in pursuit only to have the pedestrians inexplicably run right in front of your car?  And I have seen cars pull to the right when I have the sirens going but for the most part the traffic ignores the siren and does its own thing anyway.  I've created a lot of road kill and a lot of property damage that shouldn't have been which has led to many 4 star grades that should have been 5.

* The facial animations.  A strength is also a weakness.  While its cool to see the more realistic expressions, for the most part its painfully obvious when someone has decided to fudge the truth.  On the same note there are times when the expressions are kind of ambiguous and you can't get a proper read.  I know there's context of situations you're supposed to consider as well, and doing that actually makes me overthink the reaction sometimes and I can't get a good read.  Maybe thats just me, I don't know, but then again these are my impressions so...

* Car spawns/despawns.  This has always been annoying to me, its a tradition in Rockstar games.  Its like all the cars spawn in a particular order and EVERYONE is driving a variation of 3 or 4 cars at once.  Then a day passes and they're driving a variation of 3 or 4 other cars.  I can understand this to a point, but it looks so bad.  And the despawn is what really bums me out.  You'll see a car that you need to collect and start running to it and for some reason you move the camera off it.  Maybe you got hit by a car, some reason.  When you turn the camera back to the spot that car you needed was, its gone.  Poof.  Despawned.

* Linear gameplay.  And this is the killer for me.  This is not quite a sandbox game although it does have the table set to be one.  Yes you have a nice open world around you, and yes you can drive around and create havoc to a point.  But even though there's random street crimes to solve the game is always funneling you towards your objective.  You don't have the real freedom you've had in other sandbox games like Saints Row or even the older GTA games.  Even freeplay mode once you clear a desk is kind of meh.  There's not that much to do.

Not only that, but why would you replay this?  The investigation/interrogation elements are so straight forward it might as well be point and click.  Yeah, you can get slightly different reactions if you choose different responses during interviews but it doesn't really vary the gameplay.  It just gives you a different line of dialogue and shuts you out of other options.  There's been no "wow I have to do that again!" moment for me so far.  The gameplay is pretty much all the same and not very exciting outside of the story elements.

So there you have it, I don't really care for this game.  Its definitely worth playing but IMO only as a rental.  Depending on the pricing of it I'll probably skip the DLC too.  That a buck will get you the daily paper.

Possible Spoilers on another subject:

Random tv clip Tuesday.  Yesterday was one year to the date that Lost finished up its 6 season run with a very polarizing finale.  I've yet to meet anyone who was in the middle on this show, they either loved what happened or still to this day curse it.  I'm in the former category, I loved the finale and enjoyed the way they finished the characters' stories.  No, you didn't get all the answers you wanted.  I doubt the producers knew all the answers anyway.  But I was happy filling in my own blanks in most cases and felt satisfied with the character development and resolutions.  They were all dead in the "sideways" timeline (which I suppose made it a flash forward) and everything that had happened to them on the island was real.  Weird, but real.  And since this was Jack's story all along the sideways timeline picked up when Jack moved there, which would have been after the events at the end of the season.  So if you think about it that way, when he kind of opened his eyes on the plane at the beginning of S6 that was right after he closed his eyes on the island for the last time at the end of S6.

Ok thats enough of that, so here's some clips to enjoy.  First up is the recap of seasons 1-5 followed by the last 10 minutes of the finale in 2 parts. 

Lost in 8:15

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIFL104E9Ts[/youtube]

Christian explains everything to Jack

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8WPSiGBCAA&list=PLC516C277D487EC4B[/yout...

The end of The End

 [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vrNyC25-8Q&list=PLC516C277D487EC4B[/yout...

Have a good one.