why are developers so afraid of making longer demos, of cause you cant just give away half your game, but a demo that would last longer than 30min would be nice, and it would give the consumers a fair idea of what kinda game it is. | |
Well considering a lot of games are only clocking in at around 8 hours, 30 minutes is quite a sizeable chunk in relation. | |
While reading the article from the main page I thought to myself "mmmmmhhm, must check out the realise date for this game" and bang early 2010, the article gives me what I want. Thank you article! | |
Strange game to have a demo for, what with character development and emotional attachment being the big selling points of the game but also things that take a while to form. | |
8 Hours if you include the hour or two break to go get some donuts at the Krispee Kreme far from your house maybe. :P I'm shocked whenever a game doesn't end on the same day I got it from gamefly. | |
I would think the main problem with a demo for Heavy Rain would be giving away twists in the plot. I was under the impression that Cage wants Heavy Rain played through only once, so that the full impact of your actions can be felt. Maybe they could rework a part of the story so that it doesn't expose any storyline, and that would simultaneously allow Cage to show exactly what aspects of the game he wants to. | |
Thing is though, Heavy Rain isn't exactly the kid of gaming that you want spoiled for you. It's a game with multiple outcomes and you'll never know what to expect. A common problem with many game demos is that they put you in a huge climax in the game, or a place with a bunch of action, or halfway through the game. When you finally get the game, you won't be surprised anymore. You'll be expecting it, and it won't "wow" you as much as the developers have hoped. Heavy Rain is supposed to make you connect to the characters in the story. If they only give one scene with one character, people will think that the entire thing is based around this one character when there are 4. If they give a demo with a scene from each of the characters, then they've revealed way too much to make an impact. Demos have to leave you hungry for more, and that's tougher than it seems. | |
If they're having such a tough time deciding what's in a demo, then don't release one! Sure it'll piss people off, but those people are usually just impatient whiners. | |
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Heavy Rain's Demo Is Confounding Quantic Dream
A Heavy Rain demo is in the works, but Quantic Dream is not having an easy time deciding what to put in it.
In an interview with G4, Quantic Dream CEO David Cage revealed that the company will be releasing a demo for the upcoming PlayStation 3 exclusive Heavy Rain, though to actually do so has been a challenge. Heavy Rain is a spiritual sequel of sorts to Indigo Prophecy (also known as Fahrenheit), or at least an advancement of its gameplay.
Heavy Rain is a "dark film noir thriller" that will follow multiple sets of characters looking for the "Origami Killer", and has an overarching theme of "how far are you prepared to go for love" according to Cage. If a character dies in Heavy Rain, it is said that he/she will be dead in that play-through's storyline and the game will advance; there will be no retries. Indigo Prophecy (as the title I played it under) was rife with context-sensitive actions, and Heavy Rain is likely to be as well, with the intention of making the game as interactive as possible. As Cage says: "Heavy Rain is just the first step in discovering how to tell a story through interactivity."
For this reason, Cage has found it hard to commit to a certain scene to make available in a demo. "If we show an action scene, some players will think that this is what Heavy Rain is all about, and it is the same thing if we show an exploration scene," says Cage. He wants to express the full value of Heavy Rain in its demo, but says Quantic Dream "just [needs] to find the best scene for it." Sure, Quantic could not release a demo at all, but Cage doesn't want anyone to feel like his company has anything to hide. I just want to get my hands on the game as soon as possible.
In my personal opinion, knowing what I do about Heavy Rain, Quantic Dream should release a demo with two or three short scenes. That way gamers would realize that Heavy Rain is not about one gameplay aspect, or about one person's tale, but rather a larger, intertwining storyline with a variety of interaction. As of right now, Heavy Rain does not have a release date, but is expected in early 2010. A demo would be a nice holiday present, but we'll probably have to expect to see it when we see it.
(Via: 1up)
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