PAX last weekend was packed with games and gamers eager to play them. Over at Sony’s booth one game was particularly packed and that was the station playing Heavy Rain.

I gathered around the station and I grabbed my camera and started watching the person playing the scenario in progress. It was the same demo that was shown at GC in August; you play the role of Scott Shelby a detective on the trail of the Origami Killer. You enter a convenience store to question the store’s owner whose son was a victim of the Origami Killer. This particular scenario (as with the others) had many different ways of playing out. The store owner is unintersted with helping you as you try to get any sort of lead or clue that will put you on the Killer’s trail. A variety of responses in the way of button prompts are presented on screen. Some have you take a sympathetic approach with the shop keeper and others in a more pressing manner. It’s completely up to the player on how the conversation will end and when it will end for instance the player before me chose to be persistent yet end up with the shop keeper declining to help. During my play through I chose to quickly end the conversation and move onto the next part of the scene. Despite your choices during the conversation at the end you will ask for an asthma inhaler which the shop keeper directs you to the back. Moving is done with holding down the R2 button and using the left stick to direct your movement. Arrow prompts are done with the right stick. For instance to pick up the asthma inhaler you push the right stick up which is pressure sensitive so the slower you push up the slower you’ll pick it up.

Once you do pick it up a jittery man enters the store and starts looking around he then pulls out a gun and demands the money from the register. It is here that the choices really start to branch out. For instance you can sneak up behind the would-be robber and clock him over the head with a bottle or frying pan. Provided you managed to pick them up without dropping them and alerting the gunmen. In my session I managed to pick up a frying pan and began my sneaking. One aisle (in) conveniently had potato chips scatted about which would almost for sure cause the robber to know of your presence. The next aisle over though was a clear path to him, which also houses a bottle you can pick up. As I crept closer and closer I knocked over a box of detergent which I was able to catch with a quick button prompt. I was close to knocking the robber out but failed a motion control prompt (yes there is sixaxis support) and alerted him to my presence. He then told me to put my hands up and a conversation began. At this point you can try to talk him out of it by either scaring him or trying to reason with him.

Regardless of your choices he will turn his attention to the store owner and again demand the money. At this point it’s up to you as the player to make a decision whether to approach the robber and try to wrestle the gun out of his hand or simply stand there and watch what happens. In an effort not to spoil anything I won’t give away how the other situations play out aside from the one in the video but each plays out very differently. And the consequences of these choices are undetermined if any. While the controls are a little wonky they work well in the closed environment. The sheer amount of decision making the  effects of those decisions were pretty spectacular given just a short scene in a much longer game, testifying to the replay ability of seeing just how each way a scene can play out and what it means for later in the story.

Be on the lookout for the PS3 exclusive Heavy Rain when it drops next year.

About the Author:  20 year old broke college student attending the University Of Oregon. I love gaming, its a big part of my life and enjoy writing and talking about video games and everything video game related. I enjoy movies, hanging out with friends, partying and doing really what the average college student enjoys.