In Third Person

There are going to be a lot of people who will buy this game, thinking that they’re picking up Grand Theft Auto: 1940s Cop Edition. If the commercials or your expectations led you to believe that this would be that type of game, you’re either going to be pleasantly surprised or horribly disappointed. If this isn’t a Grand Theft Auto variant, than what is it?

In a lot of ways, this game is the antithesis of Grand Theft Auto. The basic premise of the game is to take on the role of Cole Phelps, a World War II veteran and rookie cop, and bring justice to the criminals of Los Angeles, which is mostly done through investigating, interrogating, and to a lesser extent, car chases, combat and free-form adventure. This is not a bad thing, as long as your expectations for this game are in check. This is very much an adventure game along the lines of Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney that happens to run in the Grand Theft Auto engine.

Without much in the way of physical action happening in this game, the focus of this game is about progressing through the game’s story, which has multiple layers to it. Each case has its own story arc, but each case story is part of a larger thread within the division of the police department you’re working in, which is also part of an overall thread that ties the entire game together.

Even with the added layers of story depth, none of it would matter if the story wasn’t very good. L.A. Noire’s story feels like it was ripped from a 1940s detective television show. While the initial set of stories that have you playing as a Beat Cop (which doubles as the game’s tutorial) are pretty boring, things quickly pick up steam once you join the Traffic department. At that point, the story, dialogue and plot progression do a great job of entertaining you from case-to-case. My brother, who has no interest in playing the game, watched me play through the entirety of L.A. Noire because he enjoyed just watching the story play out, which is a testament to how good the story in this game is.

As I’d mentioned earlier, the majority of your time playing that game involves you finding clues and talking to persons of interest. This is where L.A. Noire really shines. In my experience playing adventure games, item gathering can be a very frustrating or clunky experience. L.A. Noire does some interesting things to make item gathering interesting and easier. For one, you don’t have to find everything to proceed. You can go through a case and not find most of the clues if you want to be a terrible detective.

On a more serious note, Team Bondi uses the controller’s rumble and audio cues to tell you when you’ve walked by something important, when you’ve walked by something you’ve already checked, and when you’ve found everything relevant in an area. Even the act of inspecting items is handled very well, as you inspect things from a first-person view, as if you were physically inspecting the item yourself in real-life. It’s a very nice touch. The only point in the game where finding clues got frustrating was during the arson cases, where most of the crime scenes were charred messes. I did burn more Intuition Points on these crime scenes than I did on any other series of cases, but arson cases generally have less clues due to the nature of the crimes.

Interviewing people is by far the most enjoyable aspect of this game. Armed with your evidence, the story hinges on how well your interviews with persons of interests go. What makes this part of the game special is the fact that there’s a very human approach you need to take when interrogating someone. Team Bondi’s new facial animation system is scarily realistic (and at times, very uncanny valley) to the point where reading facial expressions is a key gameplay element. Some people have obvious tells when they lie, such as rapid eye blinking or raising their eyebrows, but on a number of occasions, you’re going to have to use your human intuition to make the right decision. The most powerful moment in the game for me occurred when I had first had to interview two suspects back-to-back and make a judgment call on who goes free, and who spends a lifetime behind bars. Not many games on the market right now push the types of emotional buttons that L.A. Noire does, which is part of what makes this experience special.

Despite the focus of the game being placed on traditional adventure game mechanics, there are still traces of Grand Theft Auto in there, which actually expose some of L.A. Noire’s biggest holes as an experience. You’re still playing in an open world, which you can explore freely, though there isn’t nearly as much side stuff to do. There are moments in the game where you will need to pull out your gun, but the gun combat doesn’t feel very good. If anything, it might be a step back from Grand Theft Auto IV. There was one specific moment in the game where you had to partake in gun combat in dark and tight corridors, but the camera made it extremely frustrating to navigate the area and shoot. Don’t get The saving grace to the physical action are the on-foot chases, which feel like the most polished of the game’s action elements. They’re also the most used, so they can get repetitive.

I fear that a lot of people are going to unfairly judge L.A. Noire because it’s not a Grand Theft Auto game, and that’s a shame. Sure, the game isn’t perfect on its own merits, but it shouldn’t be penalized for trying to be a different beast from Grand Theft Auto. If you’re going to pass on it strictly because it’s not GTA, you might be missing out one of the most interesting and forward-thinking video games to come out this year. This game isn’t for everyone, and I personally wouldn’t consider it as “Game of the Year 2011” caliber, but I think it’s a game worth going outside of your comfort zone for to at least say you’ve tried it. L.A. Noire is a really adventure good game that definitely takes some steps to move gaming as a medium forward in terms of maturity and realism. With some added polish, I’d love to see where a sequel or a similarly formatted game could go.