Previews// inFamous

The bus has been armoured up and had a bunch of guns attached by the Sand Bastards ('Dust Men', if you want to get technical) so they can generally muck sh!t up and make my life difficult. My array of offensive powers now seems to extend to: 1) regular electric blast (this is your default power – like a pistol – and doesn't drain any of the energy you have built up). 2) More powerful blasts (that do suck up some of the energy you've pulled out of the power grid). 3) Shock blasts (wide-ranging concussive bursts). 4) Electric grenade jobbies. 5) The good, old, big-hard-jump-that-creates-a-shock...erm... blast.

I'm stood up above the big scary bus on a rooftop, so chucking electricity down at it seems like a good idea. It turns out, however, that it's going to take me bloody ages to kill this bus. There are two reasons for this, one of them is a good one. That reason is that Sand Bastards keep shooting at me from the rooftops, so I keep killing them back. Sometimes, however, this involves me getting onto a rooftop, which involves seeing more Sand Bastards and all the fun I could be having zipping about on power lines as I kill them. This proves more than a bit distracting.

The second reason it took me a while is that sometimes my brain operates in a manner reminiscent of a fart trying to get out of a wet paper bag. Regular electric blasts aren't working on the bus, so I try more powerful blasts and shock grenades. This doesn't work, so... I try doing it some more. Finally, after God knows how long, I realise that the best bet is to get on the bus and destroy it from there. The whole mission should have me banging my head (or the PS3) against the wall. But... it doesn't – because the level keeps me entertained. Good news, I reckon.

Then it's on to the prison, where I'm tasked with defending the very stern looking building at all costs. I'm still all dark and evil looking at this point, so I'm not entirely sure what my motivation for helping out is, but I crack on anyway.

To start with, I'm set the task of using shockwaves to deflect what looks like burning debris chucked by a ye olde catapult into the prison yard. Happily, I'm treated to a an electrified grid that keeps me supplied with a constant flow of juice, removing the need to recharge at power points. So, knocking the burning projectiles in a direction I'm not in proves not too difficult.

Then a load of Dust Men (geddit?) swarm the place and it's a long range fry up mixed with a spot of melee action. Right after that, someone sends me up a tower to sort out a generator (and subjects real-world-me to a spot of weird vertigo thanks to the rendering of the in-game height). This is followed by a trip waaaaaayyyy back down to the bottom. Another swarm of Sand Bastards appears, with a couple of giant fiery chaps of unknown origin to help them.

At this point, I must confess, it gets a little unbalanced. Despite being kept fed with a constant supply of electricity, death seems to be getting a bit too friendly, and it takes a good few attempts to make it through the encounter. Hopefully, however, this is something that will be evened out a bit in the final build.

Last up was the boss battle I mistakenly jumped into at the start. I can do it now! I don't really want to tell you about it, however, since it's a bit spoilerific.

What I'm trying to get across is the fact that inFamous has a lot up its sleeve, and if the sample of missions I played through are representative of the whole game, there's plenty of variation to keep things interesting.

Here's hoping the final game lives up to the preview code's promise! Can I go back and play it now...?