Reviews// inFamous

Missions range from following trails left by enemies (inevitably littered with encounters that leave you trying your damnedest not to get filled with holes), to guarding medical supplies from Reapers (junkies turned mutants of some sort), to scaling roofs, to dealing with your (other) psychotic ex who has also acquired superpowers.

Gameplay snapshot: Some nutjob with superpowers (Alden, a creepy old guy) has just chucked a bus on the roof of a building using only his brain. Trish, Cole's whiny ex, is on that bus. I need to get her down, because I'm like that. So I try running along the ground to get to the building, which I know I'll be able to climb, because I am awesome at climbing (for more on that, see SPOnG's earlier first look). So, I run out, flinging electricity from my hands and occasionally chucking out some of the good stuff (shock grenades, more powerful blasts) and it's going well! Sand Bastards (Dust Men, if you're feeling specific) are rolling around everywhere, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to be able to.... get cut down.

I know, I'll try approaching from a nearby rooftop! Hang on, the only way of getting from the 'nearby' rooftop is crossing a massive open area on the wire, giving them ample opportunity to shoot me while I'm in mid-air with no cover and little chance of shooting back. Finally, I find another ground route of attack, scramble up the side of a building that's at least 12 storeys high and get onto the roof to save my (ex)girlfriend from the Sand Bastards! Except I'm too slow and they just shot her in the brains. Damn bus-throwing mentalists!

As well as getting some of the flavour of the game, hopefully you're getting the fact that you're not railroaded onto a given path in a mission. It's that whole 'open world' thing coming into play... very, very elegantly.

While you're not climbing up bus-topped buildings, traversing the underside of bridges or scrambling through disgusting shanty towns swarming with enemies, you'll be required to get the city's power turned back on. This involves ducking into the sewers (which Cole knows well, because he used to be into city exploration) to do a bit of platforming and sort out some electrical stuff. By doing this, you also bring out fresh powers.

The power curve is supremely well handled. Just as you're having to do more and more travelling for missions and the immense pleasure to be had from scaling the cityscape is starting to fade into past novelty, the ability to grind along wires and train tracks opens up. All of a sudden you're zipping around at least twice the speed, and once again travel makes you feel cool.

Just as the enemy fire is getting to the point of 'too intense' and you're approaching frustration, you get a shield. Hopefully you're getting the picture. Playing with your new toys and working out how to best incorporate them into your pwning bad guys strategies is a delight.

Interspersed between the story missions are shorter side missions. As well as adding loads (I mean: LOADS) of gameplay, these enable you to build up XP, which can be spent on leveling up your abilities. Levelling up is a good idea because... well, the game gets harder as you go, dunnit? Side missions are not, however, essential for this – there's plentiful XP to be had from the main story missions.

As well as the general fighty-fighty stuff, I've also been asked by the Evil Editor if the parkour-style climbing gets harder, since hitting jump a lot is sufficient to scale most buildings. In a word: no. Climbing is very easy. What's not necessarily easy, however, is picking a line that enables you to keep moving fluidly and not get turned into a colander by enemy fire. If I were a PR I'd probably toss out the phrase 'easy to learn, difficult to master'.

If you're looking for an insanely hard test of your gaming skills offered by the likes of R-Type, you probably won't find it here. If you're looking for a decent challenge that won't have you endlessly gritting your teeth and re-starting a mission, however, you're in the right place.