Forums → Games → L.A. Noire... bleh.

Hello good friends, Your Friendly Neighborhood Satanist has more growths on his chest that he can count, so he's going to rip one of them off right now. Get ready.

L.A. Noire is underwhelming. There! I said it! er, typed it... moving on.

Before we talk about this game, we have to talk about a different game from the developers of LA, a game that defeated God of War 3, Mass Effect 2, Super Mario Galaxy 2, Halo: Reach, Heavy Rain, and Starcraft II for the title of Game Of The Year 2010, Red Dead: Redemption

Last year I freaked my mind out about Red Dead Redemption, it was the only thing I wanted for my birthday and me and my buddies in the wrestling weight room often spoke of the game. When May 13th came around the game had been out for a week, so I was pretty excited that my local independent retailer GAMEPOINT found on the Newark-Pompton Turnpike in Pequannock, New Jersey still had one copy left. I rushed home and waited tenaciously for the loading screen to end and I could begin playing. What started then ended about a month later as I put down the controller, having completed the best video game ending EVER, and walked away stunned.

And now we enter Los Angeles Black. I was a bit off about this game, RD:R was just good enough to avoid being synonymous with "Grand Theft Horse", and this new game whose only concept was "Grand Theft Solving" had me raise an eyebrow more than once.

I was exhausted from the blandness of Homefront, (though the fact the game featured the funniest line in all of video games, "Get to the Hooters!&quotscared out of my mind from Dead Space 2, slightly offended by Bulletstorm, blown away by Crysis 2, perplexed by Portal 2, and feeling a bit punched in the eye by Mr. Nukem; one could say I was feeling an emotion complex when I first played LA at my friends house on that rainy day.

So I started playing and was immediately hit with a sense I never thought I'd be hit with playing a Rockstar game. It was a feeling I usually felt with my friend Ben, who suffers from a case of CAN'T PICK OUT A GOOD GAME IN A LINEUP TO SAVE HIS LIFE-itus. (He thought Turning Point: Fall of Liberty was the greatest thing to happen since MW2) I felt a feeling I usually associate with the annual CoD release following 2007. It was a same-y feeling, a feeling that I had been there already. I had.

You see, back in 2008, i played 2 hours of GTA IV and put it down immediately. It was dark, gritty, the cars handled like crap, and was overall painful. This is why I'm a Saint's advocate. Despite that, the universal acclaim of GTA led me to trying out RD:R, and that story has already been told. However, RD:R was vastly unique to GTA, yes, there were horses instead of cars, and the guns only fired once with a pull of the RT or R2, but it was a unique experience and nothing was like it. Well, GUN was but i don't like to talk about GUN.

Back on topic, LA was too much like GTA, the cars, the colors, the feel, the way he sprinted always made him look like the only cop who couldn't find the toilet fast enough, it was all the same as it was 3 years ago. I also have a bit of a problem with the detective part of the detective game. When our buddy Cole (hm, isn't he supposed to be shooting lightning out of his hands?) starts interrogating someone, he's very black-and-white about it. When i see "Doubt" i think "raise an eyebrow". When i select "doubt", Cole starts punching old ladies. This is the same in a lot of Moral Choice games nowadays (excluding Fallout 3 and New Vegas, the freedom in Tenpenny Tower ROCKZZZ) you're either the purest substance off the Pope's holy image of perfection, or the darkest demon pulled from whatever Hell Satan will go to when he eventually dies and I take over as Prince of Darkness, or you're the blandest character of all time. Why couldn't there have been a "raise your eyebrow" option? Or a humor option? There was soooo much Rockstar could have put into the conversation system that totally missed the mark.

Most of the work was on the face-capture part of the interrogations that I found particularly commendable. However, if someone's eyes even so much as twitch along the pattern of the most immobile piece of dust, then you can automatically assume the person is lying, even without evidence, and totally call them out on it, and then Cole starts changing his name to McGrath, and shoots lighting out of his hands. (if you're not getting the references, pick up a PS3 and go get Infamous 2 now - this coming from a primarily Xbox 360 gamer)

Graphics is a weak argument, but it's something I find odd about this game. Maybe its just me, or maybe it's the shellshock that Cryis 2 left me with, but I find LA Noire kind of bad-looking. I mean, Portal 2 looked better, and it runs on the Source engine from 2004. Considering how RD: R was one of the best looking games of 2010, surpassed visually only by the interactive movie, Heavy Rain, this is weird in video game visual standards.

The final hammer in the coffin I plan to bury this game deep in after this rant is actual entertainment. LA Noire is BORING. Look, I've told people that LA was boring, and I was called out because they said i found it was boring because "it requires thought". What?!?! I'm one of those people that will spend 10 minutes in the perks screen of Fallout 3 or New vegas, or someone who will plan out an entire city-position basis in Civ 4, I'm also a huge strategy game junkie (Starcraft II ftw. I'm in ur forums, killing ur LA Noire), so please don't confuse me for a testosterone-fueled game-adrenaline pinhead, you can talk to Gstroy if you want one (jk good brother).

But seriously, this game involves you doing a job, a very BORING JOB. This is why career games (with the exception of diner dash) are usually crap, they're just like real jobs, and when we simulate our jobs in games, they're no more fun than if we were actually there. There's only one gunplay section in each of the chapters, and the gunplay is where Rockstar excels! Why couldn't they let Cole pull out his piece and scare the interrogatees a little? I betcha that old hag would've told me about the producer not having any work had she had a .44 next to her head...

Well, there it is. L.A. Noire is overrated, go get Portal 2, Crysis 2, or Mortal Kombat instead, or even rebuy Beyond Good and Evil for christ's sake. LA isn't worth your time unless you're a rockstar fanboy. Now excuse me, I have to go back to working at SUBWAY so i can ***** myself out to the corporate machine a little more. ugh.

-Chillz