I have a lot of bad things to say about this game, but when I laid it out in depth, I was called woke because I claimed the characters, especially the women, were written very badly. Here I thought David Cage was an outed pervert, but it's still controversial to say that apparently. So in short:
- The story is bad and relies on a single plot twist that doesn't even make sense from a writing perspective.
- Characters are bad, cliched, unrealistic, and they talk like AI chatbots.
- Chapters are repetitive from start to finish.
- The "innovative storytelling" would work better as a TV show instead of a game with QTEs
- Choices feel like they alter the ending instead of the whole story, which is the worst type of "Important Choices" game you can make especially if you have no other game mechanic than choices.
Heavy Rain was definitely a game that I had a hard time understanding its success, even considering the time it was released. Its greatest achievement might be opening the door for slow-burn, story-rich games that don’t have to be filled with shooter mechanics to keep the consumers interested, and can instead emphasize the worldbuilding, visuals, and actual interactive stories to utilize its medium. I just personally felt like there are times when it doesn’t do justice to this cause more often than it does.

So I got into this game expecting a philosophical game about a cyberpunk dystopia, similar to Blade Runner. Instead I got a psychological thriller that takes place in a shitty neighborhood of the future.

Instead of a fun cyberpunk experience, this game gave me a headache, motion sickness, epilepsy, fear of the future, fear of tech, fear of cyberwerewolves and probably a reason to have nightmares today, all while staying true to the roots of the cyberpunk genre. In case you haven't noticed, yes, I'm talking about the good parts.

The art direction in this game is incredible and more creative than I could ever expect. It's definitely the best I've ever seen in a horror game, and might be one of the best in general.

It's also the slowest game I have ever played, yet the lack of distinctive chapters, parts, objectives or any loading screens made it hard to quit the game at any point. Without realizing it, I spent 5 hours in the game in one sitting. Which is good, but then again, it also did give me a serious headache. Which is the only thing about this game that truly did not appeal to me.

The ultimate "this game is best experienced with a headset" adventure. There are so many things I love about Hellblade. In its core, it's a short story about loss and grief, which is not an uncommon plot at all.
But the reason why this stood out was a combination of amazing graphics, simplistic gameplay, gripping atmosphere, fluid combat, incredible sound design, good lore, impressive acting, with literally no hand-holding and the tension of perma-death...
Perfect in its own little world and league.

This game is just a constant shift between "It's so over" and "We're so back" in an unhealthy amount of changes to your self-confidence.
Overall I think it's better than the first one in terms of story and gameplay, but I'm not a fan of how you spend almost the entirety of the game in the bumblefucks of the laboratory. I enjoyed actually being in test chambers more, and I don't think it's incorporated very well in this one. Most of the time you have to navigate back corners of the vastly empty spaces, and use the zoom to barely find surfaces to place your portal.
Still, the elaborate story and the new mechanics that make the chambers more fun were very enjoyable. A solid game about two enemies-to-friends gals with a portal gun. They don't make'em like they used to.