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Game Review: L.A. Noire

LA Noire isn’t like most Rockstar games. You don’t play the renegade badass outlaw, trying to get the best rep on the street. No. Actually it’s quite the opposite. You’re a cop. A Detective in fact based in 1940s LA. The game is unique, its special but unfortunately its slightly flawed. Some of the pieces just don’t seem to fit but its fun to play. LA in 1947 is on the brink of change after the war and people are struggling to find their place in the real world again. This is the most violent year in LA’s history and Rockstar has really done an excellent job of portraying this on the screen.

You play Cole Phelps. A True Blue Detective, the Incorruptible Cop a beacon of integrity in a police department mired with scandals. The best thing about this game is the motion-scan technology, which captures the actors face. There’s no animation and the scenes are by real performances by people you will probably recognize. It gives you a new take on gaming actors and the realism of it all. Interrogations are a bit long but captivating nonetheless, which is a good thing as this is the real core of LA Noire. The story takes a while; ending in a somewhat unsatisfying way but the journey is interesting enough to keep you glued to your seat.

The game is divided into 21 cases across 5 desks. From beat-cop, to homicide to dramatically ending in arson. Each case comes with a new partner each with his or her own separate personalities, which can vary from courageous to crooked. With each case the method is somewhat the same. You search the crime scenes, pick up items inspect them, question the suspects, which when you need to start thinking less like a gamer more like a cop. It’s not easy. It’s a real challenge to trust each person’s statement and rarely it’s about what they say but more about how they act when they say it. You need to get the answers to these crimes and after every response, you are given a choice to believe, doubt or accuse the suspect of lying. Get it right and the suspect opens up, giving you more answers and you get closer to the desired result. Getting it wrong equals less from the suspect and they clam up. The better you do at this the more you understand the motivation behind the crimes but the worse you do tougher it is to get truth. Don’t worry though, the game wont end on conversation choices. The bad guy only gets away if it’s predetermined in the story. This can leave you going round in circles however.

LA Noire is not about battering people all the time and its full of car chases and action scenes and shootouts deeper in the game. After all its an open world game so you can wander around the 1940s LA map and pick up any of 40 Unassigned cases come in on the radio. These are single scene mission’s bank robberies or following a crook to his hide out and can be a nice breather from the main story line. Over all, it only has a few issues, but its bold and unique. The core gameplay mechanics work and it does have a lot of good things going on. I’ve never played a game like this before but I really hope you get a chance to. Big risk by Rockstar but in general a very good result.

4.5/5

Written by James McCombe