Review: LA Noire

LA Noire is a gaming tour de force. It takes a typical Rockstar open world adventure and adds a completely new gameplay element: procedural crime investigation.

A beautifully reconstructed late 40s Los Angeles, brilliant voice acting and next-generation facial animation results in an immersing story and a wholly addictive gaming experience.

LA Noire is a procedural crime game similar to an episode of CSI or an Ed McBain crime novel set in 1940s Los Angeles. The environment is beautifully reconstructed using aerial photos from the mid-40s, which enhance the game's historical accuracy.

I had a good laugh at the mountain-side Hollywood sign, which reads 'HollywoodLand' in the game, until my wife pointed out that the 'Land' was removed around 1950. This attention to detail adds a big element to being totally immersed in the story.

You play Cole Phelps, a war veteran working his way up the ranks in the Los Angeles police force. Phelps is brilliantly played in voice and likeness by Aaron Staton (TV's Mad Men). As Phelps, you investigate a series of crimes on the traffic desk, homicide, vice and finally arson - 21 cases in total, each about an hour long.

Each case follows a standard formula. After a short teaser, you head off to the crime scene and look for clues by analysing objects in the environment.

Gameplay assists you in finding clues in the environment. Your controller vibrates when something can be picked up and inspected, but, unfortunately, you spend lots of time looking at objects that have nothing to do you with your case.

Also, ominous music plays until you find all the relevant clues within a crime scene. The assistance can be switched off to increase authenticity, but it is key to minimising frustration while searching for clues.

You also spend a lot of the game interviewing victims, eyewitnesses and suspects. Avenues of questioning will be based on clues found or previous statements and the manner in which you respond to your interviewee is critical to the investigation.

You are faced with three options: accepting their answer as the truth, doubting their statement or accusing them of outright lying.

This is where Rockstar's facial animation technology, MotionScan, comes into play. MotionScan revolutionises the facial animation of in-game characters. The technology allows developers to accurately represent facial expressions and, more importantly, emotions, which is a crucial element of the gameplay in trying to 'read' suspects.

Avoiding eye contact and nervous movements are usually signs that a suspect is lying or withholding the truth. If you accuse them of lying, they always ask you to justify your accusation with some evidence. Unlike other games, there are no checkpoint restarts - if you offend a witness by accusing him of lying, you risk him refusing to answer any of your questions.

Another perk of MotionScan is that it enables actors to lend more than just their voices to video game characters. Their likenesses also feature in the game. While playing the game, I recognised a plethora of B-grade actors, like Walter Bishop from Fringe, Matt Parkman from Heroes and Carl the bartender from 'How I Met Your Mother.'

If you are interested in how RockStar used MotionScan for this game, have a look at the video here.

There is some respite for those times when you're torn between decisions or can't find enough clues to proceed with the case. Intuition points are collected each time you level-up and these can be used at any point in an investigation to reveal all the clues within a crime scene.

They can also be used to assist in an interview by either eliminating an answer or 'Asking the Community,' a lot like asking the audience in 'Who Wants to be a Millionaire?' This is the most commonly selected option on Xbox Live. Intuition points don't come easy, which means you can't be tempted to use them all the time.

During one case investigating the abuse of a young girl, I was able to find and apprehend her assailant, but through poor questioning, his accomplice got away. Three days later, I still wonder what I could have done differently to have captured him.

On another case, I couldn't help but question myself about whether I accused and arrested the right person. You think very carefully about your actions, as a wrong move could result in someone getting away with a crime.

But the game is not perfect. The 21 cases are repetitive and the combat system is very weak. You can take at least 10 bullets before dying, while a single shot kills even the hardest criminal.

Foot chases also seemed tedious, even though Cole can scale fences and drain pipes simply by running straight at them; I could never run fast enough to catch up to a perp. These chases seemed superfluous and I ended up gunning down random baddies from a distance.

Travelling between missions, you are often alerted to random street crime via either the map or the police radio, so it's a good idea to drive instead of using fast travel between locations. Although these missions have little to do with the main storyline, they're short and simple and, if nothing else, help you level-up faster.

Even though I felt very connected to the actual story, the one character who did not endear himself to me was Cole himself. You're slowly exposed to his back story via newspapers headlines and flashbacks, yet I struggled to connect to his character until the very end of the game.

Though very different to typical Rockstar games, LA Noire is probably the best procedural crime game ever made.

Even though the MotionScan technology is a leap forward in the facial animation, the strength of the game lies in a strong engaging story, believable characters and attention to detailed environments.

It is one of the best games of the year so far, but the slow pace of the game won't appeal to everyone.