endlessflood said:
The game mechanics were hit and miss. The driving, running, and shooting all felt fine. The 'clue' setup was fine too. The interrogations were a great idea, but they way the choices have sometimes been implemented leaves a lot to be desired (mostly because there's a disconnect between what's being discussed prior to your choice and the things that you say after the choice) and it sometimes felt like you were trying to guess what the developer was thinking rather than trying to read a face in conjunction with the evidence. It also felt slightly too linear for my liking whereby there were limited options in terms of how you actually approach making the cases; most of the 'branching' in cases stems from interrogations rather than deductions made in the face of the evidence. I like how the slower pace of the main missions is offset by the 'cut to the chase' nature of the street crime, giving the player the ability to customise their own experience by injecting more action whenever they feel the need for it.
I agree with these criticisms. Sometimes I found myself choosing the Lie option and then immediately backing out if the accusation being made didn't match what it sounded like they were getting at before the accusation was made. This should've been handled a bit better.
I also was a little disappointed in the game for letting you know when you screwed up an interrogation. Just too game-y and ruins that atmosphere during intense interrogations. Just let the scene play out as it will without revealing to the player just how one dimensional a lot of the questioning really is. Perhaps there could've been answers that will get you only partial information if you doubt them instead of call them on a lie when you don't have enough evidence.
Didn't like how scripted some of the chase sequences were. I could literally see the car ahead of me rubber banding away at times. I think those could've been fine without any scripting. The foot chase/car chase/brawl/shootout action sequences could've used a bit more variety as well rather than pretty evidently always being broken up into any one of those categories. Made the action sequences often feel disconnected and segmented.
The rest of my gripes are pretty minor. I remember being a little thrown off on certain things like the nude female bodies all having what were essentially black paint splotches on their genitalia rather than just having genitalia. Rockstar took the time to model a whole penis and testicles in TLAD but a vagina is off limits? Give me a break.
Despite those gripes, the game was one of my favorite games of the generation. Superb experience.
