Other than Dragon Age, I haven't discussed many non-MMO games here. I feel other segments of gaming are plenty well covered by other sources, and I don't feel MMOs are given enough specific attention. Plus they're 99% of what I play, so... anyway. But this warrants a post.

Heavy Rain is incredible. It's a PS3-only psychological thriller game, and it's seriously fracked up. I'm trying to keep my site out of profanity filters so I used "fracked" but pretend I used the real word there, because it's the only thing that conveys how intensely twisted the game is.

I can't say much, if anything, about the actual story of the game, as I'm anti-spoiler, but since one part of the game has been mentioned in about every interview/etc, I'll mention it. The stripping scene. Compared to a lot of the rest of the game, that scene is "suitable for children." I mean, it's really not, but in comparison to other stuff, ... yeah. It's mild.

You play 4 different characters - 3 male and 1 female - with no control over which and when - it just follows the story, movie-like, and you play the main character in each scene. The control scheme is... odd. It does make use of every single thing the SixAxis can do, that's for sure. The control choices are inconsistent, though. Sometimes a similar action will be initiated by different buttons. There's also some seriously bad button combos you have to hit. X, Triangle, L1 and R2? Come on. That's some contortion.

I'm not finished yet - and can't tell how close I'm getting as there's no "% done" indicator and I won't read spoilers. I think I'm getting close as most of the characters' stories are starting to meet up now - but who knows. Could be far off still. It'll be interesting to see.

So, if you like psychological thriller type stuff, and don't mind being pretty seriously disturbed at least once during a game, pick up Heavy Rain. It truly delivers on the promises of the developers. This is the kind of thing the PS3 really needs in order to become more of a force in the console market. Well, that and a real online service... ;)