Summer's here.
School's over.

And I am done with my third year of middle school. The first thing that came to my head was "I'm done." The second thing was "Oh wait, I've got highschool to go". In that moment i saw all of my dreams of freedom go down the pipe. I literally grabbed them with a pincer and gloves (black ones, cause they're cool) and watched them flush trough the toilet. After that i realized my mistake and ran to the sea to recover them as i cursed my shoulder devil. I've got some time to relax and unwind, and that's what matters.

Ok, so anyway i went to DA like usual and realized everybody was writing or had wrote summer journals. Then i started reflecting if i should write one. I mean, Summer has alot of things we can write about.
Trips to the beach, parties, karaoke( to me = making Darth Vader breathing with the mic and start singing "Slaughter Your World" when i lose, which is always), watchin' cute girls in the beach (or guys if you're a girl), and stuff like that.
Problem is, i was stuck at home in my first week, so i couldn't write about this stuff, and i had no idea of what i was going to do.

BUT, now that i've spent a week or so at my bro's house near the sea, I felt compeled to read my mails, and write this entry. And then i was like "@#ck, I've got like a hundred mails to read!" when i checked it. Also, i cam upon the realization that i was in the middle of summer when writing this. I realized everyone else had already wrote their summer journals. Nonetheless, this entry is more about something I'm playing right now. So lets move on to that shall we?



At my birthday (20th of July) i received InFAMOUS for the PS3 system. Before reading this, i should warn you: I might mention (read "SCREAM OUT") several spoilers.

Now, in InFAMOUS you are Cole McGrath, a delivery guy. Cole was just asked to deliver a sealed package to the Historic District of Empire City (the fictional city where the game happens). Unfortunatly, Cole had no idea that he was carrying a volatile device which went "BOOOMM" in his hands. And I don't mean a small explosion. I mean a gigantic blast of energy which destroyed 6 city blocks and killed hundreds of people.
After the blast, Cole realizes he now has electricity based superpowers. Unfortunatly, while Cole was recovering, the city has been closed, gangs now rule it, and a disease is spreading... basically, the city is a mess.
And the cherry on top of the cake is that the goverment told people Cole was the responsible! Those sons of #@%@£$%!

Luckly for Cole, hes not alone. His best friend Zeke, and his girlfriend Trish are on his side when the game begins. You go trough a basic tutorial in the first mission to introduce you to the gameplay mechanics and the first 2 powers Cole has acess to. As of the first few missions, those powers are a bit generic. I will explain why in more detail later. Also in the first mission, you get familiarized with Cole's ability to scale about anything. He pratcised uruban exploration, so he is very agile and best of all, falls dont hurt him cause of his powers!
Your first task in the mission is to get the food the goverment delivered down from the top of structure where it's hanging. What's bad is that the gang of the Reapers, who dominate the Neon district also want the food. After kicking their buts, the player will be given a choice.

This choice is the first Karma Moment of the game. In this moment, you can either be selfish, taking all the food for yourself, or selfless, and let the people take some of the food. The selfish decision will put your karma meter in the Evil side, giving you the rank of Criminal, while the selfless decision will put the meter in the Good side and rise you to the rank of Guardian. Many other moments like this will be available in the game, which will boast Cole trough Good or Evil, to reach the respective greater ranks of Hero or Infamous.

The Karma system is one of the things that makes the game deeper than any other free exploration game, as every thing you do makes you a little bit more evil or a little bit n more good. Helping citizens on the streets, capturing criminals alive and be a "nice" superhero will make you go up on the good scale, however, hurting civilians, blowing up cars or draining energy from people to regenerate yours is downright evil.
Different versions of Cole's powers are available for either side. Generally, if you're a goodie goodie, the powers are more precise and single target focused, while on the dark side, they are much more destructive and effect wide. But, trying to balance good acts with bad acts won't get you anywhere, because the strongest skills are only available to the meaner, or the fairer.
Despite what alligment you choose to play, the plot remains the same overall, but with different details. The reaction of the citizens of the city to Cole, and the way some of the cutscenes differ, per example. But Cole still meets FBI agent Moya, and Trish still dies, independently of what he does.

Empire City is an open world, with its own personal landmarks, residents, villains, and neighborhood. The free exploration gameplay is good, well-built and fun. The initial hours disappoint a bit, because it feels too much like a shooter in 3rd person. This is why i said the first powers are generic. That's mainly caused by the fact that you spend too much time just shooting lightning bolts and doing nothing else but that to hit enemies, and Cole's second power is only to open room when you're surronded. However, Cole gains a new power each time he restores power to a section of the city, and it doesn't take long to get your first new power. Near the end of the game, Cole is already a very powerfull character, but until Cole receives some of his strongest powers, hes mostly resumed to navigating trough roofs in order not to get overpowered by the gangs who dominate the city.

The things i didn't mention yet, are that, surprisingly, there are only 2 collectibles in the game, those are Blast Shards, which as you might've guessed are radioactive fragments from the explosion, that when collected increase Cole's capacity to store electricity, and Dead Drops: audio recordings of NSA agent John White, that explain and complete the backstory about the game's major villains, the First Sons.

InFAMOUS is a magnificent game for the PS3, and i dare say it's the one that better represents the life of a superhero. His dillemas, his problems, his choices and his evolution as a person. InFAMOUS overcomes the previous 'king' of superhero video games, Spiderman 2, and it does it in a way that the experience in playing is at the same time, both noltagic and innovative.

For finishers, the plot is also one of the better points of the game. It's got an awesome script, worthy of a movie, and some pretty good twists. I'm not going to spoil all of te game's important things, but some questions will still be lifted after playing.
Basically, i loved playing InFAMOUS as a good guy and am now on the process of doing as a bad guy. In a 1-20 scale, i'd give the game an 18.


I thank you for reading my review and my other thoughts, and would like to know what you think about the game and my vision of it.
Also, what would you answer: "Save the city... or destroy what's left?"
I hope i didn't ramble on too much.
See ya.