The 2nd best game after bully with rockstar's name attached and one of a kind in its own little subgenre.

Pros:
A very interesting concept for a game
The acting is well done
The setting is literally the only time anything in video games has been placed in the 40s and not been WWII
I enjoy the general pacing of the cases.
The amount of detail on a lot of the game that most people will just never notice, like all the cars.

Cons:
Feels like rockstar stepped in and forced some gameplay decisions
Everything that isn't the cases feels at best half baked, why would i just randomly enter cars?
The overarching story really gets stretched thin, his wife is more so non existent than an actual character and that's really disappointing.
the open world actively takes away from the game, although i do enjoy the car movement
it is just such a long feeling game when you try to drive everywhere instead of just letting the partner drive you.
A real downer of an ending, the bad guys get away with it all. Its very clear that the noire part is more taking inspiration from chinatown and... that's about it. The 40s noire films always have the bad guy get caught in some way and are usually very hopeful at the end.

I'm picturing an alternate version of this game that doesn't have an open world, has light time management with the cases as you travel to locations on a map screen, and you actually have your family be an aspect in the game. It sounds a lot nicer in my head.

7/10 for the 4/5ths i played of it. The shooting and driving aspects got very tiring. I'll probably pick it back up in a while. I would love to see another try at the concept but that's never happening.

It's a game that has so many damn flaws I feel like I shouldn't enjoy it as much as I do, but damn it if it isn't one of my favorite open world games ever made. The atmosphere and world of a 1947 post war LA are spectacularly done, the actors all do their best with the material given, and I adore the story for about 85% if the run time. The gameplay can be janky, and the front and center interrogations show their age as soon as the first couple, but I absolutely adore this game and would recommend anyone get it on a discount if you can. It is a great time if you can get hooked by it.

L.A. Noire was well ahead of its time on release, when playing through the "remaster" I'm not exactly sure what it changes or adds to. I think the story itself has aged not for the better.. it still confuses the heck out of me. That is not a spoiler relax! I love the vintage Los Angeles setting, the team put so much effort and time into recreating the era. Driving and shooting are def L.A. Noire's weak points, but I look at as a positive since they weren't trying to showcase that type of gameplay even though it is here. The interviews and putting together cases and evidence are the focal points. I think L.A. Noire is still a fun unique experience even if you've never played before.

bought this back when it came out for the ps3 and got up to homicide before gradually losing grip on it as usually happens when i get really into a game for a hot minute. decided to come back to it last summer though and was immensely rewarded for that. while at times it is still incredibly frustrating due to the early tech being somewhat hard to read, and the updated button prompts during investigation still being somewhat obtuse as to what cole is actually going to say, once you get lost in it there’s very few experiences like it. the game creates such a richly detailed portrayal of the noir film genre, at times really playing like the game version of something like sunset boulevard, double indemnity, or the maltese falcon. as a film girl myself was such a wonder to see the lovingly recreated intolerance set and bombing down hollywood boulevard in these classic cars, hearing the jazzy score that feels ripped straight from the 1940s, it’s a remarkable vibe even if the world itself is maybe a little less developed than one would expect from rockstar.

what really pushes this over the edge and makes it a near masterpiece (other than the very novel detective work gameplay loop) is it’s characters and story. i don’t want to go too in depth as this is obviously a game that rests upon its mystery, but if you’ve seen noir films from the time period you’ll know somewhat what to expect. bad people committing heinous acts only to be stopped by slightly less bad people working for a corrupt system. it’s a game fundamentally about the loss of america’s innocence (if it even had one in the first place) after the second world war, tons of broken men coming back to a country completely different from the one they left, struggling to survive in a world just as harsh as the war zones they just left. it’s also got a ton of other ideas floating around, like the manipulation of the mental health industry, the corruption of institutions meant to protect the people, the systemic racism perpetrated by those institutions, and all framed by cole himself, a character that though being played by the player, has an interior life completely unknown to us, parcelled out piecemeal over the course of the game but for me remaining as mysterious as a cold case

meus casos favoritos nesse game foram o serial killer com nome Black Dahlia, muito foda todo o enredo e como o assassino se preparava pra matar as vitimas e ainda colocar alguem como bucha de canhão pra ser preso no lugar dele, o arco desse caso e bem fechadinho e bem desenvolvido até, um prato cheio pra quem ama true crime.
Meu segundo caso favorito foi o The White Shoe Slaying, a lore do caso e bem crivel, pra uma mulher isso aqui e um pesadelo diario e nos mostra que homens são muito privilegiados na sociedade, mas o que faz esse ser um caso marcante e o uso da fotografia e ambientação, aquele clima chuvoso, cinza e nublado o tempo inteiro contribui um cenario muito bonito e ao mesmo tempo triste, aquele lugar urbano que não tem espaço pra liberdade ou segurança pública.
jogar la noire pela história vai ter satisfazer bem por vários momentos, mas as mecanicas de direção de veiculos, gunplay e acessibilidade podem te irritar ao extremo ao ponto de vc largar o game, investiram pesado na tecnologia de expressão facial pra no final isso não ajudar ninguem a resolver o caso ou perceber quem está mentindo ou falando a verdade.
o final é meio meh, um pouco esquecivel e jogado na trama

It's very rough around the edges but I can't help but enjoy it. Despite all the stupid facial animations, awkward and sometimes random evidence needed to progress, the weird ending. The experience overall was really special and cohesive.

Phelps is a great but flawed protagonist, which I prefer as it gives the character a form of complexity. And you're not always sure what to think of him. All of your partners are likable (except Roy) and each case has tons of memorable characters. There were a lot of just complicated and thought provoking moments where I was just sitting there trying to find the right evidence I needed and I felt really in the moment trying to figure out the mystery. There's lots of intense moments and really awesome vocal performances from everyone.

Some gripes. The open world is not great and does not really add much to the game. The collectibles SUCK. Why even put them in if you can't do anything with them? Collecting the cars is fine. But why the film reels? Just don't bother by that point.

The switch port is ok, but it can be choppy with some bugs. In general the gameplay is simple: gunplay is nothing crazy with basic shooting and cover systems. A lot of the chases have awful rubber banding once you notice it. It is impossible not to once you see it.

Still, a very unique title from Rockstar that could have been expanded on more. But I think it's still a great time on its own.

Love the Noir style of this game, especially with the detective aspect when playing as Cole.

I do admit the game does get a bit repetitive when it comes to:

- Go to a location with your partner and hear witty or funny or normal dialogue between Cole and his assigned partner.

- Find evidence

- Interrogiate Witness or Suspect and make sure to respond correctly depending on how bad the motion capture actors face is acting (since they needed to make the game somewhat easy for people to tell when someone is lying)

- Go to different Points of Interest for the case finding more evidence and interrogating more people.

- Get into a shoot out at the end or go to the station and interrogate the main suspect and determine whether to pin the murders, arson, etc on them.


Overall the gameplays repetitive but does a fantastic job at nailing the overall NOIR estethic, but that's also do to the amazing writing Rockstar incorporated here.

The game doesn't treat the character of Cole Phleps like a hero, in fact Cole does things that are outside the players control that makes you question Cole's ethics, along with the LAPD.

The City of LA is full of life in terms of how if Rockstar really wanted to, it could create actual United States location for modern GTA instead of making caricatures of the states they present. (I know GTA is about making fun of how Americans and the States act in an over the top way, just saying that Rockstar can do that while also making the states accurate looking like they did here in LA NOIRE). The city itself visually is amazing, though lacking since you barely do anything for the most part, I mean if it's not going from point A to Point B during story missions, occassionally you'll do side missions that are usually either: shooting a bunch of dudes after a cutscene plays, or chasing after people in a car until you crash into them, or some timed event crashes into them prompting Cole to arrest them.



I do wish the game expanded on some characters more than others. I think a big thing that's missing is Cole's family not being present or important enough to actually show is just weird, considering what happens towards the climax of the game, I feel like they should've played a bigger part in terms of forming who Cole is.

I think the game did an awesome job when it makes you play as Kelso for a couple of segments during the final part of the game, just wish the game would've done it early, I understand it's Cole's story, just would've been nicer if it was an idea introduced earlier on in the game of switching between Cole and Kelso.


I think the biggest thing that Rockstar got right... and wrong is the ending. I think most people will say "for anything, an ending is really hard to make everyone happy," and while this statement is true, a way to midigate that is by having multiple endings so that it has avenues of satisfaction among all aspects, even if 1 might be the CANONICAL ending.
The ending in terms of the case is amazing and is based off a real life case that never got resolved. Rockstar esthetically got the ending write in terms of it being a somber and melancholic ending of... the Bad Guys winning.
And while the game is attempting to respect the painfulness of reality, I do wish in some way Rockstar had added a second ending if certain conditions were met that somehow led to a happy ending. While many would say "but it would ruin the point of the game being Noire and there are no happy endings in Noire," I feel like 1 big thing many agree on is that the game leaves the player disatisfied, especially with all the work you as the player put in....

But there is a genius of the ending sort of being a punishment to Cole and the player for just locking whoever up. As in the game there is a constant murder going on that takes a couple of cases to find out who really is the culprit... and you see how the L.A.P.D. even with Cole finding at best circumstancial evidence, but still resulting in innocent people (though some of them still awful monsters) being locked up because the L.A.P.D. can't be asked to actually do their job.
And when the real murder is found, because he's the son of a high ranking politician they decide to cover it all out, and let out the imprisoned innocents as if it's all water under the bridge.
In a way I see the genius of the ending, as Cole, while spouting things like "Justice and Honor" really just looked a things at face value and just did things as a puppet to the L.A.P.D. instead of seeking true justice, which in a way is sort of a self reflection.

I don't know maybe I'm thinking too much into it.

Still for what it's worth, it's a game I recommend you all experience once, since In my opinion it's a great 1-Time experience.