As the war hero and up-and-coming police officer Cole Phelps, L.A. Noire’s story and premise are focused around Phelps’s disposition to be the best he can. You start your time with the Los Angeles police department as just your run-of-the-mill street cop, but your penchant for leadership quickly has you moving up through the ranks to detective. Once the rank of detective is met, L.A. Noire’s story really begins to take shape. Each case in the game, of which there are roughly 20, is its own contained story. As Phelps works his way up from the traffic desk, to homicide detective, landing a spot on the vice squad and eventually duty as an arson investigator, plot threads from each case begin to tie the games narrative together into one cohesive, excellently told experience.

Let me just say L.A. Noire might have single-handily set the bar for storytelling in a game. Rockstar has always been one of the best in the business for delivering Hollywood rivaling cinematic in their games, but the level L.A. Noire takes the art form, with its ground breaking performance capturing technology known as MotionScan is unparalleled. Over 400 faces were painstakingly captured, breathing life into one of Rockstar’s most vivid landscapes ever. Having spent many times in the confines of downtown LA. (something I’m not looking forward to at E3 next month) recognizing landmarks like Angels Flight railway and cruising Figueroa street without all the traffic and congestion (and riots form Lakers fans) made me feel part of a game world like never before.

The level of immersion created from Team Bondi’s attention to detail in L.A. Noire’s world bleeds into every aspect of the game. As the LAPD’s finest new detective, every crime scene and case boils down to investigating each area and searching for clues to help solve the case. This is just one part of L.A. Noire's unique gameplay twists to the open world experience. As you sort through each crime scene, musical and force feedback cues will tell you when you are on the right track. When all pertinent information is gathered, the music fades out letting you know it’s time to move forward. The evidence collected is then used in interrogating witnesses and suspects (L.A. Noire's main hook) to unravel the conspiracies behind each case. Not only do you need to make sure all evidence is found to help build the correct dialog paths when interviewing a character, but being able to read the subtle nuances in each person’s face or body language to know when someone is lying, telling the truth, or just plain beating around the bush becomes a crucial part in building a solid case. This is where the MotionScan technology truly shines. Every character has their tells, from shifty glances to facial tics, and having a keen eye for picking up on these details becomes key for breaking cases.

It can be hard, especially later in the game when the criminals are way more professional, knowing when to accuse someone of lying or possibly what evidence to throw at them to get the answer needed, but failing at times adds a more flawed and human aspect to Cole Phelps character. Wrong answers will lead to certain dialog paths not becoming open and may lead to charging the wrong suspect in a case when there are multiple suspects, but this won’t necessarily result in a Game Over screen. Instead, Phelps and his partner will have to go work some street crimes to earn back a little respect from their superiors until the next case is unlocked.

To help get through the tough questioning, Phelps possesses a special detective mechanic known as “Intuition” which narrows down the chances of choosing the wrong dialog path in a conversation. Depending on whether you are connected to XBLA or PSN, Intuition works in one of two ways; when offline it deletes one of the choices leaving a 50/50 chance  to make the right call, though if connected online, an option to ask the community (players who've already gone through the case) for help becomes available. Asking the community is a creative way for figuring out what the correct path is as it uses the percentages of what people chose in the same situation before and what the overall percentage of people who made the right choice is. It can also be used to show what the correct piece of evidence to use in an accusation is. Intuition is not unlimited though, which keeps the detective work challenging.

Luckily L.A. Noire is not just an evidence gathering, face reading game--if it was... well I don’t think I’d be still going on about it. Team Bondi masterfully embeds thrilling Hollywood action moments during each case. Chasing down suspects over walls and across roof tops never felt better. Fist fights and shootouts are all executed with the polish that has become expected from a Rockstar epic. Phelps is a by-the-book kind of cop, but that doesn’t mean he’s afraid to take down any criminal threatening his livelihood. By the time the credits roll Phelps will have amassed quite the body count. It’s the blending of Rockstar’s staple action with the freshness of working the detective beat that makes L.A. Noire so special.

And how can I forgot the driving/traversing of LA. While the car controls are adequate (I drive like a maniac personally, running into almost everything) paying attention to the road is crucial for landing a five-star rating on any case. This is not GTA or Red Dead, and Phelps is not rewarded for raining chaos amongst the population like Niko Bellic or John Marston. Destroy property or run over a pedestrian and see your hard earned case rating dwindle down the drain. Thankfully and maybe L.A. Noire’s greatest addition is the ability to never have to drive anywhere. As impressive a sight reconstructed 1940’s LA is to see, a simple click on the city map sets a destination and a press of a button will have your partner drive to the next location for you, eliminating the tediousness of traveling cross city, which can often be a crux in open world games.

Like Rockstar’s other open world games, L.A. Noire offers myriad distractions during the middle of any case to let players roam the massive LA landscape. These other distractions help build rank needed to unlock more uses of the helpful Intuition skill, but can also unlock some dapper new suites to strut around town in. Ranging from finding hidden rides and golden film reels, to sightseeing and busting the occasional street crime there is plenty to do for the collection enthusiast. Street crimes will be announced over a police car radio when cruising the locals and provide even more exciting action sequences. White knuckle car chases, exhilarating on foot escapades, to straight out blowing away thugs trying to rob banks. Each mini-case fleshes out LA’s seedy crime underbelly. These cases also help break up the serious nature of L.A. Noire’s main narrative. One memorable case, chasing down a peeping Tom, had me laughing for hours.