Sucker Punch delivered a superhero thrill ride not once, but twice on the PS3 with Infamous as well as its sequel. Although another installment was released on the PS4 with Infamous: Second Son back in 2014, the series has since gone dormant, without as much as a peep from Sony regarding another game. Sucker Punch may be busy with its hugely successful Ghost of Tsushima franchise, but many players feel that the Infamous series still has untapped potential for more material.
Sony doesn't intend to retire any IP for good, so there is a chance that Infamous can make a return at some point on the PlayStation 5 or beyond. If and when it does make a comeback, the natural expectation would be for a wild set of abilities being made available for players to live out superhero power fantasies. Electricity has already been showcased to a great degree and Infamous: Second Son introduced new powers of its own, but a new game should make good use of other elements to keep the experience fresh and exciting.
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One element sure to turn up the heat is fire, a power commonly used in many games to spice up the player's available arsenal. From the Fire Arrows in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time to the Pyromancer build in Outriders, fire is a destructive force of nature that truly embodies a sense of sheer power and unbridled chaos. If a new Infamous game were to add in the ability to set entire locations ablaze with just a few blasts of flame, it would surely be a sight to behold and hugely satisfying experience for any potential pyromaniacs holding a controller.
Cooling things down a bit, water would serve as a nice compliment to a fire power-up. The player could summon massive tidal waves to take down multiple enemies at once or blast into the air with a huge geyser beneath them. A catch to the power could be that close proximity to pools of water is necessary in order to fully maximize the skill, adding in a layer of strategy and even providing an opportunity for new locations near rivers and oceans. Infamous 2 already included ice, so it wouldn't be a stretch to melt things down and make use of good old H2O. For added fun, combining water and fire attacks can create huge bursts of steam, providing a blanket of cover for the player to escape tense encounters.
Every Infamous game thus far have made good use of impressive destruction physics in terms of how objects and debris soar across a raging battlefield. Considering there is so much metal scrap, vehicles and other trinkets always flying about, why not add in the ability to manipulate these items at will with the power of magnetism. A good source of inspiration for how to represent this skill is present within the X-Men's archenemy Magneto, who is able to transform any metal object in his proximity into a deadly tool against an enemy. The PS5's Unreal Engine tech demo showcased the console's capacity to have hundreds of moving parts on-screen at once, making the concept of tearing apart an entire city street with the push of a button all the more possible.
The Infamous series' morality system has been a main gameplay mechanic since its first installment back in 2009. The general idea is that depending on the player's behavior, the character slowly leans more towards being a hero or villain, and changes how the public in the game world generally perceives them. So why not take this concept literally and provide gamers with both light and dark attacks to compliment this morality system. To once again add another catch, the player is only able to acquire one of the contrasting powers per playthrough, adding more choice to how the game progresses.
No New Infamous game is known to be in development.
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