Staring down at the city from twenty floors up, my eyes were transfixed on the messenger, studying his every move, ensuring he never leave my sight. While he was stalling, I soared into the air and landed on an electrical pole closer to him. I lifted my hands slightly and leeched the electricity from the pole, eyes never leaving the messenger, not even once. I leapt from pole to pole, staying well above him. The messenger knew he was being followed; he kept turning around. Soon, he reached his destination, a dreary looking street, where he passed a letter to a couple of armed baddies and I was given the green light to take all of them down.

I zapped and fried the messenger with a blinding blue bolt of lightning before he could make an escape and sent a shockwave to the two baddies, leaving them crashing on the ground, hurt. They must have called for reinforcements, before long, I was surrounded by a small army of masked armed gunmen, all wanting to take me down.

Released on May 26th, the development team at Sucker Punch studios has created one of the PS3-exclusive titles that will surely vie for the exclusive Game of the Year title for 2009 in inFamous. Playing as Cole McGrath, you start off as a small time bike messenger. While delivering a package on a normal day, a package that turned out to be a mysterious bomb that triggers off and leaving Empire City into a state of anarchy mess, Cole somehow manages to survive the blast, and picks up the ability to control electricity. With the city quickly becoming chaotic, Cole has no choice but to step up and bring some order to the massive chaos.

While the premise is much like any comic books or graphic novels today, much more can be said of the gameplay. Though sandbox styled games are quickly capturing the gaming industry market today like Grand Theft Auto 4, Saints Row 2 and the much familiar Prototype, inFamous is more of a cross between the heroic (or anti-heroic) Spiderman and the gritty nature of GTA4.

The beauty in inFamous is whatever Cole does in the game, it affects the overall outcome of the game. Injure civilians, ruin monuments, become a menace to the city and your electricity turns a crimson red. Cole can only learn a set of powers that are aligned to the evil side and even when you are defending the city against onslaughts of evil henchmen, the city’s inhabitants will still look unfavourably upon you and throw stones and call you names. Heal civilians, protect the city’s properties and your electricity powers will turn a shade of bright blue, you will have a set of powers that are aligned to being good and people will stop and cheer you on, even throwing rocks at enemies whenever they see you.

Being good or bad not only affects Cole visually with different coloured powers but choosing either path will lead with slightly different storylines and entirely different endings. This gives inFamous the replayability factor, once you have completed Cole the anti-hero, you will surely want to see the ending to Cole the hero.

The graphics in this game can be described as nothing less than stunning. The buildings in Empire City are intricately designed and there are always items around the city that are destructible and look awesome when they are smashed like cars, benches and lampposts. The sound effects and music that are tied into the game gel in well together and sets a brooding, yet urban quality feel in the game.

Overall, Sucker Punch studios has developed an ultimate gem of a game, my vote goes to inFamous as my favorite PS 3 game of the year, hands down.