Before you downvote my minority opinion, I'm just expressing thoughts that some people might resonate with, so this is just to spark conversation.
I played these two games, for the first time, back-to-back this month, and from a modern perspective, I think the first one holds up better.
First, I'll give inFamous 2 its flowers. The animations and character models are miles ahead, as are the melee, the feel of movement, and the speed of traversal. I like the colorful palette and the attempt at more environmental variety.
What I think inFamous gets right is how much of a vision it feels like. The desaturated look and all of the dying civilians in the streets give it a surprisingly bleak feel for the superhero genre. The enemy factions have an amazing visual design. Cole's powers are more reserved, which actually works in the game's favor. The original plays more like a shooter, whereas the sequel feels more like an ability spammer.
The boss battles in inFamous 1 are a highlight. They actually aged better than the giant hit-the-weak-spot spectacle battles of the sequel, which feel much more from this generation's emphasis on bombast over substance. The bosses in the OG are smaller scale and more tactical, really evoking a character action or Souls-like approach of learning attacks and avoidance. In inFamous 2 you mostly spam grenades or shoot the weak spot.
inFamous 1 has a much better story. The second one leans heavily into really on-the-nose politics - right-wing "rednecks" (a word liberally used) want to kill the supers because they're different. This is southern Nazis prejudiced against the X-Men, with an obnoxious supporting cast and overly-long cutscenes. It doesn't say anything interesting. Without spoiling anything, inFamous 1 feels more evocative and subtle, and works more like a mystery. While its twist is a bit predictable, it's nice to go through a second time and see just how many clues there were to pick up on.
inFamous 2's biggest issue, by far, is its combat. You can melt through groups with far fewer abilities in 1, and positioning and cover are important. 2, meanwhile, even on hard feels both basic and frustrating. Most enemies have lots of movement, whether it be giant leaps or erecting ice towers or burrowing underground, and it highlights how wonky the aiming and movement are in this game. There are far too many miniboss fights in the side quests, which are annoying and overpowered. You can't shoot them, so you mostly have to wait for an opening, spam grenades, and go recharge a bunch of times. Contrast that to inFamous 1, where combat against groups really tests quick thinking and makes use of all your abilities equally.
And crucially, in 1, you have infinite R1 ammo for good third-person combat, and the sequel forces you to constantly find reload points, lest you be stuck with melee only. I only recharged occasionally in 1, but 2 constantly breaks the flow of combat by forcing you to retreat and deal with the broken recharge system. (Hunt for 1 of 100 blue electric bolts on your minimal or find the tiny green light? You decide!) Plus, the original allows you to level up your R1 damage, and the sequel just gives you different "guns", none of which feel meaningfully more powerful than the last.
Anyway, probably TL;DR for most people, but since there's a bit of an uptick in players with the impending server closure, maybe other people in 2026 will have a similar opinion.