Junior Adventurer's Guild - April: Alpha Protocol

[Anon]

I voted for it because of what others said, but I couldn't even get it working.

Then tell us the issues so people can try to help you fix them?

[ArcaneLurker]

I voted for it because of what others said, but I couldn't even get it working.

Then tell us the issues so people can try to help you fix them?

Really important that you make me suffer help me to enjoy playing it too, huh?
The exe of the version I downloaded didn't work at all.

[Oyster Sauce]

I voted for it because of what others said, but I couldn't even get it working.

Then tell us the issues so people can try to help you fix them?

Really important that you make me suffer help me to enjoy playing it too, huh?
The exe of the version I downloaded didn't work at all.

Did you use the latest GOG release?

[ArcaneLurker]

Then tell us the issues so people can try to help you fix them?

Really important that you make me suffer help me to enjoy playing it too, huh?
The exe of the version I downloaded didn't work at all.

Did you use the latest GOG release?

I was planning to, then GOG-games shut down-- but now I see that it's back up...
I'll try that one instead now.

[boot]

I... cannot participate at this time, sadly. Song for you to listen to before operating.

[Watser]

We're now halfway through the month. Give me a status update @Irenaeus @The_Mask @gerey @BobT @Nemesis @boot @Watser @ArcaneLurker
You better all be Protocoling right now.

We're only two weekends into April, and the weekends where I've had time for gaming I have spent on legend of amberland (which I am also far from completion).

[The_Mask]

We're now halfway through the month. Give me a status update @Irenaeus @The_Mask @gerey @BobT @Nemesis @boot @Watser @ArcaneLurker
You better all be Protocoling right now.

I've barely started, because I'm being fickle and I had stuff happen irl. But I'm going to focus on this for the next half of the month. <3

[Anon]

I voted for it because of what others said, but I couldn't even get it working.

Then tell us the issues so people can try to help you fix them?

Really important that you make me suffer help me to enjoy playing it too, huh?
The exe of the version I downloaded didn't work at all.

Not "too" because I'm not playing this crap, but since you voted for it you gotta at least try imho

[WhiteShark]

Not "too" because I'm not playing this crap, but since you voted for it you gotta at least try imho

Play it.

[Anon]

I promise I'll try to give it at least 1 more hour of gameplay as a 2nd chance

[Oyster Sauce]

I promise I'll try to give it at least 1 more hour of gameplay as a 2nd chance

I didn't think it was great but I was glad to finally beat it after so many years of meaning to. No regerts.

[Anon]

I promise I'll try to give it at least 1 more hour of gameplay as a 2nd chance

I didn't think it was great

I'll still play despite your numerous attempts to discourage me further of doing so

[wndrbr]

Forced myself to stop being professional and started deliberately pissing people off. Decided to make Marburg my first victim, the conversation is pretty amusing if you keep picking suave options.

[wndrbr]

Dang, I picked EVERY line that would've pissed Marburg off, yet he still refused to fight me and ran away like a coward during our confrontation in Rome. I was at -5 disposition.

[Anon]

A game where you can't know what your character will actually say having dialogue being ultimately useless? Color me surprised!

[J1M]

I had forgotten just how clunky Alpha Protocol is in nearly all aspects.

It came out after Metal Gear Solid 1 (and 2, and 3), and after Splinter Cell games, a bunch of Hitman games etc., yet Obsidian apparently failed to learn anything from those. The itemization is also horrible, as is the map design, which is mostly just corridors connecting you to the next arena.

And it's a pity too, the reactivity is great, I just wish they had put as much effort into the gameplay itself. All they needed to do was copy Chaos Theory for the gameplay, and then add the branching narrative on top. I'd hazard and say that PS1 Syphon Filter plays better.

Then again, it feels like a game from another dimension nowadays - protagonist is white, heterosexual and male (you can only give him a tan at worst) and all the women are good-looking.

Does prioritizing those things over reactivity prove publishers right or just make the people whinging about such things out themselves as mainstream consumers?

[Oyster Sauce]

A game where you can't know what your character will actually say having dialogue being ultimately useless? Color me surprised!

You make an educated guess on which stance appeals to a person and then generally stick to it once you see the number go up. There are a few curveballs but otherwise it's pretty much what you'd expect.

[Anon]

A game where you can't know what your character will actually say having dialogue being ultimately useless? Color me surprised!

You make an educated guess on which stance appeals to a person and then generally stick to it once you see the number go up. There are a few curveballs but otherwise it's pretty much what you'd expect.

Many times I've seen my character say something that feels unexpected considering the stance I've chosen. I remember choosing aggressive option and him not being aggressive. Choosing sarcastic option and him not being sarcastic etc

[wndrbr]

A game where you can't know what your character will actually say having dialogue being ultimately useless? Color me surprised!

it's not useless, I know for a fact that you can piss that guy off to the point of him fighting you to death. It's just that he wasn't pissed off enough, I needed a lower level of disposition than -5.

[rusty_shackleford]

only reason people like seeing the dialogue before their character says it is because it makes them feel smart, as if they came up with the dialogue
dialogue in RPGs was a mistake

[Oyster Sauce]

only reason people like seeing the dialogue before their character says it is because it makes them feel smart, as if they came up with the dialogue
dialogue in RPGs was a mistake

Aggressive

[Vergil]

only reason people like seeing the dialogue before their character says it is because it makes them feel smart, as if they came up with the dialogue
dialogue in RPGs was a mistake

[rusty_shackleford]

only reason people like seeing the dialogue before their character says it is because it makes them feel smart, as if they came up with the dialogue
dialogue in RPGs was a mistake

You know when that pops up that you're going to be doing something badass. It's the badass button, every game needs it.

[Vergil]

only reason people like seeing the dialogue before their character says it is because it makes them feel smart, as if they came up with the dialogue
dialogue in RPGs was a mistake

You know when that pops up that you're going to be doing something badass. It's the badass button, every game needs it.

Make example of him.

[wndrbr]

only reason people like seeing the dialogue before their character says it is because it makes them feel smart, as if they came up with the dialogue
dialogue in RPGs was a mistake

You know when that pops up that you're going to be doing something badass. It's the badass button, every game needs it.

[gerey]

Dang, I picked EVERY line that would've pissed Marburg off, yet he still refused to fight me and ran away like a coward during our confrontation in Rome. I was at -5 disposition.

Apparently you need to make him like you. He did fight me, but I was at "trusted" with him - which consisted of me activating chainshot and putting five bullets in his head, ending the fight in seconds. He still managed to run away despite five bullets lodged in his cranium.

Got to Taipei - hopefully there's not much more of the game to suffer through.

The game is still a miserable slog. Out of all the issues, the lack of alternative approaches is really what ultimately kills the game. Regardless of your choices, skills, perks, equipment et al, the game will always play like a popamole third-person shooter.

My guess is that Obsidian blew what limited budget they had for the game on the voice acting, the hole they dug for themselves by going with a timed "cinematic" approach, leaving very little for actual gameplay. Instead of playing like a Splinter Cell or Hitman, it instead plays like a very clunky, bland third-person shooter.

[wndrbr]

Dang, I picked EVERY line that would've pissed Marburg off, yet he still refused to fight me and ran away like a coward during our confrontation in Rome. I was at -5 disposition.

Apparently you need to make him like you. He did fight me, but I was at "trusted" with him - which consisted of me activating chainshot and putting five bullets in his head, ending the fight in seconds. He still managed to run away despite five bullets lodged in his cranium.

nah, that's what usually happens when he likes or or doesn't hate you enough. If he really hates Thorton, he will stay after the mid-fight cutscene and fight you til the bitter end. And you get his unique pistol as a reward.

[wndrbr]

When I played the game for the first time ages ago, my Thorton was a polite, calculating, cool as cucumber professional who spared most of his enemies and eventually took Halbech's deal.

This time around I managed to break free from the usual politeness. Pissed off everyone I could except for Steven Heck, killed everybody, shot Leland in the eye. Left the island alone.

[gerey]

Finally finished this game.

The best I can say for it, at least when it comes to the narrative, is that it is experimental. The rest of the game, however, ranges from undercooked to raw and rotten.

The last mission pissed me off like no game has in a long while. Whose genius idea was it to subject the player to three boss fights (two of which are beyond broken) in a row? For Darcy I had to resort to hiding in a nook between a container and the wall next to his tower and sniping him with the pistol, and the helicopter was like pulling teeth. The third fight was a joke in comparison, just hiding behind a pillar and shooting with the pistol from cover.

As others have said, Obsidian has somehow managed to make a worse dialogue wheel than what BioWare came up. It's interesting in theory, but in practice I never felt like I was in control of any conversation, and getting people to like or dislike you was either far too easy (just stick to one "stance") or torturously opaque. The game also doesn't do a good job of explaining what benefits there are to making people angry at you, so you're not really incentivized to do so.

I liked the perk system, though the perks themselves are the usual minuscule percentage boosts that you can hardly tell does anything. It would have been preferable to have less of them, but having more of an impact, or have ones with more unique effects.

The moment-to-moment gameplay is also awful. Obsidian really had no excuse other than incompetence to have the game released in 2010 to play this badly, not after all the various stealth and third-person shooters released before it figured out what mechanics do and don't work. Everything is clunky, from the movement, to the shooting, to the skills can use, to the gadgets. The stealth is as rudimentary as it can get - which is doubly insulting in a world where Splinter Cell existed.

The map design is the biggest offender by far - all the maps are painfully linear and restrictive, the game practically forcing you to play it as a corridor shooter. And since there's almost no penalties or worthwhile rewards for sneaking around, you're just better off gunning everything in your way down to not subject yourself to the game more than necessary. The way the maps are designed makes stealth, laying traps and, really, anything other than shooting your way through pointless. There's no experimentation because there are no alternative routes.

And on the topic of the gadgets, there's really nothing interesting to play with. The only one that isn't some form of grenade or health/buff is the sound generator, that for some unfathomable reason attracts enemies to you. I guess the idea was to isolate enemies so you can lure them into traps of kill them via stealth, but in practice it's a completely useless device. There's no audio mic to listen to enemies from afar, or the pistol attachment to shut down lights (not that you can use darkness to your advantage anyway).

Guns and their attachments barely make a difference. Just about the only useful attachment is the pistol silencer if you want to be stealthy, and you can comfortably play through the whole game with the starting weapons. Even more egregious is that all the guns feel the same in terms of handling. The armors look ugly, but at the very least there's a noticeable upgrade when going from basic to advanced.

The minigames are awful too. It's torture to suffer through them, doubly so since they're almost unplayable on a keyboard, and the game adds insult to injury by severely curtailing the number of EMP grenades you can bring on a mission with you.

The narrative is often touted as the best part of the game, but failed to hook me. I didn't care about any of the characters, or the stakes, or the various twists and revelations. The attempt to make the game as nonlinear and open as possible had serious repercussions in terms of pacing and story gravitas. While I tried different things in this playthrough compared to my first one years ago, the changes were largely cosmetic. Nothing you do actually opens up new missions or maps, so all you get from picking different choices is recontextualizing why you are doing a specific mission.

All in all, now that I've finished the game, I have no wish to replay it ever again. It's too janky, too unpolished and too dull to warrant another playthrough. The best I can say about the game is that Obsidian had the good sense to devote more resources to New Vegas.

[Oyster Sauce]

Finally finished this game.

The best I can say for it, at least when it comes to the narrative, is that it is experimental. The rest of the game, however, ranges from undercooked to raw and rotten.

The last mission pissed me off like no game has in a long while. Whose genius idea was it to subject the player to three boss fights (two of which are beyond broken) in a row? For Darcy I had to resort to hiding in a nook between a container and the wall next to his tower and sniping him with the pistol, and the helicopter was like pulling teeth. The third fight was a joke in comparison, just hiding behind a pillar and shooting with the pistol from cover.

As others have said, Obsidian has somehow managed to make a worse dialogue wheel than what BioWare came up. It's interesting in theory, but in practice I never felt like I was in control of any conversation, and getting people to like or dislike you was either far too easy (just stick to one "stance") or torturously opaque. The game also doesn't do a good job of explaining what benefits there are to making people angry at you, so you're not really incentivized to do so.

I liked the perk system, though the perks themselves are the usual minuscule percentage boosts that you can hardly tell does anything. It would have been preferable to have less of them, but having more of an impact, or have ones with more unique effects.

The moment-to-moment gameplay is also awful. Obsidian really had no excuse other than incompetence to have the game released in 2010 to play this badly, not after all the various stealth and third-person shooters released before it figured out what mechanics do and don't work. Everything is clunky, from the movement, to the shooting, to the skills can use, to the gadgets. The stealth is as rudimentary as it can get - which is doubly insulting in a world where Splinter Cell existed.

The map design is the biggest offender by far - all the maps are painfully linear and restrictive, the game practically forcing you to play it as a corridor shooter. And since there's almost no penalties or worthwhile rewards for sneaking around, you're just better off gunning everything in your way down to not subject yourself to the game more than necessary.

And on the topic of the gadgets, there's really nothing interesting to play with. The only one that isn't some form of grenade or health/buff is the sound generator, that for some unfathomable reason attracts enemies to you. I guess the idea was to isolate enemies so you can lure them into traps of kill them via stealth, but in practice it's a completely useless device. There's no audio mic to listen to enemies from afar, or the pistol attachment to shut down lights (not that you can use darkness to your advantage anyway).

Guns and their attachments barely make a difference. Just about the only useful attachment is the pistol silencer if you want to be stealthy, and you can comfortably play through the whole game with the starting weapons. Even more egregious is that all the guns feel the same in terms of handling. The armors look ugly, but at the very least there's a noticeable upgrade when going from basic to advanced.

The minigames are awful too. It's torture to suffer through them, doubly so since they're almost unplayable on a keyboard, and the game adds insult to injury by severely curtailing the number of EMP grenades you can bring on a mission with you.

The narrative is often touted as the best part of the game, but failed to hook me. I didn't care about any of the characters, or the stakes, or the various twists and revelations. The attempt to make the game as nonlinear and open as possible had serious repercussions in terms of pacing and story gravitas. While I tried different things in this playthrough compared to my first one years ago, the changes were largely cosmetic. Nothing you do actually opens up new missions or maps, so all you get from picking different choices is recontextualizing why you are doing a specific mission.

All in all, now that I've finished the game, I have no wish to replay it ever again. It's too janky, too unpolished and too dull to warrant another playthrough. The best I can say about the game is that Obsidian had the good sense to devote more resources to New Vegas.

I agree with most of this but I am going to have to force you to launch it again to get a screenshot of your guy