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 Hear ye, hear ye! The miserable tyrant that was Killzone the First is dead, long so. Their reign threatened to grind nine-gear crow and myself to a pulp. Wretched were they, let us never speak of them again lest their shadow darken our halls. Wee Killzone the Liberator sought to redeem this series but despite a fine showing, could raise no bannermen. The call of the PlayStation Portable is such cheap tin to many an ear. Brave Killzone the Second, may their Golden Age long be remembered, endured much to become one of legend. Yet sadly, all good things must come to an end. Their successor, Killzone the Third was fine. Just, you know. Fine. I like the forest level. But their rule, fine as it was, too came to an end. The PS3 Dynasty is long over and new factions vie for the throne... the Killzthrone. There are two new royal bloodlines to contend with: Killzone the Fallen Shadow of the PS4 Dynasty, and its wayward cousin, Killzone the Mercenary of the King of All Consoles, the PlayStation Vita TV. At first it was believéd that only the PS3 trilogy would be completed, yet crow and I, foolish youth we once were, took it upon ourselves to attempt and chronicle this new royal order. We had not the energy for such a task... Now, plagued with gout, our humours out of sorts, we seek to purge ourselves of this task. To do so, we must complete these LPs. Then and only then, shall we be free.   It sucks having these two games hang over our heads! We were so close to the finish line. The largest reason for not completing them in the last thread is because I moved to a smaller place with several roommates. I no longer have anywhere to record. I'm against spending money to rent an empty room to go do group commentary, but I've found a solution: Sorry, Shadow Fall. If you never get done, I don't really care, hahaha. Welcome to Killzone: Mercenary!   S P O I L E R ! P O L I C Y ! There ain't one! Spoil away. Mercenary takes place during Killzone 1, Liberation, and 2 anyways so there'll be a lot of old plot points going on in the background as we do our special ops mercenary thing. This going to be a solo VLP of Killzone: Mercenary. Less goofy co-commentary shenanigans, but I really appreciate this game and want to share it with all those poor souls who don't own a PlayStation Vita TV. It's me and the lads! Its style has been influenced was influenced by some awesome Cinema Discusso threads a few years back that used a running commentary style of reviewing: Kyle Hyde's American Psycho thread and Terry van Feleday's Transformers threads. That said, lets' Continue To Needlessly Complicate The Killzone Franchise and see if we can't figure out:              Sally fucked around with this message at 07:29 on Sep 15, 2021 |
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Oct 19, 2020 05:04
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Welcome back to the best Killzone! (Remember, it's only available for the PS Vita TV, the King of all consoles.) Why is it the greatest of the series? It throws away any and all pretenses about some serious war drama dealing with honour and revenge. Here you play as an rear end in a top hat mercenary only concerned with those sweet, sweet Vektan dollars. You'll fight for whoever pays the most, Helghast or ISA, and gameplay is incentivized in such a way to encourage you to kill people as quickly and efficiently as possible. Every kill gets added to the bill! And when you cash out you get to buy more and more sweet gadgets, turning you into the most murderous, Geneva Convention-defying, douche-bag James Bond to ever exist in the Killzone universe. Best of all, you don't have to play as some rear end in a top hat from Vekta or Helghan. Naw, you get to play as an rear end in a top hat from Earth: the ORIGINAL planet of assholes. Meet Aaron Danner, Earthman Supreme:  This stupid rear end in a top hat with his loving dumbass hat and facial hair and lovely tribal sleeve tats always wearing aviators like some fucko. He's an rear end in a top hat in his concept art and he's an rear end in a top hat in game:  He's a scumbag PMC pulling the silent-protagonist schtick and he winds up being the best god-damned protagonist to have ever graced a Killzone game. gently caress. Anyways, since I've done this all before, I'm going to take this as an opportunity to edit and revise the original first post a bit. I'm going to keep the introduction as its own thing, but the Chapter 1 video will be split into two videos. Partly because the original CH1 video is nearly an hour long... So, reminder: Storytelling in Mercenary is different from other games in the series. The intro is essentially a YouTube recap of the series thusfar. And we can imagine it as being viewed by Danner himself on his FalloutTM Pip-Boy. No, really! Imagine the Vita, right?  Okay, well, it's acknowledged to an extent in-game. That is to say, when you're in the menu, or setting up a mission, or watching a briefing video, you are watching this thing on Danner's arm:  This is your With regards to this being a Vita game, don't forget through this LP that this is on a PS Vita TV, so the touchpad extras that Guerrilla Cambridge threw in to make you feel like you were actually interacting with Danner's wrist communicator are somewhat lost in translation. Take your very first action of the game for example: A finger print scanner appears on the screen. On a real Vita, you'd have to touch it yourself, starting the game with YOUR first official act as Aaron Danner. In the Vita TV, this is accomplished with a "Press X" prompt. Ah well. If you can, keep an eye out for Danner's left hand when it appears on screen. You'll see the in-game pause menu idling on the Vanguard. It's good.  The game won't actually start until you complete the scan. Your first act of the game is acknowledging that you are Aaron Danner. Or I should say, you "scan" your finger and discover that you are Aaron Danner. Surprise!  The intro is a brief history of the lead up to the First Extrasolar War right up through the events of Killzone 1 to Killzone: Liberation. Yeah, you remember Liberation? Mercenary does!  The loss of actual cutscenes kind of sucks--Guerrilla is generally pretty good at them--but I do enjoy these info dumps. There's a lot of blink-and-you'll-miss-it information here. Take this shot Alpha Centauri, for example. It lists the names of planets in the system besides Vekta and Helghan. Of note, there's Epictetus, Aeschylus, and Mefitis.
 Vektan's moons are named Fortune and Hope because of course they are.  Anyways, once the narrative kicks in, it's a pretty bare-bones retelling of the history of the conflict. A lot of detail and nuance that was in that lore website Guerrilla used to have online gets lost in favour of giving just the major story beats. Which makes sense. Aaron Danner is a merc and really doesn't need to know THAT much as long as he knows who to shoot to get sweet headshot cash bonuses. And obviously, you don't want to alienate new players with too much story overload. We do know that this whole "asserting colonial independence" thing is kinda glossing over how the Helghan Corporation wanted to play it. Remember, outside of Alpha Centauri, Earth's colonies were even further away. To reach any of those places (like, presumably, Gyre), it was important to stop at Alpha Centauri where infrastructure was set up to refuel their ships. The Heghan Corporation wanted to tax the hell out of anyone using this service so that they could set themselves up as a dominant power. To briefly re-cap what was covered back in our Killzone 2 LP, the EarthGov saw what the Helghan Corporation was up to and put a stop to it before they could go full Weyland-Yutani. Say what you will about EarthGov's draconian measures, but when it comes to saving the human race from soulless profit-seeking corporations, they at least had that right. Regardless, the CEOs of  The next series of events zoom through the rise of Visari and the tensions between Helghan and Vekta, all culminating in the Vektan invasion which kicked off the events of Killzone 1. Not much to say here, though I do appreciate the timeline at the bottom of the screen keeping track of the approximate date and the video clips from previous games that anchor Mercenary into the greater Killzone Universe. For point of reference, Mercenary will span Liberation's timeline through most of Killzone 2. Oh, and we get our first glimpse of a new non-Danner character, Sepp Harkin. He is the Vektan ambassador to Helghan. We'll see how that works out for him later on in the game.  This is a nice callback to Killzone: Liberation. Those of you who played it (besides myself; I'm looking at you, crow!) will remember Rayhoven as one of the key locations of the game, being where the Red Dust nuke was created by Evelyn Batton. Those of you who paid particularly close attention to the lore of Liberation (once again, crow, you're the only one I'm looking at), may also recognize Diortem City as one of those background detail throw away names from the map printed on the back of the Liberation box art:  Just to make sure we're all keeping track, the events of Killzone 1 take place in Northern Vekta, where Vekta City itself is. Thus, Shadow Fall also takes place in Northern Vekta. Liberation and Mercenary, the portable games, are both in Southern Vekta.  We get a call-back to Liberation's big bad, Armin Metrac, here as we meet his subordinate and our primary Helghast antagonist, Vyktor Kratek. Unlike most Helghast who follow the whole fascist space Nazi aesthetic, Kratek has gone hog-wild with the Saturday Morning cartoon super villain look, what with the weird-rear end robot skull head mask. I don't know what his loving deal is, but Kratek is a ridiculously evil caricature and seems to be loving every bit of it. I can't help but imagine other Helghast leaders giving him a wide berth because he takes his job a little too seriously. Anyways, robot-skull-head guy here briefly outlines for the viewer one of the core Helghast tenets: reclaim what was rightfully theirs. I can almost hear Visari... Then we flip to the Vektans for their take:  We've been through this before, but to recap, while the Helghast are technically trying to reclaim territory that was once theirs long ago, this really is a bullshit war of aggression on Visari's part and is basically another move to try and assert power and superiority, ultimately, over Earth. The original goal of the invasion ended with capturing the ISA's Orbital Space Defense Platform to destroy Earth's fleets, blockade them from their outer colonies, and force them into submission, leaving the population of Earth to starve to death while Helghan set up a hegemony over all colonies. Admiral Grey is just calling it as she sees it and the writing is on the walls. Sadly, with her capture, the ISA forces in Southern Vekta are in disarray, so this is where Phantom Talon Corp steps in. It's going to become a recurring theme throughout this game that the militaries of Vekta and Helghan are not competent enough to get something of critical importance done, so Earth PMCs wind up getting called in to finish the job.  And here we meet Anders Benoit, the owner and operator of Phantom Talon Corp, the third faction in the game, and Danner's employer. His attitude towards the war is somewhat less nuanced than either Kratek or Grey.  We're gonna get riiiiiiich!!   Aaran Danner was born on Earth to John and Marie Danner, and has a younger sister named Petra. His father had a job as a mineral trader which led to the family travelling around Alpha Centauri quite a bit during Danner's childhood. Sadly, his dad died in a black market deal gone wrong, leaving the teenage Danner to be the breadwinner for his mother and sister. After being caught up in black market trading himself and surviving a few run ins with the law (an assault case brought against him was dismissed), he joined the UCA still in his teens, possibly to avoid gambling debts. He wound up serving in conflicts between Earth and its middle colonies, such as in the Beta Hydri system. After a failed peace-keeping mission in 2351, termed the "Procyon Incident", Danner was dishonourably discharged from the UCA. With few options left for him, he signed on with Anders Benoit to work at Phantom Talon Corp. Considering that Danner is trained by the UCA, the most powerful army in the known universe, his training puts his skills and abilities above your common ISA and Helghast soldiers. Keep that in mind going through this game. It's not just that Aaran Danner is the protagonist, and thus a badass because he's in the player's hands, but he's on paper in-game better trained than the forces he's against. Hell yeah!  Colonel Vyktor Kratek Voiced by Nicholas Boulton, who, beyond doing "Additonal Helghast Voices" in previous Killzones, did a lot of voicework for Bioware's Mass Effect and Dragon Age series. Kratek will be the main face of the Helghast throughout Mercenary.  ISA Admiral Alex Grey was born into a military family and grew up striving to prove herself to her father and brothers. Top of her class in the Navy Academy, she wound up being appointed First Lieutenant on an ISA crusier, Solar Wind, where she went on to serve with distinction in a number of campaigns, including Delta Pavonis and Omicron Eridani, and also negotiated an end to the Arcturus Insurrection (I have no idea what the gently caress any of this is--isn't Killzone fluff great?). She saw the Second Extrasolar War on the horizon and tried to diffuse it diplomatically by sending Sepp Harkin to Helghan as Vekta's ambassador--though as we know, this gesture ultimately failed. She was in charge of the defense of Diortem, and compared to the defenses of Northern Vekta under General Vaughton, she was initially far more successful. Though as Metrac was turned loose on Southern Vekta, those defenses too fell before the massed wave infantry tactics over time. Grey shares that same weird authority role that Admiral Orlock does in Killzone 3, where she's in charge of the navy and yet is charge of ISA ground forces. But hey, with Vaughton dead and the other generals, Adams and Stratson, being horrible traitors, I guess the besieged ISA need to take whatever leader they can get. Voiced by Lucy Newman-Williams, who has done a number of small roles on shows like Doctor Who and Red Dwarf, as well as films like London Has Fallen.  Anders Benoit is another fellow Earthman. Like Danner, he was enlisted in the UCA. Unlike Danner, he was also special forces. After decades of service, he left it to become a mercenary. Alongside his fellow businessman and ex-UCA soldier, Olive Adamska, they formed the Phantom Talon Corp. Their close ties to the UCA allowed them to recruit many ex-soldiers into the PMC, as well as secure lucrative contracts on Earth. When Phantom Talon Corp became involved in corporate and colonial disputes, they wound up selling themselves to this highest bidder. While this was on point for Benoit's character, it rankled the patriotic Adamska and drove a wedge between the two. The problem solved itself when Adamska was killed in action under mysterious circumstances, leaving Benoit to be sole operator of PTC. Voiced by Corey Johnson, who did voice work for ISA soldiers in Killzone 2, and has also done a lot of work in bit roles for films, such as Hellboy, Kingsman: Secret Service, and Ex Machina. Benoit is also one of the characters who appears in the live action trailer.  Phantom Talon Corp is the biggest private military contractor currently operating in human space. Run by Anders Benoit, it has a reputation for having the best fighting force money can by, especially considering many of its soldiers are ex-UCA trained. Their slogan, "War is Our Business", is an accurate one. Phantom Talon Corp has no strong loyalty to any government or organization besides itself. Benoit, a former mercenary himself before taking control of PTC, is driven entirely by money and his brothers in arms. The Vekta-Helghan conflict is a lucrative opportunity, one that Benoit will take full advantage of, offering PTC soldiers to the highest bidder, be they Helghast or ISA. Other PMCs exist in the Killzone universe, aside from PTC. Skull Knight Enterprises is a group closely affiliated with the Helghast, often contracted to provide logistical support and intelligence. Eclipse Forces are an anti-UCN group who look to throw their support in with rebels to stir colonial unrest, making their money off of anti-Earth sentiment. We won't be crossing paths with other PMC groups, but I always like to see that care continues to be put into Killzone lore to add little details like this in the background. Also, I like that the talons in the logo are bullets.  Sepp Harkin is the Vektan ambassador to Helghan. He was sent at the behest of Admiral Grey to try and maintain peaceful relations between the two planets, but was unsuccessful in his negotiations. Unlike most Vektans, Sepp is pretty sympathetic towards your average Helghast and genuinely wants peace between the nations. Unlike most Vektans, his wife is also Helghast, so that probably helps matters. Sepp is responsible for getting the warning out to the ISA of Admiral Grey's kidnapping and location. His information has been relayed to Phantom Talon Corp who have been contracted by the ISA to retrieve Grey.  Did you catch this?  This is one of the few times we'll see reference to Jan Templar in this game. If you go back and check video, you can confirm for yourself that it's him fighting on the front lines of the invasion in Killzone 1.  You were not a big enough monster to survive the K I L L Z O N E.(It's also pretty funny, because the video is listed as "Defence of Diortem", but Templar 100% was fighting in and around Vekta City at that time.) Sally fucked around with this message at 06:45 on Apr 8, 2024 |
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Oct 19, 2020 05:06
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SCRAP THIS, We're back to regularly scheduled programming with tha whole crew. crow, Cjakes, and myself are back! Sally fucked around with this message at 03:36 on Jun 2, 2021 |
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Oct 19, 2020 05:09
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And now with gameplay footage! First thing's first, we're not Shadow Marshalls, we're mercenaries. It may be standard operating protocol to send a Shadow Marshall into a warzone on their own, but mercs work together. Here we get introduced to our AI partner, Damian Ivanov:  I like how they flash a picture of Ivanov and Danner posing for a photo. What a pair of PMC assholes. But hey, Danner's a silent protagonist so we've got to establish some background for him as a character, I suppose. Ivanov is a pretty solid dude for a merc. He's not quite the greedy sociopath Benoit has already revealed himself to be. As we get to know him, we'll see there's still some sort of moral compass. Clearly there has to be some seedy background that made Ivanov fall into a mercenary outfit, but we won't find that here. Unlike Danner, though, Ivanov is Vektan, so this mission is a bit more personal for him. The briefing screens have a lot of neat little details stuffed into them that you don't really notice on your first watch through. For example, despite being in the middle of an invasion, deep in the warzone, right where a commanding officer is, the Helghast presence is fairly light in the Hall of Justice. It isn't until the very end of the mission that their reinforcements start coming in waves and they can send in a tank, but even then it's only one. Glancing at the map here, you can see there are ISA forces currently engaged outside of the Hall of Justice--probably the very same ISA forces who have been trying but failing to rescue Admiral Grey this whole time. It's not explicitly pointed out in the briefing, but it's a nice detail. It certainly explains why everyone in the hall is just kinda bored, sitting around doing guard duty, and there's no real armour sent in to prevent your escape.  We get a neat satellite view of Pyrrhus when our unfortunately named Vektan Ambassador's clip comes on to tell us that Grey is still alive. That would mean that the river we're seeing is the Corinth, so that's a nice shout back to the first half of Killzone 2.  When we jump back to Diortem and we get the plot MacGuffin that ties together Mercenary and Shadow Fall: chemical weapons. Admiral Grey is in charge of Diortem's weapon's facility and it just so happens that they've been working on super fast-acting chemical weapons for deployment against the Helghast. Being that you're a mercenary, I love that they just gloss over this. Benoit mentions she runs the facility, you see a quick animation of a chemical payload being inserted into a missile, and the briefing moves on. The game doesn't bat an eye at the moral implications. There's no opportunity for Danner to raise his hand and say, "Uh, hold on, do we really want to be rescuing this particular person?" After all, you're a silent protagonist. And being a mercenary, your silence is your complicity.  Grabbed a shot of our Vektan "Hall of Justice" here. I like to think it's a shout out to Mad Max, what with the decay of the building and the implication that carries onto that justice system:  But it's more likely that this is a reference to DC Comics: .jpg) Considering the placement near water, the latter makes most sense. Of course the Vektans would like to think of themselves as superheroes, right?  Anyways, the game starts out in a building a few blocks from the Hall of Justice. This small area serves at a tutorial for some of the game's mechanics. It even has the HUD disabled so that the map doesn't disorientate new players--I guess? Or maybe they wanted one less area to have to render a map for? Regardless. After some stabbing and shooting and climbing, we are introduced to the best character in the game. A box. Well, it's who talks to us remotely while we're rummaging through the box that is most important, but still. Meet Blackjack! This guy appears everywhere. Seriously, he has saturated every inch of every active warzone with dozens of his loving boxes. How did he do it? Who knows! Why didn't we notice them in previous Killzone games? Who cares! It's great for Danner, though, because it means we can always be spending our sweet cash on sweeter weapons. Every time you come across one of his boxes I recommend you pop one open. He has a pithy comment for just about every one. A lot of the time it's just some crack about guns and making money, but as you get further in a mission he'll start commenting directly on what Danner is doing.  Blackjack is well informed. VERY well informed. He probably has tracking devices in everything he sells to Danner. He certainly is keeping abreast of high level ISA, Helghast, and Phantom Talon officials. Every once in a while he'll comment on something that he really shouldn't know about. It isn't Danner confiding in him, no--not our silent chunk of Earthman! Blackjack just knows things. It makes for an interesting gameplay dynamic, because when you are shopping you really shut out the world. It's funny that they bother to explain it away with a cloaking device so that we can pretend the rest of the world is continuing on, but really, this is effectively a pause in gameplay. Whatever Blackjack may want us to believe, when Danner opens a box the outside world ceases to exist for a moment. It's as if we are going into Danner's inner-psyche, the outside world frozen while we explore the inner depths. Only problem is, all that's inside Danner's head are guns, explosives, and a chatty arms dealer.  The tutorial ends with a prompt to help each other up. This is kind of a bait and switch. Anyone familiar with Killzone will recognize this as a common way to keep the player from exiting a "kill zone" and it was used often in the second and third games. It happens here, but honestly, it doesn't happen anywhere else. This is kind of a nice call back to the previous games, one of many that Mercenary does, but it's not one that gets leaned on as a major gameplay tool. So, uh, enjoy it! We won't be seeing it again. Also, here's the best glimpse you'll get at their awful tattoos. Awful tattoos for awful people, I guess.  Thank goodness the wingsuit transition isn't a mini on-rails vehicle segment. There's enough of those in Killzone 2 and 3 that just felt so very, very token. Halo: Reach did the same thing with the sudden space flight section--never liked that. Maybe it was an early 2010s thing? Eh. This is a turnaround on my stance on it when I first tried to LP this, so I suppose I'm just getting more crotchety with unskippable video segments. This is a flashy transition regardless. We get a nice view of Diortem City, see how hosed up everything is, and Guerrilla Cambridge show off what the Vita can do.  After shuffling about the upper floor of the Hall of Justice with Ivanov, we make our way to the Control Room. After flushing out the officer, we interrogate him:  I included this shot just because of the ridiculous amount of clipping. I'm pretty sure he's already dead Danner! Anyways, I don't capture every clip, but the officers have unique dialogue depending on their intel. This officer chokes out "I HAVE THE ORDERS FROM THE FLEET!" before having his neck snapped, netting us the "Signal from the Fleet" intel. The guy we flush out of the Command Centre shouts "THIS IS WHY WE FIGHT!!". Fittingly, his intel is the "Why We Fight" text which you can read down in the intel section below. It's some pretty clear Helghast propaganda. A lot of nice flavour text comes from the intel, so I strongly urge everyone to read through those at the end of each update.  These shots I included because we kinda glossed over them entirely in the video. Ivanov has his own Brutal Melee system! If a Helghoon gets up close to him, he'll go in for the kill:  Just a nice detail I wanted to make sure we immortalized.  I'd also be remiss if I didn't point out this bit of gameplay: security cameras. The blue arc shows you their line of sight. Get caught in that and they turn red, alerting your presence to the many nearby enemies by setting off the alarm--which in turn summons reinforcements. They can be disabled in two ways: straight up destroying them or neutralizing them with VAN-Guard tech. The former is more permanent, but if you don't have a silenced weapon, it'll give you position away. VAN-Guard tech is reliable, but if you're using the JAMR then enemies will notice something up anyways once their RADAR goes offline. Still, cash bonus for shooting them, so there's never a reason NOT to.  This is probably the single most elaborate bit of intel in the game. Guerrilla Cambridge probably wanted to show off with this first level by really giving you a lot of different choices. You get options in later levels, of course, but they really went all out with this one. Like I say, no other piece of intel is as elaborate as this one.  First you have to open up this vent.  To do this, you gotta climb up a pipe in a debris filled room and turn this: a Killzone 2-style valve. Unfortunately, there's no SixAxis controls for the PS Vita TV, so we use the onscreen prompts (on a proper Vita, I assume it's touch screen controls).  Turning the valve makes a bunch of noise which brings a bunch of Helghoons down on you. Whatever. Kill them, toss a gas grenade in the vent, and the officer is forced out of the Command Centre. You don't want to run in while the gas is still visible, because you'll injure yourself. This makes it hard to get behind the officer, so your best bet is to tranq him, meaning you need to make sure you've purchased and equipped that particular gun. Then, and only then, can you brutally interrogate and murder him for those precious collectibles. I miss when Killzone was just about killing. Every time they've tried to add collectibles into the games, it feels like unnecessary gamefication. At least with Mercenary here, this added collectible hunt makes perfect sense from an in universe perspective. Of COURSE going out of your way to collect useless trivia would be worth Danner's while, 'cause Phantom Talon Corps will pay him for it! So really, Danner being a disgusting, murderous fuckhead makes him the truest Killzone protagonist.  In the Command Centre, you can spot Grey held in the interrogation room. What we can't see from here is the other room full of ISA soldiers and bio-engineered supervirus.  Rappelling down the side of the Hall of Justice, we're alerted by Ivanov of a crashing Helghast cruiser.  It's just a bit of background noise at the moment, but when I say to pay attention to it in the video, I'm not kidding. Spoiler alert: that's our next mission! But we'll get there when we get there. As this update is already getting a bit long in the teeth, I'll cover the rest of the update in the next post.  Born on the outer colonies on a planet settled by Eastern Europeans, Blackjack was a bright child who grew up with an affinity for technology. In his younger years, he gained notoriety for launching several cyber attacks against Earth. When Earth launched its campaigns against its middle colonies, he slowly cultivated a network of contacts, going from a minor weapons dealer, to someone who traded in the most advanced military technology in the galaxy. His ultimate motive is profit. Blackjack has no concerns with selling to either side of a conflict, frequently trading with Earth, ISA, and the Helghast. He also funds several of the Killzone universe's mercenary outfits, including Eclipse Forces, Skull Knight Enterprises, and Phantom Talon Corp. I mean, especially Phantom Talon Corp. They're the biggest, have the most money, and aren't afraid to spend it. He's great. I love Blackjack. He's so unrepentantly in love with his job. It's just that his job is war profiteering and arms sales. Welp.  Ivanov, like Danner, was former UCA. Unlike Danner, he was born and grew up on Vekta, rather than Earth. While in the UCA, the two formed a bond, and when it was time to cut ties, they joined Phantom Talon Corp together. Not much to say about Ivanov otherwise. Seems like a decent enough dude. He's cheery, tends to prefer a stealthier approach, but never complains when his buddy Danner goes in loud. They both have awful arm tattoos, constantly wear aviators, and have beards. Ivanov's is better thought. Ivanov's beard rocks.   Gonna jump back to the tutorial building for this. Take a look at that. Even with the HUD map disabled, this is one crowded screen. The field of view isn't fantastic either, but hey, it's a Killzone and a handheld. The large icons are a holdover because playing the game on the handheld you'll want to use the touchscreen. I suppose the best I can say for it is that you get used to it. Upper left hand corner always displays your current rank in the game and your online card, but most importantly, it always displays you cash. For a game that incentivizes the gameplay as much as this one, it's important to be able to see that those numbers constantly going up.  The Brutal Melee system from Killzone 3 returns here. Melee in general was an absolute joke and terrible in the first game, rightfully abandoned in the second (resulting in much hilarity, being as it was replaced by the overpowered Rambo knife), and returned as awkward, but functional action in the third game. It is this awkward but functional mechanic that we get here. As before, meleeing someone is an instakill, however, it locks you into an animation. If you aren't aware of your surroundings, you can get shot dead while trying to stab a dude. As seen in the video, if the gameplay geometry isn't agreeing with your position, it can cause weird things to happen where you flail your knife in the air and the enemy dies regardless. I'm pretty sure I've said this before at some point, but just in case: I hate having the melee attack tied to an uninterruptible animation. I prefer the way it's done in games like Halo, but hey, here we are. It's functional, but awkward. I can't speak for how effective the touchpad controls are for confirming each attack. The joystick commands work well enough. It's a nice touch where if you mess it up the enemy has the chance to counter. Doesn't get away from how awkward it is. Still, you'll see me stab a lot of dudes because it's a very effective way of taking them out.  In each mission there are six pieces of intel. Three of them come from hacking a location while another three come from interrogating an officer. Each is accompanied by a pithy remark from Blackjack. I've got three of them here for now... the other three will come with the part 2 of this update: Signal From The Fleet "Win or lose, seems the Higs don't mean to go home empty handed. This could have BIG impact on business - see if you can find out more." —Blackjack This is the first piece of intel we find in the game! It's essentially mandatory, being the intel you get from that quasi-tutorial section where Ivanov directs you to interrogate the Helghast officer. Note the reference to "hazmat teams" in this bit of intel. They've exhausted nukes and petrusite as super weapons in the previous games, so Mercenary (and Shadow Fall) are all about the chemical weapons. quote:SIGNAL FROM CRUISER AC-15 TO DIORTEM COMMAND CENTER Briefing #573968 "ISA should have seen this invasion coming. Visari, he is crazy like mad dog -- bite MUCH worse than his bark. " —Blackjack Found in the upper levels of the Hall of Justice, where we wingsuit into and where the previous intel is found. It's on a terminal attached to a massive computer bank. It's found by walking outside of a broken window near where you rappel down to the lower floors. Walk along the edge of the building and into the adjacent room and there it is. For anyone unfamiliar with Killzone, the Helghast and the ISA are both huge assholes. There are two bits of intel in this first mission that sort of describes this whole situation. This bit here is from the Vektan point of view. quote:VEKTAN MINISTRY OF INFORMATION, Why We Fight "These Helghast have big chip on shoulder. But they were treated like poo poo too. Pah, there's no right or wrong here - just winners and losers." —Blackjack This is the other piece of propaganda that tells a bit about why the Helghast and ISA are at war, except it's from the Helghast point of view. You get this bit of intel from interrogating the officer in the control room--the one you have to flush out with the gas grenade. Blackjack gives the most accurate summation the ISA and Helghast have ever received in any Killzone game. quote:Helghast Soldier's Oath Of Allegiance  There are a LOT of weapons in Mercenary, so I'll be trying to rotate through a bunch in each mission so we can see them all. Over the course of an hour, I also realizes that I cycle through a whole bunch, so surprise! You get a bit of an ammo dump, so to speak. Most of them are returning guns.  VC32 Sniper Rifle Cost: 10,000V Ideal for long range covert encounters due to the fitted silencer. Relatively low damage means headshots are required for reliable one-hit-kills. Semi-auto and silenced. If you want to do a covert stealth run with a sniper rifle, this is what you have to take. It's low damage output kind of sucks, which means you'll HAVE to get headshots if you want to keep a low profile. I'm not a fan of it, partially because I don't have time for such a weak gun. I mean, it's fine. Really, it is. But the other sniper rifles have so much more OOMPH to them! Furthermore, if I'm going to do a stealth run, I'd much rather have the silenced Helghast Assault Rifle. Sure, it doesn't shoot as far, but if I'm doing a stealth run I tend to try and get closer to enemies anyways to get melee kills when I can. In that situation, it's a much better complement. Again, it's fine. Not actually a bad gun. Doesn't fit my play style, though, so you won't see it much. Dunno why I had it paired with a rocket launcher. Oh well.  VC9 Rocket Launcher Cost: 5100V Single shot laucher firing high damage explosive rockets. Free firing [does not require lock-on]. If you're going to have a rocket launcher, I much prefer the fire and forget type. Great for land armour and infantry. Not so great for moving air targets. Helghast dropship unloading troops? Great. Drones and gunships? Ha, not so much. A solid choice, but as with other explosive weaponry, the VAN-Guard techs often make it obsolete. If you need a VAN-Guard that doesn't blow things up fast, this makes a good complement to your load-out, so there's that.  M194 Frag Grenade Cost: 3000V Disperses deadly shrapnel over a wide explosion radius. Can be cooked to shorten fuse time. The standard ISA frag grenade. Does what it always has. I kind of love that the design has remained consistent throughout the entire series what with the little LED counter on the side. It's good. I like it. I generally take it on my loadouts.  STA-52SE Silenced Assault Rifle Cost: 9000V A high rate of fire and large clip size give the advantge when facing multiple targets. Fitted with a silencer and red dot sight. The classic Helghast assault rifle returns as well. But of all things, it's been fitted with a silencer. As weird as it is, this works out well for the gun. It's a great stealth assault rifle, as oxymoronic as that sounds. The STA-52's range and accuracy have never been good as the ISA's equivalent, neither has it had the same stopping power. It's clip size has always seemed to be it's biggest advantage, especially when they took away the alt-fire in later games. With the silencer, it's all kind of fitting. Solid gun. Great primary when going stealth, though for some maps it's still better to hold onto a sniper rifle.  M2 Tranquilizer Pistol Cost: 9500V This non-lethal pistol fires toxin-laced darts. Enemy targets will be incapacitated for a short time, creating opportunities for interrogations. This gun really only exists to make interrogations easier--which is a good thing! Sometimes it's way too difficult to stealthily clear a room AND sneak up on an officer. It's easier to tranq the officer, massacre the room, then interrogate them for intel before the effect wears off. Plus, the psychological effect of being questioned by a creepy Earth merc in a room full of recently ventilated soldiers has got to be significant, right? Once you have all of the game's intel, there's really no reason to use this anymore unless a mission objective demands it or if you want to farm up cash faster with mercy kills--though the game is so happy with cash that it's not really necessary.  VC-G11 Gas Grenade Cost: 6600V Releases a lethal concoction of cytotoxic and vesicant chemical warfare agents to produce an area of denial gas cloud. And here we are, we've gotten to the Visari Corporation's grenade and OF COURSE it's a war crime weapon. This is not a smoke grenade, but a "if you inhale enough you will die" grenade. I'm not a fan. Outside of this one use in the first mission for an alternate objective, there's not really much to do with it. I guess it's an area denial kinda thing, but there's not a need for it when there are so many other better weapons.   Nearly every enemy that appears in Killzone: Mercenary is from a previous game. You'll see a couple of new soldiers and I'll have additional info for those, otherwise you'll get a quick run down on their danger level and best way to deal with them, if it's necessary. Standard Helghoons Yer bog standard Helghast. Good at working together to flank you and are very grenade happy--so, your standard Helghast. They're much the same as you remember from previous games. Honestly at this point, I've not much more to say about them. Helghast Commando These are the big grouchy-looking shotgun guys. Slightly slower and more armoured than standard Helghoons, they are still weak to bullets and will go down with sustained fire. They're a danger when they get in close, though, so don't let them close the gap. Helghast Officers They're the guys we want to torture for that glorious collectible intel. They look kinda like the shock troopers from previous games, complete with the trench coats--only they have much nicer hats. If you're ever stuck trying to find them, they're the ones that look the most like Nazi SS offiers.  No new vehicles have shown up yet! A lot of this is, once again, repeat information, so I'm not going to bombard you with a lot of retreading. I will say that so far we have seen: ISA Cruisers, Helghast Cruisers, Intruder Dropships, Overlord Dropships, and a Helghast Tank. Expect to see more cruisers--they're sort of omnipresent in the background. The Overlords and Intruders will also be a mainstay. Overlords, of course, being what are going to airdrop Helghast troops. Intruders happen to be Phantom Talon Corp's dropship of choice. Hard to say if that's just 'cause Benoit is being bankrolled by the ISA or not. I imagine cost is an issue. It's probably more expensive to buy an Overlord, considering how much more armour they have. Certainly, the open air platform of the Intruder makes for a more exciting trip. That would fit Benoit's cavalier attitude...  Larger shot of final Aaran Danner design.  Alternative Danners.  Danner early designs.  Danner in-game model. Sally fucked around with this message at 07:09 on Apr 8, 2024 |
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Oct 19, 2020 06:27
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Sally posted:Turning the valve makes a bunch of noise which brings a bunch of Helghoons down on you. Whatever. you can release the wheel when Ivanov warns you they're coming, and they won't be alerted 
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Oct 19, 2020 06:46
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 lmao are you serious?
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Oct 19, 2020 06:54
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They still show up but you can stealth-kill them.
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Oct 19, 2020 07:05
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Sally posted:It sucks having these two games hang over our heads! We were so close to the finish line. The largest reason for not completing them in the last thread is because I moved to a smaller place with several roommates. I no longer have anywhere to record. I'm against spending money to rent an empty room to go do group commentary, but I've found a solution: solo recording in a shed. There's no wifi, so I must bid adieu to nine-gear crow and CJacobs for this project... But that's okay. I frickin' love Killzone: Mercenary and really really really want to give it a proper go. Alas, the ultimate of Shakespearean fates. Being unceremoniously erased from a project I was ultimately dragged into utterly unwillingly. This is Henry IV, Part II and I'm Falstaff--run out on my rear end at the end of all things, and cursed to finish off in a lovely spin off to a much superior original product. What the gently caress is a Shakespeare? THIS the gently caress is a Shakespeare.
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Oct 19, 2020 09:41
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The history plays always were such a wonderful mix of comedy and tragedy! and at least this way you are abandoned knowing you were the best character in the series. (but hold on let's be clear the original product (Killzone 1) is way worse than the spin off! (Shadow Fall))
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Oct 19, 2020 15:36
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Can i vote Danner as my top choice for "Ugliest mug i trust to shoot all the mens. Everwhere." ? He has the awful beard, the sunglasses the stupid hat. He got it all. Same with Ivanov's dress choices. The only thng that i miss is them talking all the time in some intricate UCA bro-speak.
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Oct 19, 2020 19:35
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You mad son of a bitch. I can't believe you actually did it! I am of course referring to ditching NGC like he deserves
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Oct 19, 2020 20:34
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nine-gear crow posted:Alas, the ultimate of Shakespearean fates. Being unceremoniously erased from a project I was ultimately dragged into utterly unwillingly. This is Henry IV, Part II and I'm Falstaff--run out on my rear end at the end of all things, and cursed to finish off in a lovely spin off to a much superior original product. let's start a kickstarter to buy sally one of those 5G hotspots so you can get dragged back into a project you got erased from after being dragged into it unwillingly to begin with. we can make this far, far more absurd if we try.
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Oct 19, 2020 21:10
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i am doing this to free crow and CJacobs and myself from eternal Killzone!
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Oct 20, 2020 03:56
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OutofSight posted:Can i vote Danner as my top choice for "Ugliest mug i trust to shoot all the mens. Everwhere." ? Danner is Lame with a capital "L" and despite that is the best Killzone protagonist. (though that's only because KZ1 Rico was "meh"; if you could've played as Rico in the sequels, he'd be the best).
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Oct 20, 2020 03:57
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Considering the length of this chapter, I've broken up the analysis into two posts. But for posterity's sake, here's the vids again: This first update is essentially a double-episode. The remaining videos are all half the length, as heads up. Last we left off, Danner and Ivanov were rappelling down the side of the Halls of Justice in time to spot a Helghast cruiser crash in the bay: More importantly, we are closer to rescuing Admiral Grey!  But first, I've played this game a dozen times and I seem to always have missed it; it's going through this LP where I've finally caught this bit of background imagery: The motto for the Vektan Hall of Justice reads "Equality for All".   And this image is to show off what a hackable terminal looks like. These are the ones you want to look for when you're after intel. This one is the "Orders to Col. Kratek" report, which you can read in the section below. Successfully hacked terminals will display Blackjack's emoji icon, because it seems we're selling him the intelligence and probably not Benoit. This becomes more and more likely as the narrative progress. Oh Blackjack, that scamp! Anyways, most of this part of the Hall of Justice is me shootin' and killin' and failin' to be stealthy, so let's skip ahead here:  When we finally get to Grey, she's sealed in a room being interrogated by Kratek. Neither Grey nor Kratek nor the ISA soldiers react in an special way to our arrival, as these are one-way mirrors--you briefly glimpse this once we pull Grey out of the room. I'm sure Kratek is getting radio warnings that we're there though, considering he indirectly bids us adieu before making his exit.  Kratek turns on the giant experimental bomb full of Eschaton virus and makes Grey watch as the ISA inside die. To really hammer home the point that both sides really loving suck, let's ponder this for a moment. Yes, Kratek is clearly committing a heinous act by executing these ISA to make a point to Grey--but she made the chemical weapon in the first place! As a deterrent, sure, but... wait, really?! You create a horrifically fast acting chemical weapon as a deterrent? H-how did you go from "sending a trusted friend to Helghan as a diplomat to try and negotiate a lasting peace" to "developing fast acting nerve toxins to decimate your enemy in hopes that its existence will prevent a war". loving hell, Grey. Of course, we're only in the first mission, so it's couched to make Grey look more sympathetic--for now. The bigger problem that we have here is that Kratek now has a sample. You can probably guess what the crux of this game is going to be. (Although, if you're at all familiar with the plot of Shadow Fall, you can probably guess at how effective Danner and his merry band of money grubbers are going to be.)  Kratek probably has a billion unread text messages from his minions that read "SIR GET THE gently caress OUT OF THERE, MERCENARIES ARE LITERALLY STANDING OUTSIDE THE DOOR". He attempts to put Grey down on his way out, but fails. I suppose you could argue that he missed because he was in a rush. You might also argue that Grey is just too stubborn to die, her skill willing the bullet to ricochet off of it, or something. Let's cut the bullshit, though. Kratek is kind of incompetent. I won't get into it now, but this is the first hint that we're not up against Helghan's finest.  In a nice touch, if you pay close attention you can see that Grey is not only clearly still breathing and alive, but is conscious. Sure, in a lot of pain, but she's still there.  Grey rescued, Ivanov and Danner make there way out of the offices, down the elevator, and Danner singlehandedly holds off Helghast reinforcements--including a tank. Just standard fare for a mercenary, I guess. Benoit shows up at the end for pick up and we're done. Welcome to Killzone: Mercenary, all! As stated, there are six total pieces of intel in each mission. Here are the remaining three for the first chapter: Report #KL38T "Admiral Grey, she have interesting career before she become big war hero. You ask me, this is what interest the Higs -- and worry the ISA..." —Blackjack Found in the halls proper of the Halls of Justice. This you get from interrogating the officer that is questioning the ISA soldier. It's a dossier on Admiral Grey. Yeah, turns out she's actually fairly sympathetic to finding a peaceful resolution. Of all the people to try and kill, Kratek made the mistake of attacking one this one. Of course, she's also in charge of an experimental bioweapon division BUT ONLY AS A DETERRENT, I SWEAR! Also of note, she's a personal friend of Sepp Harkin. Hmm. So that's what he risked his life to get the message out. quote:MILITARY INTELLIGENCE REPORT - #KL38T Orders to Col. Kratek "So, the ISA were betrayed by their own. BIG surprise. As my grandmother always say -- trust no-one. " —Blackjack lol at Blackjack. So Kratek is under direct control of Metrac. Also, this intel is a direct shout out to good ol'General Anime Adams and General Stratson, the two ISA traitors. It's too bad Metrac didn't foresee the ISA knowing they'd be unable to defeat his reinforcements and thus hiring a pair of dirty mercs to get the job done! This bit of intel is found in a terminal on the main floor of the Hall of Justice, right before you find the room that has two imprisoned ISA soldiers. quote:ORDERS TO COLONEL VYKTOR KRATEK Private Correspondence "Ah, Benoit. He drive hard bargain as always. But ISA are in no position to argue. And war is business, after all..." —Blackjack I like to think that the "targeted surgical strikes" Grey mentions are a direct reference to what Templar, Luger, and Velasquez are concurrently doing in Liberation. In the offices area, directly before you find the interrogation room with Kratek, Grey, and the captured ISA soldiers who get gassed, there's a board room with a PowerPoint esque presentation on the wall. Next to it is the terminal where you get this intel. quote:TOP SECRET - EYES ONLY Lots of weapons got shown off in the first mission. Even as new ones are introduced in later chapters, you'll see me loop back around to the ol'stand-bys. The following weapons appeared in this video.  M82 Assault Rifle Cost: FREE Powerful and effective at all ranges. Fitted with a greet dot sight for enhanced target acquisition. The classic ISA assault rifle. As always, it's a great gun, both highly accurate and with high stopping power. You start with this gun, so it's free. Yay! This gun feels good, is fun to use, and could single-handedly take you through the entire campaign and back. It's nice having such a great gun to come back to when experimenting with all the other weapons. I go back to it quite often considering how well-balanced it is.  M4 Revolver Cost: 4900V Devastating close range damage coupled with armor piercing rounds. High levels of recoil and six shots per reload demand user accuracy. The classic ISA revolver. Does what is advertised. Slow and unwieldy, but it fires big bullets. Quite fun to use this gun as your main weapon. I'm less fond of it as a backup because you do want to give more time and care to your accuracy. If I'm being overwhelmed by enemies and need an effective sidearm to switch to, I'd rather be able to shoot lots of bullets fast (use the Stahl Pistol) or have a reliable one-hit-kill machine (use a shotgun). Best to have a bit of distance with this gun if you want to be able to aim reliably.  VC8 Shotgun Pistol Cost: 5900V Deadly at close-range and featuring the mobility of the handgun class, this weapon is ideal for 'run-and-gun' combat. Requires frequent reloading. Huh. The Helghast triple-shotgun pistol is back. Okay. This gun was always a bit of an oddity in previous games, and it's still one here. If I was to choose a pistol, I find the Helghast Pistol or ISA Revolver more reliable, but there's something oddly satisfying about this one. It's hard to pair well. I find it works best when you're doing those crazy close-combat runs. Equip the ISA Submachine Gun as your primary and this as your secondary and you're gonna have a good time running, gunning, and stabbing enemies. Kudos to you if you can find other situations where this fits well, because it's an odd one. I'm glad they included it, but yeah, odd.  STA-3 Light Machine Gun Cost: 8500V Designed for long distance suppression, this weapon features an optical scope and low recoil, making it ideal for picking off advancing troops. The Helghast LMG returns! It's almost been a mainstay in this series--I think it's appeared in the entire trilogy. Always a reliable weapon. You can breeze through Killzone 2 with it on all but the hardest difficulties. It's back here and it remains an effective gun. Danner stuck an optical sight on it for some reason. I can only assume he had Blackjack do that. Weird. Strikes me as unnecessary, but hey, the gun became useless in KZ2 when it didn't have a targeting reticle, so perhaps this is a nod to that. It's got good range, is fairly accurate, and has solid stopping power. Unlike, say, Killzone 1, it doesn't take an entire clip to kill a single Helghast. Thanks to the improved damage models, you can reliable kill a half dozen soldiers without reloading. I'm quite fond of taking this gun as my primary when I don't have the standard ISA M82 rifle.  Sky Fury Cost: 16000V Death from above. Decimate enemy forces from orbit with a series of high-precision particle beam blasts. The Sky Fury is pretty fun. One of the many drones in this game. When called in, it circles the battlefield. You control the bird's eye camera in the device and use it to call in laser blasts from orbit. Where are the laser blasts coming from, you ask? Didn't we blow up the SD platforms in the first game, you say? Look, I don't know and I don't care. (It works fine on Vekta and Helghan both!) You can use the Sky Fury in covered areas as long as there's a high enough ceiling. All that matters is that it lets you call in sweet orbital death ray laser blasts when fighting in large arenas. Doesn't have a cloak, so if it's spotted it can be shot down. Seems to have a bit of armour so it can tank some shots, but you'll want to put down any enemy's that spot it fast (psst, use the giant laser to do so!). Has a limited battery life.  Ivanov concept art  Diortem under attack  Hall of Justice, exterior  Hall of Justice, interior  Hall of Justice, control centre Sally fucked around with this message at 04:57 on May 31, 2021 |
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Oct 20, 2020 06:02
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The melee, hacking, and VAN-GUARD minigames all use touchscreen controls on the Vita proper--Porcupine makes you tap lock-on targets to kill them, Sky Fury lets you tap anywhere on the screen to nuke the area. There's optional, adjustable gyro aiming for scopes & sights too.
Hwurmp fucked around with this message at 11:27 on Oct 20, 2020 |
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Oct 20, 2020 11:22
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 this is my original character Aaron Killzone, of the Phi Tau Kappa frat, do not steal
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Oct 20, 2020 17:51
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Hwurmp posted:There's optional, adjustable gyro aiming for scopes & sights too. huh. now THAT i didn't know. how's it work? you tried it?
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Oct 20, 2020 20:20
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Wow. Bullet immunity during escort quests. The UCA military really has some impressive training.
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Oct 20, 2020 20:20
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Making chemical weapons for deterrence is a real thing that countries do. According to the logic of deterrence the best way to stop your enemy from using banned weapons is to have your own that you can threaten to retaliate with. And the best weapon to retaliate with is one of the same kind, since you don't want to break out the nukes if your enemy is using mustard gas and escalate things further.
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Oct 20, 2020 20:54
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Sally posted:huh. now THAT i didn't know. how's it work? you tried it? I only noticed it after I'd already beaten most of the missions without it. It seemed neat but it would definitely take some practice.
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Oct 20, 2020 22:38
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White Coke posted:Making chemical weapons for deterrence is a real thing that countries do. According to the logic of deterrence the best way to stop your enemy from using banned weapons is to have your own that you can threaten to retaliate with. And the best weapon to retaliate with is one of the same kind, since you don't want to break out the nukes if your enemy is using mustard gas and escalate things further. oh certainly! i probably wasn't clear on what i meant... this specific chemical weapons strikes me as an escalation by someone ostensibly interested in de-escalating a hostile sitiation. it's one thing to stockpile nukes if your enemy has nukes, or even to stock a variety of chemicals weapons if your enemies are using them. but to create a designer virus that is exclusively lethal to your enemy, capable of eradicating the population of their home planet? as i say, strikes me as an escaltion. (and as i type this i come full realization that i may have my wires crossed from starting and stopping this LP so many times--i might by referencing the final form of this virus in Shadow Fall (crow could confirm?)... but it starts here folks! spoilers ahoy!) Sally fucked around with this message at 01:46 on Oct 21, 2020 |
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Oct 21, 2020 01:44
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Sally posted:oh certainly! i probably wasn't clear on what i meant... this specific chemical weapons strikes me as an escalation by someone ostensibly interested in de-escalating a hostile sitiation. it's one thing to stockpile nukes if your enemy has nukes, or even to stock a variety of chemicals weapons if your enemies are using them. but to create a designer virus that is exclusively lethal to your enemy, capable of eradicating the population of their home planet? as i say, strikes me as an escaltion. In Shadow Fall Sinclair calls Massar's "Ethnic Bullet" virus quote, "purely a deterrent". That said, Sinclair is a genocidal lunatic who was just itching for the excuse to utilize it and goes... well, let's call it a certain degree of unhinged when those prospects even appear to be going up in smoke.
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Oct 21, 2020 02:10
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Sally posted:oh certainly! i probably wasn't clear on what i meant... this specific chemical weapons strikes me as an escalation by someone ostensibly interested in de-escalating a hostile sitiation. it's one thing to stockpile nukes if your enemy has nukes, or even to stock a variety of chemicals weapons if your enemies are using them. but to create a designer virus that is exclusively lethal to your enemy, capable of eradicating the population of their home planet? as i say, strikes me as an escaltion. Look, maybe those peace negotiations went really badly.
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Oct 21, 2020 02:16
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right i knew i was crossing wires somewhere
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Oct 21, 2020 08:18
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Right, cause wouldn't the ISA soldiers have survived being gassed in the interrogation room if it only killed Helghast?
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Oct 21, 2020 21:51
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do you like it when a story explains away such contradictions with a dismissive handwave?
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Oct 22, 2020 01:49
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Depends: if the story is good enough I'll give it a pass, or if it does so in a humorous way.
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Oct 22, 2020 05:38
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White Coke posted:Depends: if the story is good enough I'll give it a pass, or if it does so in a humorous way. I have some bad news for you friend... This is a Killzone game 
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Oct 22, 2020 06:08
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I love these drat things and am glad to see them back.
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Oct 22, 2020 09:08
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White Coke posted:Depends: if the story is good enough I'll give it a pass, or if it does so in a humorous way. oi vey, recanting my earlier posts. between trying to do Mercenary and Shadoe Fall simultaneously, this being the third restart of Mercenary, and the long gap between everything, i just full on entirely mixed up the two games' virus plots in my head. so yeah... the Helghast/Vekta specific virus is Shadow Fall. The "virus so potent it will kill 97% of a planet" is Mercenary and there's a different hand wave thing that'll come up... but at no point in Mercenary is the virus designed to only target Helghast or Vektans.
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Oct 23, 2020 16:18
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biosterous posted:
lol also i found more Danner concept art but i dont know if it absolves him or further condemns him to frat boy hell
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Oct 23, 2020 16:48
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Sally posted:oi vey, recanting my earlier posts. between trying to do Mercenary and Shadoe Fall simultaneously, this being the third restart of Mercenary, and the long gap between everything, i just full on entirely mixed up the two games' virus plots in my head. Aren't all the plots reducible to: The Helghast have developed a WMD, or stolen one from the Vektans?
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Oct 23, 2020 23:50
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hmm... Killzone 1: Helghast steal ISA SD Platforms Liberation: ISA develop Red Dust nuke; Helghast steal Red Dust nuke Killzone 2: Helghast have developed petrusite superweapons; Helghast detonate Red Dust nuke Killzone 3: Helghast have developed irradiated superpetrusite weapons; ISA detonate Helghan Mercenary: ISA develop Eschaton virus; Helghast steal Eschaton virus Shadow Fall: ISA develop anti-Helghat bio-weapon; Helghast steal bio-weapon and repurpose it to be anti-Vektan  checks out
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Oct 24, 2020 00:08
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next you're going to tell me admiral theoretically-good is actually admiral bad! what will those wacky killzone games do next
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Oct 24, 2020 00:48
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"Morally" is her middle name!
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Oct 24, 2020 05:32
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biosterous posted:
also, i was inspired: 
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Oct 24, 2020 05:32
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Arran Danner, Professional Motherfucker
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Oct 24, 2020 05:36
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Post in mor3 in thos thread u dumb asholes we need 2 get 2 page 2
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Oct 24, 2020 05:45
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