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grate deceiver posted:beardThornton That reminds me. There is a contest going on in the Deus Ex: Human Revolution thread right now, and people in this thread might be amused at my entry. It's AP related, but also has massive spoilers for Deus Ex 1, so if you were planning on playing that at some point, maybe just don't look.
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Jun 27, 2012 11:56
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poptart_fairy posted:If I remember right during the SIE version of that mission, you can also play dumb to Leland and tell him you just found the APC's keys in the ignition. Yep. The entire post-mission conversation for that branch is solid gold.
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Jun 27, 2012 19:24
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poptart_fairy posted:If I remember right during the SIE version of that mission, you can also play dumb to Leland and tell him you just found the APC's keys in the ignition. Every time I read this thread, I find something that makes me re-install the game. This did it.
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Jun 27, 2012 19:29
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I've reinstalled the game to another drive partition, set all of the options to low and put the game in a modest resolution in windowed mode - the pauses still happen but not as often and they're only 3-5 seconds long now. I can live with that. I've done Taipei, Rome and now I'm in Russia. I glad I went to the pub first to meet a contact. It just seemed like the first thing anyone would do.  I then did the yacht mission. I was surprised at the end - it seems that sparing people in the game always has a benefit (Mindless goons are fair game though :haw), but I imagine there must be an exception at some point. One difference is in Italy with Marburg where apparently if you have -3 rep or lower with him then he'll STAY to fight you. That almost makes me regret trying to please him when we conversed. I am getting paranoid about G22 though. It started when they first contacted me, in Taipei I think, and they promised to help me if only I didn't keep a briefcase containing vital information. I elected to gain an ally, but I am now concerned that the briefcase is very important to the plot (how can't it be??). Albatross seems to be on the level at least and I trust him. I think. I have a habit of doing that in games though, but most are designed where you don't truly lose out for doing so. I almost regret spending 14K on dossier information on him and Sis, but the one juicy fact I got was that G22 leaders are NOT supposed to send their bodyguards away on missions - and that is what Albatross did with Sis on the yacht. I hope I can put that to use at some point. For now I'm in an alliance with them. They're the group I'm most interested in reading about after I finish the game. I hope they're not aligned with Halbech or something...
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Jun 27, 2012 22:15
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Magic posted:One difference is in Italy with Marburg where apparently if you have -3 rep or lower with him then he'll STAY to fight you. That almost makes me regret trying to please him when we conversed.
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Jun 27, 2012 22:43
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I was wondering whether I could save Madison and then defuse the bombs, like Batman so I looked up the mission (Link) and saw what can happen with Marburg - looks like you need -4 rep AND 83% of his dossier. Apparently you get his pistol(s) if you kill him, though. One for another play through, I guess. Minor endgame spoiler: I've read the part about the final mission so I have that at least. And the knowledge that Marburg will be present. Magic fucked around with this message at 23:20 on Jun 27, 2012 |
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Jun 27, 2012 23:16
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Magic posted:I was wondering whether I could save Madison and then defuse the bombs, like Batman so I looked up the mission (Link) and saw what can happen with Marburg - looks like you need -4 rep AND 83% of his dossier. Apparently you get his pistol(s) if you kill him, though. One for another play through, I guess. You've also got one other component. You must be mostly suave up to that point in the game. Marburg won't be goaded if he just hates you. I'm not sure about the Razor Wit perk being absolutely necessary. You should get an idea if it's possible depending on your conversation with Leland following meeting Marburg. If Leland says something like, he described you as a man who prefers talk over action then you should be ok if you piss him off and get enough dossier info on him. I'm pretty sure I've went to Rome straight after Saudi without that perk and done it.
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Jun 27, 2012 23:54
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Magic posted:And the knowledge that Marburg will be present. Doesn't happen on every single playthrough
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Jun 28, 2012 01:55
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Just finished my second playthrough. It was awesome playing as the overpowered Veteran instead of the underpowered Recruit this time. Killing Marburg in the museum was the most satisfying part of the game, which is funny considering the rest of the game I was a complete pacifist. (and actually, since bosses don't count on your totals, my endgame score still showed 0 enemies killed total). Actually, that's the way I did both playthroughs (though I didn't get a chance to do the previously stated action the first time which pissed me off). I tried playing through this time with a combat character but it wasn't as fun to me so I rerolled as another stealthy pacifist character (with the Veteran benefits this time instead of the Recruit non-benefits). I was upset that I managed to miss a couple dossiers somewhere along the line. I was at 97%, with one missing from Darcy and G22. I'll have to fix that next time. Thanks to the Mass Effect thread for letting me know this game existed, and CirclMastr's LP for showing me how awesome it was.
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Jun 29, 2012 21:34
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Is there anyway to close doors behind you?
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Jun 29, 2012 21:56
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mastajake posted:I was upset that I managed to miss a couple dossiers somewhere along the line. I was at 97%, with one missing from Darcy and G22. I'll have to fix that next time.
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Jun 29, 2012 22:16
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Hannibal Smith posted:It's actually impossible to get 100% of the dossiers. There are a few that are mutually exclusive. At a couple of points, Mina will send you an email asking who you want her to dig up intel on, and there's no way to get the ones that you don't choose there. Ah, that sucks. I noticed that they had extras of VCI in the final mission that I didn't need and so I should have chosen G22 instead of VCI dossier, but I guess with the one where she makes you pick between Darcy, Westridge, and Parker it still doesn't matter. I just figured I missed something. Actually, going back and checking I see I missed all three of them in addition to the one mentioned earlier. Sucks you can't get 100% though. I'm stupid about things like that. I suppose getting 97% or whatever it was and only missing 4 complete dossiers total isn't TOO shabby.
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Jun 29, 2012 23:17
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Since a sequel probably isn't in the cards I'd love it if worldbuilding material got released. That whole theory I ginned up about Heck's motivations doesn't seem to be real so much as "totally plausible and a neat idea" but I wanna know more about G22 etc.
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Jun 29, 2012 23:25
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mastajake posted:Ah, that sucks. I noticed that they had extras of VCI in the final mission that I didn't need and so I should have chosen G22 instead of VCI dossier, but I guess with the one where she makes you pick between Darcy, Westridge, and Parker it still doesn't matter. I just figured I missed something. Actually, going back and checking I see I missed all three of them in addition to the one mentioned earlier. I felt the same way about it until I thought about how I'm probably only seeing a fraction of the game's content in any given playthrough. Honestly the fact that AP has so much stuff that you can't see it all in one runthrough is the whole charm, so I can go with it.
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Jun 29, 2012 23:27
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Finally started playing this game after having it in my backlog for ages. drat it is amazing, was up to 4am last night just completing Rome. I can understand why most people would hate this game as it is almost like tabletop RPG rules applied directly to a game. Loving it so far, especially the writing. Obsidian should get more respect from publishers cause they could really turn out some awesome games if they were just given a few more resources. Should I do Taipei or Moscow next?
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Jul 1, 2012 16:20
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There is no 'should' in this game, only options and consequences. That said, if you do Taipei then Moscow, you will get an option that will make the moscow boss less of a pain in the rear end.
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Jul 1, 2012 16:38
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Alternatively you can just start Taipei and once you've established contacts there you can go do missions in Moscow. You're not tied down to a location once you start it and can move freely between all of them.
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Jul 1, 2012 16:40
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Word. Been throat ripping my way around Moscow like a man possessed. The amount of double crosses and moral/motivational ambiguity in this game is unbe-loving-leivable...and I love it.
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Jul 1, 2012 18:15
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Stephen Heck is the best character in any videogame, ever. Every line of dialog he has is absolute gold. Not like Wen. Not like Wen at all...
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Jul 1, 2012 18:24
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Heck, do you copy? Like a floppy...
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Jul 1, 2012 19:25
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I think one of my favorite parts about Heck is that you can tell how much Nolan North is enjoying not having to play Nathan Drake for once.
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Jul 1, 2012 19:26
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I just thought of something. Picture this: an Alpha Protocol-style game, set in the Warhammer 40k universe with an Inquisitor as the main character. I know the "everything has to be 40k" thing is a bit played out, I guess that's what I get for reading the Eisenhorn books while also playing this game. Do you choose to purge the heretic, or
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Jul 1, 2012 19:59
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I don't know what any of those things are.
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Jul 1, 2012 20:17
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Role Play McMurphy posted:I don't know what any of those things are. Heretic could refer to xenoloving scum, someone worshiping any god other then the Emperor, anyone not worshiping the Emperor, anyone who says anything bad about the Emperor or good about Chaos no matter his beliefs, ect, ect.
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Jul 1, 2012 21:25
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Ineptus Mechanicus posted:I just thought of something. Picture this: an Alpha Protocol-style game, set in the Warhammer 40k universe with an Inquisitor as the main character. I know the "everything has to be 40k" thing is a bit played out, I guess that's what I get for reading the Eisenhorn books while also playing this game.
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Jul 1, 2012 22:27
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So Comte, you said you tried to get people to base scenarios and general vibe and lessons around the themes in Syriana. Was the Marburg meeting based on the meeting with Whiting at the diner?
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Jul 2, 2012 11:14
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Ineptus Mechanicus posted:I just thought of something. Picture this: an Alpha Protocol-style game, set in the Warhammer 40k universe with an Inquisitor as the main character. I know the "everything has to be 40k" thing is a bit played out, I guess that's what I get for reading the Eisenhorn books while also playing this game. I'm thinking more Mass Effect than Alpha Protocol, but it would ultimately be a combination of the two. Knowing game developers, I bet they've thought about it already. Role Play McMurphy posted:I don't know what any of those things are.
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Jul 2, 2012 20:39
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I picked this up at a used games shop a few days ago after hearing about it so many times on this forum. The conversation & choices system definitely lived up to my (pretty high) expectations, as did it's...not so great and clunky gameplay. There were a few times I got pretty frustrated in missions either not allowing me to progress without reloading, or the crappy gunplay, etc., but I do walk away feeling pretty impressed with it and wishing there was a sequel. I am very glad that I went the stealth/pistol way, which made the game much easier to deal with in the later stages. I'm just reading through some of the many, many different routes the game can take depending on who likes you, who hates you, who you ally with, what choices you make, etc. They definitely put a lot of work into accounting for all of the story variations and how they can affect the game right from the very start to the ending. I felt the whole conversation system was a lot more natural than say, Mass Effect's - in AP I generally responded according to the role I chose for Thorton (confident/cocky and focused only on the mission) or going down interesting conversation paths vs. constantly choosing either paragon/renegade options in ME no matter what I felt like doing because I wanted to get P/R points to open up more conversation options. AP's was much more fluid and I'd love to see it used more often in games in the future. I'm pretty sure that the ending I got is probably not considered the "best" ending, but riding away on the boat with Heck felt like the perfect one to me. edit: I should also mention that I was pretty much sold on the game as soon as I found out you could customize your serious spy main character with a beard option described as "Lumberjack"  I particularly liked that the beard a) stayed visible while you were in stealth mode and b) disappeared for the cutscenes after surrendering to Darcy and being interrogated at the end and then reappeared immediately afterwards, as if he sprouted a full, bushy beard within minutes.
el oso fucked around with this message at 04:14 on Jul 3, 2012 |
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Jul 3, 2012 04:05
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There is no best ending, only the ending you get, which I always though was a strong point for the game, since so many other similar RPGs try to have a "best" ending.
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Jul 3, 2012 04:09
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Really, it can't be said enough. There are basically zero choices in this game that have a 'right/good' and a 'wrong/evil' choice or result. Everything is just a different shade of grey, up to and including the ending(s). Depending what you value, or what your Thorton values, there are different endings that may be considered better or worse (for example the terrorist attack in the end credits killing less people because you shut down Nasri's arms network) but even those will always have a tradeoff (for example, losing out on the intel and other benefits that arresting or extorting Nasri would gain you, which could then help you in further missions, maybe allowing you to save even more lives in a different way). The game is really worth replaying two or three times, not just reading about the different ways to execute it. It's so reactive, and it's not very long once you get good at the actual gameplay and realize that there are often ways to skip bits that may be less important to you, and that even skipping those affects other parts of the game (for example, if you want to skip to missions, you can just hang up on your contacts in the middle of phone calls, which pisses them off but gets you right back into the action, and if you do it often enough gets you perks as well), which means that even a full replay doesn't take too many hours of your life. And it's so worth it, to see how all those games that advertise '8000 endings! Reactive conversations with dialogue trees! Build reputations with a colourful cast of characters! etc.' should actually be handling those things.
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Jul 3, 2012 05:08
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Is there a hump in this game? In Mass Effect 1, the game was slow until the part you became a spectre and started flying round the galaxy being cool, and it was a hard slog to get over the hump, but once you did it became awesome. I only ask because I got up to Moscow and wasn't grabbed by the game and Thornton's voice actor was driving me crazy. Does the game "take off" at any point? It's sad because I love Vampire the Masquerade, Mass Effect et al and I really want to love this, but I feel it's a worse RPG/Shooter than Mass Effect 2 and a worse stealth game than Splinter Cell.  I don't hate it, I'm just underwhelmed.
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Jul 3, 2012 06:03
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The first hub is the worst, yes. The other three are considerably better/constitute the real game.
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Jul 3, 2012 06:08
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LordPants posted:Is there a hump in this game? You can switch hubs at any point now, so fly over to Taipei and with your source there, Steve. If the game still doesn't grab you after that, then you pretty much have to play to the end of a hub to really get a feel for all the different ways the game can go. Which might not be worth it to you. It's not going to be the gameplay that gets you. (Possible Exception: shotgun filled with phosphorus slugs, vest loaded with incendiary grenades.) hey girl you up fucked around with this message at 06:17 on Jul 3, 2012 |
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Jul 3, 2012 06:14
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vyelkin posted:It's so reactive, and it's not very long once you get good at the actual gameplay and realize that there are often ways to skip bits that may be less important to you, and that even skipping those affects other parts of the game (for example, if you want to skip to missions, you can just hang up on your contacts in the middle of phone calls, which pisses them off but gets you right back into the action, and if you do it often enough gets you perks as well), which means that even a full replay doesn't take too many hours of your life. This has been the thing I am surprised most with the second playthrough I'm currently doing. I decided to not gently caress around with my usual play tactic of "oh god I've got to stealth every area perfectly and non lethal deus ex style" so now I'm just booking it through every area loving everyone up and I think I'm getting less alarm triggers then I did in my last playthrough. Turns out people trigger few alarms when they are all dead from pistols and shotguns. Stealth skills actually work pretty awesomely when you are being aggressive too since you can sneak up on people mid firefight. It also helps that I'm basically playing Archer and loving up everything just to see how it goes.
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Jul 3, 2012 06:18
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randombattle posted:This has been the thing I am surprised most with the second playthrough I'm currently doing. I decided to not gently caress around with my usual play tactic of "oh god I've got to stealth every area perfectly and non lethal deus ex style" You mean... ghosting? Not knocking anybody out, just bypassing them? The game doesn't discriminate between "nobody knew you were there" and "nobody saw you, but you knocked everyone out". One alarm or red pointy arrow and you lose the stealth bonus, though.
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Jul 3, 2012 08:57
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After the first few missions AP is basically "How fast can you murder everyone" if you play it right. Chain shot and the move that makes you invisible + stabbing people in the face makes stealth pistols a cakewalk. Also people new to the game, make sure to listen to the news casts during the credits! They talk about things you did.
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Jul 3, 2012 09:15
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Dreggon posted:You mean... ghosting? Not knocking anybody out, just bypassing them? The game doesn't discriminate between "nobody knew you were there" and "nobody saw you, but you knocked everyone out". One alarm or red pointy arrow and you lose the stealth bonus, though.
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Jul 3, 2012 18:08
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Every time I revisit this thread it makes me want to load up Alpha Protocol and have another run through it, which makes it hard to get through my pile of games that I haven't gotten around to playing yet. Goddamn you all! 
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Jul 5, 2012 04:59
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Buy fewer games, most aren't worth your time.
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Jul 5, 2012 05:12
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Holy Calamity! posted:Also people new to the game, make sure to listen to the news casts during the credits! They talk about things you did. Very much this. I didn't actually know about this until my third playthrough. Also, I actually played my first playthrough on Recruit; it wasn't that bad, and unlocking Veteran made it worth it. Just remember: aiming takes time. You can't just keep spamming the trigger and expect to hit things; instead, you need to wait a little for the crosshair to turn red, at which point you're pretty much guaranteed a hit. Incidentally, are pistols actually the best weapon in the game? They're awesome, to be sure (especially with chain shot), but can the other weapons be equally broken at high skill levels? hectorgrey fucked around with this message at 15:26 on Jul 5, 2012 |
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Jul 5, 2012 15:18
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