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2house2fly posted:Wait... you can do a Veteran playthrough on Hard if you already playred Recruit on Normal? All of a sudden I'm dreading that Hard run a lot less. Yep, that's what I did. Edit: Keep in mind that you don't have to spend all your skill points at the beginning of a Veteran playthrough either. I maxed out Stealth and Pistols, left one point in Sabotage in order to EMP the mini-games, and removed all points from all other skills and saved them until the later Stealth/Pistol options opened up.
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Aug 3, 2014 00:48
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2house2fly posted:Wait... you can do a Veteran playthrough on Hard if you already playred Recruit on Normal? All of a sudden I'm dreading that Hard run a lot less. If anyone new is just getting ready for their first playthrough, ignore the part where it tells you not to play as a recruit for your first time through. A pistol / stealth / martial arts build will let you walk through the entire game on normal difficulty, the recruit class won't really make any difference and it lets you unlock veteran, which is the raddest class.
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Aug 3, 2014 00:51
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Crappy Jack posted:As someone who lived through this hell, I recommend some variation of shotgun rear end in a top hat for your Hard playthrough. If you try to be sneaky, you will fail, because every single minigame becomes pretty much impossible unless you have the reflexes of a god, and you'll be setting off alarms all over the place. But then you can just set everybody on fire with a shotgun or whatnot. Just don't try to be sneaky. I'm with you on stealth probably not working so well on that difficulty; hell, even on normal enemies will have too much health for a tranq bullet to take down in a single shot.
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Aug 3, 2014 02:52
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The White Dragon posted:I forget: is it possible to bring enough Chaff Grenades to brute force every hacking minigame in almost every stage? iirc you can slot the same item multiple times so you can bring up to like nine or twelve with the best stealth armor, but it's been kind of a while. I never played on hard, though, so chances are I'm completely wrong. You probably can, but on my Hard playthrough, I tended to just kick down doors and letting the alarms serve as a dinner bell to send bad guys toward the meat grinder that is Mike Thorton. And yeah, that's an excellent point, on a hard playthrough, enemies are so strong, a headshot with a tranq dart will just alert everyone to your presence.
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Aug 3, 2014 03:05
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Just got this recently and I'm loving it-- I feel like my actions have way more of an impact here than in basically any other game of this type. Why don't people make more games like this?
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Aug 3, 2014 07:52
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Fetterkey posted:Just got this recently and I'm loving it-- I feel like my actions have way more of an impact here than in basically any other game of this type. Why don't people make more games like this? Because most people play most games through once and don't touch them again so spending time and resources on content a huge chunk of your players won't ever see is viewed as a waste. Which is a shame as I'd much prefer a five hour game I can play a dozen times and get different scenarios than a 50 hour "epic" where my decisions amount to which terribly animated boning cutscenes I get to see.
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Aug 3, 2014 08:08
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The only other game I can think of that does something similar is Way of the Samurai. The original Dead Rising may also count.
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Aug 3, 2014 08:50
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The White Dragon posted:I'm with you on stealth probably not working so well on that difficulty; hell, even on normal enemies will have too much health for a tranq bullet to take down in a single shot. Addendum : I also sticked to the Russian-made pistols for this, they've got the most stopping power and accuracy is irrelevant when you make nothing but critical hits. X_Toad fucked around with this message at 09:27 on Aug 3, 2014 |
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Aug 3, 2014 09:19
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titties posted:If anyone new is just getting ready for their first playthrough, ignore the part where it tells you not to play as a recruit for your first time through. A pistol / stealth / martial arts build will let you walk through the entire game on normal difficulty, the recruit class won't really make any difference and it lets you unlock veteran, which is the raddest class. Note that for Recruit playthroughs you get +10 skill points if you pick enough of (maybe all of?) the [Recruit] replies (also maybe life-wasting points for your system account if you're doing the console version). Not that you necessarily need them because pistol/stealth/anything makes you Space-God, but just a heads-up.
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Aug 3, 2014 09:24
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There's very few scenarios where you're forced into direct combat, so there's literally no reason not to go for critical headshots, which destroy people regardless of difficulty.
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Aug 3, 2014 09:41
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Hard is extremely not fun and adds nothing to the game. Also on my Hard run I didn't put points into Martial Arts and wound up perma-stuck at Marburg's villa during the two-goon fight without your weapons.
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Aug 3, 2014 19:59
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Ddraig posted:There's very few scenarios where you're forced into direct combat, so there's literally no reason not to go for critical headshots, which destroy people regardless of difficulty. Unfortunately, Tranquilizer rounds do really low damage even on crit headshots. On Normal, while they will take an enemy out, their last few HP are always gonna be eaten up by Tranq's secondary DoT effect. Until you start getting points in Pistols and Tech for the damage bonuses, it's maybe fifty-fifty whether or not enemies will fire off a reactionary volley at nowhere in particular just to alert other guards before they go down. On Hard with their bonus HP (or, I dunno, your damage penalty, I can't say for sure how it works), I wouldn't wanna chance it.
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Aug 3, 2014 20:09
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The White Dragon posted:Unfortunately, Tranquilizer rounds do really low damage even on crit headshots. On Normal, while they will take an enemy out, their last few HP are always gonna be eaten up by Tranq's secondary DoT effect. Until you start getting points in Pistols and Tech for the damage bonuses, it's maybe fifty-fifty whether or not enemies will fire off a reactionary volley at nowhere in particular just to alert other guards before they go down. Using a more damaging pistol will stop that, on Normal anyways.
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Aug 3, 2014 21:22
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On Hard, I easily tranqed guards without them alerting others. Like, they never alerted anyone once. Unless you guys just aren't putting enough points into pistols, I don't understand the difficulty you're having.
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Aug 4, 2014 04:25
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FactsAreUseless posted:Hard is extremely not fun and adds nothing to the game. Also on my Hard run I didn't put points into Martial Arts and wound up perma-stuck at Marburg's villa during the two-goon fight without your weapons. There is literally no reason to ever play Alpha Protocol on Hard. It's not a fun challenge, it's just a horrible slog.
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Aug 4, 2014 14:59
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Is that fight that much more difficult on hard? I just steamrolled those two goons on normal, but I do have a ton of points in martial arts. Walking around Steven Segalling people is the best. I rarely use my SMG unless overwhelmed.
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Aug 6, 2014 00:39
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The hardest fight in the game for me was saving Madison at the museum when I was playing a recruit and using assault rifles. The spread was so terrible I killed her about a dozen times before I got lucky 
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Aug 7, 2014 07:46
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Wolfsheim posted:The hardest fight in the game for me was saving Madison at the museum when I was playing a recruit and using assault rifles. The spread was so terrible I killed her about a dozen times before I got lucky The only fight I really struggled with was that cocaine rear end in a top hat but once I figured out the strategy I took him down fairly easily.
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Aug 7, 2014 07:59
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Hard mode isn't even challenging. The trick is understanding that AP isn't balanced for poo poo and pistols/stealth make everything a joke; where you run through every level completely invisible doing throat stabs on all the helpless goons and then a boss shows up and you headshot him 10 times before he is even allowed to move.
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Aug 7, 2014 08:20
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I did stealth/pistols first time without knowing how op it was and it was way too easy. Still great game though. To be honest I'd probably do the same build on repeated playthroughs just to see the other dialogue easily.
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Aug 10, 2014 22:56
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Wezlar posted:I did stealth/pistols first time without knowing how op it was and it was way too easy. Still great game though. To be honest I'd probably do the same build on repeated playthroughs just to see the other dialogue easily. You should try hand to hand/smg/toughness. That's what I've focused on with a little bit of stealth. It's my first time ever playing the game and I'm doing fine. It's quite hilarious to run around punching and kicking everyone, and the smg is there for backup if I need to clear a bunch of enemies quickly. There's few things better in life than punching and kicking your enemies like your Steven Segal.
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Aug 11, 2014 05:40
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There needs to be a scene where Thornton goes into a bar and beats all the bad guys down with a pool cue.
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Aug 11, 2014 14:36
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Just beat the game for the first time, enjoyed it a lot. Gonna run it again as a recruit and see exactly how different a different approach will be. I had some issues in the final mission, though: I got a "call me!" e-mail from Albatross but had no way of actually contacting him, and he wasn't a handler option for the final mission. I could pick SIE, though, even though I hadn't spoken with her since the mission where I met her, and had Albatross as my handler whenever I had the option. Later, Leland told me he had Mina taken prisoner, and I got an objective to rescue her, but when I checked out the weapon range she just wasn't there, and there was no Objective marker on the map, so I figured it was some bluff or that I could find her later. Then she died offscreen. Was that supposed to happen? Also, how much can you make Leland dislike you? Whenever I manage to offend him, he then goes on to praise something Mike did, and I think I ended at +2 despite my efforts.
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Aug 12, 2014 00:06
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She's not at the weapon range, theres a door across from scarlet in the Graybox. Pretty sure theres some kind of marker there, or one of the monitors are over the door or something. I dunno, never missed finding her  I think you can only contact albatross in the last safehouse before the endgame starts. And why make leil;and hate you, when you can just kill him with a double-cross? soo much more satisfying
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Aug 12, 2014 00:20
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Kajeesus posted:Just beat the game for the first time, enjoyed it a lot. Gonna run it again as a recruit and see exactly how different a different approach will be. Did you leave him behind during the mission where he gets captured midway through it? Because he dies if you do that. He could have sent the email before he died and you just don't receive it until later. quote:
I'm not sure why the guy above me says that's the improper destination because it's definitely correct. Did you go all the way to the back of the weapons range and open the door? She's just inside that door. quote:
He loves agents who are cocky, agents who don't kill a lot of people, and agents who have the balls to lie to him. He hates agents who make jokes about everything and agents who leave behind a large bodycount. Edit: The reason he hates agents who kill a lot of people is because Alpha Protocol is a highly secret operation and every person who dies at your hands makes it easier to tie things back to Alpha Protocol, which is not a good thing for keeping it secret. ...! fucked around with this message at 00:40 on Aug 12, 2014 |
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Aug 12, 2014 00:34
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...! posted:Did you leave him behind during the mission where he gets captured midway through it? Because he dies if you do that. He could have sent the email before he died and you just don't receive it until later. I did not. I got a message during the mission that he survived. The only thing I could see messing him up was using the bluff option to keep spying on his Taipei servers, or showing him Sis' locket but he never made a comment about it. ...! posted:I'm not sure why the guy above me says that's the improper destination because it's definitely correct. Did you go all the way to the back of the weapons range and open the door? She's just inside that door. Ohh. I got to the door and didn't get a command to open it, so I assumed it was a dead end door. Oopsie me. ...! posted:He loves agents who are cocky, agents who don't kill a lot of people, and agents who have the balls to lie to him. He hates agents who make jokes about everything and agents who leave behind a large bodycount. I had a pretty low bodycount outside of stuff like the track suit mafia and groups like Deus Vult and the CSP. I guess that's where all my brownie points came from.
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Aug 13, 2014 00:03
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I just started another playthrough and finished the Greybox. The mission screen is showing 23/23 objectives complete. I have seen some people talking about getting 23/24 or 24/24, though. I posted a while back in this thread about completing 27/27 objectives. There must be more objectives, but I can't figure out what I missed this time through. I completed all 3 bonus missions (including not getting spotted and picking up 2 dossier cases during Parker's mission), got the news perk, changed my outfit, and hacked the PC near the lockers. Does anyone know what I missed?
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Aug 13, 2014 00:54
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How do you get to fight Westridge? Every playthrough I've only encountered Darcy during the finale.
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Aug 13, 2014 03:26
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Sam. posted:How do you get to fight Westridge? Every playthrough I've only encountered Darcy during the finale.
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Aug 13, 2014 03:26
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You don't even have to do that, just say yes when Shaheed asks if you're willing to work against America. You'll get Westridge as your final boss and you can kill Shaheed right after anyway.
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Aug 13, 2014 05:42
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You can also just agree to Leland's deal. But there's nothing that says you have to keep your promises!
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Aug 13, 2014 05:46
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-A69- posted:And why make leil;and hate you, when you can just kill him with a double-cross? soo much more satisfying Why kill him when you can leave him alive amongst the wreckage of his broken hopes, dreams and power? Soo much more satisfying. 
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Aug 13, 2014 12:17
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Munin posted:Why kill him when you can leave him alive amongst the wreckage of his broken hopes, dreams and power? Soo much more satisfying. Dismantling Halbech industries in front of his eyes is a much more fitting ending to "pacifist" karate Thorton anyway.
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Aug 13, 2014 12:40
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Our Lord and Savior Avellone posted a link to a Kickstarter for a potential spy-themed game that looks to feature all the conversation and branching of AP, but replace the action sequences with a card game, which can only be more interesting than chain shotting pistols. On board is the writer for Deus Ex, the designer for KOTOR 2 and Mask of the Betrayer, and stretch goals include the hiring of the Deus Ex composer to do the music, and MCA himself as a creative consultant. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1591209713/sienna-storm
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Aug 19, 2014 17:21
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Crappy Jack posted:Our Lord and Savior Avellone posted a link to a Kickstarter for a potential spy-themed game that looks to feature all the conversation and branching of AP, but replace the action sequences with a card game, which can only be more interesting than chain shotting pistols. On board is the writer for Deus Ex, the designer for KOTOR 2 and Mask of the Betrayer, and stretch goals include the hiring of the Deus Ex composer to do the music, and MCA himself as a creative consultant. Looks interesting but I think I'll wait to see how it develops, the whole card/dialog system looks intriguing but strange, I'd like to have more concrete details on it before committing.
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Aug 19, 2014 17:30
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Do they have a website or something where I could learn more about the design of the game? Because, that kickstarter page is pretty sparse on information. e: concerning card/dialogue systems, #YesCallMen from the SA game dev challenge had this (sort of) and it was great.
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Aug 19, 2014 17:35
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It's very sparse, but it also looks like the page went up like a day ago, I'm sure they'll update the FAQ and post more details as it goes. I'm with you, it's too early to tell on it yet, but I'm definitely keeping an eye on it.
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Aug 19, 2014 18:14
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I'm not sure how well $34 will go over for lowest 'buy the game' level - sure AAA titles go for $60, but this is clearly an indie title with a goal of <$200K. They really need to have something ~$20 that is the base game but without all the extras.
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Aug 19, 2014 18:30
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The backstory sounds so Alpha Protocol it hurts.
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Aug 19, 2014 18:46
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I'm reckless with money so I'm in.
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Aug 19, 2014 18:50
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