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LATEST UPDATE: Part Thirty-Seven: Lights Out! Hello, I'm Cool Ghost. In this thread, I'm going to do an LP of Metal Gear Acid. What is Metal Gear Acid? Metal Gear Acid is a spin-off to the popular Metal Gear series of video games, released as a launch game for the PSP in 2004 (in Japan) and 2005 (in North America and Europe). It puts an interesting spin on the Metal Gear gameplay formula by replacing the regular stealth action approach with a turn-based model, with most actions being performed by playing cards. This is the Active Command Intelligence Duel system, which gives the game its name and makes Acid and its sequel probably the most unique of all the Metal Gear offshoots. And, for my money, they're the best Metal Gear spinoffs out there. At the same time, the Acid games aren't without their faults, and this first game definitely has some rough edges. But the core gameplay is solid once it finds its feet and I find the feel of the game, aesthetically and tonally, to be pretty in-line with Metal Gear at large. By the way, if you're coming into this thread knowing nothing about Metal Gear and you're intimidated by the size of the catalogue, don't worry. Both Acid games are pretty much self-contained. Story-wise, they have nothing to do with the Metal Gear Solid games - the biggest connection is that most of the cards you'll find in the game are references to other Metal Gear games, but even that's essentially just set dressing. Before we get started, here's a little backstory on the game's events, courtesy of the manual: Metal Gear Acid: The Story posted:The year is 2016. The place...somewhere over the United States.  ON SPOILERS Don't spoil either of the Acid games. I'm not too concerned about spoilers for non-Acid Metal Gear games, but those are all off topic, so you shouldn't be talking about them too much anyway.  And so, let's dig in. Table of Contents Part One: Teliko Meets the Big Man Part Two: Solid Snake Part Three: A Snake at the Gate Part Four: Cutscenes on a Plane Part Five: Snake Goes North Part Six: Makin' Friends Part Seven: The Wall Part Eight: What Does a Snake Need in an Armoury? Part Nine: The Wall Comes Down Part Ten: About Alice Part Eleven: Snake Logs On Part Twelve: Snake Meets the Big Man Part Thirteen: The Snake and the Swallowtail Part Fourteen: Mr. Snake's Wild Ride Begins Part Fifteen: Discount Cutscene Warehouse Part Sixteen: The Search for Flemming Part Seventeen: Flemming Part Eighteen: Still Talkin' Part Nineteen: Big Jeff Part Twenty: Escape from the Big Man Part Twenty-One: Hittin' the Brakes Part Twenty-Two: Betrayal on the Big Bridge Part Twenty-Three: Regular Field with No Mines Part Twenty-Four: The Super Spy's New Clothes Part Twenty-Five: Solid Snake Dressup Doll Flash Game Part Twenty-Six: The Twin Snakes Part Twenty-Seven: There's Something Weird Upstairs Part Twenty-Eight: Dream Town Part Twenty-Nine: The Reunion Part Thirty: In-Flight Entertainment Part Thirty-One: Roped in to Some Nonsense (Like the Rope Bridge in the Update) Part Thirty-Two: Should Have Brought Stun Grenades Part Thirty-Three: Crossing the River Part Thirty-Four: Alliance Part Thirty-Five: AA Quality Filler Part Thirty-Six: The Genius of Stealth Part Thirty-Seven: Lights Out! Bonus Updates The Solid Snake Starter Pack Extra Missions The Teliko Friedman Starter Pack On Interference Cool Ghost fucked around with this message at 20:41 on Sep 6, 2019 |
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Nov 19, 2017 02:17
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Reserved.
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Nov 19, 2017 02:17
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Part One: Teliko Meets the Big Man Like all good stories, Metal Gear Acid begins with the President arriving.  Most of the game's big story scenes are set up like this, with text on a (semi-)static background. This scene isn't voiced, either. There's a little bit of voice acting in the game, but by and large they saved the space for other things.   Speaking of saving space, all the textboxes in the game are like this. I'd bet dollars to donuts that it's a Japanese font spacing thing, but still, the way it stretches things out is very annoying. Secretary-General: No apology necessary. The best way to handle this is to punish those in charge of each unit. President: I appreciate your understanding. Secretary-General: All for one, and one for all. Well that's not very nice. You know, I think these shadowy men might not be entirely above board. Secretary: My apologies for calling everyone on such short notice, but this is a serious incident. Chairman: What is it this time? Prime Minister: Yes, please enlighten us. With the PM's line there, we've been "introduced" to the entire cast of characters in this room. Judging from their titles, they're all very important.  And that's all we really need to know, since this meeting is just the framing device for the game. We won't be seeing any more of those guys for a while.  ???: we here at NEKAL are providing a special limited offer. Those who act now and purchase pajamas or a nightcap from participating outlets will receive our special NEKAL Silk Powder as a free gift.   Uh, okay. Sure.  Following the ad for nightwear, the scene jumps out of the visual novel dimension and into this hallway. I promise you, I am not cutting things out here.   The shot moves moves in on the door, which opens to reveal a woman.   As she steps out of whatever that room was, she receives one of those classic Metal Gear radio calls.  The little interface spoiler there identifies the woman as Teliko. Frankly, knowing her name changes nothing here, and her picture is in the manual anyway. HRT: Bravo! Don't come near this place!  While Teliko chews the fat, these men move in assault-rifle-havingly.  This is why you should never answer the phone.   Fortunately for her, Teliko is also an assault rifle-haver. This entire sequence takes place under the game's "battle" rules, but none of those trappings really matter here.  What does matter is that Teliko is not doing a no-kills run.  HRT: Delta here. I'm surrounded. Requesting backup. Goddammit, Delta, give Alpha his phone back. This is serious! HRT: Dammit! Echo here! Ungh!   Spotting some rough-looking gentlemen in her path, Teliko throws a grenade at their feet.   And then she shoots it.  This kills the goons.  I assume the line was open that whole time, and everyone involved in this call just heard that. HRT: I'm in the west warehouse. Our unit has been wiped out. We have to scrap the mission. That's what you get for sending a whole team into a Metal Gear situation. HRT: We can't wait much longer. Teliko: Roger.   HRT: What the... That looks exactly like... Teliko runs down the hall and the scene cuts to black.  Who or what looks exactly like what or whom will have to wait, though. We're gonna be waiting on a lot of things. HRT: Bravo...you still alive? The meeting point is in the west building warehouse.  Judging by the decor, Teliko isn't the first person to be through here.   Hey.     I don't think that grenade trick is gonna do it this time.  Leone Soldier: The group in Corridor B was wiped out, too. Leone: Take her. And don't let Clown find her. I'm sure we'll find out what that was about eventually. Cool Ghost fucked around with this message at 16:08 on Apr 3, 2018 |
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Nov 19, 2017 02:17
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Acid 2 is a faster game overall, and IIRC they did away with the card-locked doors and environmental roadblocks, but there are still times when you'll need some card and your deck won't cooperate, for sure. And the XM8's card graphic lists it as a 5.45mm, but the "more info" blurb has it as the correct 5.56mm.
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Nov 19, 2017 05:54
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Part Two: Solid Snake We're done with Teliko for a while, but there's still a lot of intro left in the game.   First thing to introduce: trees.  Even the trees in this game have radios. Wild.  You can immediately tell this guy is a dickhead because he's using his first name on the radio.  Once the pan is finished, we can see that Roger was not actually speaking to a tree, but to everyone's hero, Solid Snake. In MGS canon, Snake looked like he was about 70 years old in 2014, but here he looks pretty much the same as he did in MGS2, just in his MGS1 outfit. Roger: Looks like you made it ashore, Snake.  Didn't quite hit "kept you waiting, huh?" here, but they tried. Roger: Any enemies in sight? Snake: None so far. There's a conversation like this at the beginning of most Metal Gear games, usually establishing that Snake's going into the poo poo alone and against heavy resistance.  Roger: We've lost contact with them. HRT Unit Spenser would be the guys Teliko was on the horn with last update. Snake: HRT... Isn't that a SWAT-based unit specializing in terrorism prevention tactics? Roger: Yes. But...they were wiped out by enemies. I'd say something about what HRT is in reality, but whatever, they're all dead anyway, so who gives a poo poo?  Eh, I dunno, they looked pretty generic. Roger: Snake, our mission consists of just one thing. "Our" mission, he says, as if he's going to be doing anything. Like every other Metal Gear game, Roger here is about a thousand miles away from Snake at the moment.   Well they're about 2,500 years late on that one. Roger: Headquarters has concluded from the hijackers' demands that Pythagoras is the name given to a research project conducted at the Lobito Physics and Chemistry Lab. Inquiries to the lab, however, went unanswered. An unknown group of mercenaries had taken over the lab just before we sent in HRT.  The only action in this part of the conversation comes from the camera swingin' around and giving you a look at just all the parts of this tree, by the way.  Great news, everyone, the mystery research that the terrorists want is a mystery. Snake: A mystery? Why's that? Roger: The project's head researcher, Flemming, was formerly developing biological weapons for the U.S. Military. Snake: Biological weapons? Roger: In order to get the specifics on Pythagoras, you'll have to get in contact with Flemming. Snake: You got his profile? Roger: I was only able to get my hands on some old pictures. The investigation is still underway. Snake: Find out who's taken this place over while you're at it. Roger: That, too, is being taken care of as we speak. Now... I know it's been a while since you've been in actual combat, Snake. Before infiltrating the target location, you better brush up on your intuitive skills.  I know that's a lot of text just all in a block there, but honestly, this is what you're missing. It is just all tree on this end.  Roger gives a little explanation on how to move in the game after that last pictured line there, and the "mission" starts. This sequence serves the dual purposes of introduction and tutorial.  And now we get our first look at the main player interface screen, which has Snake's current hand of cards at the bottom there. For this tutorial sequence, the order the cards are drawn in is fixed, but in normal gameplay it's completely random, and believe me, that can screw you over. Now, normally, I'd just skip over this tutorial and keep things moving, but:  Roger: Use the "Genome Soldier" card. There are something like ten different ways to gently caress up in this tutorial, and there are about three different lines of dialogue for each one. When I was taking these screens, I spent about 20 minutes just screwing around and watching Roger get progressively angrier at Snake's horseshit.  This whole sequence is long enough on its own, though, so I'll save that for a bonus post or something. What you're supposed to do here is use this Genome Soldier card to move four spaces down the path. Genome Soldier is the first type of card in the game, a movement card. As the name implies, movement cards let Snake move some number of spaces when they're used, but do nothing else. They're very important to have in your deck, but generally shouldn't be the bulk of the content.  The way movement works in MGA is that you choose a card to move with, then choose a route through however many squares (in this case, 4), and select the space you want to stop at. Keep in mind that the specific route you follow is important for two reasons: first, obviously you have to stay within your move limit; second, if you cross an enemy's line of sight, they'll notice you, which is usually not ideal.  Once you select your stopping point, you select which direction Snake will face. Facing is mostly important for lining up shots on enemies - Snake can't shoot behind him. If you want to interact with something in the environment, you also have to be facing it a lot of the time. Facing is also important in combat, since your attacks will do more damage if you attack from behind.  The last step in moving is to select a stance. The standard stance is standing, which is just regular, no special features. The other option, generally, is to crawl. Crawling will let you do stuff like squeeze into a ventilation duct or through some small spaces, but it comes at the cost of half your movement allotment. Since you can only choose your stance at the end of your move, you have to sort of think ahead to what your next move is going to be - you don't want to be stuck crawling longer than you have to be, nor do you want to have to waste an action (and a card) just to stand or lie down.  Once you've done all that, Snake sort of jogs along the path you chose until he reaches his destination. The CIA or whoever is in charge of this mission must be paying him hourly, because he does this with exactly zero urgency. Movement in Metal Gear Acid is not fast.  But, by walking like four metres down the road, and the movement tutorial is over. Roger: I'll contact you again when you reach the gate. Snake: Right.  While Snake finishes his nature walk, we're going to jump back about six hours and look at an airplane.   It's not lookin' great inside there, to be honest.  You can see it better in this low view down the aisle, but there's little wisps of something floating around the place.  More importantly, these two fade onto the scene.   These are Elsie and Frances. A pair of talking marionettes are important characters in the story of Metal Gear Acid. Elsie is on the left, Frances is on the right, if you're concerned about that. Frances: Doctors use it for surgery n' stuff, to stop the pain. Vecuronium bromide is, in fact, a real thing used as a general anaesthetic. In reality, though, it's delivered via injection, not through inhalation. Speaking of injection, vecuronium is also part of the drug cocktail used in the United States to administer lethal injection.  Frances: No, no. We've just hijacked this plane. Elsie: Cool... And so, we've introduced Flight 326, as mentioned in that backstory paragraph you should have read in the OP. This is a scene we'll be revisiting many times during the course of the game, but for now, we're just gonna take a little peak at one last thing before we get back to Snake:  I, uh, don't think that's a photocopier.    Absolutely no poo poo, I promise you, the game cuts to this nasty shot through the trees to show Solid Snake running like 10 metres.  And bam, right back to yesterday. It just wouldn't be believable that 18 minutes passed if it didn't cut away, you know?  Frances: Well...I dunno. If the big leaders in America do what we want, most passengers should live. Elsie: How boring. I think everyone should DIE! Frances: If everyone dies, we won't have any more hostages. And without hostages, we can't negotiate. Elsie: So then we just hijack another plane. Frances: Elsie, can you just hush up a little while? Elsie: Why? Frances: I have to relay our demands to the control tower now. We have to claim responsibility... Elsie: OK, well...I guess I'll be quiet. But not for long.  Frances: We have taken over Flight 326, and the lives of 517 passengers are at stake. If you didn't read the backstory in the manual/OP, this is the first mention of this tidbit. For the record, that backstory paragraph doesn't contain any secrets or anything the game doesn't tell you, with the exception of the game being set in 2016. Frances: Every one of them has been temporarily paralyzed with vecuronium bromide. All we have to do is increase the density ever so slightly, and all these pitiful passengers will die in an instant. And, as the cherry on top, a bomb has been set somewhere on the plane. That would be the thing we saw earlier.  Frances: So don't even consider making us land. I'm sure you wouldn't even think of doing a silly thing like that, now, would you? Our demand is for access to a hidden treasure--kept in a South African laboratory.  Frances: Give us Pythagoras with no strings attached, and your precious passengers will be set free. Time's running out. You've got 10 hours. Let's see if you can get us Pythagoras within 10 hours. How you get it to us is up to you. But, if you're not quick about it, precious lives will be lost...one by one. Oh, yeah. You're probably hoping we don't find out, but we've already confirmed that Viggo Hach is on board this plane. Well, there you have it. Now the story has been set up for us, and we can move on.   Yeah, you knew that poo poo was coming.  Here's another new character, Charles, who's presumably on the phone.  I mean, he's having a conversation, but we only see one side of it here. He could be just talking to the window. Charles: So what exactly are the demands? Is that right. They've got a helluva plan there. By the way, there's no sort of beat between Charles's lines here or anything. Charles: I don't know who these hijackers are, but I'm drat thankful they showed up now. We have to take advantage of this golden opportunity. Strike while the iron is hot, as they say. Yeah. You know that a guy who describes a hijacking as a "golden opportunity" is an upstanding citizen. Charles: Leave this to me. I'll do a little negotiating with some higher-ups. You're kidding me. Roger was assigned to this?  Well, that was illuminating.  This is actually the same day as Charles's soliloquy, they just forgot to include the ten-second shot of Snake tying his shoes.  This time, we rejoin Snake and Roger in a slightly different setting. This is probably Alaska; in the MGS canon, Snake retired to Alaska after his mission in Zanzibar Land (the subject of Metal Gear 2). The events of the first two games are never explicitly discussed in this game, but my understanding of things is that the two timelines diverge after Snake leaves Zanzibar Land. Roger: Lobito Island itself belongs to the southern African republic of Moloni. Today's subject is the geopolitics of Lobito Island. Roger: But the Lobito Physics and Chemistry Lab itself is under corporate control. Snake: Which corporation? Roger: BEAGLE--officially one of the largest and most respected conglomerate enterprises in the world. But beyond its surface reputation, BEAGLE is quite a mystery. Dog Corp...how sinister... Roger: No contact could be established with them regarding this incident. Not only has the Moloni government been banned from meeting with Flemming or entering the lab, but they claim that it would be interference in nongovernmental affairs.  Roger: Until recently, Moloni was a country plagued by constant warfare and strife. Support from the international community has led to a national reconstruction, but the most generous financial contributor to Moloni was BEAGLE...by far. Snake: Sounds like the Moloni government doesn't want to betray their savior. This stuff is all important scene setting, sure, but the scene I really want to see is whoever had to convince the brass that they needed Solid Snake specifically to do this job.  Roger: Negotiating with terrorists is not an option. That's the right policy to show the world. But if Pythagoras isn't delivered to those hijackers in a matter of hours, the 517 passengers aboard Flight 326 will be killed. That's why this operation must be kept strictly confidential. But you don't need to hear that from me.  Snake asks a very good question here. I mean, he's obviously retired, he's living in Alaska. If you accept the idea that this game follows Metal Gear 2, Snake's been retired for 17 years. What would have happened if, say, these guys got all the way to Alaska and Snake had gained 300 pounds or some poo poo? Roger: You were Roy's close friend during your time as a green beret. Snake: Roy? Colonel Roy Campbell? This is, as far as I can tell, the only direct reference to a character from another Metal Gear game. Roy Campbell was Snake's CO during Metal Gear 2, and he's also a recurring character in the MGS series, where he's usually playing a similar role to that one. Here, he just gets mentioned in passing.  Snake: ... Roger: Snake, Senator Hach is on that plane. That's, right, Viggo Hach--presidential candidate in the upcoming elections. For the sake of America, we can't risk losing Hach.    And that little exchange leads back to Snake, still stuck in the forest. We're almost finished with the introduction at this point.  Jesus, dude, do you need him to chew your food for you, too?  This introduces, naturally, another tutorial. Roger: All right, Snake. Climb the ladder and head north. Snake: Right.  So, skipping over the game's explanation of what to do, let's look at some cards again!  If you don't have any movement cards on hand, most cards in the game can be used to move by selecting "move" when choosing the card from your hand. The trade-off for this is that, with few exceptions, you can only move three spaces when you use a card like this - movement cards start at 4 spaces.  So, ladders. To climb ladders, what you have to do is move to the square in front of the ladder and stop while facing the ladder. This adds the ladder option to the stance menu, which you can then select.   And there it is! Up he goes! Now, just like changing stances, you can only climb ladders after you move. And that means that, just like changing stances, you need to be careful and consider your next move when you do it. Don't want Snake just standing around at the top of the ladder just waiting to get spotted, after all. Having all these things that you have to stop moving to do makes movement in this game pretty rough. Thankfully, by the time they made Metal Gear Acid 2, they had smoothed a lot of this stuff out, and you no longer have to stop dead in your tracks to lay down or whatever.  Also, you know there's another tutorial. Snake: Are you sure it's only one thing? Roger: Very funny. I need to tell you how to equip yourself.  He does exactly that, and asks Snake to equip this Front Evade LV.1, which makes no sense to actually do right here and now, since there's nothing to evade, but you gotta get those 'torials in. Something you can see here is that, by pressing square, you can pop up a window like this one that gives more detail on what a card does. For the ones that actually feature an object or character, the window usually also includes a description of that object or character.  Anyway, if you use an equipment card, you can equip it to one of these slots, which are indicated by the boxes in the upper-right corner of the screen. Equipment cards can be all kinds of things, like body armour or this frontal-evasion ability or even weapons. We'll see a lot of equip cards later on.  Snake: Even a child could do this. Roger: Don't get offended. I have to make sure you've got the fundamentals down. "Well, Snake, it's been a while since your last mission. Maybe you forgot how to walk or some poo poo."  At this point, Roger explains that you can only use so many cards per turn. You start off able to use 2 cards a turn. Once you use that many cards, your turn ends and you have to wait for your next turn. Again, when ending your turn, you have to be careful, since it's usually followed by enemy turns, and you don't want Snake standing around like an rear end in a top hat and getting spotted. If you want to end your turn early, you can also do that, and it's a good idea for setting up your next move sometimes.  Anyway, the next order of business is to move up towards this fence.  Roger: Can you get in? Snake: The fence looks like it might be high voltage. Roger: Any doors? Snake: Yeah, but there's a big padlock on it. Roger: Shoot the padlock open and enter the compound. HRT should've left some goodies behind for you. A Sneaking Suit and SOCOM are stashed away in a cave at the seashore. Why would HRT be carrying an extra suit? I can understand an extra handgun, but is there some HRT guy who died naked? Did Snake come over to Lobito Island naked? That aside, in addition to "explaining" where Snake got that getup (he was also wearing it in that Alaska flashback), this introduces...a tutorial on attacking!  This brings us to the next big type of cards: weapons. All the standard Metal Gear fare is represented here: guns, grenades (we saw both of these with Teliko earlier), missile launchers, knives and swords. All kinds of stuff. But, more broadly, weapons can be divided into two big categories, use-type and equip-type. Use-type weapons, like the SOCOM here, are cards you can use directly from your hand. Equip-type weapons, on the other hand, you have to equip, since they're a subset of equipment cards. With weapons, you equip one card (think of this as a gun) and then use a second card that uses the same ammo type to "load" that equipped weapon. Generally speaking, equip-type weapons are better and more versatile, but we don't have any yet.  Once you use/load a weapon, you get a little target selection screen like this one. You can see two numbers listed on the left side there. The first, "ATK: 10x4" means that the SOCOM will shoot four bullets, and each one will do 10 damage if it hits. The second, "HIT: 89%" means that there's an 89% chance that any given bullet will hit the target. Every weapon has its own base attack power and accuracy, and there are various ways to modify either number. We won't see it for a while yet, but this is also part of why equip-type weapons are better: you can do more to screw with the numbers.   For now, it all comes down to using a SOCOM to shoot the poo poo out of that padlock. Roger: That's it. Now, get through that fence and infiltrate the lab. Snake: Right.  And now, finally, we're finished with this tutorial/introduction mission.   What we're not finished with yet is people talking. We've got one more scene of that to go through.  It took Snake 25 minutes to get through the forest. On the other side of the fence, Roger calls Snake up to berate him about cardiac health. Roger: I've gone over your basic physical functions and rate of exercise from the time you arrived, and some numerical inconsistencies have arisen when compared with the apparatus. See, this is why you use people who are still in the service and get regular physicals, instead of picking some jackass who's been living in the Alaskan wilderness for a decade and a half.  Roger: Yes. The Sneaking Suit provided to you has been fitted with a CHAIN that stores physical data. A CHAIN! Roger: Not only does it store a soldier's physical data and information related to their surroundings, but it also includes the advanced capability of providing remote medicine. This is the first time it's been used in an actual combat situation, and it seems a little unstable. Snake: Well, I've been out of active duty for a while, so... Roger: No, Snake. Your current data is recorded in the CHAIN. Your age has nothing to do with it. In addition... If you assume Snake shares a birthday with the Snake in the MGS canon, he was born in 1972, so he'd be 43 or 44 here. Snake: Just get on with it, will ya? Roger: ...Yeah. Dang, Roger was all amped up to talk about the CHAIN.   But instead, he'll have to settle for introducing another character. Snake: A psychic? Roger: She's well-known for her supernatural abilities, and has played a major role in solving various cases. Among her abilities are telepathy, astral projection...and...what was that called...  And there's our first glimpse of Alice Hazel, psychic extraordinaire. Alice: I'm able to view events from a great distance. Roger: Alice will act as a navigator for you. She can sense images and events within the laboratory.  Snake is not on board with the psychic navigation plan. Snake: You expect me to base this mission on palm readings and crystal balls? I'm in no mood for the psychic hotline here. Roger: But she's the real thing. Recommended by the Feds. I just want to point out that Roger works for the CIA, who are, by all accounts, "the Feds." Alice: You don't have to believe in my gift, but I'd appreciate it if you'd stop treating me like some dime-store fortune-teller. It may be troubling for you to entrust your life to me, but it would be in your best interest to trust me. Snake: ... Roger: Alice has recovered over 200 missing persons in cooperation with the FBI. She's young, but has a great record and a truly incredible gift. Snake: ... Snake's not convinced. Alice: I do hope we can get along. Roger: And Snake... She may not have the veteran expertise that you offer us, but... Just in case, OK? Snake: Yeah, sure... What a ringing endorsement. Roger: Any action taken outside of an order should be thought out carefully. We may lose contact with you. Snake: I know. Roger: All right, Snake. Head for the gate.  And so, finally, the intro sequence closes with the title card.
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Nov 21, 2017 03:10
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The first two Metal Gear games have no supernatural elements to speak of, so it makes some sense for Snake to be wary. I guess they're pretty run-of-the-mill in MGS, though, since Snake doesn't really react when anyone tells him Psycho Mantis can read minds. Edit: he's also surprisingly amenable to the Liquid situation in MGS2.
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Nov 22, 2017 03:54
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DeathChicken posted:I think the weirdest thing in the original game was those robot twins who were implied to be Snatchers The robots in the first game were Terminators. It was Big Boss in MG2 who was part of the "Snatcher plan."
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Nov 23, 2017 05:39
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Part Three: A Snake at the Gate Now that the tutorial "mission" has ended, the game dumps us out here, on the intermission screen. This is where you do all the fun stuff, like mess with the settings or save your game. Later on, this will actually be a useful screen, but right now all it's really offering is map selection.  The map select screen is how you select, naturally, maps. Most of the time, a new mission means a new map, but that's not a perfect one-to-one relationship.  There's only one map to select at this point. The forest is visually on the map, but you can't actually go back there.  After choosing a map, there's a high-angle shot that shows off the basic lay of the land. This map is pretty simple - there's a road towards the gate, with three little buildings off to the side.  To indicate the goal, there's a tighter shot of the gate, with this guard standing in front of it.   Then it pans back across the map to show Snake entering the scene.  And immediately making a phone call.  Why just show or just tell when you could do both?  It's kind of a lovely fence. Nothing to write home about. Snake: I see some soldiers standing guard in front of the gate. Roger: That gate is your only ticket into the lab.  I'm including this shot because you can mostly see what the guard is doing, which is standing around holding a rifle. Essentially, an activity you could describe as "standing guard." Snake: Doesn't look like he has any intention of moving. Roger: You've got to get him to move out of the way somehow. This mission is a bit of a tutorial on making people move when they're not inclined. If you know about Metal Gear, you know where this is going. Roger: Snake, I hate to sound like a parrot, but this is a top secret mission. It's very important that you move forward without being detected by anyone. No special penalty is levied for being detected in this mission. Roger: I'm sure the soldiers inside are armed to the teeth and patrolling the area with a steady eye. If that guard catches sight of you and calls for backup, you'll be seriously outnumbered in a matter of seconds. Survival is very unlikely under such circumstances. Snake: Right. I've gotta stay alert. Roger: Yes. I'm repeating myself again, but I can't stress enough the importance of staying out of enemy sight. If enemies see you, they call in more enemies, and then all the enemies shoot Snake many times with their rifles.  You can set up for combat later on, but this is good to keep in mind early in the game. Snake: I get it. Enough with the lectures, already! Roger: Fine. You have to get through the gate. Figure out some way to distract that guard. Snake: Right. Time to get down to business.  This next exchange is added if you gently caress up the tutorial. Snake: What is it? Roger: You don't seem to be paying attention to my instructions. So I've been thinking... Snake: Is this about our last conversation? Roger: Yes. I lose my temper sometimes. ...So don't be surprised if your equipment starts acting up on you... If Snake screws around during his jog, Roger threatens to have Alice psychically make Snake's pants fall down or something.    Like I said, this is an optional scene if you screw around during the tutorial, so it actually has no bearing on the story at all.  Now the mission starts. It's pretty simple, just gotta bomb up that road and past the gate.  Every mission begins with Snake's turn, and with a full hand. This is the first time in the game that the hand isn't pre-determined, and I'll tell you right now: the starting deck loving blows. It tries to showcase a little bit of everything, which is a no-no when you're building a deck for a card game like this and makes it harder to do any single thing.  Before I actually do anything, though, I want to show off this menu here, which has a few supplemental actions. The first is to end your turn, which is useful more often than you might expect. Punch makes Snake punch a guard that's directly in front of him, which is very useful and means the player always has a way to attack. Discard throws two cards away to grab two new ones out of the deck, which of course you have to do a lot when you have all the good cards in your hand but need some dumb bullshit to finish the mission.  There's also a very important feature that the game doesn't tell you about right here, but you can hit triangle to switch to this overhead view and scroll around the map.   Doing this is especially useful because it lets you see where the guards are and what they can see. Any tile with a square on it is in the guard's vision cone, so you shouldn't go there. These two guards, who are currently staring at fences, are generally irrelevant to this mission. If you don't get too close to them or make trouble, they won't hassle you.  Over here between these two buildings is a much more important guard, who is looking out at that main stretch of road by the truck. If you're the kind of player who just tries to make the sprint towards the gate, this is the first guy who'll see you.  And, finally, the man of the hour, this guy who just stands around looking down the road. This is the guard Snake needs to move to finish the mission. While he's highlighted, I want to point something out: when you highlight a guard, their HP is displayed in the upper-left. The other three guys have 40 HP each, but this guy has 25. At the same time, though, the guard's current equipment is shown in the two boxes right above the HP number. Every other guard has two rifles equipped, but this guy has a rifle and a vest. The vest is actually body armour, which absorbs 80 damage if you attack the guard, which makes his effective HP total 105. This is a trap for players who think they're going to just shoot the guy and run through.  There's one more mechanic to talk about here, which is Cost. If you look at the little data window next to Snake here, the number next to the stopwatch icon is his Cost. Every action has an associated Cost, which determines turn order: lowest Cost goes first, and then however much Cost that person's turn is deducted from everyone else's totals, and the next turn starts.  You can tell what the Cost of a card is by looking at that big number in the upper-right corner of the card. Something else to know about Cost is that, when you play a card, the next card's Cost is reduced by 1. You can see here that Spin Kick has a cost of 6, with that 1 down icon next to it. Spin Kick has a base cost of 7, but because I moved up the road, it's now at 6. This mainly serves as a complication of the system that has basically no actual effect on anything else. The point of all this is that you need to watch what you do and try not to spend too much Cost if you want to take your next turn quickly. This is another reason why this starting deck sucks, but let's look at some pictures to break up this text.   Everything guards do also has a Cost associated with it, but I don't think they're limited by what's in their hands, they seem to just be able to do what they want on a turn.  Now, back to Snake and why this deck sucks: there's a lot of high-Cost, situational cards in here. The Spin Kick from earlier is one of them, but there's also a lot of stuff like Grenade in there. When you use Grenade, Snake throws it on the ground, and after 8 Cost "passes" the grenade blows up and does damage in a 3x3 square, but it also causes a loud explosion, and if any guards are alive, that triggers an instant alert. So, most of the time, you don't want to be chucking grenades around, but you don't even want to use it to move, since it's got a Cost of 7. Since Discard costs 6, it's actually cheaper to throw Grenade (and something else) away than it is to use it.  Mechanics aside, I'm gonna hang out over behind this building for a minute.  And Snake's gonna just hop on the radio real quick.  This call exists in case you forgot what you were doing.  Snake cannot see the guard or the gate from here.  By flattening against a wall, you can knock on it to make a noise and distract guards. This is the other purpose of the call, to introduce the knocking tutorial. Roger: Think you can get through now? Basically... Snake: ...Make a sound to lure the guard away from his post. Roger: Just do it without getting caught. Snake: Got it.  So, with that little hint out of the way, we can move on with the mission. This guard between the buildings just moves from one end of the alley to the other, pausing for a turn after each trip.  Since the guard at the gate is watching the road, the best way to reach the north end of the map is by sneaking back behind the buildings.  Flattening up against this back wall here is a great opportunity to shoot the alley guard, if you can draw a SOCOM. The SOCOM is silenced, so you don't alert the guards if you fire it, and killing this guard can speed up your run, especially if you want to visit the little buildings around the place. See, each building contains a booster pack of cards that you can use to customise your deck. The problem is, the cards you can get from this mission aren't very good and it's a hassle to open doors in this game. My decision, in the end, was to skip the cards and just finish the mission.  Instead of shooting that man or running around the map collecting trash, I ran over here and flattened up against the wall.  And promptly ended my turn. When you knock, if a guard hears it, they will immediately come to investigate. So, if you do it as the last action on your turn, Snake's stuck in the exact place the guard's going to go towards.  So I knocked on my next turn.  The green exclamation mark over the guard's head here indicates that he's alerted to something, but he doesn't know what it is, so he'll go investigate.  Before the guard can move, though, Snake's back up against this wall, safe and sound.  I also timed it out so that the alley guard would be facing away.  This time, I am going to shoot him.  I am, not, though, going for a kill. See, the SOCOM has a fun side-effect. When you hit an enemy with it, it causes them to fall down.  Falling down knocks a card out of a character's hand. Since this guard only had one card in his hand, the fall causes him to faint.  And that lets Snake zip right up the alley and stand on top of him. If I remember right, this actually stops the guard from ever waking up (because someone else is on his panel), but I'm not 100% sure, I just did it here because it let me do this on Snake's next turn:    And that''s that!   The game even recognises my skills, and that's an S rank right there. The rank is based on how much Cost you spend on the mission, how many times you're found, how many people you kill, and how much damage you take. Lower numbers in each category means a higher total rank. You're also awarded points at the end of the mission - higher rank, more points. Later on, those points will be useful, but right now they're just there.  At the end of a mission, you can also see which cards you gathered. However, I skipped them in this mission, so it's just nothing here.  Additionally, there are also three bonus cards you can collect at the end of a mission. There are bonuses for completing the mission without being seen, without killing anyone, and for keeping your Cost under some threshold. I did all three this time, so it's three bonus cards.  Now that the mission is finished, Snake runs off to the next adventure! Cool Ghost fucked around with this message at 04:45 on Nov 27, 2017 |
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Nov 27, 2017 01:15
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You can buy packs after the second mission, thankfully.
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Nov 27, 2017 03:28
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I did not, and have now fixed it. Thanks.
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Nov 27, 2017 04:45
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Only spoilers for the two Acid games are off-limits.
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Nov 30, 2017 01:15
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Ocelot coming back from the dead just to gently caress with everyone's plans would have been an interesting third-act twist in MGR.
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Nov 30, 2017 01:49
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Part Four: Cutscenes on a Plane Since they figured out how to make them in 1989, Metal Gear has been a series that really embraced cutscenes. Some of the games in the series have cutscenes that are over an hour long, and it's common for there to be prompts for the player to save after scenes, sometimes between them. The gameplay:cutscene ratio in any given Metal Gear Solid game is probably close to 1:1, depending on how skilled the player is.  Anyway, after going through the gate, Snake takes two steps and immediately gets back on the horn with Roger.   I just want to reiterate that I hate the line breaks in this game. Not accommodating the change from fixed-width fonts to variable is amateur hour. Snake: Not quite.  Cost is always set as COST in the game's text. It's not an acronym as far as I know, that's just style. Roger: Don't worry. You'll be back in good form soon enough. I honestly haven't seen anything so far to suggest that Snake's not in fighting shape, but that's good to hear.  Oh, hold on Roger, someone's gotten hold of Snake's number.  ???: Any...out the...? Please... Someone ans... You have to actually speak into the microphone, chief.  The rules of radios in Metal Gear are never established. Sometimes the command staff can hear what's on other lines, sometimes they can't.  Roger: I'm not sure, but he's using the van unit's emergency frequency. Well how did he get that? As near as I can tell, "van unit" here refers to the command unit's surveillance van (or equivalent), where I suppose Roger and Alice are. I've not really seen the phrase used outside of this context. Snake: Could be an enemy. Roger: Talk to him, and try to find out what his situation is. I'll run a background check on the name "Gary Murray". Snake: Right.  So let's talk to Gary.   The connection seems to be much clearer this time, as we even get Gary's codec portrait showing up. Snake: Something like that. What about you? Gary: I'm an engineer at this lab. Name's Gary Murray. Is a fedora and trenchcoat the regular uniform for an engineer to wear at the lab?  Dude, we are nowhere near answering that one right now. Gary: These soldiers just swarmed us all of a sudden, and the next thing I knew, we were thrown into the residential quarters and treated like dirt. I was in charge of quarantine and disease prevention for test animals here. And that's all. They interrogated me about the actual research. I don't even know anything. Hurry, you've got...hel...me... Enemy soldiers are patrolling as we spea...  Snake: I hear you, Gary. Just calm down. Where are you? Gary: ...control room...the north gate. But enemy soldie... Dr. Flemming is...the east...   Well, at least we know what's next on the agenda. Roger: It could very well be a trap. But if he claims to know where Flemming is located, he could really help us out. Snake: He said he's in the control room--to the north. Uh, no, he said "control room...the north gate."  Oh no poo poo? I thought the gate outside was preventing access to a loving empty field. Thanks, Roger. Roger: Snake, get to that control room and find Gary. Then ask him about Flemming's whereabouts. I'll try to reestablish radio contact with him. Head for the north gate.  And with that, the scene past the front gate is over at last.  Now, back to the plane. This is a different angle from before, featuring some brand new characters, but it's still the Flight 326 we all know and love.  And hey, would you look at that, it's Senator Viggo Hach, the main hostage himself.  Next to the Senator is his assistant, Lena. Lena's full name is listed on the Wikipedia and the Metal Gear wiki (the most reliable sources online) as Lena Arrow, even though I can't actually find a source for this.  Lena: But, Senator Hach, please speak with caution.   Lena's line there kind of just dead-ends. Oops. Lena: Just stay put. I'll go see what's happening here. Viggo: Wait. It's too dangerous. Lena: You could be in much more danger than I am, Senator. I have to find out what's going on. There's really no point in us both going. Viggo: ...OK. Just be careful!   Given the anaesthetic gas in the air, you'd think that Lena would be less disposed to walking around than Hach is.   Oh hey, it's these two.  Viggo making a very good point here. Frances: We want Pythagoras. Elsie: Do you have Pythagoras, Mister? Viggo: It must be...that drat kid. No doubt about it.  We're not gonna talk about what Viggo's last line there means right now. Frances: I was working. Frances is the stewardess on this flight, actually. Gotta run those drink carts even in a hostage situation, you know? Elsie: Liar, liar, pants on fire! You just left me alone and went off somewhere to play. Frances: No, I didn't. I'm a busy girl, unlike you!   Shocker. Elsie: Killing? Killing what? Frances: I murdered the pilot, and the copilot, too. Made their hearts stop...  How polite of Viggo to not interrupt their conversation. Viggo: So they're...dead?!  And, as if to answer Viggo's question, the scene cuts to the cockpit.  Next time, on Metal Gear Acid: Snake reads the phone book! Cool Ghost fucked around with this message at 19:42 on Dec 5, 2017 |
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Dec 5, 2017 19:38
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"Van unit" could mean vanguard, I suppose. I guess Gary would have one of the dead HRT guys' radios, and they might have been on the emergency band. Also, I looked it up, and Japan Airlines used to fly Boeings with a passenger capacity of up to 563; according to Wikipedia, these particular models were built specifically because of Japanese requests. To my mind, though, it's weirder for a presidential candidate to be flying commercial with his assistant as his only (apparent) escort.
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Dec 6, 2017 06:58
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Part Five: Snake Goes North After the shot of the dead pilot and co-pilot, we're dumped out to the intermission screen. Having completed the first mission, there's something new here: the deck editor.  The deck editor is exactly what it sounds like, the screen where you can choose which cards are in Snake's deck. This is, of course, fairly important as you go on through the game. On the other hand, it's a bit useless right now. I was going to run through Snake's starting deck here, but I decided I'd rather go into more depth on what each card is and how they (don't) work together.  While we're here, though, I will take a moment to talk about a couple more types of cards. The first is cost reduction. These cards... reduce your overall cost for your turn. This is very useful for getting a turn advantage on enemies, or just for offsetting the use of a high-cost card. For example, you can use a movement card followed by Cost -4 here to get Snake's turn cost to 0, which means he'll go twice in a row. Cost reduction cards should pretty much always be in your deck.  The other type is character cards. These are cards named after characters from the game, and they can do all kinds of things (usually emulating the characters from the game). For example, if you use this Revolver Ocelot card, it reduces the cost of all of Snake's gun attacks to 2, but prevents him from using CQC. Character cards also come with little bios and quotes from the characters, such as: Revolver Ocelot Card posted:[Revolver Ocelot] There are character cards to do pretty much anything in the game, so this category is really too broad to comment on as a whole. Some character cards are really good, some are novelties, some are trash. If you want to see your favourite Metal Gear characters in this game, though, character cards are the way to do it.  And that's all I have to say about the deck editor here and now, so let's slide into stage 2, the office.    Just like outside the gate, there's a pan over the mission area. Guards are inside, what a surprise.  Also surprising: Snake's loving phone is ringing.  Roger: It's the Leone Unit--a group of insurgents opposed to the Moloni Republic--named after their leader. If you don't remember, we saw Leone and his Unit in the intro: Like with Teliko, the player being able to identify these guys might be an interface spoiler, but Leone has a portrait and bio in the manual. Snake: So anti-government rebels have stormed a lab facility built on government soil... Another one of Moloni's internal conflicts, maybe? Roger: No. The Leone Unit is actually a group of mercenaries hired by someone else. The group is made up of soldiers from several countries, and they're not working together under any political ideology. Snake: So they were hired by someone to take over this lab after Moloni's civil strife was brought under control?  All of this raises the questions: what's in this lab that's important enough to hire mercenaries to take it over? What exactly is "Pythagoras"?  Just feel free to stew on those. Roger: Yes, and the enemy security is higher than anything we've seen before. There appear to be security cameras in the facility. Be careful as you go in...  Snake's no rookie. Roger: And Snake... I've got something important to tell you. Listen carefully. Snake: What is it?  That lead-in makes it sound like Roger's about to drop some knowledge on Snake, but nope, he just gives a tutorial about Cost. I've already discussed it, so I'm not going to show the tutorial, but I am going to point out that it comes before the second mission of the game. I bet that at least one new player has gotten screwed over because they didn't know what the number on the cards meant, so they ended up in a patrol route. Roger: Snake, I think Gary's Codec is damaged. I can't make out what he's saying. But we know he's in the control room to the north. Snake: North. Got it. Now, back to our regularly scheduled program, "Snake's Search for Santa."  And that's the start of the mission!  The first thing I did was zip up to this door.  You can see between the two screenshots, moving in front of the door opens it and allows Snake to see in - in the first shot, the interior area is all blacked out. And yes, in order to open a door, you absolutely have to end your movement. It's a pain in the rear end. Also, yes, enemies can open doors and see Snake if he's just milling about in the hallway or whatever, so you have to be careful of your positioning. You can't see through closed doors, so it's kind of a good rule of thumb to just assume that they'll open up next turn.  In addition to the guard in the office, there's one in the hallway.  And there's also a surveillance camera! Cameras are harder to see than guards, but get highlighted the same way in the overhead scan view, which makes it a useful tool for getting a read on their position/FOV. Stealth-wise, you have to be especially careful of cameras, since they'll instantly initiate an alert if they see you. With guards, they'll take a turn to use the radio to call for help, so you have a brief window to take them out before they can do that.   There are also two more cameras further down the hall. These are two views of the north side of the little office Snake is south of.  Even further north, there's one last guard. You can also see a white bullseye in this shot. When Snake stands on that, he'll move to the next part of the map.  Now that we've got the lay of the land, I can go on with the mission. It begins with Snake moving into the office and stopping on this tile, where he picks up an "MGS1 Pack." These are booster packs, each containing three cards. The three boosters I skipped outside the gate are all also MGS1 packs, if you were curious.   Standing behind this filing cabinet, Snake is out of both guards' lines of sight.  Getting the MGS1 pack in the office is a bit of a detour, but...   ...It synchs Snake's path up with this guard's, so you can duck back into the office without being seen.  Now it's just a matter of getting out without getting spotted by the guard when he turns around. I could murder him with a sword here, but I'm trying for a no-kills run. The H.F. Blade being in Snake's deck here is a bit odd, since Snake explicitly says he doesn't want to use it in MGS2. Let's mark that down as Solid Snake and, uh, Solid Snake being different characters.  Instead of sword murder, I follow the guard over to this space and sucker-punch him.  It's a knockout!  I can't get the MGS1 pack over here because I don't have a gun in my hand to shoot the camera.  So it's over here instead! I don't think flattening against the wall actually helps in any way (guards can either see a tile or they can't), but it makes me feel sneakier.    This guard's easy to juke, since the furniture restricts his vision cone.   You just have to be careful when he moves up here.   Make sure you're still behind the divider, since he turns to the right on the next turn, and he'll spot you if you rush.  While I was waiting for the guard to turn around, I drew Action+. Using Action+ gives Snake the ability to use one more card per turn, which is a bit of a mixed blessing. It'll let you attack/move/&c. more times, but it also generally means you'll get fewer turns, since you run your Cost up higher. It also means that your hand will slowly dwindle, since you only draw two cards at the start of each turn.   In this case, I used it and then immediately ended my turn. Action+ lasts for 10 turns, so it's not a total waste, and it'll let me move further next turn.   Unfortunately, the guard in the hallway put a stop to that plan.   With the guard over there, getting the pack in that little alcove means dealing with him somehow, which is more of a hassle than it's worth to me.  So I'm going to just move on to the next area.  As soon as Snake enters the northern part of the office, Alice stops him. Snake: What is it? Alice: Gary is to your north. Oh my god, I get it.  I'd like to say that Snake is just being an rear end in a top hat here, since it's been pretty well established that Gary is in the control room to the north.  But Alice answers earnestly, so who knows. Alice: If you go to the west side and turn the corner, you'll see an entrance. That's your way in. This is the actual information. You don't have a chance to look at the map before Alice calls, but the hallway in front of Snake is running east-west, not north-south.  This line is fun if you read it in a kind of pleading tone. "Snake, please don't be a jerk about this." Roger: Go to the west side. Snake: ...Right.  And now it's back to the game!   Off to the right, there are two guards. They cover this hallway pretty well, so it's nice that we don't have to go that way.   Security on the west side is comparatively light, a camera just south of the door we need to hit and a single guard. There's a second camera, but it's too far north to be in the way.  By the way, your action count carries over between the two parts of the map, so I could only use one more card at this point. I just ended my turn, but it's something else you have to be careful of.  The guard has decided to stare at the wall.  Then he fucks off back up the hall. Good work, my man.  Cameras can't see the tile directly underneath them, so you have to either shoot this one out or slip past it here by hugging the east wall.  Having to stop for doors is absolute horseshit. They fixed this for the sequel.  Also horsehit: the game gives you the chance to line up a move here.  But as soon as Snake goes through the door, he stops.  You guessed it! Roger: Snake, it's a Patrol Bot. Keep your guard up. Snake: A Patrol... Bot? This is the introduction of a new enemy type, Patrol Bots. Roger: A state-of-the-art guard dog developed at the Lobito Chemistry and Physics Lab. Looks like it belongs to the Leone Unit now, though. Snake: ...So I'll put it out of order, then. Roger: Hold on, Snake. That won't be as easy as you think.  This is one of the main features of patrol bots. Having armour means they take less damage from attacks. There are various weapons in the game (e.g., Grenades) that have the "anti-armour" property and deal full damage even to armoured enemies. Roger: Unless you can find an armor-piercing weapon, or can disable it with a Chaff Grenade, your best bet is to sneak by without getting caught. Snake: ...Right. That's Patrol Bots 101.  And here's another thing that can screw over a first-time player: that cutscene stops Snake right on the other side of the door, leaving him out in full view. Not a problem if you killed the guard, or you timed his route right, but it's also not ideal.  The bot always goes south on its first turn.  This leaves an easy avenue up the west side of the room.  But then you have to wait for it to move again. This is, after all, a stealth game.   If you like, you can blow up the robot with a Grenade to get a free MGS1 pack, but it's easy enough to just sneak past it like this. As far as I know, it won't turn to face this doorway, and when it's going north-south, its vision is restricted.  This tiny hallway only exists to slow you down.  Passing through the second door, you get a glimpse of this trenchcoat-wearing guy as he runs off to the north.  There's a guard in the room ahead, but he's not an issue since the furniture blocks his view of the doorway Snake's standing in.  The only problem is I ran my Cost way up using three cards per turn, so I have to watch every other person on the map take their turn.  Would have been handy last turn.  But oh well. At this point, all that's left in this part of the mission is to run north past the guard. Now, let's see what Gary Murray has to say for himself... Cool Ghost fucked around with this message at 04:08 on Dec 16, 2017 |
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Dec 15, 2017 21:11
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No, movement cards let you move up to however many squares, you don't have to use the full allotment every time.
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Dec 18, 2017 02:28
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The booster packs we're seeing here all contain cards from the MGS1 set, a lot of which is the stuff that's already in the starter deck, so you can't really do much for improving that other than taking out a couple of the really bad cards. Plus, boosters will be available to buy soon enough, and that's a much more efficient way to get cards (getting a higher score in the mission means you can buy more cards, anyway).
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Dec 18, 2017 02:40
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Part Six: Makin' Friends The north part of the office complex contains a cutscene.   Thanks to the low camera angle, the player can see the guy hiding under the desk, but this never occurs to Snake.  He's never been on a seeking mission before.   What?   Gary skipped the lesson on not yelling at the phone during hiding school. Snake: You must be Gary Murray.  Clearly, Gary wasn't thinking that the gun pointed at him was the start of a conversation. Snake: I just talked to you on the Codec. Gary: Oh... So you're the American? Thank you. Snake: Looks like you're injured. Can you stand? Gary: Yeah. I'm fine.   Instead of animating Gary getting out from under the desk, the scene cuts to Teliko running through this hallway. This is where Alice called Snake and told him to go west.  Now back to the Snake and Gary show.  Gary: Yes, I do. I just happened to see where Dr. Flemming was taken during my escape. This kind of situation happens in every Metal Gear game through MGS2. The player enters an enemy stronghold looking for some VIP and ends up getting directions to find them from some other prisoner/VIP. Part of why I think Metal Gear Acid is effective as an MGS spin-off is because it nails down the structural similarities in those early Metal Gear games. The first four Metal Gear games all also start with you going north (well, up, towards the top of the screen).Gary: Those terrorists forced the lab workers into boats and sent them off to a nearby island. They were being treated like prisoners. Then, after U.S. soldiers came and attacked, the terrorists just went nuts. Despite being an FBI unit (so not technically "U.S. soldiers") the HRT does deploy overseas. Maybe this factoid is less interesting to Americans. Gary: I managed to slip past them and tried to make my way to FAR, but one of the guards caught sight of me. I thought it was all over, but somehow I managed to make it here without getting killed. Snake: What's "FAR"? Gary: It's a research building in the northernmost part of the plant, where Dr. Flemming would receive instructions. Only the doctor's closest advisers were granted access to that place. Everyone called it FAR--an acronym for Flemming's Assembly Room. Must have been big assemblies if they needed the whole building.  Gary: Intellectuals can be a little extreme. Snake: Where was Flemming taken? Gary: The residential quarters, located to the east.   Little slip by the editor there. Gary: But I could hear him yelling, "I'm Flemming! What the hell are you doing ?!" It had to be him. There's no doubt in my mind. Snake: Residential quarters to the east, huh?  The shot moves to Snake for his last line there, but I thought the call icon over his face was funny. Roger: Snake, you better get over there on the double. Snake: Right.  Snake: I'll come get you when my mission is over. Gary: Please hurry... Good luck, Gary.  Since the mission can't just cut off there, now we have to head back south and go east through the hallway.  As shown here. The purple bullseye indicates the mission goal. Note also that the cutscene with Gary doesn't actually end Snake's turn, so I only have one action left.  Since I'm heading south, I've flipped the camera around. Just pointing it out here because all the rooms are "upside down" compared to the previous trip.  The guard is heading to the north side of this room, so I'm able to pick up this MGS1 pack while I pass through.  The patrol bot's still watching the west exit, so it doesn't spot Snake moving through the door here.  I have to kill a turn standing next to the door so the guard doesn't catch Snake when he turns around.   And that lets me slip under the camera and past the guard.  However, there are two guards watching the east exit. It can be a little tough to sneak past these guys, since they cover each other's blind spots well and there's not a lot of cover.  Thankfully, Snake has a tool for that.  This is a Metal Gear game, so of course you can hide under a cardboard box. The box stays equipped forever, as long as Snake doesn't get spotted and you don't use a weapon. As long as you're in the box, guards won't investigate unless you're directly in their path or they see you moving.  So I'm free to hang out here.  And then, once the guards are looking away, I'm free to slip into this little nook.  If it weren't for the box, Snake would be spotted here. I'd have to knock out one or both of the guards to slip past.   At this point, it's just waiting.   And then a quick hop to the exit, and it's mission complete.  Another S rank! Despite this mission taking six times as much cost as the last one, I still get the "speedy" bonus. I don't know what the exact criteria are for it.   The two MGS1 packs I picked up didn't really have anything great in them. Equipment LV. 2 can be handy once you actually have some good equipment, I guess.  The clear bonus contains a Genome Soldier, though. That's handy, since Snake only starts with three in his deck (out of a maximum of four) and it's the only movement card available at this point in the game.  Anyway, time to phone command.  The guard around the corner is probably very confused right now.  Also, the call is only that one line. It doesn't really serve any purpose to the story.    Before we return to intermission, though, it's time to check in with Lena and Viggo. Viggo: Are they really dead?! Lena: Yes. But how did you...?  I don't think I'd vote for a guy who said he talked to dolls.   Lena's very tactful, so she just glosses over it. Lena: People at the control tower should have cleared the air lanes for us so we can fly a relatively safe path.  Viggo's still stuck on the doll bullshit. I mean, not that I blame him.   Oh? What's this?  Something we'll find out about later, of course. Elsie: It's not fair, Sis! Frances: What? Elsie: You were playing, just like I thought! You were killing people. I wanna kill people, too. I wanna make their hearts stop 'n' all that. Frances: ... You know what, Elsie? I killed the pilot and copilot to get some messages across. Elsie: Messages across? Is that a fun game, too?  I suppose that means there aren't 12 more bodies lying around, at least.  Frances: I'll tell you.    Lena: But... Viggo: Explain the situation to the best of your ability, and get them to catch that...that monster sneaking around in the shadows. Lena: Yes, sir.  I think that's just the art style, chief. Lena: When I found the corpses in the cockpit, I gasped with the shock. I could've sworn I smelled gas...  "You know, make sure you smell gas. Don't jump the gun."
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Dec 21, 2017 20:55
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I did a little test myself just now, starting five new games in a row. In one of them, Snake did indeed have the Cyborg Ninja card in his starting deck instead of the HF Blade. I didn't see any other changes, but I'll admit I wasn't keeping close track. None of the card packs in the office or the outside area were MGS2 packs, though (but I did only check these once, using the Ninja deck under the assumption that they might be related). Fun fact: if you start with the Ninja card, you can kill the guard at the gate straight away, since it doesn't trigger his body armour.
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Dec 23, 2017 04:58
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HitTheTargets posted:the hostages are rescued with no complications Not with Solid Snake on the job!
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Dec 25, 2017 19:26
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That's only people who died. Things definitely became complicated for Meryl. Hell, Otacon quit his job to become a terrorist after Snake showed up at the office.
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Dec 26, 2017 01:37
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Snake not being hanged (and not killing himself) are the conclusion to the arc set up in Metal Gear 2. Big Boss says that Snake will be unable to escape battle, and from then on that's Snake's real drive. It's part of the conflict in MGS and MGS2, as well, and gives rise to Snake's objection to being called a hero in MGS4. So when he takes the gun out of his mouth (and when he quits smoking) it's Snake's final symbolic victory over Big Boss to follow the practical victories of destroying the Patriot AIs and killing Liquid Ocelot. Having Snake and Otacon executed would have been a more provocative ending, but not as thematically strong.
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Dec 29, 2017 23:33
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Bonus Update: The Solid Snake Starter Pack Like every other card-based game ever, Metal Gear Acid starts the player out with a pre-fabricated deck. And, like most of those, the starting deck in this game isn't great. But, to really properly set things up and to give everyone a frame of reference for how I improve things throughout the game, I just wanted to take a quick look at the cards in Snake's initial deck. The deck comprises 30 total cards, the smallest (and best) deck size you can run, made up of copies of 17 different cards. First up, let's look at Snake's weapons:  The first card is the SOCOM. This is Snake's first weapon from Metal Gear Solid and, in fact, most of the cards in the deck act to replicate Snake's "core" arsenal from that game. The SOCOM in this game kind of sucks, frankly (this is actually kind of an issue with all handguns in MGA). It's a severely underpowered weapon, firing 4 shots at 10 damage and 90% hit rate each. Even the weakest guards in the first couple missions have 40 max HP, so you need to land all four if you're on the front or the side, and three from the back. The SOCOM's accuracy also drops off when you're more than 2 squares away from a target, which is most of the time, so you have to be annoyingly close to guards if you want to kill them with this thing. Cameras are a little easier targets, with only 20 HP each, but can also be dealt with in other ways. The big "advantage" of the SOCOM is that it's silenced, but it's not at all a big enough deal to make this gun worth keeping in the deck very long.  The FAMAS is the second gun in the deck and, in my opinion, the main weapon here. It fires six shots, at 20 damage and 75% accuracy each, and the accuracy drops off after 4 squares. Compared to the SOCOM, the FAMAS is much more reliable - against those basic 40 HP guards, it's much more likely that you'll land two shots out of six than three or four out of four. The gunshot noise is technically a handicap, but it mostly comes down to being careful of your surroundings. Finally, similarly to the SOCOM, the FAMAS has an additional effect, adding 1 Cost to the enemy each time it hits, which can be used to manipulate the turn order in situations where you can't kill an enemy outright, such as boss fights. In the long run, the FAMAS isn't the best gun, especially because it's a Use-type (so you can't get too nuts with it) but it's not an albatross either.  In addition to his guns, Snake carries two Grenades into action. Grenades are a situational kind of thing. They deal 120 armour-piercing damage in a 3x3 square around them after 8 Cost passes, or after they're shot. They also make a fuckload of noise and if anyone's around to hear one, it's an instant alert. This means they're best used in crowded quarters after an alert has already gone off. Honestly, the way I like to approach the game isn't conducive to using Grenades. The fact that it's a 7 Cost card also makes Grenade a bad choice for movement. Grenade is a card I don't like, but that I could understand someone using.  The Stun Grenade card is a lot like the Grenade card except it goes off after 5 Cost instead of 8, knocks people out instead of killing them, and doesn't cause an instant alert. They're also only 5 Cost to use, so they're much better for movement. There's not much else to say here, I like Stun Grenades better than Grenades for general purpose use, but still don't use them a lot.  Claymores are a trap card, which enemies can activate by walking in front of them. When they do, the square directly in front of the mine and the mine's own square both take 80 damage. They're a neat tool if you set one up in a patrol path or lure a guard into them. I prefer a more direct approach, so I won't use Claymores often, but they're not strictly an awful card.  Kicking is, admittedly, not a weapon in the traditional sense, but Spin Kick is an attack at least. If you play this, Snake will do a roundhouse kick, which deals 60 damage to each square adjacent to Snake's own, plus it will knock any enemies it hits on their asses (which can knock them out entirely if timed properly). As far as I know, this does have perfect accuracy, barring defensive cards the enemy is using, so that's good. On the other hand, being right up next to an enemy isn't ideal in a stealth game, and there's only one Spin Kick card in the deck, so you can't rely on it being in your hand. Plus, 7 Cost is a little high for an attack card this restricted.  Snake's final weapon is the H.F. Blade, which deals 100 damage to an enemy directly in front of Snake, but that can't be used against machines like Patrol Bots. This is a fairly high amount of damage, and it won't miss by itself, just like Spin Kick. In this initial deck, though, there's only one copy of the card, so you can't rely on it too much - I kind of like the H.F. Blade later on, when you can put 4 in your deck, but here it's too rare to plan around and Snake doesn't have the movement capability to really set up a melee weapon deck, either. From a meta-game perspective, this is a weird card to have in the starting deck. Solid Snake explicitly doesn't want the H.F. Blade in MGS2, so why would he have one here?  The H.F. Blade is also subject to a weird mechanic: rarely, you can start the deck with a Cyborg Ninja card in your deck instead of the H.F. Blade. The Cyborg Ninja will deal 50 damage to any single target on the map. That makes it more interesting, in my opinion, but the fairly low damage keeps it from having long-term potential. This is the only card in the starting deck that ever changes, as far as I know.So that's everything for Snake's weapons. There are seven of them, with 3 each of the guns, 2 of each type of explosive, 1 kick, and 1 sword. The deck has 14 weapon cards in total, so the odds are reasonable that you'll have some way to attack a guard in any given hand (in addition to using the regular punch from the menu). It's an important angle to cover, but I feel like having all of these here gives the player too many options, too many of which are going to be the "wrong" one for any given situation. A good deck will generally focus in on one type of weapon and build to support that, but the angle here looks to have been giving the player a taste of everything (which is understandable, from a game design standpoint). Moving on from weapons, Snake has equipment:  Scope is a card that's loving garbage in this deck. It has an effect, but to use that effect, you have to attach it to an Equip-type gun. The starting deck has no Equip-type guns in it. So instead, the Scope is a 5-cost, 3-square movement card. There are other cards from non-MGS1 packs in the deck, so I have no earthly idea why it wasn't replaced with one of the MGS2 pack's movement cards. Snake being able to move slightly more would not have broken the game. gently caress to Scope.  Body Armor is an equipment card that has a 50% chance to knock 50 points off any incoming damage. Handy if you think you're going to get shot, but this will probably mainly be used for movement. Since this is the starting deck, made to be used in the first couple missions where enemies are still weak and few in number, this probably could have been replaced, but it's not particularly offensive. At least you can use it.  Box A is one of four cardboard boxes in the game. You can use a cardboard box to hide from enemy attention - as long as you're not directly in their path, a guard won't look too closely at a box. It's a great stealth tool, and a Metal Gear staple. Just don't let people see you running around.  Snake's also carrying one single Mine Detector around. This lets the devs put a minefield in the game without having to worry about the player not having a mine detector. Pretty much purely a gameplay conceit, but not one I consider a bad choice. In practice, this card is a 3-square movement option. Replace it when you get the chance, unless you're in a mission that has mines. Of course, the first time you play the game, that means you'll either get rid of the detector and forget or you'll carry it around and waste space in your deck.  Rations are healing items, using one restores Snake's HP by 150. Having a couple of these is probably a good idea. Since they're only 4 Cost (as is the Mine D.) they're also no more expensive than a Move card, but will only take you three squares.  Styptic is a healing item that stops the bleeding status effect. If Snake is bleeding, he'll take HP damage at the start of each turn, which is bad. I have no idea why this is in here, specifically, instead of another Ration, or like any other card in the game. It's not even from the MGS1 pack, it's from the MGS2 pack. What a weird fuckin' pull. Oh, and there's only one copy in the deck. Those 10 cards are Snake's equipment. He has two copies of each, except the Mine D. and the Styptic. They're mostly semi-useful, except the Scope and the Styptic. This brings us to the final category, miscellaneous cards:  Action + gives Snake an extra action on his turn. Not a bad play, if you've got something to do. Action + is a card that relies strongly on the makeup of the rest of your deck - this deck will rarely deal you a hand that can do three really important things in a single turn, but Action + is a good choice for inclusion in the decks you build later on. Only having one copy isn't ideal, though.  Front Evade LV. 1 is an equippable card that gives Snake a 50% chance to dodge an attack from the front. It's okay if you think you're going to get attacked from the front, or can make that happen. I believe it only works once, though, so don't rely on it long-term. This is, to my mind, a weird choice for a starter deck because it's just a little too specific to be useful to players "in general".  Cost reduction cards are useful to players "in general" and Cost -4 makes sense for the starter deck, since it's the lowest-value one in the game. This is a good inclusion, and the only problem with it is that there's only one of them. Every deck should have Cost reduction cards, so I'm glad that it's here to be accessible to players early on.  Finally, Snake has the Genome Soldier Move card. Four squares for four Cost. Like the Cost -4, this is the first "level" of an essential card type. Movement is the most important task in the game, and the only one that every deck has to deal with, so the only problem here is that there aren't more Move cards. Generally, you'll want 8 or 10 in your deck, at least. Having only 3 Genome Soldiers slows Snake down a bit, since the odds are well against you actually drawing one at any given time. And that's the deck! Overall, I think it's just a bit too scattered. There's a definite needle to thread in a game like this, where you want to give a new player a chance to try out a few different things and not pigeonhole people into one playstyle, but it also just doesn't make for an amazing deck. It doesn't give you a really good backbone to build on, either, because you're probably going to end up replacing most of this stuff as you build your own deck. This starter deck is passable for the first few missions, but really it's not very good. Cool Ghost fucked around with this message at 22:12 on Feb 8, 2018 |
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Jan 16, 2018 03:42
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Zereth posted:What happens if you use up all the cards in your deck? Does it get reshuffled? Yeah, it just shuffles everything back in. There's a 10 Cost penalty for it happening, though.
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Jan 16, 2018 16:21
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I believe they are, but I've never actually stopped to count.
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Jan 18, 2018 20:17
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Bonus Update: Extra Missions  After finishing the Office mission, a new feature is unlocked.  The game's actual tutorial text is a little misleading on this, but you can start playing Extra Missions immediately after finishing the Office. These missions are for point farming, and there are three available on every map from the Office on (so, everything actually inside the complex). Since they're for grinding, you can do Extra Missions as many times as you like.  Starting one is just the same as starting a regular story mission, you don't get to choose which objective set you'll take on at this point.   See, each Extra Mission has a special condition for its completion. The two main ones, which show up on every map, are "don't get spotted" and "kill everyone." On top of these, each map also has a semi-unique condition for its third mission, but it didn't show up for me here while I was collecting these screens. For the record, on the Office map, the third condition is that the exit door is locked, so you have to take out the guard who locked it.  Before each mission, you get a little briefing, but it's delivered by a system message instead of Roger. Other than that, there's not much to say about the actual execution of Extra Missions. They're the same maps and usually the same enemy setups.  While I'm back at the Office, though, I thought I'd just point out that the MGS1 pack I picked up here before is now gone forever. You can't farm free cards by replaying missions, sorry.  The sneaking mission in the Office looks a lot like the story mission, except you don't have to go west first, the destination is always the east exit.   Nothing exciting happens if you get spotted, you just get booted back to the Intermission.  Finishing an Extra Mission gets you the same number of points that finishing a story mission does. Since they can be replayed, what this means is that you find one mission you can do easily and quickly, and you just do that over and over for points. Which, I guess, is how I would describe the concept of grinding to someone unfamiliar. There's no reward for doing them all, either, so there's nothing wrong with just doing your favourite one.  You also get the same type of clear bonuses you get from story missions.  And a little bit of positive reinforcement.  The elimination mission in the Office is the longer of the two maps, since you have to actually go after all the guards.   I also took the opportunity to get the MGS1 packs lying around, if you were worried that I had left cards on the table during the story pass.  The Patrol Bot also drops an MGS1 pack, and you have to kill it. I took the Grenades out of my deck, so that was the  Since I didn't do this quickly (my deck isn't really set up to kill a bunch of people efficiently) I only got a B rank. Technically speaking, you should always aim for the S on extra missions, since it's more points and the Card Shop will refresh after every mission (i.e., higher rank = more cards) but practically speaking, it barely makes any difference. If you're trying to complete your card collection or get something specific, you're better off save-scumming the shop than doing a bunch of missions, so just having enough points to buy one pack is enough.  It's impossible to get the No Kills bonus on an elimination mission, so you'll never see more than two bonus cards after one.    For elimination missions, you don't actually have to go to the purple target to finish. Anyway, that's about all the substance there is to Extra Missions. Like I said, there's not really much to these visually, so I'm not likely to show off any more of them. You can just assume I'm doing them off-screen as necessary to get points when I need them.
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Jan 25, 2018 20:22
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Part Seven: The Wall https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9738uFvId1s  After the mission in the Office, the game immediately jumps to a video. These little videos are the only voiced content I'm aware of in Metal Gear Acid, which is kind of an odd choice.   This one announces that new cards are available from the Card Shop in the form of the MGS1 pack.  And, after that, it's back to the Intermission, where there's a small tutorial on the Card Shop.  Here's the shop in all its glory. As you can see, only the MGS1 pack is available right now. If you look below the icon, you can see that there are 10 packs left in stock, and each pack costs 600 points. Now all those points I've been getting after missions are actually useful for something.  Buying a pack gives you the exact same stuff as finding one on a mission: three cards from the set, chosen randomly. This is why I wasn't worried too much about getting the card packs earlier. It's much more convenient to collect points, then jump in here and hit Circle.  The other advantage of using the Card Shop is that you can savescum. If you don't like what you got, just reload a save and try again. This is the best method for getting a specific card (say, a rare to complete your collection) so you should always save the game before you buy anything. The "intended" way is that you buy packs, then do an Extra Mission, then come back and buy more, but savescumming is faster. If you do grind with Extra Missions, though, the shop is restocked every time you finish a mission, so availability isn't a problem.  Other than that, there's not really much to say about the Card Shop.  So let's move on to Stage 3A, the Lower Ruins. There are a few stages in the game that are split up into different areas like this. It's a big sign of an area you'll have to come back to later.  As usual, the mission starts with a call. Roger: Going straight along this path to the east should get you to the residential quarters.  A lot of time is about to be wasted.   Off he goes.  And the mission starts.     The standard enemies are here, but it can be hard to see the guards on the middle level under some of the structures. Looking at the FOV markers is handy if you can't tell which direction a guard is facing.  I use my first turn to move Snake over to this little hole in the staircase.  By crawling, you can move through the hole, out of sight the whole way. This is something to keep in mind on other maps, but you have to do it here.   There's a camera right above the hole, so only the tile directly on the other side is safe.  If this guy sees me shoot out the camera, he'll get suspicious and come down. So I have to wait a couple turns for him to look away.  And then, once the camera's gone, moving one square forward triggers this scene.   This is a classic Metal Gear obstacle. Someone has built a wall in Snake's path for some reason. This trick is taken to its logical extreme in the first Metal Gear game, when somebody apparently builds a room around Solid Snake. Snake: Looks like it's just been repaired. The wall surface is smooth as glass. I can't even climb it. If you look up at the screenshot, the wall surface actually looks like poo poo. Also, the ruins are full of ankle-high walls that Snake can't cross, so I assume it's less "can't" and more "won't." Roger: I see... Snake: But I can't do anything with the equipment I have here. Well, there goes our simple trip to the residential area.   Thanks, Alice.    Snake and Roger taking two very different interests in this information. Alice: Yes. It's as clear as day. Roger: If you could get your hands on some "C4", you could blast through the wall. Just as having a wall in the player's path is a standard Metal Gear obstacle, blowing that wall up with C4 is the standard Metal Gear solution.  Here's our new objective: busy work. Snake: To the west, right? Got it.   Finishing this mission is as simple as doing what you did to start it, but in reverse.  Back through the hole, over to the gate.  Yes, this counts as a real mission.   You even get points and a clear bonus for doing it.  In case you forgot.  Back to the Intermission!  Coming back to Intermission after these early missions, there are a bunch of little tutorials about mechanics and such. This one's about the top-down camera toggle. They're handy for new players, but some of the features probably should have been explained in that first tutorial on the Forest map.  If you're so inclined, you can go back to the Ruins. Roger: There must be some "C4" stocked in the armory. Get in there on the double. Snake: Right. Roger: We're counting on you, Snake.  No point to doing this at all, other than that little scene. It does refill the Card Shop, though, if you're flush with points but already bought everything.  The destination at the moment is the Lower Minefield. Like the Ruins was stage "3A", this is "4A". Also, if you took it out, it's a good idea to put the Mine Detector back into your deck.  There's no call or ceremony for this one. The Lower Minefield is a pretty boring map.    There are only three guards here, but it's a small space and they cover it well.  So, like I said, it's a good idea to have a Mine Detector on hand for this one.   Because of the mines.  After equipping a Mine Detector, the next order of business is to jump into this little shack.  Over in this corner is our first MGS2 pack. It'll be a bit before these are in the Card Shop, so it's a good idea to pick it up.  If you go past these boxes, nobody will see you on this turn, but on the next turn one of the guards will catch a glimpse of Snake and make trouble.   Next step: hide under the truck.   Then it's just waiting for these dickheads to look the other way.  Or, if you're lucky with the numbers...  ...you can miss enough shots with the SOCOM to knock one of them out.  I need to reduce my Cost to do this next part. This isn't a good plan.   But, with a little luck on the draw, I can set it up for two turns in a row.  And there it is.  No celebration for finishing the mission, either.  This is an easy S rank.  And the MGS2 pack contains three useful cards!  The clear bonus just makes kind of a neat image. The Roy Campbell card is a rare one, and it can be useful if you set your deck up right.  The Marines card is the first non-Genome Soldier movement card I've got, which is good because the deck is still short on movement. I included the description here because I like that the character quote is some Marine's death scream.
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Jan 28, 2018 00:23
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I'm doing some deck building a bit further ahead in the game, and I just figured I'd put it to the thread: would y'all prefer that I keep doing the stealthy-stealth/no kills approach, or do you want to see Solid Snake get up to some of the old ultraviolence on these guards?
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Jan 28, 2018 06:02
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You can't go back into the Ruins as long as the wall is up, so there are no extra missions there. I can take a look at some of the other maps, though, sure.
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Jan 28, 2018 17:48
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Zereth posted:Say, would you mind mentioning what the unique objectives in the extra missions are for those maps? I went back to the minefield and the ruins, and I actually couldn't trigger a special objective on either. Considering I used the minefield to grind for a couple hours, I doubt it's bad luck. MysticalMachineGun posted:And knowing the game inside and out I'd bet you know the best approach to take for various missions! But I also think it should be noted that I know Metal Gear Acid 2 better than this game. On top of that, this game isn't as well-documented as FF8 was. So, I have a pretty good understanding of a lot of mechanics, but I also don't have any reference to look at for details.
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Feb 6, 2018 02:22
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Ace of Aces posted:Just wanted to follow up on the starter deck post: the SOCOM and FAMAS actually have a couple of additional features that you skipped over, and in both cases they're pretty useful. When the SOCOM hits a target that is vulnerable to it, it inflicts Fall (same as Spin Kick or the no-card melee attack). A target subjected to Fall has a card discarded from their hand; if a target is reduced to 0 cards in hand, they Faint, which is identical to being knocked out in a regular Metal Gear Solid title. It lasts for... I want to say 3 cost, so if you're going to use it you need to make really good on it, and if an enemy comes across a Fainted unit they'll be like "wat" and investigate. The early access to the SOCOM is probably the best reason to include Action+ cards early, since if you can faint a target with the SOCOM you then get 2 actions to move past them and into a spot that will let you rest off your Cost debt while they wake up and are like "aaa". I've used/mentioned the SOCOM fall effect in one of the proper updates, but I haven't had occasion to do the FAMAS thing, so I'll add a line about it to the deck rundown.
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Feb 8, 2018 22:09
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Part Eight: What Does a Snake Need in an Armoury? Having gone through the Lower Minefield, the next stop is the Armory. But first, an establishing shot of some mysterious door.  Psych! It's just Snake entering the building.  I've got it on good authority that S-End is the internal term for referring to Snake's rear end.  Roger: You know, "C4" isn't the only thing you'll find of use in there, Snake. Snake: How do you know? You probably know where this is going, but Snake sounds like a dipshit who thinks the whole building is just C4 storage here. Roger: Well, Alice said that, uh...  Alice: Those who have made weapons, used weapons, lost their lives to weapons... Such items often contain spiritual residues... Snake: Which you can view with your "special powers"?  Alice can't see Snake's use of scare quotes. Snake: Roger, is it stated in the fine print somewhere that we have to trust Little Miss Tarot Card here?  Read this with the intonation of someone calling a relative out for using a slur in conversation.   Tired of Snake's repeated insults, Alice leaves in a strop. For the record, I don't know exactly how old Alice is supposed to be, but I would say early teens or so. She's carrying a doll in her radio portrait, but I think that's more neotenous than showing her being 5 years old. Snake: ... Roger: Snake, both the FBI and CIA have treated her as a guest of honor. And I received a detailed statement explaining her qualifications in advance. Maybe you need to grow up a little. Roger has a point here, Snake is being weirdly petulant about this. Snake: Since when does a grown-up put his life in the hands of a child? Roger: I'll deal with Alice. You need to get into that armory and find the "C4". I know you can do it. Snake: Right.  So, let's start the mission.    The part of the Armory we're going through here is set up in a C shape. These guys are on the bottom arm of the C.   And these two are on top. Something to note is that the guards in this area are using the same setup as the guard from way back outside the gate: (This guy.) That is to say, they only have 25 HP but they also have body armour to soak up some extra damage if you try to kill them.  The immediate goal is to go over to this stairway, which is right at the "bottom corner" of the C shape.   The deck I'm using right now is set up for low-cost movement rather than combat, so I'm going right to the box. I also just like to use boxes.  It helps that the guards like to just stare at walls in their patrol routes.   I forgot how I did this, but I certainly did it. The bottom of the stairs is a good spot for the box, because guards won't look at you.   So I could shoot out the camera with a SOCOM, then pop into another box. The destination is, again, upstairs, but first let's have a small non-canonical sojourn down the hall.  This guard is a big problem if you want to go down this way. There's only one path in, and he likes to watch it.  The camera also covers the far door.  Anyway, the reason I'm not really going down this hall is that both rooms just contain MGS1 packs, and it's not worth the extra Cost.  I did want to show off a handy trick, though. It involves Chaff Grenades.  When a Chaff Grenade goes off, it'll gently caress up all the electronic devices in the area, but it also makes noise. Unlike a regular Grenade, which explodes and causes an Alert Phase, a Chaff Grenade just draws attention.  So, by throwing one, you can get a guard to move to a specific spot. It's kind of like long-distance knocking.  This would allow me to sneak Snake in here and grab an MGS1 pack.  But instead, I just jumped up the stairs to the area change.   Unfortunately, my movement is stopped by a cutscene.   Roger doesn't know his internet catchphrases very well. Snake: Yeah. Roger: According to Alice, "C4" is stored somewhere on the second floor. She stormed out again after telling me that. This girl is starting to get difficult.   Pictured: Roger regretting Solid Snake on this job instead of just sending Private Jones.   So, on to the second floor.    Something to note about the second floor of the Armory is that there are no people here, only machines.   Roger: Gun Cameras are mounted on the walls. This call is canonically five seconds after the last one. Roger: They've been programmed to attack anyone that triggers their motion sensors. If they make things difficult for you, disable them while the lamp is green. As far as I know, you can disable a gun camera even after it sees you, but it still pays to be proactive. Roger: Also, be careful of the infra-red sensors. Pass one and Danger Mode will be activated. Snake: Ah, I've seen them around. Snake is a loving liar. There haven't been any IR sensors up to this point.  The C4 is kept on this floor, pretty much straight in front of the stairs in this small room. The problem is this gun camera.  If you throw a Chaff Grenade in front of a camera, it doesn't care.  This part of the mission is extremely easy if you have Chaff.   I only had to stop because of the goddamn door thing. Roger: Looks like you got your hands on some "C4". You can use it to destroy the wall. Get the hell out of there. Looks like the only way out is where you came in. Get back to the hall, Snake.  Unfortunately, you can't just use the return to intermission option, you do actually have to walk out.   Box on, down the stairs, around the corner. Easy peasy.   This is not a hard mission.  There's the C4.  And the clear bonus.  But there's one last call before we actually get back to the Intermission. Roger: Looks like you made it out in one piece. Head for the wall blocking off the residential quarters. Once you get past that wall, go find Flemming on the other side. This game loves reminding the player what you're supposed to do. Roger: Getting in touch with him should give us an idea of where Pythagoras is located. Looks like you'll be up on that mountaintop, taking in those breathtaking views much quicker than expected. The bit about the mountaintop seems like a non-sequitur, but Snake was climbing a mountain when Roger called him up. It's just not pointed out in the script when Snake's first introduced. Snake: If we can trust Gary, that is. There's something about that guy I just don't like. There has not been a single character introduced so far that Snake does like. Because Snake is an rear end in a top hat.  Roger isn't even listening. Roger: We'll find out if he's been telling the truth once you get to the residential quarters. Proceed with caution. Snake: Right. And that's the end of the mission!  As a last preparation before the next mission, I go to the Card Shop.  Now that I have C4, additional C4 is available from the MGS1 pack. Since you need to use it to finish the next mission, it's a very good idea to pick up a couple extras.   So, putting 3 C4 cards and the Timer I got from the MGS2 pack in the Minefield is the end of my setup, and Mr. Snake is ready to tear down this wall.
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Feb 12, 2018 20:31
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Ace of Aces posted:I think the reason the game reminds you what you're doing after each mission is in case you've been grinding out side missions - I know I appreciated it a lot when I was playing through. I didn't really think of this, but it makes sense. I've definitely been grateful for similar features in other games.
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Feb 15, 2018 16:53
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Part Nine: The Wall Comes Down Now that Snake has the C4, the next destination is the Lower Ruins again.   A nice thing is that, if the C4 isn't in your deck, this call pops up immediately. Roger: Cards must be put into the deck in order to use them. Don't forget. Snake: Thanks, Roger. I'll keep that in mind.  So, if you were wondering, no, you can't not include the C4 in your deck and get stuck at the wall again. They did pay enough attention that it's a different scene than if you try to come in before hitting the Armoury, though. The other thing to note about this scene is that it actually does refresh the Card Shop, if you're flush with points.  This time we're going in for real.  Of course, there's still a call here. Roger: Even though the wall has been repaired, it could take a good four weeks for the cement to fully harden. The area repaired is still pliable enough for a little "C4" to make its mark. "C4" can be detonated by shooting, as well as with a detonator or a timer. Got it? One of the things that actually makes C4 useful is that it won't blow up if it's shot (or burned, or struck hard). Of course, if they actually stuck to that, you'd have no way to detonate it if you didn't get lucky and pull a Timer/Detonator card from that one MGS2 pack.Snake: Right.  And here we are!   Again, this one guard and camera are the only things to worry about before the wall.  The enemy layout is the same as before, but this Patrol Bot has showed up to reinforce them.   Just like before, I crawl through the hole and shoot out the camera.  And then it's time to set the C4. I'm using my Timer here, instead of shooting it.  This lets me use a cardboard box, which is about to be very useful.  The C4 blows up the wall no problem.  Before the smoke clears, an Alert Phase starts up.  And the guards start moving in. Most times that there's an explosion on the map, enemies that hear it will move towards the site.  Despite its being deaf, the alert attracts the Patrol Bot as well.  There's one last scene on this side of the hole.   Roger: OK, time to put the clock back! Snake: Right. I don't know what Roger's line here means.   Now there's an actual destination on the map.  There's just enough time to get to the other side of the opening before the guards reach the area, but you can just barely see Snake in a box at the bottom of some stairs in this shot. Since he's not directly in their path, the guards won't look under the box, even during an alert. This gives me the chance to wait until the guards start moving back to their normal patrols and sneak through unseen. The way alerts work in Metal Gear Acid is pretty simple. In the Alert Phase, the little bar under Snake's life is red and the guards go to his last known location, or where something blew up, things like that. New guards also show up in this phase to reinforce the normal enemies. The alert gauge runs down every turn as long as the guard don't find Snake again and nothing else explodes.  Here you can see that I'm basically pinned down. If I had been more daring, I might have been able to move past the guards while they closed in, but as it stands I'm safe as houses.  I'm stuck on the stairs through the whole Evasion Phase, while guards spread out and look for the bomber.  And during the Caution Phase.  But, once the alert is over, I start moving towards the goal.  This includes picking up a Stinger launcher. Just like how Snake found the C4, there are sometimes single weapons placed around the maps in addition to the card packs you can pick up.  After an alert ends, the guards just go back to their original positions and patrol routes.  Also, this map is loving miserable for seeing what's going on on the lower level. The ruined structures frequently block the player's view of the ground.  But there's also not much to see, just me waiting for guards to move so I can hit the exit.   The result on this one was, uh, not great. I could have tried again to get a more efficient route and try for that S rank, but this was at the end of a play session and I didn't really feel like doing the whole mission again. It's not like points are hard to come by, either.  The Stinger is a pretty useful card for blowing up Patrol Bots and other machines, but you can't use it on non-machines. It has pretty high damage and it locks on, so it doesn't miss.  Only one on the clear bonus this time.   Snake: What is it? Roger: New info has come in from headquarters. Investigators have confirmed that "Pythagoras" is the name of a research project being conducted at Lobito Physics and Chemistry Laboratory. Our mission is to find out more about this Pythagoras research, and Flemming -- the man behind it. Another fact has been confirmed regarding Flemming's research. He was conducting drug-related tests and production in this lab. As we close in on the residential area and Flemming, we're starting to learn more about Pythagoras. The pace of the story is picking up a bit, as we're moving into the next big section of the game.  Snake thinks Flemming was working on next-gen 'roids.  Roger: Candidates from various countries were sought and used for clinical testing. The candidates signed an agreement -- basically an acknowledgement of the life-threatening dangers involved in the testing they were to take part in. Oh great, it sounds like the guys running the Lobito Lab were really in the right here and I'm just super glad Snake's on their side. Roger: Perhaps a large sum of money is what persuaded them to endure such horrors...  Snake's more interested in exactly what dangers these people were exposed to. Roger: All sorts of viruses were shot into the test subjects in order to monitor the effects of a new drug. Lobito Lab is famous for its innovations in the field of ethical violations. Snake: I get it. He must've chosen this remote island as a way to cover up what he was researching.  Snake: What the hell is it? What's going down in here?   Yeah, that's what I thought.Roger: Let's focus on the mission at hand for now. Get a hold of Flemming, and things should become clear. You should head for the residential quarters now. I'll continue probing for details on Flemming's whereabouts. Snake: ...Right.  Even as he finds his mission getting more and more complicated, Snake has no choice but to move forward and keep trying to find Flemming.  Before he does, though, let's check in with Viggo and the Plane Crew. Lena: Who? Viggo: The kid in the back.  The camera slides to the right a little bit. The red-haired girl in the row behind Lena and Viggo has always been visible, so you might have already expected we'd learn more about her.   Their portraits both being on the right makes me think that Lena is talking to Minette without actually looking at her. Lena: Yes? Minette: I'm, eh...mmm...my name's Minette. Lena: Minette?  And so we're introduced to a new character, Minette Donnel, a girl stuck on Flight 326. Lena: You all by yourself? Minette: Well...I'm going to see my daddy. Lena: Where's your mom? Minette: Well...Mommy really hates Daddy now, so she didn't come. Lena: Oh, I see. Aren't you scared to ride on a plane all by yourself?  Lena: You're pretty brave, kiddo. Viggo: I'm used to riding on planes, too... but this is a first for me. Do you think Viggo means it's his first time being gassed and having a bunch of murders happen around him, or it's his first time talking to a child?  Viggo: I didn't mean to startle you. It's just that they keep pumping these drat drugs into me.   While Viggo explains his unpleasant body experiences, let's complete our Flight 326 experience by checking in on these two.  Frances isn't impressed with Elsie's screaming.  Elsie: Help, Sis! I'm scared... What should I do? Frances: ... Elsie: Th-The stewardess lady in the back... She...she's all bloody... She was killed! Great. This flight was full of anaesthetic gas and talking dolls and now there's no drink service. Elsie: There's a blood-thirsty killer on this plane, Sis! Frances: You killed her, huh? Elsie: How come you found out so easy? Elsie: That's no fun. Frances: Did you do as I said?  A third number. Now we have 1, 14, and 11. Soon we'll get a bingo. Elsie: Just like you told me to. Frances: Hm. Elsie: Am I a good girl? Frances: Uh-huh. You're a real good girl.  And now it's back to Viggo, whose mind has gone so "nutzo" that he's... somehow gotten a hold of a phone we can't see. Viggo: Both Lena and I can only move our fingertips. Even putting these earphones on was like pulling teeth. It's those drat drugs..they've paralyzed us.  There are no beats or anything in the text to indicate when the other person on the line is talking, so this sequence looks a little weird. Viggo: Even if I could, you think I'd really give a drat about the other passengers?  Someone's reading Viggo the earlier part of the update.   Earlier, the dolls were asking Viggo about Pythagoras, now Lena's asking him about the lab. I think Senator Hach might know something about Lobito.  Lena: But...if you-know-what falls into the wrong hands, everything could go public...and... Viggo: I know, I know. Dammit! Why did this have to happen? We can't let that...monster live now, can we?! I'm beginning to think people should vote for the other guy.   Huh, sounds like Viggo's offscreen friend told him about our protagonist. Viggo: Oh. Aha... I see... So that's also a viable option...  I guess we can add "who the gently caress is Emilio" to our list of questions. Viggo: I heard he's been saying and doing some pretty disturbing things lately. Going against the agreement made between him and the organization...  Must be talking about Alice now. Viggo: All right, then. Help us. Only one of us can move...  So, uh, somehow Minette can apparently move. Remember that earlier Lena was mobile enough to check out the cockpit, but Viggo's basically paralysed.   Viggo's gotta talk to someone else, so let's join Elsie and Frances to make fun of him. Frances: He's deluding himself. Elsie: Deluding himself? What does that mean? Is it more fun than killing people? Frances: Elsie, sometimes you can be so...  Fair point re: air travel. Frances: No killing for a little while, OK? Elsie: Borrrrrrring... I wanna go home!   Back to these guys, it looks like Alice is on the line with Minette. Minette: Minette Donnel. Alice: Minette, I have a favor to ask you. Minette: I don't feel good... Alice: But you can move, right? Don't be selfish, now. The fate of all on board rests in your hands. You're their only hope. No pressure, though.  Minette is not enthused. Alice: Listen, OK? Now... There's a bomb somewhere on the plane. If you can find it, then everyone might be saved. Alice really underselling the difficulty of disarming a bomb here. Minette: Really? Alice: Really. It's a race against time. Look around, and do exactly as I say, OK? Minette: ...hm...mm-hm...   Good team.   And, before we wrap up here, it's back to these two. Frances: I was gonna save this for later, but... Since you're so bored, I guess we'll have to make a little change in plans. Elsie: What is it?! C'mon, Sis! Tell me! Something fun?  
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Feb 18, 2018 00:43
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My advice is definitely don't read spoilers for this game.
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Feb 18, 2018 01:48
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If I'm right, this is the end of the page. Edit: I was right, update's on the next one. Cool Ghost fucked around with this message at 22:52 on Feb 26, 2018 |
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Feb 26, 2018 22:47
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Part Ten: About Alice Now that Snake's finished his vandalism, we can finally move on to the Residential Zone and, hopefully, catch up to Flemming.   What a great hiding spot this is. Roger: Snake, it seems that Senator Hach, aboard Flight 326, managed to contact the White House. He stated that a number of people on board are already dead, due to vecuronium bromide fumes. The hijackers' anaesthetic gas plan seems to be less and less well-thought-out every time we hear something about it. If Hach died, they'd lose all their leverage. Roger: He also spoke of another type of killing. It was assumed that the hijackers were operating away from the plane, but now it seems that one or more of them are hiding among the prisoners. The additional murders have nothing to do with vecuronium bromide. The pilot and copilot were both found dead -- their carotid arteries severed -- with the numbers "1" and "14" carved into their chests. A stewardess was killed as well -- found with an "11" carved into her forehead.  Snake understands killin' but not what "eleven" is. Roger: The hijackers made sure to transmit an image of each corpse using the onboard camera. Those images are being analyzed at headquarters.   Little bit of static on the line, I guess. Snake: Have you found out anything on Flemming's whereabouts? Roger: Negative. Nothing has shown up on our spy satellites. And Alice isn't back yet.  Frankly, Snake's got a point here. Even if Alice really is psychic, it's clear that Snake is totally unwilling to work professionally with her. Just give her a half day.  But let's talk about this instead. Snake: Never heard of it. Roger: The Burtons own a large oil company. It's time for another classic Metal Gear trope, someone telling a story even though it's absolutely not the time. Roger: Harold Burton, head of the family business, was brutally murdered about a month ago. His body was found with multiple stab wounds. Hundreds of them. That's a lot of stab wounds. Roger: At first, authorities believed the motive behind Burton's death was purely due to a grudge. But along with the unusual amount of stab wounds, his corpse was found completely naked, except for a NEKAL brand nightcap on his head. The murderer was full of contempt for Burton. We've heard of NEKAL once before, in that weird "commercial" during the intro.  Snake doesn't seem very invested in this story. Roger: Several days later, the authorities had named four bodyguards as suspects in the murder case -- all of whom had disappeared. But they lacked any solid proof that these bodyguards had done anything wrong. Eventually, all four of them were found dead, too. Snake: ...   Roger is undeterred by Snake not giving a gently caress. Roger: That's when Alice tracked down the suspected bodyguards, and led the FBI to all four corpses. That's only a taste of what she's accomplished.  Roger: Supernatural abilities and mystical phenomena were nothing more than superstition, so I thought. But Alice is the real thing. She's made a believer out of me.  So here's Roger, laying out the case that Alice is a real psychic. But again, the issue was never Alice's ability, it was the fact that Snake is being a jerk to her for absolutely no reason and it's interfering with the mission.   Roger: Alice. You're back. Alice: I'm only here for the mission. It's time to get some work done. Snake: Amen. We can finally agree on something. I guess that sets us up to get back to the task at hand.  Uh, once the scene ends. Roger: East wing? Alice: Flemming is somewhere in that vicinity. Roger: Did you view that somehow?   I like that Alice, maybe a teenager, is being the adult in the room here. Roger: Well, you heard her, Snake. Flemming's in the East Wing. So get moving. Snake: Right. East Wing it is. Might as well, since I have nothing else to go on.  Pictured: Roger slowly realising that Roy Campbell's recommendation to get Solid Snake on this job was a prank.  There's a lot going on in this mission, so I'm going to cut the update here, leaving you all to ponder Snake's rear end.
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Feb 26, 2018 22:48
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It's not in the same canon as MGS.
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Feb 27, 2018 01:33
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Part Eleven: Snake Logs On Now that the cutscene is over, it's time to get the mission started.   The Residential Zone is a pretty big map, made up of these small pathways outside of the three main buildings. There's one guard on this first path, which isn't much of a hazard, but I wanted to point out that the guards are a little hardier these days. Now, instead of 40 HP, they've got 80, and four equipment slots. On top of that, they now start with 4 cards in their hands, so the SOCOM/CQC knockdown effect won't knock them out straight away.   There are also a couple of guards on the other side of the first building here.   Nobody on the east side of the map, though.   Getting to the actual gameplay, this guard just goes back and forth like this over and over.  And I drew about the worst hand possible. I haven't covered it yet, but the Meryl card is a Cost reducer; unlike Cost -4, though, it reduces the user's Cost by half. Character cards like this one also have a little additional feature:  First, as befits a "special move" a little screen pops up with the card effect's name on it.  And then a clip of the character in question plays. There's no audio that goes with these, so you get stuff like Meryl staring wordlessly at the camera for a second before the actual game starts up again. If you use a lot of character cards, you can turn these cutaways off in the menu.   In order to draw the guard's attention, I knocked on the wall.    Then I ducked under a box and slipped behind him, into the building.  I put a little too much focus on cost reduction with this deck. The only weapons I have are the SOCOM and Chaff Grenades.  There's one guard inside the building, at the south end of the hall.  Before anything happens with him, there's a cutscene as soon as Snake steps through the door.  Snake: What is it? Alice: I had a vision... a premonition. Roger: Premonition? What did you see, Alice? Alice: The barrel of a gun... pressed to his head... a ridiculously large gun. Roger: ...  Sounds like bad news for Snake. Roger: ... Snake: ...  Snake: ...  Well, back to gameplay!   The buildings all have little side rooms like this. Some of them have MGS1 packs inside:  Like this one. But they all have IR detectors right past the doors, so you have to crawl in to get them. There's nothing in the MGS1 pack I need at the moment, so I just left them to languish.  The guard ahead has his back to the wall, so I can't sneak behind him. And the hallway Snake's in is only one square wide, so I can't draw him out by knocking.  The only move he'll make on his own is to turn around and watch the hallway.   So what I do is I toss a Chaff Grenade in front of him.   Now it's back outside.  This guy's no problem.   The path leads down this way, but there's nothing important inside the building. The crates you can see in this hallway block the way out to the south.  Unlike the first building, though, this one has a north exit as well.  The direct path is blocked, since that yellow door is locked.    Instead, the way forward is down this ladder. There's a trench leading south down here.  And, at the other end, a ladder up.   You have to crawl under the stairs here, which slows things down a bit.  And then, of course, you have to watch out for the guard on the other end. This is the same guy Snake passed coming out of the first building, by the way.  He's in the way...   Thankfully, the trusty ol' box keeps him from making any other problems.  And now the south half of the building is open. The side room's empty, so it's just a quick jump through here.  Back Outside, Roger gets Snake on the horn again. Roger: Snake, it's a room in the East Wing. Alice thinks she has a fix on Flemming's location.  Snake might not believe in her, but if she's right, it's a hell of a call. Alice: But I can't tell if it's Flemming. It's as if he's been captured... hands tied behind his back... moving about restlessly. Snake: The far east end, right? Roger: But she doesn't feel the presence of any guards in the area. So he's tied up, but nobody's keeping watch? Snake: That's odd. If they're after Pythagoras, Flemming is their star hostage. How could they just leave him unsupervised -- no guards, nothing?  Ladies and gentlemen, the combined efforts of The World's Greatest Mercenary and a veteran member of the CIA.  And now, while Solid Snake stands in the middle of this bridge, let's talk about Leone. Roger: He calls himself "Leone, the Lion," and has over 100 soldiers at his disposal. His unit is made up of men who've lost their homeland. A guy who has an animal codename and collects soldiers that have abandoned their countries? What a stunningly original idea to see in a Metal Gear game. Roger: Men from small countries in Southeast Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, put under United States aegis after their civil wars. I told you earlier that Leone's men don't share a common ideology.  I don't think it's necessarily intentional, since this game was released before Peace Walker or Portable Ops were on the radar, but there are an awful lot of similarities between Leone's unit and Big Boss's MSF here.  Roger: To overthrow U.S. puppet regimes and restore independence to each country. They despise America and seek revenge. Leone is a seasoned veteran, able to control even such a motley group as this. Snake: But why would these mercenaries be bothered with Moloni? Roger: ...I don't know. But what I do know is these people aren't legitimate soldiers, Snake. There's no telling what they'll pull.  Roger: Either way, you need to find out the truth. Snake: Yeah, I'm with you there. Well, let's go spring this trap. How come I don't have control?  ...Oh.  Haven't heard from Gary in a while, have we? Snake: ...Gary? What is it? Gary: The room you're headed for is probably fitted with a security system. A charge-coupled device scans its target, and if it matches a preprogrammed description, you're in. But an alarm will sound if you're not registered.   Despite us not having had a perfect fix on Flemming's location earlier, apparently Gary knows the specific room. Would've been handy. Snake: So how should I handle it? Gary: You should be able to register at the terminal in the East Wing, but I don't know the password.  Snake doesn't know how to use a computer. Gary: Maybe. I really don't know. Roger: No, Snake. The lab info we've acquired from various organizations should provide us with a list of potential passwords. If everybody at the lab has to use this terminal, it's probably just "Password" or "12345" or something. Roger: We've also received a wealth of info that the Spenser Unit, assigned to this mission before you, didn't have access to. You might as well try it. Head for the East Wing, Snake. We have to find a way to get you past security.  As in, like, literally right around the corner and through that door.  That's where the terminal is.   Why even bother hanging up at this point? Roger: Snake, I'm going to list off a string of potential passwords. Type them in as I read them. Snake: OK! Roger: First try: "Pythagoras." P - Y - T - H - A - G - O - R - A - S.  All the terminal does (visibly) at this point is show some text on the screen. Snake does not know how to use a computer.  What the gently caress?  Why did you hang up? Snake: I don't know.  Unfortunately, there are no famous people named Hans Davis for me to say that Snake is. Roger: Hans Davis? Anyone you know? Snake: No. Roger: You've never been in this lab before... Have you? Snake: Never. Roger: Well, there are two possibilities. Either the machine is broken, or you're "Hans Davis." The most likely possibility, that Hans was the last one to use the thing and forgot to log out, occurs to neither of these men.  Snake: I've never gone by that name. Roger: Well, it bugs the hell out of me what happened, but you've been granted access as Hans Davis, so you should be able to get through the East Wing. Check each room. Snake: Right.  And now it's back to gameplay!  ...For all of a minute, while you move down this hallway. I'll spare you the checking of every room and jump straight to the end.  You can tell this one's important, since it pulls you out of gameplay.  What - or who - could be inside...?
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Mar 2, 2018 23:01
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Snake looks tired to me, like the kind of guy who would say he's too old for this poo poo.
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Mar 4, 2018 16:36
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