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Let's play Alpha Brotocol (and Rage together)

Cassidy

Arcane
Joined
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Messages
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Location
Vault City
Jaedar said:
Dude... its the same airfield... it is not supposed to look differently..

I was so tired when I did this update I didn't even pay attention to airfield name or to the fact the location in the mission map matched that of the previous mission, seriously.

Also, it's not over yet. I decided to split this update in the most epic moment of it on purpose.
 

dr. one

Augur
Joined
Dec 5, 2009
Messages
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posts
Jaedar said:
Dude... its the same airfield... it is not supposed to look differently.

yep, and AFAIR it´s the only copypasta besides one spoilery location.
as for the EMP/camera moment - there is an alternative stealth route involving hollow airplane and rope slide IIRC.
the bug sucks, should be hopefully a rare occurrence though - i think it happened to me once in two playthroughs.

anyway, nice LP.
 

Cassidy

Arcane
Joined
Sep 9, 2007
Messages
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Location
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Now for the rest. To be honest, I nearly gave up on this game after that bug, and this would make my gameplay time in it shorter than in Oblivion with guns, but I decided to go further on and hope this shitty bug won't happen again, and that the rest of the game won't change my opinion about this game from "mediocre, but still can be fun at times" to "Banal, shit, boring."

Also, several serious plot developments in the end of this update

All Roads(and Boss Fights) lead to Rome

lpbrotocolp6s68.jpg


Here the same again.

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Having no illusions nor patience to try going in stealth against such large number of enemies, at least a BRO ought to take down as many of them as possible in a discrete manner.

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Screw discretion, better to just lure them and slaughter them from a position of advantage.

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Flechette bullets for the pistol, the best silenced armor-piercing solution AFAIK.

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The exit of this warehouse.

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BINGO!

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As Shaheed and his goon depart with the missiles, Thorton is advised by Westridge to take a way through the impassable hills to intercept their convoy.

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Sneaking becomes useful to put him in a position of advantage.

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And get the hell out of there.

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A tough fight later, Thorton Shepard cautiously seeks to eliminate the coming enemies, covered by the natural landscape rather than by a sticky cover system.

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After throughly running through the hills, and killing or bypassing enemies depending on which was more convenient, Thorton finally arrives at the meeting point of the convoy. But the place is busy, packing and shall deliver

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Heavy resistance as expected and the first ever in this thread:

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POPAMOLE BOSS FIGHT!!!

Had I been unaware of this game failures and tried to go at a full stealth approach regarding skills, I'd be really pissed off right now. But as those dumb special abilities simply made me dismiss further development on "stealth", except may for getting the intermediate "Camouflage", Thorton can Pop Moles like a BRO and won't have issues dealing with this boss.

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I think this was one the dullest boss fights ever in the history of gaming.

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And I didn't even have to use the sticky cover system because of the generous collision detection setup making even the tiniest diagonoal tip of a wooden crate block an assault rifle bullet, or maybe because of how much of a bad aim this boss had.

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Seriously, Obsidian, you should have ignored the complaints of butthurt retards about how some of the fights in MOTB were too hard. Now we get this as a boss fight.

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How do you call a game where someone managed to die at the tutorial but easily kills the first boss without even going under the risk of dying?

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I'd call it a consoletard game with one of the flattest difficulty and learning curves ever. If I judged it by gameplay only or if I had a mondblut-like mindset I'd fully agree with skyway: I just didn't give up is to see where this plot ends. Hopefully it won't have a Half-life like ending.

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Wait a minute? I didn't even have to climb there to finish him? I love those between combat cutscenes that ignore the player actions before their happening. At least saved the time that would be wasted to go up there.

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Just to show how gold plated guns are awesome. The symbol there with the pistols and the flag beneath the rifle are mere coincidences, I swear.

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And thus, Shaheed is instead of a Stryker.

[Intelligence]What sort of terrorist group would have access to the newest Amerikwan military technologies? Something is wrong about this.

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ ... 13-iav.htm

Believe it or not, this link is relevant to the theme of this segment, because according to Alpha Protocol, the Stryker sucks and the Brass should have sticked to the M113 because in this game it can be destroyed by firing enough times with an assault rifle against its frontal armor.

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But first, time to pop the weaker moles.

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And while its armor can be pierced by even a fucking 5.56mm AR, the Stryker's grenade launcher can't easily destroy a pile of wooden crates and has a ridiculously low rate of fire for what should be an automatic grenade launcher. These screenshots don't convey how many grenades it took for the crate above in the pile to be destroyed.

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But regardless of the fact it is possible to take it down with enough firing of the rifle, everyone knows RPGs are more efficient.

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And thus, of course.

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It is possible to expose yourself completely to an IFV and fire a RPG without getting killed. If things were like this(unless the crew of this AP Stryker boss was on drugs and/or drunk, but even them it doesn't explain the armor being vulnerable to assault rifle rounds) the US Army would have been raped in Iraq and end with the most humiliating defeat in its history.

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And once again.

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And thus, just one more shot before it is destroyed.

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And thus another boss easier or at best as easy as the tutorial is defeated.

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Thorton then goes check if Shaheed, who was inside the vehicle, is still alive.

Then suddenly a cutscene happens, where Halbech's G-man asks Thorton why did he kill Shaheed.

[Intelligence]This cutscene is happening in the future

[Hope]The game won't force me to kill Shaheed regardless of dialogue choices.

G-man asks Thorton why he killed the sandnigger. He answers:

lpbrotocolp6s105.jpg


And an interesting discussion proves that Halbech is really up to something, and something big. Then back to the present of the game:

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Shaheed makes the typical Baaaw America is Evil speech, pissing Thorton off, who, like any EXTREME type of guy, makes the most obvious choice, asking him for information.

Shaheed refuses to give away much, but as the conversation proceeds, he finally claims to know a very shocking truth, as he tells Thorton something he never could have imagined:

vilejerkAhmadinejad.jpg
: The missiles weren't stolen! Halbech sold them to Al-Samad. As you can see from the fact there was a Halbech sattelite in the our stockpile! And from the data you collected in the prison, that your superiors definitively took as classified. Halbech is using you as a pawn to cover this up, and it could be only the tip of the Rosenberg!

mass_effect_2_shepard.jpg
: ORLY?

vilejerkAhmadinejad.jpg
: YARLY. If you spare my life, but inform them you killed me to get them off me, I have a network of contacts I can use to provide you more information about this conspiracy, and Halbech will want both of us dead because you know too much from the moment you took this mission.

mass_effect_2_shepard.jpg
: NO WAI. Why would Halbech deliver weapons to you? Conspiracy, spare me this bullshit! I think you are inventing this to get rid of this situation!

vilejerkAhmadinejad.jpg
: YA WAI. Why would Halbech not want to incite wars for the sake of raising their profits like all evil corporations of the Great Satan and of the Jewmasons of Zion with their fictional holocaust?

mass_effect_2_shepard.jpg
: But, I don't believe you.

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: Who do you think that gave a Stryker to us? A terrorist invading Fort Knox to steal one?

mass_effect_2_shepard.jpg
: Ehm.

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: Like I said, if you let me go and tell your superiors I am dead, I will gather my network of contacts, get more knowledge about Halbech dealings across the world.

lpbrotocolp6s116.jpg


mass_effect_2_shepard.jpg
: All right. There is something suspicious about this, so I'll trust you for now, but if you ever show up on the media again, I will kill you!


Then suddenly, Al Shaheed vanishes, as Westridge sends in a transmission, and Thorton lies that he killed Shaheed.

book-of-eli-denzel-washington.jpg
: Congratulations Thort*bzzzzt*

LazyTown_0034.jpg
: Thorton! I had to cut off Westridge transmission to warn you! You need to get out of there! NOW!

mass_effect_2_shepard.jpg
: Why?

lpbrotocolp6s117.jpg


LazyTown_0034.jpg
: your position! They are from Halbech! They want to kill you because you know too much! Alpha Protocol will deny your existence, you can't go back now! RUN!!!





Couldn't bother taking the 2 MB of screenshots to detail the missiles exploding around and Thorton GTFO. Once he is far enough, he asks:




mass_effect_2_shepard.jpg
: What is happening? Why can't I return?

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LazyTown_0034.jpg
: There is someone working for Halbech in Alpha Protocol, and manipulating the program to attend Halbech's interests, and Halbech is doing some serious leveraging across the world. If you go back they'll arrest you, execute you, or worse, like being raped by a multiheaded dick!

mass_effect_2_shepard.jpg
: Then what the fuck should I do? I have nowhere to go! They'll hunt me, what about Halbech?

LazyTown_0034.jpg
: I've tracked several suspicious activities involving Halbech and inactive Al-Samad cells in Taiwan, Rome and Moscow. I suspect Halbech may be plotting to assassinating the president of Taiwan, support a terrorist attack in Rome and God knows what in Moscow. There are secret, abandoned havens of Alpha Protocol in these cities you could use, that not even Westridge knows about, due to the deep running layers of secrecy in the Protocols.

mass_effect_2_shepard.jpg
: But why?

LazyTown_0034.jpg
: Halbech profits from war, so it would be in their interests to provoke one, even if it would be a cold war, but from the data we gathered, if their plan is like this, this conflict could go off charts.

mass_effect_2_shepard.jpg
: How exactly off charts?

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: As exactly as ending with the need of drinking water from toilets to recover wounds!

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: Oh my God! We need to stop this and put the responsible people to justice! My EXTREME Justice! Where should I start?

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: Wherever you prefer

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: All roads lead to ROME.


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Before further plot, the mission details.

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Time for specialization. According to 1eyedking, Operative and picking pistol to pop moles without exposing yourself from cover is the easiest choice, but it's not the most interesting one.

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Instead we'll have a combat-oriented specialist with an AR. Just because I hate all the stealth special abilities and the other camouflage upgrade doesn't require specialization.

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Inside the airplane, Thorton meets an investigative journalist(or maybe a spy from CIA, who knows?). Being a badass EXTREME and also a smart guy, he pretends being the son of an Oil industry mogul and dismisses all her attempts to get any sensitive information out of him. I feel this is the right way of avoiding a potential romance, so it is the best way of dealing in this cutscene with interactive dialogues.

And with this, the end of this update. There are several leads to take in Rome in any order, and the game tries hard at making them sound difficult, and potentially more than one mission, but I've displayed enough plot already.

Lets just say ahead of time two of the leads involving either invading ECHELON or a CIA outpost in Rome, and that the latter, at least according to what Mina said, will fail if you are detected or use lethal force in the mission. OH MY! HOW I WISH THAT WAS TRUE! BUT I KNOW IT WON'T BE! Since Thief II, I never saw a game that forced the player to resort to absolute stealth in a few missions.

Regardless, you can guess I'll do the CIA infiltration mission first, maybe because of a very faint, nearly nonexistant hope that indeed, it will require that.

Veredict of this Update: Like all Obsidian games, it leaves a lot to be desired on the gameplay department, and due to the consolitis and popamole gameplay, this lot to be desired becomes even greater than the average for an Obsidian game, to the point gameplay alone doesn't hold it.

But the plot on the other hand. It may be cliché spy flick, but I have a soft spot for this sort of thing(as I do for lolconspiracy themed plots like in Deus Ex), and even if the consequences aren't much relevant or notable for the popamole Quick-Time Events where you make choices, at least this game shows serious hints of having them instead of just giving flavor choices, even if most of the dialogue choices in the game belong to the latter, and not to the former.

So, because I'm not like mondblut, The average of a decent, somewhat branching story with a mostly shitty gameplay equals a mediocrity. Hopefully neither the gameplay department nor the story and C&C department will get worse from now on. The story department improved a little, and I hope I won't end disappointed by seeing no consequences on choosing a location first than the others, for example, or on skipping missions whenever possible.

tl;dr Mediocre, yes, Banal, perhaps, Boring, unless you're like mondblut, no.

I'm liking this game for what it is. But I'd rather play another Deus Ex or traditional FPS/RPG hybrid over this. I supposed Hardcore Elitists have one similarity to beggars: they can't be choosers in times of decline.
 
Joined
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Messages
7,269
Um, you actually can stealth the Al-Samad Lieutenant. Not that it matters much. He's the only boss you can stealth, I believe.

Anyway, I'm playing through Deus Ex for the first time, and after playing this and not liking it even then, and then playing Deus Ex, it makes me even less forgiving.
 

Cassidy

Arcane
Joined
Sep 9, 2007
Messages
7,922
Location
Vault City
Flying Spaghetti Monster said:
Um, you actually can stealth the Al-Samad Lieutenant. Not that it matters much. He's the only boss you can stealth, I believe.

Anyway, I'm playing through Deus Ex for the first time, and after playing this and not liking it even then, and then playing Deus Ex, it makes me even less forgiving.

In Deus Ex there is only one "boss" you'll have to kill through conventional means(although in theory you could run away from him too, use the invisibility augmentation and avoid him, but I never tried it). The other two you can deal with through smart ways depending on your choices instead of straight run and gun, and all other enemies in the game are avoidable through stealth, or can be knocked out unconscious.
 
Joined
Feb 10, 2007
Messages
7,715
If you count the 3 triads in Taipei and Luzo in Moscow or whatever his name as bosses (since they have the big health bar like a boss), they can be stealthed.
 

Cassidy

Arcane
Joined
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Messages
7,922
Location
Vault City
This is not Langley, and Xenu is not here

Also, now here is an arguably(or definitively according to skyway) Banal, Shit, Boring Theme for this Entire Let's Play:

Moby - EXTREME Ways

lpbrotocolp7s01.jpg


Looking out at the window, Thorton wonders why he is trapped to always follow through missions and why he can't just wander and explore the city in search of clues, cash and allies instead.

So time to check for the new dossiers.

lpbrotocolp7s02.jpg


They are involved into something big right here, in Rome.

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VCI is definitively involved into something. This Marburg sounds like a suspicious man.

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The President of Taiwan is pro-independence and this is causing lots of tension. Where did I see this before? (Maybe I should do a LP of People's General, on Thursday).

[Lore]The "Taiwan crisis" is becoming an overused plot device in spy/war/conspiracy themed games situated in modern times, because now the Commies are defeated and Amerikwa considers China the next great threat for the future.

lpbrotocolp7s05.jpg


Scarlett Lake could be a spy for all that is known, so Thorton lied he was in the oil business to avoid drawing her interest.

lpbrotocolp7s06.jpg


Another potential target? How could this man be involved with Halbech?

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Will Thorton be able to fuck someone there? Nevermind, time to check for e-mails.

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Scarlett looks like certain Codexers to whom it's better avoid giving e-mail addresses, Facebook or myspace.

[Lore]There are rumors Facebook is controlled by the CIA.

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Henry Leland is G-man, a hollow man. Is it because he isn't really a man but something else wearing the skin of a man?

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Clearinghouse. Selling everything that is away from what Thorton specializes at is only logical.

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Gather some information about the CIA listening outpost.

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This time being EXTREME is not advised. Thorton needs to exert caution and avoid violence of any kind. Sneaking without shadows and with the type of floor he is stepping at having no relevance. And without popamole stealth skills once again, of course.

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By messing with a fusebox, Thorton draws an agent down, and carefully waits while he is fixing it to get upstairs.

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There is a problematic camera upstairs but it can be bypassed.

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Meanwhile, exploring all rooms of the building, specially the ones that are with the lights out, is a good idea.

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Cameras are down. This is the database computer, on the other hand.

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Is that (alpha) just there in the white board randomly?

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Automatic kill with pistol, and as far as Thorton will get with the pistol skill. Because sometimes you can't risk getting close to knock out someone and only one of those tranquilizer bullets not always suffice. Do I need to explain why I did choose to focus on AR instead? (At least the auto-aiming is more akin to Rainbow Six than to insta-kill, but well, next time, if there is one, it'll be an only SMG and Shotgun playthrough)

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Time to go upstairs.

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But like always, await the patrols.

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Thorton does a trick in the AC to scare the hell out of who is inside the control room.

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Elsewhere, while sneaking through Thorton hacks computers just for the sake of it. Some interesting e-mails are found.

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Waterboarding is truly EXTREME. Apparently this Al-Bara is the real deal. But no clues on his relation to Halbech.

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[Intelligence]It's referring to Mike Thorton.

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More sneaking through, and on another room, more amusing e-mails from a hacked computer.

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Vince Foreman? Wait a minute? Could it be?

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According to rumors in the Echelons, this one is like Missus Bishop in New Reno.

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Across the last floor, more computers and crosswords.

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Being careful is the only way. Cheating an ubermensch line of sight with the camera is also something impossible to resist doing, where throwing the keyboard out of the window because of the camera is something possible to resist doing.

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Some good loot in a locked door adjacent to the room where Thorton was.

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Now careful... time to get out, without being detected, and the place is fully lit so there aren't many shadows to hide at, and even if there were the game doesn't consider them when determining whether an enemy will spot you or not. As the CIA agent turns away, Thorton begins to stalk him.

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Then he turns left and navigates through the several adjacent rooms to avoid being sighted.

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And waits for the CIA agent to make the way back to the other side so he can get downstairs.

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Thorton managed to avoid any violence in the mission and got what he had to. When he returns, Mina begins to explain things from the big TV.

LazyTown_0034.jpg
: Thorton, someone inside the VCI staff appear to be searching for information regarding you and your location through the Internets and other means. This person is doing it in overtime, apparently to not draw much attention, using not her own workstation but one that Alan Parker used back when he was an undercover at Halbech. This person is called Madison Saint James






[Wisdom]If Alan Parker worked as undercover at Halbech, it wouldn't be surprising that the Halbech goon in Alpha Protocol is him.





mass_effect_2_shepard.jpg
: What does Madison works at for VCI?


LazyTown_0034.jpg
: Just a new employee, as far as I can tell right now. Marburg hired her quite recently. With time I can gather more information about her.


Veredict of this Update

I found a very, very weak resemblance of the typical Thief indoors level in this CIA Listening outpost level, like if they were, for a change, actually trying to make a level where a stealth approach is viable instead of a mole popping racing track(some levels are more linear than a typical NSFU/Test Drive track FFS). Though I really hoped it was a bit bigger, and less linear, at least there was almost always more than one path to reach every destination, which isn't valid for the majority of the segments in other levels.

Having played further in the game(actually I've finished the Rome segment already) all the other levels were worse than this one IMO. It is small, yes, simplistic, yes, but it is the only one so far where a full stealth approach is completely viable and not frustrating.
 
Joined
Aug 6, 2008
Messages
7,269
Sadly, that's pretty much the only good level in the game (some people say the hotel in Taipei, but meh). Moscow is full of banal, shit, boring level designs, with one literally railroaded (GET IT).

Anyway, continue.
 

Cassidy

Arcane
Joined
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Messages
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Location
Vault City
Flying Spaghetti Monster said:
some people say the hotel in Taipei

One of the worst levels in the game due to overprevalence really nasty minigames that must be beaten to ever to succeed at going through a more or less covert approach and specially because of the horrible 10+ clipping minigaymes. But the epic rage that level delivered is a long way to be posted here yet.
 

Cassidy

Arcane
Joined
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Messages
7,922
Location
Vault City
DefJam101 said:
lpbrotocolp7s48.jpg


Why is his pistol drawn lol

Because that's the standard model and this is an Obsidian game so don't expect them to bother with such details.

Also need to bring this shit to the next page.
 

Cassidy

Arcane
Joined
Sep 9, 2007
Messages
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Location
Vault City
To support those who have shitty Internet, one more page.

Also, I guess I'll have to try sinker another bait like the tutorial to draw more comments in this thread from now on.
 

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