Zero Punctuation Reviews "Alpha Protocol"

[Der_Unbekannte]

Whaaaaat. Jacob and Jack's missions are good? BWAHAHAAHAHA

Jacks loyalty mission was the most ridicoulous thing if ever seen. And Jacob? wtf was this shit.
There was no mystery in either of them, since everything that could have been mystrious was spoiled by your companions.

Example:
Jacks loyalty mission.

I see a dead animal. Obvious explanation: someone killed it. Implikation: Someone is here.
Jack: "OH BOY! DEAD ANIMAL! I WONDER IF SOMEONE ELSE IS HERE!"
Thanks miss dumpfuck for spoiling everything.

Oh yeah and here "This is a bad place" line is still the best.


Mordins loyalty mission was way superior since it enhanced his character. Before this mission you could easily think he is just a mad scientist. Afterwards you knew that he hated his decision but that it was the best solution.

Neither of this happend with Jack or Jacob. Jack stays the dumbfuck emo she is and Jacob keeps being the Knight in shining armor.

Liked Grunt's loyalty mission though. Didn't bring some insights to his character but hell. Shephard headshmashing a krogan was worth it.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

Shepard's EXTREME is usually the thing worth something.

 

[SuicideBunny]

Samara

samara's mission is one giant fail, especially the "choose a texture" moment at the end, and her daughter is easily the most botched character in the entire game.

 

[Silellak]

Any other opinions of ME2 aside, Mordin is perhaps one of my favorite video game characters of all time.

 

[Drakron]

Whaaaaat. Jacob and Jack's missions are good? BWAHAHAAHAHA

Jack, yes for what it does but Jacob ... not really.

There was no mystery in either of them, since everything that could have been mystrious was spoiled by your companions.

Example:
...

What kind of a retardo are you?

"Mystery" is not the purpose of either of those missions, in Jack case is to show what make Jack what she is and it does exactly that, also it creates dents on Jack persona as what she thinks happen and what happened have significant differences.

Jacob loyalty mission fails because it simply does not function very well, the only it does is right is after its over with Jacob/Miranda relationship as the rest is just a normal mission that happens to have someone that is related to a crew member.

Mordins loyalty mission was way superior since it enhanced his character. Before this mission you could easily think he is just a mad scientist. Afterwards you knew that he hated his decision but that it was the best solution.

Wrong, Mordin is a great character and the stuff THAT happens in that mission were pretty much already told, it gives no surprises.

What you get is more Mordin and because Mordin is good, so is the mission.

Neither of this happend with Jack or Jacob. Jack stays the dumbfuck emo she is and Jacob keeps being the Knight in shining armor.

And Mordin goes back to saying they did the right thing, even if you can get him to admit he have his doubts.

Liked Grunt's loyalty mission though. Didn't bring some insights to his character but hell. Shephard headshmashing a krogan was worth it.

Grunt seems a afterthought, his mission amounts to "kill things, the end" as Krogan are further dropped into the Proud Warrior Race stereotype.
Nothing changes, that is funny as its pretty much the only character on board that needed some kind of character progression.

 

[Xor]

I think the point of Krogan is to be the stereotypical warrior race. And also to piss me off to no end while playing an adept.

 

[Der_Unbekannte]

"Mystery" is not the purpose of either of those missions, in Jack case is to show what make Jack what she is and it does exactly that, also it creates dents on Jack persona as what she thinks happen and what happened have significant differences.

I was refering to mangoose who said, that in these missions mystery is a great part, which is not. I didn't expect mystery nor did I wanted it. So I agree with you there.

But Jack's persona was pretty clear before the mission. She was treated bad, her psyche was scared by this and she only cared for her own survival.
Yes what happend and what she thought were different. But not so much. She suffered much. She thought she suffered most, while in truth others suffered more. This revelation should trigger something in her in order to be relevant. But she still goes on about how bad she was treated never trying to help those who were tortured in order for her to survive.

Some time later (I think when you did both loyalty missions of miranda and jack) they start a bitch fight which only purpose is, how bad jack was treated. Nothing about the other kids.

So her persona didn't change at all and we didn't learn something new about her (beside her being a stupid emo bitch, which we already knew)

Wrong, Mordin is a great character and the stuff THAT happens in that mission were pretty much already told, it gives no surprises.

What you get is more Mordin and because Mordin is good, so is the mission.

I agree here to some degree, but I still found it interesting that Mordin is so disgusted by the wrong research styles. I always thought that he would accepted those treatments in his research of the genophage. But maybe I just missed some parts because I didn't choose the dialouge options concerning the genophage.

And Mordin goes back to saying they did the right thing, even if you can get him to admit he have his doubts.

Yes but those doubts made his persona more interesting since seeing how much his research troubled him wasn't that obvious before.

Grunt seems a afterthought, his mission amounts to "kill things, the end" as Krogan are further dropped into the Proud Warrior Race stereotype.
Nothing changes, that is funny as its pretty much the only character on board that needed some kind of character progression.

But he is a krogan. His mission brought more insight to the krogan society than to him. Yes he is a pretty flat character, but he is the pure krogan so he represents the krogan society. As a result his loyalty mission was about the krogan society. (Especially liked the part that the krogans know, that everytime they build up a society they will destroy it themself. Evolution of Societies was kinda interesting).

But of course I admit, that Grunt is a very one dimensional character, so your argument is valid.[/quote]

 

[Mangoose]

I don't really remember the specifics about ME2's story, just that I liked some of the companion story-lines. I just mentioned some qualities that I thought were why I liked them, but I guess I was wrong. So don't worry about nitpicking what I said, they were pretty much off-hand.

 

[Freelance Henchman]

I'm wondering if anyone at Bioware read the Kzin Wars books by Larry Niven and collaborators. The Kzin (tiger-like aliens) were iron age savages but were uplifted by another race, the Jotoki (8-armed starfish-like aliens), that used them as shock troops and mercenaries. That plan backfired colossally as the Kzinti overwhelmed the Jotoki later and turned them into slaves and meat animals. I kept thinking of this whenever the Krogan/Salarian conflict came up in the game, just that the Krogan got put in check by the genopage.

 

[Jim Profit]

I wish an rpg had varying degrees of evil alignment. That'd be the game for me.

If I wrote a moral and philosophical book. It would basically look like Nietzsche+Bioware. With a pinwheel of different evil alignment answers. (But no "good")

 

[Jaesun]

Define "varying degrees of evil alignment".

Ever played NWN2's Evil Alignment (And conclusion at the end)?

 

[StrangeCase]

I wish an rpg had varying degrees of evil alignment. That'd be the game for me.

If I wrote a moral and philosophical book. It would basically look like Nietzsche+Bioware. With a pinwheel of different evil alignment answers. (But no "good")

I want you to pitch this idea to any major publisher, and snap a photo of the representative's face immediately after the word "good". Make sure to use the quotation mark finger gestures.

 

[Azrael the cat]

I wish an rpg had varying degrees of evil alignment. That'd be the game for me.

If I wrote a moral and philosophical book. It would basically look like Nietzsche+Bioware. With a pinwheel of different evil alignment answers. (But no "good")

Nietszsche (mid-to-late period anyway) wasn't so much interested in 'evil' - more (to use his terms) an 'aesthetic morality'. I.e. he'd choose all the options that would make the story the most interesting in terms of its full arc, rather than weighing the good and evil of each decision.

Oddly enough, really early Doctor Who might fit into that category. There's tonnes of episodes in the old black-and-white serials, for the 2nd doctor's era in particular, where the Doctor basically goes 'Oh, I suggest you shouldn't go opening the angry tomb of possessed cyberman death, but hey that won't stop me from, like, completely goading you into investigating anyway, and helping you go to your doom by getting all the doors open and cyberman-awakening machinery running. And then tagging along slightly further back where it's safer, so I can satisfy my curiousity.'

 

[Der_Unbekannte]

I'm wondering if anyone at Bioware read the Kzin Wars books by Larry Niven and collaborators. The Kzin (tiger-like aliens) were iron age savages but were uplifted by another race, the Jotoki (8-armed starfish-like aliens), that used them as shock troops and mercenaries. That plan backfired colossally as the Kzinti overwhelmed the Jotoki later and turned them into slaves and meat animals. I kept thinking of this whenever the Krogan/Salarian conflict came up in the game, just that the Krogan got put in check by the genopage.

I never thought, that I would be hearing about these books again. Read them and now since you mention it the connection is quite obvious. Just forgot about them. Thanks.