Apparently so! My copy should get here by Saturday, or maybe Monday, so I'll give you guys some first-hand impressions, but some of the guys from another forum I frequent are really in love with it.
Quote:In terms of character building and story, it's brilliant and the affects on the story and situations based on that are incredible. It's one of the deepest games I've ever played in that regard. The characters are also fleshed out quite well, not only from personal encounters but by the excellent email system.
Quote:I think it would be easier to ask, "what don't I like about AP?" because then I'd just say...occasional weak graphics and buggiest game I've ever played. Everytime I play for 5 hours I hit at least one bug per hour. Also I think there are some mandatory alarms in the game (not 100% sure on this) which is frustrating if you are going for a perfect no alarms, no kills run like I am.
Everything else about the game is perfect. The only wrpg I've ever played that has been this good has been Fallout 2. It's not just that the story/character relations is amazing next gen stuff that blows away every game ever made. The gameplay is SO GOOD. If you play stealth like I am and try to get through every stage without being seen and not killing anyone, the game is better than MGS or SC in pure stealth gameplay. The guards can see further (though their scope is narrow), the level designs are great puzzles, the objectives are varied and the skills are awesome. Even the hacking mini-games are fun in this. Love the shooting mechanics as well from a stealth perspective. Having to get close and line up a shot makes it tougher and more fun than MGS/SC because you can't just tranq some guy from before he can even see you. You actually have to get close up where it's dangerous and sneak around him or finding a hiding spot close by and snipe him off.
Quote:It is better as an RPG and storyline wise, basically because there's a massive amount of choice in how things play out.
Quote:If you play this by trying to avoid combat, then you'll get the most out of it since it utterly sucks as a shooter. It's becoming one of my favourite games in years. There's a mission where it's just talking, and it's one of the best missions I've played in the game so far. Everything just flows almost seamlessly and never feels like say.. Dragon Age.
Quote:I'm glad I kept my order because I'm enjoying this game a lot.
I'm playing total stealth and nonlethal, as in, I haven't fired a gun since the tutorial. The action is hilariously jank fun if you play it as a stealth game. It's on par if not worse than a lot of old PS2 stealth games; I don't mean MGS2 and Splinter Cell, like someone mentioned above, it's more like the ones that came from Japan to cash in on the craze. At the start, stealth was walk up to enemy, hit button, they go down. Now I'm going invisible, I can run and they don't hear a thing, and I have a gadget that creates a sound anywhere I point it, so I can just aim at a far wall and take out an entire room in seconds. This isn't hyperbole. At one point I wanted to open fraps and take a video of how bad the AI was, but it actually helps make stealth more enjoyable, at least. The tiny bit of shooting I tried in the usual bad RPG shooter stuff where you point, aim, and end up shooting eight feet to the left.
That's all the action stuff. The conversation system and how you affect the story is what I'm really liking. The conversation system is better than most games, I think. I can see people not liking how everything is on a timer, but it's never two dudes standing around not saying a word or repeating dialog. I won't do a good job explaining, so I won't too much, but I will say that it does a very good job at making you feel like what you matters. Even the fact that I'm playing stealth and not getting detected, or the orders I do mission despite them being non-linear, and other seemingly minor things impacts conversations.
and yeah, the game is pretty funny.
Quote:Having good times.
My character is full on Bourne, so it's stealth and martial arts. The perks are cool to use in combat, at least in the sense that they help making the combat a bit more....or a bit less shitty.
I've met some characters now where the dialog with them has been interesting. Not much aside from that has changed from my last impressions, i'm guessing that having -100 hype for the game has helped so far, and i'm enjoying it.
So, basically, if you want a deep RPG and don't mind some jank, get Alpha Protocol NOW.
It's really too bad that the second half of his career was so injury-damaged, he was so, so amazing for a long time that while he was great, he'd have been even greater had he avoided injury. However, even without that, he is #5 in the all-time home runs list, and one of the few superstars from the steroid era who appears to have been really been clean - a worthy achievement to be sure. It is to bad that it had to end early like this though, early in the season and when he is only 40... I know, he wasn't playing much this year or doing well this year yet, but still, it's too bad. Still, his overall career was outstanding, and he certainly was one of the great baseball players of all time.
We all remember the large blue and gold plaque with an R in it, and a lot of us have seen the modern logo which takes away the plaque and is just a large stylized gold R (which, well, doesn't look as good in some of the animations, but still looks nice enough).
...I know I said that "emblems" and such are out and just stating the name in a clean font is "in", but they managed to make a logo that has NO flavor, no character, whatsoever. And it STILL has a big emblem in it so they fail twice.
It looks like a logo for a propane company, like they teamed up with Phillip 66 or something. The R's themselves look like lazy road signs.
I don't mind a remodel, and I do love "neat and clean" as an aesthetic choice, but this just seems like... boredom incarnate.
It's not like it's a big deal, but I get the impression, just looking at it, that some just out of college marketting students "wow'd" Rare executives in some meeting with made-up nonsense about prioritizing opportunities and pointing to graphs without numbers or data-points on them to suggest this is some super science optimized logo that'll grab everyone's attention, and they probably spent a lot of money on it. They should just focus on the games, that's where they are losing people, not the logo. The sales of Perfect Dark Arcade should confirm no one is skipping out just because of that.
The funny thing is, to this day Nintendo has NEVER changed their logo. It's the same thing it's always been, the word Nintendo in a round outline. The most variation it gets is sometimes it's some color other than red.
These guys have done a really good job doing a "Blair Witch done right" documentary style "investigation". They do a good job making it incredibly creepy, and so far there's no stupid fights over lost maps, which is always a plus. It also helps that the way they've set up this series is intentionally "out of order" (though they're put in ordered "sessions" so you know which way you should watch them). It's pretty interesting so far, though I've not watched the whole series.
![[Image: nm2255973]](http://www.imdb.com/media/rm1027640832/nm2255973)
![[Image: 30adco.450-759062.jpg]](http://www.alrdesign.com/blog/uploaded_images/30adco.450-759062.jpg)