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LTTP: Spec Ops: The Line (I am Sick) [SPOILERS]

-COOLIO-

The Everyman
finished it, it's amazing how little game play has evolved in some cases since winback on the 64. the shooting was stupidly boring, and the on rails segments were even worse. the sniping sections were even more wack-a-mole than the normal gameplay. i basically hated the game and i was plodding through it to soak up the atmosphere and narrative that i heard was supposed to be very good.

overall, id summarize the narrative as forced. by the time you finish up the gate you essentially get what the game is about and you can practically time your playtime on the 'tough decision' moments. "oh man, the shooting is feeling especially boring, it's probably time for a hallucination or a tough decision". i applaud the developers for making the killing a little more questionable than your cods and gears, but that feels like the only minutely interesting thing about this whole game.
 
Anyone playing on Suicide Ops mode, can you give me any tips? Im stuck in the very beginning of Chapter 14 and I just cant get past these enemies. Its wave after wave and just getting close enough the turret seems impossible. I thought that chapter 13 was hard but Jesus. Theres just too many and Adams just sucks compared to Lugo.

I know Im close to the end and I should probably just ratchet it down to easy, but Im soooo close.
 

Trike

Member
So I just beat the game a few hours ago. It's weird, because I read about the game affecting people and I just shrugged it off. But it did intrigue me enough to get it, especially when it was dirt cheap on Gamefly. I got it with Bioshock 1&2 for $8. I have barely touched Bioshock because of this game.

Stuff like the white phosphorus kind of shocked me, and upset me. I thought it was a bit like a Call of Duty moment, with getting rid of an army of bad dudes. Seeing the things they did in the game, I didn't really care much for them. Walking through the debris I saw a man crawling around in pain, so I shot him. Either Adams or Lugo said "Don't bother with them, they are already dead." and that is when I noticed others yelling or crawling around in pain, some with melted off limbs. When I heard someone say "Oh shit" I thought that the twist was going to be that we accidentally attacked a group of good guys. I was convinced that was the case until I saw the civilians with their melted off faces.

In games when morality comes into play, I usually go as good as I can be as long as it isn't ridiculous. Even with the gray morality in the choices in the game I had a hard time deciding what to do. At one point I tried shooting at the snipers, but was instantly killed. Didn't think it was possible to survive (it was), so I just shot the dude on the left. Later it turned out it didn't matter though. But what really got me is how even before the cutscene ended, I knew I was going to kill as many civilians as I could for what they did to Lugo. I didn't hesitate. I barely got off a few shots before I had to reload, so I just switched to my alternate fire and shot grenades into them, killing the last of the bunch. This is from someone who Played through Modern Warfare 2 and didn't shoot a single civilian in "No Russian" because I would feel bad, despite there only being like four different character models for them.

Why did I get so upset to the point where I wasted precious grenade ammo? I mean I liked Lugo, even though he was kind of a prick for killing the radio man. But I felt bad for him. He really, really didn't want to use the white phosphorus. Walker put him and Adams through hell. Walker was the jackass who tried to get a helicopter through a sandstorm. It was Walker's fault that he died. Lugo might have had a weapon to fend off the civilians, but I don't think he would have killed any of them after the white phosphorus bombs.

Edit:

Quick question. In chapter 14, I died in the house a little after I killed the heavy that looked like Lugo. It happened after I cleared the first floor, and I have no idea what got me. It looked like it was Adams, but it might have been a hidden enemy. Either way after I died the screen got scrambled and black and white, and I heard a girls giggle and a child-like figure. Then the game restarted back at the checkpoint. The heavy no longer looked like Lugo and there was no dialogue referencing it anymore. This happen to anyone else?
 

SystemBug

Member
looking back at the trailer they released

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZKGSKiyol0

I have to say it might be just one of the best one's I have seen, especially after finishing the game.

Quick question. In chapter 14, I died in the house a little after I killed the heavy that looked like Lugo. It happened after I cleared the first floor, and I have no idea what got me. It looked like it was Adams, but it might have been a hidden enemy. Either way after I died the screen got scrambled and black and white, and I heard a girls giggle and a child-like figure. Then the game restarted back at the checkpoint. The heavy no longer looked like Lugo and there was no dialogue referencing it anymore. This happen to anyone else?

Yes.
 
Beat the game today.

I have to say, the twist was a bit "meh," but the epilogue made it worth it.

The game plays like a parable about killing and war in general. Spec Ops does moral choice better than any other game I have played (making it in-game actions instead of making it like a multiple choice quiz was amazing), and is worth going through if only to experience that stuff. I died a lot on normal, but the context of the game made it so I didn't mind at all (in fact, especially with the loading screens, dying a lot and getting frustrated only added to my enjoyment of the narrative).

Not a perfect game, but a good step towards things I want to see more in video games.
 

antitrop

Member
Edit:

Quick question. In chapter 14, I died in the house a little after I killed the heavy that looked like Lugo. It happened after I cleared the first floor, and I have no idea what got me. It looked like it was Adams, but it might have been a hidden enemy. Either way after I died the screen got scrambled and black and white, and I heard a girls giggle and a child-like figure. Then the game restarted back at the checkpoint. The heavy no longer looked like Lugo and there was no dialogue referencing it anymore. This happen to anyone else?


Yes, it's a small girl humming Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5a4aCveGQg
 

Sorral

Member
I just got to chapter 8...with the white phosphor by the gate. I should have seen it coming, but I didn't....just wtf man. D:

The story only got better and better.. I wonder how it ends now, but I have to get some sleep.
 
Any one read this interview with the writer Walt Williams? Had no idea that 2K have floating staff that they send out to work with developers. Always assumed he was part of Yager!

2K fly under the radar, not sure what goes on over there but they seem to be pretty successful this generation with their management style.

Great interview by the way by Brendon Keogh, who wrote Killing Is Harmless about Spec Ops.

Chapter 9 spoiler from the interview

Walt Williams: There was one thing. When you are repelling down at the start of Chapter Nine and you mention you thought that you saw that reflection—

Brendon Keogh: Oh no. Is it not actually there? I swear I saw it!

W.W.: No that’s the thing, you were right! And I wasn’t sure if I should tell you that you were right or not. I realized I had no idea how to interact with this thing.

B.K.: I’m so happy I wasn’t imagining it!

W.W.: Yeah. It’s Lugo.

B.K.: I… Wait. What? It’s Lugo?

W.W.: It’s Lugo!

B.K.: I’ve had people tell me I am reading too much into this game – which is still certainly true at points – and their proof is often that I say that there is a ghost there!

W.W.: I know! And I really wanted to tell them, no! He is not reading into it too much! It is totally there! It is Lugo hanging in the window as he is hanging at the end of the game.
 

jimi_dini

Member
Quick question. In chapter 14, I died in the house a little after I killed the heavy that looked like Lugo. It happened after I cleared the first floor, and I have no idea what got me. It looked like it was Adams, but it might have been a hidden enemy. Either way after I died the screen got scrambled and black and white, and I heard a girls giggle and a child-like figure. Then the game restarted back at the checkpoint. The heavy no longer looked like Lugo and there was no dialogue referencing it anymore. This happen to anyone else?

You left me to die <-- burnt into my brain

Yeah, the game tries to fuck with your brain.
and it works
 

zkylon

zkylewd
Any one read this interview with the writer Walt Williams? Had no idea that 2K have floating staff that they send out to work with developers. Always assumed he was part of Yager!

2K fly under the radar, not sure what goes on over there but they seem to be pretty successful this generation with their management style.

Great interview by the way by Brendon Keogh, who wrote Killing Is Harmless about Spec Ops.

Chapter 9 spoiler from the interview

Walt Williams: There was one thing. When you are repelling down at the start of Chapter Nine and you mention you thought that you saw that reflection—

Brendon Keogh: Oh no. Is it not actually there? I swear I saw it!

W.W.: No that’s the thing, you were right! And I wasn’t sure if I should tell you that you were right or not. I realized I had no idea how to interact with this thing.

B.K.: I’m so happy I wasn’t imagining it!

W.W.: Yeah. It’s Lugo.

B.K.: I… Wait. What? It’s Lugo?

W.W.: It’s Lugo!

B.K.: I’ve had people tell me I am reading too much into this game – which is still certainly true at points – and their proof is often that I say that there is a ghost there!

W.W.: I know! And I really wanted to tell them, no! He is not reading into it too much! It is totally there! It is Lugo hanging in the window as he is hanging at the end of the game.
great stuff
 

Def Jukie

Member
I finally got around to playing through this a few days ago. I have to say that while the game does a lot of really interesting things, the gameplay itself really holds it back in my opinion. The story and setting are great overall but I found the pacing to be terrible. The problem is there is no variety in the gameplay. Maybe that's part of the critique on modern games that they are going for but I found it to be incredibly boring from a gameplay perspective.

I also didn't find the phosphor scene to be moving in any particular way and I'm wondering if it's because I don't play a lot of modern shooters, especially of the military variety. The last Call of Duty that I played was the first Modern Warfare and I honestly felt bad after the similar scene in that game. There is no aftermath there but it made me feel worse than it did in Spec Ops because I felt it was so telegraphed here. I knew something was going to happen sooner or later or nobody would be talking about this game like they have been. All the you don't have a choice stuff was a little too heavy handed. I found this theme to be handled much more effectively in the original Bioshock.

I know many people are finally getting sick of shooting people in the face but I haven't wanted to play games like that for years now. So I have to ask, people that found this game so emotionally draining, do you normally play a lot of modern shooters? I feel like if I normally did I might feel different about certain aspects of this game. If you go into the game thinking you are going to have some fun mowing people down with assault rifles I could see being shocked by this game but I already didn't want to do that.

The only reason I even played through this was because of all the buzz surrounding the narrative and in that regard it was worth playing. The story is basically Apocalypse Now meets Fight Club which is already head and shoulders above your average video game story but it's the little touches that truly set this game apart. I just wish it was more fun to play. I don't think the gameplay is bad, just very bland with little variety. It will be interesting to see where this team and writing staff go from here.
 

TheSeks

Blinded by the luminous glory that is David Bowie's physical manifestation.
I play a lot of shooters and I'm in the "it's overrated and not worth the time" camp. Mostly because of the choices like you said and mostly because of the story. One interpretation is that "Walker is dreaming" or hallucinating or whatever you want to say which is bullshit because if that's the case: What the fuck is Lugo and Adams and the whole game then? Walker walked through a ghost town of Dubai shooting off millions of rounds from guns he just happened to find?

It just didn't resonate with me simply because the shooting was mediocre (tolerable and okay, but nothing to write home about) and the story was so ham-fisted into trying to be serious/melodramatic that it fell on it's face and didn't make me feel anything to where I just can't regard it as anything but a D or C-tier game.
 

antitrop

Member
I just read this blog post by Casey Cameron, a composer on the soundtrack of Spec Ops (specifically the ending of the game):

http://caseycameron.com/spec-ops-the-line-ending-music/

Back in late 2011 I was approached by 2K Games to write music for the climactic ending of Spec Ops. They wanted two things: background music to set the tone for the final encounter, and a score for an eye-opening final encounter cutscene. I&#8217;ll talk about the background music in this post as proof that something very simple can benefit highly from careful consideration.
<cut>

A drone is a sustained pitch (or several) that lasts throughout the entirety, or a section, of the music. Drones often serve as gateways. In many cultures they&#8217;re used to open doors to spirituality, initiate rites of passage, or simply lead the way to unfolding musical ideas. They can be used transport us or our characters somewhere even if the music stays relatively static. In Spec Ops, when my drone fades in, it supports the visual aesthetic well, and the player gets the feeling they're about to experience something very dark.

More in the link, good read.
 

Spierek

Member
Just finished the game. The gameplay itself was nothing to write home about and the initial hours of the game are kinda boring. However, once you get to the white phosphorus scene - which didn't leave a gigantic impact on me, since it was easy to predict what will happen - the mood of the game slowly started getting worse - and by worse, I actually mean better and more interesting.

Slowly seeing how Walker and his men are becoming more and more animal-like, swearing so much that even the Gears' boys would have nothing on them, constantly fighting against each other made the game much more fascinating. When you arrive in Dubai you are presented with the "they went rogue, therefore they are bad, that's why you have to kill them" mentality. However, after the first 2/3rd of the game you yourself have actually blindly killed so many soldiers, only because Walker blindly believes that "it's all Conrad's fault and he has to pay".

Essentially, you become a dangerous killing machine that everyone wants to stop, and your character is unable to notice that.

And just then the game dropped it's biggest bomb on me - the death screens. I'm not talking about the shitty "You're dead!" screen, because that was really lame - I mean the loading screens after that. Seeing lines like "Do you feel like a hero yet?", "You did nothing wrong.", "You are still a good person", "How many americans have you killed today?", etc. left the biggest emotional impact on me. Probably the best one is the "Killing for yourself is murder, killing for your government is heroic, killing for fun is harmless." one, since it can be kinda interpreted as a 4th wall-breaking critique of the player itself.

The cherry on top of the cake is the ending (which I have to admit, caught me a little off guard - hiding real Conrad behind the painting was neat) and the epilogue, where you can see that the Dubai conflict has thoroughly broken Walker. I really liked the fact that you can drop the gun in the final scene, but you also can kill the patrol; and the game does nothing to sway your choice. There were no hallucinations depicting those soldiers as monsters, no voices telling you to do so. It was all up to you.

Long story short - worth playing for the final 1/3rd. I wouldn't call it the best game of 2012 but it certainly deserves a playthrough, especially by all of the people that are bored by all of those high-action shit-story cookie-cutter FPS/TPS games on the market. Spec Ops: The Line is a game that makes you think of the story, even after finishing the game - and that's something you don't encounter a lot in these genres.
 

Raoh

Member
Just finished the game. The gameplay itself was nothing to write home about and the initial hours of the game are kinda boring. However, once you get to the white phosphorus scene - which didn't leave a gigantic impact on me, since it was easy to predict what will happen - the mood of the game slowly started getting worse - and by worse, I actually mean better and more interesting.

Slowly seeing how Walker and his men are becoming more and more animal-like, swearing so much that even the Gears' boys would have nothing on them, constantly fighting against each other made the game much more fascinating. When you arrive in Dubai you are presented with the "they went rogue, therefore they are bad, that's why you have to kill them" mentality. However, after the first 2/3rd of the game you yourself have actually blindly killed so many soldiers, only because Walker blindly believes that "it's all Conrad's fault and he has to pay".

Essentially, you become a dangerous killing machine that everyone wants to stop, and your character is unable to notice that.

And just then the game dropped it's biggest bomb on me - the death screens. I'm not talking about the shitty "You're dead!" screen, because that was really lame - I mean the loading screens after that. Seeing lines like "Do you feel like a hero yet?", "You did nothing wrong.", "You are still a good person", "How many americans have you killed today?", etc. left the biggest emotional impact on me. Probably the best one is the "Killing for yourself is murder, killing for your government is heroic, killing for fun is harmless." one, since it can be kinda interpreted as a 4th wall-breaking critique of the player itself.

The cherry on top of the cake is the ending (which I have to admit, caught me a little off guard - hiding real Conrad behind the painting was neat) and the epilogue, where you can see that the Dubai conflict has thoroughly broken Walker. I really liked the fact that you can drop the gun in the final scene, but you also can kill the patrol; and the game does nothing to sway your choice. There were no hallucinations depicting those soldiers as monsters, no voices telling you to do so. It was all up to you.

Long story short - worth playing for the final 1/3rd. I wouldn't call it the best game of 2012 but it certainly deserves a playthrough, especially by all of the people that are bored by all of those high-action shit-story cookie-cutter FPS/TPS games on the market. Spec Ops: The Line is a game that makes you think of the story, even after finishing the game - and that's something you don't encounter a lot in these genres.

Well Said...

I just posted a reply to ending the game on a thread I was already in but I have to say, your personal review pretty much sums up what I want to say about this game.
 

pakkit

Banned
I've heard people say that Easy is the way to play. Gotta disagree. With medium difficulty you're guaranteed a few deaths, which allow you to see the brilliant loading screens.

I enjoyed this a lot. It's commentary on faux-morality in a gameworld infested with trigger-based politics is spot-on. It also resonated as a story about a protagonist trying to overcome PTSD (the hallucinations, and "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" song hint at this angle).
 

oneils

Member
Anyone know which platform this game is best on? PC/360/PS3?

I have it on my Steam wishlist but I'm wondering if the pc version is any good.
 
I was thinking about the final segment of the game
if you choose to shoot Konrad.

This might be me giving too much credit to the devs/writers — similarly to what Phospor[numbers] did in another thread when he mentioned the change in trigger discipline, something that doesn't actually happen in game — but when
one of the soldiers comments on how Walker is clearly unhinged because he's just standing there with his gun at the ready, with no other response,
I thought that that's all that the player is able to do in just about every game of this type. You're only ways to interact with the game environment are aim, fire, take cover, sprint (to cover, to a better position to take out more targets, Etc.). There are no "say hi/shake hands/wave," inputs, no ability to sit, chat, or even surrender/drop your weapon, like in most shooters.

The above is all that
Walker knows how to do at that moment
, just like the player. It isn't until
one of the soldiers tells him to put the weapon down that you're given the prompt to do so. After the cutscene following Konrad being shot, you're once again given control in a game where all you do is kill. Walker, as a character, is — probably idly so — contemplating what to do just like the player and all he can do, until the "drop weapon," prompt, is stand there. The only thing his PTSD-ridden mind can think to do, besides "nothing," is kill, which is the same thing the player has been taught by this game and others like it. The player themselves are, in a way, shell-shocked since the thought to shoot the people in front of them, regardless of who they are or whether there's a true need, will almost certainly pass through their mind at that moment.

I thought it was an interesting way of framing a game's basic gameplay to make a point, all without having to spell it out.
 
Looks pretty good on PC.

You really need to force AA on it though. The game is very bright and jaggies really stand out. Once you throw some AA at it it looks very nice though.

Playing again on the hardest difficulty, Nolan North really knocked it out of the fucking park with this one.
 

Jocchan

Ὁ μεμβερος -ου
You really need to force AA on it though. The game is very bright and jaggies really stand out. Once you throw some AA at it it looks very nice though.

Playing again on the hardest difficulty, Nolan North really knocked it out of the fucking park with this one.
I played it on a 17" 1080p screen, small enough for me to not really notice any jaggies. It looked pretty awesome there :)
 

Branson

Member
I finished it today. Holy shit. What an ending. What did you guys do in the ending? I
killed "Konrad" and gave up after the credits.
It was pretty great. I dont want to ruin it and see the other endings. Its a one play-through game for me basically. Played it on PC and it looked fantastic. What a ride.
 

spekkeh

Banned
All endings are really excellent and fit well to the story though. I think it's the best multiple ending that I played.

Initially I shot myself, was so amazed to find that you could live through it and you'd get an epilogue
 
Is the epilogue people are talking about after the credits? I just beat the game tonight and it's a masterpiece, one of my fav campaigns ever. I chose the ending where
Konrad reflection shoots me, I didn't fire.
 

theaface

Member
Is the epilogue people are talking about after the credits? I just beat the game tonight and it's a masterpiece, one of my fav campaigns ever. I chose the ending where Konrad reflection shoots me, I didn't fire.

If you make a different choice at the end, there's a little bit more gameplay/ending.
 

Keyouta

Junior Member
Just finished the game about a day ago. I quite liked the story, especially since it does a lot to make you think about whether what you're doing is right or wrong. I also liked that it sets itself apart from others in the genre and does something with the "one man army" trope. Multiple endings were also nice.
 

h#shdem0n

Member
I just beat this game. I liked it, despite the somewhat pedestrian mechanics. I mean I still had fun playing it, but the reason I kept going was the story, really. I wanted to see if it lived up to the hype (and infamy to some).

Conceptually I was pretty pleased. The "this is all your fault" tip didn't bother me at all, although I kind of went wtf when I saw, "you're still a good person." I'm sure Spec Ops isn't the first game to address its own medium, but it's certainly one of the most high profile ones.

Overall I enjoyed playing Spec Ops: The Line and look forward to more titles with similar themes. I might even replay it to see how some of the 'choice' moments play out. I'm not expecting drastic differences, but I did branch out a little bit on respawns of my own game, and they were more different than I thought they'd be

I also loved the ending. I didn't really feel like I had won. Even if you don't read into the story at all and take it strictly at face value, it was good as far as videogame stories go. Lord knows there's room for improvement all around.

Oops, I typed this before the stuff after the credits happened. Didn't really change much.
 

jimi_dini

Member
Is the epilogue people are talking about after the credits? I just beat the game tonight and it's a masterpiece, one of my fav campaigns ever. I chose the ending where
Konrad reflection shoots me, I didn't fire.

If you look closely,
you actually shoot yourself
.
 

Scoops

Banned
First off huge SPOILERS in this post. The thread and this post have been marked so I don't really feel the need to tag all the spoilers.

Got this about a month ago via the $8 Gamefly 2K sale. Finally got around to finishing it yesterday. I'll just go into what worked versus what didn't, but in short, it's a phenomenal game:

I don't usually play third person shooters so maybe I just don't know what a really good one feels like, but I actually really enjoyed the gameplay. It didn't blow my socks off, but I found it consistently fun throughout. I had a couple problems with some of the cover and sprinting controls (I played on PC) like other have mentioned, but I had basically figured them out by the end of the game when it got tougher. I thought shooting felt good especially when getting a slow-mo after pulling off a head shot, and I liked how cover was destructible but not too destructible. I generally don't like rail shooting sections in my shooters and this was no exception, although obviously the one helicopter section where Walker is tearing stuff up because he can is very important in the plot of the game and I appreciated that. Something I haven't really seen mentioned are the mini-stealth sections. The game introduces silencers and third person cover shooters inherently are set up to allow some stealth gameplay. I definitely wouldn't of liked the game to force stealth upon us, but maybe giving us more options to use it would've mixed up the gameplay. Then again stealth gameplay probably didn't fit in with the overall mood the game was trying (and succeeding) to accomplish. I thought the AI was well done both for your squad and the enemies. Enemies were constantly flanking forcing me to always check my sides before looking ahead. Squad AI also never really got in my way which is all I can really ask for.

No one is playing this or talking about it still for the gameplay though and where this game really shines is through story telling, art direction and presentation. The graphics, technically speaking, are good not great. It's an UE3 game with all the advantages and disadvantages that come with that. I really thought the art was terrific. The sand-flooded Dubai is a spectacle to begin with but really got me were the smaller things. The "forest" of hanging bodies, the graffiti/art on the walls, the sections you walk through with all the candles on the ground, the mannequin scene, the painting at the end of the game, Sniper Joe on the main menu, any of the hallucination scenes really, plus any of the stuff mentioned in this post half of which I didn't even really notice during my playthrough:

Yes, it's fucking amazing. It should have gotten more awards.

The amount of details in that game... Jesus Christ... giant spoiler tag below.

Hidden sniper nests
The snipers names with tallies of people killed

Wall with Delta's pictures on it
Lugo is crossed out after a while

Normal billboards
After you do something horrible the eyes burn out/are painted out once you look away and look back
They are shutting their eyes because they cannot stand your atrocities

Only healthy tree in the area, everything is burnt to shit
Walk past it
Look back
It's dead

The mannequin scene
After that, see a mannequin
Melee it, it flashes into a real person before shattering

As the story goes on your executions become more brutal
Straight up kneecap a guy

Let Riggs die in the fire
Use your only bullet on the ibex
Achievement unlocked: The Deerhunter

Die enough
'Do you want to swap difficulties?'
Die some more
'Do you feel like a hero yet?'

Die in certain areas
The death screen doesn't appear
You just flash back to the start of the area, he shakes his head and goes, 'what the fuck?'

Entire list of the 33rd on a wall
All are crossed out except eight
Eight soldiers in the next room
'We surrender to you sir'
Go back
The eight are crossed out
Go back to the soldiers
They aren't there anymore

Pay attention to his trigger discipline

Of course what really matters is how the story is interwoven with the presentation. One of the absolute highlights of the game is the squad's transformation. As it's been said numerous times in this thread both the squad's physical appearance and their vocal interactions throughout the game are masterly handled, and you know what? I feel like that if I was in their position I would probably look and sound the same way by the end of it (not that I would necessarily do all the actions they did) and that's how games are supposed to work.

That brings us to the story itself. I knew going in to playing that I wasn't necessarily going to be to "good" guy throughout. I don't think that's what the developer meant to be the big twist. Obviously via word of mouth alone too many people would've found out long before playing the game that that was going to occur. For me the big twist was that Konrad had been dead the whole time and Walker was projecting things to justify his actions. I didn't really see that coming. The whole "you're the bad guy" thing wasn't meant to be subtle, that's what was supposed to get people interested in playing this otherwise generic shooter to begin with. The big twist of the game was Konrad being dead the whole time and the power of the mind to justify the body's actions.

I see there's a lot of debate on which scenes "worked" versus which ones didn't. The white phosphorous scene actually didn't get to me too much although I can see why it affected some people the way it did, and more importantly why it effected Walker which is all that really matters. I felt like I didn't really have a choice so to me it felt kind of like No Russian in MW2. The scene that definitely DID effect me was of course right after Lugo had died and you're surrounded by the civilians. I hesitated to see if they would disperse on their own. They didn't. I fired straight into the crowd. I didn't think I had a choice. "But there's always a choice!" Not in videogames. That was an eye-opening scene for me. The other thing that really got me was the line "Do you even remember why you're still here?" Honestly by about the halfway point, I had forgotten what my original mission had been.

I'll probably think of more things to say later but this is definitely one of my games of the year. The thing is if you judge it solely based off the criteria we typically judge videogames (gameplay, graphics) you'll come up with the conclusion the game is merely average and unfortunately that seems to be what most critics did looking at its Meta score. However I prefer to simply judge it as a piece of media. An interactive one at that where the interaction amplifies the story and emotional effects. It pushes the medium forward in not so obvious ways or at least not the ways we were expecting (ie. graphical update every gen). But as far as games go released in 2012 goes, I'd put it below only Xenoblade Chronicles (I'm in America). As far as games I've played in 2013, it might be the best right now. Definitely worth playing and I've been pushing it onto all of my gaming friends and even some friends not really into gaming but who I know would like the story.

I don't usually do write-ups this long for games, much less shooters, but after finishing it I can't get the game off my mind and I felt the need to get my thoughts out there. That's how I know it worked.
 
Good post, but I want to comment on a couple of things.
The white phosphorous scene actually didn't get to me too much although I can see why it affected some people the way it did, and more importantly why it effected Walker which is all that really matters. I felt like I didn't really have a choice so to me it felt kind of like No Russian in MW2.
You DO have a choice, it's just not an obvious one, but a choice nonetheless.

Remember this little piece of dialog at the end?

Walker: What happened here was out of my control...
Colonel John Konrad: Was it? None of this would've happened if you just stopped. But on you marched. And for what?

Konrad isn't only speaking to Walker, he is speaking to YOU, the player. At any moment you could have just stopped playing. Game over, Walker, and by extension you did not commit these atrocities. It's supposed to send a message for players to think about the actions that these video games tell you to do, ask questions instead of implicitly following orders. Lead writer Walt Williams also considers it a valid ending.
There are 4 official endings and 1 unofficial ending. 1 in Konrad’s penthouse. 3 in the epilogue. And 1 in real life, for those players who decide they can’t go on and put down the controller.
Read more at http://gamingbolt.com/aftermath-crossing-the-line-with-walt-williams#2hmvmgWy1bxvHYPx.99


The scene that definitely DID effect me was of course right after Lugo had died and you're surrounded by the civilians. I hesitated to see if they would disperse on their own. They didn't. I fired straight into the crowd. I didn't think I had a choice. "But there's always a choice!" Not in videogames. That was an eye-opening scene for me.
Once again, you do have a choice. Firing into the air or meleeing the guy in front of you will disperse the crowd. But fuck these guys, they killed Lugo!

I'm sure that's what a lot of us were feeling on our first time through.
 

Scoops

Banned
Good post, but I want to comment on a couple of things.

You DO have a choice, it's just not an obvious one, but a choice nonetheless.

Remember this little piece of dialog at the end?

Walker: What happened here was out of my control...
Colonel John Konrad: Was it? None of this would've happened if you just stopped. But on you marched. And for what?

Konrad isn't only speaking to Walker, he is speaking to YOU, the player. At any moment you could have just stopped playing. Game over, Walker, and by extension you did not commit these atrocities. It's supposed to send a message for players to think about the actions that these video games tell you to do, ask questions instead of implicitly following orders. Lead writer Walt Williams also considers it a valid ending.




Once again, you do have a choice. Firing into the air or meleeing the guy in front of you will disperse the crowd. But fuck these guys, they killed Lugo!

I'm sure that's what a lot of us were feeling on our first time through.

Well while I have heard the writer say that one ending is turning off the game, at the end of the day for that to be a legitimate ending it would basically have to assume the player was taking the game as seriously as real life and couldn't differentiate. I would certainly weigh the decision differently in real life then in a game, but that's not the developer's fault per se that's just a limitation of the medium. By the white phosphorous scene I wanted to progress because as I said I was enjoying the gameplay and story.

The reason why the Lugo scene was more effective for me is because I had an in-game choice (even if at the time, in the heat of the moment, I didn't feel I did) but I basically went straight into firing into the crowd. What makes this scene so effective, and kind of scary, for me is I can't say I would do anything different in real life in the given situation and stress the characters were in. That scene proved it.

How the white phosphorous scene should've been handled was giving you a choice. They should've made it so you could clear the section without using it. Now they could've made it really fucking hard for you to pass the section without using the white phosphorous or use other ways to encourage you to use it, but making it impossible (as mentioned earlier in the thread, there are infinitely spawning snipers) kind of cheapened the effect. Now the problem this would've caused is the white phosphorous scene's aftermath is crucial in the story, so the developer would've had to figure that out but it would've made the scene so much more effective. I can't find a source, but a post earlier in this thread mentions the developer wish they could've added a choice.

As I said in my earlier post, the game is phenomenal. Some of it is definitely open to interpretation and it'll mean different things to different people. The fact that we're having this kind of discussion about a videogame is exciting to me though. I suppose I'm just more interested in the fourth wall being broken to be critical of violence in the world and on a personal level as opposed to the fourth wall being broken to criticize violence in just games.
 

Eknots

Member
Just finished this in one sitting, couldn't put the game down. I thought it wouldn't live up to expectations but it 100% surpassed them, I think it will be hard to play another standard shooter after this also white phosphorous oh lord...
 
The only game I've played that hates you the further along the story you get. Even the loading screens start chastising you. Then there's the random eerie loading screens (tough to describe without showing a video. So here.) Then there's the hallucinations during gameplay, ones so obscure that barely anyone would notice.

I even love the casting. I admit Nolan North got a bit over-exposed this gen, but he was perfect in this game. This was Nathan Drake gone insane with self loathing and North pulled it off admirably.
 

Eknots

Member
The only game I've played that hates you the further along the story you get. Even the loading screens start chastising you. Then there's the random eerie loading screens (tough to describe without showing a video. So here.) Then there's the hallucinations during gameplay, ones so obscure that barely anyone would notice.

I even love the casting. I admit Nolan North got a bit over-exposed this gen, but he was perfect in this game. This was Nathan Drake gone insane with self loathing and North pulled it off admirably.

The hallucinations near the end really started becoming freaky tbh, at that point I really had to start thinking how much of this game is real and the ending reinforces that even more. (This was before I started reading about what the writers thought and the white fade ins/outs and black transitions.)
After finishing this game and just having finished The Walking Dead ep 1-5 I really don't know what to play from here, maybe something happy lol.
Or I might just play TLoU and continue on this spree of games making me hate myself
 
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