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ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED: THE HORROR   The story would resonate a whole lot more if everything else about the game wasn't so drat stupid.
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| # ? Jul 3, 2012 23:15 |
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| # ? May 18, 2013 13:11 |
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White phosphorus is a common allotrope used in your slaughter at The Gate. It can set fire to soldiers and the innocent civilians they are trying to help. Dubai's harbor was filled with sand when storms first wracked the city. The corpses were your doing. The US military does not condone the killing of unarmed combatants. But this isn't real, so why should you care? loading screens own
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| # ? Jul 3, 2012 23:40 |
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Did you get those on your 2nd play through? Some nice mindfucks there.
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 00:24 |
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I've actually got no idea what triggers the first two, I just checked SRGame\Localization\INT\Subtitles.int. I'm guessing they trigger on higher difficulties or something, because I can't get them to show up.
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 00:26 |
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BlackSanta posted:"To kill for yourself is murder. To kill for your government is heroic. To kill for entertainment is harmless." I was getting a bunch of crazy loading screen art on my last play through. Walker wrapped in an American flag, with some crazy angel of death thing holding a scepter in one hand and an ak-47 in the other in the background surrounded by dead bodies. Anybody else seen this one? I thought I'd anticipated how this game would screw with my head via the loading screen messages becoming progressively more deranged, but then it got weirder and for a moment actually made me wonder if I'd actually seen what I just saw. (Late game spoilers)This happened right near the end where you are about to go through a door when a Heavy comes out and you hallucinate it to be Lugo. I took him down, but was killed in the next room. Instead of a loading screen with an image and a message, I get some sort of washed out, bleary black and white scene of I-don't-know-what. It seemed like I was staring up at a wire fence and I could have sworn I heard crows or something. No text, nothing recognisable, no loading bar. It only lasted for about two or three seconds, too quickly for me to understand what I was seeing, then it was over and I was back in the game. I was outside the door where the Lugo-Heavy came out, and everything was quiet. I approached the door, but this time a normal Heavy came out, no Lugo hallucinations. What the gently caress? It was really unsettling, I'm sure I had a  expression going on.This is probably the most impressive game I've ever played in terms of it affecting me. I thought Max Payne 3 was good at making you empathise with a character's bad situation, but this game actually makes you hate yourself for the things your character does. I was absolutely emotionally drained and upset by the end of it. Really bloody impressive, and probably the only actually subversive war game I've played.
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 03:09 |
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Just made it through, luck I guess. Question about a choice Saving the Civ's or Gould, is it possible to save the civs? I get up to the civs and they're deciding who has to kill them and I get ready to shoot then someone else does and they know and i gun them down and someone from someplace I can't see yet guns them down. Pladdicus fucked around with this message at Jul 4, 2012 around 05:28 |
| # ? Jul 4, 2012 04:39 |
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BlackSanta posted:"To kill for yourself is murder. To kill for your government is heroic. To kill for entertainment is harmless." I was getting a bunch of crazy loading screen art on my last play through. Walker wrapped in an American flag, with some crazy angel of death thing holding a scepter in one hand and an ak-47 in the other in the background surrounded by dead bodies. Anybody else seen this one? Holy poo poo, no. And now you almost have me convinced it's worth going through. Without any aim assist on the second of the four difficulties, I was having an absolutely horrible time on some fights. Just getting completely worked. I really don't think my blood pressure could handle FUBAR difficulty.
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 06:38 |
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Alright, just bought this based on the sheer mindfuckery and deconstruction of the modern FPS war-porn genre. I played the demo and it felt like the bland gunplay mechanics were almost done like that on purpose.
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 07:23 |
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Bastard Tetris posted:Alright, just bought this based on the sheer mindfuckery and deconstruction of the modern FPS war-porn genre. I played the demo and it felt like the bland gunplay mechanics were almost done like that on purpose. Make no mistake, from a gameplay perspective, that's exactly what you're getting; too little of the stuff that could have set the game apart (breaking down walls with sand behind them, dynamic levels, sandstorms that crop up in the middle of fights) never really got fully worked in. They're actually a multiplayer feature, but it doesn't seem like people don't care about that (I kinda like it, honestly), so don't expect anything but a rote cover-based shooter mechanically. On an emotional/cerebral level, though, the game is actually one of those things that works on that whole "mature" vibe that would normally sound like PR speak. This is a game that's pretty intensely geared toward loving with your head/motivations. War is a terrible, terrible thing, and leave it to a bunch of Germans to really hammer that home instead of celebrating it with a bunch of jingoistic chest-pumping bullshit. If nothing else, Spec Ops: The Line not only completely overhauls the series (which, it should be noted, was a kind of US-military-is-awesome attempt at doing what SOCOM basically did much, much better) and really turns the whole idea of just shooting a bunch of dudes for hours on end into something that makes you think. It was a brilliant move, honestly, turning Americans against their own, because it helps subvert so many games that have happened this generation. If you weren't fighting aliens, you were almost certainly shooting generic brown people; The Line forces you listen to the anguished screams of your own countrymen (provided you're American, of course). That's hosed up, and I think it's important. Kudos to Yager for really busting out a strong first next-gen effort this late in the game. It really makes me wish Inversion could have been better, because I sure as poo poo didn't see that twist coming, but that's for another thread. I guess that shows that it's not always about gameplay. We're finally getting to the point where you can present something in a different way and even if it's fundamentally identical to other games in a genre, we're seeing a different way of presenting it. That's pretty loving rad if you ask me, because it shows honest maturation of the medium.
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 07:44 |
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SamBishop posted:We're finally getting to the point where you can present something in a different way and even if it's fundamentally identical to other games in a genre, we're seeing a different way of presenting it. That's pretty loving rad if you ask me, because it shows honest maturation of the medium. That's exactly the reason I chose to even give this game a second look, it looked generic as hell until I actually gave the demo a shot. Gonna play through this on July 4th 
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 08:05 |
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Bastard Tetris posted:Alright, just bought this based on the sheer mindfuckery and deconstruction of the modern FPS war-porn genre. I played the demo and it felt like the bland gunplay mechanics were almost done like that on purpose. I get what you're saying, but I don't think it quite excuses it in this case. Bland being the keyword here - I feel like the gunplay actively gets in the way of what this game is trying to do, and it lessened the impact for me. The shooting is boring and annoying, it's not like it creates tension like in, for example, Silent Hill, where you're completely useless because you're just some guy. That said, the solution isn't just to make the mechanics more "fun" like Call of Duty or whatever. I think there's something to be said for video games being able to provoke negative emotions through gameplay, e.g. Amnesia, Demon's/Dark Souls, but this game isn't an example of that, for me, and it creates a disconnect that takes me out of the experience and basically just makes me not want to play it. I totally think it would have been awesome if this was more like Metro 2033, where there were actual survival-based subsystems in place to make the general proceedings more interesting as well as more harrowing towards the player.
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 08:22 |
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I don't know, the gameplay is working pretty much perfectly for me on the harder difficulty, a few frustrating deaths but the challenge is brisk enough to be engaging and the gunplay feels visceral, enemies die to a quick burst of fire or a well placed headshot. As such it doesn't distract from what I'm here for, the incredible narrative. I actually enjoy the gameplay but then again it's worth noting most of it is new to me, the only similar game I've played is Uncharted.
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 08:54 |
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SamBishop posted:On an emotional/cerebral level, though, the game is actually one of those things that works on that whole "mature" vibe that would normally sound like PR speak. This is a game that's pretty intensely geared toward loving with your head/motivations. War is a terrible, terrible thing, and leave it to a bunch of Germans to really hammer that home instead of celebrating it with a bunch of jingoistic chest-pumping bullshit. I think what sours me about the game more than anything else is just how much the actual gameplay misses the mark. It sucks that they've come up with a story that's actually interesting but it's stuck in a game that, like most modern military shooters, is nothing but alternating sequences of walking slow and retarded action against brain dead enemies.  "War is bad look how bad this all is soak up the badness no running here." "YEE-HAW HERE COMES WAVE, THREE OF THIRTEEN! AIM HIGH! HEAVY WEAPONS MARKSMAN! LOOK OUT A SHOTGUN ENEMY! LOOK OUT A KNIFE BERSERKER! LOOK OUT A RED ENEMY WITH A MOHAWK THEY'RE TOUGHER!" "Finally they're all dead just like these civilians. I can't believe how bad war is."I just really, really wish games like this would actually make encounters with enemies meaningful which is why I'm really hoping The Last of Us succeeds in that area.
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 12:01 |
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Whether or not I even gamefly this depends largely on how long it takes to get to the mindfuckery. If the gameplay ends up bland as hell and it takes half of it to get to the "holy poo poo" parts, I think I will end up skipping this one. I REALLY admire their balls though, for making a subversive shooter that gives the distancing effect to the whole concept of the dudebro shooter.
deepshock fucked around with this message at Jul 4, 2012 around 12:51 |
| # ? Jul 4, 2012 12:48 |
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The combat is a typical cover shooter type but the storyline is solid from the beginning and becomes more interesting and bleaker as hell as you play on. It's not like Alpha Protocol where the first few mission levels are incredibly godawful and you have to just tolerate it until you get to the good stuff many hours later. Game really reminds me of Alpha Protocol in many ways. Generic combat that will probably turn many players off, despite the fantastic story, character arcs and amount of choices. Noirex fucked around with this message at Jul 4, 2012 around 13:13 |
| # ? Jul 4, 2012 13:09 |
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I found that after the first hour I mostly forgot about the gameplay in favor of the story and the occasional beautiful vistas. I think I was sold around the time I saw the desert canyon, because god drat that place is gorgeous.
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 13:16 |
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Keep in mind that I didn't mind the Gears of War series (I thought 1 and 2 were good, and 3 was great). If that means I'll end up enjoying even the combat of the game, that will help for sure.
deepshock fucked around with this message at Jul 4, 2012 around 14:50 |
| # ? Jul 4, 2012 14:34 |
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Out of interest, can you save Lugo from being hanged if you rush through the boat area, or is it a set piece? Additionally, If you can't, is there actually a way to get out of there without shooting the civvies? I tried to walk past them, but they pushed me. I then tried to melee them, but that just started the whole gunning down civilians thing, same as if I shot.
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 14:56 |
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Conot posted:Out of interest, can you save Lugo from being hanged if you rush through the boat area, or is it a set piece? For the second part, you can also shoot in the air to drive them off, but meleeing them actually worked fine for me. Are you sure they actually got shot and it wasn't just Adams firing in the air?
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 15:02 |
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Varam posted:For the second part, you can also shoot in the air to drive them off, but meleeing them actually worked fine for me. Are you sure they actually got shot and it wasn't just Adams firing in the air? Might be, we'll never know though, because when I thought Adams was opening fire anyway, I decided to gun down some of the cheeky assholes myself
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 15:24 |
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Conot posted:Might be, we'll never know though, because when I thought Adams was opening fire anyway, I decided to gun down some of the cheeky assholes myself I didn't hesitate opening up into them...I liked the dude who died:(
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 16:16 |
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Yeah, but from their point of view, he kind of deserved to die. Just like the rest of your squad.
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 16:47 |
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So reading through I'm not 100% if moral choice is the deciding factor for ending/attitude THEORY!?!?!? The morality system might be determined by your brutality, which the moral choices effect but which may also be determined by how many executions you do? The radioman made a comment about how needlessly brutal the executions were and the fact that people doing identical choices still had/lost control at the end of the game. I also never got the more shocking execution described but I rarely did it anyway. Also interesting how people are getting different loading screens, I played on hardest and got, '...but they aren't real so what does it matter' and 'do you even know why you're here?' But it also might be determined by difficulty mode with moral choices effecting what Conrad says at the end. Enjoyed this game immensely, will probably play through it again at some point, maybe on the hardest difficulty, anyone know if there's a reason to other than making you hate yourself?
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 18:55 |
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Pladdicus posted:So reading through I'm not 100% if moral choice is the deciding factor for ending/attitude Ending chat:Yeah, it seems to depend on more than just the obvious choices. I chose the more "sane" path every time: Let the soldier go, saved civvies over Gould, refused to choose who to shoot/attacked the snipers, mercy killed Whatshisname the CIA guy and scared the mob away nonviolently. And still I got the end where Walker was wearing Konrad's jacket, needed a few seconds before he could put down the weapon ("he's shellshocked") and was seriously hosed up at the end: "Who said I survived?". Konrad's speech was pretty harsh too, stating that Dubai needed to be protected from Walker and his squad. That said, I only ever executed guys like five time, most of those near the beginning. I still got the DJ's comment about unecessary brutality though. Also, another harsh loading screen: "If Lugo wasn't dead he'd suffer from PTSD now. Lucky him." Edit: I'm bad with names 
Perestroika fucked around with this message at Jul 4, 2012 around 21:44 |
| # ? Jul 4, 2012 19:24 |
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I got an alternate loading screen. A B&W picture of Walker's silhouette against a background of an office building with the loading screen music replaced with low moans. In a level to which none of this is relevant in any way as it features no office blocks, Walker striking any dramatic poses or moaning.
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| # ? Jul 4, 2012 21:34 |
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Asehujiko posted:Which brings me to my own question, how the gently caress do I defeat that rear end in a top hat in the mall on higher difficulties? He has the same high dps gun as the others, I am stuck in a tiny room short on cover without teammates, the screen blacks out constantly(which doesn't stop him from moving and shooting) and he can matrix dodge out of the way of incoming bullets, leaving behind a mannequin that fucks with my pathfinding and I have absolutely no idea how to counter any of that. After dying there a few times, I found out that you can negate his warping abilities by taking out all the mannequins first. (Even in a regular fight, he actually stops warping when there are no more mannequins left to substitute.) Since he's pretty slow, just take cover on one side of the central block and take out the mannequins one by one without shooting at the soldier. Then gun him down. (Which obviously isn't a cakewalk, especially on higher difficulties.)
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| # ? Jul 5, 2012 00:13 |
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Perestroika posted:
That one was chilling, loved it. Interesting stuff though. I think I could put it down after a few seconds too The loading screens shifted, I think in relation to how far I was in the game? Can anyone confirm? They went back to normal after I beat it. The flag changed, it got dark and worse looking I think? One time had a rotting corpse next to the flag Ending Discussion Essentially there are three/four endings right? -Let 'Conrad' kill you, what happens? I didn't see -Surrender your weapon after the credits. Walker goes in and then they ask how you survived all this and Walker replies "I didn't" or whatever. I don't remember if he had Conrad's jacket, Can anyone tell me what it's like if Conrad apologizes for what happens instead of demonizes you? -Fight back and die, you die and they move around you while you bleed out. I forget what if anything happened after this. -Fight back and win, you kill all of the soldiers, they lay dying around and Walker says "Welcome to Dubai" I'm wondering if there are any variations, it seems like there's two variations, whether you weren't super damaged which implies you do all moral choices right? I didn't get the good one, possibly because I accidentally killed one of the hostages when rescuing Gould? Or otherwise failed. Is it possible to save them? Anything I miss? Also that boss fight Just stay behind cover and blind fire him. I had the magnum/desert eagle/whatever and it went really easily. He stopped advancing when he got close
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| # ? Jul 5, 2012 04:49 |
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Here are all 4 endings, major spoilers obviously. I'm loving all the subtle changes in details people have been getting. I haven't even encountered half of the loading screens talked about, definitely need a another play though soon.
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| # ? Jul 5, 2012 13:47 |
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I wonder if the ch9 choice is even relevant to the ending that you get as it isn't touched upon later any more, the only scenes shown during the conversation with Konrad are Gould, Riggs and the civilians, the hanging prisoners were dead already and the snipers didn't exist, which leaves me wondering about how much influence shooting/not shooting McPherson has too
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| # ? Jul 5, 2012 14:34 |
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Rookersh posted:Second game, I saved the civilians, fired at the Snipers, shot Riggs, fired into the air, and shot Konrad. It ended with Konrad apologizing for what happened in Dubai, and how it all fell apart around him, but that Walker was no saint either. Both Adams and Walker were visibly less insane then in the first run, and Walker put down his weapon immediately when the soldiers came ( and was wearing his Delta force gear ), and actually talked to them about what happened in Dubai, they comforted him and told him he'd be hailed as a hero for what he did. You didn't make this up did you? I made the exact same choices and I didn't get any of this stuff. I mean, I'm pretty sure that I chose the 'morally superior' option in every instance, Letting the soldier go, saving civvies, mercy killing Riggs, attacking snipers, dispersing the mob by firing into the air, shot Konrad in the end so if there is a 'good ending', I don't see why I wouldn't get it. Adrastus fucked around with this message at Jul 5, 2012 around 17:28 |
| # ? Jul 5, 2012 17:08 |
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Pladdicus posted:
If you get shot, or shoot yourself, the screen goes black, and the camera pans around the scene for a bit and you see Walker sitting dead with a pistol in his hand next to Kondrad's corpse. IIRC there's no real voice over here, and you just get the credits.
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| # ? Jul 5, 2012 18:24 |
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Bohemian Nights posted:If you get shot, or shoot yourself, the screen goes black, and the camera pans around the scene for a bit and you see Walker sitting dead with a pistol in his hand next to Kondrad's corpse. IIRC there's no real voice over here, and you just get the credits. It replays the Konrad's radio message about how the evacuation was a complete failure as it pans around and towards the view of the city on fire. It also reveals that the tower is actually in a state of disrepair and is not in the state it was when you were seeing things from Walker's point of view.
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| # ? Jul 5, 2012 18:32 |
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Housh posted:For people who beat the game: how easy is it to go back and redo choices to get the different endings? Like would you need to play the game over from the beginning or can you just start from a certain chapter? Asehujiko posted:Does anybody have a full list of the choices and what they affect? I feel I've missed a few because it wasn't really obvious that there was a choice.
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| # ? Jul 5, 2012 18:50 |
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So When you decide to save the civilians instead of Gould can they live through the firefight? They always died for me, someone sniped them from out of my line of sight every single time it started.
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| # ? Jul 5, 2012 19:33 |
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Pladdicus posted:So You can save the civilians, but it sounds like you're trying to do it the wrong way, because there shouldn't even be a firefight involved. It's not really clear the way it's set up, but when Lugo starts asking for permission to take the shot, you need to look to your left and follow Adams instead.
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| # ? Jul 5, 2012 19:45 |
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Varam posted:You can save the civilians, but it sounds like you're trying to do it the wrong way, because there shouldn't even be a firefight involved. It's not really clear the way it's set up, but when Lugo starts asking for permission to take the shot, you need to look to your left and follow Adams instead. I follow Adam's and go to the end where they're flipping a coin to decide and then I take the shot before, and then immediately a fight breaks out and the civilians get snipped in about 3 seconds. Of course there was this weird glitch I think where someone started the shooting early or alerted them? So maybe that was it.
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| # ? Jul 5, 2012 20:03 |
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A fight shouldn't break out at all. Did you keep the silencer on your M4? I don't remember if that matters or anything, but the one time I took that choice, there was no fight. There definitely was when I screwed the sequence up, though.
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| # ? Jul 5, 2012 20:07 |
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So, I don't understand the moral choices. It seems like the real ending of the game is decided in the last chapter of the game. nothing really matters aside from that last few choices you can make Or is there actually more to it?
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| # ? Jul 5, 2012 23:15 |
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JoshVanValkenburg posted:So, I don't understand the moral choices. It seems like the real ending of the game is decided in the last chapter of the game. nothing really matters aside from that last few choices you can make Or is there actually more to it? While the actual endings themselves are chosen at the end, the choices throughout the game seem to control a sliding scale of how hosed up Walker and his squad are by the end of the game, changing some of the dialogue and the messages you get on the loading screens.
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| # ? Jul 5, 2012 23:33 |
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| # ? May 18, 2013 13:11 |
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Welp that sure was a pretty sweet game in the end. It's a shame you had to go through so much other bullshit to get there but I really enjoyed Spec Ops: The Line when it was all said and done. Maybe I'll revisit it in the future to see what actually changes. And I understood the ending that I got (everything was in your head, you caused hella destruction and killed people, came to the realization that I was nuts and went home) but I'm not entirely certain how my choices decided that. It was certainly a good ending but one that I don't really feel like I affected too greatly.
Yodzilla fucked around with this message at Jul 6, 2012 around 04:05 |
| # ? Jul 6, 2012 01:46 |
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