|
Who is your favourite Killzone 1 hero? This poll is closed. |
|||
|---|---|---|---|
| Templar |
|
7 | 3.24% |
| Rico |
|
14 | 6.48% |
| Luger |
|
23 | 10.65% |
| Hakha |
|
64 | 29.63% |
| Don't talk to me about Killzone 1 |
|
108 | 50.00% |
| Total: | 216 votes | ||
|
nine-gear crow posted:Also, BEHOLD: The best part is that I'm sure by the time all is said and done, that list is gonna be hella' longer than that ridiculous title card for it.
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 02:51
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 24, 2024 18:17 |
|
|
Having never played any of the Killzone series, I wasn't sure if you guys weren't just using it as a catch-all phrase. nine-gear crow posted:Also, BEHOLD: 
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 02:55
|
|
|
nine-gear crow posted:Also, BEHOLD:  EDIT: crow, you spelt "committed" wrong :p Sally fucked around with this message at 03:32 on May 25, 2015 |
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 03:04
|
|
|
Klaus88 posted:Has there been any developer feedback on whether or not they're actively trying to make the Helgast more interesting then the ISA? Mmmm, they've never stated that they're trying to make the Helghast more interesting than the ISA specifically, but the whole "I can't tell who's really the good guy" thing is a conscious goal. Hard to find older interviews, but I've found some related to Shadow Fall and Killzone 3: http://www.stealthybox.com/guerrilla-games-talks-killzone-shadow-fall-story-mp/ http://www.stealthybox.com/guerrilla-games-talks-killzone-shadow-fall-story-mp/ posted:Boltjes says that although the Helghast have always been presented as the antagonists of the franchise, the underlying question throughout the series has been “‘Who is the bad guy…’ Is it the ISA or is it the Helghast?”. [...] because even in real wars, the question is always who is the good guy or the bad guy.” http://www.pushsquare.com/news/2013/09/killzone_shadow_fall_will_delve_deeper_into_helghast_culture (with an expanded quote from the above article:) http://www.pushsquare.com/news/2013/09/killzone_shadow_fall_will_delve_deeper_into_helghast_culture posted:“The really interesting thing about the universe is, ‘Who is the bad guy?’” he pondered. “Is it the ISA or is it the Helghast? The Helghast look evil, but are they really? It’s that kind of grey area that we really wanted to play with.” http://www.vg247.com/2010/07/13/helghast-have-some-humanity-left-in-them-in-killzone-3-says-guerrilla/ http://www.vg247.com/2010/07/13/helghast-have-some-humanity-left-in-them-in-killzone-3-says-guerrilla/ posted:“In Killzone 3, we show that even the Helghast have some humanity left in them,” said Hulst. http://www.gamingunion.net/interviews/4153/killzone-3-interview-with-chris-haluke/ (CAUTION, this one has spoilers ahead, if you want to see the plot of Killzone 2 unfold naturally) http://www.gamingunion.net/interviews/4153/killzone-3-interview-with-chris-haluke/ posted:We really tried to make [the Helghast] the focus of the game, while you're trying to make a moral decision. Who is the bad guy here? Is it you being the ISA, or is it the Helghast? That's the take we want people to have, we want them to pose the question to themselves. That said, I know the ISA get a lot of flak, but I actually think a lot of the choices Guerrilla made for them are pretty clever, and I enjoy it. I mean, the protagonists for Killzone 1 are pretty flat. They're tropes, and though they attempt to subvert their stereotypes, I don't feel they go far enough to be meaningful in any way. Even most of the characters in Killzone 2 aren't that amazing. Sev, Garza, Natko--they're fine. They work. They have some subtle moments of character building I appreciate, but they don't blow me away. A lot of the individual members of the ISA aren't particular memorable. However, the fact that ISA high command readily jumps ship to side with the Helghast? Ha, that's a really interesting plot point, and it's important enough to Guerrilla Games that they made it a key feature of two of the six Killzone games. I WOULD nominate Rico and Narville as particularly interesting characters. Rico Velasquez is a surprisingly cruel human being, but the fact that Guerrilla Games kept him around as a main character for THREE of the four main Killzone games is telling. In a series where the developer isn't interested in portraying good vs. evil, Rico Velasquez is the kind of person that thrives. Narville, as we see in Killzone 2, is a fairly static character. He's mostly a parody of R. Lee Ermey, but in Killzone 3 we get to spend a lot more time with him and he gets developed into an interesting and conflicted character. So there's that.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 03:31
|
|
|
 The "good" guys have been doing pretty good so far. I mean, from what we've seen in Killzone 2. The initial invasion fleet, as seen in Killzone: Mercenary, were absolutely overwhelmed and nearly decimated. But the second wave, here in Killzone 2? We've been rocking it. We made solid progress through Pyrrhus City in the first five missions of the game. The giant electrical shield at the gates of Visari Palace proved to be a problem, but hey, Templar already has Alpha Squad investigating potential ways to troubleshoot that problem. Yeah, sure, half of Alpha Squad AND their scientific expert have been captured, but all in all, I'd say the ISA have been doing pretty drat good. That's all about to change.  Last time we jumped onto a train--so now we get a train level!  Train levels are cool. It's something about the kinetic momentum of the stage. It's like a parallel for the gameplay in corridor shooters: you're ever going forward, never back, and train levels reflect that. Oh, and early on we see that the train is full of weapons. Rico acts a bit surprised, but I mean, come on. We're on Helghan. What did you expect to be on their trains? Also, we begin this level with only our revolver. Presumably, we dropped our rifle between loading screens. Okay. Super minor inconvenience since Shock Troopers pop up almost immediately. Speaking of "miners", Rico managed to avoid adding another war crime to his list when he spares the civilian driving the train. So yeah, it's confirmed:  The miners are civilians. Again, it makes me question whether or not they were actually fighting for the Helghast in the last stage or if they were just trying to defend their property from ISA invaders. Heck, you decide, I guess. How terrible do you believe the ISA to be?  Moving on, welcome to Tharsis Refinery, where Helghan's rich deposits of petrusite are refined for use as an energy source for the cities and military of the planet.  This place always sort of reminded me of a darker Citadel from Half-Life 2:  We even get to go for a ride in an automated transport system. More importantly, while exploring the refinery, we discover that the Helghast have managed to condense Arc Tech into a handheld personal weapon. The most glorious aspect of this weapon is that it draws energy from the surrounding atmosphere, effectively giving it infinite ammo.  What a wondrous gun! It's going to stick with us for the rest of the level. We come across a corridor that Rico has already been down:  Note that the Cadaver Beetles are already out in force. We haven't been away from Rico that long, so it's quite remarkable how quickly these creatures react. Fortunately we don't wind up being their next meal when we surprise Rico.  Though we do get to see a map of the petrusite grid. The wider net on the left represents various petrusite mining operations. The material is gathered and piped to Tharsis Refinery, where it is processed and piped out to Pyrrhus City, on the right. There are other refineries around the planet, but Tharsis is responsible for Pyrrhus, and only Pyrrhus. Fortunate for us, because it means we can stop the flow to the grid and power down the city if we can sabotage that intermediary pipeline. But first, we need to rescue our team. We get an interesting rant from Rico along the way. Transcribed here, because I feel it's a pretty important look into Rico's character: Rico posted:This place is a fuckin' rat's nest--but I worked out where our guys are held. Another instance of Rico's skills at work. While Sev was busy shooting people and acquiring sweet Arc Rifles, Rico not only found a way to disrupt the petrusite grid, accomplishing our primary objective, but he located the rest of the team. Not bad. Rico posted:Can't loving believe this. Command should've sent in a fuckin' company here, at least. Instead it's four guys and a scientist. No wonder things came unglued. Why do we always have to pay in blood for their screw-ups? This is interesting. Templar gave the orders. Templar is now Command. And yet, Rico isn't directly blaming Templar. He is blaming the nebulous concept of "Command". Rico doesn't much care for the ISA's leadership, right now. After all, consider his experience. Between General Adams and General Stratson, he certainly hasn't been given much reason to trust Command. Oh, and the fact that while Templar gets promoted to officer material, Rico remains on the frontlines despite being just as much a war hero as Templar. Clearly there's some resentment there, likely on both the parts of Rico and ISA High Command. I'm betting this stems from Rico's capture in Killzone: Liberation. Templar, too, is Command, but Rico doesn't see him that way. Rico still sees him as "Captain" Templar. As a soldier. As a friend. As "one-of-the-guys". Thus, it's "Command's" fault, not "Templar's". Rico posted:We'll just punch our way in, kill fuckin' everything we see and collect our guys. Then punch our way out. Uh, yeah, that sounds like a "Rico Plan".  Rico posted:They better still be alive. And Evelyn. I'll slaughter every fuckin' Hig in the place if they're dead already.  Rico posted:If this goes wrong. the fuckin' Generals back home will be lining up to blame us Another reference to the Helghast capturing Rico in Killzone: Liberation.  Hey, let's see how Rico deals with being in a highly sensitive, high stress situation!   Some more character development for Radec, oh yay! This is an excellent cutscene. If you're reading the update before watching the video, you should go back and check this bit out. It's really well done. Radec is a pragmatic sort. Highly efficient. Unlike many villains, he doesn't waste a lot of time with monologues. Nosiree, he gets straight to the point.  But Rico is unwilling to wait for Sevchenko to reposition himself so that they can out-flank Radec and his troops.This kind of sucks. We know that Alpha Squad is a group of professionals. Sev recognizes immediately that they're in a poor position, and he makes the necessary maneuvers. I like to think that they would have had time to surround Radec, perhaps getting themselves into some sweet and tense stand-off situation. Instead, Rico rushes in--  --much to Sev's horror. This is a pretty bone-headed move. I mean, I get it. For Rico, this kind of crap has managed to work for him time and time again. (Or maybe it hasn't--we don't know how his original squad in Killzone 1 died, only that Helghast killed them--maybe a bad move on Rico's part got them killed?). Rico's plan, after all, was to punch in and punch out. Rico is just doing what Rico does. FoolyCharged posted:I'm surprised that nobody mentioned my favorite part about that scene. Take that scene on it's own and show it to someone that hasn't seen the rest of the game.  And Garza gets shot because of it. Natko sums it up perfectly with this rebuke:  And Rico's answer? Rico posted:Whatever, I saved your rear end, man. "Whatever". Rico just blows it off.  Garza, mortally wounded, he just waves it away.  Garza   Hmm, I think crow and I are going to have to convene at some point to solidify this list. For now, here are the crimes in Killzone 2 that I think Rico is potentially guilty of, as of this post:
Rico himself never uses any particularly cruel weapons, but drat, he certainly doesn't seem bothered that his subordinate, Sevchenko, is happy to use them. Ignoring the whole ISA shotgun, which uses poison bullets and the fielding of which is a war crime in and of itself, some of the weapons Sevchenko uses against the Helghast are pretty horrific. And I mean, I know you have the choice to not use them, but the way the game is designed, it's as if you're encouraged to use them--as if you're meant to use them. Therefore, the fact that Rico isn't stopping Sevchenko from using the Bolt Gun or the Arc Rifle, is pretty terrifying. I mean, let's go over the weapons that Rico doesn't give Sev a reprimand for using: The Flamethrower - light enemies on fire and let them burn to death--horrific, any way you cut it. However, under the 1980 Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons, our use of the flamethrower does not constitute a war crime: quote:Protocol III: Incendiary weapons That said, their terrifying effects and psychological effects on soldiers have led to some people calling for an even stricter ban on them, so I felt it relevant to bring up here. The Boltgun - This is an industrial tool converted to act as a weapon. It fires a bolt of metal at an enemy with enough velocity to pin them to a wall. If that isn't cruel and unusual enough for you, after a delay, the bolt explodes, so even if you survived the impact, you're guaranteed to have died by virtue of having your insides liquefied. Considering the effects of this weapon, once usage of it gets out to Earth, I'm pretty certain they're going to move to have it banned. I mean, it's design is guaranteed to leave you disfigured or maimed. A body shot is pretty much a death sentence. If you are hit in a limb, then it's going to wind up being shattered or destroyed after the explosive delay is up. Without the detonation, okay, maybe it'll fly--but it's the explosive that pushes this weapon into "this is not okay" territory for me. Thoughts on this? The Arc Rifle - Okay, I'm having an even harder time justifying the usage of this gun. Judging by the screams, the victim of this gun is in immeasurable amounts of pain while being targetted. If they aren't given sufficient amounts of juice, then they survive, meaning you need to fry them even longer. Ponder upon that word: "fry". Sev is walking around with what amounts to a portable electric chair. I mean, I get it, the Helghast developed these weapons, they were going to use them on you, so why not turn them around? Does that make it right? This is another weapon where, once Earth found out about its existence, I'm sure they would lobby to ban.
The whole Garza thing. Phew. Yeah, I know this is wartime. Yeah, I know that Radec is committing war crimes by executing his unarmed hostages. That said, Rico is supposed to be the leader of an elite fighting force. Elite. It's been shown again and again throughout the game so far that Rico is one of the ISA's best fighters. He knows better. He knows. Sev knows that Rico knows. Despite this, Rico bungles his way through a rescue mission and gets one of his own members seriously injured. If this were just some civvies trying to do the right thing to save some soldiers, then I'm not so sure. However, Rico is a trained professional and I believe that the courts would find that, based on his skills, he displayed a wanton disregard for human life--in this case, that of Garza, Batton, and Natko, with Garza coming out the worst because of it. Crabtree posted:[...] I just can't get the whole Helgan people are more interesting than the ISA. All of them likely suffer from the flaw of Eugenics in that its easy to believe when you're what's considered the Übermensch. When its the beautiful starting speeches, it was any that struggled and survived on a world where the bugs politely wait for you to die before they devour you whole; whether man, woman, child, etc., you're true Helgast. Evolved beyond human and you likely have the lack of hair and increased muscle-mass to imply those "better" genetics without having to do poo poo to prove it. Then, in the army, the belief becomes only those who enlist and show their strength for the good of the Empire are better than those pathetic civilians, mucking about the important machinery and jobs that are too low for even a grunt, they're no better than those weak little "humans". And the higher up the chain you go, obviously the more entitled to life and existence you are than your growing list of inferiors until you get to be in the drat Imperial Cult because you're loving Visari -- practically a God amongst all other Helgast. Oh its very easy to carry the faith when you're Divus or a General or anything really important. But how quickly do those beliefs mysteriously vanish when you're no longer wearing the Schirmmütze and in a nice space Trenchcoat? How many true believers are there when the convenient layers of power, status and wealth aren't there? gyrobot posted:The only thing ISA has is "Traitorous brass that crippled their war effort every time while Helghast remains united, how do we even stand a chance against the Helghast if our brass betrays us.". The ISA's only interesting bit is dealing with the treason sowed in their top ranks. Crabtree posted:True, the ISA is no less hindered by having to carry their shared archetype of failing, corrupt Republic. However, they get a little bit of a pass in that the player characters are the lions that are lead by an even more self-destructive Third Republic. It's cheating, but at least it is attempting to show the little soldiers that try to deal with incompetence from the entire the chain of command, from barely seen Admiral to Rico. The potential layers within that mold.   Advanced Shock Trooper I'm calling it: sorry, crow, they aren't trying to imitate Sevchenko's hairstyle, they merely have funny hats. Hats that, incidentally, don't pop off when shot. These guys are also known as the "Autarch's Guards". Distinguishable from regular Shock Troops by their long coats and odd hats, they are trained to work in pairs in order to work more effectively when in riot situations. Presumably, they spent a lot of time before the Extrasolar War breaking up protests for the Helghast High Command. They shoot more often and with greater accuracy than standard Shock Troopers, but can otherwise be dealt with in the same manner. Don't let them get close. They're armed with knives and SMGs, so they will try to close the distance to you as soon as possible to cause the greatest damage. Prevent that, and you're fine. The will sometimes throw Teslite Grenades which are a type of grenade that uses, you guessed it, Arc Tech. We don't see them get used in this Chapter, so I'll wait until that happens before I go in depth regarding that weapon.  Heavy Trooper (Arc Variety) A Heavy Trooper with an Arc Gun. Oh, joy! Their armour is quite a bit different than the standard Heavy Trooper, hence the comparison image above. Incredibly easy to defeat. Shoot the canisters that fly by overhead, stunning the trooper, and shoot he glowing tanks on his back. Though the Arc Gun is terrifying, it doesn't do as much damage as you might think, so don't worry if it takes a few tries to bring this guy down. He isn't much of a threat even on Elite. This is the only Heavy Arc Trooper in the game you'll encounter. Well, the entire series, even. Heavy Troopers have their uses, but not with Arc Tech. These guns are light enough that you don't need to saddle a heavy with one. Heck, Sev can haul it around just fine. Standard Helghast Troopers in Killzone 3 wield them just fine. I like to think that Sev's impressive showing here convinced other Heavy Troopers to stick to light machine guns.   VC5 Arc Rifle Use it when you get it. It's perfect. A mid-range gun, but it can hit a large area, stunning multiple enemies. Oh yeah, it's electricity, so it stuns. Use on Elite mode to stun enemies on one side of a room while you roast to death enemies on the other. It's great. So much fun. Sentry Bots are even more of a joke thanks to it. Oh, and the ammo--it just charges up with the atmosphere. Haha, this gun rocks! But you only get it on this level. Totally a gimmick. So use it when you get it. (It doesn't even get a multiplayer level--this is the only time you get to use this weapon--enjoy it while you can!). You pretty much have to use it when you ride the conveyor belt on Elite mode. Standard weapons will get you killed. You move inexorably through the area, causing ever more enemies to trigger, and without proper cover, you will die fast. This gun is really the only way to get through it. As I mention in the video, even then, you need to learn where enemies are going to spawn and how long you need to shock them to make sure they're dead. The conveyor section on Elite is a tedious trial-and-error section. It sucks. A lot. Fortunately, it's the only time in the game where you're going to have this problem.  Concept art of Rico's failed rescue attempt:  Man. Radec is terrifying. Look how he stands there, towering over his soldiers, unafraid of the bullets whizzing by him. Hardcore! Also, Evelyn Batton is wearing FAR more practical gear in this artwork. She has body armour, for one, and isn't wearing a skirt for a field op. Sally fucked around with this message at 06:25 on Jan 1, 2016 |
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 05:22
|
|
|
Neruz posted:To be fair it does work. For pure intimidation and typical Helgast bravado? Sure, there's probably military regulation for proper dramatics that's drilled into every superior officer as soon as they move up above grunt. But when the effect is basically this? Blind Sally posted:Hahaha, they actually modelled it in-game: There's likely some notes Jorhan Stahl furiously wrote about how the only thing collar theater lights accomplish is making his half illuminated head a big flashy target for any decent sniper to see.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 05:34
|
|
|
Since we're on the topic of war crimes, I can't get this scene out of my head-- There are spoilers from Killzone 3 for those of you who want to be surprised, but I'll be damned if this 20 second exchange between two of the game's characters doesn't sum up how war crimes are treated in the entire series: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4q_c3Ot3kAA
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 06:35
|
|
|
Blind Sally posted:Since we're on the topic of war crimes, I can't get this scene out of my head-- Ah, our first tantalizing tease of Jorhan Stahl in action. 
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 06:37
|
|
|
He delivers his lines with such complete and utter contempt. What a brilliant character.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 06:38
|
|
|
Blind Sally posted:He delivers his lines with such complete and utter contempt. What a brilliant character. Malcom McDowell is loving awesome.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 08:08
|
|
oh yes oh god yes form the head FORM THE HEAD unghhhh...
|
McDowell has the background and history to deliver that kind of line, but I just can't get the whole Helgan people are more interesting than the ISA. All of them likely suffer from the flaw of Eugenics in that its easy to believe when you're what's considered the Übermensch. When its the beautiful starting speeches, it was any that struggled and survived on a world where the bugs politely wait for you to die before they devour you whole; whether man, woman, child, etc., you're true Helgast. Evolved beyond human and you likely have the lack of hair and increased muscle-mass to imply those "better" genetics without having to do poo poo to prove it. Then, in the army, the belief becomes only those who enlist and show their strength for the good of the Empire are better than those pathetic civilians, mucking about the important machinery and jobs that are too low for even a grunt, they're no better than those weak little "humans". And the higher up the chain you go, obviously the more entitled to life and existence you are than your growing list of inferiors until you get to be in the drat Imperial Cult because you're loving Visari -- practically a God amongst all other Helgast. Oh its very easy to carry the faith when you're Divus or a General or anything really important. But how quickly do those beliefs mysteriously vanish when you're no longer wearing the Schirmmütze and in a nice space Trenchcoat? How many true believers are there when the convenient layers of power, status and wealth aren't there? The sooner they can show something beyond that comfortable shell and addictive cultural vendetta, the easier it is for me to treat most of them as anything other than Rico in a glowing helmet. Crabtree fucked around with this message at 08:19 on May 25, 2015 |
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 08:16
|
|
|
Crabtree posted:McDowell has the background and history to deliver that kind of line, but I just can't get the whole Helgan people are more interesting than the ISA. All of them likely suffer from the flaw of Eugenics in that its easy to believe when you're what's considered the Übermensch. When its the beautiful starting speeches, it was any that struggled and survived on a world where the bugs politely wait for you to die before they devour you whole; whether man, woman, child, etc., you're true Helgast. Evolved beyond human and you likely have the lack of hair and increased muscle-mass to imply those "better" genetics without having to do poo poo to prove it. Then, in the army, the belief becomes only those who enlist and show their strength for the good of the Empire are better than those pathetic civilians, mucking about the important machinery and jobs that are too low for even a grunt, they're no better than those weak little "humans". And the higher up the chain you go, obviously the more entitled to life and existence you are than your growing list of inferiors until you get to be in the drat Imperial Cult because you're loving Visari -- practically a God amongst all other Helgast. Oh its very easy to carry the faith when you're Divus or a General or anything really important. But how quickly do those beliefs mysteriously vanish when you're no longer wearing the Schirmmütze and in a nice space Trenchcoat? How many true believers are there when the convenient layers of power, status and wealth aren't there?  Excellent points all around. The end result of this isn't seen until much later in Shadow Fall, but the cracks are going to start appearing at the very least early on in Killzone 3.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 08:26
|
|
|
Crabtree posted:McDowell has the background and history to deliver that kind of line, but I just can't get the whole Helgan people are more interesting than the ISA. All of them likely suffer from the flaw of Eugenics in that its easy to believe when you're what's considered the Übermensch. When its the beautiful starting speeches, it was any that struggled and survived on a world where the bugs politely wait for you to die before they devour you whole; whether man, woman, child, etc., you're true Helgast. Evolved beyond human and you likely have the lack of hair and increased muscle-mass to imply those "better" genetics without having to do poo poo to prove it. Then, in the army, the belief becomes only those who enlist and show their strength for the good of the Empire are better than those pathetic civilians, mucking about the important machinery and jobs that are too low for even a grunt, they're no better than those weak little "humans". And the higher up the chain you go, obviously the more entitled to life and existence you are than your growing list of inferiors until you get to be in the drat Imperial Cult because you're loving Visari -- practically a God amongst all other Helgast. Oh its very easy to carry the faith when you're Divus or a General or anything really important. But how quickly do those beliefs mysteriously vanish when you're no longer wearing the Schirmmütze and in a nice space Trenchcoat? How many true believers are there when the convenient layers of power, status and wealth aren't there? The only thing ISA has is "Traitorous brass that crippled their war effort every time while Helghast remains united, how do we even stand a chance against the Helghast if our brass betrays us.". The ISA's only interesting bit is dealing with the treason sowed in their top ranks.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 08:36
|
|
|
It's hilarious that you have to switch from the arc gun to a different zapper to revive the team.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 08:40
|
|
|
I'm surprised that nobody mentioned my favorite part about that scene. Take that scene on it's own and show it to someone that hasn't seen the rest of the game. Then ask them who was in charge of the squad. Their answer won't be Rico  The dude has zero control over his own men. It's pretty easy to see how he failed to get promoted up like Templar did.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 13:45
|
|
|
gyrobot posted:The only thing ISA has is "Traitorous brass that crippled their war effort every time while Helghast remains united, how do we even stand a chance against the Helghast if our brass betrays us.". The ISA's only interesting bit is dealing with the treason sowed in their top ranks. True, the ISA is no less hindered by having to carry their shared archetype of failing, corrupt Republic. However, they get a little bit of a pass in that the player characters are the lions that are lead by an even more self-destructive Third Republic. It's cheating, but at least it is attempting to show the little soldiers that try to deal with incompetence from the entire the chain of command, from barely seen Admiral to Rico. The potential layers within that mold. That in mind, I'm only harder on the Planet of the Fascists as they have so much more potential to really grow into an I, Claudius situation that could show various parts of Visari's inner circle plotting their way to the throne, working their way to backstabbing and eliminating who knows how many rivals like a nice Julio-Claudian quagmire of schemers. Sure, when Earth and those drat thieves living on Vetka are still around, there is a war effort to unite around. But after that or when victory is assured, would every part the political machine simply sit under the Autarch? Content to just be what they were when the whole philosophy of their nation is wisely investing the economy of violence for future greatness? At least they only have room to grow as the series goes on, not many antagonists in video games, much less shooters, get to develop like that as time goes on. I guess what I'm saying is that Killzone should have been more Space Opera where you see how both sides are moving towards or are going to set themselves up for failure like an intergalactic Fall of Eagles. Probably too much to hope for from a shooter that at this time was crafted to be THE HALO KILLER, but I can dream.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 14:26
|
|
|
Blind Sally posted:There are spoilers from Killzone 3 for those of you who want to be surprised, but I'll be damned if this 20 second exchange between two of the game's characters doesn't sum up how war crimes are treated in the entire series: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4q_c3Ot3kAA There are times I have to cherish those rare few moments where games actually acknowledge that Sweden exists. 
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 16:07
|
|
|
I don't know if this adds or takes away from the point Blind Sally is trying to make but there's something poignant about the Helghast having a way to reverse the laws of thermodynamics but doing nothing with it but mounting it on a lighting gun to give it infinite ammo.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 19:11
|
|
|
No Doubt should be added to Rico's war crimes list. Hella is somehow his fault.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 23:35
|
|
|
CJacobs posted:No Doubt should be added to Rico's war crimes list. Hella is somehow his fault. Unfortunately crimes against english are neither a war crime nor result in a court marshal, so it doesn't apply to the list. Unless crow adds in a line saying "And any other abominable acts the thread wishes held against him" or somesuch.
|
|
#
?
May 25, 2015 23:55
|
|
|
FoolyCharged posted:Unless crow adds in a line saying "And any other abominable acts the thread wishes held against him" or somesuch. 
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2015 00:36
|
|
|
Wikipedia posted:Hella is a word associated with Northern California, particularly the San Francisco Bay Area. It is a contraction of the phrase "hell of a" or "hell of a lot [of]," in turn reduced to "hell of." It often appears in place of the words "really," "a lot," "totally," "very" and in some cases "yes". Whereas hell of a is generally used with a noun, according to linguist Pamela Munro, hella is primarily used to modify an adjective such as "good." ask me about regional dialects and general intensifiers (  )
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2015 00:38
|
|
|
"That Garza is hella good." Cjacobs on the subject of the second best character in Killzone
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2015 00:44
|
|
|
biosterous posted:ask me about regional dialects and general intensifiers I was gonna ask where that sound bit came from. Thanks!
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2015 04:50
|
|
|
So I noticed a hella or two at 23:35 that went unaccompanied. Not sure if that, itself, counts as a war crime... or an anti-war-crime.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2015 05:42
|
|
|
   The supplementary fifth chapter of Killzone: Liberation begins a few days to weeks after the conclusion of Chapter 4. Metrac might be dead, and the Helghast assault of Vekta broken, but pockets of alarmingly well-coordinated resistance are still popping up in Southern Vekta concentrated around Sedah City. Templar The Chapter 5 DLC can still be downloaded for free from Guerrilla’s website and integrated into any copy of Killzone: Liberation, and I will show you how to do that at the end of this update. &   STAGE 1: THE HUNT Stage 1 begins all Mad Max on us, with Templar  Over the radio, Evelyn informs  Templar responds over the radio and—JESUS CHRIST, that’s not Nigel Whitmey! Yep. Templar has yet ANOTHER new voice actor for the Chapter 5 DLC for… I don’t know. Reasons. I don’t feel comfortable speculating, really. Regardless, our uncredited stand-in Templar is now the third man to voice Jan, chronologically, and the fourth actor overall. Templar truly is an Everyman Hero; not only can he be multiple people across multiple games, he can also be multiple people in the same game. Or, as I say in the video, we have simply completed the walking Metal Gear: Solid reference that is this game and we’ve swapped out the base game’s Solid Templar for the DLC’s Liquid Templar. Everyone else appearing in the DLC retains their original voice actor, although once we make the jump to Killzone 2 on the PlayStation 3, Templar, Rico, and Evelyn all get new voice actors anyway.  The base appears to be deserted…  Yet it’s automated defenses are online… and targeting Templar’s Jeep.  So Jan just decides to drive right up to the main gate. I mean, there’s absolutely nothing that could possible go wrong with tha—  Oh I guess he died then.   RIP Liquid Templar  But wait! What’s this?! Very clever, Templar. The old “push the Jeep down the hill in Neutral and hope it comes to a stop so it can be blown up” gambit. I’ve used that one before too. It didn’t work out quite as well as it did here.  Ever the optimist, aren’t we Jan?  The Helghast realize they done goofed and prepare to raise the barricades.  But Action Jan dive rolls over them before they close. Oh why hello there Killzone 3 gameplay mechanics, fancy meeting you here. Also, I don’t think the mad dash to get through the gate was all that necessary. That’s an anti-vehicle gate, not an anti-personnel one. I’m pretty sure even I could get over that stupid crosshatch and I haven’t had a decade of Space Army training like Jan has. STOP SHOWING OFF, LIQUID!  Okay, so the reason I’ve crushed Analysis and Gameplay into a single topic for this update is because there isn’t that much new gameplay elements involved here in Chapter 5, and the DLC also weaves in important plot updates into the gameplay section a little more than the previous chapters did. Again, for reasons I still don’t quite get, Luger is swapped out as our Mission Control character for the DLC with Evelyn, at least from a practicality standpoint. From a storytelling standpoint, of course it makes sense. The whole point of Chapter 5 is to set up Killzone 2, where Evelyn is a fairly major character, so Guerrilla would naturally want to spend as much time familiarizing you with her character here as they possibly could.  After that little fake out at the beginning of the level, we get our third and final drivable vehicle in Killzone: Liberation, the ISA Jeep. And after the Hovertank and the Hovercraft, a good old fashioned dune buggy is a surprisingly down to earth change of pace for the DLC. We’ll be encountering a souped up version of the Jeep later on in Killzone 3 called the HAMR (“hammer”) IFV, a cousin of the LANCER IFV glimpsed occasionally in Killzone 1. The Jeep controls identically to the tank and hovercraft, and once again in co-op mode control is split between the two players acting as a driver and a gunner, respectively. The Jeep is the figurative mid-point between the tank and hovercraft, it’s faster and more maneuverable than the tank, yet is also less inclined to drifting and over steering like the hovercraft. It also has slightly more armour than the hovercraft. Up in the top right corner of the screenshot you can also see something that’s kind of popped up the background of the last few stages but gets a more prominent role here in this run to the next portion of the ISA base: Helghast auto-turrets. These automated machine guns line the path you need to drive down and can whittle away the Jeep’s armor fairly quickly if you dawdle in their line of fire for too long. Taking the ones on the ridge of the canyons out is suicide. You’re better off just blowing past them and only taking out the ones in the upcoming boss arena where you have to fight a tank. Trust me, they’re not gonna chase after you. During the Jeep section, Evelyn also namedrops General Mandrake, who was mentioned in the pre-level title card. He’s a slightly important figure, lore-wise at least, so let’s take a moment to talk about him then.  ...For example, that’s him slumped up against the wall there in mid-frame, dying of several hundred Helghast-inflicted bullet wounds. Goddamn, the ISA have incredibly poo poo luck with keeping their generals either alive or loyal. I can see why Jan only accepts a promotion up to Colonel in Killzone 2, now. If he went any higher up the paygrade, he’d spend every other second nervously looking over his shoulder. Anyway, Mandrake is the local commanding officer of Sedah City’s ISA detachment, and with his dying breaths we learn a few key details about the situation here.  Namely, that Rico was here with the Helghast, he might have at least helped kill Mandrake, and now they’ve all fled into the sewers from a nearby access shaft. Oooo. Can I add another one to the counter? 
Oh what a day. What a LOVELY day! It should also be noted that Jan later names the strike fleet he leads to Helghan in Killzone 2 after General Mandrake. Following the abysmal failure of Admiral Alex Grey’s first wave assault on Helghan, Templar’s Battle Group Mandrake arrives a few weeks later to continue the fight utilizing new tactics gleaned from her fleet’s initial difficulties. Unfortunately, there’s no Battle Group Vaughton in memory of old General Bradley “Toothless Brad” Vaughton from Killzone 1. And also, it would just seem really gauche to name a fleet Battle Group Adams, given, well… everything we know about Stuart Adams. Also, one interesting cultural gloss regarding Mandrake's namesake, the Mandragora plant: the Mandragora officinarum is a rather famous root in literary, religious, and occult circles, notable for its distinctive shape like a small human body. It's often used as an ingredient in magic spells and is often liked to a homumculus, a small human-like creature with its roots in the world of alchemy. But beyond that, the Mandrake or Mandragora is also famous for being a hallucinogen and an alleged aphrodisiac. Funny then, how a group of unsubtly phallic starships is named for a root thought in ancient times to increase male potency, no? Just sayin'...  So Jan   Uh oh…  Well. poo poo. It’s Rico and a group of Helghast bodyguards. Ummmm… Yeah, that’s some pretty damning evidence right there. I think Rico’s pretty much facing a death sentence the second Templar gets his hands on him, assuming he just doesn’t haul off and summarily execute him right here.  Well, now that the cat’s out of the bag and Rico’s up-till-now rumored collaboration with the Helghast has been confirmed, the Helgoons open fire on Templar to give Rico a chance to slip away into the sewers.  Templar manages to take one of them out, but hangs back behind cover while the other two climb in after Rico.   I don’t know, but I’m guessing the explanation has to be loving a-maz-ing.  STAGE 2: DEFECTION But WHOSE?!!! DUNDUNDUUUUUUUUN!!!! So Stage 2 is a sewer level. A big honkin’, lovely sewer level. Paging Dash Rendar…  Umm… She’s a nuclear munitions expert, Jan. What, do you think that just because she has the title “Dr.” in front of her name that means she knows everything? Yeah, just hang on a second there Jan as she dials up someone from Sedah City Public Works.  Or she can just use her Star Trek scanners on the place AND prove she’s an Omidisciplanary Scientist while she’s at it. Either that, or she is a Gaius Baltar-level bullshit artist when it comes to “talking authoritatively about things outside of your field of study”.  Oh Jan…  We learn early on in the level that not only are they way more Helghast down here than there reasonably should be this far into essentially a post-war clean-up effort now, but that they’ve been using the sewers to launch attacks inside Sedah City itself.   The sewers share a lot of similarities to the refinery and dockyard from Chapter 2, namely open level that’s fairly easy to get lost in where you have to shut off various hazards like these outblowing water pipes before you can advance forward. Trying to run through the water will cause you to slip and fall and stun yourself for a few seconds, like what happens to both of us in the video.  The main objective for this first part of the stage is to get this floodgate open. There are two switches to unlock it, and they’re obtusely on opposite ends of the stage. Cue: “Sally and crow get lost for half an hour trying to figure out how to get the drat thing open.”  Midway through the level, Evelyn drops a few more hints as to the identity of the ISA traitor who’s been lurking in the shadows since Metrac and Cobar’s little walk and talk introduction at the seaport.  So Evelyn’s gonna get on the case of figuring out and exposing our mole as Templar  Oh, this is the map screen for Killzone: Liberation, by the way. Yes. We got so lost that I OPENED THE MAP SCREEN FOR THE FIRST TIME IN THE ENTIRE PLAYTHROUGH! Pressing the Select button brings up the map. The grey areas on screen are walkable terrain, black areas are impassable, and the various shades denote terrain elevation. You can also see where you are, your co-op partner is, and where any crates, keycards, open power up items, and level exit points are. The thumbstick scrolls around the map while the L and R shoulder buttons zoom the map in and out. Pressing the Square button will bring up an icon legend telling you what icons represent what objects. On the left side of the screen are your mission objectives. Completed objectives are denoted by a bright orange square in front of them. Active objectives, such as “Trace Rico” have a black square in front of them. And lastly, up at the top right of the map screen you can see your total Vektan Dollars collected for your current stage.  Eat poo poo and die, Helgoons!  We also take a brief detour into the Sector 7 Train Graveyard from Final Fantasy VII. I know Evelyn said at the start of the stage that there was a subway terminus and an emergency evacuation line down here. I just don’t know why it has to pass directly through a sewer system. Maybe that’s just how trains run in the future. I dunno.  Once the floodgates open, Evelyn informs us she’s found Rico… and a few of the missing Red Dust bombs, by the look of it.  At the end of the stage, Jan finally happens upon Rico.  He readies his courage, and prepares to face the hardest confrontation of his life.   Something tells me that Jan was the last person Rico was expecting to run into down here in the sewers.  That said, he seems to be at ease with him finding him, despite the cloud of suspicion that’s been hoving over him for quite a while now, lowering his weapon in Jan’s presence. Of course, it doesn’t seem to click that the weapon he’s lowering is a Helghast StA-52 Assault Rife—a gun he has no business holding unless he really is a Helghast traitor… or this is Killzone 1 and he’s run out of special ammo for his M224-A3.  Jan, predictably, is a very angry to see Rico so blithely nonchalant after participating in the apparent murder of General Mandrake, and probably holding the Helghast rifle that did the deed.  And because Rico’s a thick idiot, he’s kind of shocked that Templar is attacking him all of the sudden.  So he fights back by… Olympic Slam’ming him into the concrete. Oh PSP Cutscenes. I’m sad we’re coming to the end of you in the next update.  However, Templar is able to apparently survive getting his neck broken and skull fractured on a concrete floor and manages to get Rico off his feet.  Oh the trouble you would save so many souls if you just did Jan. Come on. Do it. No one’s watching. It’ll be our little secret.  To quote JamieTheD: DRAMA-BOMB!  In short order, Rico reveals all the background details that have been informing the goings on of Liberation, yet have been just out of Jan’s knowledge till now. So we have here the missing cache of weapons from the Rayhoven base, which as it turns out Stratson, our second ISA traitor general, allowed the Helghast to steal when they overran the base. Stratson sending Templar  And here at long last, the sub-title of this LP is contextualized. We called Liberation “The Merry Wives has an infamous reputation among Shakespearean scholars, as the play is The Bard's first and only “spin-off,” so to speak. The character of Sir John Falstaff (alleged to have been based off of Sir John Oldcastle) originally appeared in the dramas Henry IV, Part I and Henry IV, Part II as a comic relief character, con artist, and hanger-on to Prince Hal, the future King Henry V of England. And though both parts of Henry IV are kind of the duller portions of the so-called Plantagenet Tetralogy, the character audiences fell in love with was Falstaff, to the point where Shakespeare was repeatedly lobbied by fans to write more stories about him. Only one of these ever came to fruition; The Merry Wives of Windsor. And just as well, too, because it’s kind of universally despised by critics and scholars and derided as a slapdash, hastily written, cashgrab of questionable quality. So if nothing else, it at least shows that even William Shakespeare of all people wasn’t immune from making his own Hot Tub Time Machine 2. Blind Sally also has this to say about The Merry Wives: Blind Sally posted:Oooh, oooh, me, me, I have stuff to add!  Anyway, Rico, in typical Rico fashion glosses over the finer details of Metrac and Stratson’s plot, so I’ll explain it in a little more depth right here. At some point during Chapters 1-3, Stratson approached Rico and essentially pressganged him into a covert mission to infiltrate Metrac’s camp as a feigned turncoat. When he runs off to get medical supplies for that dropship pilot in Chapter 3 and gets captured by Cobar, that was actually him turning himself in to Metrac. Rico believed he was infiltrating Metrac’s inner circle to gather intelligence on the Helghast’s operations and help win the war and recover the Rayhoven weapons. Rico goes along with the plan under the impression that Stratson informed Templar about his status after he was in Metrac’s custody. Hence why Rico was shocked that Templar attacked him just now. What Rico didn’t account for is that Stratson was actually a traitor himself working with Metrac, and that Stratson had betrayed him the second he sent him to Metrac. Stratson’s plan was to publicly expose Rico’s supposedly covert mission and paint HIM as the traitor who sold out Southern Vekta to the Helghast in order to cover up his own involvement in the plot. The one thing he didn’t account for was Templar actually fighting his way through the Helghast forces that Rico was operating with and actually taking him alive so he’d talk.  So now we know why Stratson’s subordinates and contemporaries in ISA command have been dropping like flies in recent weeks: he’s been feeding the Helghast info on their movements so they can take them out one by one to leave him in absolute control over the ISA military in the south. We also learn that while Rico was present at the ISA base when Mandrake was killed, he was not a part of the actual murder, so we can scratch a whole list of accused offenses off the War Crimes counter.  However, just as Rico seems to be getting to the good stuff, the lift him and Templar find themselves on begins to rise to the surface.  Ummm…  Yeah, Jan, I don’t think it’s a good idea to give Rico a gun. Just given his present mindframe and recent history. You know.  And as we round out Stage 2, Jan shows that after all this he still has faith in Rico. All told, it’s probably the only thing keeping him straight and sane right now. Everything and everyone else might have betrayed and abandoned Rico, but not Jan. Jan will always have faith in Rico, for better or worse, and while Rico will become incredibly jaded with the ISA’s command structure after drat-near having his career ruined by a tarnished member of the ISA brass, at least his friend Jan will never betray or abandon him. As long as he still has Jan, Rico will still be human.   ISA Jeep Also referred to as the ISA Buggy, this light rapid all-terrain vehicle is used for operations where rapid action is required, particularly fast hit-and-fade or reconnaissance operations. With a set of tires and suspension that can handle the most difficult of terrain, the ISA Jeep can seat up to three people, a driver, a passanger, and a gunner, and is armed with a single turret-mounted M221-A1 large machine gun for offense and defensive purposes. Though it is capable of traveling at high speeds under control, its light armor limits the amount of enemy fire it can withstand before failing.  More big revelations as we head into the finale of Killzone: Liberation.  Rico has revealed his role as an unwitting pawn in Metrac and Stratson’s ploy to cripple Vekta for the Helghast. Though he’s been cleared of all suspicions in the eyes of Templar, to the Vektan public and the surviving ISA brass, he’s still seen as a traitor, and only a public confession from Stratson will be enough to spare him from the firing squad now.  Dwight Stratson has been revealed as the true power behind Metrac’s until now perplexingly precise blitzkrieg of Southern Vekta, the “root” of evil, if you will. With Heff Milcher and General Mandrake dead, and Admiral Grey incapacitated, Stratson’s purge of the ISA command structure is nearly complete. All the stands between him and total domination of Vekta’s military is General Murphy stationed in Sedah City itself. …Guess he’s not getting a “Battle Group Stratson” named after him now, is he?  SNAAAAAAAAAKE!!! It's not over yet! HOW TO INSTALL THE CHAPTER 5 DLC FOR KILLZONE: LIBERATION If you have a copy of Killzone: Liberation (seriously, track one down, it's a pretty decent game all told), and would like to have the Chapter 5 DLC for yourself to see the complete Killzone: Liberation story, then this segment here will show you where to get it and how to go about installing it on your PSP. For starters, the Chapter 5 DLC can be downloaded from this page here on Guerrilla's Killzone website. The visuals of the site have been updated to reflect the most recent mainline game in the series, Killzone: Shadow Fall, but all the links for Liberation still work. If you just want to skip right to the file, the direct download links are right here: And here are Guerrilla's official instructions on how to go about installing it on your PSP once you have it on you computer: Guerrilla Games posted:To install Chapter Five of Killzone: Liberation, please follow the instructions below carefully: Also of note: Guerrilla also uploaded a ZIP file including all the Killzone: Liberation unlockable materials that would have been auto-downloaded from the PlayStation Network when the game detected certain check flags. This content was pulled from the PSN after Sony wrote the PSP off once and for all in favour of the Vita, but Guerrilla has graciously hosted it on their website for free now. It includes awesome stuff like Killzone: Liberation PSP and PC wallpapers, concept art, making of video, and even some sick rear end ISA and Helghast propaganda one-sheets. I'll be going back and adding various pieces to their appropriate updates and will do a massive dump of everything in a separate post once the storyline of Liberation is finished for good.G nine-gear crow fucked around with this message at 08:55 on Aug 6, 2015 |
|
#
?
May 26, 2015 12:56
|
|
|
Bluemage142 posted:So I noticed a hella or two at 23:35 that went unaccompanied. Not sure if that, itself, counts as a war crime... or an anti-war-crime. Argh, my secret shame  CJacobs gleaned onto that pretty quickly and was giving me a hard time. I just totally missed it. I'm not going back to edit them in though but I'll make sure to get all future usages   nine-gear crow posted:And here at long last, the sub-title of this LP is contextualized. We called Liberation “The Merry Oooh, oooh, me, me, I have stuff to add! The popular rumour of the time was that the play (Merry Wives of Windsor) was written in just two weeks at the behest of Queen Elizabeth herself because she thought Falstaff was such a great character--and because she wanted to see a play where Falstaff fell in love. Of course, as many people have noted, this play isn't quite up to snuff when compared to the Histories. Notable literary critic, Harold Bloom, has said that biggest problem with Wives is that is stars a "pseudo-Falstaff," "a nameless imposter masquerading as the great Sir John Falstaff", operating out of necessity and survival instead of being the force of anarchy and fun. Compare this to our Killzone games: Stratson is a pseudo-Adams. He isn't very interesting, he isn't fun. His monologues suck by comparison. Guerrilla needed an ISA traitor for Liberation's plot, but Adams had already been killed off so they created a watered down boring version in Statson to make the story work. *sigh* At least in the case of Wives, Verdi wound up creating a rather magnificent opera homage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4Buc8wTsbg nine-gear crow posted:Also of note: Guerrilla also uploaded a ZIP file including all the Killzone: Liberation unlockable materials that would have been auto-downloaded from the PlayStation Network when the game detected certain check flags. This content was pulled from the PSN after Sony wrote the PSP off once and for all in favour of the Vita, but Guerrilla has graciously hosted it on their website for free now. Holy poo poo, awesome find! This stuff is great--I'd never seen it before! Now if only we can find the PSN unlockable materials for Killzone 2, everything will be perfect.
|
|
#
?
May 26, 2015 15:56
|
|
|
As promised, here's that bigass image dump of all the wallpapers, concept art pieces and propaganda one-sheets from the Killzone: Liberation website. There's no spoilers to be found here, as we've pretty much gone through all of Liberation's big plot twists as of the last update. CONCEPT ART  Helghast Shock Trooper with K9 unit.  Helghast Shock Trooper in industrial area.  Tendon Cobar uniform reference.  Cobar in the snow.  Armin Metrac uniform reference and prototype designs. (Apparently he was gonna be the Helghast Pope at one point? I dunno. ) Metrac with Helghast soldiers.  Rough/Finished swamp dock platform, Chapter 3, Stage 1.  Swamp dock, 3-1, again.  Cliffside hanger, Chapter 3, Stage 3.  Templar confronting Cobar after Milcher's murder.  Adlez Mountain Airbase, Chapter 4, Stages 3 & 4.  Adlez Base from the air, Chapter 4, all stages.  ISA VTOL dropship under construction.  Finished ISA VTOL.  Cobar's Spider Tank, assembly reference.  Cobar's Spider Tank.  Helghast Fighter, design reference.  Helghast Fighter, cockpit. WALLPAPER  Evelyn Batton taken hostage. (Like, seriously, when is she NOT kidnapped in a Killzone game?)  Metrac and Cobar.  "Death has many faces... Evil has only one."  Metrac and Helghast soldiers, close up. (You can see in this version that Metrac has a sweet eye scar that's not as prominent in most other depictions of him)  Metrac and Cobar, close up.  Metrac and Helghast soldiers, long shot. PROPAGANDA Now this is the most interesting stuff right here. This subset includes both ISA and Helghast propaganda one-sheets and it definitely speaks to the ubiquity of blatant wartime propaganda and the power to persuasive interpretation, as many of these ones use the same image to tell two different stories depending on which side's propo you're seeing.  Helghast: "Rats in the shadows!"  ISA: "Never surrender." This one kind of needs to be seen at full resolution and the disclaimer at the bottom is a must read. It's both hilarious and horrifying at the same time.  Helghast: "Helghast 'rescue' Vektan dropship crash survivors." You can see the twisted POV-shifting being done by the Helghan state-run media here. They manage to spin Helghast soldiers shooting down the ISA dropship in Chapter 3 and capturing its survivors to be tortured and executed as them rescuing the poor victims of a random dropship crash. Hooray for our brave Helghast heroes!   ISA: "Liberty in your hands... or THEIRS?" Again, same image, different spin. Here's the Helghast dragging Evelyn away from the dropship to be imprisoned and and tortured for information on Red Dust.  Helghast: "Drive them back!" Yaaay! Spider Mine marketing. You can just tell that that explosion down below is like five Spider Mines swarming one poor Helghast straggler and blowing him to bits together.  ISA: "Vekta Today front page" There's so much to unpack in this image. Again it kind of needs to be viewed and full size to take it all in properly. First up, we've got the same image as last time, only seen from the ISA perspective now. A full article on how terrifying Spider Mines really are. News that the ISA council rejected Stratson's original plans for Red Dust, hence why he gathers Evelyn and Milcher to make his pitch directly to them. A headline article on General Adams' betray and why another ISA general defecting to the Helghast could totally, never, EVER happen again, 100%, I'd stake anything on it, no siree, no more traitors in the ISA top brass, nuuh-uuuh. And... Milcher, NOOOOOOO! He was just one day away from retirement before Cobar killed him. COOOOOOOBAAAAAAAAR!!!!!!! 
|
|
#
?
May 27, 2015 06:26
|
|
|
I just caught up on the last two videos, and there was a point where all the various comments and dumb jokes I was building up were lost, at all once. This point: CJacobs posted:What is this sewer for? Where is this water flowing out from? It's quite simple! You see, 
|
|
#
?
May 29, 2015 08:26
|
|
|
 Alas, we arrive at the end of the beginning. The final update of Killzone: Liberation (storyline-wise), and our final foray into Killzone 1-era Killzone. From here on out we migrate on up to the PlayStation3 for the rest of the “trilogy”. Templar, Let’s find out. & STAGE 3: THE INVADER Again, I’m not really sure who this one refers to, as we’re technically going to be doing some invading of our own this stage.  Stage 3 opens with a pair of hapless Helgoons on patrol duty. You just know things are gonna turn out terrible for these two.  Case in point: Rico is nearby with a weapon.  The Before.  The After. Just one thing I want to point out that I learned from watching the Making Of video that came with the bundle of unlockable goodies I linked in the last update: Guerrilla made a point of showing off how the colour of the Helghast soldiers eyes reflects their disposition in-game. You’ll see in the video that this Helghast grenadier’s eyes go from yellow, to red, and finally to black. It doesn’t translate all too well because of the shoddy rendering abilities of the PSP when it comes to cutscenes in Ad Hoc multiplayer mode, however. Yellow eyes indicate “passive” Helghast troops, ie; ones you who aren’t alerted to your presence which can sneak by. Red eyes indicate “aggressive” Helghast, and they will actively attack and track you through a level to the best of their ability. And finally black eyes indicates a dead or incapacitated Helghast.  Yes. It’s good to have you back murdering people for our side again, and not someone else’s, Rico.  I don’t know why you’d need to do both those things to hide an army, but whatever, Evelyn.  So Chapter 5 Stages 3 & 4 are a soft rehash of Chapters 2-4 of Killzone 1, where you spend most of your time just trying to get out of Vekta City. It’s a bombed out metropolis setting, but at least there’s a fairly recognizable path through it and it’s brightly lit, so at least it have that over the sewer level.  The big gameplay element of the first part of the stage is that there’s four manholes scattered around the city square which the Helghast are using to flood up into the city now that Rico and Templar have rendered the service elevator inoperable.  You’re gonna need to collapse all four of them with C-4 charges to stem the flow of troopers. You’re gonna be under near-constant assault for this part as these manholes will keep spawning troops at a constant rate. Even worse, the more manholes you seal, the quicker they start coming out through other manholes until you seal all 4.  Meanwhile, Evelyn gets in touch with the Vektan Defense Department and finds a piece of corroborating evidence to back up Rico’s allegations against Stratson.  So the bad news is that Stratson was planning a coordinated assault on every major Vektan city as well using the sewers, but thanks to Evelyn getting the word out to ISA command, it looks like they’re being dealt with before they can launch their attacks. Three cheers for the good guys.  The last part of the stage is another survival mini-boss. More on that in a moment.  Blind Sally also picks up a flamethrower and to our surprise, in Liberation it does indeed have some sort of drum backpack attachment. It’s not quite the 200L monster chitoryu12 showed off in the thread, but well, it’s close…  And as you can see it’s got quite the firing arc to it.  So like I said, the finale of Stage 3 is you and Rico (and your potential co-op partner) holding your own against a few waves of Helghast soldiers. On the one hand, in co-op mode, this section is kind of easier because you’ve got three sets of guns instead of just two there, but you also face an increased number of Helghast each wave than you would in single player. There’s a turret there just in the lower frame which Blind Sally hops in which is meant to help the defense section go more smoothly…  Mid-way through the attack, Evelyn gives us an update on the situation, it’s pretty much what I outlined at the start of the post, but this is the first time it’s mentioned in-game.  And then once you’ve worn your way through their entire platoon of Helgoons, the Helghast deploy their “oh gently caress off” option and just send a tank over the barricade to take you on next.  So the thing about the tank is…  It literally runs over your little cover barricade and into your defensive zone. It’s coded to do this, so there’s no stopping it.  …Unless you have a flamethrower that is. Like Sally mentions in-video, the Helghast tanks don’t differentiated between damage types, so it reads the persistent fire from the flamethrower as individual hits from any other weapon. Which means it goes down like a chump with like three pools of napalm on it. Bam, boss over.  Yes, thoughtlessly murdering people you are on record as regarding as sub-human. Truly, you are doing God’s work in the most resplendent of ways, Rico. Regardless of how awful the Helghast are, Rico is one of the most disgustingly unselfaware characters I’ve ever encountered in fiction.   Suddenly an ISA trooper appears over the ledge to lend Jan a hand.  He throws down a pair of ropes for Templar and Rico. Hakha gets nothing because Hakha doesn’t exist.  But then Templar orders Rico to help with the clean up effort because Templar wants to go after Stratson alone. Probably because Rico would gently caress up along the way and get captured again or something.    And that’s it for Stage 3. STAGE 4: RESURRECTION I don’t really know why the final stage of Liberation is called “Resurrection” beyond, well, I guess the war’s over now and this is Vekta’s chance to revive itself into a functioning society once again… But we’re gonna see how well they go down that road in Killzone 2, however.  The final stage begins with Stratson approaching the palace to murder Murphy.  Weeeell, someone clearly doesn’t know about Killzones 2, 3, Mercencary, and Shadow Fall. Also, Stratson is flanked by a pair of ISA honour guards. These guys only show up in this stage of Liberation, and only here. And as you can sort of tell by their gaudy trench coats and shoulder pads and the fact that they’re wearing rebreathers, they’re actually disguised Helghast troopers posing as ISA soldiers.   “And by that I mean of course murder him.”  I don’t know why Stratson is lying to his clearly Helghast troops here. This is where Liberation’s storytelling faults tend to appear. There’s a lot of ambiguity in what you’re seeing which is then contradicted by background information or even explanatory information in the same game no less. So I’m just going to assume he’s speaking in code to his troops right now because he’s clearly talking about Jan. I guess his plot was to murder Murphy and then make it look like Jan killed him, just like it looked like Rico killed General Mandrake so that way he’d have an excuse to kill him that didn’t immediately look suspicious to anyone with two brain cells that rub together.  See: Killzone intro. Visari: “Our enemies at home have been re-educated. We have given them new insights into our resolve.”   At the start of Stage 4 proper, Evelyn lays out or final objective: reach the old royal palace—where Stratson already is… greeeat. Also, Vekta apparently used to have a monarchy of some sort. Okay.  Again, Evelyn back up officially what Rico asserted in the Stage 2 post-level cutscene. By and large, we already knew this, but she’s just making sure we remember it before we head into the final confrontation.  And look at that. Murphy’s dead. Farewell General Didn’t Even Get A Character Model. You will be… never referenced again in the franchise. This means that there’s no Battle Group Murphy named after poor General Murphy, but then again for all we know, maybe Admiral Grey’s fleet was called Battle Group Murphy. That’s why it goes to poo poo like it does in Mercenary.  We also encounter ISA Honourguard soldiers in-battle too. This is the only time we ever intentionally face off against hostile, non-traitor ISA soliders in a Killzone game.  And then Evelyn reveals the smoking gun, with a callback to our beloved General Adams from the first game too. Stratson and Adams planned out the whole defection operation with Metrac months before the Helghast began their invasion. Unfortunately, Adams turning out to be a crazy melodramatic fuckup threw a whole tsunami of monkeywrenches into the Helghast plans, leaving Stratson to continue the operation on his own. I also love how Lente is completely glossed over in this whole equation. The man is practically a walking afterthought, that’s how useless Joseph Lente was as a general and a character in Killzone. And in the end, it’s a highly appropriate fate for a man whose crowing moment of relevance in the franchise was literally being gelded to death via a bullet. This is also our last official reference to Luger in a Killzone game… to my knowledge at least. I haven’t played either Mercenary or Shadow Fall, so I have no idea if she’s mentioned at all in either of those two. I just know that there’s no mention of her in 2 or 3.  To get to the palace, we need to move this train out of our way first…  …Which we can do by flipping this switch on the overhanging balcony above the train itself. See what I mean about Stage 4 being a little more user-friendly than Stage 2 was?  The train slides out of the way automatically and we’re now within striking distance of the end of Liberation for good.  Evelyn informs us that Stratson’s personal battalion of soldiers is still loyal to him. Either he was lying to them too, or they’ve all come around to his way of thinking and they know he’s selling out Vekta to the Helghast, the game doesn’t really tell you.  At the end of the roundabout we reach the gates to the Royal Palace and our last few generic Helgoon enemies.  Capping that guy causes the gate to swing open, allowing us to head into the final boss.  This is looking very Final Boss Arena-y, if I do say so.  It’s also looking very “Soviet Palatial Chic” too. I guess this helps imply the shared history between the Vektans and the Helghans, as Vekta was settled by the Helghan Corporation originally after all. Its founder and original CEO was named Philip Vekta, if you will recall. This structure was probably one of Helghan Corp.'s main administrative buildings and now serves as an ISA command building, much like how Visari Palace on Helghan itself (which we'll be seeing up close in Killzones 2 & 3) was repurposed into Helghast's seat of power out of the old Helghan Corporation planetary headquarters.  Stratson and Templar engage in a little pre-battle banter, not unlike he did with Metrac.  The Unstoppable Bore and the Immovable Blank, ladies and gentlemen.   I can’t loving believe we swapped out General Anime for THIS. I can’t believe we swapped out Metrac for this. Killzone has an impressive slate of batshit amazing villains. Dwight Stratson is not one of them.  And with that the final boss fight begins. Evelyn opens the fight by telling you to collapse the balconies on either side of the arena to give you access to the upper level.  One side has a big explosive red barrel shoved underneath it, which you can shoot and make it explode.  Blowing it up turns the balcony into a ramp, essentially.  The right side is just literally made of ramshackle wooden boxes. Shooting them out causes the other side to collapse, thus turning the upper balcony into a walkable upside-down U-shaped platform.  Stratson’s got a fairly rigid attack pattern which he follows. He will emerge from behind one of six doors, Scooby Doo-style, and you need to shoot him a few times to get him to retreat. He’ll also retreat by himself if he depletes his revolver clip. And when he runs away a pair of Helghast soldiers will emerge to fight you in his place.  Stratson also has the highest amount of HP of any boss or enemy in Liberation. There’s a reason for this, but even then as a human enemy, his defense stats are absurd. Like just about everything short of the rocket launcher only does like 1 damage per-hit on him… on a guy with 1200 health.  Eventually, however…  HOLY poo poo! HE WHIPS OUT METAL GEAR REX ON US!  This is the reason why Stratson has 1200 health for this fight: he whips out a beefed up prototype version of the ISA LS209 exoskeleton seen in Killzones 2 and 3.  Straton’s mech continues our unintentional Robocop references by being a big honkin’ ED-209 ripoff. It also serves at our official baptism into the realm of ultra-mechanized warfare which will now be a big part of Killzone. Cobar’s Spider Tank was just the appetizer. From here, things are just gonna get more and more crazy and complex until the MAWLR finally stomps its way into Killzone 3.  So this is the rest of the fight with Stratson. Yeah, he’s in a big fuckoff walker, but we do have a couple of advantages now. First of all, his mech is so big that he can’t duck behind doors anymore, so he’s always vulnerable to our attacks now. And secondly, as he burst out of the building, he knocked down both the balcony and sandbag barricade to the upper dias where that supply crate has been just out of reach till now. However, the Helghast soldiers he’s been calling in for support still spawn, so you have to keep them in the back of your head too as you whittle him down.  Stratson’s mech has three basic attacks to it. 1) Incendiary grenades; he’ll lob a cluster of them at you and when they explode they also light part of the arena on fire for about 10 seconds. And as we learned in Chapter 4, fire will kill you very quickly if you walk directly into it. 2) Autocannon; he’ll burst fire his mech’s autocannon at you and do a shitton of damage if you’re hit by it. I’m talking like critical damage. And finally, 3) Mele; if you get too close to the mech it will swipe its bladed grabby arm at you and do a hell of a lot of damage to. Unfortunately, we don’t get anywhere close to it for him to use it on us.  And as you can imagine, it’s a bloody slough to take down Stratson’s mech. I think like half the video is us trying to beat him.  Eventually, however…   Take a dirt nap, jagoff!  And surprisingly, after all that, Stratson manages to crawl out of his ruined mech no worse for wear.  He also takes a moment to weakly explain his (and, retroactively, Adams’) motivations for selling out Vekta to Visari.  But Templar is having none of it, and calls for Stratson to be taken away for interrogation. Wait, what’s that? A villain in a Killzone game SURVIVING?! Well holy poo poo. Maybe this will be some kind of precedent-setter for the series.  A pair of ISA soldiers come to take him off to military prison. Personally speaking, I like to imagine that that’s actually Garza and Natko making their unofficial Killzone debut ahead of Killzone 2.  Stratson drops one last plot bomb on Templar (which we might have already known. I don’t really know any more), but anyway, the Helghast have both the Red Dust nukes and the remainder of the ISA weapons cache from Rayhoven that wasn’t intercepted by Rico.  So as Not-Natko and Not-Garza cart off Stratson, Evelyn and Rico arrive at the palace to give Templar a celebratory thumbs up, beer, and gold metal for winning at Killzone.  From this point onward, Rico’s opinion of any ISA superior officer who is not Jan Templar is officially and irreversibly poo poo. Rico already had a major problem with authority before he was betrayed by Stratson, and now that problem has, or will at the very least, grown into a full-blown case of hostile paranoia of anyone sufficiently up the ISA chain of command.  Templar tries to placate him and remind him that not every ISA General is a traitor… or a corpse waiting to happen… but it falls on deaf ears as far as Rico’s concerned.  See?   And Jan gets his hollow George W. Bush-era “good, just fight” rhetorical platitude in for the game.  Evelyn looks optimistically to the future, seeing a chance to rebuild and move on from this pointless war.  Jan, rather ominously, twists this around into justifying a counter-attack on Helghan itself. Again, this mirrors how he ended Chapter 4, because for a lot of people, Chapter 4 was the end to Killzone” Liberation.  And as Jan, Rico, Evelyn, …Pay no attention to the statue that’s sieg heiling off to the right there.  Like, seriously. What the gently caress Guerrilla?  We also get a post-scrip pre-credits stinger with a character claiming to be Visari (who isn’t voiced by Brian Cox here, so he has to explicitly say he’s Visari to get the audience to believe him) setting up the major subplot to Killzone 2.  Again, Visari hammers home the point that the ISA weapons, including the Red Dust nukes, have arrived on Helghan, meaning their invasion was a nominal success at the very least. Visari also pointedly mentions that the ISA weaponry, which the Helghast are now reverse engineering, repurposing, and replicating, has catapulted their war machine forward by years, probably even decades. This is why when we see the Helghast in Killzone 2, they have better weaponry and equipment than they did in Killzone 1 and Liberation. I’ve been saying for a long time now that the seeds of Killzone 2 and everything that unfolds therein have been planted here in Liberation, and now we’re finally going to see them blossom in the next game. And now, a look at where our main cast is in our post-Liberation, pre-Killzone 2 landscape.  Already a Vektan folk hero, Jan Templar's status among the Vektan people and ISA military has skyrocketed to legendary heights thanks to his efforts to save Vekta from not just one, but two traitor generals. His expressed interest in participating in the counter attack on Helghan and prior service record leads to his promotion to the rank of Colonel and his assignment to command over the ISSC New Sun and it's detached fleet, Battle Group Mandrake. Cleared of any wrongdoing by Evelyn's recovered evidence and Stratson's eventual confession, Rico Velasquez was cleared to return to active duty under Templar. He reforms the squad he commanded at the beginning of Killzone: Liberation, dubbed "Rico's Raiders" by Velasquez and others, handpicking ISA soldiers Tomas Sevchenko, Dante Garza, and Shawn Natko to form the core of the squad.  Hopeful for peace, but still mindful of her duty to the ISA, Evelyn Batton remained by Templar's side after his promotion to Colonel as a scientific advisory. Her knowledge of the Red Dust wepaonry and her predictive analysis on what weapons the Helghast could potentially create from the weapons delivered to Helghan by Stratson will prove vital to the ISA's war effort against the Helghast in the coming months.  General Murphy was shot and left for dead by Dwight Stratson. He may or may not have been revived and cybernetically enhanced by OCP. Former ISA General Dwight Stratson was dishonorably discharged, stripped of all his ranks and honors, and is currently in an ISA military prison awaiting court-marshal on multiple counts of treason against the ISA and UCA. He will never be mentioned again in a Killzone game. Good riddance.  Dante Garza does not appear in Killzone: Liberation.  Shawn Natko is a massive shithead. He also does not appear in Killzone: Liberation  Vyktor Kratek went back to his home planet.  Admiral Alex Grey eventually recovered from her gunshot wound to the head and went on to lead the opening round of Vekta's counter-attack operations against Visari and the Helghast. She then went loving crazy. From here, the final update for the Killzone: Liberation LP will be a brief look at the extra-game material included in Liberation, including its Challenge Games, (defunct) multiplayer modes, unlockables, "cheats", and other nifty secrets. Sally and I will be joined by a special guest for that episode to try and make it less dreadfully boring than it already is in theory. Stay tuned! For now, however, I shall leave you with a scan of the map of Southern Vekta included on the back of Killzone: Liberation's front cover. The in-game maps I'll post in the epilogue update will help contextualize it a little better. For now though you should be able to pick out place names I've mentioned in the various updates like Rayhoven, Sedah City, Diortem City, the Adlez Mountains, and so on. SOUTHERN VEKTAN CONTINENTAL MAP 
nine-gear crow fucked around with this message at 08:00 on Jun 23, 2015 |
|
#
?
May 29, 2015 11:55
|
|
|
 Hmmmm...  hmmmm...  welp
|
|
#
?
May 29, 2015 22:16
|
|
|
I'm not fixing it. 
|
|
#
?
May 29, 2015 22:33
|
|
|
Let us payeth dearly for playing killzone 2
|
|
#
?
May 29, 2015 22:35
|
|
|
biosterous posted:
|
|
#
?
May 30, 2015 00:02
|
|
|
So hey, since we're done Killzone: Liberation, I thought I'd ask the thread their thoughts on it. As far as I can tell, Liberation has been pretty overlooked. Being a PSP game wasn't doing it any favours, but for even those people who owned the console, it didn't seem like a whole lot played. Like, besides myself (and crow, who I made play it for the LP), is there anyone else currently in this thread that has played the game? Basically, I really, really like Liberation. Despite a flaw here or there, it's a blast to play and is one of my favourite handheld games. I'm not really expecting anyone to be so blown away by it they rush out and buy a PSP so that they can experience it for themselves, but I wanted to know if I succeeded in making anyone think "yeah, okay, Liberation looks pretty solid, Blind Sally. I'll give you an approving thumbs up."
|
|
#
?
May 30, 2015 01:58
|
|
|
Despite some jankiness, it did look pretty alright for a dual stick shooter of the time and hardware. Hahaha oh man what's going with those uniforms. Desert legionnaire kepis, full face gear, huge pauldrons with an out-of-control epaulette on one side, and a bunch of gear pouches over an offset coattail. I love it. One of them even nails the other in the back with a crossbow bolt in the actual fighting too. Also I move for the ISA orange color to be officially named "ISA Yam" after Liquid
|
|
#
?
May 30, 2015 02:09
|
|
|
Blind Sally posted:So hey, since we're done Killzone: Liberation, I thought I'd ask the thread their thoughts on it. As far as I can tell, Liberation has been pretty overlooked. Being a PSP game wasn't doing it any favours, but for even those people who owned the console, it didn't seem like a whole lot played. Like, besides myself (and crow, who I made play it for the LP), is there anyone else currently in this thread that has played the game? Yeah, that was the thing that kind of perplexed me. Posting Liberation updates essentially killed the thread momentum till a Killzone 2 update came along, and I've kind of wondered why. Was it just that there was that little in the game to work with or form discussion around? I enjoyed Liberation for the most part as well, but the real problem I had with it was the same problem I've had with every PSP game, and that was the slapdash PSP control scheme which really hampered it. Tough that's not an issue with Liberation itself so I really shouldn't hold that against it. I don't necessarily see myself going back and playing it again once the LP is over with completely, but unlike a few other games I've played for the PSP, I do no regret any amount of time I put into it while doing the LP. I just wish I'd actually sat down and played it a little more before we went to record the LP itself so I didn't screw up as much. Doubly so because the LP is from my perspective too. Oh well, maybe we'll redo this one one day, who knows. (probably not)
|
|
#
?
May 30, 2015 02:10
|
|
|
Fish Noise posted:Hahaha oh man what's going with those uniforms. Desert legionnaire kepis, full face gear, huge pauldrons with an out-of-control epaulette on one side, and a bunch of gear pouches over an offset coattail. I love it. One of them even nails the other in the back with a crossbow bolt in the actual fighting too. Yeah, I was gonna mention that in the update but decided against it, but I would LOVE to see a full CG render or concept art sketch of these guys just to see what the ungodly gently caress Guerrilla was thinking these guys would look like under optimal conditions. Unfortunately, there's virtually Zero supplementary or design material available for the Chapter 5 DLC, unlike the rest of Liberation.
|
|
#
?
May 30, 2015 02:13
|
|
|
Liberation seemed pretty fun. I would probably go through it once with a buddy and then never pick it up again, because that is what I do with games like this. I didn't have anything to say about the individual episodes because Crow's posts kinda covered everything. Wasn't much left to discuss 
|
|
#
?
May 30, 2015 02:35
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 24, 2024 18:17 |
|
|
nine-gear crow posted:Yeah, I was gonna mention that in the update but decided against it, but I would LOVE to see a full CG render or concept art sketch of these guys just to see what the ungodly gently caress Guerrilla was thinking these guys would look like under optimal conditions. Unfortunately, there's virtually Zero supplementary or design material available for the Chapter 5 DLC, unlike the rest of Liberation.
|
|
#
?
May 30, 2015 02:44
|
|