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Garrand
Dec 28, 2012

Rhino, you did this to me!

FrenzyTheKillbot posted:

This is a pretty neat way to connect the dots that the game presents. However, I think it's trying a little hard to give the story (for lack of a better word) coherence. In fact, I kinda get the impression that the dots not connecting is part of the point of the game. What the story ends up being about has nothing to do with the girls who disappear, nothing to do with any government plot, and it really has nothing to do with either Henry, Julia, or Delilah. It's just a bunch of poo poo happening.

I would understand if it were just a bunch of disconnected stories but none of them make sense as it is. Then of course there's that plug early on with Henry overhearing Delilah's conversation with somebody. To me it seems like they had a bunch of ideas but had no way to figure out how to work them so they left out a bunch of stuff, shrugged and said "there ya go".

I did like the anti-climax that was never getting to meet Delilah but like the entirety of Ned's existence or the fact that apparently a university research station was built in the middle of this park without anybody knowing (or at least not telling the people watching over the park) bothers me.

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FrenzyTheKillbot
Jan 31, 2008

Good Hustle
:siren:UPDATE:siren:

09 - Deleted Scenes (polsy)

Here's the bonus video for Firewatch, just showing some stuff we didn't see in the main playthrough.

And I apologize for that long break. Work got crazy busy at the same time I had some family commitments, as well as the baseball season ending and the hockey season starting. Just a complete perfect storm of things taking my time and leaving me unmotivated to do anything in the little down time I had.

FrenzyTheKillbot
Jan 31, 2008

Good Hustle
:siren:BACK TO THE FUTURE:siren:

08 - The Boat (polsy)

And let's get back to Mirror's Edge for the last leg of the game. This time we head off to that random boat that the assassin is on for some reason.

SWORDFISHHH
Apr 1, 2010
Somebody had to make this happen.

White Coke
May 29, 2015
If project Icarus wasn't just training parkour cops but specifically recruiting runners for their skills and criminal connections I could see it being worth keeping secret but as it is it seem really stupid how secretive the government is being about Icarus.

EponymousMrYar
Jan 4, 2015

The enemy of my enemy is my enemy.

White Coke posted:

If project Icarus wasn't just training parkour cops but specifically recruiting runners for their skills and criminal connections I could see it being worth keeping secret but as it is it seem really stupid how secretive the government is being about Icarus.

Little bit of Column A and Column B: Government might be recruiting runners to train cops to catch runners. Considering how totalitarian and 'pristine' the Government seems to be it's not too unusual for them to want to keep it under wraps. 'We're hiring criminals to help catch criminals because our current methods suck' isn't exactly a good line to tell your public. Might give them ideas.

Of course this requires more characterization on the actual antagonistic force of the game so we don't know enough to attribute that to malice.

Jade Star
Jul 15, 2002

It burns when I LP
It's been a long time since I have played Mirrors Edge, but that seemed like a really circuitous route you took to get to the sniper.

AlphaKretin
Dec 25, 2014

A vase to face encounter.

...Vase to meet you?

...

GARVASE DAY!

Jade Star posted:

It's been a long time since I have played Mirrors Edge, but that seemed like a really circuitous route you took to get to the sniper.

I imagine it was an attempt to not stay out in the open and get shot.

Jade Star
Jul 15, 2002

It burns when I LP
Well right, yeah, but even still I remember there being a lot of cover even if you go in a mostly straight line rather than switchback all over the place.

FrenzyTheKillbot
Jan 31, 2008

Good Hustle
Oh there's almost definitely a more direct, more 'efficient' path to the sniper. I was trying to go for something a little more interesting, moving around through different bits of cover. Maybe I went a little far the other way.

Mr. Highway
Feb 25, 2007

I'm a very lonely man, doing what I can.
The start of this level is painful on a hard, no gun playthrough. I think I got through it by hiding by a corner and waiting for someone to walk close enough to disarm.

FrenzyTheKillbot
Jan 31, 2008

Good Hustle
:siren:UPDATE:siren:

09 - Kate (polsy)

Some more Mirror's Edge. I like this level.

White Coke
May 29, 2015
It should have been Callaghan City Construction Projects.

And I'm sure you know by now Frenzy, but the joke about Ted Cruz's father was that Trump spread a rumor that Cruz's dad was seen in a photo with Lee Harvey Oswald and that therefore he was the second gunman.

FrenzyTheKillbot
Jan 31, 2008

Good Hustle
:siren:UPDATE:siren:

10 - The Shard (polsy)

Our conversation at the end kinda goes all over the place, but I meant to say that I always liked the fact that this game sort of begins and ends with a helicopter part.

Oh yeah. That's it.

Psychotic Weasel
Jun 24, 2004

Bang! You're dead.
The Shard is probably one of the best looking levels in the game - certainly the wide vista of the city below is one of the best looking backdrops you see - but as mentioned it is brutally hard. The elevator shaft followed by the air vents probably held me up the most when I first played, just a lot of trial and error to get through all of that while you figure out what to do. Didn't help that this game made my palms sweat like hell when I played through it. The part with the snipers outside also looked a lot easier than I first found it; Faith can face tank a .50 cal round like a champ but they usually hit you in mid-air causing you to lose all your momentum or throwing off your trajectory, resulting in you immediately plunging to your death.

And as cool as the set piece on the helipad was, I always wondered what happened to the two soldiers who were shooting at you. They had to have seen you jump from the helicopter and at the very least you'd expect them to run over and see what the helicopter slammed into but no, they just vanish. Leaving Faith and her sister to enjoy a nice quiet moment together.

Glad you're tackling Catalyst next. As much as I loved this game I've grown to hate EA and refuse to use Origin out of principle so I've never gotten around to playing the sequel/reboot.

Jade Star
Jul 15, 2002

It burns when I LP
I'm surprised to hear you say the plot is disjointed. It's pretty simple and you are right that there are multiple things going on at once but there are really only two main threads and every thing else is connected to one of those two. Kate is framed to advance Callahan's agenda and the Icarus project. Subset to those is the rescue of Kate, Ropeburn and PK, Celeste's betrayal, and Jack Knife's involvement. It all seemed simple and easy to follow for me but it's been a long time since I played it through in a sitting. One thing you said at the end was calling Jack Knife the big bad guy at the end and that struck me a little oddly. I never got the impression that he was the big bad guy ever. When you speak with him he is always talking with the attitude of 'there is someone bigger and more powerful out there, always'. At the very end he says 'Let's just say I know who the bigger fish are', That says to me that he's not the power player, he's not in control of anything but he knows enough to know who are sitting in power and is probably working under the direction and protection of a bigger and more powerful entity or organization.

Mr. Highway
Feb 25, 2007

I'm a very lonely man, doing what I can.
Good work on both LPs. I'm looking forward to Catalyst and possible discussions on it.

Jade Star posted:

I'm surprised to hear you say the plot is disjointed.

Not to speak out of turn, but I think "disjointed" might not have been the word Frenzy meant, or it could've been and Frenzy's just wrong. But, I get what he meant, especially with the last cutscene where Faith saves her sister and then has to save her sister again. The flow of the plot makes sense, but in a "crammed together" manner. The levels rarely have any connection, and the cutscenes between levels, from which we usually get the level connections, mostly restate elements the player already knows. On one hand, the overarching plot makes sense. On the other, one can see the seems were the story was sewn together. This can cause a disjointed feel because the player leaps from plot point to plot point rather than being eased into them.

FrenzyTheKillbot
Jan 31, 2008

Good Hustle
So, "disjointed" is the word I meant. However, in trying to come up with a more detailed explanation for why I think that, I sorta talked myself out of thinking that. Mostly. As Mr. Highway said the levels seem to jump around a bit, but when you lay it out Faith follows her lead from Jacknife to Ropeburn to the assassin. What really bothers me is that after that, she decides to infiltrate Pirendello-Kruger on essentially no information and with no idea what she's looking for, and this inexplicably leads her right to Project Icarus. Once you've seen the whole game, you can make the jump that the assassin is wearing the same gear as the Icarus cops, but at that point in the game you haven't gotten a good enough look at her. And that's not what the game does. It goes "hey look on the TV" and then jumps you to the next level (which I might mention is the one that begins with the cutscene of Faith running and no dialogue). I think that having thought about it more, I would say that most of the game actually goes together pretty well, it's just the one level that sticks out as not belonging or being wedged in there to try and tie the threads together.

The Jacknife thing I will stand by however. It's clear that he's not top of the food chain, in the final cutscene Faith says out loud that he's working for Callaghan. But we never see Callaghan, and Jacknife seems to take credit for both Project Icarus and Pope's death, which is the entire plot of the game. Which sorta brings me back to the disjointed thing, just because I don't understand why Icarus (Jacknife/Celeste) would be involved or in charge of killing Pope. I see how the story threads go together, it just seems really inorganic to me.

I do also want to say that it might be a while before Catalyst happens. I haven't started at all and might be working over the holidays, so who knows when I'll have time to get things going. I did happen to buy myself the comic book Mirror's Edge: Exordium, which is a much better game tie-in than the last one. It does a very good job setting the stage and introducing most of the major players.

Jade Star
Jul 15, 2002

It burns when I LP
Yeah I think you're fair on some of the hasty transitions between levels Frenzy, and in particular the rescue Kate/lose Kate immediately cutscene is super weak about it.

I still don't understand how you think Jacknife is taking credit for Icarus or Pope's murder. To me Jacknife reads as a loner who see's who the power players are and sells his allegiance for whatever best suits him. I have no thoughts that he was involved in Pope's murder. If he was, why would he point Faith to Ropeburn if he himself was the killer? Put Faith on a trail that leads back to him? Doesn't make sense. I thought it was pretty explicitly spelled out that Ropeburn was payed to betray Pope, and in turn hired Cel for the murder. Cel doing it as an act of good faith to cross the lines from Runner to being in the Callaghan camp.

So the assassination part is getting a little weaker here than I first thought, but still not seeing Jacknife as anything more than a smarmy rear end in a top hat who just has a better picture of all the players and whats going on than the Runners do.

White Coke
May 29, 2015
With all of Faith's friends dead or traitors who would she work with in the sequel that never happened?

Jade Star
Jul 15, 2002

It burns when I LP
Krieg was never shown as dead, and maybe the sequel would be about training Kate to live as a fugitive runner. And there's plenty of space to introduce more characters and add more lore and backstory to it. There's a lot of room to make up a lot of cool story and people and bits in the background of Mirrors Edge City setting.

FrenzyTheKillbot
Jan 31, 2008

Good Hustle

Jade Star posted:

Jackknife stuff


I mean maybe I'm putting too much emphasis on the fact that Jacknife is the one in the cutscene, and he's just puffing himself up to feel important. However, he is the one there filling the role of mastermind who brags about the plan before failing to kill the protagonist. He also says something about Faith tying up loose ends, which to me means he sent her to Ropeburn so they could kill him and frame her for it. Presumably she was supposed to die in the mall ambush and that would have been the end of it. I also don't think Ropeburn would be capable of just hiring Celeste. How would he be able to find this one specific runner who wanted to ditch the life on the edge. Only makes sense (to me) if she's involved with Project Icarus and gets the job through that. And the only person introduced in the story who would fill the role as head of Project Icarus is Jacknife.

Sometimes I like stories that are open to interpretation, for example Firewatch does it well, but the fact that we can't seem to agree on what Jacknife's role even was in the game seems like a failing to me.

White Coke posted:

With all of Faith's friends dead or traitors who would she work with in the sequel that never happened?

In my head Kate takes over from Merc as the handler/mission support. And then yeah there's a bunch of characters they could pull from the comic book or just make up new ones.

FrenzyTheKillbot fucked around with this message at 18:16 on Dec 14, 2016

Jade Star
Jul 15, 2002

It burns when I LP
It was pretty clearly stated that Jacknife used to be a runner, and by some of the dialog i got the impression that Faith and Jacknife dated. From there it would be pretty normal for Jacknife to know Celeste, and Merc.

You're right about him being the guy at the end and it seems a bit out of place since he was just sort of an aloof messenger/untrustworthy information source the previous times Faith Dealt with him.

FlamingLiberal
Jan 18, 2009

Would you like to play a game?



Jade Star posted:

Krieg was never shown as dead, and maybe the sequel would be about training Kate to live as a fugitive runner. And there's plenty of space to introduce more characters and add more lore and backstory to it. There's a lot of room to make up a lot of cool story and people and bits in the background of Mirrors Edge City setting.
I agree with the criticism that the story ultimately fails to make good use of its setting as a police state. That doesn't come into play as much as it should. I get the impression that they were a little more focused on the gameplay than the story when making this game since it was a much different game than had been seen before.

The plot isn't much different than your average 'fugitive story' or 'wrongly accused running from the police' deal. The background is incidental.

It does seem like a pretty bleak ending though, since for all appearances the Runners are either dead or working for the government (other than Faith). Callaghan gets what he wants at the end because he gets to frame Faith and her sister for the violence at the Shard being some kind of plot against the City. It makes the Runners look bad again.

White Coke
May 29, 2015

FlamingLiberal posted:

I agree with the criticism that the story ultimately fails to make good use of its setting as a police state. That doesn't come into play as much as it should. I get the impression that they were a little more focused on the gameplay than the story when making this game since it was a much different game than had been seen before.

The plot isn't much different than your average 'fugitive story' or 'wrongly accused running from the police' deal. The background is incidental.

It does seem like a pretty bleak ending though, since for all appearances the Runners are either dead or working for the government (other than Faith). Callaghan gets what he wants at the end because he gets to frame Faith and her sister for the violence at the Shard being some kind of plot against the City. It makes the Runners look bad again.

I think it works better as the birth of a true police state, with the mayor consolidating total power by the end. Sequels would have presumably then have dealt not only with Faith and Kate being framed but the consequences of security being even tighter and the resulting resistance that would create.

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Mr. Highway
Feb 25, 2007

I'm a very lonely man, doing what I can.

FlamingLiberal posted:

I agree with the criticism that the story ultimately fails to make good use of its setting as a police state. That doesn't come into play as much as it should. I get the impression that they were a little more focused on the gameplay than the story when making this game since it was a much different game than had been seen before.

I had always heard that the levels were designed first, and then the story was developed to tie them together.

As I said at the start, I like how non-threatening the police state appears in this story. That's probably the least generic part. My problem lies in the backstory and, like you said, the simplicity of the story progression. The game has the seeds to some good story (city police vs. PK, the political situation, the public's view of runners). The backstory, given in a brief flashback, always struck me as being an item on a mandatory checklist. The riots come off as lame when the game could do more to explore what the city was like before. Instead of giving depth, the game relies on a cliche.

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