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Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

I got the chicken-killing one entirely by accident. I wanted to set a trap for a guard and run away, but then running away made the chickens panic and welp...

I've been on a stealth binge for the past few months. I started by playing NEON STRUCT and then decided that I missed stealth games, so I played Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, Dishonored 2, Styx: Shards of Darkness, Hitman Absolution, Hitman No Subtitle, MGS V, Sniper Elite 3 & 4, Aragami, and now I'm on Shadow Tactics Blades of the Shogun.

Aragami was neat. A bit buggy, but the way you used shadow powers was interesting. Like Dishonored, there was a power that could eliminate a bunch of enemies at once, but you had to draw guards to it and there still was an element of risk.

Styx 2 was really fun, although Styx is too talky and not quite as clever as the devs think he is. But the gameplay is great and the maps were really cool. Fortunately they didn't do the same thing as the last game where the second half of the maps were the same as the first half, just with a different starting point.

MGS V was my first MGS and it was ok, but I wasn't really seeing what the hype was about. Being able to fulton things was cool and the assortment of gadgets and companions made it fun, but I don't know...I think the open world kind of got boring pretty quick and there were only two maps. I wasn't crazy about the final boss being so combat-oriented too. I realize that boss fights are kind of an MGS thing, but it just seems to me that bosses in a stealth game should have a way to beat them that's stealth-oriented.

Anyways, up next are Invisible Inc, Death to Spies, and Republique. I also have Calvino Noir, but I don't plan on loading up on mobile-type stealth sidescrollers. I realized that I also have a game called "Velvet Assassin," but I've heard that it's pretty bad.

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Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Am I imagining things or do the characters on the main screen of Blades of the Shogun get more and more bloody as the game goes on?

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Lumpy the Cook posted:

I appreciate your passion for stealth gaming, but... have you played MGS1-4 yet?

Unless they've been ported to PC, I don't have a way to play them.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005


I'll give that a try, thanks!

Major Isoor posted:

Also, let me know how these go, if/when you wind up finishing them! I've been curious about buying/playing all three of these, so I wouldn't mind hearing opinions on them.

I'm still halfway through Blades of the Shogun so it might take me a while, but definitely. I've heard that Death to Spies is just low budget Hitman, though.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Just finished Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun, really great game. I loved how challenging some of the scenarios were. It was pretty easy to rely on Yuki's distract-and-trap, though.

Next up: Death of the Outsider. Has anyone tried it? I've heard it's more stealth-oriented than vanilla Dishonored 2.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Death of the Outsider is interesting so far, I just started the third mission. Because you don't have the Outsider's mark, you only have three default powers and you can't upgrade or change them in any way. You have Displace, which is like Blink except that you place a marker and then teleport to it. There's Foresight, which basically lets you invis + noclip so you can scout ahead. And finally you have Semblance, which lets you steal the appearance of an unconscious character. This lets you get past guards, but your mana runs out as you move. There's also no more mana potions, your mana will always recharge to full even if you completely drain it.

I think it's only stealth-oriented in the sense that you can no longer make yourself a killing machine, capable of taking on multiple guards with ease. If you want to deal with multiple NPC's, you'll need to either sneak past them or get some help from your friends "grenade" and "mine."

Seventh Arrow fucked around with this message at 01:20 on Sep 26, 2017

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Major Isoor posted:

The bolded part sounds especially great - I always found that annoying, when I want to just mess around, so having it always recharge (eventually) without needing to keep an eye out for potions is great.
Sounds good overall, too! I think I'll have to pick it up sometime, (soon, preferably!) as everything you just described is how I liked playing the main Dishonored games, anyway.

Although you have to be a bit careful, because your disguise could fizzle out when you're in the middle of a pack of cops. But if you keep an eye on your mana bar, it shouldn't be a big deal.

quote:

Although, just curious - does your D2 playthrough get factored in, at all? Specifically, in the mission "A Crack in the Slab", I believe it's called. Since in one playthrough I knocked whats-his-face out so he survived and Megan didn't lose her arm and get a scar on her face, while in my other playthrough I simply left him untouched so that the timeline would continue, and Megan continued to only have one arm. Will that change anything in DotO, if you know? (I'm not expecting anything major, but I suppose it might impact some dialogue and/or a minor choice, or something)

The game assumes that you knocked out whats-his-face from "A Crack in the Slab." So Billie starts the game off with her arm and eye intact. Although that only lasts one mission; you then get in a tussle with the Outsider and you get a weird void arm and terminator eye. This encounter also gives you your powers, although it's not apparent why, since you refuse the Outsider's mark. Maybe he just leaks void power like radiation or something.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

I don't know about that. Steam had a Bethesda publisher sale not long ago and of course DotO didn't get a discount, so it might be a while. Hopefully they might just wait until sales start to drop off before giving it a mini-sale or something.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Yeah the Jindosh mansion and Stilton manor were some really inventive level design, very ambitious. It was even fun to go through the Dunwall fortress at the end, too.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Just found out that "Dreadful Wale" is an anagram of "Farewell Daud" (DotO spoiler)

:eyepop:

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Man, that is some "Purloined Letter" level of craziness.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Ok, so I finished Death of the Outsider and I guess the TL;DR is that if you liked Dishonored 2, you'll probably like it. If you didn't like D2 then this is not going to change your mind. There's a bit of recycled content - Mission 3 takes place in the same area as Mission 2, except at night. However, in Mission 3 you can access the bank which does add a bit more content. Mission 4 takes place at the Royal Conservatory from Dishonored 2. The only differences are that now it's full of overseers instead of guards and witches; also, you can't even access the rest of the town. There are five missions total and in the last one you get to travel through the void and sneak around its inhabitants. Apparently they can be killed, but they seem to be quite damage-resistant. The ending was interesting, but they kind of played it wishy-washy with regards to the future. They didn't seem like they wanted to reveal too much about whether the future of the isles would change much or not. Believe it or not, you don't actually have to kill the Outsider. If you learn his name, he just becomes a normal dude and you literally leave him to wander the streets of Karnaca. How's he even going to get a job? There's definitely some good sneaking to be had here and the new powers are really neat.

edit: what game should I play next? Death to Spies, Republique, or Invisible, Inc?

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

So I tried out Death to Spies, as well as Death to Spies: Moment of Truth and its sorta-sequel Alekhine's Gun and I wasn't really feeling it. It's basically WW2 Hitman in Germany. You're a Russian spy infiltrating various Nazi strongholds by the use of disguises, and while that sounds cool, for me it didn't really hold up. The games are quite hard but often this isn't due to intriguing level design but clunky mechanics and lack of polish. The games seem to have good reviews on steam, but they seem to be by people who like this "uphill battle" level of challenge. I've decided instead to replay Fallout New Vegas for a bit and then I'll probably dive back into stealth with either Republique or a recent game called Serial Cleaner.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

So I finished Republique, and it's a bit of a mixed bag. For a brief overview, you play a teenaged girl named "390-H" or "Hope," as she calls herself. She lives in a totalitarian regime that seems somewhere between "1984" and "Brave New World." You play a hacker whose job it is to help guide Hope out of the world of Republique by way of making sneak.

I guess the first thing to point out is that this is really a point & click adventure game with stealth mechanics bolted on. You need to interact with the environment and items in your inventory to keep the story moving. This game is clearly a mobile port, so you control Hope by clicking on the spot that you want to move her to. You also have to take control of the cameras throughout Republique to not only see where Hope is going, but also to scout ahead for guards and obstacles. I quite liked the story and characters; you can collect media like tapes and emails that help flesh out parts of the story, like how the dictator (named Treglazov) came to power. This is good, because the gameplay is nothing special and the interface is rather clunky. The voice acting is also interesting, with David Hayter playing a charismatic rebel, Dwight Schultz as Treglazov, Khary Payton as a ruthless guard and Jennifer Hale in the most ridiculous french accent you've heard outside of Monty Python.

There are five episodes and it needs to be said that Ep 5 reuses maps from Ep 2 and all of the episodes feature a lot of backtracking. However, it's not a bad game and I rather liked it. Whether or not you should get it depends on how much point & click adventure you want in your stealth game.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Well, it seems to me that Death to Spies is difficult due to clunkiness and by design, so it's doubly hard; that said, people on the fence might want to watch a Let's Play to get a better idea.

I'm currently playing Invisible Inc and this is also challenging, but the challenge factor is well-designed. It's tricky, but not unfair - at least, not so far.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

I didn't have Dishonored 2 installed when I played DotO and it was fine.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

That looks cool...sort of like budget splinter cell. I've added it to my wishlist, although I'm wondering if you can really play it single player, or is it like Orcs Must Die 2 where playing it with anything other than two people is going to have you pulling out your hair?

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

I'm convinced that all stealth games are puzzle games, it's just that some of them (like maybe Hitman) are more overt .

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Yes, it's Amon Tobin all the way; I bought the soundtrack on itunes, it's great.

Chaos Theory is one of the all time great stealth games - although I played it again recently and found that some of the Korea levels were kind of lacklustre. But then again there's so many great setpieces there that it doesn't matter much. I think the boat is my favourite.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Major Isoor posted:

Speaking of which, I remember how in Chaos Theory (in the Japan mission I think, with the nightingale floors) there's a guy talking to his buddy about how his unit was attacked by a "ninja"/Sam while they were on a certain oil rig, talking about how the ninja was a ghost, slipping through the facility undetected, etc. :v: (Naturally I let that guy live, in all my playthroughs; even if I was playing aggressively)

If you nab him he says something like, "Oh cool, I'm gonna be killed by a ninja!"

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Blades of the Shogun is one of the best tactical stealth games out there. I gave it a very brief mini-review a few pages back. To sum it up: if you don't play Blades of the Shogun, the Elders of Stealth Gaming will hang their heads in shame.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

The game will actually remind you to quicksave every ~20 seconds or so.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Major Isoor posted:

:allears: In games like this I'd love the ability to be able to watch a real-time replay of the mission after you complete it, so you can see how your hours of work turn into a few minutes of perfectly-timed maneuvers and assassinations. Probably a bit too much to ask for I guess, for the game to record it, in addition to processing everything else that's going on.

While it's not as cool as that, you do have a "tandem task execute" kind of mode that lets you queue up your dudes to do a bunch of things at the same time. So task 1 might be the ninja throwing a shuriken at a guard, task 2 might be the sniper shooting a second guard, task 3 could be the samurai sneaking past the gate and then task 4 would be the rogue making a distraction. Press a button, and they all do everything at once.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

I think the shuriken has a cooldown, I don't remember it needing to be restocked. Yuki can lure guards away with a whistle and quietly kill them with a trap, so it's almost a challenge not to overuse her.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Major Isoor posted:

Oh, speaking of which, I remember reading that the shuriken (and all other attacks that aren't made by Mugen, I think?) don't hurt the top-level samurai enemies. So, is that the case for traps as well, or can those enemies still be killed by walking into Yuki's trap? (And if not, will the trap trigger and fail, causing the enemy to be alerted, or will it just sit there and remain untriggered?)

It's a moot point because the samurai enemies can't be lured away from their posts.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

rediscover posted:

i have no idea what this game is but this post makes me want to have it

Well the steam sale is on for one more day so now would be a good time to snag it.

In other news, I saw an upcoming stealth game on GOG called "Wildfire." You play a guy who can use the elements of fire, water, and earth to manipulate the environment and sneak around bad guys. It looks pretty neat from what I've seen so far:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cnX0Y_XCVo8

https://www.gog.com/game/wildfire

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Assassin's Creed Chronicles: China, India, Russia







After playing through the og Assassin's Creed, then II, Brotherhood and Revelations, I took a big long break from the series and never really showed interest in any of the subsequent titles (well ok, except for Rogue). However, AC Chronicles: China caught my eye, being touted as a 2D stealth game (or 2.5D, as you can move to levels in the background and foreground); it looked interesting and I figured I'd give it a whirl, but then found out there were two other entries, India and Russia. China takes place at the tail end of the Ming Dynasty, India takes place during the Sikh Empire, and Russia occurs during the transformative events of the October Revolution.

Of course, a side-scrolling stealth game is going to invite comparisons to Mark of the Ninja and I'll have to say right off the bat that none of the three topple MotN's status as a top-tier stealth sidescroller. I will say that they all have gorgeous art direction, especially in the backdrops as you play through the levels. China has a flowing, watercolour style to it; India is fashioned in more of a (of course) psychedelic-type direction; Russia looks like a Soviet-era propaganda poster come to life. All three of the games give the player a different set of gadgets which they can use to leap, sneak, and shimmy stealthily through each level. The game works best when it gives the player a stealth puzzle and free reign to solve as desired, either dispatching enemies or ghosting through to your heart's content.

Unfortunately, India and Russia seem terribly confused as to what a stealth game is. Both games are marred by very unforgiving timed sequences that players must barrel through or replay from the start. These contain what I refer to as hard timers (a literal numeric countdown appears on the screen) and soft timers (the player must outrun the fire or apprehend and NPC before he reaches the door, etc). It seems hard to believe that someone would actually make a stealth game where you would see words like "Hurry! Get to place X in time!" on the screen, but here it is. Even people who like to play stealth games in a more action-y way (Dishonored, Splinter Cell Blacklist) still have the freedom to play at their own pace. Also, the combat is pretty clunky, at least with m+kb. Fortunately, you don't really need to do all that much combat but China and India each have a bossfight where you can't avoid it.

Overall, I would say that if you're really jonesing for a 2D stealth game then give China a try. I wish I could recommend India and Russia more because of the great art direction but I think you should only try them out if you're willing to endure some pretty unforgiving action sequences.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

hey man EXPOSITION is NO JOKE



comrade

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Funny that you should ask, but you go to ask your ol' pal Leon (Trotsky) what's going on and he BETRAYS YOU!!!

Also, you play part of the game as Anastasia because why not.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Yeah, Anastasia Romanov manages to escape the Bolshevics and runs into the protagonist, Orelov. Orelov decides to help her but then she touches a precursor artifact that he was wearing on his neck and she becomes possessed by the spirit of the AC China protagonist. This gives her stabby-stabby assassin abilities and so you play parts of the game as Orelov and part of the game as Anastasia. Orelov has a bunch of gadgets and Anastasia has some abilities that make her temporarily invisible. See? It all makes sense!

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

The real villain of the game actually turns out to be the Russia chapter of the Assassins, since they want to experiment on Anastasia and find out how she got her stabby-stabby powers. But joke's on them, she ends up stabbing them all.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

"I love hamburgers" - Mahatma Gandhi

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Shadwen





Shadwen is a fairly bog-standard third-person stealth game, with a few twists. In it, you play a pseudo-Scottish she-assassin venturing throughout pseudo-Scotland on your mission to kill the king. On your way, you cross paths with an orphaned youngster named Lily. Lily accompanies you on your adventures, either avoiding guards or slitting throats as you go. If that makes this sound like a giant escort quest, it kind of is and isn't. Fortunately, Lily cannot be discovered by the guards and can do nothing to induce a failure state owing to her actions. So what's the point of having her around? You can only unlock the door at the end of each level with her present so you need to guide her by either distracting the guards or dispatching them as you see fit. Even though she can't be seen, she will act as if she can and will only move from hiding spot to hiding spot if none of the guards have line of sight on her intended path.

That's the first twist. The second twist is that the game also has a SuperHot-esque gameplay aspect where time stops when you're not moving. This is very useful since you have a grappling hook and can leap in midair and then look around your surroundings to determine the best precipice or platform to get around. You can also pull off some nifty moves, swooping down to knife a guard, then using the grappling hook to pull a barrel onto his buddy's head and then swooping up a floor to chuck a bomb at another guard. There are some examples of these kinds of shenanigans here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hmoqcxQNS0

There's also a key that lets time pass normally if you want to watch guards patrol or whatever. Another aspect to Lily's accompaniment is that her disposition towards you will change depending on whether you go on a murder spree or not (and whether she actually sees you killing anyone). I was stabbing guards left and right and let me tell you, she was downright grouchy about it! The gameplay can be quite fun, but the levels are very same-y; except for the king's castle in the last level, they're all your typical medieval peasant fantasy surroundings. This is surprising for a game by the guys who gave us the Trine series. I'd also like to add that if you dislike stealth games with a binary pass/fail state, you are not going to like Shadwen. A guard being alerted is an instant fail, however the last twist is that you can easily rewind to any point in the current level, even right to the very beginning. This works very smoothly and was great for experimenting with different strategies. You can craft gadgets, but a lot of them are rather situational; the traps are quite noisy so if you're going to use them you need to account for every guard in the immediate vicinity closing in on the area of impact.

Overall I thought it was well done but not without some noticeable flaws. If you're hankering for an old-school third-person stealth game you can't go wrong picking it up; otherwise maybe wait for a sale.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Yes agreed, but considering how little the time-stop was used, I wonder how much they had to practice before doing the video.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Clandestine





Clandestine is a third-person stealth game that takes place in the mid-90s. You play the part of Katya Kozlova, agent of an off-the-records spy agency to do espionage-y things while the CIA & FBI aren't looking. It's a fairly standard stealth game, the gimmick here is the emphasis on co-op. Katya is teamed up with hacker and turbonerd Martin Symborski. Admittedly I didn't play it co-op, but I don't see how the game would be fun for anyone playing as Martin; all you do is hack the occasional door or computer by way of Deus Ex-ish minigames. It's simple enough that you can actually do it in single-player just by opening the hacking screen and playing the minigame yourself, as long as you're out of sight of guards or cameras. Speaking of cameras, these are the biggest challenge/pain in the rear end in the game. The player (or their partner) can only hack one camera at a time, so it's very easy to accidentally mosey into a different room and set off a big ol' alarm because no one thought to disable the camera there. You have a window of time to evade the camera's notice, but it's not very long. Also you can't save whenever you want, the game instead uses a checkpoint system and can sometimes be rather stingy with those checkpoints.

The story is fairly standard spy thriller stuff. One thing that I thought was amusing was that one of your superiors tut-tuts you if you engage in any killing during the mission, but the superior that you actually report to is usually all, "Yes! No living witnesses! High-five!" Also, your Q-guy at one point gives you grenades packed with nerve toxin and makes it clear that using them will cause your victims to die an excruciating and torturous death. But hey, at least they're not in the hands of teenagers, right?! Oh yeah, the voice acting is dire...the only bright spot is that one of your fellow spies sounds like the same guy who played the Alpha Protocol protagonist. There were also some level-crushing bugs that required me to restart a level a few times. Overall, while the setting had some promise, I can't really recommend the game for stealth enthusiasts and definitely not stealth newbies looking to get into the genre. At best, it might offer some cheap drunk co-op fun.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Serial Cleaner





Serial Cleaner is a top-down stealth game where you play the part of Bob Leaner, a single dude in the 1970s living with his retired mom. You're an expert "cleaner," meaning that you rush to the scene of grisly murders and clean up any bodies and evidence before the police can process everything. Of course, complicating things is that the authorities are usually on the scene at the time, so you need to skillfully evade them while dumping bodies, picking up evidence and hoovering up blood with your noisy industrial vacuum cleaner. Bob doesn't only work for the mafia though - he's willing to help out serial killers and anyone else who can help him clear out his looming debts.

There are a number of gimmicks that help you navigate your way through those messy police investigations; first of all, there are hiding places like bushes, closets, and the ever-trusty cardboard box. One thing that's interesting about the hiding places is that they are inviolable. The cops can be hot on your heels and see you dive into a closet but once you're there, they'll look around for a bit and take off. You also have shortcuts, which are trapdoors that allow you to essentially teleport from one end of the map to the other; shortcuts can be visible to the cops though, so you have to be careful before using them. As well, there are movable objects, like dressers, cars, automated doors, etc. These can be used to block off a cop's patrol route or field of vision. Finally there are noise distractions like speakers or appliances that will lure the authorities away for a while. Getting to know these gimmicks is essential because you can't take out any of your enemies and you don't have any gadgets like smoke bombs or stun guns to help you get out of trouble. If you get spotted, your only hope is to either grab a shortcut or get to a hiding place.

The game seems fast, especially because the movement is reminiscent of Hotline Miami...however, you can actually go at your own pace and make each level as long or as short as you like. I liked Serial Cleaner quite a bit, but it only held my interest for a level at a time. The levels get to be quite expansive and clever, though, so your mileage may vary - especially because it takes a lot of mistakes to find out the best way around the cops (who have a huge vision cone, by the way) and this may impact your frustration level. That said, if you're in the mood for a unique stealth game that isn't afraid to do things a little differently, then I'd say it's certainly worth a try.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

The publisher could barely be bothered to put out a patch for the first game, so probably not.

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Interesting interview about Thief 1's growing pains:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzD9ldLoc3c

Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Volume





Volume is a third-person stealth game by Mike Bithell, of "Thomas Was Alone" fame. It takes place in a dystopian England and you play the part of Robert Locksley, a young vigilante who wants to arm the populace with the means to overthrow their industrialist oligarchs. He does this by breaking into simulations of government strongholds and broadcasting his efforts as they occur.

The setup for each of Volume's levels is pretty familiar stealth territory. Each level is populated that guards that you have to avoid or distract with an eye towards collecting gems - when you have enough of these, you can head towards the exit. The gems apparently represent goods that Locksley's fellow Brits can swipe in the real-world equivalents. The guards can't be killed, but the game gives you tools to distract, elude or stun them in various ways.

There is the Bugle, a device that bounces off walls and will emit a sound when the player activates it. This way, you can set it off behind a guard to get them to look the other way. Then there's the Oud, which is a similar idea, but it will stick to walls so that you can time your distractions more accurately. Another gadget is the Figment, which creates a replica of you that runs in a straight line, causing the guards to give chase. And there are other items that allow you to become invisible, quiet your steps, or knock out guards. The environments adopt a growing number of challenges as well - there will be, for example, floors with "noise tiles" that create a loud AOE sound when you step on them. There will be locked forcefields and stun-capable electric floor tiles and, of course, deadly timed lasers. There are also an increasing variety of guards but most of the gimmicks here involve larger and wider vision cones.

I thought Volume was a great challenge overall, even if you're already quite familiar with the stealth genre. There are a lot of great puzzles, some of which can be maddening at first but are very satisfying to solve. If there are any complaints to be had it's that the levels esthetics can be very same-y after a while. Of course, the fact that they're all holograms is done - I imagine - because the game is largely a one-man development effort but it isn't helped by the fact that all the interesting stuff happens outside of the level. When you're at the level selection screen, you're given a fantastic tale about how the overwhelming military crushed a rebel force and then it loads a hologram of the military HQ where you steal some data. The hologram HQ looks very similar to a hologram TV studio where you read that a psychotic serial killer picked off her victims before escaping, and so on. Also, with 100 levels I feel like it overstayed its welcome somewhat. Still, you can go at whatever pace you like
or even use the level editor to make your own maps. Of further interest, the soundtrack is great and Andy Serkis voices the game's antagonist.

Volume is completely worth checking out if you're a fan of the stealth genre.

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Seventh Arrow
Jan 26, 2005

Seven: The Days Long Gone







Seven: The Days Long Gone mixes sci-fi and fantasy, as well as stealth and RPG for an intriguing experience. You play Teriel, a low-level thief who plans a grand heist at a local mansion. Unfortunately, an encounter with a strange device leads to him being sent to the prison island of Peh, accompanied by a daemon named Artanak. The story is so-so and the factions are not very interesting, but a lot of the background lore is fascinating and the island itself is more varied than you'd think a prison isle would be. The voice acting is also great, and I really liked the visuals. Despite the RPG leanings, there is no xp and no character levels. You mostly level up by acquiring and upgrading gear (via crafting). The crafting is just kind of there, there's nothing terrible special about it although it's mostly used for upgrading gear that you already have. Getting better gear is usually a matter of taking down stronger enemies and seeing what goodies are in their inventory.

The stealth gameplay itself is pretty great, the first part of the game gives you a proper stealth mission to sneak around in, giving you a good idea of how the mechanics work. There's no shadow-based sneaking, it's all line of sight. Your character can climb up on objects to navigate and to avoid detection; as usual, you can shank guards from behind and also from overhead if you get the jump on them. Guards can be dumb in some ways, while smart in others. Dumb in the sense that seeing a dead body elicits no suspicion on their part...in fact, sometimes they'll helpfully vanish a dead body for you! However, they're a bit smarter in that if they spot you, they'll alert their nearby buddies and also check any nearby hiding places. You can distract them with a thrown rock, but they'll suspect that something's up and will sometimes search nearby hiding places as well. Since Peh is an open world, you're probably not going to be stealthing around all the time - that would get tedious. Mostly, you'll stealth when you infiltrate certain locations. You get a helpful icon on your screen when you're in a prohibited area, so you know when to start skulking about.

I appreciated the lack of fetch quests; there are a few of them there, but overall I found a lot of cool little stories throughout the island. For one, a merchant was having power problems with his cooler and got me to investigate. This had me using Seven's brand of detective vision to follow the cables over the island to find the source of the problem. Along the way, I ran into an insane mage who was wanted by the state for treason. I freed the cops he was holding hostage and we all got in a big battle with him; it was only by ripping his heart out that we were able to defeat him (I then had to return the heart to an computerized questgiver). Another time, I encountered a locked safe; once I hacked the combination, it contained a note that led to another safe, and these led to a few more safes until I finally got a note leading me to a master locksmith on the island. I had to break into his mansion and avoid his guards, whereupon he challenged me to come with him to infiltrate the tomb of The First Locksmith. When we got there, he said a prayer to the God of Lockpicking and we solved a big floor puzzle and plundered the giant neon tomb that came forth. And these are just the sidequests. Another thing I liked is that for you to uncover a set of fast travel nodes, you have to break in to the local police station and hack the primary terminal (called an overseer) without being spotted. One of them was even located in the main police HQ, a sprawling facility where I had to sneak through overhead rafters, outdoor pipes, and training halls just to get to the overseer. I thought that was pretty cool.

Really, if you just burn through the main mission, I think you'll have a short and not-so-immersive experience. Much of the fun is had through exploring Peh and stealthing through its contents. Finally, the game received a bad rap on release due to bugs and playability but apparently they've pushed out six big patches and several minor ones since then. I really didn't have many issues playing it - I did encounter a few crashes but they were all while loading and never interfered with gameplay itself. I really enjoyed Seven TDLG and its wealth of content. I highly recommend it, even at full price.

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