Review: Alpha Protocol

[Terrified Android]

It's good to see that, Susan, you are always very honest and fair in your reviews.

as much as I had seen this game advertised on the site I would have expected a review of it to be a little. . . one sided (if you'll forgive me). but rightly so, you did a great job as usual, offering a truthful review, which i certainly didn't expect, these days, other reviewers are always giving games, "A perfect ten" "10/10, a rare gem" "Stunning, blah blah blah"

It's good to see good, honest reviews.

 

[Chakanus]

This is one of the games where I wish it was reviewed on this site before the star rating system was added. I'm playing it on pc, hard mode, and besides the occasional texture pop-in, and a few furious first attempts at the hacking, I'm enjoying it immensely.

If the person doesn't care too much about the graphics, and likes RPG's, I think this one is a possible keeper. Maybe it was the way it was advertised, but there are a lot of folks (not here) complaining about shooting a guy straight in the face and the character missing. The thing is, this game is an RPG in a spy world; it's not a shooter with (a lot) of RPG elements like Mass Effect. It's just an RPG where you get to shoot, and the mathematical mechanics are there as underlying rules.

I remember when I first picked up KOTOR, the first thing I did in Taris was entering a duel with some guy. I stood 5 m from him, shooting and missing, while the poor bastard shot and missed me, for a good 3 minutes, until the pc was so bored it killed that enemy just so I could move on with my life.

And it's not a stealthy game. It's an RPG where you can hit H and Hide in Plain Sight, causing criticals (thankfully there are no undead in this game). And sure the AI is just a wee bit... "special", but again, in hard mode, it's not overly ridiculous. Just has its quirks.

Someone in the official forums claimed that this game could potentially be the next Vampire The Masquerade Bloodlines, and I couldn't agree more. A fairly deeply flawed gem (VTMB was downright unplayable for me, which gets even less points), but one I'm sure I shall remember fondly and come back for it a great deal of times.... especially if some fans deliver a wonderful goody-patch like it happened for VTMB and KOTOR II.

 

[Rayansaki]

Where others fail, others will improve upon. Take a good look at Obsidian's job and don't make the same mistakes The Agency & Agent!

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

And this is why I'm holding out for subversion.

 

[Dommyboy]

I enjoyed the game until it got to some of the 'boss' fights. They're just insanely stupid and difficult. Though, the control glitches do not seem to be apparent on the PC version.

 

[Dectilon]

I would like to hear about these far superior spy games.

 

[albinoterrorist]

I enjoyed the game until it got to some of the 'boss' fights. They're just insanely stupid and difficult.

Yeah, I remember the first time I fought Brayko.. Took HOURS. D:

Still, Chain shot helps. A lot.

Regarding bugs, I have the PS3 version and a ye-olde 40GB fat PS3.

Never got the controller issues. True, at full zoom the sniper was VERY twitchy, but that's no real problem.

Got the graphical glitches everynow and again, but not often enough to break the immersion.

With this in mind, i'd recommend renting it. It's worth a try, if nothing else.

 

[Revolutionary]

Apart from the bugs looks pretty damn good.

 

[The Imp]

I've beat the game twice on pc and loved every minute of it. Sure, the graphics are really bad but i can live with that since they tried to combine my most favourite genres espionage and rpg.
Not necessarily the $60 worth for a console but definitly the 32.99? for the pc. And because full price games start at 45? this is even a budget titel.

 

[Susan Arendt]

*snip*

Our opinions are actually fairly close, but given what a buggy experience I had, naturally I scored lower than you. Really quite befuddled by the number of people who say they had no problems at all on the PS3. I'm wondering if perhaps the version of PS3 you have makes any difference at all. Because if something happens once, maybe twice, I'm happy to chalk it up to my imagination, but these issues were just too frequent to be all in my head.

I don't know. I had a friend who got all kinds of game-crashing bugs in Red Dead Redemption that I didn't get, and when he called Rockstar they said he probably got a bad disk, so maybe there's a little bit of that going on. Though if it provides any evidence for your theory I have one of the newer PS3s, the thinner one with a 120GB hard drive, I bought it when Heavy Rain came out, whenever that was. Not long ago.

Mine's one of the original 40 gigs. Interesting.

Oh, I also ran into more than one situation where there was something to pick up, but when I went to grab it, I ducked into cover instead. Very annoying, especially when the item in question was healing that I very much needed.

So far the only issues I've had is a laggy camera, but we'll see. I don't know why I haven't learned to just stay the hell away from Obsidian by now. Oh well, I guess this was their final chance with me.

Hmmm, interesting. Can't remember having any serious camera issues - well, no more serious than other games, I should say. More than once you end up in a corner looking at your hat instead of the guy you're trying to punch, but that's hardly a situation unique to AP.

 

[uk_john]

This review site doesn't even understand it should tell us what machine it was played on! The fact it doesn't doesn't help any of us at all - or the company!

It's like that RPG called Two Worlds, on PC ok to good, on console terrible - but go to threads and nobody tells you what they played it on - hence me believing that all the people complaining having the console version and all those praising the game having the PC version, but I could be wrong!

We ALL need to understand, both media and gamers, that when a game comes out on 2-4 formats, we need to tell gamers (either viewers of reviews like this or our fellow gamers) what format version we are talking about!

Can be get a little more IQ into our gamers and gaming sites?!

 

[Ixal]

Play the game on a real system, the PC, and nearly all of the negatives go away.
Alpha Protocol is a good game. It has some problems and rough edges, but it is very enjoyable.

 

[zauxz]

I think something might be wrong with your version of the game, I did not experiance any of the bugs you listed.

I loved every second of that game, it was just amazing.

 

[Kelorin]

Sounds like a failed attempt to recreate Mass Effect in a modern setting.
Let's see:
[x] - Computer hacking minigame
[x] - Safe cracking minigame
[x] - Picking pre-game character history
[x] - Combat, Stealth or Techie roles
[x] - Character can lean towards suave, ladykiller (Paragon) or ruthless badass (Renegade)

 

[Unhappy Crow]

Just like Gametrailers and Gamespot, this game is not worth buying. Just a rent unless you're really bored and want somnething to play to make time fly. I say skip it.

And on the side note, I still find the way he walks when crouch down so effing funny. It's like he has to go to the bathroom or got something caught up his rear.

 

[qwagor]

This is one of the games where I wish it was reviewed on this site before the star rating system was added. I'm playing it on pc, hard mode, and besides the occasional texture pop-in, and a few furious first attempts at the hacking, I'm enjoying it immensely.

If the person doesn't care too much about the graphics, and likes RPG's, I think this one is a possible keeper. Maybe it was the way it was advertised, but there are a lot of folks (not here) complaining about shooting a guy straight in the face and the character missing. The thing is, this game is an RPG in a spy world; it's not a shooter with (a lot) of RPG elements like Mass Effect. It's just an RPG where you get to shoot, and the mathematical mechanics are there as underlying rules.

I remember when I first picked up KOTOR, the first thing I did in Taris was entering a duel with some guy. I stood 5 m from him, shooting and missing, while the poor bastard shot and missed me, for a good 3 minutes, until the pc was so bored it killed that enemy just so I could move on with my life.

And it's not a stealthy game. It's an RPG where you can hit H and Hide in Plain Sight, causing criticals (thankfully there are no undead in this game). And sure the AI is just a wee bit... "special", but again, in hard mode, it's not overly ridiculous. Just has its quirks.

Someone in the official forums claimed that this game could potentially be the next Vampire The Masquerade Bloodlines, and I couldn't agree more. A fairly deeply flawed gem (VTMB was downright unplayable for me, which gets even less points), but one I'm sure I shall remember fondly and come back for it a great deal of times.... especially if some fans deliver a wonderful goody-patch like it happened for VTMB and KOTOR II.

After playing it for few hours (on PC), I have to say that I completely agree with the above statement (also with Korhal's review). Once I realised that AP is not ME2 like action game with RPG elements, but an actual RPG that just happens to look like third person shooter/stealth game, it clicked and I am enjoying it very much. I just finished Saudi Arabia (that would be like 1/5th of the game) and I'm already planning to play it 3 more times as each of the JBs...

 

[Korhal]

Mine's one of the original 40 gigs. Interesting.

Oh, I also ran into more than one situation where there was something to pick up, but when I went to grab it, I ducked into cover instead. Very annoying, especially when the item in question was healing that I very much needed.

The plot thickens.... Maybe there's something to you theory, Ms. Arendt.

Sounds like a failed attempt to recreate Mass Effect in a modern setting.
Let's see:
[x] - Computer hacking minigame
[x] - Safe cracking minigame
[x] - Picking pre-game character history
[x] - Combat, Stealth or Techie roles
[x] - Character can lean towards suave, ladykiller (Paragon) or ruthless badass (Renegade)

*headdesk* Yes, Mass Effect is clearly AP's primary influence, but it's much more different in practice than it sounds in a bulletpointed (and somewhat silly) list like that. Picking history? Being nice or being a jerk? Direct combat or specialist... sounds like almost every RPG.

 

[Frenger]

Looks like I might get this one, in a year or two when the price drop. And maybe they've patched it by then

 

[Jake Martinez]

Sigh. Still continuing with the love/hate relationship with Obsidian. They always come so close to making a stellar game...hopefully one of these days they can pull it together and overcome their faults, whatever they are (I'm guessing poor management and overbearing publishers).

Still looking forward to New Vegas though. If they screw that up (which would essentially be taking Fallout 3 and ruining it - it would have to be a spectacular failure), that'll be the end.

That is precisely what I hate about most game reviewers. Stop trying to be so bloody objective! Reading between the lines of this review I figured that Susan quite liked the thing but was worried that Joe G Public cannot enjoy what is actually a good game because it's not polished enough.

There's a difference between lack of polish and brokenness, though.

I think people blaming the publishers for Obsidians increasingly poor track record is a little played out by now. Other studios manage to consistently deliver engaging and fun games under publisher pressure, I don't see why Obsidian should get a pass, 3 or 4 times in a row on this score.

To me, the problems with this game seem to be all project management/design. For instance, the game has this great customization and upgrade system that is very engaging, but when you get into the field and encounter the enemy, their AI is so bad you could defeat them all with a can of silly string and a salami that has been sitting in the back of your fridge for 3 weeks. That's just terrible - it's like someone dreamed up this great system, focused a ton of effort on getting it implemented, then never bothered to actually see if it enhanced the gameplay (or even brought any actual value to the game experience).

Crashes aside, if the AI in this game wasn't so poorly implemented (even if it cost them say, half of the customization elements) the game would instantly become so much better.

Also, I think Susan should have mentioned how unbalanced the RPG elements of the character building are in this game. She might not have noticed because it doesn't seem that these type of games are her bag, but several of the skills (most notoriously in the stealth branch) are obscenely over powered to the point of making a very easy game ridiculously trivial.

 

[electric discordian]

I rather enjoyed this so far, however one thing I will say. You can "Gears" every level, there is no need for stealth or subtlety at all. Go in in Swat armour with the assault rifle and you literally cannot loose at all.

Which in some ways is a bit annoying. I look on it as if Mass Effect and Splinter Cell had a baby unfortunately they didn't know they shared a surname!