Alpha Protocol Review
Short Version: Alpha Protocol is a Mess! The combat is a chore, the AI is laughable and the game is clearly unfinished with the SLOWEST loading textures I have ever come across! Only the intriguing story, shifting character allegiances and unmatched dialogue system manage to redeem the entire experience for fans of RPG’s & Spy Stories, but only just.
What you’ll Like:
• The Dialogue system is the best of its kind right now. Your choices have actual consequences not superficial ones – completely different responses from NPC’s, bonus missions, and new equipment and favors can all be gained through masterful manipulation.
• The Story was Involving & characters were flavorful – I felt like a Jason Bourne, romancing ladies, hacking computers, and uncovering evil plots.
• Fun reading and replying to spy emails, gathering intel and customizing Weapon & Armor while planning your approach.
• Not all missions involve shooting, some are solely to establish relationships and gather more intel for the future.
What you’ll Hate:
• The AI is EXTREMELY Inconsistent effectively breaking the combat portions of the game. Going from walking targets to hyper sensitive one-hit killers that spam grenades every 3 seconds.
• Pistols and SMGs are so laughably inaccurate even with mods that they are useless.
• Broken Stealth play, and some useless skill trees break the Illusion that you can approach a mission anyway you want. You cant.
• Numerous Bugs & Glitches can break checkpoints and refuse to load the next level.
• Are you serious? At one point it took the game 30+ seconds to load a texture on a simple pistol! And whats with all the blur effects?
Final Verdict:
Slightly Below Average
4/10
RENTAL RECOMMENDATION
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165 thoughts on “Alpha Protocol Review”
I watched this review long before I decided to purchase the game.
I just recently bought the game with the lowest possible expectations. Within an hour I was hooked. I truly enjoyed every bit of the game. The combat system is a little difficult to master, but I believe that to be at the core of the rpg/3ps crossover.
Every gun has it’s own unique firing style. The pistol is meant to be honed on the target for accuracy. Not just fired rapidly at an enemy at a considerable (but not great) distance, pistols are mainly for the stealth classes anyhow and fire fights would most of the time be avoided. Maybe I don’t know exactly what I am trying to say, just when I was watching you play and the footage that you used as an example looked so much worse then it would look if things were being done properly(and I’m not trying to sound like a pompous ass, but it just seems like the guns weren’t being used properly etc.) . That’s why pistols have the precision shot, where you hold the reticule over the guy for 1.5 seconds and you have (for most enemies at least) a one shot kill. Or the pistol’s chain shot ability that allows you to freeze time and score 6 guaranteed critical shots and can dispatch a room of enemies. I mean, yes SMG’s are horribly inaccurate, but the again, they were meant to be, and that’s why they have the Bullet Storm/John Woo mode ability that gives you 20 seconds of no reloading and infinite ammo to do what holding two SMG’s sideways does best “Spray and Pray”.
I would never ask for a rating change, and I certainly do agree with the game feeling unfinished. But I feel that the only real problem the game had was a tough learning curve for the ACTUAL way combat was supposed to be done. I know KOTOR was mentioned several times by other people, imagine someone playing that for the first time expecting more of a SW Battlefront-esque combat system, it would feel strange and I am sure to some broken. I feel many people came in expecting Mass Effectish combat system. I believe Alpha Protocol’s combat system to be more skill system and environment based than just straight-up combat. My first play through was one of a stealth class, did it take some getting used to, yes, but it got to a point where I was a veritable Sam Fisher, eliminating EVERYTHING without detection. Again I blame the learning curve of the game. As far as bugs and whatnot, I bought a newer copy of the game and While textures still take a few seconds to load it was never long enough to be a distraction. I have yet to find a bug either (I’m not saying you haven’t but I am saying it may just be relative.)
Really I am just Disappointed that SEGA has called off a sequel, EVERYTHING ELSE about the game was unarguably excellent. And I feel that perhaps people were judging it based on games like Mass Effect’s standards and it’s simply not, it is it’s own entity, and I would have loved to have seen what they could have done to improve it. Like I said, I don’t really know what I am trying to say, but I felt like I had to say something. I guess there is just something i am missing.
Obsidian eh? They did a terrible job on knights of the old republic 2! I mean sure kotor 2 was a good game but the obsidian assholes that worked on it cut out a LOT of the story and gameplay from the game. If Bioware didnt have other projects to work on by the time kotor 2 was developed i would have liked if they worked on kotor 2. Bioware always live up to expectations(And they have got TOR to prove it)
Damn that conversation system looks awesome, like a Persona game in real time. Shame everything else sucks
I think they fix some of the problems that angry Joe said with the not loading of sections as well as the loading of the that machine takes forever bug.
I recommend Indigo Prophecy to ANYONE who liked this game because of the dialogue. The game has great dialogue, and is VERY reliant on this. By this, I mean the game is more like an interactive movie than a game, if that makes sense. If you only play action- packed shoot-em ups, then do NOT get Indigo Prophecy. If you like your game to focus on your actions in dialogue, and what you prioritize on changing the game a lot, then Indigo Prophecy is for you! (sorry for… basically advertising a game here, it’s just that when you showed the dialogue system, I was immediately thinking of Indigo Prophecy)
I thought this game was one of the best releases in 2010. But I’m an RPG buff. I loved every single bit of the interactions, characters, gameplay, skills etc.
Stealth/Pistol/Melee resulted in the finest asskicking scenarios in videogame history. I felt like Jason Bourne kicking ass and takin’ names. It was totally awsome.
The strongest points were dialogue, choice, story and feeling. That’s REALLY what made this game. It’s abit linear in a sense that the maps you play feel like corridors. The bugs, AI and somewhat freakishly hard puzzles made the game abit less enjoyable. But, I NEVER found it boring tho. I was always on my toes just to see what came next. It pulled me in completely. Bugs don’t really bother me, never really have, never really encountered super-human AI and the puzzles (Lock-picking, circuit break or computer hacking) just made it feel more realistic.
So in other words, i thought it kicked ass.
I just got the game and to be honest,its not THAT bad.Yes the combat gets redundent but im enjoying it.So far though,I haven’t come across many glitches/bugs.But I still love this review!
this game reminds me of Mass effect 1, cause a lot of the problems and good things in Alpha protocol were also in Mass effect 1, just that the problems weren’t as bad in ME1 then they were in AP, hell the devs were even gonna make the sequel of AP so that you could import your save from AP1 and have all your choices effect what happens in AP2, like mass effect! :O
to all you idiots that say the game doesn’t works like *I want*, then the game is *wrong/bad*”. its a fuckin RPG!!! it suposed to work how you want it to i think Joe is right on this reveiw
P.S. titys
Joe i agree with you I was very dissapointed at one part i wasnt even seen ( im playing stealth) and suddenly i went right and they went right and shot throught the wall. I agree joe good review
That was the most awesome news program i have ever seen at the end.
Bought this on the Steam sale for £16 quid I think. So far seen the ultra aware guards and one example of the suicidal rush guy doing the dodge thing. The textures also sometimes load incorrectly and take a few seconds to appear too.
Certainly the best part of the game is indeed the dialogue scenes and the weakest, sadly the actual gameplay.
On a strong spec PC I’d give this game (so far, only got to the user choice base bit) a 5/10.
This Review left me angry and confused, for I am now about 10 hours into the game and
- have not yet encountered a single of the “cheater” enemies
- not any of the mentioned bugs either
- and my Stealth/Pistols/Melee-Build works out just great!
My points of critique: So yeah, the textures take way too long to load as well as everything else. High Stealth makes some parts rather unchallenging.
You pretty much hit the nail on the head in this one Joe. I just did a check out/rental for this game at my store….it was really underwhelming for the AI, the controls, the graphics (although surprisingly it wasn’t as long for my system for the loads :/ ), it was definitely the main draw of choices and most of the story that’s really worth it.
If there’s someone out there who wants to buy this game, definitely rent it or at the very most, wait until it gets lower in price like $30 at best.
I’ll be honest, Joe, this game kinda flew below my radar, which is sad, when you consider I love RPGs to the point where I am no longer allowed inside buildings belonging to the Catholic church… If the dialog system’s as good as you say, I’ll definitely consider renting this and hey, thanks a million for the pre-warning to use your build; I suspect that saved my sniping, sneaking self one HELL of a headache.
I’ll tell you what though; I want to see Neverwinte Nights 3 come out from Obsidian. With this kind of dialog options, that game could kick ASS. Especially if they included a few old favourites from NWN2. Neeshka as a valid romance option, anyone? Come on, Obsidian, toss us a bone here! At least with the Dungeons and Dragons system of combat, you can’t screw it up this badly!
Wow. Another publisher-rushed Obsidian game. What a shocker.
Seriously. I wanted this game to do good when Game Informer first showed it in 2008, but I just had this gut feeling that it would dissapoint one way or another. 2 years later, it turns out I’m right.
I don’t even know why Obsidian would release it in this state. Maybe because they thought they could quickly patch everything up later?
Hope this doesn’t cut into New Vegas too badly.
Apparently, Chris Avellone’s recent interview at E3 did corroborate with A Tired Dev’s post on Joystiq’s review. The development team was really in a bad state, and from what I’ve read on A Tired Dev’s posts, an unknown number of devs walked out on Alpha Protocol mid-production. I’m really fucking disappointed with the game as a result of that, and to add insult to injury, it ended up as a waste of $70 bucks including the fact I pre-ordered the damn game.
The intro scene is inaccurate…
Question; Did you try zooming? Not just aiming but zooming and trying a critical shot?
Also – There is more than one way to play. You can play though as a commando, sure… the easiest way to play it. But you can also play through it stealthy; have you actually tried it? And, yes, the SMGs are laughably bad, but the pistols aren’t as bad as you say they are… If you want to use a certain weapon, try leveling up the skills on it.
I thought the game was fun… boring at parts, and some REALLY bad AI, but fun, none the less.
Well i played the pc version and i didn’t encounter one single bug but i just might be lucky cause i played it only once. I had an operative with pistols and melee build and the battles were always the same : waiting in a cover till my critical shot gets ready and then kill any enemy or use the multyshot ability and kill 5 enemies at once or if someone gets close kill him with fists. The only negative that I agree with here is the very poor AI and the insane loading times for accessing computer and shop.
Oh and I don’t hate musslems I just wonder what went through thouse spacific guys heads.
Sorry if I don’t know if the cap locked letters make it look like you needed to review it but really you don’t need to.Well IMO (In My Opion or however you spell it) the game takes three awsome stuff my son loves and then jams it into one kick ass game.But what’s weird is many people bash the game saying things like:”Oh this game sucks so don’t pick it up” or “I hate this friggen game.”.I have no clue why anyone hates this.either they hate the fact your killing Fricken taliban which are a group of muslem bad guys or they just hate the fact you need to plan out and not charge in like in the game Modern Warfare 2.Well thats enough blabering from me hope you decide to review this wonderful work of art.Well that is IF you want to review it.Sorry for typos.
I have a game that I wonder if you could review.I’m NOT saying you NEED to review it I was just wondering if you could give it a shot at what the guys made.OK it’s called Close Combat first to fight for the xbox,pc,and i think ps2.It is a tactical fps.
Just ran through it as a melee charachter on normal difficulty. Not stealth+hand-to-hand, just hand-to-hand and toughness. AI shooting really can’t handle it when you just run straight at it, I would suggest it to anyone going for a “no orphans” run since somehow punching someone in the throat until they collapse is never fatal. It was actually much easier than using the Assault Rifle.
You know, I see this game getting a four out of ten, & it hurts me to see that. I had a ton of fun with this game. However, when I try to think of a reason why it shouldn’t… there’s nothing. It’s tragic that such potential had to be squandered like that, but I kind of saw it coming. My guess is that Obsidian spread it’s resources a little too thin between this & New Vegas, & at the end of the day, couldn’t devote the staff necessary to finish the project to meet Sega’s deadline. Here’s hoping we get a sequel when Obsidian isn’t wanking off to the money mountain that is Bethesda.
As for load-out, i actually went with Martial Arts, Toughness, & Assault Rifles, as I found that my fucking hands got the job done better than just about any weaponry available. that’s either ridiculously stupid or outrageously brilliant, take your pick.
I actually liked alpha protocol, sure the dialogue helped a lot with this, but i like the whole story in general. And since i don’t care about easy/hard difficulty, just the story plot.
I played the PC version, and i think if you have a decent computer, you’ll be fine. My computer is a 2.8Ghz processor, Nvidia GTX 260 graphics card. I didnt really have any trouble with freezes or no textures not showing up, and when they did it was only for like a half second, and for me that’s nothing to jump and blow fire out my eyes and butt cheeks about.
I used Easy, recruit, and focused on stealth/pistols/melee skills and a little of sabotage. at the very beginning i was hating this game because it seemed like they always knew you were coming no matter how hard you try to conceal yourself, behind walls or creeping up behind someone. but once you were about a quarter the way done with the skill tree in steath, things got extremely easy. Until i fought boss battles then i got my butt handed to me for lack of health upgrades and everything else.
Overall, i think this game is alright and it is addicting with the dialogue system. And i believe that this game should get at least a 5/10, if not a 6/10.
I know Joe reviews most of his games on Xbox 360, but if it’s possible couldn’t he try to review the other systems? i know it’s expensive, but i guess it should only happen when permitted. cause if i played this game on the 360 i’d understand fully with his verdict, i believe the 360 version does deserve a 4/10.
I feel the other systems deserve a chance as well since the pc wasnt really put into consideration this time around and i believe people would be more incline to try this out on pc, or ps3 if it doesnt have the same trouble as 360
I got the pc version of this game And I hardly noticed most of the bugs. Though in the video I saw you just hold and fire, why didn’t you hold aim and wait for a critical shot? Ah well you were probaly showing the broken firing of normal shooting. I went with Stealth Sabotage and tech using Assault rifles and SMG’s as my main weapons. I was rarely, if ever, seen and my main tactic was to use distance or rushing and melee when the alarms all sounded. I used Utility armors with stealth increase and damage reduction items. I had maxed my main stats, some assult rifle skill, the first active SMG skill unlocked, and knockdown melee. The rest was in toughness.
The only problem I found was hit boxes on that darn helicopter near the end; not to spoil anything but I reloaded that checkpoint more times then any thing before! I do agree on the game for the rst though; the addicting npc talking and choices you have, though only small parts can effect huge parts later ((Muaha Sis your all mine!))
This is one reveiw I have to not agree with one on this. Mabey it was a PC port or something else. Any who talking about PC ports Sims 3 is come to PS3, X-box 360, Wii, and DS.
I have to say that the controls for Splinter Cell Convection are very akward. LB is crouch which is very weird.
Well i must say, the PC version must be a lot better, never saw any of these bugs or glitches you talk about and the only time a saw a texture pop in was once at the inventory screen and then that was only like half a second after i opened the inventory…
As for AI, i played this game with stealth, pistol and martial arts as my main skills, sneaking around taking guys out one by one from behind or in the worst case knocking them out with a series of melee attacks while picking of enemies left and right with my pistol, didn’t notice any of the cheater bots. Only thing i can complain about the ai other than maybe being slightly stupid is that one boss that kept spamming grenades all over the place.
Oh and as much as i agree that the story is wonderful and the dialogue system is pretty smart there was a few times i got really angry about it, best example being this one time when a guy told me he had a proposal for me, natural i choose the dialogue option named proposal because i want to know more about this proposal of his. What happens? My characters start talking about proposal being well nice but he is rather fond of his life as a bachelor. Give me the mass effect system any day, nothing has beaten that this far.
On thing i would really want to know is what moron approved the animation for crouching, it’s horrible, i can’t say i liked the one in Splinter Cell Conviction to much either but at least that one looks like a motion a real human could actually do just not the most effective way of crouching, Alpha Protocols crouch animation is just retarded.
So yea I played the game before this review came out and I gotta say I liked it. Oh and just to prove that I played it the “worst” possible way I played recruit with pistols and smg’s and I played a stealth build. I’ll admit I didn’t use the SMG’s but that was because at the higher levels of pistols it becomes the best stealth weapon ever. True if you peak your head out some A.I. will auto detect your ass which is annoying but at a certain level of pistols you can do critical headshots FROM COVER! Playing on recruit was hard but that’s the point it is suppose to be challanging you are suppose to be a green agent who doesn’t know anything solid in skills. Plus once you complete recruit you can play as a vet. which gives you i think double the amount of AP than the other four builds. Also when playing the game as a vet whenever you where forced to pick between two different objectives in the previous games as a vet you can pick both. Such as saving an ally AND getting the intel from the vault. Also at mid level of stealth you can obtain Master awareness which is like the regular awareness from the beginning of the game only it STAYS ON FOR THE REST OF THE GAME! Making stealth kills much much easier. Funnily (I am aware it is not a word) enough I did not like the dialoge system. The real time real consequence was awesome. But sometimes the one word descriptions were not enough. also the A button was used entirely for the “special” responses which range from execution, revealing special information, to ending the conversation early. Sometimes these “special” actions where not distinct enough for me to know what they did. In one instance the action was simply labeled “PDA” Picking that option it immediatly ended the conversation making me have to reload. To me it would be a little less frustrating if the time limit was incresed a little and the choices were described a little better than one word choices something like mass effect. Another thing I didn’t like about the game was the frequency of the other characters. While I doubt I’m the only one to complain about this. It was the lack of Sis. Yes I am a younger person so the one girl I was attracted to was Sis. (SIE was weirdly enough was my favorite second) but you only get one (I guess technically two) scene with her were you get to interact and gain rep with her. And then you find out that rep with her really doesn’t amount to anything. I honestly don’t think you can gain more than 3 rep with her! I will admit the game is not finished and is far from good but I just wanted to write this because I didn’t feel like the review was very fair.
“the most disappointing title of 2010″ huh?
well Joe, don’t jump the gun too early we still have plenty of “good” title games coming out later on this year that has a “good cinematic trailer” from great game classics.
I’ll tell you what Obsidian should be sorry for: KOTOR 2! I think AP sort of met KOTOR 2′s fate in a way, as in it’s broken and incomplete. I’m not saying that KOTOR 2 was a bad game, but it has similar flaws to AP, not to mention that they had to cut out at least half of the game’s original content to meet a holiday deadline. However, like AP, the dialogue is what saves it, along with some pretty memorable characters, and one of the most intimidating and brilliantly developed villains I have ever seen. For some reason, Obsidian focuses on story and dialogue more than polishing its gameplay. A shame, too, because both KOTOR 2 and Alpha Protocol had the potential to be solid 10s.
Compared to other Action RPGs like Elderscrolls Series, ME1 & 2 and Fallout 3… Alpha Protocol is more awful than fun, and like Joe said: “Alpha Protocol is a game that only the extremly tolerate can fully enjoy.”
Being intolerant on crappy produced games, besides there are so much more fun, polished and better game-mechanics Action RPGs out there, that Alpha Protocol deserves this punishment for being such a failed game.
Are you seriously suggesting that the Elder Scrolls series, which while somewhat popular was pretty much panned by everybody for some of the worst voice acting ever, probably THE worst levelling-to-challenge ratio ever, and in all installments some pretty hefty game-breaking bugs, is somehow a masterpiece of game design?
Don’t get me wrong, I loved Morrowind and Oblivion as much as the next guy, but Daggerfall was more bug than game, Morrowind was ridiculously easy to break, and Oblivion seemed custom built out of the box to keep all the fun and INTERESTING stuff as far away from you as possible, until they started releasing DLC that gave you access to it more easily. I won’t even get into Arena, because the series didn’t take off until Daggerfall and frankly most people barely know it exists.
Mass Effect 1 and 2 I’ll grant you are pretty damn near masterpieces of modern gaming. Fallout 3 isn’t quite in that league, but it’s at least a crapload better than anything else Bethesda’s released… and keep in mind that despite their flaws I ENJOY the Elder Scrolls games. But each and every one of them was released with some pretty horrific game design flaws, bugs, and/or just plain brokenness.
Alpha Complex is getting the nasty reception it’s getting because the hype was so high. If this had been a game released “under the radar”, it would’ve been hailed as a somewhat flawed but ultimately interesting and worth playing title that deserves a polished sequel.
Alpha Complex is suffering from the typical Obsidian problems. I don’t know what the heck the guys at Obsidian do with their time, but it must not involve as much actual game development as other companies. Their games are consistently disappointing.
But their games are also consistently worth playing.
Alpha Protocol is nowhere NEAR unplayable. I understand Joe’s frustration, and I even to an extent understand the bandwagon-jumping coming after it, but it’s nowhere NEAR as bad as many people are making it out to be.
I’m not saying it’s excellent. I’m not claiming it’s 10/10 material, goodness no. I am claiming that it’s at least a 5 or a 6.
Alpha Protocol is, at its heart, a game with a lot of good ideas with some questionable execution, but at the end of the day, a lot of great moments. It is a game that is a lot of fun, IF and ONLY IF you aren’t actively trying to act against the system.
If you can suffer through the hour-long cutscenes of the Metal Gear Solid games, the horrible dialogue systems of every Bethesda game ever, or God help you the grinding of any MMO (especially the ones that claim they’ve cut down on grinding), there’s no excuse for failing to understand the basic premise of an Action-RPG having actual RPG elements that affect your combat.
I never had a problem with the combat or most of the AI. Sure occasionally my opponents did silly things, but it wasn’t as often as I actually expected. And by and large, most of the biggest “mistakes” my opponents made were clearly outlined in their dossiers… The thugs and terrorists weren’t as tactically sound as the trained military personnel. The trained agents spotted me more easily than the Russian Mafia.
It’s funny. We, as gamers, used to say that bad graphics were okay in an RPG because RPGs were all about the story and characters… the two things Alpha Complex pulls off without even blinking. The two things that bring us back to every Obsidian game no matter how disappointing the last one was. The two things that will bring us to play Fallout: New Vegas even if we worry every day that it’s just not going to be any good.
Alpha Complex is not a bad game. It is not an excellent game, either, but it is not a bad game.
Other people are entitled to their opinions, but by and large, those opinions seem to be based in erroneous assumptions and unrealistic expectations more than anything else.
Alpha protocol’s game play is entertaining at times, though I find it mostly disappointing. The AI is horrible, I can stand 4 feet away from a man shooting a mounted machine gun at me and he CANNOT hit me with thousands of rounds. Enemies are more likely to see you if you attempt to sneak up behind them than if you sneak within 10 feet and sprint the rest of the way for a 1 hit melee kill. I personally am having HUGE graphics problems, I play the PC version and am above the recommended system requirements, and even with all settings turned as low as they can go, mouse smoothing off, vsync off, and all of those other “fixes” in APengine and APgame.ini it continually freezes for large amounts of time, I crash at about every 3rd checkpoint I reach, and in the clearing house the models take FOREVER to load. The game itself looks like a ripoff of Mass Effect, up to and including use of the same story, game play and so forth. I mean think about it, your a person contracted to a government organization that is the shit, and you now answer to no one but your boss. The npcs then put an inordinate amount of faith in your untested abilities and give you free reign to save the world (or universe) as you see fit. Game play will consist of mainly linear levels followed buy pauses in game play at your safe house (Normandy) where you are allowed to rest, rearm, and get your groove on. As you level you will put points into talents and low and behold at certain points on those talent trees you receive skills. It looks almost like they used the same shaders, or texture mapping or something on the human models, Mikes eyes are straight from default male Sheppard, hell mike looks almost like Sheppard’s brother or father or some other close relative. Obsidian utilized The unreal engine and yet they really didn’t, the engine has so much more capability than how they present it in alpha protocol. If you play this game like you would play mass effect 2 as a soldier it will be thousands of times easier than the moronic stealth system, I mean please I can be within 170 degrees of strait forward of a guy within 3 feet and he cannot see me, but that guy 6 miles away happens to glance in my direction and he sees me perfectly. Most of this may have to do with my graphics issues, it is pretty tough to sneak around when your game will randomly freeze up for 10+ seconds and suddenly you are looking at the wall behind you, getting frisked and wondering what the hell just happened.
I feel that any reviews for this particular game should take into account that they are reviewing a game which should technically be in beta right now (with the bugs a lot of people are reporting), so I personally will withhold my full judgment until they patch it and hopefully fix my graphics issues.
Joe, thanks for making your game reviews so damn entertaining, you can make it fun to get information about even the shittiest of games. I also agree with at least 90% of your reviews, so keep reviewing and ill more than likely keep playing the games you recommend.
You’re getting detected while stealthing because you’re at the beginning of the game and moving too fast. by the middle of the game you can pretty much run up on dudes and they wont hear you.
you have to put on line of sight reducing and sound dampening type gear.
also as mentioned, pistols are the most powerful weapons in the game by the midway point.
having beaten the game first as an assault type guy like joe did, then playing second time purely stealth/martial arts/pistols, the stealth approach works SO much better and is more fun.
Coming from someone who has beaten the game five times, it still doesn’t excuse the erratic A.I. or bugs and glitches the game has. There were times I know for damn sure that I was at least fifty+feet away from enemies, behind cover, had an advanced stealth suit equipped, had no noisy equipment, and yet these clowns were able to psychically know my exact position, despite the fact I was out of their line of sight. These moments do happen at random moments, and as it is, I’m more or less forced to knock out every single mook. For a game that preaches “Choice is your weapon” you’re more or less railroaded into playing the game in a certain way.
On top of this, the controls are utter crap, and there were times when the dipping framerates actually affected the combat situations or lock-picking negatively, namely resulting in a dozen SMG bullets killing me faster than I could press the melee button just because of the erratic framerate. Bad design at its finest. They were better off with KOTOR’s system if the stats are going to be more heavily involved
Can anyone tell me the name of the song (if it is one) that is played at the end of the video (and apparently all others)?
Where was the bit with the monkeys from?
Anyway…shame they screwed this up…now lets hope they did not screw up Fallout: New Vegas.
Thanks Joe, I really thought about buying this for PC, but now I know better. All the reviews kept telling about the glitches, bugs, and stupid combat system. Even Gametrailers’ review of it was poor and recommend to stick to assault rifles and avoid pistols like the plague.
too bad to I thought this would be the next Deus Ex. Oh well at least a new Deus Ex is coming out and it looks awesome
I have to say, having played through the vast majority of Alpha Complex so far, I disagree with a lot of what the reviewers have to say about it.
I’ve had no difficulty with stealth, myself. The AI being “inconsistent” seems to be by design… the various dossiers make it clear that some people are trained soldiers, while others are little more than thugs, and the former would naturally work together better than the latter. I played the entire game with a pistol and never had to break out any other weapon except for hard targets like the Stryker, the chopper, and the occasional autoturret (APDS rounds from an assault rifle take those out almost too easily).
I also never noticed the texture troubles that you did, but then, I wasn’t really looking for them. I do admit that the graphics could’ve been better looking and smoother.
That said, I did have my own issues with the game. Specifically, cover is twitchy and easy to accidentally break out of, and there are places where it seems like you should logically be able to take cover but can’t, while other places it seems odd that a pool table provides better cover than a wall. Also, opening doors from cover is difficult sometimes, which seems to be related to another issue, which is that it seems like there are two or three “types” of cover… cover right next to a door or other corner, cover right next to other gaps where you can “swat turn/roll” from cover to cover, and normal cover. Sometimes the transition between them is… difficult, and you have to actually break cover and re-take cover in the new spot to move between them, which strikes me as needlessly difficult in firefights (which is generally where the problem rears up the most).
There also does seem to be the occasional point where the game just makes it damn near impossible to get through a given area stealthily, but patience goes a long way.
A combination of “Chain shot”, improved pistol criticals, and effective use of cover goes a long way too. Whipping out five tranquilizer rounds into five different guys in one instant definitely helps make you feel like a master pistoleer. I relied on tranquilizer pistol rounds for almost every single section of the game.
I can’t honestly say I wasn’t somewhat dissapointed in Alpha Protocol, but truth be told I’m disappointed in 9 out of 10 games. Even the ones that turn out to be utterly awesome tend to make me feel like they could’ve… should’ve… been better.
Still, I’d've given it at least a 5 or 6. Probably not more, but still. Of course, I didn’t face any game-breaking bugs, and the only major bug I did face seemed to be a glitch of getting stuck in a certain spot of cover that I couldn’t escape. That one didn’t reproduce itself, so I assume glitch.
I’ll admit that I seem to be one of a very small few who’ve had a genuinely good experience with this game. But I’m still happy I bought it.
PS>>Wow. I was writing this in between waiting on your video to load and I hadn’t read the comments yet. Apparently I’m not the only one who had fun going ninja.
Still, I’ll again admit that you’ve got a lot of valid points. But you have to support yourself with your build or you wont’ get anywhere. It wasn’t until about halfway through the first major set of missions that I realized I needed to stick my points into Pistols and Stealth even if it didn’t SEEM like the bonuses meant much.
As it turns out, well, name me something more hilarious than listening to a boss character shout “Where the hell did you GO?!” right before popping him so full of tranqs that it’d kill an elephant.
It should be noted that if you aren’t specializing in pistols and stealth, pistols and stealth will suck for you.
Final note.
I WAS playing a Recruit with pistols.
I’m really just hear to say, that chick in the game doesn’t look near as Gorgeous as Lt. Lisa. <3
I just started watching the review, and I have to say from looking at the start of it, that is pretty pathetic. I don’t care if the game bases accuracy on stats or whatever, there is absolutely no reason Joe wasn’t able to hit that guy from that distance. That’s simply crappy game development.
There is a reason why he couldn’t shoot the guy. It is called RPG with stat based ruleset. When you play an RPG like Oblivion or Baldur’s Gate, sometimes you don’t damage your opponent, despite the animation shows that you hit him. It’s just that in Alpha Protocol, it looks a little awkward, because you are using guns. God, I don’t know why people can’t understand this. Yeah, in Mass Effect you could shoot more efficiently, but maybe that is because ME is more of a shooter, than AP.
Anyone who remembers trying to kill anything with an assault rifle at long range with no points in the assault rifle skill in ME1 will tell you you weren’t that much more efficient. Even worse if you were a class that had it “untrained”.
It’s as nonsensical as saying bullets randomly go upward if you are aiming a pistol five feet away from a person just because “you’re not well trained in it.”
I just think it’s stupid as shit if you consider that you’re a secret agent and you can’t hit shit with a pistol at close range. I mean, even if you choose recruit your character should have been given basic firearms training.
Oh, and I should add that the targeting reticule does not get smaller when you put points into the weapon skills. You unlock passiv abilities and special attacks. For instance with the pistol you get so that you can slow down time for a short while and take more precise shots. Really awsome but then you got cooldown on it
While from a real-world standpoint you have a point, from a game design standpoint, having your character already be an excellent shot right off the bat would be a good way to completely invalidate the whole point of action-RPG-style character development and combat that is as affected by stats as it is by your twitch reflexes.
It should also be noticed that “basic firearms training” and “can accurately hit a target thirty to forty feet away while he shoots at you with an SMG” are not the same thing. The dialogue in the game also specifically notes that (unless you took the soldier class) you were not chosen for your skills in combat. As a Recruit, Westridge told me I had been chosen partially because my psyche profile indicated that I had the potential to be a very manipulative SOB, for example.
Your standard issue pistol is really nothing particularly special. Get better guns, with high level mods, and up your skills with that weapon, and you become a deadly adversary. I was, by midgame, fully capable of popping out of cover for two seconds, dropping a guy with pinpoint accuracy, and popping back into cover to retarget.
That’s BEFORE I got the “pistol-snipe-from-cover” ability, which took me from “ninja” to “deadly unstoppable ghost”.
actually there IS,
the pistol has an aiming system, where it gets more accurate the longer you aim at your enemy. so when you keep shooting at someone without letting the system adjust to that enemy AT ALL, you wont hit.
makes perfect sense to me.
I’m playing on PC, so the texture pop is not a huge problem for me. It doesn’t load immediately, but it doesn’t take more than 1 (max 2) seconds. I agree that the AI is good and bad at the same time. As for the combat system, I have no problem with it. Although I’m only playing it on normal difficulty, a pistol-martial arts-stealth character is very easy to play. Just go the website of Obsidian, you can see that a lot of RPG fun love the game.
http://forums.obsidian.net/index.php?s=e011b0b07ba5c8ab2e8cdfda61f16d1a&showforum=66
I actually invested my AP points in Pistol, Martial Arts and Technical something (don’t remember what it was), and I really enjoyed the game ..
i have this game and i realy enjoyed it the only reson people are finding it hard is because they cant get headshots! play batman arkham asylum first and you will get more into this game. so i would give this game a 6/10 because i think it deserves this rating more!
I’m playing it. Not a bad game, but crappy combat. Nice try. 4/10 seems right
I have to disagree with your score. I’m enjoying the game and I haven’t had any problems with the combat so far, besides Stephen Heck shooting a bunch of civilian security officers.
There are ways to make pistol and AR shots more accurate: get in close and hold the crosshair over the guy’s face for a few seconds. Perfectly accurate kill- (or tranq, in my case) shot. Although I should note that I mostly do silent, nonlethal takedowns, Solid Snake style.
Still, I can understand your frustration and the shared frustration of pretty much every other critic out there. The combat mechanics are too stat oriented, where a perfectly lined up headshot from medium-long range will miss. Games like Mass Effect 2 and Fallout 3, which are similar to AP, allow even non-RPG oriented players to dominate on personal, not statistical, skill.
i agree with you read my other comment
So Joe, do you think that a game like Mass Effect would benefit by having something similar, if not exactly the same conversation system that Alpha Protocol uses?
I am really glad that you decaided to review this game, because I have been wondering if I should give it a try or not.
Judging from what I have heard gamers and reviewers say, then I fear that Fallout New Vegas might be in danger, unless Bethesda have made sure to lend them their expertise.
I have a minor request though Joe, could you try and schedule a preview of New Vegas, or perhaps an interview with the developers from Obsidian once the game have been released?
Joe those are the game mechanics. You are in the first part of the game shooting with the weakest guns, with the weakest mods and with hardly any skill points in it and you are shooting with a mid to low range weapon(fully leveled pistol works well in long ranges too) from a position that is meant for a long range weapon.
Pistol becomes the most powerful weapon from mid to endgame and you will kill bosses in seconds with it. The AI will only know where you are when you are using noisy non stealth oriented gear. Notice the stat Sound dampening, that’s the key. I have never had problems with “cheaters” when i played my stealth characters.
50% of the game isn’t divided to RPG and combat. Combat is also based on RPG elements. Pistols, stealth, toughness, and technical aptitude are the most powerful skill trees in the game. Going trough the game with stealth pistols and smgs is one of the easiest way to go trough it.
I’m sorry Joe but you are making the same mistake as so many other reviewers are. You are doing it wrong. Using pistols from long range, sneaking with noisy gear shooting like a mad man with the pistol when you(the character, not irl you) don’t have the skills to use it.
What AJ said about the AI, bugs, the good and the bad about the dialogs is all true. The game isn’t finished and it has many problems it’s unfinished as hell and looks like crap, but please try to understand the game mechanics before making accusations about things that aren’t mistakes, but planned part of the RPG experience.
Apologist.
No. Just No. Make all the excuses you want, I don’t give a shit what game i’m playing i better be able to hit a guy while stationary if hes less than 30 ft away with a high powered pistol WITH laser attachment.
You look foolish. If you like the game thats cool, I do too if you pay attention to the review – but that doesnt mean im going to give it a higher review score that it doesn’t deserve.
he does kinda have a point joe. next time you have something like this, try something other than your normal play style, your being kick in the door and start throwing lead like crazy. try a stealth class or a sniper. also, are their more than 1 pistol in the game? it could be that the one you were using was kinda crappy. but yeah, the game should have been done better than that. you start with the game basics and core controls and A.I. THEN and only then do you add the dialog and all those extras.
And scope, which you failed to use. Your shots will go anywhere within the giant red circle. If you want more accurate shots then don’t shoot at someone who’s less than half the size of your margin of error. You had a scope which practically doubles the size of the target and I guarantee you wouldn’t have missed at all. If you hold the aim over a character until you sight in you get 100% dead on accuracy and double damage.
AP is a victim of more action oriented “RPGs” especially Mass Effect 2 which ditched practically everything the first game setup. I guess 6 years between Vampire: Bloodlines and 10 years between Deus Ex has changed the hearts of people when it comes to action/RPGs. I fear for Deus Ex 3 if they decide to go a more statistical approach like the original game.
Joe, to be fair, this game CANNOT be played like a shooter. you can’t, it will suck if you do. this is MUCH more rpg than mass effect is. weapon accuracy is entirely based on stats. the guy you replied to wasnt lying, midway through, the pistol becomes the best gun in the game and can clear entire rooms with ease, kill bosses in seconds, etc.. you have to let the reticule focus in before you take shots.
im surprised you bash this game for that but you liked the first mass effect, which did the exact same thing, you started off not able to hit the broadside of a barn, but eventually became a marksman god.
its an rpg, not a shooter.
It is an action rpg. The “rpg” part doesn’t give it an excuse to have shitty action.
It’s not an Action RPG, it’s an RPG.
Also, you have to use quiet gear, not big armor. by mid game you can literally walk 2 inches behind someone and they won’t hear you.
you have to use line of sight items that make it harder to see you, with enough points you become an invisible ninja.
there ARE lots of bugs and ai issues though no doubt.
Joe, I usually agree with you, but this time your argument simply makes no sense.
Your phrase “I do not give a shit what game I’m playing i Better Be Able to hit the guy if hes stationary while less than 30 ft away with a high powered laser pistol WITH attachment” can be translated as “the game doesn’t works like *I want*, then the game is *wrong/bad*”.
I think it’s perfectly valid to declare that as your opinion, and this is what you usually do. But when you start to say that someone who thinks differently is “making excuses” or “seems foolish”, you lose the reason, because it sounds like you’re wanting to turn your opinion into a fact. That’s not how it works. I do not think you should change the score in any way, it is your prerogative as reviewer, but that does not legitimizes you to classify a different analysis that way.
The game has several flaws, some of which you pointed out, and it was really a disappointment. And moreover, has serious balance, bugs and AI problems. From the standpoint of the plot, it makes little sense that an trained agent has such a hard time to hit a shot (even if from the standpoint of the mechanics, it does). As I am a person that value much more the story and the interaction of the characters, I see the game in a more positively bias than most, but it is perfectly understandable that many detest the game at the point of classifying it as unplayable. And whoever deny it has serious issues.
looks like the gamers have spoken joe. and they say you need to stop your normal Gung-ho gaming style and try stealth and evasion stuff more often. or just post a partial retraction of your review saying that this game is not about shooting like a madman, and more for a stealth and black-ops player. but keep the whole bugs and good dialog part. just remove the whole “this game is unplayable” part. and in the future, if i were you, i would stick playing mindless shooters and stay away from the games that require you to think. and also, most RPGs, i would skip. you just had your first revolt within the angry army. be happy you are still in command, and learn from this.
So you’re basically saying Joe is stupid then? He should stay away from games that require him to think eh? And stay away from most RPGs? Here’s a though, why don’t you just carry your ass away from the Angry Joe Army and go to some other review site? Joe is entitled to his opinion of course as is everyone else. But you’re just coming out and insulting him which isn’t cool.
Personally I have been thinking about getting this game, or perhaps a rental at least. But what I hear about the game isn’t good at all. Also I don’t think Joe is saying the game should work the way he wants it to. If you’re less then 30ft away from someone, I don’t care if it’s a shooter or an RPG, you should be able to hit the guy. Especially if it has a laser sight attachment on it.
I don’t know, this game just sound generally broken overall. Developers did a piss poor job and didn’t bother to polish or bug test the game. That seems to be the general feeling overall anyway. I might give it a try. MIGHT.
ok, i went to far with the whole “avoid games that require you to think” thing. but really, from joe’s review it sounded like he only went for the shooting stuff, never really looking at the stealth, it just could be that stealth is not his type of gameplay. i myself prefer games with total shooting and less stealth. and i totally agree, this game was NEVER BUG TESTED! microsoft seems to be doing that alot since the 360 came out. so, yeah, i am sorry for saying you are dumb Angry Joe. a word of advice, from one guy who sucks at stealth to a guy who looks like he has trouble with it himself, if i may? if brute force does not work, try precision. and LockDown2341, yes, if you do get it, make it a rental, or get it used. thank you for slapping me upside the head. i needed that.
Joe’s response to my arguments was surprising. Especially after we found out that he has played and liked Deus ex(or so we can assume after seeing him talk about the DX3 trailer). DX1 was also heavily stat based when it came to combat and you had to wait for a long time to focus your aim with an untrained weapon, just like in this game. It was not possible to just spam the shoot button and hope the enemy dies(well it was, but it wasn’t efficient)
Why can he accept the stat based shooting mechanics of Deus Ex, but shun them In Alpha Protocol. The “problems” he mentioned exist in both games, I’m confused. Also the laser in deus ex didn’t improve your accuracy it just showed where the bullet was going to land and the laser dot jumped around like a “mother******”.
While AP is a very different game from DX, the stat based shooting mechanics have many similarities and it feels like a good comparison.
Its really annoying when your enemys instantly know where you are and shoot you in the head. I remember that problem in old ps1 games. Still gives me nightmares.
O shit korruption, your right,
but wait, bethesda are ordering and overseeing the game since it is legaly theirs.
and oter than anoying glitches bethesda game are 10/10
No Corporate Commander cameo praising the combat system and the game’s marketability?
Wait wait… Obsidian? The same developers handing Fallout: New Vegas? Oh shit…
meh i wouldn’t say oh shit about the fallout : new vegas game.
they were black isle they pretty much made the old fallout games with interplay. also they have the old writer on the job so it should be awesome.
but if it’s something i have learned about obsidian it is that they can only make games with a done engine. kotor 2 for example
apart from that they only have mediocre rpgs NWN 2 wasn’t that great tbh ok but not great
i also believe this is their first game with a shooter mechanic so might explain it.
Frankly Obsidian has a history of releasing disappointing games.
NWN 2 and Kotor 2 both went basically unfinished with rushed and disappointing endings (come on, rocks fall everyone dies? SERIOUSLY…?), and now Alpha Protocol. While I did thoroughly enjoy all three games, I also recognize that they are in many ways in need of serious fixes and none of them qualify as truly magnificent titles.
Mask of the Betrayer went a long way to redeeming Obsidian in my eyes, but Storm of Zehir didn’t do much for me. It felt like they gave away their biggest strengths (compelling characters, excellent writing) for too much semi-random sandbox. But I’ll admit that I won’t bash Storm of Zehir too much since I only played it for about six hours before quitting.
I have high hopes for Fallout only because when Black Isle broke up, a lot of those guys went on to create Obsidian. Feargus Urquhart (god I hope I spelled that name right), for example. I unfortunately worry that those high hopes will be dashed.
I don’t know if Obsidian’s staff is too small, or if they just don’t know how to schedule, or if they take like nine vacations a year instead of polishing their titles, or what, but they do have a history of “nowhere near as good as it should’ve been” in almost every title they’ve released so far.