I haven't contributed a lot on here, but I'm slacking off on my homework tonight and was just thinking I would give my opinions on Alpha Protocol.
I went in to GameStop and sold a stack of 15 games out to the man for $65.00 (worse than text books) and decided I would pick up Alpha Protocol. I remember reading an article about it when it was early in development, the concept seemed intriguing enough to me. As the developers put it, you can essentially choose from three different "JB" approaches, James Bond, Jack Bauer or Jason Bourne...and how you act influences the content you see and the results of the game play. The game has been touted as the espionage rpg. This is not Final Fantasy though...it's way too much of an arcade style game to be an rpg.
There's nothing about rolls, you get points from how you deal with situations and enemies. Using points you can increase skills and earn special abilities. Depending on how you play you will encounter "mini games" that involve "hacking" computers, "cutting" circuit boards and "picking" locks. These mini games are kind of tricky at times, but are very simplistic and I imagine they can get a little monotonous to most players.
The coolest thing about this game is the way that the dialog is handled between the main character and the NPCs. Basically you have a limited amount of time to choose your tact, and you gain or lose favor with them (Depending on which "JB" you want to be). And from what I gathered you will get a lot more out of the game by gaining the favor of everybody. The first go through I made nice with the good guys and the bad guys and it gave me a lot to go on by the end of the game. I know I made a few bad decisions, but there were some where I could have went either way.
I see the game as a modern choose your own adventure book, I really couldn't put it down. It took me about a week to blasted through the game. There were things that were redundant...but it wasn't bad enough to make me put down the controller. My main complaint is that it seems as though there was supposed to be more to the game and it just isn't there. I would love to have the option to choose different "handlers" for my missions, but it doesn't matter which tact you take...you still get pretty much the same missions...pretty much the same dialogue. And when the game starts out they make it seem as though you have a say in the matter, but really you don't, not until the last level. I haven't got far enough into my second runaround to see how much things differ once I get to the main subplots, so I may be jumping the gun here...but I think the only difference may be a few choice interactions and cut scenes change.
So if you were expecting an honest to goodness RPG...this ain't it. This game is more about a story hooked on to a basic 3rd person shooter. The puzzles are elementary. A hardcore gamer would probably say screw this in about five minutes....but for the casual gamers out there, this will be a good bargain bin game in a few months, and if there is a sequel I think that some earnest improvement in the game play and graphics would go a long way. It looks and feels a bit like a rough GTA....I like where things are going with it, and I stuck it out...but I cannot say that others will do the same.
