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In Alpha Protocol you play a black ops agent who becomes embroiled in a conspiracy of false flag operations, terrorist plots, and arms dealing. The most interesting thing about this game is the incredibly deep dialogue branching, and how that and the actions you take during the missions effect how the plot plays out. In a lot of other games with dialogue choices, there will be a "good" and a "bad" plotline, but here it is more complicated. In Alpha Protocol, you can converse using by-the-book, aggressive, and suave options, and different characters respond differently to certain demeanors. Their view of you effects later missions and plot developments. There is lots of replayability here to check out all the different pathways.. Unfortunately, even though I enjoyed the plot on my first playthrough immensely, I am reluctant to go through it again. This is because the gunplay/combat in this game is extremely frustrating and unfun. There is an RPG element to earning skill points in weapons, but for some reason they made it so that for much of the early and middle part of the game, your aiming SUCKS. Meaning, you have to aim at a guy for like 10 seconds waiting for your reticle to shrink so that you can fire. If you move your character, if you move your gun to readjust, if you do anything at all, your reticle expands and you have to start the whole process over. This wouldn't be so bad if it only affected accuracy, but bullet damage is dependent on your reticle being small as well, which means your guns are totally worthless if you try to fire outside these strict parameters. So playing the actual missions is a chore, but all the bits in between are amazing. If you think you can deal with the major gameplay flaws, there is definitely something here worth seeing.
Posted by phoenixlau