I'm generally against overused profanity when it doesn't necessarily fit the context (Far Cry 3 all over the place), but Spec Ops uses the profanity in a legitimate way. Walker goes from giving out by-the-book military orders to his team mates, but by the end of the game he eschews all military protocol and inserts liberal doses of "Fuck".
LTTP: Spec Ops: The Line (I am Sick) [SPOILERS]
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Messofanego
Banned
Has anyone found or made a video of Nolan North's voice progression in the game? Going from "kill confirmed" to "kill fucking confirmed" and growling "RELOADING!", he did an exceptional job. Easy Northies award for this game XD
Spec Ops: The Life of Joe the Main Menu Sniper
Love the national anthem getting more distorted and busted as you progress in the game.
No one quoted this, but this needs to be shown to others. =) This is one of my favourite subtle aspects of this game. The title menu sniper's position and his environment changes slightly as you progress through the game, getting notably
worse the further you get into the game D=
You wouldn't notice it unless you played on one of the harder difficulties, died a lot, and were forced to quit your session. Otherwise you'd probably beat the game in two sittings without realizing that the title menu keeps changing as you advance through every chapter.
Chalk me up as another person that loves this game, by the way.
) buy this game, tomorrow I'll have it in my hands and I honestly can't wait to play it.28 Posts Later
Member
Others have mentioned it, but Kane and Lynch 2 also explores the concept of violence in video-games being horrific and the player being at fault [similar to Spec Op's] in a subtle manner [arguably too subtle]. Here's an article that briefly explores the subject.
Messofanego
Banned
OH GOD MY EYES AWFUL LOOKING BACKGROUND AND TEXT!
See, unlike Far Cry 3 where the writer didn't convey any of that in the game, K&L does all of that. There's no good ending in the first game, and I thought it was a great story ending in K&L 2 (maybe not great for gameplay but then this isn't like some hollywood movie with the biggest bad as some boss challenge) with the dogs and getting on the plane with no fanfare. Your job is done, you've escaped, what more do you want? Them sipping drinks on a beach watching some news report about their success walking off into the sunset like Max Payne 3?
The headshot, usually the most satisfying part in typical shooters, has been denied from you. No, you don't get to see the immediate dopaminergic reward of your brilliant aiming, you just get a censor bar and see the consequences of a pool of blood spilling over the floor. When you shoot a person dead, they don't fly back in a great feedback manner, they just slump over. Look at all this violence you have caused. It's disturbing, realistic, creepy. Might not make for the most rewarding shooter ever, but it was consistent with the atmosphere and world they created.
For some critics and K&L fans (yes, we exist!), we got the message. This was a straight shooter, no palette cleanser turret sections, sniping bits, or driving segments like the first game. This wasn't a heist adventure like Heat in the first game, this was like the midnight amoral blur of Collateral. They were more confident with the second game on those fronts of being unconventional while still improving some of the gameplay, even if that went in the face of rewarding players for every thing they did.
Still, my one big complaint about K&L 2 was I wanted more character development. A little more flavor text between Kane and Lynch that wasn't related to business. What they're planning to do with the money, their thoughts, why Lynch doesn't hallucinate as much anymore because the whole trek is over days and he never takes his meds.
I really should check out Hotline Miami, since it's going for the same unsettling atmosphere and ultraviolence.
rosaceadude2112
Member
One of my favorite little bits is after
Lynch's girlfriend is killed, he's clearly pretty upset, and Kane sheepishly goes, "Do you, uh, do you wanna talk about?"
Or how when they meet the big bad guy,
Kane reveals he has no convictions whatsoever and still tries to make a deal with him.
And this exchange:
"How you likin' Shanghai?"
"It's fucked. I hate it."
Good article. In a lot of ways, I think KL2 is better than Spec Ops at the same thing. Spec Ops is really heavy-handed and occasionally too goofy to really take seriously. Instead of taking a COD-esque game and elaborately trying to subvert and deconstruct it, KL 2 very simply and subtly makes it into the ugly thing that's been bubbling underneath the surface the entire time.
Messofanego
Banned
Forgot that bit. Yeah, Kane's true colors were revealed in the second game which I liked.
Lynch does mumble now and then (in the demo level) when you're in cover and pay attention. It's pretty creepy!
Shit, want to replay K&L 2 again.
Lynch does mumble now and then (in the demo level) when you're in cover and pay attention. It's pretty creepy!
Shit, want to replay K&L 2 again.
I think IO is being given undue credit here. Kane and Lynch are basically just ugly characters (Literally and Figuratively). They're written as mentally unstable criminal fuckheads, in attempt to realistically ground their exploits within the context of a standard TPS, wherein the player must shoot an inordinate amount of enemies. They're well realised, but they're simply a device used to minimise ludonarrative dissonance. The first game copied the Mann aesthetic, the 2nd pushed it further into YouTube like found footage territory. That's where the pixelated gore, and abrupt style of the storytelling come from, any meta commentary you guys are seeing is an imagined by-product. It's an extreme case of style over substance that you're all reading way too much into.
So, this was pretty good. I approached it with a cynical state of mind, but it worked for me. There's not much that hasn't already been said, but it was effective, and aside from some clunkiness it handled "mature" content in in a much more, well...mature way then most videogames. It was a harrowing and memorable experience. The visual design was also surprisingly strong at times.
My main complaint is the excessive enemy spam. There were way too much points where I felt like I was under siege by an army of faceless clones falling off an assembly line. Not only does it undermine the theme of the game, but it's tiring and repetitious from a gameplay standpoint. I guess you could argue that it's intentional, and it's meant to make you feel detached from the killing, but I think smaller scale, more intimate and lethal fights would have been better.
Thankfully it doesn't overstay it's welcome at 7 hours long. I enjoyed the ride and it ended just before it's shortcomings got to me.
My main complaint is the excessive enemy spam. There were way too much points where I felt like I was under siege by an army of faceless clones falling off an assembly line. Not only does it undermine the theme of the game, but it's tiring and repetitious from a gameplay standpoint. I guess you could argue that it's intentional, and it's meant to make you feel detached from the killing, but I think smaller scale, more intimate and lethal fights would have been better.
Thankfully it doesn't overstay it's welcome at 7 hours long. I enjoyed the ride and it ended just before it's shortcomings got to me.
rosaceadude2112
Member
First of all, you can't really cite author intent because you don't know what their intent was. There's no such thing as reading too much into something so long anything you gleam is actually based in the text and context of the work, rather than pulling something completely out of your ass.
Second of all, about ludonarrative dissonance: Exactly. That is the entire point. They're drawn as awful, remorseless people so that their hideous actions can't be seen as heroic. Nothing they do is really any different than the protagonists of other shooters, it's just painted in a different context so it's more honest than those games.
Messofanego
Banned
Everything we're interpreting is from the game, not made up pretentious connections like some people do with David Lynch or other arthouse movies.
As for what IO was going for, they've said that Kane and Lynch are assholes and awful people. Anything other than that is up to the viewer, just like all art where the artist has no more say when it's out.
I've actually seen an interview with one of the writers that supports your readings of the material. However, I felt what he was claiming was just an attempt to attribute more meaning, in the face of some of the criticism the game was getting.
I like both games, but I still think there's nothing more to them than the surface level artistic ambitions IO had with the visual style.
rosaceadude2112
Member
Every work of art inherently has meaning, regardless of how much thought the creator(s) put into it.
Me too - impactfull game IMHO
Spec Ops: The Life of Joe the Main Menu Sniper
Love the national anthem getting more distorted and busted as you progress in the game.
Wow. I beat the game in one sitting so I never got to see this. That's a really nice touch
Uh, the audio work in KL2 is phenomenal. The sounds are of a psychotic man, you can't tell if his ear drums have finally popped or if he is unable to register certain sounds. Police sirens are dull but every gun has a loud, glorious "rat-tat-tat" to accompany his ethereal soundtrack. The reality of the world fades out because they lack a conscious. The sirens barely register not because Kane can't here them but because he doesn't register them. They're white noise. Their blue and red lights flash across your screen distorted, adverse the to how poignant they are when you're driving down a high way in real life.
The camerawork is a stylistic choice and it completely grounds the series in a way we've come to view the real world. The article elaborates on this (great article, by the way). There is even a poignant moment in the game where Kane and Lynch are captured and right before the scene ends, the officer reaches for you. Your dismissal of what was happening in that game is completely undone with that simple moment. The player is identified as an accomplice of the two.
It's not corny. It's not a parody. That scene is a chilling assessment of games culture and an industry's wants. Fuck, I why am I on a computer that can't play this game at the moment.
undrtakr900
Member
Okay thanks for the input, that puts me at ease since its a slow build up and they don't just Shyamalan you at the end.
I played the demo, and the controls/cover system felt a bit clunky but manageable which is fine since I'll mostly be playing for the story. I loved that the "hidden intel" was actually intel(voice-overs) and not just thrown in for achievement collect-a-thons.
But one issue was that all the stuff you guys talked about in this thread that got me intrigued to play it I didn't get out of the demo (story-wise I mean). Probably because they were skipping around chapters alot in the demo.
Still you convinced me to play it
Messofanego
Banned
What part was this?
Right at the end of the train yard level.
They had been jokingly using that term since their first run in 2009. They actually were pretty positive about Spec Ops.
CambriaRising
Member
I couldn't bring myself to play the game for a few weeks after a particular scene. I did go back and finish it though, made the ending mean more for me than it would have otherwise if I had just powered through after that.
PepsimanVsJoe
Member
Same. And I just played through it a month or so ago.
Maybe I should do a coop run next.
O.DOGG
Member
Yeah, me too. I'm looking for a deal on Dog Days and I'll buy a second copy to play coop with my cousin.
Right now Spec Ops: The Line is the third best selling game on Steam after Borderlands 2 and Chivalry, and even one spot ahead of Skyrim!
I'm glad it's selling very well at the end of the year sale, I fee like a great deal more people will have something to say about it in the coming weeks and I like that. You just can't pass this game up at $10.
I'm glad it's selling very well at the end of the year sale, I fee like a great deal more people will have something to say about it in the coming weeks and I like that. You just can't pass this game up at $10.
BurnOutBrighter
Banned
I just finished this now.
My favourite video game story of the year.
Brilliant deconstruction and critique of the modern shooter genre - especially games like Call of Duty which reward players for violent action.
I felt uncomfortable, guilty, and disgusted at some of the things I partook in as the player behind Walker's actions. Great use of the medium - only interactive art such as video games can make a person complicit in the actions of the narrative, rather than being a merely a passive observer. The metanarrative around complicity of player choice in video games is indeed provocative.
But I think the thematic centrepiece of the game is the way foreign ethnicities are rendered as "other" by media and therefore less than human, making killing them a guilt-free act. If the idea of killing rogue American soldiers makes you uncomfortable, why don't you even think twice when gunning down Arabs or Russians? After all, they are both entirely virtual constructs. Why is one virtual life somehow more valuable than another - is it because you value one over the other in real life? And if so, what caused this belief?
Great environments and art direction and voice acting, and extremely well done presentation around Walker's mental state and how it degrades over the course of the game. One of the great examples of gameplay telling the story. Even the little touches like the slow-mo headshots and the snarky loading screen "tips" put question marks into the player's head - are you enjoying this? Should you be?
The game isn't "fun" in the traditional sense of gaming. Like Requiem for a Dream, it's meant to make you feel uncomfortable, it's meant to be brutal and harrowing. And it's also meant to be thought provoking and stay in your head after the credits roll. And it is, because I'm typing this post right now.
Mission accomplished, Yager. I've grown up. Games have grown up alongside me, and it's nice to see a title like this deliver more than what I expect from today's mindless, hyperviolent and juvenile modern shooters.
My favourite video game story of the year.
Brilliant deconstruction and critique of the modern shooter genre - especially games like Call of Duty which reward players for violent action.
I felt uncomfortable, guilty, and disgusted at some of the things I partook in as the player behind Walker's actions. Great use of the medium - only interactive art such as video games can make a person complicit in the actions of the narrative, rather than being a merely a passive observer. The metanarrative around complicity of player choice in video games is indeed provocative.
But I think the thematic centrepiece of the game is the way foreign ethnicities are rendered as "other" by media and therefore less than human, making killing them a guilt-free act. If the idea of killing rogue American soldiers makes you uncomfortable, why don't you even think twice when gunning down Arabs or Russians? After all, they are both entirely virtual constructs. Why is one virtual life somehow more valuable than another - is it because you value one over the other in real life? And if so, what caused this belief?
Great environments and art direction and voice acting, and extremely well done presentation around Walker's mental state and how it degrades over the course of the game. One of the great examples of gameplay telling the story. Even the little touches like the slow-mo headshots and the snarky loading screen "tips" put question marks into the player's head - are you enjoying this? Should you be?
The game isn't "fun" in the traditional sense of gaming. Like Requiem for a Dream, it's meant to make you feel uncomfortable, it's meant to be brutal and harrowing. And it's also meant to be thought provoking and stay in your head after the credits roll. And it is, because I'm typing this post right now.
Mission accomplished, Yager. I've grown up. Games have grown up alongside me, and it's nice to see a title like this deliver more than what I expect from today's mindless, hyperviolent and juvenile modern shooters.
Haunted
Member
Awesome little touch.
Call of Duty in general has a lighter tone than Spec Ops, even in the moments where it was trying to be shocking or gritty.
firehawk12
Subete no aware
Wait, when do you kill Americans in MW2?
Oh right, the end of the game. Those soldiers are so nondescript that I didn't even think of them as American. lol
Oh right, the end of the game. Those soldiers are so nondescript that I didn't even think of them as American. lol
I just finished it now and was really impressed with it as a whole. So many disturbing moments like launching the gas at the soldiers and civilians. Hell I was really uncomfortable for a good portion of the game just mowing down what I knew were American soldiers. Then to find out at the end that I was the insane bad guy even though I pretty much knew it as I was doing so many horrible things.
Just wow. Glad I didn't skip this before our goty voting was finished.
Just wow. Glad I didn't skip this before our goty voting was finished.
And in the No Russian mission too. Now that's a great case study and how NOT to do "shocking" or emotionally manipulative content in a videogame.
speculawyer
Member
This game got passed over in view of all the Mega franchises out there. Nice to see it get some attention after the price dropped.
Haunted
Member
oh shit!
Awesome. It definitely deserves the attention. I feel like a high percentage of people who played the game have put it on their Top 10 list of the year. Given how badly it sold that's still not enough to make a dent, probably, but still.
I don't think it's as black & white as you paint it to be. The real issue of Spec Ops is the fact that these soldiers are supposed to be your allies. Forget about your nationality, these guys are your co-workers and their stay in Dubai changed them. Their sense of reality has been warped and their approach to the war, it's victims and survivors has changed. The real issue here is your humanity; do you agree with these horrible acts or are you against it? Did the war change you?
Plus, plottwist!
Just spray bullets and listen to the soundtrack. So good.
I edited this into my list at number 5. Probably won't make much of a difference.
Are they really flawed though? It's just pretty basic cover based shooting, it's not ambitious stuff, but there's nothing wrong with it. You can mark enemies for your squad to target, and head shots give you a bit of bullet time. It's fine.
Ciastek3214
Junior Member
He may haven't beaten it yet.
"I just finished it now"
Derrick01
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?p=45761827#post45761827
Ciastek3214
Junior Member
My bad.
It's clunky. For example when running you feel that you are not in control and the weird moments the character latches onto objects. The controls in general feel off too.
Lostconfused
Member
The controls feel fine if you play the way the game wants you to play. If you are running you should be doing it in a straight line. Personally I played through it with a mouse and keyboard and didn't have any issues for the most part. They are not perfect, but serviceable for majority of the game.
Edit: As for my impressions of the game. I liked it, mainly because it was supposed to be something different from your average modern military shootbang. I don't think it had any noticeable emotional impact on me, but I do appreciate the developer's efforts to make the player thing about what they are doing and why they are doing it.
Edit2:
One thing I really liked was that there was a reflection of the main character in the laptop during the mortar sequence. Instead of it creating a disconnect between the player and the action, it actually make me think more about what I was doing as a player.
Yeah the game doesn't really pick up until after that
\/\/\/\/\/\/
Playing this at the moment, the gameplay is mostly ok, though the cover system screw me over more than once.
Pretty nice set pieces here and there, though at the moment i'm not really blown away by the narrative, but i'm fairly early on, i think (just passed the part where
).
Pretty nice set pieces here and there, though at the moment i'm not really blown away by the narrative, but i'm fairly early on, i think (just passed the part where
you fall down and are alone with a gun for a few minutes, after the aquarium with the giraffe statues