This took me a while, but here we go:
PackageWorks for me!
OverviewPretty average overview, nothing special.
IntroHeh, he jumps from one building to another, Matrix-style. Cool stuff
Although slightly...hm...weird. It seemed like a pretty long jump. Also I wasn't entirely sure how the different people were connected, but I guess what we saw was your pal getting nabbed.
BriefingQuite good. Didn't seem really proper for the pair of paramilitaries to add stuff under clean subsections and the like, but what do I know?
It did what it was supposed to do.
MissionA weird bug: whenever I first start the mission, it's broken. There's no "choose time of day" dialog, the three drivers of the cars just stand next to each other close to the camp (presumably ready to be MoveInDriver'd), the guy who's supposed to be sleeping by the fire isn't, and if you kill him no-one reacts. Pressing retry gives you the proper dialog and seems to fix the mission. Weird, anyway.
I tried this quite a lot of times, from many different directions, before getting it right. And, in the process, I managed to break it
The things that work: The sentry is asleep and wakes up when you get too close -> it seemed though that my pal could sneak in much closer than me. Make sure the wake-up trigger triggers for both of us, not just for the player. The radios bounce away nicely and are "broken" when shot at, and no reinforcements are called. The weaponless one can be captured, although there's a slight spelling mistake in his speech (Don't shot -> don't sh
oot). Also, why does he speak...uhm...ArabicOrHebrew?
Things that don't quite work:
You can see the third car (the bomber) from where you start just waiting in the distance. Not a biggie, exactly, but either add some fog to hide it or make it move in from further away?
If the chopper is called, you can hear its engines revving up (at least if you're slightly south of the camp, as I was once). Call it in from further away/setpos it? Once again, not exactly a biggue, just one of those pet peeves. Lucky I didn't at least go and see if I could find the spot it started from >_>
BIG ONES:
1) If your friend is killed, there's no way to know when the magical moment for capturing a POW comes, since he's the one who tells you. Also, your friend keeps talking even if dead as long as you don't KNOW he's dead. Might want to fix that with some !alive checks or somesuch, and also let you know there's only one enemy left even if he's dead.
2) If your car is destroyed, there's apparently no way to finish the mission? I know it's unlikely your car will be killed, but what happened to me was that the last living enemy crawled up to it and shot it to pieces with his handgun. (no idea why he hated it so much)
I suggest you simply add an extraction point that needs to be reached instead, allowing you to take a car or walk or whatever to get there.
Also, I don't know about the whole suicide bomber thing. I mean...we're going to capture _ONE_ POW to use to release ONE friend, yet in the process we already blow up one more of our own? I would understand it if the main objective here were actually to attack the checkpoint and kill lots of people (and possibly plant a surprise), in which case capturing the POW is just a -side objective-. This is in deed what the outro suggests, isn't it, that it was a regular terrorist attack? It makes precious little sense to me actually to kill 7+ people just to capture a single one, if you're working on your own (which in turn the intro suggests). If we'd be working on our own, doesn't it make more sense to instead ambush one of those patrolling hummers with an IED and capture someone from there (for example)?
For me this whole thing would make more sense, quite simply, if the POW-capturing was a side-objective, attacking the Checkpoint the main event, and you having one or two more pals with you. Alternatively, if the POW is continually the main event, then you could give the player some options on how to get one : for instance by disabling a patrolling hummer or just abducting that sleeping sentry
DebriefingWorked for me.
OutroI got the outro with the TV reporter. Background image of the two soldiers carrying the ammo crate was coool. Very real-looking.
The terrorist video was a tad short, though. Could've added some more, y'know, fluff. I have a feeling people tend to become rather self-important in those kinds of videos.
SummaryThere were still some game-breakers above, although they're certainly easy enough to solve. My main gripe was, I guess, with the premise of the mission itself. I do think this was a much more unique approach though: instead of directly freeing your friend you go about it this way. Goodstuff. Still, I don't know. Maybe suicide bombers don't impress me, is all. But overall, it was a unique, nicely voice-overed and generally well-scripted mission! Short, though.
Project Beta Approved
Topic: (Review Completed) [SP] Fida'i - Checkpoint (polished edition) (Read 5586 times)