EDIT: Sorry, I accidently hit “alt+s” sending this before it was ready. As such, it is currently not complete. If you could hold off any posts untill I say it is done, that would be fantastic. Thank you!
EDIT 2: Done!
While all of you are dancing around your identical (and quite frankly rather boring - spare BF 1942 which is quite fun) world war 2 games - I on the other hand am playing a gaming masterpiece.
“No One Lives Forever 2: A spy in H.A.R.M.'s way” is a lighthearted spy game set in the mid to late 1960’s, where you play as agent Cate Archer up against the evil organisation “H.A.R.M.” (and nobody knows what it stands for). NOLF 2 is the funniest game I have played, with characters ranging from the war mongering American general, the russian H.A.R.M. Guards (who say things such as “Slippery Capitalists…” when they lose your trail), and pasty-faced french mimes toting 1920’s era modster-style tommy guns (who will sometimes incorperate mime acts into their fight routines)
Other examples of comedy appear in the game’s intelligence, ranging from one series of letters in an indian mission, arguing over changing the name of some presumably awful operation, and how they can’t call it shakiti because of shakiti cola, and how himatipatachabogalo (something like that :sigh:) keeps getting mixed up with himanipatchabogalo, all the way to a spare request form in russia for ordering more toilet paper (to which there is a follow up form that says denied)
Mind you, a good portion of the games humor can still be found in the cut scenes - especially those dealing with H.A.R.M. - such as H.A.R.M.'s director, who constantly has to deal with his mother on the phone (“Good bye, mother…” “OH! Don’t you dare hang up on-”).
Not to mention the enemies you can face. Sometimes, when you sneek up on enemies, you can hear them carrying on conversations that are generally funny (such as in Japan, where you can hear 2 ninjas (female) talking about how you should poison your man everyday, and tell him he can have the antidote when he comes home to stop him from straying to other women), but sometimes the conversations contain vital information or tips for the completing the mission.
NOLF 2 isn’t all fun and games though (just most of it is). The game has enough “hard core” shooter action to satisfy any FPS enthusiast.
Among the features of the game are it’s dual methods of playing. You can go through most missions relying purely on stealth, and some relying just on brute force and firepower - although some missions may have a clear favour of stealth (sneaking around H.A.R.M’s Indian headquarters) or brute force (the “tricycle” sequence). Another bonus to the game is it’s element of an RPG. As you collect intelligence and complete objectives, you are awarded skill points. You can use these points to update your skills such as Marksmanship, Stamina, and Weapons skills (for example) the best part about this system is - it gives noticable changes. Example, at a Novice level (level 1, what you start at) your crosshair will swim drastically when you zoom in on a scope. As soon as you upgrade it to Amature (level 2) the crosshair is alot easier to control, and so on and so forth up to level 5 (expert) where it stops swimming all together.
The game, when realeased (2002) may not have been absolute top notch graphically, but it was definately one to contend with using the LithTech Jupiter engine. Although, in my oppinion, graphics in a game only matter if the game looks horrible and you should not judge how good a game is by how good it looks, because the point of a game is to have fun rather than to look good and be realistic (if I want that, I will watch a bloody movie)
NOLF 2 has an excellent story line that (while a tad slower than the rest in the first 3 missions) is quick with intelligent plot twists relevant to the overall scheme of things, but still ripe with great amounts of humor. The missions are varied, and have a good contrast of humor and action.
EDIT 3: From a more technical stand point, the voice acting in this game is perfectly suited, and well done really adding to the game. Also, this is the first game I have seen with lip-syncing in actual play as well as cut scenes (ie, when you talk to someone, their lips move perfectly in sync with the voice that follows). I’ll admit, I was pretty impressed by it.
:red: [color="#FF8800"]Coppertop[/color]
(I may have left something out. I may update this a little later on)
Edit: and I did.