That’s exactly what I tell myself every time I get ganked by a spy. :)
-Tom
Also, Tom, have you used the spies’ sonar goggles? Then you know what I am talking about.
3rd person situational awareness + completely bright + highlights paths and enemies + sees through walls
vs.
Narrow FOV without even a freaking flashlight.
EDIT: Oh, and mad props to Ubi’s sound team. The “hacking” sound as a spy sucks the data from a terminal is so well done. It makes everything feel so tense, especially the last 10 percent.
Dude, please. I’ll see your sonar goggles and raise you a simple motion tracker while my back is to a wall. If your point is that spies and mercs are different, I agree. If your point is that you’ve apparently sussed out some sort of inherent balance problem on your first day of playing without even dipping into the merc equipment, I don’t really have any comment. :)
By the way, you know what’s even more powerful than sonar goggles? Two spies with the tagging ability, handing off constant data to the entire team.
-TomNot really a balance complaint, more like good-natured whining.
And yeah, dude, you’re probably going to kill a lot of hackers standing around with your back to the wall.
So no one’s playing this? It’s worth it for the multiplayer alone, but the single player is huge and really good, too. Maybe not dishonored good, but really good. It’s lost some of the smoothness of conviction, but has a lot more options.
The single player is fantastic. Huge levels, too. I’ve played the first two, and each were over an hour (then again, quite a few deaths because I’m playing all stealth on the difficulty right below hardest)
I’m playing it and love it but I play in fits and spurts because I make myself restart if I’m discovered. I can only take so many restarts before I need to take a break so it’s a little slow going here, especially with a couple other games on my plate (SR4 and LoL). But yeah, they’ve expanded on everything I enjoyed in Conviction and right from the start they encourage diverse approaches so that we don’t feel like any one approach is ideal or mandatory.
In fact, I can already see myself going through a second time for a pure ghost playthrough since I feel like every level (so far!) supports that playstyle, whereas in Conviction it often felt way too onerous if not impossible.
You might be making it needlessly hard on yourself, Joe. Blacklist is very much a character progression game. I found that it worked fine just getting through the levels as best as I could to earn money to buy better gear, which made it easier to then do more difficult missions more efficiently, for higher scores and more money. Also, if you do all the Grim missions – which restart you if you’re spotted anyway! – you’ll unlock the highest tier stealth suit, which makes it far less frustrating to entirely ghost missions. Of course, different types of missions play differently. The Kobin missions have a great mechanism for punishing you if you’re spotted, so you don’t have to feel compelled to restart.
It all comes down to playing how you want to play, so you don’t have to resort to self-imposed restrictions to make the game challenging or to draw it out.
-Tom
I could never play the Grim missions co-op. I’d be too embarrassed if I shut down the mission before the last goal and too frustrated if my pal kept doing that.
I’ve started playing team deathmatch (for the weekly challenge, natch), and it’s very fun. 80% of players are spies. Sprinting through the map spamming “E” (for melee kills) is not a bad strategy.
PS
Get the crossbow and all the upgrades. It is INSANE. EMP, sleeping gas, shock dart, & noismaker, all in one. Love that thing!
The co-op missions work great if you’re using the markers and dual execute options. Which means playing with someone you want to talk to, which means probably not playing with some random online yahoo. And, yeah, it helps if you and your partner don’t mind occasionally frustrating each other. :)
Also, in my latest spies vs mercs games, I’m seeing a lot of higher level spies just running around trying to get kills. I’m guessing there’s some skewed reward for racking up kills. Ugh. So annoying to see people treat yet another one of Ubisoft’s brilliant multiplayer designs like straight-up deathmatches. People suck. But I guess it’s partly Ubisoft’s fault for not designing more carefully around that by minimizing the reward for kills.
-Tom
Can’t believe how little attention this game is getting. I’d love to play some multiplayer on the 360, but I’m on vacation (with no 360) for another week. In Tom-Chick-time that’s like 11-12 new games. ;)
For everyone else, the gamertag is Inver. Maybe I’ll see you in seven…
Holy crap, this is huge. Split-screen co-op is a dying feature (I thought it was dead). Love that they included it.
I think the only reward is the rewarding of ganking people, which, as long as you’re still hacking points, is a good strategy. Hopefully those who just want to kill people will soon move on to the deathmatch mode.
I’m playing this on the PS3 if anybody cares to join me. PSN id is JetTone.
So far I have only played a couple of matches of Spies vs Mercs and I suppose it’s the training level since it was the same level each time. But is the hacking the only mode for this or are there other objective based matchtypes? So far of what I seen, I like. I have tried to play Splinter Cell over the years but it just never took with me but something finally clicked with this one. Even with me being a semi-perfectionist that needs to redo missions over and over and over I’m actually have a lot of fun being Mr. Silent Killer badass.
There are five total modes –
Classic - This is 2v2 with a focus on darkness, and there are no upgrades. 2 spies try to hack the terminals, 2 mercs try to stop 'em. I can’t recommend this mode enough. It’s amazing.
Blacklist - 4v4, with customizable loadouts. Spies try to hack, mercs try to defend.
Extraction - 4v4, with customizable loadouts. Mercs try to extract data, spies stop them.
Uplink - 3v3, with customizable loadouts. 2 teams (player can choose to by spy or merc) try to keep control of three points on the map.
Team Deathmatch. 4v4, with customizable loadouts. 2 mixed teams try to rack up the kills.
Tom, it is more about playing Sam how I want to play him than anything else. I do odd stuff like this on occasion, like not using the game map in Skyrim if I’m not playing a Nord. It just makes the game a little more interesting for me if I add my own arbitrary rules into the mix. Suffice to say, this will be even more masochistic when I do the ghost style playthrough.
Couldn’t agree more. This game is fantastic. I love the campaign, the side quests. There’s even a cool metagame puzzle to perform in the SMI. They even fixed the biggest problem that most “sneak games have” They let you play how you want to. I love sneaking through a board without killing or being seen, but I love to have the option to pull out a gun and start a fire fight.
Online I’ve been playing mostly classic spies v mercs, but black list is great as well. I’m still messing around with all the gadgets, but what a great game. I love the lighting, I love how tense the game is. If you just run and gun as a spy or a merc you will lose. You really have to take your time and check your corners, but at the same time you have a time limit forcing you to move.
After the last game I was so turned off by splinter cell. I was really worried it was going to be more of the same.
People, GO BUY THIS GAME NOW!!
Inverarity,
When you get back let’s play.
I’m with you Joe. I love trying to just sneak pass everyone. Yeah it’s near impossible, but it’s so rewarding when you can pull it off.
Mercs also unlock vision modes (which I haven’t played yet) that let you see spies when they use goggles or another vision mode that let’s you see spies when they use gadgets and equipment.
Mercs also unlock vision modes (which I haven’t played yet) that let you see spies when they use goggles or another vision mode that let’s you see spies when they use gadgets and equipment.
Mercs also unlock vision modes (which I haven’t played yet) that let you see spies when they use goggles or another vision mode that let’s you see spies when they use gadgets and equipment.
DAMN you, Tom Chick. I’m still finishing up New Vegas, yet I’m now downloading SR4 due to your voodoo skills, and now I’m ordering this game for my next 360 obsession. (Unlike SR4, this looks like something directly in my “what’s not to like?” zone.)
That’s how I feel. I know I can go in guns ablazing and the game won’t penalize me too much. But I want to be sneaky silent badass killer guy who sneaks around people, avoids confrontations and takes out guys in the most discreet way. It is getting annoying to me so I may have to stop since I’m reloading sections dozens of time to redo them just so I can get by silently instead of killing them outright when I get spotted.
I’ve tried all the goggles, and I’d say the motion detector is best, as most players who rely on goggles also grab the helmet that makes their goggle use invisible, and most spies REALLY love to sprint at you to get a knife kill in, which will show up on the motion tracker.
That said, if a spy is using his sonar and waiting behind a corner or whatever, and doesn’t have the helmet, the RFD tracker will save your ass. Highlighting the cameras is helpful too. The sound one didn’t do much for me.