Kindred

Oh yeah, jiggle physics. The peanut gallery's contribution to videogame design.

I've played the hell out of Bloodlines as my name might suggest, and having reinstalled and replayed in the last couple of weeks I can tell you you've got the rose tinted glasses on there. The writing on Bloodlines is good, but compared to the majority of modern games (Alpha Protocol included) it's facial animations are almost comical. That's the one part of AP's animations that are up to scratch.

I just registered to have my say on this. Don't look at me like that - it's the internet, everyone has an opinion. Alpha Protocol isn't a bad game. It's not even a buggy game by modern standards. It's got rough edges (figuratively, and literally with the lack of AA support.) It's unimpressive visually. The animations are clunky compared to other third-person games. I ran into a grand total of one bug during my first (and currenly only completed) playthrough in the form of onscreen distortion when accessing one computer in the Moscow train station. There's no grand conspiracy. I think the problem with Alpha Protocol is peoples' preconcieved notions of how it would be. Releasing the game in the wake of Splinter Cell is a questionable marketing move - I'd compare it to releasing an original sci-fi movie the week after Star Wars - especially since when people think of stealth espionage games, they think of Sam Fisher. The problem is that Splinter Cell is an action game, and therefore can focus on providing a completely linear story, where Alpha Protocol is an RPG which requires more than a writer sitting in a room for six hours to come up with a way to deliver its content. I bought Splinter Cell: Conviction and played through it once. That's it. I didn't even think about a second playthrough. Right now, I've got two AP save files on the boil, and it likely won't be too long until I begin another.