Never thought I'd see the day where Alpha Protocol would escape rights hell and reemerge available to legally obtain once more. I already had an old Steam copy long before the delisting happened, but I was quick to double-dip on GOG to show my support once I heard the news and it also gave me a good reason to replay the game after my last one quite some time ago. AP still holds up for me as one of my favorite games, flaws and all, though said flaws definitely are rather over-exaggerated I feel; it really isn’t that especially janky or buggy when it comes to ambitious WRPGs.

When I first completed AP more than a decade ago I was a bit lukewarm on it, I enjoyed it enough but some of the fights frustrated me, having not fully understood how to best utilize the builds and how to break the combat. Replaying the game not long after transformed it into one of my favorite games, because through that replay I realized how genuinely reactive AP was and how unrivaled it was and still is in this regard, nearly fifteen years on. While Bioware at the time was touting how Mass Effect was going to take all your choices into account, which they would inevitably flounder on that promise in the end, Obsidian quietly fulfilled that promise in reactivity with AP. ME was obviously a much taller order, being a trilogy and all, but Obsidian did the smart thing of just having AP be a standalone game which allowed easier and greater reactivity; and boy does this game have layers. There's so much to uncover depending how much you explore and your relationships with the characters. Finding dossiers on characters and factions have real tangible effects on the game. This information could also lead to very different outcomes and even a unique mission or two. Alpha Protocol’s dialogue system is a more fleshed out expansion of Mass Effect’s Paragon/Renegade dialogue system with three personality styles based off popular spy characters; Professional (Jason Bourne, this one being the more heroic one on average, as much as a black ops fed agent can be anyway), Suave, (James Bond, though like the biggest dudebro version of Bond ever who has got all the smarm and verbal sexual harassment but none of the class) and Aggressive. (Jack Bauer, complete aggro asshole who shoots first and asks questions never) There is some more nuance to these personalities so they don’t always adhere to that mold strictly and characters respond differently to which approach you take with them and the game encourages a varied approach because of that. The dialogue system is also a precursor to the Telltale formula, as you are timed in your responses unlike in Bioware RPGs of the time. The dialogue system is the best part of the game mechanically, really mastering what Bioware was working on at the time. Being able to use information you gleaned from dossiers in dialogue is also real cool and characters will even compliment on how prepared you are.

The gameplay outside dialogue is kinda jank though, but honestly isn't notably so compared to other WRPGs of the era. Like the pre-EA buyout Bioware games of the 2000’s and Mass Effect 1 didn't have great combat either, for example. And if people can forgive the sheer mess of Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines (I'm among them) AP can be forgiven too. The biggest FYIs I'd give when it comes to the combat is that the game demands that you need to wait for the reticle of the guns to tighten up in order to consistently hit enemies and that stealth is primarily used as a combat option, a very good one as you level it up more, but not as a means to ghost through the game. You can avoid combat with stealth but the game still throws a bunch of fights at you that you can't avoid, namely the boss fights. Stealth in AP is more meant to be used to become an invisible punch-ghost who throat chops everyone in the room. Combat can be rather fun though, mainly in that most of the stat branches are busted once you start getting midway through the tree. Pistols are the biggest example as Chain Shot is an amazing ability that practically deletes every boss in the game with just the second upgrade of it. Martial Arts is also a fun ability as you can give enemies a flying knee to the face to knock them on their ass and finish them off with a stomp. Also you should put like two points into Sabotage so it makes the hacking mini-games easier or you can just bypass them with EMPs, they get rather rough as the game goes on, though hitting alarms isn’t that big of a deal as the only penalty is that enemies in the area are alerted to you, its not like MGS where they can spawn in.

Narratively, I do think the game is quite good with more depth than you would initially think. AP's tone is actually kind of all over the place, but I think it still works despite any hiccups; it actually ends up being this odd combination of genuine spy thriller that dabbles in some rather bold political themes for a mainstream video game, mainly it how the game has such as an utterly dim view of American empire and the military industrial complex, but it’s also essentially an almost parodic pastiche of the genre, letting you be a big juvenile power fantasy fairly straight most of the time where you can bang most of the female cast while making snarky one-liners and fight a Russian mobster and full time Tony Montana cosplayer who gets superpowers from snorting coke. The game can be quite funny too, manly with how Thorton is just such a big asshole; though it definitely falls into some cringe outdated 2000’s jokes at times, mainly when it comes to Suave Thorton being a creep. When it comes to the serious themes, in contrast, one example is how the Islamic terrorist leader set up as the initial antagonist is actually a man who honors his word; he has a whole bunch of innocent blood on his hands but he's still a lesser evil compared to, as well as being a mere pawn to, the grand web of global capital and American empire. American intelligence, the so called "good guys" are actually a den of sociopaths who number crunch death tolls to determine acceptable losses for American interests, dipshit nepo babies, and patriotic dupes unwittingly giving their service to a military industrial machine that will easy discard them without a second thought. The corporations are the actual masters of the American state and they use global politics as their playground just to make Number go up. Even though I really wouldn't call the game leftist, that's more for the Obsidian games Josh Sawyer directed, the game still has a rather keen awareness of American imperial megalomania for a 2010 video game and one of my favorite examples of this is a dossier that reveals that one of the previous names for Alpha Protocol was Deus Vult.

When it comes to the cast I think AP’s is neat. They aren’t as fleshed out as say, the Mass Effect crew, and they can be rather standard spy story clichés like SIE for example, who’s the big German femme fatale who likes violence and Thorton being aggro with her, but there’s always usually something more about them beneath the surface that you can uncover and figuring out what response they’d approve of is fun. You can also totally just piss them off too and the game even rewards you for it just like it would if they liked you. One of my favorites among the cast is Conrad Marburg, who I think is one of the best video game antagonists because he is still the only video game villain who actually takes into account how you've played the game up until the point you first meet him and he will know if you’re just trying to manipulate him by getting under his skin. Speaking of villains, AP also has my favorite evil ending in a game because you can just win over all the people working under the main villain and just take his place, to do so requires some thought and not going the standard stupid evil path of just killing everyone, though you can actually kill pretty much the entirety of the named cast if you want! That’s why this game’s the GOAT, it is truly is one of the most reactive games I have ever played.

In conclusion if you have any interest in game reactivity and player choice and don’t mind a bit of WRPG jank I really do recommend playing AP as it is still one of the shining stars, even over a decade later. It sucks we never got a sequel or spiritual successor that ironed out the game’s flaws but I’m just real glad people can experience this game again because it still holds up.

The best Metroidvania I've played that's not either namesake of the genre (I count Bloodstained as a Castlevania) Lost Crown manages to nail pretty much everything about getting the genre down right. The combat flows so well and as someone who usually doesn't like parrying in games the parry window was forgiving enough where I actually enjoyed doing it (Not to mention that you’re not forced to use it to actually beat bosses; this game and how great it is really me reminded me of how much I hated Metroid Dread). The movement and platforming is fast, responsive, and smooth. Moving around the world feels great and there’s enough well-placed warps where backtracking never feels like a problem. Exploration is rewarding with useful upgrades and items to discover and collect. The moves you gain also feel good too and have all that growing power and variety a quality Metroidvania should have. The game also manages to make you feel powerful as you progress through the game but still demands a good engagement with the mechanics on Normal, i.e. bosses are a great mix of requiring you to know how to play but never feeling like a slog. The main antagonist especially, who is clearly Vergil, Judgement Cut and all, is a great example of this. I’m also real glad that the only thing this game cribbed from Dark Souls was the estus flask system because man I am really sick of so many indie Metroidvanias shoehorning in Souls mechanics when they don’t really work all that well with the genre; I liked Hollow Knight in spite of that, but Lost Crown doesn’t have that problem at all. A few of the side-missions are a pain in the ass though so I didn’t bother with them, but overall I did most of them and they were real fun. Ubisoft Montpellier really proving they’re like the only part of Ubi making fantastic passion projects like this instead off AAA slop anymore. Lost Crown definitely going to be one of the must play games of this year and it’s already one of my favorites.

Another quality installment in Digital Eclipse's series and a neat historical look at the UK computer scene of the 80's through Jeff Minter's experiences, especially for me as an American who had little knowledge of it; but man just like with Karateka I just don't like the vast majority of Jeff Minter's games in this collection. A good chunk of them are obnoxious sensory overload that go way too fast and/or are overly complex to a trollish degree. Also didn't change my opinion that Commodore games just sucked. Tempest 2000 is cool though and I definitely can see why it was the only reason to get a Jaguar. Funny thing is I felt Jeff's visualizer programs were more of an interesting topic when it came to his games because even if I wasn't totally into them Jeff had a clear passion for them as well as an ambition that was ahead of his time with them. Just as with Karateka, Llamasoft is a great historical piece but I just wish they could cover games that are mostly fun to play. Regardless I'm completely locked into with this series and definitely will be Day 1 once again for the next installment.