[MatthTheGeek]

Spoiler:

END HUMANITY

SOLVE ALL PROBLEMS EVER

???

PROFIT

[Axem]

Kay, so I finished it. I started it weeks ago, but got stuck at a mission, and then just ran through the last few missions today. So I might have forgotten some of the things I wanted to mention.

Before I go on, this is a very nice campaign. A little rough on some edges, but very much worth your time.

Spoiler:

What I liked:
The original universe gave you the freedom to do whatever you liked. Not much time is wasted on showing the "sides", not that you needed much with the Oligarchy!
The Starcracker, oh the Starcracker. Fun to fly, fun weapons. Jumping in and out of subspace to avoid fire and/or attack. As a superfighter, it does the job.
Boss Fights, they were all so nicely varied. Osmund was probably my favorite; I liked his recurring appearances in the early missions. Gave me the time to build up my aggression to him and his smarmy voice.
Edward, what is it with AIs being power hungry beings that like to kill everyone? Well no matter, slyly guiding the player to nuke the sun under the guise of overthrowing this regime was a nice twist. You could tell the Edward was up to something, but the scale was still hidden (though on retrospect, the ship's name sort of foreshadows it!).
Voice Acting: Some of the VA was hit and miss, but it added to the campaign in any case.

What I would have liked to see: (aka crit time!)
Noooo countermeasures... Most advanced fighter in the galaxy and there's NO COUNTERMEASURES?! 
Sort of related, but it was easy to get overwhelmed by the enemy. Sure you needed a lot of enemies to try to take down this super fighter trying to destroy the regime, but there were some ways to help the player out. Using hotkeys and directives would help. Giving everyone an F9 hotkey would help in keeping track of just whats around trying to kill the player, as well as a directive would help the player keep track of what's left to kill.
Also those beam cannon fighters! The bane of my existence! Finding them was a pain. "T-T-T-T-T-T-oh there he is-T" D'oh! My suggestion there would have been to give them "targetable as bomb" and flash that as a training message the first time they appear. That way b is for "Target those Beam Sons of Bit-"
More Power-ups! I liked the idea, but they seemed far and few. It would have been nice to see stuff like limit health regen or weapon energy maxing out for a period of time.

Anyway, good campaign. Everyone play it and learn from it to make extraordinary missions. I mean seriously, there aren't any escort missions! That's a big thing you can learn from right there!!

[utops]

It's just me,or mission "Destroy all subspace inhabitants" gets buckets of frustration?
I mean,maybe I'm using wrong weapons... or tactics perhaps? The thing is im going like this:
Heat up inhibitiant -> afterburner -> destroy fighter waves -  repeat.  It works to the point of being swarmed by too many buggers after doom of rocket frigate  and my juggernaut end up as a space dust.
Any helpful tips will be appreciated.

Campaign is good and innovative almost feel like oldskool arcade space shooter due to power ups and  many weak against one buffed also bosses ,its good to have something like this in freespace campaign soup.

[KyadCK]

It's just me,or mission "Destroy all subspace inhabitants" gets buckets of frustration?
I mean,maybe I'm using wrong weapons... or tactics perhaps? The thing is im going like this:
Heat up inhibitiant -> afterburner -> destroy fighter waves -  repeat.  It works to the point of being swarmed by too many buggers after doom of rocket frigate  and my juggernaut end up as a space dust.
Any helpful tips will be appreciated.

Campaign is good and innovative almost feel like oldskool arcade space shooter due to power ups and  many weak against one buffed also bosses ,its good to have something like this in freespace campaign soup.

Thats pretty much the strategy, ya... I generally go for killing 3 of them, then let the fighters get to me and move at random while picking them off. Remember, one of your missiles is a heatseaker swarm missle, and you dont have to be looking at anything to fire it. Just let off a salvo every once and a while while dodgeing everything and pound the missile frigates hard when they appear. A couple grenades and heavier missles should due the trick nicely, just point and shoot. Don't worry about lock-on, it takes too long.

[bigchunk1]

I consider that mission the hardest one of them all. It also happens to be the longest. The strategy varies on what you're comfortable with, but it almost always involves the shooting and runing. I will give you a hint though: If you destroy inhibitors without first defeating combat units, you will find yourself overwhelmed. So get fighters first, then the inhibitors.

I balanced this mod to be a challenge, so much so that it takes me a few tries on insane to beat it even after knowing everything that goes into it. I think there are a number of players out there who got frustrated with this mod and set it aside. I was considering down the road making a patch which is more balanced with the casual player in mind, at least on the skill levels very easy through medium. One of the things that has been stopping me is the mysterious random crash error some players get when fighting Commodore Osmund. I would like for the patch to fix that, but I haven't found the exact cause of it. I'm not even sure if it persists through the newer, more stable builds that have recently come out.

[bigchunk1]

I recently gave this a rerun on easy with RC5 to test for compatibility. It ran smoothly and there were no crashes whatsoever, even on mission 8. The Ion Cannon weapon, however, now has a cooldown it didn't have with a previous build. The weapon's fire rate much slower now making the weapon nearly ineffective. I am guessing there is a parameter (wait time?) which FSO ignored before that now is calculated for beam weapons.

Can others who have played the mod run mission 8 and see if you are getting the same issue?  Also, I want to know if the potential crash to desktop error went away.
Note: The X-Ray can also penetrate shields for m8

[niffiwan]

I think you've hit this change, which altered the way fire waits worked.  Previously, any primary fire wait longer than 5 secs was changed to 1 sec.  The Ion Cannon is tabled to 10 secs, which would have been 1 sec prior to the change.

Code: [Select]

$Fire Wait:                     10.0                ;; in seconds

After the change, you get the as-tabled 10 secs fire wait 

So, umm... update your tables? 

[bigchunk1]

Niffiwan picked it out exactly. It's a one line fix.

Here's a hotfix which solves the problem. Put it in freespace2/Antagonist/data/tables

http://www.mediafire.com/?ek3a44z8e3fg51a

This is NOT a patch. The only purpose of the update is to change the cooldown of the Ion to what it was originally intended to be.

Still no crash to desktop errors. I am going to assume they have been fixed if no one else says anything.

[General Battuta]

The Antagonist

Live impressions up first, in spoiler tags:

Spoiler:

I started my playthrough in techroom intelligence. I really appreciate the effort put into cleaning up the ship and weapon entries and offering some background on the setting - I really like the themes of control and systemic inefficiency that crop up here. The intel entries could've used an editing pass, but it's nothing major, and they're very readable.

The techroom art does a great job of setting a hard-SF mood which jives nicely with the setting.

Onwards!

Mission 0

Very effective intro - atmospheric, cinematic, lays out the sociopolitical background that I was afraid would be left in the techroom. It's a little longer and a little wordier than it needs to be - just a bit - but it's excellent at setting up a fundamental conflict and a cool hook. The Oligarchs are a really exciting idea for a video game player, because they concentrate the interesting bits of a society down to just a few individuals, which makes for easier, uh, antagonism.

There was a peculiarity here where the ship in the first shot stopped moving well before the shot ended.

Mission 1

Love the in media res beginning. I like the decision to go with a voiced protagonist/narrator - he's personable and sympathetic. And I enjoy the effort put into the presentation here, the guard grunting as he's tackled, the camera pan simulating movement down the length of the ship.

I think this is an interesting, and challenging, stylistic decision -- instead of bypassing the components of storytelling where FreeSpace is weak (action outside the cockpit), you've tackled them head on.

Mission 2

well that's certainly a fair bit of firepower

The AI companion reminds me a bit of Defense Grid.

The gameplay's a lot of fun - I like the slow-acceleration afterburner and the area-of-effect attacks, and the upgrades are cool.

I actually really enjoyed the final fight in this mission. The ship's capabilities bring particular depth to ETS - unlike in regular FreeSpace, you can get pretty tactical with your allocation, going full on engines to blow through a group and get some breathing room, then full to shields to charge up.

That was a really well-engineered boss fight - and close! Got out with 6%.

I like the hint dropped at the end here that there's something more going on than 'you stole a fighter, lucky you'. Edward has some objectives in mind.

Mission 3

Smart of these guys to realize they can't just zerg me and win.

Hooooooooly **** that was fun, I got out with like 4%. I love the capship artillery and those anti-fighter torpedoes are hilarious - they're so big and persistent and when I'm on afterburner they like to trail along like 10 feet behind like we're in a Looney Tunes skit. I never shot any of them down because I didn't want to abandon my mad rush for the gate.

I wonder if I should've stopped and fought any of those people!

Mission 4

OH GOD BUGS

thank **** for vicias

I like the Homeworld-esque overall narrative you've got going here - not in the sense of 'go home', but in the sense of 'break through the defensive layers of an entrenched enemy'.

A MORAL DECISION cool

**** that I'm gonna leave that broadcast center broadcastin.

Oh, damn, I guess I don't get any choice. 

Thank **** you made a new mission

Mission 5

Very cool fight. I was surprised to see Sapphire didn't react when I brought down a wingmate. When she dies I got a message from Command which probably was meant to come from one of the surviving wingmen.

Damn, Edward's starting to sound a little...megalomaniacal. Maybe I'M the evil guys, did we ever think of that

Mission 6

torpedoes cool

Your music doesn't seem to like to loop, you should add some loops to your play-sound-from-file SEXPs.

This mission was a lot of fun, I ran around taking out inhibitors one by one. Then I realized I had to kill everyone else too. That didn't turn out so well. Was still fun on replay, though.

Mission 7

i am going to kill your dick oligarch

Hahah I killed his dick

I bet Edward is one of the Oligarchs and he's making a power play on all the others. I'm so smart

Mission 8

uhguhuguhghuguhg this is so ****ing cool

Mission 9

Ahaha it's that dick Ozmund again. I am going to kill his dick

AGH IT CRASHED i don't care i'm going to kill him anyway

hahaha suck my ion dick

Mission 10

This is ****ing epic

(I really like how you introduce new mechanics, teach them with simple scenarios, then ramp them up into boss fights. That's classically excellent game design.)

SUCK MY SUBSPACE DICK CORNELIUS

Okay I'm getting ready for a big plot twist here, SK-1 seems like it's gonna stand for STAHH CRACKER

oh christ, I need to think about this for a while

Okay. What I know about the Oligarchy tells me that it's a dictatorship run by mustache-twirling villains who keep the populace in line through chemical coercion. This doesn't seem to be a government worthy of support.

That said...

The Oligarchy seems to be doing its job. Humanity is expanding and preparing itself to meet potential alien threats, better than its predecessor did. Technological development is clearly a priority. I'm not sure I can justify destroying a government that's --

But. Wait a second. In the case of the one individual we're aware of who escaped Oligarchy control - me - we know that his immediate reaction was revulsion, disgust, and a fateful decision to avoid falling back under chemical thrall.

That suggests to me that, given the chance to consent, most individuals would not favor Oligarchy rule. And that makes it a government that, no matter how effective, I'm not sure I can support.

fire the starcracker

Mission 11

OH **** **** DAMN

I...think I made the wrong call.

The Antagonist Review

This is one of the finest mods ever made, and one of the cleanest, most flow-inducing experiences I've encountered in gaming over the past few years. It'd be a fine XBLA title or indie PC release. It surprised me more than anything I've played since Windmills, and I would rank it alongside Wings of Dawn as one of the most important new milestones in recent modding.

I'm going to drop some spoilers in here, so please stop reading if you haven't played the campaign: just trust me, go get it.

Plot and Metaplot

Let's talk story, atmosphere, and presentation. A good game story isn't a good book story or a good RPG story. It eschews sprawling background material and excess scripted narrative; instead, it strives to bury elements of its world and themes in the gameplay, where the player will uptake them and - hopefully - assimilate them as part of play. Where there are characters, they must serve dual functions both in the narrative and gameplay.

Edward's role in The Antagonist is functionally similar to Cortana in Halo or the raspberry AI from Defense Grid, but narratively, he's a bit more complex - a GLaDoS figure whose goals locally parallel the player's, but, it's hinted, may ultimately diverge. One of the absolutely strongest pieces of writing in the Antagonist is in the way Edward seduces both the player character and the player himself. I can't indicate strongly enough how well this is played. Here's why:

When we meet Edward, the player character has a need: get the **** out of this situation, get oriented, figure out a goal. And the player has a need: get a plot. Get a reason to keep playing. Edward is a catalyst who converts the player character's need into an answer to the player's need. 'I need a mission', he says. 'Don't you want to complete the mission? You want to bring down the Oligarchy? Great. Let's do it.'

Gameplay, plot, and player psychology work together here: the player character supplies a hook to Edward, who supplies a hook to the player. That's going to be a theme in this review. And, of course, there's a metatextual through-line here: ultimately, the hook that the player character gives to Edward will come back around in the final confrontation, which brings the player character into conflict with Edward, and the player into conflict with the narrative arc. This is a really beautiful piece of game writing.

Let's talk setting and setting writing. Again: fantastic use of setting to empower gameplay. The player steals, and is stolen by, a special ship: the player has special powers and an advantageous position in the gameplay space. Alpha 1 syndrome is justified. The Oligarchy consists of a few specific, powerful, unique individuals supported by hordes of mindless drones - and so the minion/boss structure of gameplay is justified.

There are criticisms to be leveled here: the writing on the line by line level is nothing special and the voice acting is, well, you know. But they get the job done.

The plot moves forward in a way that enables new and interesting gameplay. Edward's movement towards the center of Oligarchy space creates a logical escalation of enemy types and threat levels. And we get important progress on the metaplot: we learn to trust and work with Edward. He is our friend. At only one point are we put in conflict with Edward, when he demands the destruction of a comm station. And -- get this --

You cannot refuse.

That struck me, at first, as a flaw - I don't want to kill civilians. But because Edward is the connection between player and plot, the plot cannot proceed without Edward's approval. This sets the player up to trust Edward's judgment even in morally conflicted situations, and it also contributes to the clever foreshadowing that Edward is not truly human; he is a mission-driven organism, consumed by his goals. (Is he not, in a sense, a twisted reflection of the player, who works only to complete the task, to annihilate and destroy?) Because we can do nothing but destroy the com station, we learn that listening to Edward keeps us moving forward towards our goal.

Only at the end of the narrative, of course, do we finally reach the apex of the metacrisis, the struggle between player agency and plot agency, Edward's agency. We are given the chance to complete our mission, but we must consider the cost. For the first time, player and player character can choose to break from Edward, Edward who has guided and saved us -- to realize that he kidnapped us as much as we stole him, and that we have not been in control, any more than the player controls the narrative they are railroaded down.

This is the scope of the final choice: to choose between the player accepting the tyranny of narrative control, as Call of Duty, as any number of scripted triple-A titles, and accepting slavery to Edward in an unending mission to destroy without purpose. Or to reject narrative control, to break free, to go wherever the player pleases -- and, in doing so, to end the game, because, after all, the game cannot support such freedom.

It's beautiful.

And, of course, there's a plot crisis to go along with the metaplot crisis: the tension between destroying the Oligarchy, at great personal and humanitarian cost, or allowing the Oligarchy to endure, and securing personal freedom. This was a really tough decision, and one I wavered on several times. The Oligarchy is clearly totalitarian and dehumanizing; yet it is also efficacious and useful; yet there are no threats that seem to demand its extreme measures; yet such threats may well arise; yet - in the end - everyone who we have ever seen who has escaped Oligarchy control desperately wants to avoid returning, even if death is the alternative. It seemed worthy of destruction. That, too, is a really strong conflict.

Gameplay Design

Again: very little here except praise. The grenade was pretty bad in all but a few specific situations, but all the other weapons had their uses and were a lot of fun, though I usually just spammed the cluster missile.

The gameplay allowed some really interesting decisions not present in core FreeSpace. Evasion and recharge is a much more viable option, making ETS play - favoring afterburner-heavy breakaways followed by a lot of shield love - much more viable. The ability to attack in all directions eliminated the frustration of the circle fight against multiple adversaries. I don't think there was a single enemy attack that felt like bull**** to me.

Really, I'm struck by how smooth and confident the design was. New mechanics - subspace/realspace shifting, for example - were introduced in simple scenarios (kill one Arbalest), escalated to multiple foes, complicated with other elements, and then ramped up into boss fights. This is sterling game design and I can't praise it enough.

The enemy types offered a lot of fun variety, though I never really got a sense for what a lot of the basic enemy fighter types did. I loved your take on capships as artillery and irritating-missile platforms - really fit the setting and the arcadey style. It struck me again and again that these were gameplay elements that simply wouldn't work in a FreeSpace setting, and you made the most of that creative freedom.

Inducing flow states is, I think, the best thing a game can do for the player. It needs to be challenging, with death a constant but never-quite-overwhelming risk, attention demanded but not exceeded. Playing on medium, The Antagonist did that for me better than almost anything else I've played. Even in a relaxed mod like JAD 2.21, bull**** beam kills can lead to frustration and 'done for the night' syndrome, but the quick mission structure in Antagonist made death mostly just inconvenient, and the player has plenty of tools to stay alive.

I really can't praise this mod enough. I think I'm going to do a post in the near future on my big concern: why aren't more people playing it?

Spoilers end.

[Spoon]

Excellent review

[Droid803]

SUCK MY SUBSPACE DICK CORNELIUS

 

[bigchunk1]

Definitely worth it after seeing a review like that. Much appreciated.

[General Battuta]

PLAY THIS MOD ****

[mjn.mixael]

Make a sequel...

[General Battuta]

Make a sequel...

No, don't, it's said everything it needs to say. It's perfectly self-contained.

[Darius]

I agree this thing is perfectly paced. I had to stop halfway through a combat segment when I realised what time it was: there's a constant narrative drive that makes it hard to find a spot to say "that's it for now."

[mjn.mixael]

but I want MOAR Antagonist!

[MatthTheGeek]

Then replay it, this time knowing that you can glide.

BAM, instant replay value.

[TrashMan]

I just have one question:

How does one pilot fresh out of a drug stupor high-jack a super-advanced fighter by himself?
I know [ur=http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FallingIntoTheCockpit]Falling into the Cockpit[/url] is not an uncommon trope, but mayhaps you should have put more effort into the story start?

[General Battuta]

I just have one question:

How does one pilot fresh out of a drug stupor high-jack a super-advanced fighter by himself?
I know [ur=http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/FallingIntoTheCockpit]Falling into the Cockpit[/url] is not an uncommon trope, but mayhaps you should have put more effort into the story start?

Play the damn mod instead of being a jackass about it. It's not a ****ing documentary.