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extrapenguin...you know, I realize I forgot to check the /played time. Oops. I completed Corellia at 1d 9h-ish, and the Agent storyline had an extra dungeon afterwards, so 1d 10h, maybe? I spent about 3h on Belsavis and 2h each on Voss and Corellia. Irizi'ra'narath screencap album.
I'd say chapter 3 is the weakest of the chapters, which is a shame. I expected we'd be sent to do counterintelligence and find a mole (maybe with a stunning plot twist of it being Watcher Two or Three), but instead, we get sent to track down some super secret organization called the Star Cabal that's been secret for centuries despite being immensely powerful and able to disband Imperial Intelligence. Like, bleh.
As for the individual plots, I think Belsavis was the best, though I'm slightly regretting going through KotFE/KotET and meeting Scorpio there before I met her as part of the Agent's story – knowing the answer really takes a shine off the mystery. An interesting observation of myself I made on Belsavis was that the plot is basically "convince these criminals you're a criminal pulling a heist" and while I was mopping up rift lurkers with Lokin as my companion, I actually took the time to swap Kaliyo to be my companion for every conversation with my "crew" for the sake of verisimilitude, since she's a criminal and looks good for my cover. (...though now I wonder what sort of reaction Vector would've inspired.) I was on the edge of overleveled, as for the rest of chapter 3, so I didn't do any side quests, though I did kill enough rift lurkers to bring Lokin to 1k kills with him as an active companion! (That's probably what took me the extra hour.)
Voss started out really strong with Bas-Ton, an Imperial man surgically modified to look like a Voss, complete with taking over the original Bas-Ton's life. His family was nice, and the plotline/mystery intriguing – better than the Knight's, imo. I continued my habit if swapping companions for cutscenes, and took out Vector for the diplomatic-y bits (he was the one who briefed Ziran on Voss, after all!) and ground out kill counts with Temple. This had the hilarious effect of having Vector be witness to his girlfriend's citizenship marriage to a Voss dude. (He was understanding about it. What a good pixel boyfriend.) Then it sort of fizzled out with the conclusion. I really think they should've given us a bit larger a victory there, or emphasized the data we gained more.
Then Imperial Intelligence gets disbanded and we're given over to the military, except for Kaliyo, who's locked up and unavailable. Boo! (I guess this is the game ensuring we use more than one companion?) As a Lieutenant, we get to play laser pointer on Corellia so the bombers know what to bomb and do other very useful military things. Then Watcher Two contacts us and tells us how to make the Star Cabal scramble in a way that lets her get at their comm traffic, and we do that and fake our deaths while the SIS watches over holo.
Unrelated scene, but infinitely cooler screencap.
Other noteworthy stuff from Corellia: our new Sith overlord, Lord Razer, gets a remarkably personal sendoff by being offed by an unnamed Jedi Knight who... well, here's the dialogue:
"The dark side has failed you, Shakren san Jukii."
"I am Lord Razer!"
"If only I could believe that."
...it was something that was surprisingly meaningful/pathos-y for a bit player of a Sith and a random miniboss.
The final ending is an assault on the Star Cabal's space station, which involves some combat and a few easy puzzles of the "don't walk into the lasers" type, but, eh. Hunter (dude originally working for the SIS who wanted to use the Agent's control phrase to have his own personal slave, how lovely) gives a big speech on how you're one of the last ones like him, but I shot him in the head so idk if there's an actual "become the Star Cabal" option there.
With the Star Cabal Data McGuffin in hand, the Minister of Intelligence just abruptly tells us to erase ourselves from the databanks. This was ... well, we could tell a Voss Mystic we wanted to be free, and I guess this sort of echoed it, but it was a bit disjointed from the entire conversation before it, where the Minister said he'd be punished but no-one else would. At least tell us it'd be a way to shield Kaliyo from further prosecution or something? Anyway, Ziran took it, because that way she'd be an unlisted super secret agent working for the benefit of the Empire with zero Sith Lords jerking her around. (Somehow, despite the voice direction being "would sell you to Satan for one corn chip", she ended up being a mostly non-jerky Imperial loyalist. I guess I like patriots?)
Mostly I'm Big Mad because it started out so well and also I had an idea for chapter 3 that was better than the actual thing and also would've gone through an aspect of spycraft they just ignored. Let us go hunting for the person who leaked our control word to the SIS! As opposed to the Bargain Bin Illuminati...
Also, I figured out Raina Temple: she is the Agent's impressionable young female padawan who is a romance option for dudes. According to friend-confirmed osmosis, six of the eight classes have such a companion. Did the devs have a quota or something? Anyway, I didn't really give her much time in conversation (I swapped to Vector for the diplomacy/Bas-Ton's family bits and then took Scorpio for Corellia and beyond), but she's ... boring.
Scorpio, OTOH, is someone whose central mystery I've already seen the solution to, but was nice nonetheless. Not least because of her sexy voice. She's voiced by Deborah Kara Unger; I wonder if the VA's done anything more?
I love her voice, her skull shape, and her advice on fluid consumption before torture.
And on the theme of companions, Ziran got (unofficially) married to Vector! He was a very positive surprise, with his slightly understated sense of humor, interesting way of talking, and sharp intellect. He disconnected himself from the hive mind temporarily for the fade-to-black sex and said he'd say by Ziran's side even if she wouldn't join the Killik hive. He's an excellent pixel boyfriend (pixel husband?), and the first het romance option I've felt like poking at.
Though on the topic of romance – since they had to animate the kissing animations for two different character heights anyway, it really should've been very little trouble to make everyone bi/playersexual/whatever they want to call it. Sigh.
Unlike the Jedi Knight, I don't think this was overhyped – chapters 1-2 were actually that good – but it sort of stumbles at the end. Let's see how the rest of the lot measure up.
I'd say chapter 3 is the weakest of the chapters, which is a shame. I expected we'd be sent to do counterintelligence and find a mole (maybe with a stunning plot twist of it being Watcher Two or Three), but instead, we get sent to track down some super secret organization called the Star Cabal that's been secret for centuries despite being immensely powerful and able to disband Imperial Intelligence. Like, bleh.
As for the individual plots, I think Belsavis was the best, though I'm slightly regretting going through KotFE/KotET and meeting Scorpio there before I met her as part of the Agent's story – knowing the answer really takes a shine off the mystery. An interesting observation of myself I made on Belsavis was that the plot is basically "convince these criminals you're a criminal pulling a heist" and while I was mopping up rift lurkers with Lokin as my companion, I actually took the time to swap Kaliyo to be my companion for every conversation with my "crew" for the sake of verisimilitude, since she's a criminal and looks good for my cover. (...though now I wonder what sort of reaction Vector would've inspired.) I was on the edge of overleveled, as for the rest of chapter 3, so I didn't do any side quests, though I did kill enough rift lurkers to bring Lokin to 1k kills with him as an active companion! (That's probably what took me the extra hour.)
Voss started out really strong with Bas-Ton, an Imperial man surgically modified to look like a Voss, complete with taking over the original Bas-Ton's life. His family was nice, and the plotline/mystery intriguing – better than the Knight's, imo. I continued my habit if swapping companions for cutscenes, and took out Vector for the diplomatic-y bits (he was the one who briefed Ziran on Voss, after all!) and ground out kill counts with Temple. This had the hilarious effect of having Vector be witness to his girlfriend's citizenship marriage to a Voss dude. (He was understanding about it. What a good pixel boyfriend.) Then it sort of fizzled out with the conclusion. I really think they should've given us a bit larger a victory there, or emphasized the data we gained more.
Then Imperial Intelligence gets disbanded and we're given over to the military, except for Kaliyo, who's locked up and unavailable. Boo! (I guess this is the game ensuring we use more than one companion?) As a Lieutenant, we get to play laser pointer on Corellia so the bombers know what to bomb and do other very useful military things. Then Watcher Two contacts us and tells us how to make the Star Cabal scramble in a way that lets her get at their comm traffic, and we do that and fake our deaths while the SIS watches over holo.
Unrelated scene, but infinitely cooler screencap.
Other noteworthy stuff from Corellia: our new Sith overlord, Lord Razer, gets a remarkably personal sendoff by being offed by an unnamed Jedi Knight who... well, here's the dialogue:
"The dark side has failed you, Shakren san Jukii."
"I am Lord Razer!"
"If only I could believe that."
...it was something that was surprisingly meaningful/pathos-y for a bit player of a Sith and a random miniboss.
The final ending is an assault on the Star Cabal's space station, which involves some combat and a few easy puzzles of the "don't walk into the lasers" type, but, eh. Hunter (dude originally working for the SIS who wanted to use the Agent's control phrase to have his own personal slave, how lovely) gives a big speech on how you're one of the last ones like him, but I shot him in the head so idk if there's an actual "become the Star Cabal" option there.
With the Star Cabal Data McGuffin in hand, the Minister of Intelligence just abruptly tells us to erase ourselves from the databanks. This was ... well, we could tell a Voss Mystic we wanted to be free, and I guess this sort of echoed it, but it was a bit disjointed from the entire conversation before it, where the Minister said he'd be punished but no-one else would. At least tell us it'd be a way to shield Kaliyo from further prosecution or something? Anyway, Ziran took it, because that way she'd be an unlisted super secret agent working for the benefit of the Empire with zero Sith Lords jerking her around. (Somehow, despite the voice direction being "would sell you to Satan for one corn chip", she ended up being a mostly non-jerky Imperial loyalist. I guess I like patriots?)
Mostly I'm Big Mad because it started out so well and also I had an idea for chapter 3 that was better than the actual thing and also would've gone through an aspect of spycraft they just ignored. Let us go hunting for the person who leaked our control word to the SIS! As opposed to the Bargain Bin Illuminati...
Also, I figured out Raina Temple: she is the Agent's impressionable young female padawan who is a romance option for dudes. According to friend-confirmed osmosis, six of the eight classes have such a companion. Did the devs have a quota or something? Anyway, I didn't really give her much time in conversation (I swapped to Vector for the diplomacy/Bas-Ton's family bits and then took Scorpio for Corellia and beyond), but she's ... boring.
Scorpio, OTOH, is someone whose central mystery I've already seen the solution to, but was nice nonetheless. Not least because of her sexy voice. She's voiced by Deborah Kara Unger; I wonder if the VA's done anything more?
I love her voice, her skull shape, and her advice on fluid consumption before torture.
And on the theme of companions, Ziran got (unofficially) married to Vector! He was a very positive surprise, with his slightly understated sense of humor, interesting way of talking, and sharp intellect. He disconnected himself from the hive mind temporarily for the fade-to-black sex and said he'd say by Ziran's side even if she wouldn't join the Killik hive. He's an excellent pixel boyfriend (pixel husband?), and the first het romance option I've felt like poking at.
Though on the topic of romance – since they had to animate the kissing animations for two different character heights anyway, it really should've been very little trouble to make everyone bi/playersexual/whatever they want to call it. Sigh.
Unlike the Jedi Knight, I don't think this was overhyped – chapters 1-2 were actually that good – but it sort of stumbles at the end. Let's see how the rest of the lot measure up.