Alpha Protocol Could’ve Been the Mass Effect of Espionage

That’s the title of an editorial on Proto Attack, during which the author points out how Mass Effect invented dialogue trees, why changing a character’s appearance mid-game is unrealistic, and why Alpha Protocol’s storyline was its greatest downfall.

In a small attempt to mimic Mass Effect, there are kind of dialog trees. I say (kind of) because you’re just choosing what attitude you want to give off. Instead of an overall good/bad type score it seems that it’s mainly a per person thing rather than overall. So if you act like an ass to one character, another character that you might treat well won’t think of you negatively. Another bummer with this system is that the response choices flash on the screen before the other person is done talking, and when they’re done, you don’t have time to choose, it just plays whatever response was already selected.

…

The bummer of this game is the story. I don’t really care about it, and since there is so much of it, that makes the game drag along. Ultimately that’s what made me decide not to finish the game. It’s halfway decent gameplay, combined with a story I didn’t care about.

Quite the observations.