Watch_Dogs - _Role Model
I've quite enjoying Watch_Dogs, playing it a little every few nights - it's not the new best thing since sliced bread, but it's quite interesting. I'm slightly disappointed by a lot of things in it - punishing damage in gunfights mixed with little to no downsides to anything relating to vehicles (beyond the driving model), boring and unvaried hacking minigames in a game that headlines "hacking", and a bit of a fluffed intro where you seem to get all the items from the start and then "get" them for the first time throughout the game.
One of the things I've been really bemused about is the annoyingly forced mission _Role Model, which I've just played today. Some spoilers follow, and I'll probably refer to it all fairly casually - as if you knew enough to be spoiled, really.
Objective: Kill 'em All
It'll surprise noone who knows me that I've been playing Watch_Dogs so far fairly quietly - only really killing when I really need to. I love the way that the vigilante/alignment meter seems to reel in the tendency among folk to drive around manically, running down countless faceless civilians.
There have been a few missions that require you kill enemies - mainly gang-members, or mob affiliated goons. Sure. There are a lot of weapons in the game, I do wonder if I should be playing it slightly more trigger-happily - but I've enjoyed the choices provided.
Until this mission.
Spoilers begin here.
The mission begins with Jackson (or "Jacks", the protagonist's nephew), going missing from his current hideaway. You, as the player, are then prompted to go and find him. You locate him (fine, done that before), travel to the location (yep), and are told to kill a moderately large amount of enemies.
No choices, no sneaking, no clever hack-around solution.
Slaughter them. Oh, and wipe out the reinforcements, when they inexplicably arrive (I managed to kill them all quietly, without any alerts or enemy shots fired).
That's all fine - I'm great at this!
You then go up to "rescue" Jacks to find that he's seen all of the bodies, is terrified of you, and is judging you - which I'd probably be fine with, if I'd had a choice.
I guess it's going to become obvious why, in future play (and will probably contribute wonderfully to Aiden's relationship with his sister), but it really grates after so many brilliant games that allow you the choice of killing or not. I suppose I was hoping for something similar here.