Wednesday, August 6, 2014

Meanwhile, back on the planet's surface...

I'd been taking a break from gaming for several days, figuring that the time away from the computer would do me some good. No big surprise, really, since every time I go through my blogroll I'm reminded that I kind of need to come up with a new theme for the title graphic among other things.

But a week away is long enough, and I logged into SWTOR for the first time in a while.

I'd been trying to keep from leveling too far with some of my toons that are at the end of Chapter One so I could play with my kids, so I figured that I should either try something new or work on the Chiss Bounty Hunter I've got.*  The Bounty Hunter isn't a bad option at all, and I do like where the story has been going in Chapter 2 (I'm up to Hoth now), but there was one glaring class omission from my list that I decided I should rectify:

The Imperial Agent.

My son had started an Agent but gave it up because the Empire asked him to do things he felt uncomfortable doing.  I can respect that, but after having played a few Imperial toons --and one to max level-- I figured I could handle the Agent's story.

I spent more time than I usually do creating a character, mainly because I was trying to get a look that would allow the toon to seamlessly integrate into various Hutt and Republic areas. I also figured that an Empire that emphasized pureblood Sith and Human races over others would likely send a human to perform their espionage activities. Finally, I decided on a female toon, because I had 4 male and 3 female toons on this server, so things ought to balance out.

In the end, I realized afterward that I created a Black Widow lookalike**, but with a bit more 80s style hair.

The first several quests were designed to ingratiate me to the local Hutt in control of this portion of Hutta, but were nothing special.  I could see certain conflicts lining up, and I had a basic feel of the progression this story would take.  Still, I had this feeling in the back of my head that since this was Bioware, things were about to turn sour fairly soon.

And I was not disappointed.

I reached that part of the questline where a Sith intervention (naturally) led to... Complications. I was then asked to turn around and kill the person I'd spent some time aligning myself with.

While it was not unexpected --the one thing I've learned on the Imp side is that the Sith can wreck just about anything-- I still blurted out "You have got to be fucking kidding me."

I then realized what it was that caused my son to quit his Agent.

And, to be honest, I've not touched my own Agent since receiving that quest.

Maybe curiosity will eventually get the best of me and I'll go to complete the quest, but I simply can't go and kill somebody like that. It's not like anybody in the Hutt's palace is free from some sort of blood on their hands, but killing a person not because of something they did but because of something the Sith did to their family and you don't want them to find out, that's a different matter entirely.

I guess that means I'm too much of a good guy to play an Agent.  So much for that edgy bad-boy image I've been cultivating.





*Apparently he has a "melty look", according to Mako.

**Scarlett Johansson version.

6 comments:

  1. Your son sounds like a real sweetie, displaying such strong morals even in a video game. I'm surprised that it's the agent that got to both of you though - I remember that the quest that made me squirm the most was the bounty hunter one on Hutta where you get asked to cut someone's head off and throw it at his wife... that was rough, man.

    If the agent bit you are talking about is the one I'm thinking of, don't give up on the story yet - just because you're being told to kill someone, that rarely means that you actually have to do it that way in order to progress the story.

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    1. I think the reason why it didn't bother me was because I was a Bounty Hunter, and nabbing/killing for bounties was my gig. I wasn't trying to be buddy buddy with people and then betray them, and I was still smarting over the loss of my team just a quest earlier.

      (I just got to the end of BH's Chapter 2 an hour or so ago, and once again I talked back to the screen: "You want a piece of me? Don't try to hide by saying you're doing the 'good thing', because your actions are all bullshit!" Or something like that, I might have used a few more cursewords...)

      But the BH is a fairly uncomplicated kind of guy, even though his motivations can be completely light or dark side. The Agent, however, is all about the villany and spying.

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    2. That BH quest just made me squirm because of it's cruelty. Killing people - sure, chopping up and engaging in psychological torture of their relatives? Errr... I was hoping to go "grey" during that quest, meaning I wanted to kill the guy but skip the cruelty with the wife, but sadly that wasn't an option. Once I'd taken the dark side option, the game forced me to go all the way - which is something I don't recall experiencing in any other class story to this extent.

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    3. I went back to look at that quest online, and I remember that one now. I took the non-dark result.

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  2. I think that you and your son will really enjoy Light-Side Imperial Agent. It's an outstanding story and provides a really interesting perspective on the Empire.

    Just trust me. Play through that quest, take the LS choice, and see how an LS non-Sith survives in the Empire ruled by the Sith Aristocracy.

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    1. Eventually I'll get back to it, but for now, I think I'll wait. Thanks for the vote of confidence, Rohan.

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