Rogue Ops – PS2 – Preview

E3 2003 – First
Look

 

I was lucky enough
to sit down with the director of the next blockbuster title Rogue Ops, Dylan
Beale. He ran through a few levels of the game for me, explaining the game along
the way, and Rogue Ops looks to be an excellent tile.

 

Rogue Ops is an
action adventure title that takes place in 3rd person. You play as
agent Nicola Conners, an operative for the organization Phoenix. Nicola has been
chosen to investigate and eliminate a terrorist threat, but she has a mission of
her own: to find out who killed her parents. Even though Rogue Ops has an
intense plot with twists and turns, it shines exceptionally bright in its
gameplay as well.

 

Rogue Ops is set
in a very futuristic, sci-fi environment including some fantasy elements as
well. The game starts out with Nicola infiltrating the enemy headquarters. Start
with only a few guns and a pair of glasses that allow you to see the heat source
of enemies through walls, you must make your way through level and complete your
missions along the way. Throughout the game, you will get more and more gadgets
that run off battery power; the glasses are an example of a battery run device.

 

Your health and
battery life are both displayed in the upper right corner of the screen, where
you will also receive video feeds from your boss. Stealth is a huge part of the
game, and abilities like pick pocketing, stealth kill combos, and searching and
moving bodies are very useful. Guards will even notice things like blood from a
guard you might have killed, so sometimes avoiding them or finding other ways to
get rid of them are more useful. A great way to take guards out without leaving
evidence is utilizing the stealth kills. Stealth kills leave no mess, and treat
you to a cool little cinematic of Nicola taking the guard out with her bare
hands.

 

Players that
explore Nicola’s abilities will be rewarded by finding an easier way to get
through a certain level. For example, right outside of the first building is a
guard. Then, later on inside the building you’ll run into a room equipped with a
laser defense system. If you picked the guard’s pocket, you would have found a
key card that can turn off the lasers. Otherwise, you’ll have to find other ways
of moving through the room. There are a lot of scenarios like this in Rogue Ops,
giving you multiple paths and options through a level.

 

One feature I
particularly liked is how interactive the environments are. Like I mentioned
before, a lot of the levels have multiple ways of taking care of guards or
obstacles. Interacting with the environment can really turn the tables. One
mission takes place in a museum swarming with guards, and instead of running in
with guns blazing, Dylan shot the wires holding up some of the dinosaur bone
displays causing a giant dinosaur skeleton to come crashing down on a group of
enemies. This is just one example of the many things possible in Rogue Ops. Keep
an eye out for this great title in Q4 of 2003.