A quick question before we start: when you were playing Infamous, did you ever find yourself thinking "Man, I really wish this was a budget imitation of Bioware game set on Mars"? Because if your answer is yes, then you are in fucking luck. Right off the bat I will say that I enjoyed Mars: War Logs, and, granted, I do mean that in a same way that I enjoyed the movie Ghost of Mars. A lot less whenever Ice Cube wasn't on screen. Really though for some games it does become clear when, for better or worse, the developers like it. And when I get that feeling I tend to cut the game some slack and try to appreciate it. It's by no stretch good but, fortunately, in amusing rather than frustrating ways. It's one of those 'janky games' that are just broken and silly enough. So, after doing two playthoughs, one good and one evil, I honestly believe that developers made something at least near to what they wanted and that they like it. Plus, I did find out that there is a sequel of sorts is coming out. A few days from now. So, you know, they have faith in a setting. That said I can only recommend it if you want to burn some money on some cheap laughs, because, despite being an RPG, it's not a time sink either. You'll need 7 to 10 hours spare. If you are expecting an in-depth journey tens of hours long - throw away that notion right now. It's more like a bizarrely overpowered twat bumbling from town to town a little bit, solving problems. And, as always, I'm going to spoil essentially everything anyway. The world of Mars: War Logs is Mars... during a war. Humanity colonized it some time ago, but then Mars moved a smidgen closer to the sun. This made the surface near completely uninhabitable, cut off communication between Earth and Mars, a bunch of people, who suffered exposure, turned into mutants, and, in contrast, some people learned how to shoot lightning. Water became incredibly scarce. So much so that ruling class is now water guilds, ran by leaders called Dowsers. And safe from growing crops, no one is making anything new. Everyone is scavenging the tech left behind by the first colonists. It's at this point everyone picked up sticks and started hitting each other. All of this invariably killed the tourism industry. There are 4 water guilds running the planet, but only 2 of them really come up: Aurora and Abundance. Aurora has a custom of 'virtue names', which the more you learn about, the more you'll side with Abundance. Saul: First name, last name, former job! Innocence: Innocence Smith, apprentice electrician. Saul: Innocence? Shit, I'll never get used to these names... Honestly, Earth probably did figure out some time ago that it could contact Mars, but then it saw what's going on and decided not to. It's on this dry barren shithole that we join Innocence Smith on his way to POW Camp 19. As he tells us, he had a pretty easy life: just hanging about with friends and doing basically nothing. That was until the Water Wars started, and he was drafted into Space WW1 between Aurora and Abundance. The other two water guilds really don't come up, and they are likely better of. Actually, Aurora is the only one that gets any depth at all. All we really learn about Abundance is that they run a prison camp somewhere. And now Innocence is there. So, connecting the dots: he wasn't really good at his job. And I really don't want to play as someone called Innocence to begin with. Arriving at Camp 19 everyone is sent to the sand showers to get cleaned up. And the only cockney on Mars is fat rapist known only as Fatso, and he is waiting there for Innocence. Fatso: Get a load this, fellas. Fresh meat! This just makes my day. I was getting tired of drillin' the same old asses. Fatso: You're not bad lookin' either... Get down! You've got a real pretty mouth... But before anything can happen a mute walks in and starts damaging his own clothes. Fatso: You just won't stop yacking, will ya. Spit it out, if you got something to say! And this causes Fatso to back down. Fatso: Just thinkin' about what you're going to do to this poor bitch, brings a tear to my eye... I just can't watch. I'm sensitive. The mute than walks in, stops being a mute and takes his place as the actual player character. Innocence: Hey... Thanks... Thanks for the help. Establishing himself pretty quickly as a world-weary irreverent fighty bloke. Roy: And what makes you think I'm not just a better lookin' Fatso? You give your trust too easily. That's a bad habit if you wanna stay alive in here. Innocence decides right away to stick to this guy like glue, since he is a player character, and we can immediately see upon talking to the first available side-quest guy in the next room over, that Innocence is not very smart. Roy: I'm not too busy just now. Can I give you a hand? Innocence: Why help the mechanic? I mean even if he seems alright, he's still an enemy... Yeah, just say that right there next to him. So, PC gets to introducing himself and reveals that he dropped his 'virtue name' of Temperance. He decided he'll be known simply as Roy. Roy: Fraid so. They called me 'Temperance' back then. But I chose Roy. Those virtue names... not really my thing. Innocence: Oh, okay... I guess Temperance doesn't fit. Alright, listen here, fuck-boy, I've not been drinking and I've put up with your stupid name for 5 minutes. Give me some credit. Truth be told, I knew Roy would be the main character from the get go, since the guide on the main menu pretty much spoils it. Having left the showers, it turns out Fatso have just gone to find a more scenic spot for a combat tutorial. So we break out... eh, that, and start fighting. The combat feels like a bizarre half-way meeting between Arkham and Dragon Age. A weird melt to start with. Our basic combat options are a button to attack, a block break, a block, and if you block at the last second you'll do a parry, opening up enemies for a counterattack. And lastly, a dodge roll. There is also a hot-key bar with only 4 icons. Despite the fact you can have up to 9 abilities equipped at a time, because the UI guy seriously underestimated Roy. This is where your cool-down abilities go, and when I get to them, you'll learn how they break the game. So, the combat can fell a little bit tricky at first due to how junky it is. It is real-time combat. You click, a random hit animation is selected, which is something I'm really starting to tire of, due to the fact that I generally like to know how quickly I'm going to hit something and I don't care if he wants to throw in a twirl. Meanwhile, enemies throw hits, and you have to block them, rather than hope for the random odds of a miss. However, it's still an odd meeting between real-time fighting and RPG, meaning you can't be hit by enemies out of range or whilst dodge-rolling. Enemies also block and dodge entirely at random, and while you do have a block breaker, if they are dodging, your only option is only not to hit them for a moment. Stand still and wait for them to calm down, which is not what I'm here to do. I mean, you can throw sand in their eyes, I guess. But some of these cheeky cunts brought glasses. Essentially, to get good at the combat in this game you have to become the junk. Health regens mid-fight, and while enemies can hit you at the distance, you can still get out of range. So if you ever in a jam and you are without health packs - just fucking dodge-roll. Roll until refreshed and get back in there! Tap block repeatedly. Fuck it! Roll and tap block repeatedly if you want. There is no downtime before you can go back in defensive state. I call this martial arts technique 'tap-parring'. And the denizens of Mars are helpless to resist it, their only counter is to land a hit in a frame-wide opening. This stuff will see you through fights alive, but once we actually start unlocking abilities, then we'll start getting too broken for game to keep up. On my second playthrough I put zero thought into combat and basically curb stomped Mars. The first time around was much the same, it just had a longer wind up. The weird mishmash between RPG-based chance to hit combine with real time attacking and blocking sits on the middle ground that doesn’t have the stats to make RPG elements have any depth or strategy, and the brawler-paced combat lacks the speed and precision to make the game feel really skillful. I think it really should have leaned further towards a straight up brawler, rather than trying mix and match. Now, it does help that I like this kind of flavour of combat as well. I won't deny, brutal post-apocalyptic scraps with few or weak guns and improvised melee weapons - it's a strange niche, that I absolutely love. So there is that, and I won't deny, it makes me like combat more than I should. So, Fatso is beaten down, the guard intervene and Roy... Are you alright, mate? Ah, it was a level up. But I'm not spending any of my points just yet since of the three level up path two are mostly boring, one is useless and the third is locked. Roy, having seen the raw power of Innocence in a fight, asked him to tag along in a jailbreak he is planning. Innocence agrees, and deciding they need a more secluded spot to discuss the plan, they go and talk about it smack-bang in the middle of the mess hall. So, get guns, shut off the defense systems near the train terminals, break into the cistern and nick some water for the trip, and excite the distraction while we steal the train and bugger off. Some of these are tied to side quests, but luckily I did all of those before we got here. Such as finding out why Bob The Guard is depressed. Roy: You don't want to talk about your problems? Bob: Listen, it's all real nice, gotta admit, but can you tell me how it's any of your business? And then it turns out that he is instrumental for the escape. He will tell you how to break into the cistern. And the only way to fix his problem, by the by, is to confess to the guard that you are planning to break out and he will decide to tag along. Roy: I'm thinking about escaping... by taking the train. Bob: You insane? And I guess you want to go back home... What would I do there? Roy: I've thought of everything, and once we're out of here we can split up on a Shadow Path and you can go back home... The Mutants, nicknamed The Dust - well, they are treated even worse than regular POWs and the revolt is already growing. Abundance army sergeant: Attention! To the dust rebel who hit a guard. If you don't give yourself up in two hours, we will shoot ten of your brothers! In fact, the guard has been recently attacked by one and the rest of the small dust commune is trying to hide a perpetrator. By figuring out who that is we can blackmail them into timing their revolt with our breakout. Or just talk them nicely into it, they are going to revolt either way. Innocence pretends to be a naturally talented electrician. And despite having been here for about 20 minutes tops... Eh, good minds are needed, so he is allowed to work in a security wing of the prison he is in. Saul: ...we'll put you in the power plant. For once we'll have someone remotely qualified for it! Prisoners can sign up to kill molls in a nearby mine, and since this prison has already shown itself to be pretty lax, they are allowed guns to do the job. Roy: I came to get a gun. Joe: Here. The chargers are fully loaded, so you shouldn't have any problem with the ammo... Despite being armed a few of the prisoners fucked up and died. So Roy goes on and stashes these leftover guns for later. So, it should be pretty clear by now: this prison is great! The prisoners are fed, they get water. They can even keep their own gardens. I've spent all of my time in jail faffing around just doing odds and ends: found some parts for a mechanic, dealt with an outbreak of rabies infecting the guard... dogs. This is by no stretch of the imagination a dull unfulfilling day. This is the nicest place you'll see in the entire game, and I don't get Roy wanting to leave. It's fucking lovely. I mean, sure, Innocence had a rough start - meeting the only cockney on Mars would be a fright. But he'd probably got beaten up, and everyone here hates him. And everyone loves Roy for smashing his face in. Prisoner: ...He was embarrassing the entire Aurora army... Here, take this. A little thank you. Roy: Huh... Thanks. You shouldn't have. A majority of the guards are cunt, sure, but so is everyone on this planet! At least here it's nothing personal, it's just part of the job description. And I mean sure, the mutants may be treated worse than regular POWs, but think about how little that must mean. Dead beaten and looked down upon - again, no different from anywhere else - but here they have a gate! We've got basically zero oversight as well. The guards simply can't be roused. While snubbing the guns down in the mine with blokes called Sobriety and Courtesy... Courtesy: Roy? If you need a hand for a job or something, you know where to find me, right? ...(who we will never meet again), we come across a ton of Earth relics - old shit left behind by first colonists. And so the three prisoners go and report this. It is by doing so we get a meeting with the head of the camp - a Technomancer named Sean. He sends us back down there with his apprentice Mary to investigate the relics. Mary: A lot of people would have just mistaken it for drilling machinery. What did you do before the war? Roy: Well, I... What the...? The museum trip is interrupted when a mole queen turns up and nearly pulls the TPK. Luckily, the ever competent Roy is able to smash eggs and dodge-roll until Mary can get back up and collapse the tunnel. Roy: We need a powerful shock to collapse the tunnel, or that thing will follow us! Mary: But... What about the relics? So, that gained us nothing.
Mary: You told me exactly what to do... Mary: How is it that you know so much about the powers of technomancy? Roy: I worked with one once, nothing more. Mary: Is that so? Save for suspicion of Sean and Mary, considering that Roy knows about relics and technomancy, and most of the planet are basically dunces. Sean: A smart prisoner... This camp is chock full of surprises... So, as you can see, Technomancers are the mages of this setting. They can slowly shoot electricity, make bubble shields and run electric current though their weapons. The denizens of Mars, being good sports, have made sure to wear scrap metal for their armor. They also get a bunch of privileges in society and something approaching an education. But on the other hand you are shipped off to a place called 'The Source' and raised in a lightning-powered cult. So it swings in roundabouts, really. So, after solving pretty much all of this prison's problems, it's time for our break out. Some bloke we got info from along the way called Jay wants in. And, well, since we've already okayed one of the guards, why not? The revolt begins. The mutants rise up! It's a mutiny! Yep. Just hold this fight... Just hold this shot... It's a big combat sequence. Wrecking our way though the kinda sparse train station. With little to stand in our way and the guards caught by surprise, we... Bob: I... I'm hurt... I can't go on... Go on without me! Oh, em... Hey, didn't see you there, Bob. Well, alright then. You sound like you are pulling a sicky, but you know, I'll take your word for it. We run into Sean and the fight ensues. So let's make the kid feel like he is contributing and figure out why the Technomancers are so feared. Turns out, I still don't know. They are kinda like regular enemies, but they stand around a lot more imitating their favourite anime. I mean, for one thing they can shoot lightning. But this setting has guns. They may be nail guns and the rifles may be unwieldy but... We still got fucking guns! They are jumped-up human plug sockets and everyone on this planet is just buying into the hype. Innocence: Damn... you killed a Technomancer! I didn't think it was even possible... Roy: Course you can kill them. They're human beings, you know? Ok, jokes aside, this boss is actually tricky the first time around. I mean, he is no different from any other Technomancer that follows in this game, even down to him having goon backup. And once you work out that they are insanely slow and easy to bait and at range they are very easy to dodge, they actually become easier than normal enemies for the most part. Except when they do than. Kind of annoying. Just puts a fight on hold for 20 seconds. Anyway, with Sean dead Roy picks up his techno-gloves, and Innocence is confused. Roy: It'll give us a better chance to escape. Innocence: You gonna sell them..? Roy: Shit. Never thought I'd put these things back on... Innocence: Put them back on? Roy, what are you saying? You know how to use these things? Roy: Yes. Now let's go. Granted, I knew before than. I learned that by the main menu. It was pretty obvious I'll get these powers besides. So with that done, Roy, Innocence and Jay book it for the train. But the guards are hot on their heels, and someone has to buy time, even if it spells death. Roy steps up, but Jay has other ideas. Jay: You keep an eye on the kid. You guys are almost family... I've known this kid for 3 hours, you melodramatic fuck. And then he dies. Mary swears revenge on Roy, but honestly, if she was just his apprentice, I'm not too worried. And with that Roy and Innocence jump on the train and escape. Chapter 1 is down, and time-wise the game is one third over. Mary: He'll pay for this, I swear... That's also the hardest chapter cleared. I'm not kidding, the rest of this game is a joke compared, particularly to the cistern dungeon and the mines. A lot of this does come down to getting used of the game's awkwardness in this chapter, plus a lower health pool, less moves, less health items... And honestly, the moles are likely the toughest enemies in this game, and it's in this chapter that they are most numerous. All you really got here are your basic combat moves, a bunch of sand and whatever mines and grenades you can get your hands on and save for the hardest moments. I spent ages in the cistern, dodge-rolling around slowly regening health. But from here on out, after we board this train, beating the rest of Mars would be simple. What follows is a very brief explanation of getting to Shadow Lair alongside more than a bit of gushing. Innocence: Roy's strength and bravery are only equaled by his biting cynicism: he takes down enemies as if they were poor jokes in lack of a good punchline. I call this the "Roy is great" cutscene. To me Roy hasn't really been much of the character up to this point, he's just been a stronger metal bar than anyone else. He used to be a Technomancer at the Source, but he wasn't a fan of the oppressive atmosphere and insane co-workers, so he decided to go AWOL, becoming a traveler and a mercenary of sorts. And at some point, loving freedom and all, I guess he decided to join the military. And the most unbelievable beat of this story: he got captured. I did expect the story to become a journey across Mars, essentially. Going from place to place, solving problems, not just jumping into the big narrative arc and instead working our way back to the home territory in Aurora. But no, we pretty much smooth-sailed back home to the town called Shadow Lair. And in the interlude between escaping prison and here the titular war ended. Innocence: Aurora seems to have won the war and both sides are demobilizing troops. So this game can be just called 'Mars'. Innocence's parents lived here and were members of the rebellion called 'The Militia', so that's out port of call. After all the war these characters wanted to get away from they've decided to go with much chiller experience of violent internal uprising. It's also at this point we unlock the Technomancer upgrade path, and now I'm going to talk about leveling skills and abilities. We've got 3 upgrade branches, and to unlock higher tiers you have to put in certain amount of points. So this pretty much means that you should specialize, but you can push at least 2 branches pretty far. Let me save you some time: there is a combat tree, a stealth and crafting tree and an aforementioned Technomancer tree. Fuck stealth and crafting, just grab the mildly incongruous +25 health from it and never come back. In a post-apocalypse scenario who would you rather be: the man who can sneak around some scuffles or the man who can beat an entire planet to death? I mean, you do get bonuses to stealth in here, more easily crafted grenades and mines, and a gun gets a damage boost. But all of that stuff requires ammo. A pipe NEVER needs ammo. Plus, the situations in which stealth is a valid options are limited. Sometimes you walk through doors - and right into the eyes of enemies. And I doubt you can upgrade your stealth enough to bamboozle your way out of this one. Meanwhile, blunt force trauma is always viable. Meanwhile, by popping points right into combat or technomancy you can become unstoppable quite early into chapter 2. In fact, I did it accidentally the first time around and just ran with it. This all said, most of the upgrades are actually quite dull. They are small meaningless stat boosts you pop points into to rank up to the fun stuff. I'm talking about things like a longer dodge-roll, +5% overall damage or damage resistance... You know, +25 health. The only amusing thing is that crit chance racks up so ridiculously that by the end of the game nearly half of your attacks are critical. And you have things like boosted crit chance after dodge-rolls or during Technomancer attacks to make it even more ridiculous. Then we have things like using up only half of your Technomancer juice to put a world in slow motion around you or running electricity through your weapon. And as you upgrade this further, it ups crit chance and regains juice on crit. And then you combine this with slow motion so you can be nearly perpetually faster and stronger than everyone else. Plus, health and juice refill between fights, so you don't even have to worry about being conservative with this. On my first playthough I mainly threw lightning bolts and energized my weapon. This curb stomped everyone. On my second playthough I electro-punched myself in the heart to open every fight, and this went worse for everyone else. Save for some sore ribs, there was no drawbacks. Other Technomancer abilities, such as lightning bolts, force push and bubble shield, mean very little compared to shit like this. Basically, you go from throwing sand in people's faces to amped up Max Payne within the span of about 4 hours and only get more power fuck from there. Not to mention, save for one boss fight later on down the road you've also faced every type of enemy this game has at this point. A majority of humanity have gone for one-handed clubs and knives, maybe with a cheeky gun stashed away somewhere. Some inventive few have gone for a shield to back that up. Or a rifle, that is somehow worse than a pistol. And then we got people with power gloves who explode on defeat. Kinda uselessly since it doesn't do much. Kinda like everything they did in life. Then we've got the non-human enemies: moles and dogs. Moles are basically humans, who are immune having sand thrown in their non-existant eyes, and different sizes to denote relative health and strength. So... Humans with eye-wear are basically moles. Dogs are the easiest enemies in the game by a country mile. They are not very aggressive and their one defensive gimmick - the fact that you have to hit them from behind to do damage - is not very hard to pull off. The moment you are behind them (easily accomplished by running or rolling, if you're feeling a bit flashy) they basically just give up and die. Likely because Roy is the only person on Mars to realise this, making them conversely the hardest enemy for allies and NPCs to fight. So to meet the one man who worked out likely means that they loose their will to live on a spot. And that's it. Humanity has become stagnant and unimaginative, and the wildlife consist of 2 really shit creatures. The combat does quickly become repetitive, and in a quasi-RPG having a small enemy pool (none of them have any unique quirks that force different strategies beyond just non-stop pummeling) really does exacerbate that issue. And this repetition is not helped by the fact that enemies in the hub world respawn. But! Only if you loot their corpses. Mars follows a 'killers keepers' rule, so touching the bodies would likely be rude. All in all, however, I did enjoy the combat. Not because it was good, however. I was enjoying it from the perspective of having snapped it in half. And on my second playthrough my primary concern was figuring out the quickest way to become broken and pushing it a step further. I did play on 'normal' both times, and this game does have difficulty options. So I don't doubt that there is a more challenging game in here, but I fail to see how it can become anything other than the same game, but longer. Unless there is also enemy variety and AI in there. And on that note of hub worlds... well, the positive is that they are pretty small. About 3 minutes running tops to get from one end to the other across multiple maps. The negative is that they are also visually all the same. The Prison looks like Shadow Lair, looks like the next hub and so on. They've tried to make up for the ease of navigation by sprinkling the maps with pointless doors and ladders, so that you get many cutscenes every few steps. It's kinda impressive they've popped down the option to skip these many cutscenes, so you get miniature fade to black every so often if you skip them. To summaries, Mars is a giant favella. After the 'Roy is great' cutscene we are at the entrance to Shadow Lair. And before we can get to Innocence's home, we have to get through incredibly understanding border guards. Pro tip for any Abundance spies: just say that you were at prison camp. Roy: I know this is gonna sound like science fiction to you but... I managed to escape from Abundace's prison camps. Aurora army sergeant: Those bastards... They make me sick. They sure gave us hell on the battlefield. But we still took Green Hope! Aurora army sergeant: And where were you? Which camp? Do you happen to know Prowess Martin? Aurora army sergeant: You actually saw him before you left? How is he? I mean, he's my sister's fiance, so you know... Roy: Life is hard in those camps, you know... Very hard. And I believe he's among the ones who've been taking it very badly. Aurora army sergeant: Fuck! A short while later we arrive at Innocence's home to find it's been burned to the ground. Innocence asks Roy if his parents are dead, and my response options are: 'yes', 'yes' or 'maybe'. Morality is meaningless in this game, and right now I'm either blunt Roy or sugar-coating Roy. The morality in this game is very simplistic and really doesn't tie into much. Good characters get a 50% discount at all stores in a game, but the choices you get to gain positive morality so few and far between that you won't see this bonus until pretty far in. So much so that by the time you get it you'll be geared up and money won't be an object anyway. Humility: Get lost, fucker. Meanwhile, evil characters get bonuses to wounding foes and they can intimidate their way out of more situations more easily. But if I'm evil, why wouldn't I just brutalize my way out? Roy: And you're not worth the effort. So... I'm just gonna beat the shit out of you. Evil and good choices also are not really telegraphed, which I don't really find to be a negative, it's just noteworthy. This game could have really just thrown away morality and not been any lesser for it. Just base what happens and how people respond to you on choices made. Such as when these border patrol guards I lied to come looking for me, because they found out what actually happened to Prowess. Integrity: Cause, you know, I just heard he was killed in his prison camp... By some prisoner named Roy. Funny, isn't it? In my next playthrough I beat the guards down there and then and spared them the pain of finding out about their dead friend. My favourite part of the morality system and probably my favourite bit of world-building in this entire game come in a form of serum. It's the currency of Aurora, potentially all of Mars. In the mole mines in the first chapter we find a serum syringe. After a fight you haven't actually killed anyone. But you can extract serum from them, killing them and earning a measly 5 serum. This is not even a half of the required amount to buy the cheapest metal tube. You got that? You ain’t worth half of lead pipe. That's every person - 5 serum. Extracting and killing is, of course, considered an evil action. So there are 2 steps to looting if you'd like. You can't get serum from animals, might I add. Only humans. This means that even as a good guy I'm walking around with tens of dead people in my wallet. That's pretty metal. And besides, I'm not being evil. I'm just stimulating the economy! I'm a financially responsible warrior. On my evil playthrough I liquidated the Shadow Lair guard regiment repeatedly and ironically I was in the black for doing so. Outside of Innocence's torched house Innocence is feeling sad. And then... Abundance Soldier: You there! You're under arrest! Abundance?! Fucking border patrol... Roy murders his way deeper into Shadow Lair. And manages to shake them off at the highly trafficked ladder into town. Elsewhere, a Technomancer who can control energy with his mind but never really bothered to learn commerce, contracts a bounty hunter named Tenacity to hunt down Roy. Technomancer Boss: His name is Temperance, but he calls himself Roy... He refuses to join us. He is a renegade... You must be careful, it is said that he is armed. Tenacity: Armed? You think I usually go after boy scouts? Tenacity: Anyway, I know this Roy. I didn't know he was a renegade. We even... worked together, back in the day. Roy meanwhile nabbed one of his old safe-houses, and next on the itinerary is tracking down the remaining members of the Militia. He goes to an old contact named Charity, and she looks after the local prostitutes and seems to know a little bit of everything going on. She wants favors for favors and does need time to track down the Militia regardless, so in return we go and find one of her girls who went missing, saving her from an abusive pimp. Faith: Listen... Leave me alone. He'll kill me if you keep this up... He beats me every day. Where it can't be seen... Roy: I don't think you get my drift. You let her leave and I don't kick your head in... That's my offer. Pimp: Ooohh... You really think a shithead like you's gonna scare me? Roy: You little fuck... That was a big mistake. One I was hoping you to make. Roy: I talked to your pimp. His corpse is 5 feet that way, Roy. There is no need to be coy. So with that we get our in with the Militia. Charity: You're going to be so proud of good old Charity... Charity: I found the Resistance... Or at least a way to get in touch with them. They have an informer in a bar in the North neighbourhood. A guy who organizes arena fights. But before we go do that, I do all of Charity's side quests. I need dosh for a nice new lead pipe and some new rags. Sorry, Innocence. Don't be mad, stop blocking the shot. I know you want to join up and avenge their demise, but, well, your parents are not getting any deader, and I've gotta be in vogue. On that note about shopping: only ever buy shit with upgrade slots. I mean, they start mildly worse than any complete gear, but become ridiculously better. And here is another thing: you never need to actually buy the best gear, it's usually hidden in a hub worlds and in side-quest rewards. Money is also pretty plentiful, so it really comes down to how lazy you feel. Enemies only drop crafting materials used for these upgradable items, plus usable mines, grenades and nail gun ammo. Which I find a bit dull (I prefer finding weapons and armor), but this game does not have the variety to do that in a first place. And so long as you loot every corpse and find a decent number of very poorly hidden piles of junk and boxes in the world, you'll have enough money left over to buy whatever leftover crafting materials you need to max everything out. Aside from anything else, one of my key issues with this game is a lack of interesting items. There are 2 kinds of expendable weapons, save from the gun. The only melee weapon type are one-handed clubs and blades. There are only 2 status effects, one being a 'stun' achieved via upgraded parries and certain other moves, and 'wounded' - a health drain and slowdown achieved via bladed or upgraded weapons. The variances in armor are tiny. For the most part it's best to focus on just straight up upgrades since the other minor effects are so tiny and negligible that it's pointless. I mean, aside from electrical resistance, which... is also pointless, because Technomancers are rare AND useless. The item selection feels like it was made for an engine test, not even a budget title. You can also recycle or combine the lesser crafting items into a better ones, but to get the good stuff you need to spent level up point on a trait for it. And to even get that trait you have to recycle a lot of weapons and armor of which you are give very little. Meaning you have to spent money on stuff just to break it. It's both uneconomical and poorly thought out. By the time you'll have this trait you'll have money just to buy the good stuff instead if needed, and not to mention that by this time you'll likely have slow-motion and lightning powers as well. It doesn't help that the crafting and recycling menus are also clunky and slow. You can't do anything in multiples, for instance. And the moment you do anything you are booted back to the start of the crafting menu. Plus, if you are evil you'll never need recycling anyway, since you have killed more people than the sun and thus have a pretty dump wallet to just buy crafting components, if you haven't already gotten enough from the dead people. Essentially, it feels like no effort was put into the menus, both in terms of presentation and convenience. However, and this is kinda shitty way of putting it, two wrongs have made a bit of the right. In it that there is so little required micromanagement that you won't have to deal with the menus very long anyway. Luckily, the side-quests are pretty enjoyable. They do a good job demonstrating the key issues affecting each settlement, from their crumbling infrastructure and tensions of Camp 19 to the criminal underworld of Shadow Lair, particularly when it comes to drug use and trafficking. The side-quests aren't exactly plentiful and that is actually to the game's benefit. What is there is generally well thought out and delivers a small side story, and save for one quest in Camp 19, it's not just picking up random garbage littered around the world. Granted, the big long side-quests of each area follow a pretty standard layout. They go like this: you are presented with a violent solution, but it's kinda iffy or morally dubious. Frugality: From what I've seen, you're not the kind scared of duking it out with scumbags. Roy: I'm not planning on making a career out of it. For example: a workshop where a bunch of drug addicted kids are hiding in, away from their violent dealer. Providence: What...? Who are you? Roy: Delivery man. I got an order to deliver a dozen kicks in the ass at this address. It won't take long. Promise. You can either just kick the shit out of them and get the workshop back to it's annoyed owner, or go on the bunch of conversations, working your way up the drug dealers' hierarchy until you can beat up the source of the problem. It isn't really ambiguous what the good thing to do is here: beat up disaffected youth or exploitative drug dealers. How about the violent diseased dogs in prison camp? Bearing in mind that we don't know if humans can be infected, kill the lot of the dogs and cut off early or go around trying to work out who has the smarts to make a vaccine. Dog master: Alright, give me that shit and get out of here. I need to be alone. Essentially, being evil or absolutely pragmatic is just the way of cutting further content for yourself. Not to mention less rewards and EXP overall. There's a surprise though: this game does have a really good escort mission. It takes 5 minutes tops, and you can still clear the mission (albeit with lesser outcome) if the carry you're escorting dies. You just pick up the stash of money he was transporting and decide wherever to finish the job or pocket it. Getting him through alive does entail a bigger reward, however. Roy: And you never felt like running off with the takings, "Honesty"? Honesty: The old joke about virtue names, huh? Just so you know, there actually are virtuous people among Aurora. Roy: Of course. But you could've had other virtues than the one you're named after. Like pragmatism, unpredictability or... Or Tenacity. Or Parsimony. Or Frugality. Or Fatso. Honesty: These aren't virtues. THEY ARE NOT FUCKING NAMES EITHER! Depending on the outcome of certain quests you can actually get further quests. For instance, if you beat up one of the people harassing Charity's girls and kill him, she'll give you another job, because hey - you are not above getting your hands dirty. In Shadow Lair you do also have a side-quest to get an ID to move freely around. You can ignore doing this if you want. Just means you'll have to beat up entire guard of Shadow Lair. Again. And again. And again. You know what? You, people, can at least look impressed. There resistance are operating out of the only bar in town, situated deep in the slums, far beyond the group of people, who'll attempt to kill you on sight, since that's about the only affordable hobby. All this tells you about the Militia is that they have great taste in real estate. The barman says he'll test if we are a government spy by putting us into a pit fight that he runs. So we're made to take on a mole queen. You know what? Killing this thing doesn't prove that I'm not a spy. It just kinda proves that if I am, you are fucked either way. The Militia recruiter and leader Marco doesn't take too well to Roy, seeing as he thinks all Technomancers are unstable. Marco: I bet he could get his place back at the Source if he turned us in... Roy: I doubt it. They know me too well to want me alive. They know I'm not made for the Source. Innocence: Roy won't betray you, they want him too... Please, you have to listen. Despite Roy's arguments and Innocence's pushing, Marco won't budge. Innocence: Please, Roy... Let me try and convince them that you're an honorable man. Just give me some time... And then an explosion is hear outside. The Militia sod off Innocence in tow. And Roy decides to go and investigate the blast. So, we get there, and it turns out that Mary exploded. I guess, Marco has got a point... Marco: The Technomancers are too unstable. And this is another reason why Technomancers fucking suck. Roy takes her back to his hideout so she could recover. She awakened and goes right into 'revenge mode', which Roy rather easily talks her down from. Mary: You thought a weak woman would never come after you, didn't you? Roy: Mary, Mary! Like you said, your master didn't give us a choice... You're exhausted and really worked up... Mary: I... I feel weak... but when I got here I was full of anger and power... What has happened to me? Roy: You had an overload that you couldn't get rid of. Young Technomancers are almost never told about things like that. I can't think for single good reason why not beyond the sorority prank. Roy: Now you are empty. You should rest. And it's then that you get an option to either save her or kill her. If you kill her, the cutscene's tone does a complete 180. Roy: ...you trying to come after me again. Sorry, Mary. If you spare her, you get your second companion - nearly two thirds of the way through the game. You do also get a pretty nice follow-up conversation, which pretty much decides if she'll treat you like she did Sean (where she was a completely subservient plug socket), or you can tell her to think for herself and exercise free will (something she's likely never been able to do before). That said, beyond this point she doesn't really develop in any way, forming her own take on the world. And much like Innocence, Roy just becomes her moral compass. I haven't really talked about Innocence outside of cutscenes, have I? Well, the companions in general are pretty lackluster. They come in 2 flavours: useless and active hindrance. All but one of them are useless. They fight like most enemies do if they were on opiates. They slowly and seemingly randomly lash out at foes, occasionally pulling out a gun and popping off a shot, before charging into melee range to politely ask if I'd hurt. Mary is the hindrance. Her Technomancer attacks are just as likely to hit you as the enemy. She is a good comrade to bring along if you want to make the combat a bit more of a gamble. Kinda like a pub brawl during an earthquake. But, to be fair, it's not just you. Enemy Technomancers are equally capable of fucking their mates over. You can only have one active companion at a time, so you can't mix useless and hindrance together. To say companions are entirely worthless in a scrap is a little bit unfair. They do act as a good method of distracting the enemy until they are inevitably KO-ed, and best case scenario you can clear house before that happens. Even if they are knocked out, there are no ramifications. After each brawl they get up and dust themselves off. So if nothing else they are decent punchbags. And at times their incompetence will rub off on the enemy. On more than one occasion I left the last enemy alive while they fought a companion. In EVERY case they would get bored before the brawl is over and instead decide to fight the man, who've just single-handedly beat all of their friends to death. Live bored or die brave, I suppose. You can also talk to them for additional lore and backstory. And since this game doesn't really have the length to break these conversations up with anyone but Innocence, you can learn everything about them and become their best mate (or lover) within about 5 minutes. So, long story short, Innocence is fucked. A woman named Devotion has wandered into the Roy's seemingly shit hideout. She has an invitation to go meet general Honour Grant, a high up in Aurora military and a personal friend of the Dowser. So we head off there. Honour Grant has a proposition. He is worried that the Technomancers are getting too powerful, suddenly gaining a ton of sway in government, and his best mate Wisdom, the Dowser, is seemingly involved in this escalation. Honour wants some digging done, but he need someone to do that off the books. Roy says he needs some time to think about this, and with that I'm pretty sure we all can feel the big choice of the game coming on. So, back at home Tenacity has kidnapped Charity, broken into the hideout and locked her in the bedroom. Roy, did you put up a fucking sign outside? Tenacity: Attack! Oh nooooo... Anyway, after beating up Tenacity and his dogs, we get another 'kill or recruit' choice. Roy: You've known me for ages, why'd you accept this job? Yeah, man, you should feel ashamed. Roy can't even look at you. He is pretty much the evil character who'll judge everything nice you do. He knew that by being hired by the Technomancers he was essentially dead either way. So his best bet was really just to join Roy, knowing that he will likely win out. So he is a moron for fighting in a first place. So far our ragtag band of companions has been a symbolic representation... Innocence: I never gave them a second thought. I didn't realize they had a sense of injustice like ours. ...and 2 easily swayed turncoats. Plus, it's a good thing that Charity was kidnapped, since while she doesn't know anything right now, she will 100 meters from here. The Militia have launched an attack on Technomancer convoy, rumored to be holding prisoners, and Innocence has gone along, hoping that his parent would be there. Roy rushes off to make sure it doesn't go too badly. Really could have taken your time... We arrive just as Innocence gets captured. Roy: Innocence! Innocence! Innocence! I guess I better give up. And with that Roy now has a choice to make: join the Militia or go with Grant. So my options are really fighting government corruption from the outside or inside. Oh, and Innocence would probably prefer if I go with the Militia. Later on we find ourselves in a town of Green Hope. During the war that didn't appear but was supposedly logged, this place was a site of quite a number of battles, costing both sides greatly. It's an agricultural town, currently dealing with the mole infestation affecting the fertile farmland and the mutant slave labor stealing food since they are barely cared for. That's all side-quests, mind. Wreck: ...and carry bags, and plant grain, and... Roy: I think I see, you do a bit of everything... Wreck: Oh no, we decide nothing. We are here to investigate and disrupt the Technomancer work-site. And once there, it's discovered that it has quite a number of pre-war relics. The going theory is that the Technomancers made sure the conflict made it here to give them an excuse to excavate the area. It's far easier than getting permits, you see. In retaliation the Technomancers ambush a Militia meeting. We single-handedly save them. Don't try and prolong your live, lads. Having nabbed a keycard from one of the corpses, we break into a nearby Technomancer HQ to do some digging, find out what they are up to. Also killing everyone in sight. It's from here that we learn of the Shadow Line - a nearby site where experiments are been carried out. Roy, now likely wholly aware he can storm the compound solo and live to speak of it, heads off. We do find experiments been carried out, and they are not pretty. People kidnapped by the Technomancers then exposed to Unit 731-style shit. Good or evil, Roy says he'll bust them out. After beating up most of the facility in search for the key, we run into the comma-free Technomancer. And before he can be dispatched, cutscene-Roy is blasted into the way of one piece of fauna we haven't killed yet. FUCKING WARNED YOU ABOUT THE TECHNOMANCERS! A moment later the Drilling Worm is utterly destroyed. Roy climbs out of the tunnel to repeat the feat with the Technomancer. Having found the way to free the prisoners and with every worker in Shadow Line having been beaten and likely learned their lesson, Roy decides it's time to head for the Source, face Wisdom and settle this. So, who did I side with? Glad you've asked. The answer is both of them. The exact same events transpire regardless of who you pick. You do them for slightly different reasons and have access to different exposition, however. My good Roy went with the Militia, my economical Roy went with Grant. If you join the Militia, you are joined by Judy - a woman with a single-minded devotion to the Militia. If you join Grant, you are joined by Devotion - a woman with a single-minded devotion to Grant. The rebels are trying to dig up dirt on the Technomancers, and when you go to the work-site, you also have to sabotage the dig. Plus, alongside the fact they are trying to deal a killer blow to Wisdom, they also have a mole giving away their location, leading to the ambush. Their leader Marco, as previously established, is a paranoid asshole with the hatred for Technomancers, particularly Roy. Marco: Well, I was expecting a Technomancer, and here we have two... Two for the price of one! I hope neither of you is planning on stabbing me in the back. Mary: I... Who would I betray you to? The Source is after me too, just like Roy... So, I brought Mary into the Militia as well and romanced her right in front of Marco. Basically, just despite the git. Honour Grant actually has a decent grasp of what is going on and uses his connections to follow up on Roy's discoveries. He has us defend the Militia from the shadows, so they can act as a distraction. Again, leading to stopping the ambush. Either way you go, your companion does fuck-all to help at the Shadow Line. Did you have fun watching me fight the Drill Worm? However, comma-free Technomancer does turn out to be Devotion's brother, so she doesn't want you to kill him, and this changes nothing. While it is quite lazy and more than a little contrived, the game actually does an ok job framing why we are doing the same things. Going back to the work-site, if you are working with Grant, you exit the site to find that the Militia has launched an attack on it. So there is a level of consistency. You raid the Technomancer's base for different reasons. For the Militia it's to discover the mole's identity. And in Grant's case it's to eavesdrop on Wisdom during his visit. And either way you learn about the Shadow Line. Well, here is the thing, actually: you are listening on this conversation either way. Wisdom: So the work just stopped, like that? Technomancer Boss: A group of terrorists sabotaged the excavation... In fact, the rebels have more objectives overall. So, speedrunning tip: go with Grant. If you are going just for time, forget about who you actually want to win and just go with that. In both playthroughs I did kill Marco, which I am proud of. When you out the mole for Marco, he goes kind of turbo cunt. Marco: How could you do this? You've been with us since the beginning... Jerry: ...they've got my family, and they've gonna kill them... I had no choice! Roy: He put our lives at risk, but killing him won't change anything now... Marco: You are wrong, Roy. If we let traitors live, it means we value personal profiteers over the good of the community. Marco: So long, Jerry. Roy: Mm. The documents I found indicate where his family's being held... They're at the site of a Shadow Line that's being built. About 4 seconds too late there, Roy. Well, as you'll learn at the Shadow Line, he is not much better, having a contact within the Abundance government. Political prisoner: He spoke to someone called Marco. He said he succeeded. Roy: If we let the traitors off the hook, it'll mean the death of the Resistance, remember? And you didn't just betray your side, you betrayed the guild. Marco: It's not treason, I did it for the good of the Resistance, of Aurora! You can't kill me, Roy! What will happen to the movement without me? So, after his long spiel, he is killed... By a companion. What a fucking pansy. Meanwhile, if you go with Grant, Marco turns up at the Technomancer HQ mission, accusing you of rejoining the Source. Seeming to have missed an entire room full of corpses that Roy created. And Roy doesn't even try to set him straight and instead just kills him. A noble choice. I did extract the serum from the serum from the guy to ensure that he's dead. What about Innocence though? Well, see, before the Green Hope chapter even begins the Militia rushes off to save their own from a firing squad. Jerry: Judy... We tried everything. We even thought about an all-out attack, but look at that! And, shit, it turns out they have one whole machine gun, that's pointed away from us. We'd better do nothing. Meanwhile, Grant pardons Innocence and shoes him out of the plot peacefully in exchange for Roy's assistance. Either way we loose out Innocence. At the Source out final power is unleashed: having 2 companions. This is how you can tell it's the final showdown, since they are upping the difficulty. I better turn all of my money into health packs. I could probably get about 40... Yeah, that's alright, cool. And it turns out that you can mix useless and hindrance, but only if you are really giving in your all. The final boss is 2 Technomancer enemies and some of their friends. And it's essentially a cakewalk, they don't even have a Drill Worm or two in here. Militia Roy and Judy arrive in time to find out that Grant killed Wisdom in order to spare him from public lynching he'd receive from the hands of Militia. And by doing this he'd also save face for Aurora in front of the other guilds. He then submits to a trial held by the Militia, pretty much sure that he is going to face death penalty despite his status as a war hero. The final choice Roy has is whether to kill Grant there and then or let him face trial. Judy: There's a world to rebuild! The free people of Aurora await! I have no idea whether this is an improvement, but either way I have a very bad feeling. Honour Roy, meanwhile, confronts Wisdom alongside Grant. It's revealed in this version of events that the Shadow Line was set up due to Wisdom having contracted a mutation during the war, and he needs to find a cure. Him being a mutant would see him kicked out of the office, and he can't hide it forever. And so he went to the Technomancers in order to handle that, and in return they got to do whatever the fuck they wanted. Honour: What would happen if news of your condition got out? If everyone found out you're a mutant? Honour: Yes, you disgust me, but not for the reasons you think. You're going to die, Wisdom, but no one will know of your secret. For Aurora. Good-bye. Honour kills Wisdom (and yes, I feel like a twat for saying that sentence), and then Grant turns on Roy. Before he can pull the trigger though, Roy reveals he left the Mars war log with Charity back in Shadow Lair somehow. This bit of undeniable evidence and insurance makes Grant spare Roy and let him leave. So, with no political enemies, Honour Grant will likely become the new Dowser. And then that means that Honour was definitely my cleaner run of the game. Roy points out that he may have caused a police state. So I fear for the lives of the guards. Roy: ...all of criminals, people a bit suspect, and, of course, traitors are systematically arrested. Roy either drops the log off at the torched home of the dead Innocence or boards the train to exile himself alongside the freed Innocence, having successfully completed a series of actions I can't fully comprehend the reasoning or causality behind. So that's Mars. I'd describe it as a curiosity. It was definitely enough to make me interested in a sequel 'Technomancer' coming out... soonish. If only because I'm hoping for the same amount of half-baked odyssey, which is unlikely. This is a game that I do like in spite of itself. It's the right sort of cheap imitation: amusing when it can't quite recapture what it wants to. The world is silly and really half thought out, so it's amusing and easy to poke holes in it. The combat is shallow and broken, but not frustrating or unsatisfying on a pretty basic level. The voice acting is cheap, cheesy and wholly inconsistent. I'm not sure just how many countries made it to Mars, but it hasn't been so long that they've homogenized the accent yet. I was at first disappointed by the short length, but I came to appreciate it being a tight package when I replayed it. I did end every chapter wondering where the fuck were they going with it, and it doesn't outstay it's welcome or drag heavily. The one where the author clearly likes it and wants it to succeed beyond just making back it's costs. If you can get it on sale and want a cheap laugh, I would recommend Mars. Roy: I'll be staying here for a while regardless, just to see how things pan out. Because I know the conflict's far from over.
