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I've been slowly working my way through this, and I think it has been seriously patched over the last 10 months, because I haven't seen anything like the number of bugs the reviewers apparently did. Of course I have the X360 version with decent graphics, not the broken PS3 or utterly awful PS2 versions. So far the game has glitched exactly twice in about 300 mission attempts (counting all the HVT captures); each time an enemy leader somehow became immune to melee attacks, and I had to shoot them instead of capturing them. That's it. No pop-in, disappearing vehicles, allies committing suicide, outright crashes or any of the other stuff reviewers complained about. The AI is fairly stupid, but frankly it's no worse than the police in GTA4 - the only reason it looks worse is because far more of the enemy have rocket launchers and thus get a lot more opportunities to kill themselves with them. Similarly, the quips are a bit repetitive, but no moreso than GTA4 (perhaps the frequency has been toned down?). The weapons seem fine, so perhaps they've been rebalanced. Airstrikes are still mostly useless though.

Airstrikes are highly useful, but to get a useful number of them to wreck a base is next to impossible without cheating. You can use the 2000 pound strike, which are all over the place but those are one location only.

The useful satellite based strikes are only available end game and then mostly useless due to the massive number of jammers and SAM's. In Mercs 1 end game you could walk forward in rain of death as you call Carpet Bombing Strike after Carpet Bombing Strike as you stride forward in a rain of death.

Not so much in Mercs 2....

I love that game. I really should finish it at some point. And you need the ability to toss an airstrike beacon while in a vehicle. Drive by MOABing. YES.

I also hate that the need for people to measure e-Peens via achievement points has meant that I can't spam cheats for MASSIVE CASH to buy endless support from the Russians...

weemadando wrote:I love that game. I really should finish it at some point. And you need the ability to toss an airstrike beacon while in a vehicle. Drive by MOABing. YES.

Lets leave aside the stupidity of requiring the player to throw the beacon in the first place.

"Hey guys I've got an idea, lets make the Mother of all bombs hit anywhere you throw this giant beacon thing, it's more exciting if the player can only throw it about two feet, it means every time they use it, they have to run for it, or get taken out by their own air strike!"
Brilliant!

Thread moved FYI

Well, yes - obviously the best way to do it is from a hide somewhere a long, long way away, but you can't. So lets just work with what we've got.

It's nearly as awful as the ending for GRAW2 where you plant the beacon to show the aircraft where to hit, because all your fucking laser-designator shit that you've been using for the rest of the game has just up and fucking evaporated. And then what happens is THE INSTANT you place the beacon the bomb hits. So obviously the fucking plane already knew where it was and had come on target, dropped and hit the fucking target without your help. So you just sacrificed yourself and went through a whole heap of shit for no good reason. Thanks command.

weemadando wrote:I also hate that the need for people to measure e-Peens via achievement points has meant that I can't spam cheats for MASSIVE CASH to buy endless support from the Russians...

Just redo the winch challenge a few times. Once you break 100 mill it'll start giving you more than it's minimum (5% of your current cash).

weemadando wrote:Well, yes - obviously the best way to do it is from a hide somewhere a long, long way away, but you can't. So lets just work with what we've got.

That's why real men use rocket artillery. Satellite aimed and pretty much the widest scale devastation the game offers.

Vendetta wrote:

weemadando wrote:I also hate that the need for people to measure e-Peens via achievement points has meant that I can't spam cheats for MASSIVE CASH to buy endless support from the Russians...

Just redo the winch challenge a few times. Once you break 100 mill it'll start giving you more than it's minimum (5% of your current cash).

It's how I got my money, I did missions until I had about forty million then did the mission ten times for another fifty million, got bored, did two more missions, then came back did it ten more times and ended up with close to two hundred million, ten more times(Took me twenty minutes to beat it ten times, I got good) and I had 500 mil, I broke a billion and stopped. Then just started trying to spend it, but after I had twenty of every tank/plane/boat I bought rocket artillery and carpet bombing.

The laser-designated airstrikes (e.g. the bunker buster) are really the only good one (as in, decent game mechanic). You should get a relatively small number of those and that's it. The main use I had for airstrikes was destroying targets of factions I was friendly with; you can stroll up to the allied HQ or whatever, toss a flare against the wall, run away, watch the whole thing blow up, and not get any negative reputation despite doing this 20 times or so. This is kinda broken. I confess after the first few missions I started doing most of the game in attack choppers, just getting out to mop up the last few targets, and since there don't seem to be any other attack helicopter games out recently this is a win by default for Mercenaries 2...

Unfortunately my wife got me Heatseeker for the Wii for my birthday. I guess it would be rude not to play it...

Starglider wrote:utterly awful PS2

Whoa there, skippy.

I actually rather liked the PS2 version. Sure it wasn't a great port, and seemed smaller than even the first Mercenaries game, but it had its upsides. Like your PMC HQ garage/boatyard/helipad, where you could steal vehicles and drive/pilot them back and save them that way. Free Ambassador gunships, once you got the hang of sniping the AN pilots. And you didn't need some silly QTE to steal, either. It had the QTEs, but those were basically a bonus for some extra fuel; if you failed it or simply didn't bother, you still got your hands on whatever you were going after. Which is awesome.

Sure it lacks some features (I miss Mui's catsuit ) and friendly/neutral troops would randomly start shooting at you for no apparent reason. And the story missions were rather short, though I'm sure there were plenty of side missions to keep me entertained (alas I only had a rental so not much time). But all in all it was still plenty of fun.

Oh yeah, and like the original, the PS2 version doesn't care if you cheat. Cheat code enabled destruction of Venezuela ahoy!

I haven't finished the game yet. Know why? Because I got it in my head to do a 100% completion run, and I'm stuck doing missions for the pirates. Namely the mission where you have to drive a pickup full of rum to a party. While dodging UPN soldiers. And 50. Cal equipped pickup trucks, and armroed trucks. AND MISSILE EQUIPPED HELICOTERS WHOSE ATTACKS WILL BLOW ALL THE RUM OUT OF THE TRUCK JUST BECAUSE OF THE SHOCKWAVE EVEN IF THEY MISS!

I mean, level 2 of the mission was epic, since I turned the truck in by jumping out of it since it was burning. It stopped at the target, and blew up the second after the mission was completed. But level 3. LEVEL 3!

The game is, otherwise, fun to play, if you forgive its glaring flaws.

The interesting thing about level three for the Rum mission... If you're allied with the UP the copters will generally leave you alone... As long as you don't disguise.

Though the birds... the birds have no such option, given the VZ are who're shooting at you, with their AT missiles...

LordOskuro wrote:I haven't finished the game yet. Know why? Because I got it in my head to do a 100% completion run, and I'm stuck doing missions for the pirates. Namely the mission where you have to drive a pickup full of rum to a party. While dodging UPN soldiers. And 50. Cal equipped pickup trucks, and armroed trucks. AND MISSILE EQUIPPED HELICOTERS WHOSE ATTACKS WILL BLOW ALL THE RUM OUT OF THE TRUCK JUST BECAUSE OF THE SHOCKWAVE EVEN IF THEY MISS!

I found that fairly straightforward. Level 1, you just winch the truck with a helicopter. Level 2 and 3, the trick is to go off road as much as possible, using the airport runway and then the valley parallel to the road as far as you can. The copters tend to miss as long as you maintain speed.

Though the birds... the birds have no such option, given the VZ are who're shooting at you, with their AT missiles...

Yeah but they pretty much always miss as long as you maintain speed, and it's easy to do so on the southern route. Unfortunately there seems to be some special scripting to defeat the helicopter winching trick, as it always bounces all the boxes out of the truck on contact.

The mission I had trouble with (and the only one I didn't complete to level 3 other than the spare part collection, which I didn't bother with) is the Chinese tank run. On the third level I just couldn't get the tank through the course without taking too much damage in the process.

I admit the game was considerably less frustrating because I used 'start a mission I have no intention of completing' to simulate being able to save at locations other than my home base. This avoided a lot of pointless trekking around when going after the HVTs - the save system is pretty stupid, since not only does it forget your location if you're not in a mission, it also seems to lack an explicit load option (so what is the point of having multiple save slots in the first place?).

RogueIce wrote:Whoa there, skippy. I actually rather liked the PS2 version

I'm going by this review; the screenshots look unplayably awful even disregarding the ridiculous pop-in and other issues.

Starglider wrote:I'm going by this review; the screenshots look unplayably awful even disregarding the ridiculous pop-in and other issues.

Yeah, I won't say it doesn't have problems: it does. I'm just saying one can still have fun with it, and it has a few things the other doesn't (like stealing and stockpiling vehicles, which is awesome; and no required QTEs to steal stuff, yay!). Also one thing I forgot earlier: you can drive the UP tank and M3 APC across bridges! I was very annoyed when the X360 version wouldn't let me do so, but the PS2 version does.

RogueIce wrote:Also one thing I forgot earlier: you can drive the UP tank and M3 APC across bridges! I was very annoyed when the X360 version wouldn't let me do so, but the PS2 version does.

You can't drive those across bridges? I'm guessing the PC version is an Xbox port, and I noticed no such thing.

As for the PS2 version, I'm guessing this is a clear case of "the graphics are not as good as the other versions, waaaaaaaah" nonsense (also known as the "we expect the Wii to do what it wasn't meant to do" syndrome). Yeah, it has bugs (just like all the other versions), but if you had fun with it, naysayers can go screw themselves.

Also, fuck UPN! You mean I'll have to bribe them to be able to complete the mission? Argh, hate it.


Oh, and fuck the game for not allowing LAN coop, or for asking to go online every motherfucking time I load the game. Wich part of NO doesn't it understand?

LordOskuro wrote:I haven't finished the game yet. Know why? Because I got it in my head to do a 100% completion run, and I'm stuck doing missions for the pirates. Namely the mission where you have to drive a pickup full of rum to a party. While dodging UPN soldiers. And 50. Cal equipped pickup trucks, and armroed trucks. AND MISSILE EQUIPPED HELICOTERS WHOSE ATTACKS WILL BLOW ALL THE RUM OUT OF THE TRUCK JUST BECAUSE OF THE SHOCKWAVE EVEN IF THEY MISS!

The helicopters won't attack you if you don't have a pirate disguise. Beep your horn periodically, and you only have to deal with the scripted attackers.

(Edit: Assuming UP aren't hostile. If they are go and shoot at filthy marxists until they turn neutral)

Vendetta wrote: The helicopters won't attack you if you don't have a pirate disguise. Beep your horn periodically, and you only have to deal with the scripted attackers.

(Edit: Assuming UP aren't hostile. If they are go and shoot at filthy marxists until they turn neutral)

Firstly, yes, they hate me. I completed all the UPN missions first, and then proceeded to slaughter them, capture all their HVTs and destroy all the buildings in order to get rep with the pirates and guerrillas, or as a consequence of pirate/guerrilla missions.

Secondly, I'd say the rocket-equipped attack helicopters are the scripted attackers. Level 1 has pickup trucks, level 2 has heavy trucks, and level 3 has attack choppers. In fact, I tried blowing the choppers out of the sky, and they respawned almost instantly.

Whoever came up with those missions should be dipped in boiling in olive oil, along with the tester that didn't notice that if you move too fast towards the point where you get on the truck to start the mission, the rum bottles might spawn before the truck, and thus fall to the ground and make you fail. Epic. Although strangely hilarious.

LordOskuro wrote: Secondly, I'd say the rocket-equipped attack helicopters are the scripted attackers. Level 1 has pickup trucks, level 2 has heavy trucks, and level 3 has attack choppers. In fact, I tried blowing the choppers out of the sky, and they respawned almost instantly.
.

Which version are you playing? On the Xbox 360, the helicopters aren't part of the scripted attack. I got mauled by them repeatedly until I figured that out, so they'll ignore you if you aren't hostile to UP.

If you are, shoot PLAV types until you aren't, then try again.

PC Version, and the choppers keep respawning and going straight for me. And they spawn in areas they shouldn't spawn normally (that is, away from the airport). Of course, it might be because once I jump into the truck, the UP troops nearby raise the alarm, although I've tried decimating them until nothing moved, and as soon as I got under way, choppers would show up.

I'll try getting back on UPN's good side (poor PLAVs) and see if it helps, cuz the mission is impossible otherwise.

LordOskuro wrote:I'll try getting back on UPN's good side (poor PLAVs) and see if it helps

Just bribe them, no need to piss off the PLAVs (though you will do that anyway later if you go for all the HVTs). Bribing a faction from hostile to friendly takes the cash from what, two or three winching challenges?

cuz the mission is impossible otherwise.

I did it on level 3 with UPN fully hostile in three or so attempts. You are staying off-road as much as possible right?

LordOskuro wrote:

RogueIce wrote:Also one thing I forgot earlier: you can drive the UP tank and M3 APC across bridges! I was very annoyed when the X360 version wouldn't let me do so, but the PS2 version does.

You can't drive those across bridges? I'm guessing the PC version is an Xbox port, and I noticed no such thing.

To judge by the exchange regarding those helicopters and the rum, it sounds like there are differences.

Anyway, yeah, if I try to cross a bridge it's like I hit an invisible wall, because the damn thing just stops.

Lord Oskuro" wrote:As for the PS2 version, I'm guessing this is a clear case of "the graphics are not as good as the other versions, waaaaaaaah" nonsense (also known as the "we expect the Wii to do what it wasn't meant to do" syndrome). Yeah, it has bugs (just like all the other versions), but if you had fun with it, naysayers can go screw themselves.

More or less. Perhaps the most annoying bug is when a faction randomly starts hating you. I was going around the AN base once, hadn't done anything hostile, just checking it out, and they started shooting at me for no reason. And sometimes if I hang around the aftermath of a battle, a friendly/neutral faction will start shooting me. That's a weird bug. Sure it was annoying in the first one when some dipshit allied soldier ran across my line of fire and I became a "Traitor!" but I could understand that. In this one, though... *shrug* Does that happen in the next-gen/PC versions?

The rest...eh I can live with that. The first may have looked prettier, to be sure, but this one still has its charms. Oh yeah, another thing: none of that stupid "You're out of satellite range!" BS to lock off areas. After that intro mission, everything is open to you. Granted it feels a bit smaller than the X360 version did, but again this was only on a rental and I was more focused with story missions than exploring.

Are you sure you were not threading into High Security zones? No matter how friendly you are, they'll shoot you once you set a foot in those.
Or maybe you were driving an opposing faction vehicle and the disguise kicked in? It's a pain in the ass to drive VLZ vehicles, specially the Hind, since you have to continually hit the horn or else EVERYONE will shoot at you (except VLZs of course).

If it is a bug, I really didn't find it. The closest thing is when you cause damage to a faction (unintentionally, for example if they cross your line of fire) and they call for reinforcements, thus awarding a hefty rep loss.

LordOskuro wrote:Are you sure you were not threading into High Security zones? No matter how friendly you are, they'll shoot you once you set a foot in those.
Or maybe you were driving an opposing faction vehicle and the disguise kicked in? It's a pain in the ass to drive VLZ vehicles, specially the Hind, since you have to continually hit the horn or else EVERYONE will shoot at you (except VLZs of course).

Nope. I didn't see the blue shading on the PDA map (I don't even remember if there was any at all in the PS2 version), and anyway for those times in the aftermath of a battle, I wasn't even in a vehicle: I was on foot, wandering around, and they started to shoot at me.

LordOskuro wrote:If it is a bug, I really didn't find it. The closest thing is when you cause damage to a faction (unintentionally, for example if they cross your line of fire) and they call for reinforcements, thus awarding a hefty rep loss.

Yeah, happened in the first game too, with those morons crossing your line of fire. And it may not be an issue for the other versions, but I was just curious.