[EGD] Please Don't Feed The Ducks

Review by meowmeowfurrycat on Tuesday, August 12th 2014

It�s a cliche (yes, here we go again) of spy novels/movies/adult films that spies talk discreetly to each other whilst feeding the ducks. I�m not the first one to notice this, by the way; it�s been mentioned several times outside of Sploder. In any case, the Department of Secret Services is -- what else? -- a secret agency, which obviously, um, employs spies. But this series has a noticeable lack of ducks, and I struck out with the intention of finding out why.

And within three seconds, I chanced upon the answer: Mat7772 and Lordeldar (Dept. of Secret Services is a collaboration between them) failed to include Milky/0minutes in said collaboration. Guys, you really missed out on something there. Milky, it should be pointed out, has the Collab Award, which you receive for, um, making good collabs. Also, he really likes ducks, so . . . fail on your part.

Um, so what about, well, the actual game? I suppose that�s what the reader is here for, after all. First, I should explain that Department of Secret Services is not a single game but a series of shooters, four in all, released for (you guessed it) the eighth Epic Game Drop. The shooter creator, while excellent, does have its failings: for instance, each game must be single-leveled. Matty and the Fwuffynator set out to change this by making the whole game (Department of Secret Services) divided up into �episodes�; that is, what would otherwise be a level. I�m going to review each of the four episodes in turn.

Episode One

A lot of shooter RPGs, or at least shooter games in the sandbox style, have been made recently, most by Crunchynut. Episode One was not exactly the same as that: it takes place in a town or city, and there�s little or no gameplay in this episode. It�s quite similar to Getting Your License by Bobbler in that most of Episode One takes place on a road, with the ability to enter houses and/or stores. You play as Mat7772 (I think) and you are being trained by the agent Lordeldar -- talk about narcissism! Is their combined oversized ego so great that they are the protagonists? (That was a rhetorical question; the answer, of course, is yes.)

Anyway, I really disliked the first episode. There�s no action, no dynamite, no damsels in distress, and while the game creators did put some witty dialogue in there (�This banana bread tastes like bananas!�) I spent my time speeding around the town, finding roadblocks (as far as I could tell, those were unavoidable, though: polygons are sort of screwed up), backtracking, finding more roadblocks, backtracking yet again, and desperately trying to get the hell out of this place.

Episode Two

(www.sploder.com/games/members/mat7772lordeldar/play/dept-of-secret-services-1-2)

I didn�t really pay much attention to the storyline, but I believe that you�re on a dock or quay of some sort. This episode was awesome: as nonlinear as its predecessor, but nowhere near as annoying. Different rooms, different enemies, a variety of powerups; and most of them are optional, making Episode Two a sort of pick-your-path level. It�s still fairly easy, because of the hidden health, but it�s also really fun, possibly also because of the hidden health (after all, no one aside from necrophiliacs like death). This episode gets the Official MMFC Seal of Approval, which I just made up.

Episode Three

(www.sploder.com/games/members/mat7772lordeldar/play/dept-of-secret-services-1-3)

This one is a linear episode: you�re now actually on a cruise ship, or maybe a jet ski following said cruise ship. Episode Three begins in such a manner that causes you to lose most of your health, so this is a pretty stealth-based level. Still, you�re not as close to dead as could be possible, so even if you�re not as good of a game player, you just might be able to beat this one. The game is getting progressively harder until it reaches its climax at

Episode Four

(www.sploder.com/games/members/mat7772lordeldar/play/dept-of-secret-services-1-4)

which puts you in the position of having no health left -- one hit and you�ll die. This one is for the experts; and even though I�m an AMAZING game player (and might be just a little bit arrogant), it took me quite a few tries to beat Episode Four. The challenges -- how not to be spotted by the (warehouse, because I guess you�re in a warehouse now) security? -- were quite entertaining and I enjoyed solving them. In addition, there�s something about OHKO games that gives the player a rush of adrenaline, and oh Lord, did I ride that rush of adrenaline. I rode that baby all the way to the wall at the far side of the warehouse where a turret killed me, and then I hit Ctrl R and rode the rush to the wall again and died again, and just when my enthusiasm began to fade, I got past that part and the exhilaration built back up again.

On the other hand, I wouldn�t recommend playing this if you don�t have at least some knowledge of the shooter creator. c:

Conclusion

Episode one bleeps; episode two is awesome; episode three is really fun; episode four is insanity itself. The one regret I have about this game as a whole (i.e., Department of Secret Services Season 1) is that only Episode One was featured. This makes sense -- it avoids clogging up the Featured Games page -- but in my humble opinion, if any episode could have been featured, it should have been the second. Episode Two is the most playable of the lot, with the exception of the first, which, as I�ve already said, bleeped.

On the other hand, the first episode provides a start to the story, and without a beginning, no tale can be truly great. While it wasn�t any fun by itself, chuck it in the melting pot with its sisters and you get a situation where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts: Department of Secret Services was a great game/series to play, and basically if you don�t play the second episode I am going to throw a brick at you. c:

One downfall: no ducks.

--Meow