Welcome to the least buggy verision of Double Agent
Double Agent was first developed for the 360 which displays the greatest amount of visual graphics. But in spite of this, the game's framerate tends to drop a lot making many areas really horrid to complete. There are also many strange rules and oddities that the game never properly explains. The guards in this game can show bizarre behavior and can have trouble seeing Sam
Some things to know:
- Smoke grenades are really hilarious in this game. They affect the guards hearing and vision in funny ways. Smoke grenades can bleed through walls and ceilings and the coverage appears to be larger than what the smoke shows.
- 100% Stealth on Hard means no guards attacked (unless mission requires it like Sea of Okhotsk), no lights can be broken or shooting at all (unless the mission allows it). 100% Stealth on Easy allows all of that except for killing. The difficulty also determines how much trust is gained/lost.
- Turning off a light switch when holding the FN2000, Five-Seven, or certain gadgets immediately turns it off since the animation is completely skipped
Also, when loading a save, the screen lags for a second before it shows gameplay. Even though the screen lags, the game is technically in-game and running even though it says it is loading. Example, loading a save and mashing the whistle button, will cause Sam to whistle during the loading screen just right before the screen shows you in-game.
Guards that are extremely suspicious, but have not detected Sam, can fire random shots at where they think Sam is. This also means that Sam can be shot and still not be detected. This is a carry over from Chaos Theory and it even happens at around 9:20 in CotySA's 100% speedrun. As long as the light does not turn red and music does not start playing, Sam was not detected.
- 02 Jail:[04:34]
The poor framerate makes it is easy to accidentally miss the pipe when crawling out of the tunnel.
Jail is a very short mission, but has one infuriating part that you see at 3:49. This part tends to be extremely random at times making it a major pain in the ass to get by. I managed to get very lucky that the guards acted the way they did with that smoke grenade.
Now, I’m surprised that I got shot before I went up the stairs. This sometimes happens when a guard is extremely suspicious, but hasn’t detected Sam. When this happens, they sometimes shoot at where they think Sam is. In fact, you can see this happening in Iceland at 5:40.
What I find hilarious is that running immediately after passing the guard activated door causes the other guard at 4:35 to slowly turn around. Sneaking in and then running up the stairs causes him to quickly detect Sam.
- 03 JBA HQ Part 1:[12:22]
JBA Missions have rules that are very poorly told. If Sam is seen wielding NSA gadgets then that is an automatic gameover. Likewise, if Sam is seen doing things like hacking a computer, picking locks, or any obvious spy things, then that also results in a gameover.
The part on the roof is a funny trick I found out on accident. The game apparently doesn’t consider Sam to be in the restricted area until his climbing animation completely finishes.
The part at 8:45 is a funny glitch that occurs when Sam is interacting with objects at certain angles. The game tries to slide Sam into the correct position to perform the animation, but due to the angle, it fails.
Once the primary and secondary objectives are done, Moss appears to take a fixed amount of time to return.
- 04 Sea of Okhotsk:[11:20]
I did this mission on accident. What you see here is practice run that I just so happened to be recording. It appears that it doesn’t matter if you attack guards before the order is given. Also, it is not very clear when a guard discovers a body making this horrid level very luck based at times.
Now, the game has a bunch of rules that are never explained. I only found out about this through trial and error. The game doesn’t register certain things if Sam is not directly responsible for it. What the game considers as not directly responsible is really strange. Activating the detonators are required to proceed in the mission. Any guards that are killed by detonators are not counted towards the stealth score. Which also means that their bodies don’t register as bodies found.
And another example, is that the smoke grenade in the ventilation eliminates the crew members, But they don’t count as killed or knocked out on the stealth score.
Another example, you can see at 8:06 that the boat dropping and killing the two guards don’t register either
Also, I have no idea how he shot me at 11:39 but was not alerted. This spooked the shit out of me since I thought this practice run was ruined. But I guess I got really lucky. The guard was only somehow really suspicious and shot where he thought Sam was. The light did not turn red and music did not start playing. I had to remind myself that this was the 360 version of Double Agent. I found out its possible to repeat this in this specific area, since the snowstorm fog and the distance just so happens to be enough to obscure his vision.
At 11:05,It's really difficult to jump off the rail, slide off the other rail, and land on the boxes. Most of the time, Sam ends up sticking to the rail and dropping into the hanging off a ledge animation. The captain is not a solid NPC at this time. Since the developers never expected players to go this fast, he is scripted to run around the corner and disappear.
On a side note, IIRC Sea of Okhotsk for some reason penalizes -40% for a body found compared to the usual -20%
- 05 Shanghai:[09:39]
This mission is a gigantic fucking bottleneck.I don't think there is any way to scale the building any faster.
At 4:36, one of this guests is not like the others. One of these guest just doesn’t belong. Can you find that guest?
I got lucky at 7:14. This tends to be very difficult to pull off so quickly.
Boy do I hate jumping off this dragon.
- 06 JBA HQ Part 2:[07:54]
Emile’s speech is due to a stupid bug. The only way that I found to get the correct speech is to immediately start up JBA part 2 after finishing Shanghai. Otherwise Emile assumes Sam failed to get the notes even though the JBA trust says otherwise.
This mission is as boring as it looks. That first error with the mine was annoying but luckly I could get another one completed in time. Even if that error didn’t occur, I don’t think there is enough time to get two mines done before getting Emile’s voice sample. Also Emile’s voice sample is needed since his is faster for opening voice locks.
The ultrasonic emitter part was something I discovered on accident. It was useful to make Jamie go away.
It appears that mine building is significantly faster, but harder to control on the 360 version.
- 07 Cozumel:[08:00]
Running up the stairs undetected at 4:05 tends to be very random at times.
The pool area shows how hilarious smoke grenades are in this game.
The part in the Spa at 6:50 is scripted to have steam fill up the area, which makes it harder for the guards to see. You can even hear him fire random shot
The crew members in the command deck can’t hear the door being bashed for some reason. Which is hilarious because at 8:10, the crewmember with the binoculars hears the footsteps but doesn’t care and goes back to sightseeing. But when Sam exits the deck at 8:21, he suddenly gets better hearing
For some reason the guard in the bomb area can't see through the glass door yet the crew members in the command deck could see through the glass windows, the developers never picked up on this apparently. Additionally, that guards hearing is hilariously inconsistent. He can't hear the door being bashed, yet can hear me stomping around if I'm outside that room area.
I think the glass doors are actually regular doors that are simply reskinned.
The final part unfortunately had bad checkpoint timing. I had to hold back in order get Sam behind that object. The smoke grenade trick was another thing I found on accident. It somehow manages to get both guards to leave and investigate. It also skips the lock since the guard opens it for me.
- 08 JBA HQ Part 3:[15:27]
For some reason, the first fingerprint scanned double counts the amount of trust given, yet this doesn't happen with voice samples in JBA Part 2
Enrica's disarm code needs to be done first before she returns to her office. Also, Enrica's fingerprints are needed for a faster unlock in JBA Part 4 but I don't think there is enough time to scan them in her office.
The Visual proof of bomb of objective is automatically hacked. I don’t know if the automatic hacking for the visual proof of bomb is a bug or a feature. The only reason I can think of, is that the developers noticed that someone on the lower floors can see Sam hacking the computer–which will result in a gameover. I'm guessing this is their quickfix towards that problem.
The firing range was horrid to complete due to the awful framerate. It's the only thing that I think can be improved, but fuck that, not with this framerate.
Emile’s fingerprint opens the lock faster in this mission, but during the JBA part 4, it is suddenly changed to Enrica’s meaning her fingerprint is needed for a faster unlock. For some reason at 12:00, Sam suddenly becomes visible when scanning
Time to repeat the same mine building and other objectives from JBA 1 and 2 since the developers needed to inflate gameplay time. Bottlenecks everywhere.
IIRC, blowing up the boat saves about 12-13 seconds, something like that. Otherwise those extra seconds are due to Emile being anger and blowing Enrica's head off.
- 09 Kinshasa:[12:00]
The first part at the beginning is as hilarious as it looks. These two guards are amazingly blind and deaf.
Then after leaving the elevator, the next two guards are suddenly not deaf and blind.
The part at 4:55 took too many attempts to pull off. Now the part at 5:25, was only time I could find any use for emp grenades. Dropping past that laser is really finicky
There is not much I can do during the meeting room part.
Its really hilarious how those two soldiers at 13:00 are affected by the smoke grenades.
I’m also surprised at the small Mine detection radius at 13:26. For second there, I almost tried to reload the save.
- 10 JBA HQ Part 4:[≈08:04]
NSA trust can still be gained through the profile objectives, but only before the interrogation cutscene. Once the interrogation cutscene is completed the game suddenly stops giving NSA trust for profile objectives for some reason.
During the high security basement. The visibility sensor on Sam bugs out and fails to synch up with the HUD, meaning that the HUD sensor is the correct one. It seems like it only happens in this specific part of the game.
The cutscene during 7:05 can sometimes break. The guard can instantly kill the two scientists or miss several times with the timer still running. The part at 7:30 is not as easy as it looks. This took several attempts to get by undetected.
I use the funny smoke grenade trick of it bleeding through walls in the bomb area. But this is obnoxious to do, since one person not cooperating can fuck the entire thing up
When the mission is finished, the stealth score screen is not shown. It immediately loads the credits and then immediately loads NYC Boat. I also discovered that if NYC Boat is completed after it is immediately loaded, the game adds the statistics of JBA Part 4 to the NYC Boat Stealth score screen.
Technically, I could gun down many guards in this mission due to this rule. However, I don’t believe there is a way quickly do this without a body being found. Additionally, there are no explosives in this mission along with the fact that the guards in the bomb area are closely grouped together.
There is a horrid bug that occurs during the good ending. When the bomb is defused, Emile and his men are removed from the area and placed in a room far outside the map. During the good ending, Sam is also placed in that same room. Sometimes the AI is still active when they are moved into that room and they can run into Sam and gun him down, causing a game over during the SWAT raid. I can already tell how awful a single-segment 100% stealth run would be.
- 11 NYC Boat:[≈01:54]
I don't think there is a way to skip the conversion Moss and his men are having. I couldn't get the PC version trick to work. It appears that in this level, the stealth score cannot be penalized unless a body is found. Also the game copies the NYC Boat stealth score and pastes it over JBA Part 4
This mission is strange since it does not penalize for force hacking or even being identified as an intruder. The thing is, the game gives NO indication that there is no longer penalty for doing those things. It does dock points for a body being found, but doesn’t penalize for killing or KOing.
Sam can actually be killed when jumping off the boat. But it does not happen as often in this verison of the game. Once Sam exits the door, I lose control and Sam automatically jumps off.
IIRC, when the mission is loaded, it takes ≈10 seconds for the timer to appear. And when Sam is jumping off the rail, it takes ≈10 seconds for him to land in the water and for the mission to end. So I used that along with the timer to subtract from the 9:58 to get this level's run time.
Special thanks to prospy05 |