The Saboteur

shows the consequences of....

Source: 1Up.com

What's the game about? The Saboteur shows the consequences of pissing off a daredevil Irishman during World War II. For a refresher: The Saboteur focuses on Sean Devlin, a racecar driver who suffers a personal tragedy, and soon joins the Special Operations Executive to conduct a guerrilla campaign against the occupying Nazi troops in Paris. Like the Mercenaries games, The Saboteur is an open-world third-person action game, but with a bit of an Okami twist. The occupied parts of Paris are rendered in black-and-white -- representing a low "Will-to-Fight." As Sean completes missions, he raises the Will-to-Fight, and therefore, adds color and vibrancy to the Parisian cityscape.

What's new for E3? Executive producers Greg Borrud and Jim Ferris use E3 as an opportunity to show off new missions that better illustrate The Saboteur's gameplay variety. For example, since the developers constantly mention how Sean is based on a real-life racecar driver, and is technically a driver himself, they finally demonstrate an actual race. Borrud doesn't specify the exact context for the race he's showing, only commenting, "Sean is finally racing against the guy he's been chasing since the beginning." This particular race isn't a throwaway one either; even after winding around Paris' major landmarks for a good five or six minutes, Sean is still only on the first lap. Besides lengthy Grand Prix motor-racing endeavors, Sean can also drive in smaller races to earn money (Borrud notes that the game does have an economy system of sorts, but declines to elaborate more on this system).

Then Borrud plays a mission where Sean has to sneak on-board a zeppelin and capture his target. The "traditional" way to play this mission would be to have Sean drive a stolen German truck, and wear a stolen German doctor's uniform as a disguise to work his way past the guards and onto the zeppelin. Except, Borrud forgets to actually equip said disguise. Instead, he barrels his truck past the guard outpost, and just guns his way to the zeppelin -- demonstrating that The Saboteur, like most of Pandemic's previous titles, is the kind of game that lets you finish your mission the way you want to. Regardless of how Sean gets to the zeppelin, the mission caps off with the zeppelin igniting, and Sean racing through the blaze before the whole thing blows up.

Finally, Borrud demonstrates a moment where his disguise does work: Sean has to infiltrate a German fuel depot and blow it up. Outside of the depot, Borrud takes out an unsuspecting guard with a stealth kill, and notes, "Anyone you kill from stealth, you can take their uniform as a disguise. If you shoot them though, the uniform is too ruined." Then there is a basic suspicion meter that increases and decreases based on how close you are to an enemy, and how suspicious you look. Meaning: walk slowly and far away from foes -- running in circles right next to an officer would be pretty damn suspicious. Borrud manages to plant the explosives on the depot without raising alarm, but when it blows, his cover is also blown. Borrud then ends the demo by having Sean evade the pursuing Nazis off the streets, and then has him duck into a brothel. Think of this brothel as The Saboteur's equivalent of a Pay'N'Spray in a Grand Theft Auto game -- as time passes, Sean is able to safely exit the establishment without worrying about Nazis looking for him.