Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy takes place in the not so distant future. Various governments around the world have put a lot of money into researching and developing military operatives with paranormal abilities, and they have succeeded.
But something went wrong with America's program (called The Mindgate Project). The project was disbanded, but the former leader of the secret agency has amassed an army of mind-controlled minions, Meat Puppets, as well as several powerful psychics from around the world.
One of Mindgate's top operatives, Nick Scryer, has been charged with the mission of infiltrating this army and taking it down from the inside. But with his power and training, the leaders of The Movement (the new military force which threatens the world) would easily pick him out in the crowd.
Before going on his mission, Nick has his memory erased -- and with it, all of his training. The Movement raids an oil refinery, and the only person to escape brainwashing is Nick. As Nick moves about in the base and labs of The Movement, he begins to remember his training. With each training session Nick remembers, he unlocks one of his five psi-powers.
As the story unfolds, you find out that The General (leader of The Movement, and former commander of Mindgate) is seeking out an ancient artifact -- what does it do? Why does he want it? That is part of the mystery.
Within each huge level, there are many checkpoints, where your game is temporarily saved. This means that if you die, you will go back to the last checkpoint. This does not mean that this is where you have saved your game. To actually save the game, you must go into the menu and select "Save Checkpoint". This saves the game to your memory card at the last checkpoint you reached. Unfortunately, I didn't quite realize these details early on.
At one point, I was sneaking through the air ducts of one of The Movement’s bases, and fell out of it -- causing a lot of damage to myself, but also reaching the checkpoint I was going for. My health was down to basically nothing (literally, one shot would kill me). I was stuck in a room with five or six Meat Puppets waiting for me to exit and I had to use every trick my available psychic powers and guns would allow me in order to get out of there. Apparently at some point I had also saved that checkpoint, so I was doomed to repeat that room over and over again. Eventually I got out of there and a lot farther in the level (reaching several checkpoints and thinking it saved them for me). After restarting my PS2 the next day though, I found myself back in that hellish room. It wasn't long before I got out again and got to the first checkpoint after that (and saved it), thankfully.
Is this a good way to handle saving your progress? In hind-sight, I would say yes. I just wish I would have realized it sooner.
Editor's Note: RTFM. ;)
There are also a wide variety of unlockables within the game. But instead of breaking the feel and atmosphere of Psi-Ops by having you pick up random objects along the way, every time you complete a level you unlock several objects. Unlockables include: concept art, documentaries, levels, training sessions and more.
Most of the villains you will face as you trek through the high security facilities of The Movement will be the brainwashed Meat Puppets. But you will also find yourself against several bosses who have mastered one psychic power or another. These powers range from mind control (where a blast from this enemy will screw up your controls, making you move left when you want to go right), telekinesis, illusion and pyrokinesis. How can Nick possibly succeed against such a vast array of opposition? Simple, Nick hasn't mastered just one of these techniques -- he has mastered all of them, well almost all.
Nick's five abilities include TK (telekinesis), remote viewing, mind drain, mind control and pyrokinesis.
TK gives you the ability to pick up objects and move or throw them. Exactly which objects? Pretty much anything, boxes, people, barrels, pipes -- basically whatever isn’t nailed down. The Havok engine makes the flinging of objects and people into other objects and people a beautiful sight.
Remote viewing is like an out-of-body experience. You leave the corporal world and look upon it with a blurry eye. With this you can scout ahead and move through doors before they are opened -- though oddly enough you can't go through walls. This was an excellent feature; it was a major asset in navigating the security filled hallways. One drawback though was the fact that there was a time or two when enemies seemed to come out of nowhere. I didn't see them spawn, but I saw the area where they attacked from, and they were empty.
Mind drain allows you to regain some of your limited psychic powers. There are two ways to drain a person -- either suck it from their lifeless corpse (provided it still has a head) or sneak up on them -- you get more power if they are still alive.
Mind control is just what it sounds like -- take over another character's body and take out your enemies, with your enemies. There are also a couple of weapons (like the flamethrower and rocket launcher) that can only be used if you are controlling a Meat Puppet that has it.
And Pyrokinesis is probably the coolest of all of these powers (though I found I used TK more than any of them). With Pyro, you can set just about anything aflame. This was a great tool for clearing out rooms and taking down several enemies at once.
These psi-powers aren't the only weapons at your disposal. Early in the game you get a pistol with a silencer. As you progress you can pick up other firearms, though you can only hold one extra weapon at a time. These weapons include a machine gun, a shotgun, an assault rifle and a sniper rifle (with scope).
You will need and use a wide variety of tactics if you want to get to the bottom of The Mindgate Conspiracy.
