You entered the target lockdown area of Viktor Novikov (you can see his outline in instinct in the earlier parts of where you were running towards the guards). There are two places he can lockdown in this level - one being the basement security CCTV HQ and the small rectangle room that is between the Sheik’s guest room and another large room with painting equipment on the 1st floor.
If you notice guards with their guns out around a particular area with instinct, never enter their nearby vicinity. The more you’ll recognise these alerted guards, the less it’ll screw you over in no easy restart missions like Freelancer/Escalations/Contracts. It’s definitely done that to me more than a few over the years!
When you let the bomb off, you initiated novikov to go into lockdown. While the guard was pointing towards you, it was not AT you. He was just put into defensive/alert mode and as you continued to approach the extraction spot, you became a threat, thus him turning orange and even him saying “embrace the sus, gentlemen.”
Had you not ran towards him, you would have been fine.
Also, congrats on the second Prestige! I’m still half way through my first Prestige run, but in all honesty, I don’t think I’ll be going for a second round. For one, its taking absolutely forever to get all the weapons back and I honestly cant see me having the patience to do it all again for a second time, let alone ten times to get the trophy!
I’m happy to just carry on playing Freelancer for fun with all my weapon wall stacked!
Does anyone else see this glass bottle in New York in their game? You can’t interact with it, nor shoot out glass to get to it. It’s just there. There’s a wishful part of me that hopes it’s an Easter egg or something but it’s probably not that at all lol
Ohhh - nicely spotted. You’re right, Novikov definitely is in that room. I was unaware going near a target lockdown was an issue. That is good to know about. I was not near the crime scene where I set off the explosive, so it makes sense this is what led to the combat. Thanks for your help, and thanks to others as well
Ok, halle-fucking-lujah! I don’t know if some kind of update happened since I last played Freelancer, but I’m able to pick up the fuse cell at last and have finally got light back in my garage. Hope this sticks.
(10 minutes later)
Aaaaand, just like that, it’s gone. I can’t take the fuse cell out of the power box anymore, so making my own bombs is still out. But, the lights are still on in my garage, so glass half full and all that.
I will say, so far, any time I’ve had conflicting objectives, it has always been because of improper management. Selecting a Showdown in a conflicting map, or picking a Prestige Objective that is incompatible with existing objectives are the only situations I’ve encountered it. So, I’m starting to think my original fears were wrong and that conflicting objectives don’t generate in the mode naturally. Paying attention to the set up when you first accept a contract, and having the proper tools in your inventory, then managing what you do and when, seems to help avoid every conceivable conflict of objectives that has cropped up. I’m willing to concede that I may have perhaps made a big deal over nothing last year.
Don’t everyone get carried away just yet. I said “may have” and “perhaps.” I need to go a little longer and finish a few more scenarios before I can conclude safely that the game does have safeguards against random generation of contradicting normal objectives. It could just be that I haven’t played often enough yet to encounter them; my Freelancer play has been kind off-again/on-again as I play Assassin’s Creed games alongside it. I’m just saying that at this point I’ll admit that it’s more likely than not that I had it wrong.
There are no “safeguards” of any kind against conflicting objectives, you’re bound to come across a few of them sooner or later if you keep playing (law of large numbers and all that). The last patch changed the prestige objective generation a bit so it’s no longer possible to roll really horrible stuff like triple SA / timed objectives but that’s not related.
Some syndicate types are more prone to conflicting objectives than others, those that include specific kill types in their usual objectives (assassination, organ trafficking etc). It’s particularly noticeable in the early syndicates, or showdowns, when there’s only one target and you can sometimes get two different kills requested. So maybe you simply played the other syndicate types more than these?
I’ve seen those types of objectives too where you have multiple kill conditions but not enough targets to meet them all. I don’t recall if there are any other combination where it’s impossible that i’ve actually seen, but it definitely happens from time to time.
I don’t really care if there are safeguards or not, my main argument has always been that it wouldn’t happen often enough for it to become an issue, if it ever happens at all.
If it happens even once, ever, it’s an issue. With the combination of possible objectives as limited as they are, that it had not happened at all yet is remarkable, and what leads me to suspect that maybe it was already designed to not happen, making player choice of action the culprit for instances where it does happen rather than random chance. I’m starting to suspect such.
Cannot directly recall it happening, but No Pacifications is incompatible with a whole bunch of objectives (sedative poisonings, make target slip, silent pacifications and explosive guard knockouts come to mind).
I generally dislike basic single target missions in Freelancer, not only because of possible objective conflict, but because they just aren’t as fun imo. I feel as if I’ve spent more time preparing and sitting in a loading screen than actually playing the game. Plus trying to best optimise an improvised route that swiftly goes through multiple targets is part of the fun for me.
That’s one of things I really liked about Hardcore mode: Missions have multiple targets from the first syndicate, so there’s not waiting for the campaign to “wind up”. Sometimes I wish there was a mode between regular and HC for when normal feels too simple, yet I don’t want to sweat too much.
The only conflicting objectives generated by the game I have seen was one another player posted, can’t find the original post. The objectives were Drowning Kill, Make Target Slip and Hide Target Bodies, the map was Ambrose Island with 1 target. You can only complete two of those without using some glitch.
