Line #64 VideoGame/OperatorsSide


1	[[quoteright:256:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lifeline_coverart.png]]
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3	''You may be looking for the mobile game series ''VideoGame/{{Lifeline}}'' instead. Or the ''Series/StarTrekVoyager'' episode [[Recap/StarTrekVoyagerS6E24LifeLine "Life Line"]].''
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5	''Operator's Side'', released as ''Lifeline'' in North America by Creator/{{Konami}}, is a 2004 Platform/PlayStation2 game by Sony Computer Entertainment (now known today as Creator/SonyInteractiveEntertainment) that attempted a new spin on the SurvivalHorror genre by making the player MissionControl. Set in the year 2029, it casts the player as a young man visiting a newly opened, state-of-the-art hotel inside an orbiting SpaceStation. After monsters crash the party, the player awakens inside the station's main control center, with no clue as to how he arrived there or where his girlfriend is.
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7	However, using the ship's various cameras, he locates a survivor -- a cocktail waitress named Rio -- and contacts her via her headset. From there, the player must guide Rio through the monster-infested station, gradually unraveling the truth behind the incident.
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9	Instead of controlling Rio directly via a gamepad, the user gives her commands over a USB headset, with scripted voice commands such as "shoot [the] [[AttackItsWeakPoint head (or other weak point)]]", "dodge left/right/back", "turn left/right", "stop", "run", and so on. The player can also direct Rio during cutscenes, make small talk, and even restore her health by playing {{tongue twister}}s with her.
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11	----
12	!!''Operator's Side'' provides examples of:
13	* ActionGirl: When everything works right, Rio is a small OneManArmy against the monsters in her path and mows them down with extreme accuracy. [[FakeDifficulty When everything doesn't work right]] or the player doesn't cooperate with her, Rio turns into a FauxActionGirl by either refusing to do anything to protect herself properly or flat-out botching orders and missing shots.
14	* AttackItsWeakPoint: If Rio shoots an alien in the right body part at the right time, the alien will instantly die.
15	%%* AndYourRewardIsClothes: Tying into [[{{Fanservice}} Rio's real role]].
16	* BoobsAndButtPose: Rio has her back turned in the game's cover art, with her head turned towards the viewer and her breasts and butt in display.
17	* ButNotTooForeign: Rio Hoeinheim is half-Japanese, half-German. [[spoiler:Turns out this is somewhat plot-relevant.]]
18	* ButThouMust: When you meet her, Rio asks you to remind her what your girlfriend's name is (Naomi); however, you're more than welcome to suggest other possibilities -- the game actually recognizes several different names, which Rio then echoes -- but she will just keep prompting you with more and more blunt pointers towards the right name until you get it right.
19	* CatScare: Done several times, most notably with a [[spoiler:music box]].
20	* CollectionSidequest:
21	** The sixteen chips.
22	** Also various commands that can be found and then issued that don't have much value in advancing the game, such as "Sexy Pose".
23	* ColonyDrop: Towards the end, albeit not as a TimedMission thankfully. [[spoiler:The BigBad opted to just drop the entire space hotel on Tokyo ForTheEvulz once his research and plans are destroyed; it takes Rio and the player setting the station to self-destruct to prevent this.]]
24	* ContrivedCoincidence: Rio was just on the space hotel as a means to find answers [[spoiler:about the man that killed her father. It just so happens to turn out that the Philosopher's Stone in her chest had various replicas made by the man who did the deed, who transforms everyone into monsters for the hell of it while Rio gets caught up in the midst of everything by pure accident. On the hotel's ''opening ceremony day,'' no less!]]
25	* DamnYouMuscleMemory: In this game, Square is Select, not X, which tends to throw off many first-time players.
26	* DarkAndTroubledPast: Rio, the cute cocktail waitress you have to guide and help throughout the game, [[spoiler:was wounded fatally as a child and lost her family due to an associate to her father's research betraying them all.]] Turns out she's followed leads involving this and ended up at the hotel as a result.
27	* DevelopersForesight: Surprisingly, quite a few commands/questions avoid [[NoFourthWall breaking the fourth wall]]. The first such example is asking Rio how to open the door to the room she's stuck in, which she will give (completely useless to the player) instructions on how to activate the door.
28	* DoggedNiceGuy: Rio simply cannot take no for an answer, even though she's aware the MC is in a relationship.
29	* EasterEgg:
30	** Very early on, when Rio forgets the name of your girlfriend, if you answer with the name of Rio's voice actress instead of "Naomi", she'll remark about how that name sounds familiar, but isn't the name of the girlfriend. Likewise, if you answer with Rio's own name, she wonders how you could possibly know it.
31	** ''Series/XPlay'' once found a rather interesting one: Adam, playing the game for the review and frustrated at Rio's particular brand of uncooperativeness, mutters "bark like a dog" into the microphone, and Rio responds, "Little dog, wuff wuff, or big dog, roof roof?" After the segment they actually went to the trouble to explain that no, they hadn't included it as a joke (which they were occasionally wont to do); it was actually part of the game.
32	* EverybodyDiesEnding: [[spoiler:Besides Rio, the player, and a small handful of survivors that get rescued shortly after meeting them and disappear from the plot, every other named character dies either by the creatures, or by Rio's hand after they were converted into a monster (excluding Naomi by [[HeroicSacrifice technicality]]).]]
33	* FakeDifficulty: Not only does the shoddy voice input system mean that Rio can mishear the player entirely at random, but the game tries to loosely simulate her having a mind of her own by botching shots or doing things in the wrong order. There's a high chance that you'll give an order, but the game will inexplicably put a high latency on it. Considering she refuses to do anything ''without'' your orders in the first place and you can't speak while Rio's talking unless specifically designated to be able to do so, this is frustrating for a multitude of reasons; ''especially'' in the cutscenes that have a "PressXToNotDie" requiring strict timing for her to do specific actions or else [[NonstandardGameOver die horribly]].
34	* FeaturelessProtagonist: Most of the game is spent looking through the station's security cameras, and you only ever see your character briefly from behind in the beginning and end of the game. However, it's pretty clear that you're playing as a young Japanese man.
35	* FissionMailed: Throughout the game and even shortly beforehand, the operator is usually required to give a command to Rio or at least say something or another to keep her alive in tense cutscenes. But right before the end, [[spoiler:the BigBad just shoots her outright in a cutscene]]. A GenreSavvy player is probably quick to assume it's a fakeout, and it's confirmed not even twenty seconds later. [[spoiler:After she lights him up with her machinegun.]]
36	* {{Foreshadowing}}: Beyond conversations with others bringing up small factoids that tend to crop up later such as one guest proclaiming that the aliens are taking the form of humans early on, Rio has an excessive habit of doing a recap of info she and the operator know so far before stopping short of what they could possibly mean. It gets extremely blatant when she does an ExpositionDump and then trails off with unsubtle implications for later reveals.
37	* FreezeFrameBonus: After [[spoiler:the BigBad is filled with lead courtesy of Rio]], pay attention and you'll notice [[spoiler:he's still moving his head and thus barely survived long enough to go OneWingedAngel]].
38	* GameBreakingBug: One early puzzle involves reciting a three-part password: the player recites one part, Rio another, then both must recite the full phrase in unison. Unfortunately, the ''timing'' of this last part is frustratingly difficult to get down, and made ''worse'' by how the game ''doesn't recognize that the player is speaking if Rio is talking''. Meaning the player has to, basically, ''trick'' the game into thinking you spoke in perfect unison, ''while'' actually reciting the phrase so that it can be "heard"...
39	* GameplayProtagonistStoryProtagonist: YOU are the voice on the other end, trapped in the control center of a monster-infested space station, helping the heroine through the puzzles and combat in the game.
40	* GemHeart: [[spoiler:Rio has the]] PhilosophersStone as one.
41	* GenreShift: For most of the game, it plays itself up as a sort of sci-fi survival horror. Towards the endgame, however, [[spoiler:seemingly magical Philosopher's Stones start popping up, there's a conspiracy involving the research on them, and the BigBad's plans reach ludicrous levels amidst revelations about Rio's past]] as the story transforms into a fast-and-loose thriller with light fantasy elements.
42	* HeroicBSOD: [[spoiler:After giving her father's BrainInAJar a MercyKill without him even realizing it was her, and having Naomi [[DiedInYourArmsTonight die in her arms]] only minutes later after all the effort in trying to find and rescue her, Rio suffers a brief but severe breakdown. The operator ends up snapping her out of it, [[ButThouMust not that there are any other options]].]]
43	* HeroicSacrifice: [[spoiler:Naomi, transformed into a destructive psychic monster against her will, nearly chokes Rio to death unintentionally. But hearing the operator call her name from Rio's earpiece snaps her out of it, and causes her to realize that her boyfriend's still alive and yet she's too dangerous to be allowed to live. So she seemingly blinks herself out of existence after affirming for Rio to protect you.]]
44	* HoistByHisOwnPetard: [[spoiler:Joe's plans would've gone swimmingly and Rio would have been either isolated or killed had he not tossed you into the room that you'd take the role of operator from, effectively making you a SpannerInTheWorks.]]
45	* ImprobableAimingSkills: When everything works, Rio's a surprisingly good shot right down to the individual eyeballs of a monster. [[spoiler:The BigBad also remarks that he's not the most impressive marksman but accurately shoots Rio in the heart with a ''hipfired shotgun round in zero-G,'' simply to recreate him shooting her in the heart as a kid ForTheEvulz. It hits her PocketProtector instead. [[DidntSeeThatComing Whoops.]]]]
46	* JustBetweenYouAndMe: [[spoiler:After getting Rio at gunpoint, the BigBad [[LargeHam openly lists]] pretty much every single atrocity he's committed to Rio's face as well as his overall plans just to be a {{Jerkass}} because he's ''evil''. However, he doesn't fall for WhyDontYouJustShootHim and blasts Rio immediately after.]]
47	* MarketBasedTitle: Known as Lifeline in North America. Operator's Side was used in Asia.
48	* MacGuffin: [[spoiler:The PhilosophersStone and its fake recreations,]] which drive the entire plot of the game. Turns out that [[spoiler:Rio is also a MacguffinGirl since the real stone had replaced her heart.]]
49	* MissionControl: You play as one.
50	* MolotovCocktail: Manages to turn into a plot point, when the player has to help Rio create one to destroy an alien blocking a hallway.
51	%%* MsFanservice: Rio.
52	%%* NewGamePlus
53	* NonstandardGameOver:
54	** When Rio very politely asks you to help her, saying no [[RuleOfThree three times]] will result in Rio shooting the camera, walking out of the room, and dying off-screen. This can also happen later on with a similar result.
55	** Failing to tell Rio the right command during certain scenes can result in her dying horribly, sending back to your last save in the process.
56	* OneWingedAngel: [[spoiler:Joe Powers seemingly gets offed by Rio in a {{Cutscene\|Boss}}, but shortly thereafter he pulls out one last trick up his sleeve by mutating himself with his fake Philosopher's Stone to become a gargantuan beast. [[UnexpectedGameplayChange And then gets an entirely different boss fight from the normal play mechanics.]]]]
57	* PhilosophersStone: Invented by a distant ancestor [[spoiler:of Rio, protected by her family and currently serving as a replacement heart for Rio. Imperfect copies of the Stone are responsible for transforming the humans aboard the hotel into alien monstrosities.]]
58	* PlayerNudge: Rio will often comment on what sort of action she and the player should take next. If the player falls silent for too long, she also starts asking for instructions.
59	* PlayingPossum: Rio comes across Alan while he's lying on the floor pretending to be dead. He then goes right back to it, though he's willing to move just enough to protect his nearby laptop if you attempt to look at it.
60	* PocketProtector: [[spoiler:The BigBad gets Rio at gunpoint and, after much EvilGloating and JustBetweenYouAndMe, shoots her in the heart with a shotgun as an attempt to replicate how he thought he killed her as a child. And then he gets [[MoreDakka perforated]] from behind shortly thereafter. Turns out the real Philosopher's Stone he'd been seeking was put into Rio's chest wound by her mortally-wounded father, which not only revived her then but stops the bullet now.]]
61	* PressXToNotDie: Well, Say X To Not Die. Certain scenes and puzzles are glorified quick time events, and if you don't time your command or say it as soon as possible, Rio can either sustain damage or instantly die. Considering the FakeDifficulty above, it's possible to fail these even if you ''do'' say the commands right. Also see PuzzleBoss below for a specific example.
62	* PuzzleBoss: One early boss involves watching a near-invincible monster's movement pattern and having Rio throw a homemade Molotov Cocktail at ''just'' the right moment. Get the timing wrong, or wait too long, and [[NonstandardGameOver what follows]] [[TheManyDeathsOfYou isn't pleasant]]. [[note]]The time limit factor is particularly annoying, given that she lights it ''before'' a fairly long cutscene where she reviews your plan yet ''again''.[[/note]]
63	* TheReveal:
64	** [[spoiler:Rio not only was searching for information as to who killed her father and shot her as a child, but has the true, original Philosopher's Stone in her chest the entire time.]]
65	** [[spoiler:The BigBad turns out to be a recurring name throughout the game, Joe Powers, who was responsible for ''everything'' that went wrong on both the hotel and in Rio's life. The man named Kraft that Rio had been hunting and Joe were one and the same, with Joe Powers being a translation of his birth German name into English.]]
66	* TheScream: [[spoiler:As Rio takes her machine gun to several canisters of copied Philosopher's Stones.]]
67	%%** ShoutingShooter
68	* ShaggyDogStory: [[spoiler:One of your side objectives is to find Naomi, your player character's girlfriend. She was personally turned into a creature by the BigBad and experimented on behind the scenes to become a powerful psychic monstrosity, and ultimately kills herself once she realizes you're safe but her powers have been unintentionally hurting others.]]
69	* ShipTease: Rio with the operator (aka [[PlayerCharacter you]]), as the game has multiple bonding moments over the course of the story that almost seem to exist solely to do this. You can be quite blunt about turning her down, not that it seems to change Rio's mind much despite the operator having a girlfriend they're trying to rescue. [[spoiler:Considering you two escape the exploding space station together and Naomi entrusts your protection to Rio before she dies, it's pretty obvious what angle the developers were going for.]]
70	* SuspiciouslySpecificDenial: When Rio [[ParrotExposition echoes Alan's description of the monsters as aliens]] in a questioning tone, he snaps back at her, mockingly asking what ''else'' they could possibly be and ranting about how [[spoiler:that sort of research is decidedly ''illegal'']].
71	%%* ThirdPersonSeductress: Rio.
72	* TomTheDarkLord: While the BigBad is seemingly a man named Kraft, it turns out he'd changed his name long ago [[spoiler:to an English equivalent you keep hearing throughout your adventure as a supposedly dead guest: Joe Powers. Who has a whole laundry list of atrocities and actions for just about every event in the plot he handily lists off to Rio while giggling like a madman.]]
73	* TongueTwister: You can play tongue twisters with Rio after locating the correct command. Copy her without flubbing the words and she regains some health for free.
74	* TooDumbToLive: Rio wants to be an ActionGirl real bad, but without your orders she'll [[RunningGag die horribly]]. This also is exemplified when the commander of the rescue team ([[spoiler:really a mercenary squad sent to cover up the events]]) is attacked by a psychic alien that stops all of his bullets. Despite pleading for him to run, if the operator doesn't have Rio book it herself, she'll stay behind and both promptly die. Despite her knowing ''full well'' that she can't beat it and having been running away just beforehand!
75	* ViewersAreGoldfish: It makes sense to occasionally provide recaps if a player saves and quits, sure. But Rio apparently thinks you've got the attention span of a child, because at almost every stop she'll break out either exposition relevant to the story, or a quick recap of what you need to do. [[SkewedPriorities Even if danger is afoot]] in the PuzzleBoss situation.
76	* VoiceWithAnInternetConnection: {{Inverted\|Trope}} -- you're the one talking here.
77	* WhatTheHellPlayer:
78	** Rio gets pissed off if you swear at her. [[YouCantGetYeFlask And you will.]]
79	** She also gets increasingly frustrated the more often you have to repeat a task, and will start berating and blaming the player to just get it right already.
80	* WouldHurtAChild: [[spoiler:BigBad Joe Powers doesn't give a damn about who gets in his way, and explicitly shot Rio in the chest as a child when he betrayed her family to steal their Philosopher's Stone research. Something he mocks her over when he shoots her in the same spot again for good measure.]]
81	* YouCantGetYeFlask: The game's input system gives its own spin on this. Most of the time this is "Guess the noun" as you are trying to figure out what you should call the items you see. This is aggravated by the game's futuristic setting, which gives many everyday items an unfamiliar appearance.

Context VideoGame / OperatorsSide