Oh, that mission.
I escaped from my captors, got in the BMP, ran over some bad guys, shot it out with another BMP, ran like hell from a helicopter raining rockets down on me, and finally reached the mountains. Fade to black; Act I ends.
Pant pant pant. Whoa, that was exciting! Cool mission.
Fade in. Act II begins.
I found myself on a mountaintop; a nice, clear night sky. I quickly located the Big Dipper, and also noticed that both the Sun and the Moon seemed to be out. Weird, but ok. As it happens, the direction opposite the Big Dipper/Pole Star alignment, South, is also where the mysteriously present sun is.
"Must be a hint of some kind," I said to myself, "for people who couldn't find the constellation."
So, I headed south, down the mountain.
I felt pretty good about myself at this point. A daring escape, a furiously paced battle, and successful celestial navigation, all within a few minutes.
"Not a bad day's work," I thought to myself.
Not long after I set out, I found a town with a single US soldier standing guard. I remember that as I began running towards him, I felt a little disappointed that I didn't have to do more pathfinding and ducking bad guys. But hey, at least I did everything right, right?
Wrong.
No sooner do I approach my newfound friend than he hits the dirt and rips into me with M16 bursts.
Tap-tap-tap! goes the rifle.
Argh! Thud! goes me.
What the hell?
"OK," I thought, "Maybe I just startled him. It's dark and he's out here alone. I might be a little jumpy, too."
So I spent about 30 minutes trying to approach in different ways; walking, running, crawling, sitting, saluting -- everything I could think of. Sadly, all attempts ended in my untimely death.
"Well, doesn't that suck."
I figured maybe this guy just wasn't the US force I was supposed to seek out. Which is weird, because I followed the stars south as I was supposed to. But ok, maybe there are others.
So I wander around the island for a while. A few hours, actually (over several sessions and days, not in one sitting!. Frustrated, wondering why this thing won't end when I know that I did everything right, I finally gave in and did a very un-manly thing: I came here and looked for directions.
I could have been upset when I found and read this thread. But instead, I figured I'd just try out what Soon2B 2nd LT suggested above.
Sure enough, it works. I followed the Spetznatz guys instead of escaping from the camp, stole the car and drove off. Boom, Act II starts. No sun in the night sky this time, which I wondered about. I approach the same US guy who killed me a thousand times over, but this time, I get a cut scene -- end game, mission complete, yadda yadda.
Argh.
Oh well.
Thank you, Soon2B 2nd LT. That'll teach me to not ask for directions sooner.
