Legendary (In Name Only) - 21 - Everyone In This Plot Is Stupid
1I apologize for saying that griffins only die when you empty 300 rounds of 7.62mm ammo into them, as that was false and misleading. They only die when you empty 300 rounds of 5.56mm ammo into them, what with that being the proper ammo type for the M249. By the time these things drop they've got over two and a half pounds of metal embedded in their head and neck area, which makes them tougher than elephants and almost as durable as any given boss in Soldier of Fortune: Payback. Fortunately you can find the one natural predator of griffins in this very level: Homing missiles.
Why the hell did the Council of 98 build the base of their world-monitoring secret society under the Parliament building, anyway? Did they just not realize (or care!) that if anyone found out about them, they'd be attacking not only them but a very important part of the British government? Do people not notice the metaphorical black helicopters going in and out of one of the most prominent buildings in London, least of all the members of Parliament themselves (because these guys sure don't act like they're working with the government)? Say what you will about Area 51, but at least it's in the middle of nowhere and - more importantly - if a hypothetical rival organization decided to attack it then it's not putting anyone else at risk.
Speaking of hypothetical rival organizations, here's some info on the Black Order I forgot to get. Short version: Some members of the Council of 98 argued that all this hidden knowledge could be used to advance society, and they split off from the Council to become the Black Order. Of course, a different data entry claims that they broke off from the Council after they made Pandora's Box because they wanted to use it to do whatever they want; the differences escalated into a war, and now the Black Order is basically "use technology to take over the world."
Funny thing, though: Both the Council and the Order take new technology from the world at large, right? I mean, the Council's been around and doing this under the pretense that "the world is not yet ready" for things for centuries, if not millennia, and the Order's doing it in their quest to control the world (according to one log entry). So stopping the Black Order is a Good Thing... up until you realize that there's still going to be a shadowy organization that's been controlling and curtailing the development of technology for practically the entirety of recorded human history. So it's not about the Council of 98 trying to stop the Black Order from taking over the world, it's about the Council of 98 trying to stop the Black Order from *taking the world from them*. Shit, the Black Order's problem may just be its leadership; if someone purged the upper echelons and replaced them with people more in line with its original aims of ruthless technological benevolence then... well, we'd have something more interesting than this game.
The game at least acknowledges the possibility that there are some douchey members in two or three log entries (Lexington is described by Deckard as being someone who "thinks he knows what's best for people better than they do"), but you know that no matter the details, the game is going to end with the Black Order destroyed and the Council of 98's grip on the world unchallenged. Hope you weren't hoping for that jetpack any time soon.
This video and the last probably had the wordiest video descriptions I've ever written.