Cate Archer

Catherine “Cate” Anne Archer (b. 30/03/1942) is the main protagonist of and . She also appears in , a spin-off set between the games.
In NOLF, her design was based on the model , while her NOLF 2 look was based more on . She was voiced by Kit Harris in NOLF and in NOLF 2.
==Biography==
===Background===
Catherine was born in to a wealthy English-Scottish family. Although members of nobility, the family struggled financially. Her mother died three weeks after her birth, as she never recovered from "20 hours of labor", and she was raised by her father, who taught her hunting and horse riding. But in May 1956, her father committed suicide. Archer was placed in orphanage but escaped and disappeared without a trace.
Since then, she had been a thief for seven years. An agent of H.A.R.M. tried to hire her, but she denied it and stealthily robbed him. In 1963, Archer stole a watch from Bruno Lawrie, an operative of UNITY, a secret international organization. Unbeknownst to her, the watch was fitted with a homing device, which enabled Lawrie to track her down and apprehend her. Impressed by her abilities, Bruno recruited her to UNITY.
At first, she had to work as an archivist with the occasional task of wiretapping and eavesdropping on potential suspects. She later became an agent of UNITY, sent on a series of high-profile missions to protect humanity from global terrorists who want to take over the planet.
===NOLF===
The game begins with several UNITY agents being killed by Dmitrij Volkov in September, 1967. Due to this, UNITY now lacks operatives Cate Archer was chosen as a field operative. Her first real mission is to protect an American ambassador, Monroe, in , because H.A.R.M.'s activity was suspected. Somebody is believed to be a traitor. Mr. Smith didn't like her, because he though women couldn't be spies, while Bruno and Mr. Jones were quite optimistic of her. At first, everything was successful, but it ends in failure as both Lawrie and Monroe are killed by Volkov. Archer escaped, while also deactivating bombs and saving civilians' lives, and then snuck on a ship. 
Mr. Smith scolds her and Bruno for the failure, but Mr. Jones gives Archer another chance as they are still dangerously short-staffed. Archer mourns the death of her mentor at the graveyard. Her next mission involves the rescue of the defecting scientist Dr. Otto Schenker from a research facility in , and escort him safely to . Archer successfully infiltrates the facility, locates him and escorts him to safety. During their flight to , Dr. Schenker reveals that he was working on a highly explosive biochemical reagent, which Archer succinctly summarizes as "human time-bombs". Their aeroplane is ambushed by a H.A.R.M.'s airplane with the Scottish strongman Magnus Armstrong as an officer. He knocks Archer out from behind and kidnaps Dr. Schenker. Cate wakes up and escapes the pilot-less plane and "borrows" a parchute from one of the thugs, thus landing safely.
When she returns, Mr. Smith condemns her for the failures and offers her female jobs, such as gardening and motherhood. From now on, she'll be accompanied by Tom Goodman, a prominent spy from the American branch of UNITY, as a supervisor. When she met him in a nightclub in , , he turned out to be not so bright. Having been informed of their arrival, Inge Wagner, a tone-deaf opera singer and the owner of the club, blows a dart into Cate's neck. Cate and Tom notice a goon spying on them and Cate lures him in a trap to interrogate. Meanwhile, a group of thugs starts a shootout. After the shooutout Goodman stays behind for an investigation and Cate goes to docks.
At the docks, she meets Goodman and sets explosives in a nearby warehouse to create a diversion. After seeing Magnus Armstrong and Inge Wagner near a cargo freighter, she sneaks aboard, where she gets stunned and apprehended by Armstrong, and locked up in a cabin. After an explosion, the freighter begins sinking, so Armstrong and Wagner abandon ship. Archer, escaping, places a beacon in the ship's radio room.
Having made it out of the sinking freighter alive, Archer returns to her room in the hotel, where she's surprised by Goodman. They must return to wreckage of the ship and retrieve the shipping manifest and the captain's log. As H.A.R.M.'s thugs ambush the hotel, Goodman advises her to escape via the roof. The two take a boat out to sea and locate the wreckage with the help of the tracking beacon. After finding them, Cate's ambushed by H.A.R.M.'s divers. Having successfully obtained what they came for, Archer and Goodman head for shore.
Back at UNITY Headquarters, the organization received a threatening video message from H.A.R.M. in which they claim responsibility for the explosion at the Club Metropole in , using Dr. Schenker's biochemical reagent. A puppet with a distorted voice lists out H.A.R.M.'s demands which must be met in order to avert further terrorist attacks which will occur every 48 hours. While the documents don't provide much information, the chemical containers could be traced back to a company called Dumas Industrial Enterprises, based in the . The duo investigates the Dumas offices and a nearby compound in Bumberton and Archer manages to secure an interview with the company's director, Baron Archibald Dumas. Right before the interview Baroness Dumas goes away. The Baron himself turns out to be a lazy, infantile and silly person.
Although they are convinced that Baron Dumas is an "imbecile", it is still highly likely that Dumas Industrial Enterprises is linked to H.A.R.M. Archer and Goodman head to the Dumas Corporate Headquarters to crack the safe in the Baron's office. Archer accesses the building via a crane from the nearby construction site. Here she encounters Inge Wagner and kills her with a combinaton of water and electricity. Having cracked the Baron's safe, Archer finds Goodman who is being held at gunpoint by Volkov. In an attempt to help Archer escape, Goodman pushes Volkov aside but dies himself.
Archer grieves over the loss of her second partner and prepares for her next mission at HQ. Although she has no evidence as of yet, Archer has a theory that the Baron's wife, whose maiden name is Felicity Farnsworth could be the mastermind behind the Dumas connection to H.A.R.M. Cate also points their similarities and the moment where their paths diverged. They both came from wealthy families, were both orphaned at early age. Theirs fathers killed themselves, although for very different reasons. And both were plunged into undesirable circumstances and resorted to rather desperate measures to survive. The paperwork retrieved from the Baron's safe provides a lead to Dr. Schenker's whereabouts. Archer heads to the Dumas Lumber Company in Washington State where she uncovers a secret underground base. After locating Dr. Schenker, Archer escorts him to safety and returns with him to HQ.
In response to UNITY's successful rescue, H.A.R.M. detonates another human explosive in Shilling, England. Dr. Schenker reveals that the antidote to his invention can only be created in a zero-gravity environment, i.e. outer space. He further reveals that H.A.R.M. run their own space program headquartered on a tropical island of the coast of Mandaru. There are no antidote samples on the island but the next rocket into space is heading off that afternoon. After radioing HQ, Archer sneaks aboard the rocket, locates an antidote sample in H.A.R.M.'s Space Station and escapes back to Earth just before the station is destroyed by an incoming meteor shower.
UNITY now have the antidote, but not a list of the infected. Having run out of all leads, Archer persists on her hunch of the Baroness' involvement and heads to the Dumas' holiday resort in the on a whim. With a help of the civilian Tom, Archer tails the Baroness to her chateau in the mountains. After being caught sneaking around, Archer is ambushed for a third and final time by Armstrong and taken into a cell.
The Baroness visits Archer in her cell and reveals herself to be the mastermind behind H.A.R.M. and the explosions. She also reveals that at the club in Hamburg, Inge Wagner had infected her with Dr. Schenker's reagent by shooting a dart in the neck. While the Baroness' orders had been to give Archer a "ten hour fuse", Wagner gave her ten days, which now leaves her roughly ten hours to live. The Baroness sends for Armstrong to guard the cell, while she takes a shuttle train into her secret underground lair. Archer provokes Armstrong into fighting her with fists and defeats him. She asks him about the list, pointing at the threat of many innocent lives. He decides to leave H.A.R.M. and tells her the location of the list.
Archer finds the secret lair and retrieves the list but The Baroness escapes via helicopter. Battling her way through the chateau, Archer encounters the Elite Guard, the Baroness' bodyguards. Meanwhile, UNITY helicopters and agents take care of the guards in the outside area. Through some misunderstanding, the helicopters leave her, prompting her to take the gondola. After she's fighting off incoming H.A.R.M.'s helicopters, Baron Dumas turns out to be infected and detonates, bringing the gondola to a halt. UNITY agents think Archer's dead. She goes down and meets Volkov. He tells her to give the list, but the explosion makes ice shutter, causing them both to fall into a cavern. To her disadvantage, the spy loses her weapons but manages to find a revolver. After the showdown, Volkov plunges into the deep, while Archer gives him a satisfactory goodbye.
After returning to the village below, Archer contacts UNITY HQ via telephone and tells them to expect a telegram with the names. Mr. Smith can't believe her survival. She's ambushed by Baroness Dumas but fights back. Before dying, The Baroness claims that H.A.R.M. won't die with her. Learning that she's infected, Cate warns the civilians and hides herself. After the villainess explodes, the spy returns to HQ.
Here she's congratulated by her superiors. Even Mr. Smith, had been skeptical of female operatives, apologizes to her. Cate's slightly suprised that saving of the world isn't celebrated but is still happy. During the visit of Bruno's grave, she's surpised by Tom Goodman, who is revealed to be a traitor. Tom shows her his egoistic and greedy nature and Cate condemns him for it. After a fight on the cemetery Tom gets final blow from Mr. Smith, who then tells her that "he is finishing the last business and points his gun". Suddenly, he gets shot by Mr. Jones, who is joined by living Bruno. When Mr. Smith, lying on the ground, is about to shoot, Cate Archer kills him. 
Bruno and Mr. Jones tell Cate the truth. All that time Mr. Smith was the traitor, working on H.A.R.M. and sabotaging every mission Cate was sent on. "Tom Goodman" was a vacuum cleaner salesman from named Melvin Blitzny, paid by Mr. Smith, while the real one died in Amsterdam. They both weren't sexists but rather wanted to take her out of the game by such pressure. Mr. Jones and Bruno had suspected Mr. Smith, so Bruno faked his death to work secretly. Cate then scolds Bruno for deceiving her. After the credits, Volkov is shown alive and H.A.R.M.'s true leader is revealed to be the drunk man, who was seen throughout the game. Later, she is sent on a tropical island on holiday, where she finds H.A.R.M.'s activity but stops it.
===NOLF 2===
In 1968, UNITY sends Cate Archer to Inotakimura, to photograph the participants at an international crime convention. Unbeknownst to her, The Director of H.A.R.M. has assigned Isako and her ninjas to kill their uninvited guest. Archer meets her Japanese contact Isamu Hatori in the town, while Yamata-san waits for her by the car outside. After photographing the meeting, the alarm is sounding and Cate must fight her way back to the car. Yamata is killed by a shuriken just as she gets back. After a short standoff, Isako stabs Archer with her katana leaving her for dead. Luckily a UNITY intercept team is able to rescue Archer just in time and get her back to Tokyo to recover.
Two weeks later, Archer has fully recovered under the care of Dr. Schenker (now in the employ of UNITY) and joins Bruno Lawrie (now the temporary director of UNITY, since Mr. Jones is on a vacation) in the War Room. The U.S. government representative Isaac Barnes and general Morgan Hawkins have come to request their help in uncovering information on a secret Soviet weapons project called Project: Omega. The general shows his hate for the Soviets and mistrusts her. Lawrie agrees to help and Archer is sent to a Soviet military base in .
After spending the first day preparing for the escape by sabotaging the bridge, the base's communications tower and power station, she enters the compound at night. Working her way through the heavily guarded compound, Archer reaches the Main Records Building which contains the M-9 Data Processing Unit. A memo from 1965 stored in the computer's database reveals that Project: Omega is the brainchild of H.A.R.M. and the Soviet general Nikolai Zhukov whom she kills here. Soviet soldiers and H.A.R.M. agents swarm the building and Cate snowmobiles back to the cabin, rescues her pilot Mischa and escapes the Soviet Union. But H.A.R.M. learns she's alive.
With no further leads to go on, Archer heads to the abandoned home of Melvin Blitzny in Akron, Ohio to see if she can find any more clues about Project: Omega. It was scary, as if ghosts lived there, but Archer locates a documentation. Meanwhile, Isako and her ninjas are sent again to kill her, so she must fight off them while a heavy storm approaches. Archer and Isako face off at a nearby trailer park, but are interrupted by a huge tornado that sweeps up everything in its path. Isako hides in a trailer house and Cate chases her, but then the tornado sucks it up. In the end of the fight Isako eventually jumps out and Cate somehow survives.
The found documents mention Magnus Armstrong and , prompting Archer to find him and get some answers from him. She finds the former H.A.R.M. employee at a bar (in the middle of a barroom brawl) and brings him to HQ. He reluctantly agrees to help Archer infiltrate H.A.R.M.'s Indian Headquarters contacts his friend, Kamal Khubchandani who works there. Meanwhile, Pierre the Mime King and his gang of bandit mimes are hired by Volkov.
In , India, a contact of Kamal's approaches Archer and Armstrong. Unfortunately he is killed by a knife thrower from behind before he can reveal Kamal's location. The Calcutta Police mistakenly blame the agents for the murder. Archer has to meet Kamal in secret while avoiding the police now patrolling the area. After obtaining the password to H.A.R.M. Indian headquarters, Archer's only option to obtain the relevant information is to become a member of H.A.R.M. herself. After her appointment with the branch's leader Anoop Banerjee, Archer proves her worth by destroying the rival Evil Alliance Headquarters located in a nearby run-down movie theater. After a successful mission, Banerjee hires her as his secretary and welcomes her to H.A.R.M.
Now possessing security clearance, Archer has unhindered access around the H.A.R.M. HQ. She sneaks into the secret vault and discovers that the Project: Omega is being worked on at a secret base in . However, her cover is blown and she and Armstrong escape through a derelict building where they encounter Pierre the Mime King and his mime henchmen. Fighting their way through the streets of Calcutta, Archer and Armstrong escape from the hands of both H.A.R.M. and the mimes. Having failed to kill the villain, the heroes argue and blame each other for their failure. Because Indian H.A.R.M. branch let them escape, it falls in the eyes of The Director, so will be punished.
They fly to the secret base in Antarctica but find it abandoned but for a few dying scientists. Archer wanders through the facility and eventually uncovers the true nature of Project: Omega which involves the creation of super soldiers, who are designed for military combat. She is promptly ambushed by a rogue super soldier (who was responsible for the facility's abandonment), Lt. Joseph Anders. The super soldier mistakes Archer for his daughter Abigail Anders and gives chase. Archer has to use explosives to get past some debris, but accidentally traps Armstrong in the process. Archer's pilot warns them that many bad guys in helicopters are coming. Archer is forced to leave Armstrong behind.
Archer alerts Bruno and tells him to send an intercept team to rescue Armstrong from Antarctica and to alert the police in Calcutta of the incoming super soldiers. She also heads straight for Calcutta to help them evacuate the area. After rescuing several trapped civilians (including Crazy Harij), Kamal finds Archer and informs her that Armstrong has been captured by H.A.R.M. and remains in their custody.
Back at UNITY HQ, Archer gives Dr. Schenker all of the information found but he cannot read them without his glasses. After Cate finds them in the cafeteria, the alarm is raised and Pierre's mimes ambush the headquarters, plant explosives and take hostages. After neutralising the threat, Archer returns to Dr. Schenker who takes a look at the documentation and proceeds to develop a weapon against the super soldiers. The UNITY intercept team discovered that he was taken to H.A.R.M.'s secret underwater base in the to turn him into a super soldier. She notices a monitoring bug on a telephone but still tells that she'll head for Magnus, knowing that she may meet Pierre there. 
Archer infiltrates the underwater base via a Shark Mini-Sub. As she works her way through the base, she discovers the labs where Armstrong is being held. Before she can release him from the machine, Archer is ambushed by Pierre and his mimes. Following their defeat, Archer releases Armstrong. The friends make peace. Lt. Anders is also released in the process and proceeds to destroy the controls which causes the entire base to self-destruct. Archer and Armstrong reach the Director's escape pod and hold the remaining survivors in check. As the escape mechanism is jammed, Armstrong volunteers to swim out and unleash the mechanism manually. While successful, the Super Secret Submarine arrives on the scene and intercepts the escape pod with Archer still inside.
Now in the clutches of H.A.R.M. the Director wants to use the Man-Handler on Archer. Isako is tasked with it but refuses. The two H.A.R.M. thugs, Terrence Sloggins and his friend, volunteer and Cate is thrown here. Fortunately, the over-elaborate death trap malfunctions (probably, sabotaged by the duo and/or Isako) and Archer is able fight her way through the underground headquarters, where she encounters and has another showdown with her archenemy Volkov who is now in bandages and rocket wheelchair after a skiing incident - this time "over a lake of boiling artificial lava". After defeating him, Archer reaches the surface and finds herself back in Inotakimura, Japan. She has one more battle with Isako after which the Director threatens to kill his henchwoman for her persistent failure. Archer disarms the Director with a shuriken but he escapes capture. Isako declares herself in Archer's debt and symbolically cuts her katana in two. Archer takes her leave saying that she's "late for a war!"
Lawrie, Barnes and Hawkins think they can presume she's dead. Despite the Soviet general's order to call off the operation, the Director proceeds with his plans. Tensions between NATO and the Soviet Union are at an all time high, threatening another world war. Bearing the Soviet flag, H.A.R.M.'s super soldier invasion of an island begins and Archer is airlifted onto the battle scene where she joins Armstrong who had updated UNITY on everything. Dr. Schenker was able to develop an Anti-Super Soldier Serum which is dropped onto the island and helps Archer to fight off the invasion. Unfortunately, the Soviet Flag is raised over Khios, prompting General Hawkins to launch a missile at . The Russians threaten to retaliate unless the missile is destroyed. Cate defeats the foes but gets stunned by a lieutenant super soldier. Just then, after crossing all the way from the Aegean to the , the rogue Super Soldier arrives and, still believing he is rescuing his daughter, puts on the lieutenant super soldier's laser helmet and destroys the missile in flight. However, the helmet overheats and is gonna explode. Before his death, Anders throws himself off a cliff, while Archer runs to him. The American general is hysterical over his failure to have a war. The world is saved and the story ends with Archer and Armstrong taking friendly jives at each other.
==Personality==
Cate is a multifaceted person: she can act aggressively yet be calm, can be snarky but is kind, is brave like a man but is still feminine. Her temperament is eclectic towards phlegmatic. Despite her tragic backstory, she never gave up and didn't become angry at the whole world. Despite being the daughter of aristocrats, Archer never flaunts her noble heritage or shows any affinity with the upper class or luxury, probably due to her rough youth in the slums of London, where she had to fend for herself in order to survive. She's a second wave feminist and an image of what 1950s-60s' women wanted to be: beautiful, classy, strong and smart.
Cate gets a lot of discrimination from Mr. Smith for being the UNITY's first female operative and having her first missions failed, but instead of arguing loudly with him she keeps herself in control and proves competence. Having the similar past, she felt sorry for Baroness Dumas when the latter died, but also despised her, because she took out her suffering on other people. She seems to understand that world is not black-and-white and can feel sorry for such people as Magnus Armstrong and Isako who had tragic backstories and/or can be redeemed.
==Gallery==
NOLF1 Wallpaper.webp|Box cover of NOLF 1
NOLF1-PS2.jpg|Box cover of NOLF 1 PS 2 version
Cate-NOLF2-01.jpg
==Trivia==
*On the box cover of NOLF, she is shown with black hair, while in the game she has brown hair.
*Mitzi Martin provided the motion capture models for Archer. She later went on a publicity tour as Archer just before the release of NOLF.
*Kit Harris also voiced Inge Wagner, Ms. Kavanaugh and civilians, while Jen Taylor also voiced Isako, Ninjas, UNITY's receptionist, and civilians, along with Cortana in and Zoey in .
*Her appearance and personality have similarities with many other female spies and secret agents from 1960s pop-culture, such as Pussy Galore.
*Her codename is "Foxhunt" - a reference to her alias when she was still a thief. UNITY's corresponding codename when contacting her in the field is "Foxhound".
*Cate shares her surname with Sterling Archer from the cartoon , which incidentally also follows a 1960s-inspired secret agent. Whether the series was influenced by NOLF is unknown, though there is a theory proposed by some fans that Mallory Archer is an older Cate Archer with a new identity.
*Although Cate was born in to Scottish parents, her accent is a variant of (also known as " English" or " English"), usually associated with the English upper class. Linguistic references to her Scottish heritage include her use of the word "aye" for "yes", and "shite" for "shit".
*In the edition of NOLF, some levels feature unresponsive ("extra") Cate Archer models in inaccessible locations (e.g. "A Man of Influence" Scene 3, and "Safecracker" Scene 1). These are probably the models used during opening cutscenes that were forgotten by the game developers.
*Before the character's creation, the game designers had proposed a male operative named Adam Church for a British agency; as to avoid conflation with James Bond, his looks and personality were to provide a stark contrast to 007 (unattractive, unskilled, and no combat experience). In the end, developers found the proposed character unappealing and decided to go with a sharp and witty female operative instead.
*Earlier, she had been called "Holly" before name "Cate" was chosen.
*In both games, she meets people with similar stories; Felicity Dumas in NOLF and Isako in NOLF 2. They all orphaned, learned skills, and eventually joined a secret organisation. But while the Baroness is an aristocrat and villain, Isako is an anti-villain due to her debt to the Director.
==Licensing==
This article contains content derived from the "Cate Archer" article on the NOLF Wiki, licensed under CC-BY-SA.
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