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Wadjet Eye Resonance

Alex

Arcane
Joined
Jun 14, 2007
Messages
8,750
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São Paulo - Brasil
Oh, this is what I suspect about the endings, by the way:

I can't help but think there is a way to get Ed to back down with the "If you are going to shoot, then shoot" dialog option. Different dialog options there seem to end with him in a slightly different mental state, either more resolute in blowing up everything or more regretful for what he did. Maybe there is a combination that puts him in the right frame of mind to back down?
 

hoverdog

dog that is hovering, Wastelands Interactive
Developer
Joined
Jul 8, 2010
Messages
5,589
Location
Jordan, Minnesota
Project: Eternity
how to get the key? I'm pretty sure I'm supposed to fit it through here, but the lock prevents me from getting the key through the hole :rage:
BZLRk.jpg


what do?
 

Nope

Liturgist
Joined
Feb 22, 2011
Messages
108
You have to get the key to hang from the left part of the magnet so you don't get stuck on the lock. Layng it down just inside the "pocket" helps when positioning it.
 
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Just finished the game. Didn't get the maximum amount of points though (9 missing). The game is excellent and well deserves a full-length review. Vince Twelve :brodex:to you and your team!
 

evdk

comrade troglodyte :M
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Codex 2012 Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Ending question:
What exactly was Ed's motivation in this, beside being a colossal gullible moron? Was it just to build a better world with whomever was sweet talking him at the moment, disregarding the rapidly growing mountain of corpses?
Also I have to say that I didn't enjoy the "one of your guys was the culprit all along, moohoohaha!" twist.
 

Alex

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Messages
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São Paulo - Brasil
Reply to evdk

What exactly was Ed's motivation in this, beside being a colossal gullible moron? Was it just to built a better world with whomever was sweet talking him at the moment, disregarding the rapidly growing mountain of corpses?
Ed was kind of a nutjob. I think that at first he was convinced he was doing something heroic and grandiose, and later when he is betrayed, he just goes off the deep end and becomes convinced no sacrifice is too great for his vision. Also, yeah, it would be nice if we got to know him a bit better, butthat is true of basically all of the characters.
Also I have to say that I didn't enjoy the "one of your guys was the culprit all along, moohoohaha!" twist.
Well, I can see how being betrayed by one of your characters can be a bit strange, as it kind of breaks the control the player has over him, the idea you are able to project yourself into the game. But that said, I did think the whole betrayal thing was very well done, with lots of little hints that aren't obvious. Then again, I only realized he was the villain when the characters are leaving for the lab and he hangs his head after talking to Anna. So maybe I just wasn't paying enough attention.
 

evdk

comrade troglodyte :M
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Codex 2012 Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Reply to evdk

What exactly was Ed's motivation in this, beside being a colossal gullible moron? Was it just to built a better world with whomever was sweet talking him at the moment, disregarding the rapidly growing mountain of corpses?
Ed was kind of a nutjob. I think that at first he was convinced he was doing something heroic and grandiose, and later when he is betrayed, he just goes off the deep end and becomes convinced no sacrifice is too great for his vision. Also, yeah, it would be nice if we got to know him a bit better, butthat is true of basically all of the characters.
Also I have to say that I didn't enjoy the "one of your guys was the culprit all along, moohoohaha!" twist.
Well, I can see how being betrayed by one of your characters can be a bit strange, as it kind of breaks the control the player has over him, the idea you are able to project yourself into the game. But that said, I did think the whole betrayal thing was very well done, with lots of little hints that aren't obvious. Then again, I only realized he was the villain when the characters are leaving for the lab and he hangs his head after talking to Anna. So maybe I just wasn't paying enough attention.
Yes, I'm planning on replaying the game trying to look for all the hints of the tweest. To my eternal shame I must admit I didn't see it coming.
 

Vince Twelve

Novice
Joined
Jun 14, 2012
Messages
6
Hey guys! Glad you're enjoying it for the most part! Regarding endings:

Yup, just the two. Technically three, since you can either send or not send the story after killing Ed, which changes the credits.

There are a lot of extra hints about Ed and his motivations as well as lots of other information about all of the characters that you can get by using STMs and LTMs with the playable characters to talk about each other and the events in the game. Also lots of questions that you can ask Ed especially during that last crane sequence that fill you in on some of the motivations.

The difficulty I ran into while writing the dialog in the game is that the plot is so complex that laying it all out for the player in required dialogs makes the game way too talkie! Hiding some of that stuff (the stuff that isn't necessary to understand the plot, but can provide background information for characters' motivations and story points) in LTM or STM dialog gives curious players the ability to dive deeper! It's a fine line, though, so I'm not sure how well I did!

Thanks for your feedback! Let me know if I can answer any questions for you!
 

Jaesun

Fabulous Ex-Moderator
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Finally playing this. This is really really good. I LOVE the whole click and drag for conversations and for using items. Why the hell did noone ever think of this before. I feel it works great. I also really really love the low-res artwork. Tell your artist awesome job and give him a beer from me. :D
 

Alex

Arcane
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Messages
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São Paulo - Brasil
Vince Twelve

I guess I was just chasing shadows then :oops:

Still, I think it would have made some sense, if you had allowed the conversation options to change how determined Ed was, and maybe convince him to drop the gun at the nick of time. Either way, it is an awesome game and I wanted to thank you for making it. I look forward whatever it is you will work on next.
 

iqzulk

Augur
Joined
Apr 24, 2012
Messages
294
So, OK, I've completed Resonance. 319/340. Got all 3 endings.
(needed to sit through the goddamn TV NEWS bit 4 or 5 times because there just weren't any saves between that TV translation and any of the endings)
Breezed through a game from the
"Talk to Emma about mainframe so that she recognizes Ray" moment
to the very end without taking a single hint (as the Web was down at that moment; either the puzzles got significantly easier from that moment, either I finally "got" the ingame logic). And here are some of my thoughts about the game (WARNING! extreme amounts of tl;dr below!). It's not a balanced review, just so you know. Just some random thoughs I have about the game, that's all. Also, mind you, I am not that good at storyfag games and I really prefer "mechanical" adventure games with the accent on exploration (in the vein of Riven and RHEMs) to them.

Vince Twelve, if you happen to read this, be warned that there are some instances of really harsh critique in the spoiler below, which you'll probably be better not to read. Anyways, I still suggest you to read the "STORY" and "USABILITY" paragraphs, as they would probably contain some useful hints for you.

First of all, it's clearly a game made by a beginning gamedesigner and scriptwriter. And I mean no offence by that, the developer has certainly did the very best he could. The game has all those detailed backgrounds with parallax and loads of nicely animated stuff and obviously a lot of care was poured into all of that (like, the amounts of time I don't even want to think about). Also it has this STM system and loads and loads of optional dialogue. There is a lot of obvious care and loads of time in those things. Except this obsession with the insignificant details IS, in fact, typical for the beginners. Let's remember TLJ for a moment. It was also made by a team who had no prior experience with adventure genre whatsoever (though they clearly had the "WE ARE GOING TO MAKE THE BEST ADVENTURE GAME EVER" attitude). All the scenes were lush and had an overwhelming complexity (in terms of sheer quantity of various perceivable objects there) to them. Every book, every pipe, every nook and cranny was meticulously modelled, packed together with a gazillion of other objects (90 percent of which were non-interactable) and rendered. Except that abysmal ground/asphalt textures, ugly aliased character models and bothched "air perspective" (EXTREMELY blurry backgrounds which had contrasted quite distinctively with the other parts of the scenes) made all of that effort go straight to the... ahem... shitter. Or let's talk about animation. There were custom animations for the tic-tac-toe game and hopscotch (which were triggered by a completely optional dialogue), for Christ's sake! Only that all the animations were so unbelievably clunky and SLLLLLLOW that any good impression from their sheer variety was instantly nullified. Or there was like a 10 hours of voice acting in the game. Except the writing was cliched, the setting was made of "generic" and "boring" and half of TLJ's gameplay was, quite literally, just listening to that voice acted dialogue. Or look at the "Deadly Premonition". EVERY NPC in that game has a perfectly detailed schedule, you know. This obsession with the insignificant details IS one of the distinctive features of the beginner. An experienced developer knows he has a whole game to make and knows how to make various aspects of it JUST GOOD ENOUGH (as in "don't overdo anything") so that the player has a properly balanced experience. The beginner just can't see the wood for the trees, so to speak. He takes twice as much time to make an outline of sun behind the clouds and various cool parallax effect - and he has quite a short (in terms of significant storyline events), strangely paced game withough any distinctive style, that could totally use another 10 or 20 scenes, or, you know, have something like a "style" there. He obsesses himself with the STM idea - and in the end, player gets "Nah, don't need to talk with him about that" in 90 percent of combinations, and the fact that almost any STM is situated on the same screen as the NPC which has something useful to say about it, so that it's just simpler to drag'n'drop the respective STM on him instaed of using a fancy menu.

APPEARANCE

The backgrounds, while being nicely drawn (and with lots of meticulously animated backgrounds, wonder how much time was poured into those) totally fail to convey any unique artistic style. Everything looks pretty much generic - and that's about it, really. To worsen the matters, the music is pretty generic too, with the sole exception of main menu screen tune being quite memorable... Which is negated by the fact that the "main menu screen tune" is in fact a 16 SECOND LOOP FOR GOD'S SAKE. I honestly can't remember a single game where the main theme was just 16 second long, not even one. Anyways, what the whole generic-ness of soundtrack and graphical style actually achieves - is that graphics and music become a mere ILLUSTRATION to the story in the case of this particular game, and nothing more. Oh, and by the way, that picture of crying Anna in main menu - it could have totally been drawn better.

STORY

As for the story, it's really strangely constructed too. First, we have a linear set of levels to progress in the beginning of the game in a pretty much set order. This is like 1/3 of a game. Then, after the baseball field scene, the game transforms into the traditional Tex_Murphy-style adventure. You have places to visit, people to talk, goals to pursue in (seemingly) any order and the need to meaningfully combine characters' actions in order to achieve those goals. This would actually be the best part of the game gameplay-wise, BUT it's just not long enough so that after it ends (quite in a spectacular fashion, but I'm getting ahead of myself now) there is an annoying feeling that the potential there was much higher, and that twice that part's longevity would serve it just right. As it is, though, it's a pretty uninspiring "Okay, there are goals, you are free to go; acoomplished those exact goals? - back on rails for you" with JUST NOT ENOUGH STUFF in between. It just feels weird and tacked on. Anyways, it's 1/2 of the game. And then we have a quick easy linear hack after the TEH TWIST till the very end of the game which is like ~1/6 of the game.

Anyways, the game has a sole really good (like, a killer one) moment in it (meaning of course a certain vault scene) - and even this moment is dragged down by a somewhat shoddy execution. But I'll start by explicitly stating what was done right. 1. The masking of Ed's intentions was done just right (with the downside of that being almost complete lack of Ed's characterization [well, some of it was in demo segment] prior to the key moment - he is easily the blandest of the bunch right till the vault). 2. The method of unravelling his true intentions was spectacularly out of the box. The metro map was before my eyes during the entirety of the game - and not even once did I have a slightest idea about analyzing it critically. Really good job out there. But, you know, the method did have a flaw. Ed COULD'VE been just a stalker, after all. 3. It was completely and utterly unpredicted. 4. I really liked "Te Promete" bit. If my guess is correct (I currently have no Web access to ascertain that via online translator) then it ties to the Prometheus myth which, in the case of this particular game and in the context of that particular scene, adds some real depth to the story in a manner similar to Grim_Fandango's "With bony hands I hold my partner" poem. {Looked it up. I was wrong. It was just "Promise". Oh well.}

Now - to the things that were done quite a bit worse. 1. The whole scene relies heavily on inability to walk away from the console which subsequenly results in Anna's death. Yes, it would have been a heavy story branching there IF the player had such an option, BUT, nevertheless, it's a really crude way of assuring that the player follows the story. Seeing that the vault scene is the apex of the story, it could've and should've been done better in that account. 2. Ed kills Anna RIGHT AFTER the player (who controls Anna) presses the button. There isn't any contextual menu "Anna, do you really want to destroy the vault? Yes, I do./ No, I don't.". You press the button - you are dead. Even if Anna pressed the button ("destroy the contents" for example) split second before she was murdered, the contents of the vault would still be destroyed. You could say that you pressing the button only meant the Anna HAD THE INTENTION of pressing the button. But that's not true. There isn't a single other instance in the game where that shtick is played upon. The in-game convention (ESPECIALLY for the first-person scenes, as the third-person scenes do indeed require some reaction time from the characters) is: You press the button - character presses the button. In the vault scene the game breaks that convention. Again, this could be easily circumvented by adding another "Are you really sure?" menu with the idea that Anna presses the button in the first menu but has no chance whatsoever to press the second one before Ed kills her. 3. Anna didn't have enough charactarization in the first two flashback scenes and the best charactarization bits came, like, 5 minutes before her death. The player just doesn't have enough time to develop the emotional bond (so to speak) with the character. If Anna was more thoroughly fleshed out right from the start of the game, this particular scene would probably have a lot more powerful effect. To worsen the matters, dream scenes really did seem out of place in this game from the stylistical point of view. They had too much of typical "ZOMG PSYCHOLOGICAL HORROR SILENT HILL SO DEEP" to it, which just seemed quite out of place there.

My biggest complaint about the story is the Eleven Foundation theme. Being that the only two people directly tied to EF whom the player actually meets, are Batra and the Japanese woman (and, by the way, who the hell was the burglar?), they necesserily bear the burden of symbolical representation of the whole Eleven Foundation, Antevorta and the whole Orwellian society theme that one of the ending leads to. And who exactly are those symbolycal figures? Well, a hobo and an inane spritual_meduim-like chick who doesn't even speak English (how the hell does she analyze massive threads of information WRITTEN IN ENGLISH? via Google Translate or Babelfish? and don't get me started on the chick either, let's just say that I totally don't see her as someone with genius pattern recognition skills). That's just laughable. Moreover, the problem is severely worsened by the fact that not even once any other members are even metioned. Was it that hard to slip up 3-4 more names at least in ending newspapers?

Anyway, what I did like in the end is the really nice characterization of Ed which ACTUALLY made him quite a believable and complex character (the nerd who just snaps under the pressure? yeah, makes sense).

Anyways, the story is strangely constructed in the following sense. Every one of the main characters has lots of dialogue, but suprisingly they are still pretty bland and get properly charactarized only in 2 or 3 places IN THE WHOLE GAME each. Moreover, there is quite a lot of stuff happening in the game, but on a closer look everything actually appears to be suprisingly thin. The whole setting can easily be described in 10 sentences. EACH of the characters can be exhaustively described in 10 sentences or even less. The whole "free roaming" half of the game can be described just like that: "OK, so we get the plans. And we get the credit card information. And we speak to Tortoise. And we go to gaveyard. And we go to the Vault." This game could be EASILY made into 2-3 hour experience story-wise. It's just bloated with all the insignificant mundane details, so that it's 8-10 hours now.

Moreover, there was also a feeling, that the WHOLE GAME BEFORE THE VAULT SCENE was just a gloried extensive prologue - and now THE REAL "Resonance" will begin. But seeng as the final segment of the game is so extremely short... It's just weird, really.

Everything else I liked. Especially the proper implementation of hard sci-fi theme. But then again, it wasn't anything that special, it just was pretty good. The only bits that really got to me were the vault scene and, maybe the dialogue on the crane (during which Ed - FINALLY! - came out to be quite a complex and well-thought character).

GAMEPLAY.

Quite good. Dragged down by extremely low perfomance index (percentage for meaningful interations using that method) for STM-NPC interaction and extensive red herrings. The potential both for multicharacter combination and STMs is not fully implemented either. First of all, the game is too short for proper and extensive implemetation of both of those mechanics. Second, I would really like it to have much more complex multicharacter puzzles (there are 4 characters! why isn't there a single instance when all 4 are needed simultanelously for the puzzle completion?) with the need to think 5-6 moves ahead (in the vein of "waterpipe" puzzle, but more complex). Third, the free-roaming half could really have more locations to it and be quite a bit longer.

USABILITY

I had the following problems with the game.

1. No way to pause except to play windowed and click outside the window? Not sure about that, though. 2. No journal with logging of conversations. Which is crucial in the light of subsequential complaints. 3. There are some places in dialogues where custom animations are played and no phrases are spoken. Now, at those moments I tend to think the conversation is over and press either Esc to save or LMB to move my character - and BAM! - I've skipped the next phrase. This Crap Was Driving Me Bonkers. Because, given inability to save during scripted/conversation scenes (which can be quite long), the skip would mean that I need to reload (when the game LETS ME to reload i.e. AFTER the end of conversation or sequence) and play through THE WHOLE SEQUENCE AGAIN (just because of my stupid desire not to miss anything potentially crucial to the story). The conversation logging would instantly resolve that problem. 4. The automatic STM rolling menu appearing when I just try do drag hotspot STM image on an NPC in the left part of screen. Very annoying. 5. Extensive amount of absolutely GIGANTIC red herrings. For instance, thermal scanner in the beginning of the game. I have ACTUALLY FOUND the vault on that scene, you know. I pressed scan. And the computer have printed "You know, I don't see any anomalies here" (yeah, right, there is a BRIGHT RED SPOT RIGHT THERE). Why did it say about "No anomalies"? Well, because the developer didn't want players to find the vault (which the characteres aren't supposed to know about ATM). Except he could just make Ed say "WTF? Something strange out there. Oh well, no time to investigate that, I need to rescue professor." Or even better, SINCE THE WHOLE SCANNER IS A F@#$ING RED HERRING HE COUD JUST MAKE ED SAY "I NEED TO F@#$%NG RESCUE THE PROFESSOR. I DON'T NEED TO OR HAVE ANY INTENTION TO OPERATE A F@#$ING USELESS COMPUTER WITH F@#$ING USELESS CORRUPTED SECURITY LOGS AND F@#$ING USELESS THERMAL SCANNER, YOU KNOW". Another instance. Security code on the archive computer. I have gone through a lot of preparation to get Ray with the right equipment to the archive mainframe, you know. I've hacked the computer and learned that the needed document lies in the Q19 box. Now just to recalibrate the arm. How do I do that? OK, let's make a new search. Security code? What security code? I don't understand. Am I suposed to have a freaking thing as of this moment? Maybe I wasn't snooping around well enough. Maybe I was supposed to learn that code through a fancy STM-based puzzle? I dunno. Security code, security code, security code... OK, we need to find a freaking security code, all of that preparation for nothing. L-L-L-Loadgame. Was it that fucking hard to ascertain that the security code is a red herring? Because I DID play through that sequence again at least 2-3 times to make sure I didn't miss something. 6. The STM system, while been cool on a concept level, has an extremely low perfomance index. Actually 90 percent of useful STMs are situated ON THE SAME SCREEN as the NPC you are supposed to talk about them. And the most of STM-NPC combinations give you the "Nah, he doesn't want to hear about that" reaction. 7. The hints were really obscure and not that helpful at all. Having different "hint levels" would help.

Final words.

Anyways, the game is quite good. 3,5/5, I'd say. But all those glowing "ZOMG 4,5/5! ADVENTURE GENRE REVIVAL" reviews? Sorry, but that's complete and utter nonsense.
 

Vince Twelve

Novice
Joined
Jun 14, 2012
Messages
6
I give your critique of my game 2.5 out of 5 stars. I would recommend USING LESS CAPS LOCK and making it more clear when you're criticizing Resonance or The Longest Journey.

I kid! :P

Thanks for the feedback iqZulk. I read through the whole thing and most of your complaints are valid and flaws that I am aware of so I won't try to defend the game on those points. In some cases the time cost to address them outweighed the benefit. There are thousands of possible STM combinations, and we did our best to fill in all the most important ones, for example. No way we could ever have filled in all the options every player will try (times four, since all four characters might talk about it!). And there are lots of STM and LTM combinations in there that are not used in puzzles, but instead to provide some extra character depth or story background. Having all that explanation and background dialog in the game made it even longer and more talk-y, so I moved a lot of it to optional STM/LTM conversations. They're not needed to understand the gist of the story, but always available for those who seek it out. Of course, whether or not my solution or implementation was any good is a different question and ripe for criticism! ;)

A couple notes:

-You can skip the news report with the Esc key. Obviously, there's no documentation for that, so no way to know other than trying it.
-You shouldn't HAVE to rewatch the news report many times since if you fail the game rewinds. No need to go back to another save.
-Likewise, there was lots of optional dialog related to the Eleven foundation including who that burglar was. And I thought it was pretty clear that Reno could understand English just fine. She just chooses not to speak it.

On the rest, I'll just say I'm glad you liked the parts you liked and sorry the flaws burned so brightly they outshone some of the better parts. I know the game isn't going to click with everyone so I'm not really hurt by your honest opinion. Everything is just a chance to do it better next time. Thank you!
 

iqzulk

Augur
Joined
Apr 24, 2012
Messages
294
I would recommend USING LESS CAPS LOCK
Yeeeeeah, I really overdid that, didn't I? :oops:
and making it more clear when you're criticizing Resonance or The Longest Journey.
True.
Thanks for the feedback iqZulk.
And thanks back to you for your sensible attitude.

There are thousands of possible STM combinations, and we did our best to fill in all the most important ones, for example. No way we could ever have filled in all the options every player will try (times four, since all four characters might talk about it!).
And that's why anyone should probably be very careful when one adapts any new gameplay features. You and your team can make only so much content at any given period of time. You introduce the "description of the on-screen items" feature - you will need to be ready to write and script endless "It's a chair" descriptions. You introduce the ability to freely combine STMs with NPCs - you instantly get tons of spraying posibilities. The trick is, I think, to make every bit of that content and every bit of possibility available to player in the end as meaningful as possible - and to choose the features of your game accordingly (so you don't have "Oh. My God. There are 25426 possibilities and I need to somehow cover them all. God knows how much time THAT would require."). Interactivity for interactivity is nice, but only as long as it gets player somewhere (at least in terms of understanding of what's going on or getting the feel of the ingame world) and as long as the main content doesn't get awfully diluted by those of optional bits which are completely and utterly meaningless (like those "Nah, he would probably not be very interested in that topic").
-You shouldn't HAVE to rewatch the news report many times since if you fail the game rewinds. No need to go back to another save.
I watched it three times (each time for each of the endings) and + 1 time because I accidentally skipped the credits one time and consequently redid that ending. Nice to know about Esc key though.
-Likewise, there was lots of optional dialog related to the Eleven foundation including who that burglar was. And I thought it was pretty clear that Reno could understand English just fine. She just chooses not to speak it.
OK, points taken. Come to think about it, I just may want to replay the game in a year or so to find out who the
burglar
is. ;)
On the rest, I'll just say I'm glad you liked the parts you liked and sorry the flaws burned so brightly they outshone some of the better parts. I know the game isn't going to click with everyone so I'm not really hurt by your honest opinion. Everything is just a chance to do it better next time. Thank you!
Naaaah, don't take that rambling style of my previous message (including extensive use of CAPSLOCK) into the account all that much. I wasn't raging out there or anything like that (although the message kinda got out of control on "USABILITY" section). I guess, it's just the way I tend to have my internet discussions, maybe I kind of need some work on that. :) Ahem... Anyways, thank you very much for the game. Despite all I've said previously, overall, it's a good one.

P.S. By the way, what is the worst case scenario for the in-game score (?/340)? Did you estimate what was that absolute minimum the player could possibly achieve if he just, like, speedran through the whole game?
 

Vince Twelve

Novice
Joined
Jun 14, 2012
Messages
6
I would recommend USING LESS CAPS LOCK
And that's why anyone should probably be very careful when one adapts any new gameplay features. You and your team can make only so much content at any given period of time. You introduce the "description of the on-screen items" feature - you will need to be ready to write and script endless "It's a chair" descriptions. You introduce the ability to freely combine STMs with NPCs - you instantly get tons of spraying posibilities. The trick is, I think, to make every bit of that content and every bit of possibility available to player in the end as meaningful as possible - and to choose the features of your game accordingly (so you don't have "Oh. My God. There are 25426 possibilities and I need to somehow cover them all. God knows how much time THAT would require."). Interactivity for interactivity is nice, but only as long as it gets player somewhere (at least in terms of understanding of what's going on or getting the feel of the ingame world) and as long as the main content doesn't get awfully diluted by those of optional bits which are completely and utterly meaningless (like those "Nah, he would probably not be very interested in that topic").

What I see (and despise) in most modern adventures is an utter lack of interactivity. Left click only, <5 interactable items in each room, five or six dialog options with each character, a handful of uninspired inventory combination puzzles, and that's it. I wanted to turn that 360. Alas, my ambition overshot my ability! That being said, I felt it better to have 25426 possibilities with 90% "That won't work here" responses than to have 6 possibilities each with unique responses. Thought>brute force. Just my impression.

P.S. By the way, what is the worst case scenario for the in-game score (?/340)? Did you estimate what was that absolute minimum the player could possibly achieve if he just, like, speedran through the whole game?

That's a very good question. I'm not sure what the lowest score could be. That would have been an interesting achievement to add!
 

Darth Roxor

Royal Dongsmith
Staff Member
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Messages
1,878,406
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Djibouti
Finally playing this. This is really really good. I LOVE the whole click and drag for conversations and for using items. Why the hell did noone ever think of this before. I feel it works great.

Started playing the game today, and as much as I like everything else so far, the interface is something I can barely stomach. The drag'n'drop is clumsy and serves no purpose that couldn't be replaced by either hotkeys or simple right/left click combinations, both of which would be much, much better. This whole 'adding to short term memory' business is also annoying, there's way too much moving back and forth with 'go to place x, add to stm, return to place y, use stm in conversation'. It was especially bothersome at the burning laboratory, where you had to converse with Bennett about the broken window each time you wanted to get inside.

Bad interface aside, it's all p. cool so far. Liked Anna's dream sequences, reminded me of Sanitarium.
 

Eyeball

Arcane
Joined
Sep 3, 2010
Messages
2,541
Finished it. Good game, does interesting things with the AGS engine and involving all four main characters in many of the puzzles was a fun throwback to multiple-character adventure games of yore like Maniac Mansion or DOTT. Unfortunately, with 4 characters, you lose a lot of bonding with each individual player character, making them appear a lot less developed than they could have been.

I was not overly fond of the presentation. Coming from the devs who made the Blackwell series, I expected better music, and the overall graphical style, while well drawn and animated, just wasn't all that stylish to me and my overall enjoyment of the game suffered.

Puzzles were good. Very few of them were stupid or illogical to me, a great improvement over 90% of other adventure games. The only puzzle that pissed me off was the "retrieve blueprints" one. Why couldn't I just tell the desk clerk that I wanted some random non-classified file so I could work from there to grab the blueprints I needed? I didn't even find out about the will until much later. I also did not care for the "magnets and giant crates" puzzle, mainly due to the interface.

The "drag and drop" idea was intriguing, but could have been implemented better in the interface. I kept trying to drag things onto characters on the left side of the screen only to put them in my STM instead. The best parts of the game were thus the sneaky-investigative ones starring Ray, despite Ed probably being the best character in the game. The drag-and-drop thing made it important to take note of your surroundings to a greater extent than other games in the genre. I also liked the little non-item puzzles, with my favourites being the magnetic pickpocketing, the puzzle box and the journal decoding.

The OMG PLOT TWIST and ending got me down - I liked those characters :(

Overall, 7.5/10. Would definitely buy more from the same developer.
 

Drakron

Arcane
Joined
May 19, 2005
Messages
6,326
The only puzzle that pissed me off was the "retrieve blueprints" one. Why couldn't I just tell the desk clerk that I wanted some random non-classified file so I could work from there to grab the blueprints I needed?

Because.

One, people that request documents dont EVER just go in and get then themselves as in EVER.
Two, you are told how to do it.
 

Alex

Arcane
Joined
Jun 14, 2007
Messages
8,750
Location
São Paulo - Brasil
Drakron

I think Eyeball meant to ask why do you need to know about the will first. Why couldn't you just ask for a random document to make the tampered machine get the blueprints. Then again, they do mention that the documents you get need to pertain to your current case, so I guess that is why.
 

Drakron

Arcane
Joined
May 19, 2005
Messages
6,326
Well I admit there is no real reason but you actually need that document anyway so it kinda works for intended purpose, its more of a question of intended progression.
 

Tramboi

Prophet
Patron
Joined
May 4, 2009
Messages
1,226
Location
Paris by night
Excellent game so far.
Very good mechanism with the short-term-memory slots which really inflate the combinatorics of what to try.
Coupled with good and fair (so far) puzzles, it removes the try-everything way of solving the problems.
 

asper

Arcane
Joined
Nov 14, 2007
Messages
2,207
Project: Eternity
Despite the occasionally melodramatic story/characters, the game is excellent. I like how it experiments with new mechanics; sometimes it doesn't pan out too well - tedious click 'n dragging, but that is what experiments are for. It's also amazingly polished and fleshed out (rope-cutting, looking in the mirror, etc). Great effort, worth much more than the $10 price on GoG!

Gemini Rue, Blackwell Series, now this..

and in the future: a new Larry, SpaceVenture, Jensen's Moebius, Double Fine...

Could this be the renaissance?
 

Renegen

Arcane
Joined
Jun 5, 2011
Messages
4,062
If you mean a renaissance from the public's point of view, maybe, but adventure games with modern graphics have been very good for over a decade.
 

asper

Arcane
Joined
Nov 14, 2007
Messages
2,207
Project: Eternity
I find most modern titles to be simplified comparing to the 90-ies. Which game you consider to be very good made in the last decade? I'd say Gray Matter is a good example of modern games, and just compare that to the classics. The SCUMM bar had almost as many interactable npc's as a whole game nowadays.
 

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