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Emmisary of Immanence

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  1. It's something of an interesting trope given how the Western idea of empires is mostly shaped but the Roman Empire and much later colonial empires. Rome was long seen as a bastion of civilization whose loss brought in centuries of stupidity and awfulness. And colonial empires, of course, were great until they weren't. The idea of the "evil empire" is an odd one to trace, and I haven't figured it out. The term itself, as best I can tell, actually really got started with Reagan. —Alorael, who could see the idea having resonance in the Cold War and subsequent world. The Soviet Union was the enemy for a long time; the successor Russian Federation and China are probably the most imperial modern countries and both are uncomfortable semi-allies to the US and to much of Western Europe. And the Middle East is full of countries functioning as empires even though they were created externally and arbitrarily rather than by the usual imperial processes. They're not doing so well right now.
  2. Just going by naming it's much more suggestive of Moorelas of the Sun Sword books. Which also have no clear thematic relationship to Geneforge, and Moorelas is a barely-mentioned mythical figure of the distant past, but he did have a magical sword and was involved in fighting supernatural threats. I also don't see Jeff trying almost-anagram names of characters from somewhat obscure books with no relation. When he does pull in those sorts of names he's usually pretty unconcerned with hiding them and usually groups them to make the reference clearer. —Alorael, who is sad that there aren't more Sun Sword references floating around. They're fantastic books that haven't gotten much attention.
  3. To answer as best we can: Jeff's first game was Exile, which he wrote while in graduate school for mathematics. if there were any game efforts before that he's never mentioned them. He started with C++, and for a very long time was a stalwart user of Metrowerks Codewarrior. Exile was successful enough that he quit school and went to churning out games roughly yearly for two decades since then. Jeff's written quite a bit about the changing indie/shareware market. It's complicated; before "indie" gained cachet and a wide variety of centralized distributors (Steam, Good Old Games, Humble Bundle, etc.) his reach was quite small but his core of fans paid well. With indies came visibility, but also a push towards rock-bottom pricing. He resisted it for years, then gave in and found that actually he could sell far, far more games and end up making more money even at lower prices. But then the market became oversaturated with too many games. He's pulled back and is charging more again, and we'll all see how it goes. —Alorael, who recommends taking a look at this old interview. It's from just after Nethergate was released, so already five games in, but it gives some insight into Jeff when he was still getting started. Then poke around The Bottom Feeder, Jeff's blog where he talks about a lot of this.
  4. Somehow I'd misfiled the upgrade to IPB to 2008, when we migrated from UBB to UBB.threads. It's all a blur. —Alorael, who isn't sure the Russian admin was much of a Russian admin. For one thing, he was a long-term US resident. For another, he was really only a temporary admin. But he was a long-time member and mod. Also it's nice to see a new Finn. There was a big Finnish contingent for years, but they all wandered off eventually.
  5. A little less, probably. Levels slow down a little bit as you move through the game. Not much, but a little bit. —Alorael, who on the other hand hit level 30 definitely in the late game but not at all at the end. Which he enjoyed; it's nice to really get to play with your characters in their final states instead of just having them for one climactic moment.
  6. What, no Bioware? Granted, that gets you some of the EA problem, and their specialty is really in a kind of character-driven gaming that doesn't mesh all that well with Avernum, but they're solidly in the RPG camp and do it quite well. —Alorael, who will go ahead and co-opt the resurrected Black Isle for this purpose. What could possibly go wrong?
  7. You call out those two but not the entirely unaltered 2nd title? —Alorael, who gives this two thumbs up and eagerly anticipates Avernum 7.
  8. You can win with a no-magic party, but that's setting yourself up for a serious challenge. The lack of healing alone would make life hard. —Alorael, who recommends magic from the beginning through the end. You'll have limited spells, but the spells you have will still make a huge difference.
  9. Avadon is more linear in plot but actually less linear in geography. The plot explicitly has you repeatedly revisiting old areas with new problems. New maps too, but there's less of a "clear area, never come back" situation than many other games. —Alorael, who doesn't think Avadon is exceptionally linear. Avernum takes a notably open-world approach, and the Geneforge games are just larger than Avadon so the chunks feel a bit bigger, but Avadon's well within the bunds of standard CRPG linearity
  10. I don't know if Jeff has ever talked much about JRPGs. Certainly not recently. —Alorael, who hasn't played a new one in over a decade. He stopped owning consoles and that was that.
  11. Some people are "Natural Mages" according to the trait. Others are just ordinary mages. —Alorael, who also doesn't recall anything definitive one way or another. There's also no definitive declaration that one need not be born a priest, or a blacksmith, or a farmer, though. The absence of evidence for some necessary inborn talent probably does mean there's no such essential inherent quality.
  12. Get out of the old-timer thread with your older-timer shenanigans! —Alorael, who congratulates Dinti on his feat of endurance and excellent taste.
  13. Like some others who shall remain nameless, I saw no movies in theaters. The only movie I saw out of theaters was Avengers: Age of Ultron. So it's the best film of the year for me, and also the worst, which just about sums up how I feel about it. I'll undoubtedly see Star Wars and probably Mad Max at some point. The Martian maybe or maybe not, but certainly not until I've read the book. —Alorael, who can vaguely recall the days he saw vast numbers of films and actually knew who some actors were.
  14. The remakes of Avernum are to the original Avernums as the original Avernums are to Exile. Don't be fooled by the names. The original Avernums have traits that work like Exile's, giving bonuses or penalties to experience, but you can only pick two. The remake Avernums let you pick traits like feats as you level up. —Alorael, who prefers Avernum to Exile. The extra years of polish help. He does prefer Exile's more extensive spell list, but not enough to prefer the series overall. He'll also go ahead and say that he thinks the remakes are better than the originals. The graphics are a little nicer (original A1-3 are particularly ugly) and the combat is the best of the lot. Given how much of the game is fighting, that's a very big deal.
  15. But in A3 you don't see much horror from the Empire, nor do you hear about it. Which could mean that Avernites just have an axe to grind, except the beginning narration of A1 makes it clear that it's almost arbitrary, as do many of the NPCs you meet. A5 doesn't address it much one way or the other that I can recall. —Alorael, who does think there's some self-evident problem with banishing enough people to populate a kingdom, and then having those people be apparently decent and hard-working enough to support the existence of that kingdom, in internal peace and without any rebellion, for years. The closest thing is the Abyss, and it's relatively small and still not all that bad. That's a demonstration that the Empire was gleefully throwing away productive members of society.
  16. When the first colonists were sent to Australia there were similar rumors that there was no air down under and everyone would die a mercifully swift death. —Alorael, who also believes several early explorers (erroneously) stated that there was no natural sunlight, and therefore no natural vegetation, as the sun had no no interest in being envenomed and/or kicked to death and therefore stuck to northern latitudes when passing over Australia.
  17. Merry Christmas from the hospital! Try not to join me in here. —Alorael, who wishes everyone happy, fun, and safe holidays. For his own good as well as yours!
  18. Part of my objection is in the vast gap between the Empire as described in A1-2 and in A3. We hear about this autocratic, repressive regime that has banished people for trivial offenses, committed routine genocide, and has no tolerance of political disagreement. There's an implication especially in A1 that magic is heavily controlled and accessible to only a few, and that any deviation is grounds for getting exiled or executed. And then we see Valorim, and it's just not that. There are spells for sale all over the place, the local leadership is mostly mayors dealing with their problems and whose relationship to the larger Empire seems to consist mostly of bemoaning the fact that no aid has been coming. Sure, Valorim is the wild frontier. Sure, there's a quarantine of sorts. Sure, Prazac is not like her predecessors. It's definitely not what i expected. And the very, very minimal attention paid to the fact that your party is clearly Avernite, including possibly nephilim who are victims of mass hatred and sliths who are essentially unknown, right after a bloody losing war, makes no sense. —Alorael, who can't even buy Valorim as a frontier. It may be the most recently settled and/or conquered continent, but it's densely settled througout with large cities and small towns. There are no obviously new settlements. The roads are all in place. Silvar, at least, is a pretty small and unimpressive town that's been there long enough for one of Avernum's main settlements to be named after it. It's no frontier at all.
  19. The Exile/Avernum series' saving grace is the excellent writing by Jeff. As a setting Valorim is pretty generic fantasy. It lacks the unusual setting of the caves. Sure, no elves or dwarves, but otherwise it's a pretty regular world of towns and dungeons. It's fun to play in, but there's not much hook to keep people interested. A series would lose Jeff's writing and be entirely dependent on the writing staff. Could they really sell it? Sure, but they could also flub it, or they could be brilliant but get no attention because there's just no obvious hook. —Alorael, who counts the plagues as slimes, roaches, troglodytes, giants, golems, and alien beasts. That's six. There are certainly other monster problems, but they're not vahnatai plagues.
  20. There are three chests of soldiers' possessions and three prisoners in the Giants' Caverns. I can't remember if there's any special thanks for completing the quest in Exile 3; presumably you get some reward, though! The map is useless after you've read it. After you've turned the troglodytes and giants against each other it's worth talking to the mayor of Sharimik and the commander in Lorelei again to see if they have more rewards for you. I don't think so, but I honestly can't recall; it's been a long time since I played E/A3. In any case, after you've left the Concealed Tunnel if you haven't already grabbed the crystal shards special item from the crystal you destroyed you should go back and collect it. You definitely need to return to Fort Emergence and talk with Anaximander, and you also want to bring those crystal shards to Berra. —Alorael, whose recall of these things will be vastly improved when A3: Ruined World comes out in the next couple of years.
  21. Nepharim appeared all the way back in Exile 1. They're as old as Spiderweb Software. —Alorael, who is just sad he's never been able to play as a nephar. Forget vahnatai PCs, where are his mule-cat-people?
  22. Animation has come a long way. —Alorael, who recognizes that it's for adults now. Adults who have adult tastes. It should probably be done entirely in ponies.
  23. Actually, given how inhospitable the caves are as an environment, getting anything at all to grow is a minor miracle. I doubt there are many weeds to worry about. —Alorael, who thinks it's more likely that someone, somewhere, would find a use for any weeds. As food, as material, as decoration, something. If all else fails, the thing is clearly so uselessly dangerous that it becomes useful as a weapon.
  24. The bigger problem is that if you leave out the focus on Avernum proper it becomes just another generic fantasy series. In this case, a generic fantasy series about wandering heroes who encounter the monster/plague of the week. The story doesn't take place in one geographic area, nor is there much in the way of recurring characters, nor are the characters compelling. Erika and Rentar really only have any resonance because of having been built up in previous games. The same's true of the Empire generally. So generic fantasy. I can't see it lasting out a single season unless it came after previous seasons playing out A1 and A2 establishing Avernum, the Empire, and why anyone should care about either one, how Prazac is different, and what reconciliation is all about. —Alorael, who to be fair has long thought that E/A3 is fun but one of the weakest games in terms of premise and plot.
  25. There's a shot of the leader looking at the eggs, then it cuts to everyone leaving. Everyone can argue forever about whether the eggs are smashed or not! —Alorael, who thinks that the Final Gauntlet should be towards the end of the last season. The party finds a way out, but then decides they have to finish their business in Avernum first. They assassinate Hawthorne, get back, maybe Erika asks, "What will you do now?" And then the final credits roll over the party returning to the surface.
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