Reflections on A6 (SPOILERS)

[Alorael at Large]

These games were good when they were indie, but now that Jeff has sold out and his company has three employees they're just churning out mass-produced generic games.

 

—Alorael, who can see how the first games of series seem different. The concepts are still fresh to Jeff as well. E/A2 just gets a special pass for being beloved.

[Dahak]

Originally Posted By: Fires Upon the Mind and Time

These games were good when they were indie, but now that Jeff has sold out and his company has three employees they're just churning out mass-produced generic games.

—Alorael, who can see how the first games of series seem different. The concepts are still fresh to Jeff as well. E/A2 just gets a special pass for being beloved.

Wait... Success (more employees & an implied higher net revenue) = Failure?

Jeff's games are admittedly not as varied as the older games (or so my fading memory tells me) & the Exile/Avernum game's play time feels much shorter, but generic?

[Lilith]

Originally Posted By: Dahak

Wait... Success (more employees & an implied higher net revenue) = Failure?

i don't think you get how jokes work

[Dahak]

Originally Posted By: Thuryl

Originally Posted By: Dahak

Wait... Success (more employees & an implied higher net revenue) = Failure?

i don't think you get how jokes work

Probably not. I've never really been very good with anything except well executed humor.

[Dantius]

Quote:

I've never really been very good with anything except well executed humor.

Quote:

Thuryl
in before the apocalypse
Registered: Mar 30, 2002 12:00 PM
Posts: 13157
Loc: on a big blue ball

Quote:

well executed humor

Quote:

Thuryl

No further comment

[Alorael at Large]

In the lack of words of Slarty, "..."

 

—Alorael, who was going to keep ragging on Spiderweb. Then he realized that there's no point. It's not like Jeff is going to turn around and start making amazing indie games like Richard White and Chromite Software.

[Randomizer]

Originally Posted By: Fires Upon the Mind and Time

?Alorael, who was going to keep ragging on Spiderweb. Then he realized that there's no point. It's not like Jeff is going to turn around and start making amazing indie games like Richard White and Chromite Software.

We still can hope about the new game which will be all shiny and new before it gets cloned for the sequel.

I'm holding out for Vahnatai: The Rise of Rentar. You are a group of apprentices under her direction as you fight endless chitrachs, hydras, and off course those pink skinned invaders of your caves. Slarty starts screaming at the thought of more chitrach fights.

[Men are from Slars]

If I were to make a 24 hour contest scenario, it would clearly involve cave cows with the divine ability to eat chitrachs at range.

[jlsgaladriel]

If one can genetically modify cows to talk, one could certainly modify them to eat chitrachs.

 

--jlsgaladriel , who still thinks the vahanati are really shapers, despite Jeff's protestations to the contrary.

 

(Apologies to Alorael for the format stealing.)

[Men are from Slars]

Ah... a new branch of Vahnatai Creationism. The Misspelt Denomination. Just as heretical and idolatrous. He and She frowns upon thee.

[Alorael at Large]

Some vahnatai are shapers, and Jeff not only agrees, he literally put it in writing. None of them are Shapers.

 

—Alorael, who finds it more amusing that, according to Drakey, Jeff endorsed vahnatai creationism. Hey, when you get crazy fan theories, you might as well go with it.

[jlsgaladriel]

Originally Posted By: slarty

The Misspelt Denomination.

::hangs head in shame::

[Men are from Slars]

Originally Posted By: To Sleep

according to Drakey

*facepalm*

P.S. This is quite possibly the worst thread ever.

[Dantius]

I personally love how it went from erudite criticism of the character depth in Jeff games to facepalms , fails, and grammar Nazism. It is the Internet, after all.

[Lilith]

i would like to state for the record that the ruination of this particular thread was not in any way my fault

 

Originally Posted By: Cower in Error

P.S. This is quite possibly the worst thread ever.

 

the melon sex topic

[Dantius]

Originally Posted By: Thuryl

i would like to state for the record that the ruination of this particular thread was not in any way my fault

Originally Posted By: Cower in Error

P.S. This is quite possibly the worst thread ever.

the melon sex topic

I... Well... The... You know what, I don't even want to know.

[Milla]

I remember that one.

[Alorael at Large]

Nephils vs. Sliths.

 

—Alorael, who has no objection to the first ten pages. Or the second ten. Or the third ten. It's just that every ten pages was the same as the preceding and subsequent ten.

[Men are from Slars]

Alorael, that describes the entirety of these message boards.

[Alorael at Large]

Not true. Most threads don't make it to page 11.

 

—Alorael, who is abjectly grateful for that little fact.

[Men are from Slars]

You're assuming that if sets of ten pages consistent of different threads, they will not be the same as the preceding and subsequent ones.

[Silver Shadow]

Y'know, Solberg's provocation and subsequent defeat of the Manburner was pretty cool and all, but I'm really kind of sorry that Avernite warmage dude in the cave in the Northern Reaches didn't get to freeze her into a block of ice. My sense of irony is disappointed.

[jlsgaladriel]

::sings::

 

This is the thread that never ends;

it will go on and on, my friends.

Some people started typing it not knowing what it was

And now they'll go on typing it forever just because

this is the thread that never ends...

[Student of Trinity]

This thread needs to decide if it's feeling lucky.

[VCH]

A6 is a beautiful game with lots of awesome side-quests. But the main storyline is weak. The whole job-board type plot progression is not to my liking. Take Levit's quests or Merhewys quests for example, they were all given at once like a job board would provide them. This seemed to take away from the feeling that I was actually effecting any change in the game world. I would have preferred that the main plot advancing quests be given one at a time. I mean why would my commanding officers give me 3 quests that I can do any two of? It is more likely that they would have single large missions that need to be done. I believe A6 is the first of Jeff's games to give 3 main plot quests at once. This was not a good idea for the progression of the story. He could have maintained the three quests but he should have revealed them in a linear way. I guess Jeff wanted to give the player a feeling that based on what quests they did the world would be effected accordingly. But really who didn't do all of the quests the first play through?

 

And in the end the player really can't effect the ending all that much. Jeff straight-armed the ending no matter what you do. There is very little variation in the endings. I think this is a product of Jeff wanting to end the world forever and in his own way, meaning the player's choices have little impact.,

 

In short Job-board style plot progression is bad.

[Lilith]

Originally Posted By: VCH

And in the end the player really can't effect the ending all that much. Jeff straight-armed the ending no matter what you do. There is very little variation in the endings. I think this is a product of Jeff wanting to end the world forever and in his own way, meaning the player's choices have little impact.

This isn't strictly true: what you do with Melanchion, Gladwell and the Scourge will all have a significant impact on the ending, and you can affect how things turn out in the Abyss as well. It's only the Vahnatai and the DLs who are truly unaffected by your actions. It would have been nice to be able to have a more dramatic effect on the world with my choices, but I don't think that's what Jeff really sees Avernum as being about.

I liked the way the game was structured because it let me pick and choose what quests to do in what order, but I can see why others wouldn't.

[Fael]

Originally Posted By: VCH

I guess Jeff wanted to give the player a feeling that based on what quests they did the world would be effected accordingly. But really who didn't do all of the quests the first play through?

I think that's a basically accurate description.

The thing is, people have been whining incessantly on the forums for years about how A4 and A5 were too linear and they wanted more freedom of action. So, Jeff finally caved and (I suspect) put his design sensibilities aside to give his customers what they were clamoring for.

Like you, I don't consider it an improvement, and for much the same reason. The non-linearity is largely illusory for exactly the reason you state -- everybody does all the quests, anyway. The only actual effect is to make the game somewhat less good, since Jeff wasn't able to scale encounter difficulty to character level as well as he could in the more linear games.

But it's hard to fault him for listening to his customers. If everybody who buys his games spends years telling him, "your games stink because of X," then addressing X is a sound business decision. And, indeed, the forums have been giving A6 praise for being more non-linear than its predecessors.

So, I agree that A6 would be a better game if it was more linear. But I think the blame lies with the forum, rather than with Jeff. Alas for me and VCH, judging by the overall response to the non-linearity of A6, this is clearly a minority opinion, so we can probably expect more of the same in future Spiderweb games.

[Alorael at Large]

Originally Posted By: VCH

I believe A6 is the first of Jeff's games to give 3 main plot quests at once.

Except A1 and A2, which give you the three largely non-intersecting main plot quests to carry out over the entire game.

—Alorael, who concedes that those games are quite different anyway. Having to do two out of three major quests in the middle of other things is a bit odd.

[Men are from Slars]

The major quests in A1 and A2 aren't quests in the modern sense of things, which has been warped (and not just by WoW) into "a mission that goes on your quest log and typically involves going somewhere to do one specific thing, although sometimes it involves collecting items, and it can usually be completed in a single sitting."

 

I made a flowchart once of all the steps necessary to complete the major quests in X2. Including getting information from people, it's quite extensive.

[Lilith]

Originally Posted By: Leadendy

The major quests in A1 and A2 aren't quests in the modern sense of things, which has been warped (and not just by WoW) into "a mission that goes on your quest log and typically involves going somewhere to do one specific thing, although sometimes it involves collecting items, and it can usually be completed in a single sitting."

isn't this pretty much what quests have been for as long as quest logs have existed, which is at least since fallout if not longer

[Student of Trinity]

I doubt it's just forum feedback that has made Jeff go 'non-linear'. There just aren't all that many of us here. We might be some sort of bellwether, but if we're a sizable sample of his customer base, his kids are starving. I expect Jeff's mainly looking at relative performance of his own previous games, and the types of other games that are currently doing well.

 

It is a little implausible that you'd be assigned missions in three-packs, but it's perhaps not so crazy that your superiors have several fires to fight at once, all important enough that they really want them put out, but none of overriding urgency (by the high wartime standards for urgency). In a small and ragged outfit like the Avernum military, maybe they would just leave the choice of which to do first up to the agent assigned.

 

I agree that the main plot spine of A6 is rather simple, and not even very clear until past half-way through the game. But the story of A6 is really a cluster of loosely linked mini-stories — the main mission series. Most of these are isolated episodes, but together they explain how your character(s) end up being the ones to save the world. In a time of war and famine, you emerge through a series of increasingly difficult missions as the go-to guy(s) for tough jobs. The careers of most real-life military heroes have developed like that, actually.

 

About quests and quest-logs: even adventurers need GTD.

[Alorael at Large]

The E1/A1 and E2/A2 official hint books call the things game winning quests, or something like that, so that's what they are.

 

—Alorael, who wonders if they're actually metaquests. An assemblage of logged quests as an overarching plot? Preposterous.

[Men are from Slars]

The Fool's Errand, you might say.

[Ociporus]

Maybe what would have been more satisfying is if the heroes that got created from A1-A5 would be mentioned more. That is, the ones WE made that would become part of folklore. Why not MEET some of these old guys, hear a few of their stories, get some tips from them? They have disappeared, even though they presumably retired in Avernum. How could we not meet them? Maybe they would not be named as WE had done (which is another reason that Aldous et al should have been changed each game) but they would be accessible. If Rone and the gang are still around, why not the heroes we made?

 

I think that is an excellent consideration for any future series by Jeff. ADD to your list of heroes / folklore guys through the ones who ACCOMPLISHED the saving of the world each time.

 

I know that some of the games mentioned those dudes who saved the world before, but we need to MEET them. That would be really cool.

[Triumph]

There were statues honoring the heroes of A1 and A2 in Fort Emergence (there were, weren't there? I'm not imagining this?) and someone nearby would talk about how the first group of heroes did such and such and then disappeared, while the second (A2) group is still working down in Avernum. I thought that was a neat touch.

[Dikiyoba]

Originally Posted By: Triumph

(there were, weren't there? I'm not imagining this?)

There are.

Dikiyoba thought it was a nice touch too.

[The Knight Who Said Ni]

The only thing unsatisfying for me about the ending (speaking of Fort Emergence) was not being able to go through Upper Avernum.

[VCH]

Originally Posted By: The Knight Who Said Ni

The only thing unsatisfying for me about the ending (speaking of Fort Emergence) was not being able to go through Upper Avernum.

Seconded.

[Alorael at Large]

The problem with having previous heroes around is that they then need incentive to stop being so darn heroic. A3 justified sending wimps to the surface, but why don't those ex-wimps defend their homeland in A4? Too busy being famous in Avernum's surface lands? A5's heroes are, of course, all too pleased to get out of Avernum and enjoy sunlight and a lack of backstabbing politics, xenophobic Avernites, conspiracies, and the dragons.

 

—Alorael, who supposes that the heroes of A1-3 might be too old and feeble to save the world in A6. Alternately, they may be too rich and famous to bother risking their necks when the military can do it. But is A4's merry band really AWOL?

[Student of Trinity]

It could be that once their main quest was finished, they all got depressed about hitting the level cap, turned to Almarian wine to dull the pain, and died of athlete's liver a few years before the Slith attack.

[Men are from Slars]

Almarian wine, of course, being a euphemism for the T, F S D of A.

[Alorael at Large]

Almarian wine? No. All those years of mushroom consumption finally caught up with them.

 

—Alorael, who really wonders how much of Avernum is real and how much is accidental consumption of not quite the right cave fungi.

[Vicheron]

The Avernum 1 heroes were probably fighting the Empire on the surface during Avernum 2.

 

The Avernum 2 heroes were in Avernum doing stuff for King Micah.

 

Avernum 4 takes place 20 years after Avernum 3 so the A3 heroes are too old to go back to adventuring.

 

Avernum 6 takes place 20 years after Avernum 4 so again, those adventurers are too old.

 

As for why they didn't extend their lives like Rone and Solberg, it's probably because they couldn't even if they wanted to. Those adventurers may have been powerful but they were only good at one thing, fighting. Even though your fighter in A2 can beat a Dervish in combat, he couldn't train troops or command an army as well as a Dervish. Same thing with your mage, he might be better at blowing stuff up with magic than someone like Rone but he's not nearly as good at scrying, performing magical research, or creating magical constructs.

[Silver Shadow]

Nothing stopping them from turning to other pursuits after they're finished being all heroic, tho'.

[Randomizer]

Originally Posted By: Silver Shadow

Nothing stopping them from turning to other pursuits after they're finished being all heroic, tho'.

They're itinerant sociopaths. They got called heroes for successfully killing stuff that the Avernites wanted dead.

[VCH]

Maybe they were tricked into taking all their gear off outside of Blosk, and were subsequently killed. If it can happen to my group it could happen to theirs.

[Student of Trinity]

LOL.

 

(I have never posted that before, anywhere, to the best of my recollection. Now I have to go wash my hands.)

[Alorael at Large]

Originally Posted By: VCH

If it can happen to my group it could happen to mine.

FYT.

—Alorael, who alternately can only assume that Avernum puts its faith in adventurers because they're all the same party. The get rich and famous, then suffer amnesia because it's the heroic thing to do. Next game!

[Vicheron]

Originally Posted By: Silver Shadow

Nothing stopping them from turning to other pursuits after they're finished being all heroic, tho'.

True but that doesn't mean that their other pursuits would be useful to Avernum or that they'll be good at it. Heck, for all we know, your fighter in A3 became an architect and your mage blew himself up researching a new spell.

[VCH]

I think Jeff should have placed more encounters with gropus of adventurers in the game. Isn't Avernum full of adventurers? Why do you not meet any then?