RuneScape Forum Archive | ‡ The best quest ever? Vote! ‡

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Xenia is certainly a less popular character than Hazelmere, Korasi, or Zanik. But she was arguably the most important, because of how closely her tale mirrors Nomad's. Having Nomad constantly speaking into our heads was, I think, a great way to draw us further into his character, and weave his motivations through our journey into the fortress, bringing us closer to him mentally and emotionally as we get closer to destroying him physically. I was impressed by how many of the individual snippets of Nomonologue did seem reasonable, did seem to mirror our own character's motivations in the many adventures that have led to this. But, as soon as we pull back and view these pieces collectively, we see just how horrific his aims have become, how corrupted his self-invention.

Speaking of which, damn. And tLoV was worried about pushing the envelope. A twisted giant comprised of the writhing forms of mutilated souls is NOT the kind of thing I thought we'd ever see in Runescape just a few years ago. Great job on connecting character, plot, and design.

There were certainly some cliches in Nomad's dialogue. Some villain tropes we've seen before. But I loved how clearly, even as he paraded his arrogance and hubris and assurances of our demise, he attempted to appeal to us, desperately looked for our approval. I'm usually not a big fan of how 'important' the World Guardian is, but it really works in this quest.

That said, another thing I quite appreciated about this quest is that our allies are not just useless lumps who mostly get in the way. Mechanically, they're indispensable, and storywise, they're more than capable (as they should be), tracking down Nomad, cornering Legio Septimus, and managing much of the planning on their own, while also not making the adventurer feel like a gofer going through a rote series of tasks. While there's a definite fanservice element to the dead characters, they work more often than not.

23-May-2016 03:05:35 - Last edited on 23-May-2016 06:03:46 by Rondstat

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

The characterization may not have been 100% spot on (I'm looking at Hazelmere), but I think some characters, like Xenia, have been very understandably changed by their deaths. But, while our allies had the opportunity to face their demons, address their regrets, their shortcomings, and their doubt, I was quite disappointed that the adventurer didn't get to do the same. I feel like my character has a MASSIVE amount of regret for all the characters present. He chose Jessika over Korasi, his recklessness in Arposandra robbed Hazelmere of his last chance, he let Zanik march into the wastes of Yu'Biusk, knowing her constitution was weakening. Yet we didn't even have the chance to apologize. Jessika's/Korasi's, in particular, is a death that I feel haunts the adventurer, and I wish we'd the opportunity to work through some of our own demons.

I think Mod Wilson must have been a massive boon to Raven's story. He probably has the greatest and most intricate command of lore of any quest developer (the lore shortcomings of Hero's Welcome were all handed down from on high), and I felt his hand in all the references and acknowledgements of past adventures (Bandosian views of the afterlife come to mind). Even the quest's decisions on what to emphasize and de-emphasize, structuring it as a more-or-less direct sequel to Requiem, while mostly ignoring DAT, suggested a measured touch.

Mechanically, I think the quest did all we expected and hoped. I enjoyed its emphasis on more text (and context) based puzzles, without so many interfaces. As combat heavy as we expected. Though, while I enjoyed the constant Nomad snippets for their Underground Pass-like suggestion of our descent to madness, they got pretty annoying while trying to dispatch a horde of ascension monsters (Also, I like how the Order was finally brought into the 'main' lore. You'd think it would be forced, but it was handled deftly and absolutely fit the story/lore).

23-May-2016 03:26:09

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Final fight was quite challenging, but the mechanics all made sense, and I enjoyed it quite a bit (though I was a wimp and had to bank between every encounter). That said, I can absolutely see how something with such high base damage could be nightmarish for certain questers. I think I ended up sinking a few 100k into supplies and repairs. This is the kind of boss that makes me want to reiterate my view - all quest bosses should be safe. I think that opens up the possibility for more difficult, truly challenging fights - as this one was - while removing a good deal of dread and frustration that comes with dying and destroying one's bank for those who do need 20+ attempts.

Assets. I quite liked the environments. Noumenon is fantastic, and I'm glad it got another use. I think the way Yu'Biusk and Lumbridge were utilized, existing assets with different skyboxes, particles, etc, made for attractive and efficient repurposing. It looks like the artists REALLY had fun with particles in this quest. All the different types of smoke effects, souls, wisps, special attacks... from Gielinor down to the broken ram. These do a lot to enrich the environment, and I feel the team has finally got a mastery of using particle graphics without overwhelming the scenery or clashing with simple models (though maybe this is also due to NXT - don't know how it originally looked in java).

Speaking of clashing models - oh man. They really couldn't design one generic cave goblin? They could have had a unique model in this quest without the expectation for reworking any other cave goblins in game. I mean****'Biusk looks fantastic, Zanik looks fantastic, all these GWD models look fantastic, then low poly, jerky, decade-old models forming the centrepiece of a sequence - mega distracting. Korasi suffered a bit from this, too, and it honestly puzzled me. She's a female human wearing equipment that's available to players - they didn't even need any art or modeling to update that!

23-May-2016 03:42:47

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Design for Gielinor was, of course, fantastic. Legitimately disturbing. The fortress was fine - not an arresting visual feast, but it would be bad if everything aimed to do that. Though I did quite like how much an impression of elevation it gave, which certainly played into the 'support' sequences of the boss fight.

Audio - workmanlike. Seemed a little below par for the team, who seems to have done consistently impressive work over the past year, but it certainly got the job done. Nothing to fault.

I've addressed some of the shortcomings, but I think the biggest misstep in this quest is the ending. Sliske has become such a boring, predictable character, his dialogue is so uninspired - it seems no matter who writes him. He's certainly fallen far from the intriguing, ineffable figure we all raged against at the close of TWW. He steals a kill, diverts the focus back to his game, lobs off some boilerplate taunts. It turns a moment of triumph into an anticlimax.

But I understand why it was done. Really, I'm mostly impressed by how much effort this quest has put into respecting existing stories and themes - something we haven't seen in a 6th Age quest since One of a Kind. Little things - Zimberfizz's proxy surprise at Nomad's apparent survival, the restoration of his master - seem like they're deliberately trying to foster goodwill with the players who were disappointed by DAT, and I appreciate the gesture.

For that, I have an even deeper respect for Raven and Wilson. This quest was ambitious, most of all in its themes, and it did what I had thought was impossible - it made me care about Nomad. Kudos to the devs.

ALSO, I'm certainly certain that a certain certainty is certain. In case that wasn't clear.

23-May-2016 03:55:52 - Last edited on 23-May-2016 04:04:30 by Rondstat

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Looks like I get to keep monopolizing this thread. Cheers!

Kindred Spirits. I want to like it. I feel like I should have liked it. There are a lot of aspects I really appreciate - expansive but cryptic lore, hints and clues that expect intuition and critical thinking from the player, an expansion of NPC* as individuals instead of game checkpoints (Rancour's anti-World Guardian dialogue has to be one of my favourite speeches in the game).

But it just left a bad taste in my mouth. There are some things I can't get over.

I'll just get this out of the way at the top - Ahrim. He r*ped and murdered an innocent woman. It's just a game, and I know the whole premise of most MMOs would fall apart if we had to sit down and take a sober examination of every murder that took place. But I feel like r*** is different, it's not something to be taken lightly. When in the service of storytelling, I would never mark ANY topic as unconditionally off limits; but if you're going to include something like this as a plot point, you need to make damn sure that you're writing it well, you're treating it with care, and it has a real significance in the context of your narrative - it's not just there cos you need to fill an arbitrary tally of 'tragedies' or 'transgressions'.

None of this happens. Throughout the whole sequence, the emphasis is on Ahrim's 'betrayal of his brother' as if his sin is disloyalty, and not brutally destroying a woman's spirit and life. The dialogue is not strong, and in spots is carried by cliche and exposition. Afterwards, the events of this sequence have no impact - we are forced to ally with a murdering r*pist.

Perhaps I should have overlooked this. Maybe I shouldn't hold certain taboo areas sacrosanct. But it brought me down, man, and kinda distracted me from the rest of the quest.

While that's the issue that resonated most strongly with me, it's far from the only problem in Kindred Spirits.

29-May-2016 00:56:57

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

A big part of the quest is humanizing the Barrows Brothers, allowing them to emerge as characters instead of faceless bosses or set dressing. Honestly, though, I don't think this worked.

The dialogue is sloppy. Not lazy, not artless, not even necessarily contrived, but sloppy. Like it only went through one draft. Raven is capable of FAR better than this, and it's a disappointment seeing him settle for lesser quality in his work. We are supposed to be appalled, perhaps even horrified and disturbed, by the Brothers' sins in life, but we are also meant to empathize, understand their human flaws and just how much they've paid for them - even without the whole mindless wight bit. How much we do the latter over the former becomes a major point of the quest.

But it just doesn't land. Dharok is a 'bully'. He's sad because he 'bullied' people. He hates his commander for reminding him of 'bullying'. I get what they were going for, but there's no nuance, and I end up giving approximately zero fudges about the brothers. We get up in Verac's guts and suddenly he's all arch. Fun . Guthan is handled a little better, but the whole maudlin heartbreak angle, especially given the previous sequences, just kills it for me. I ended the quest feeling no investment whatsoever in the fate of the Bros.

Speaking of lack of investment - Linza, Meg, Mary, Samwell. Why? My character barely knows Linza and Samwell, and Rancour is a straight up stranger. The only ally with whom I have any sort of relationship is Meg. And yet these individuals were chosen by Sliske specifically to draw us out with threat of their harm? It makes little sense. We could have still used these characters - make some other contrivance for having them all together, say they were all on the same boat tour before it was hijacked by Sliske, something to make the selection's randomness more plausible in the context of the narrative.

29-May-2016 01:13:14

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

At this point, it's been well established that the adventurer is endlessly gullible - it's sort of a major factor for plot progression. So I fully acknowledge that fault for any frustration with this aspect lies with me. Still, it's slightly infuriating for my character to go along with Relomia when I'm screaming 'He obviously kidnapped himself!' It irks me for Rondstat to along with the premise that the Kin covet the Stone, when I know the reverse is true. And I detest looking on incredulously as my character gets all buddy-buddy with Sliske, his single most hated figure on (under?) the surface of Gielinor.

I've made it clear that Wilson's humour and approach to puzzles aren't really for me. So I didn't get anything out of that whole prison sequence. It all just felt so superfluous - what's the point of this ruse? - and even by the ending, can only be linked back to Sliske's scheme in the most tangential way.

Speaking of the ending - did that make sense to people? Did I miss something? Sliske's got us in submission, when he learns that we've uncovered his plan - even though our knowledge of that plan will become irrelevant in the next 30 seconds as his scheme comes to fruition. Instead of carrying on, he drops the Staff and beats us silly - for not being his pawn? I mean, is our discovery just that he wants to steal our World Guardian powers? That he's working with somebody else? Or is there some reverse-dramatic irony going on here, where our characters know something that the players don't?

It just feels like they wanted to show Sliske losing his cool and dropping the mask, but they didn't do a great job laying the groundwork ahead of time, so instead of seeming like a culmination, a long-simmering pot finally boiling over, it feels like a random sanguinary burst, a violent emotional non-sequit*r.

29-May-2016 01:28:40

Rondstat

Posts: 2,770 Adamant Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Had Vanescula acted this way at the end of RoB, with our utter humiliation of her, and how well her brutality and sudden acts of immense, efficient violence had been established, it would have made perfect sense. This just leaves me scratching my head. I think we were all expecting something like this to happen eventually, but not in this way.

Then the Linza reveal. She betrayed us cos she wanted to learn to smith Orikalkum. Actually, I wasn't clear on this - Sliske claims she can't smith dragon, then that she stole the secrets of dragon smithing. So she's pretending to smith? She's got some charm that smiths for her? At any rate, it feels sort of stupid, very petty, and far too low-stakes for us to have the barest hope of sympathizing with Linza. She didn't steal from the Dragonkin (which a non-warrior smith can totally do, no sweat) to save a loved one, to do anything heroic. She just did it for a haXXorz 120 sm1th!

I mean, for a quest that had so many twists and 'big reveals,' there was nothing even approaching an 'oh crap' moment, a sequence of shock or awe or even surprise. I just felt so - detached from this story. That doesn't stop me enjoying the lore that came with it - the books were excellent. But I feel no closer to interest in the endgame.

29-May-2016 01:40:32

Sep

2010

Lord Drakan

Posts: 7,043 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

You're a wizard or a vampyre, I once again find myself agreeing with you. I loved the gameplay and story revelations (Xau-Tak!) but stuff like the character cast were very random****:Ahrim, though, whence did you get the **** bit? For me, it was only revealed Ahrim prevented Isolde from being with Guthan, probably by slaying her, perhaps out of jealousy or spite. Nevervwas **** even implied. Bizarre Boron Fusswell, scryer extraordinaire. OSRS: POH ideas & RS3 minigames & achievement ideas !

Perhaps you're half right; perhaps we can't win. But we can fight.

— Zanik

31-May-2016 08:13:42

Jan

2021

AesirWarrior

Posts: 1,060 Mithril Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile

Erm, since when did Ahrim r*** Isolde? He killed her because she refused his advancements, but there was no r*** involved. I even checked the transcript right now to be sure. -

I have noticed your kind does tend to blindly stumble forward towards danger simply because it exists. What is your word for that?

- We call it being a hero.

06-Jun-2016 22:16:15 - Last edited on 06-Jun-2016 22:16:27 by AesirWarrior

Forums

‡ The best quest ever? Vote! ‡