EmperorSteele

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I named a destructible object (a computer) "Please don't hurt me". What no one will notice is that the Ambush that spawns when you destroy it is labeled within the MA as "Nice Job Breaking It, Hero".

A cookie to whoever knows what that's a reference to =P

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The trope is strong with this one.



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Think beyond TV Tropes and consider the trope NAMER =P

This was a triumph...

I named a destructible object (a computer) "Please don't hurt me". What no one will notice is that the Ambush that spawns when you destroy it is labeled within the MA as "Nice Job Breaking It, Hero".

A cookie to whoever knows what that's a reference to =P

"Seeing a trap is one thing, staying OUT of it is another thing entirely!" -Happosai, Ranma 1/2

I'm wondering if some of these wouldn't be better classified as TROPES as opposed to cliches, the difference being that a trope is simply a common storytelling device that isn't inherently good or bad.

What makes a trope bad, and turns it into a cliche, is when something is done over and over and over BADLY. For instance, let's take the "Gotta Fight The Contact" Trope. In some arcs, it seems that the contact's intent from the very beginning is to lead you into a trap, and you, as a player, were helpless against falling into it. This can get frustrating after a while, because these missions just keep telling you how much You Suck. You don't want a game rewarding your hard work with insults and betrayal (though to be honest, you can quit a mission arc at any time... the fact that you don't even though you do smell a rat IS your own fault ), and to have it happen over and over just gets annoying.

By contrast (gotta toot my own horn here, sorry), in my arc, the contact goes to do something decidedly not cool, and you, as a player, take it upon yourself to stop him. He's not after YOU, he's after someone else. If you had been paying attention through the story, you probably saw something like this coming. The difference between this scenario and the one above being that the player isn't the one getting the crap treatment, which makes this use of "Gotta Fight The Contact" more acceptable... at least, I hope so, anyway!

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"Gengis Khan is stabbing Abraham Lincoln while Dick Tracy stares at Geordi with an erotic look in his eye again!"

Very stressful. I'll be in the holo-shed.

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I... read that as Genghis Khan stabbing Abe Lincoln WITH his D-

... nevermind.

Wow, that's a lot of attention-seeking!

Hope you're happy, Monkey, having all these people tugging at you like starving dogs who smell the bacon sandwich in your lunch bag =D

Look at it this way..

These people who're farming up 50s?

They'll lose their attention with the game really quick. They'll make an alt, roll to 50, realize they have NOTHING ELSE to do, roll an alt, repeat...

...until they've played every possible power combo in a month and they get bored and go away.

At which point, the game will once again be safe for actual playing =)

..

WE JUST MADE THIS JOKE IN VIRTUE UNITED THE OTHER DAY

....I'm scared, hold me o_o

Dude's just saying how he feels. People misconstrue things all the time, and so if Venture thought that, you can bet other people did, too. And since you asked for a review, well, you got it. And if he missed the point, that's not just a failure on his part.

I want citizens to wander my map. Short of making a crapload of custom characters, setting them as allies and making them patrol, any way to pull this off?

You can also set a critter as non-combat within the mission editor.

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Here's one for you to chew on:

36861
Heroes No More?
Level range: 1*-50 (*:later missions cap at 45-50, but mweh)


Thing is, it has everything you despise (Hero-lopsided, Arachnos, Ritki, Mary-sues, and a defeat-all final mission), but I'm hoping the story will be decent enough to warrant a balanced review.

or not, *shrug*

[/ QUOTE ]Hey, being fair, if I say I didn't like it and it sucks, that doesn't mean my review was unbalanced.

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Fair enough!

Here's one for you to chew on:

36861
Heroes No More?
Level range: 1*-50 (*:later missions cap at 45-50, but mweh)


Thing is, it has everything you despise (Hero-lopsided, Arachnos, Ritki, Mary-sues, and a defeat-all final mission), but I'm hoping the story will be decent enough to warrant a balanced review.

or not, *shrug*

Just to play devil's advocate: You can't use your eyes to see the thing that's pulsating? You can't look around corners or swivel the camera around? You can't actually try to SEARCH for it?

I know in some places this can be a huge pain... Like CoT maps with gigantic rooms. But finding things is half the fun =)

Of course, I'm a former Thief player, so I'm used to my objectives being hidden in shadows and not having any indication that they can be taken until i'm looking straight at them anyway. I was a little dismayed when, upon first playing this game, i saw that the objectives were as obnoxiously obvious as possible, but I didn't mind. Like if the mission text said "Find the computer files", I would think to try to interact with every computer I saw... but then the tutorial makes it clear which computer it is, so your objective isn't "Find" the computer, it's "click this and wait for 3 seconds for no reason".

All that said, I'm behind this idea anyway. =) I think it would be only fair, so get on it, Devs!

I think the "vision" would be the pursuit of game balance to provide adequate challenge while providing maximum entertainment.

However, on one hand, you have game mechanics, and on the other, you have the players. Players who tweak builds like race cars, study AI and develop tactics to "Make difficult things look stupidly easy" or whatever.

You have fire/kins who can take out huge numbers of groups all by themselves. You have /FF and /Storm controllers soloing AVs. Many tanks can stand against a slew of +6 foes and not get scratched. And when the novelty of such things wears off, people get bored and leave. So the Devs sometimes need to step up and make things a little more interesting.

I remember hover used to provide KB mitigation. I remember in the description it even said this, and that if you got hit with a KB power, you'd spin in place, recover, then could attack again. But then the devs lengthened the recovery time and said "it was never intended" to give KB protection. For 10 issues it worked this way, but suddenly, it "was never intended"?

See, I could live with it if they said "We've noticed that characters with hover are over-performing against certain foes, using a level 6 power to gain an unfair advantage and mitigate that foe's only defense against a more intelligent human being, so we've decided to tweak things to ensure players are adequately challenged". That may come off as cooperate BS, but at least it wouldn't be a lie that spits in the face of 4 years of how a power worked.

Also, now that you can get a KB protection IO, plus the fact that getting KBed with hover on is still less detrimental than not having it, this isn't a huge issue in particular.

However, in the spirit of the thread, i must say that I have grown weary of "Yeah this power was never meant to be this good" and wish the developers would either make up their minds, or be more forthcoming about adjustments they plan on making... OR, give us something in return.

The pet recharge thing springs to mind. The only efficient way to fix the AI was to prevent them from recharging too fast. So, ok, they don't attack as fast now, BUT, they also can't be slowed down, and now they'll fight more effectively, which (this has to be tested more thoroughly) may increase their overall damage. That's okay (for the most part... there are some psuedo pets that this will only count as a nerf for), but YMMV

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Everybody make sure to move your characters out of Atlas Park and Mercy Island. If beta is any indication, those zones will be packed and extremely laggy

There's an AE building in nearly every city zone, plus RWZ. Use one of them if you don't like playing City of Slideshows!

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Except the intro mission has you going to AP/Mercy anyway, right?

No.

NO NO NO NO!

Not until you've fixed the Mem leaks, html bloat bugs, and nerf AI ninjas. As it stands, it takes 2 gigs of ram to make a 50Kb file (which becomes a 100 kb file due to html bugs) just to make a minion that can take down an AV.*

Please please PLEASE do not ship it like this. I beg you! I'd hate to sound demanding, but there are still some serious bugs with this system that directly hamper ones ability to use and enjoy it, thus negating the entire reason for having it in the first place. Take another week at least to do something about these bugs.

Please.


*: disclaimer, I'm exaggerating, but the problems are pretty serious.

Wow, LG was first after TWO rednames!

*bows before his awesomeness*

And thanks for sharing the vid, too!

Besides face texture, you need to tweak the head sliders. The default "youthful" headshape has some messed up cheeks and gives the head an odd shape.

Also, stretching certain parts of the head scales or compressing them too much can make even a cute face look awful.

Finally, some hair styles are more conducive to being attractive than others. Serated Sugar is just HOT, but bald w/ponytail instantly makes any cute face just look strange if not scary.

Yeah, my Mind/Kin isn't going to be soloing any GMs. No pet to absorb alpha = me dead.

But a Boss? Pft, give me a minute alone with him and he'll be put down like Ol' Yeller.

Course, I'm pretty much purple'd out so challenge in this game has become pretty binary. Either i can defeat it easily or not at all.

Isn't moving lips a feature available in most flash media creation tools? Setting a line or object to change shape according to sound produced (like in a visualization in a media player)?

Granted, it doesn't always look great, but there are shortcuts around having to manually edit every frame i would think.

Yup! That's a lock! Now let's see 'im inked and colored!

Wicked stuff, DR!

Obligatory "NCSoft should hire you to make videos" comment.

MUCH better! Now shrink his hand and forearm a little bit (his clenched fist is bigger than his head) and you'll be golden!

I can't tell you how much more I like this drawing now that his feet are in proper perspective. Bravo!

Sorry to double-post, but i found this tidbit:

The leader of the Imperial Wind, Lord of Frosts, fights the leader of the American metahuman forces in the zone, Captain Volcano, defeating and killing him. [25] Lord of Frosts eludes pursuit and escapes.

So we know the leader is cold or ice based and may still be alive, but will be very old in modern times.