Venture's Reviews V: Critic's Choice

Arc #390921, "Arena"
tl;dr: 4 stars. Offenses: overpowered mobs, affected dialogue

Reviewed on: 4/3/2010
Level Range: 40-54
Morality: Villainous
Factions: Generic, Freakshow, Arachnos, Paragon Police
Architect's Keywords: Complex Mechanics, Drama, Romance
My Keywords: Challenging, Complex Mechanics, Drama
Character used: Jessica Ballantine/Champion
Difficulty: +0x2+B-AV

THE SKINNY: You're asked to work security at the World Championship "gladiator" fights at the Giza. Wackiness ensues as the match has become politicized...and that's not counting the behind-the-scenes skullduggery.

WHAT WORKS: Amanda Vines' dialogue as the Contact is great. Most of the NPCs speak in rhymes or near-rhymes which may be disconcerting until/unless you get the references, which I'd accidentally guessed when I heard of the arc. There's an interesting mechanical trick in act IV, which I haven't figured out yet.

WHAT DOESN'T: A substantial part of the plot is contained in your orders, which are delivered via Mission Start Clues. While the big CLUE floaty really should suffice it would probably be a good idea to mention in the briefings that you should review your orders. "The Arbiter" in act I has Sands' bio but not his name; he should either be called "Arbiter Sands" or get a new bio, IMO. Amanda's story is tied up as far as the facts are concerned but still feels as if it lacks closure.

WHAT STINKS: The Arbiter Sands model used is the one from the STF; on agro it dropped two LT Drones and four Minions, which is a bit much. And you get to fight him twice. Having the plot depend on Arachnos giving the player orders to take out an Arbiter stretches credulity; it might be best if the Arbiter were replaced by a more neutral custom Judge or Referee. Act V is a tedious slogfest against multiple EB/AVs; in addition to Sands you have to deal with an upgraded Krylov (who simply refused to die thanks to Willpower; took multiple trays to wear him down), Castle and Pohsyb.

ANYTHING ELSE? Using Castle and Pohsyb is a bit cheeky, I'd say, but if they don't mind.... Krylov's dialogue in act V gets cut off in his word balloon but displays in full in the window. The arc does a reasonable job of recapitulating the plot of Chess (in one of its incarnations, at least; Chess has been rewritten more times than Soviet history) though again, having the characters speak in lyrics may be taking the homage a bit too far.

VERDICT: It was heading for five stars until act V, which pushed it down to three. I bumped it up one 'coz I've always liked what I've heard about Chess in all its various incarnations even though I've never seen any of them.... (I do have two songs from it in my library; "One Night in Bangkok" and "I Know Him So Well".) Tuning the combat and text would help immensely.

Gratz on the thumbs up from V, Fred!

I also thought the Arbiter was a bit of a handful. I used a lvl 38 kin/rad defender on default difficulty, and he wiped the floor with me the first time I met him. With Judicious Use of Inspirations, I managed it, however, and my elation on defeating him was on reflection worth it. The second time he appears, he's optional, so I didn't need to fight him.

Eco.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow [The Incarnate System is] Jack Emmert all over again, only this time it's not "1 hero = 3 white minions" it's "1 hero = 3 white rocks."

Thanks for the review.

When i17 arrives there will be some changes to the final mission. You won't have to face the Arbiter again... And as MCM pointed out, he's optional anyway.

The character in Chess is actually called The Arbiter, and my sense of humor demanded that I used an actual Arachnos Arbiter for the role. Unfortunately we only have one actual Arachnos Arbiter to choose from. I think Sands' bio works as is ("Arbiter Sands is considered a somewhat unconventional member of the Arachnos Arbiter Corps."), but I guess I might change it to point out that in his position as referee for the arena games he is not protected by the will of Lord Recluse.

Pohsyb and Castle were chosen because, well, Pohsyb is Bishop backwards, a chess piece, and Castle is a chess move. It just had to be them. Castle is also responsible for the "recent" PvP changes so he's got another connection to the Arena that way. I'm planning to ask them to play the arc when it's finalized and find out what they think.

He was de jure optional perhaps, but he spawned within agro range of Pohsyb for me....

Arc #245042, "The Next War on Drugs"
tl;dr: 4 stars. Offenses: no-closure ending, disjointed level range, a potentially problematic map

Reviewed on: 4/10/2010
Level Range: 12-20/12-20/12-20/15-20/20-20
Morality: Heroic
Factions: Generic, Trolls, Tsoo, Security Guards
Architect's Keywords: Solo Friendly, Canon Related, Mystery
My Keywords:
Character used: Jessica Ballantine/Champion
Difficulty: +0x2+B-AV

THE SKINNY: Back Alley Brawler wants your help in dealing with a new surge in drug trafficking.

WHAT WORKS: Act II has your hero do a little forensic thinking on finding a Clue, which I thought was a nice touch. This trend continues in Act III, which is a non-combat map. There are some triggered objectives here but they're clustered in the last room. The arc has good hooks in the canon.

WHAT DOESN'T: Act I uses the multi-level Skyway map seen in the "Rescue Olivia Darque" mission, which has the nasty habit of spawning objectives in out-of-the-way places. The primary objective was in the obvious place for me, at least.

WHAT STINKS: A Boss' dialogue in Act IV, but it's on purpose so that's OK.

ANYTHING ELSE? The arc has a no-closure ending and feels like the first part of a series. The architect warns you up front that it's mostly a story arc with not much in the way of tickets or XP, so be advised if those things bother you.

VERDICT: It's worth a play if you're looking for a police-story type of mystery. Clean up the level range, work on the ending and a few rough edges and it would be a five-star arc.

Hm. You wouldn't happen to have an indexed list of reviews you've done, do you?

Sadly no, something I've been meaning to get around to doing.

As fluid as MA arcs can be, if you did get around to it, I would suggest only indexing 4 and 5 star reviews and possibly more recent reviews, as older poor reviews on arcs that have greatly improved wouldn't serve anybody.

An index would be useless if it was not comprehensive.

I do date all reviews so readers can tell if a review is potentially out of date.

Arc # 454140, "Cause and Effect"
tl;dr: 3 stars. Offenses: "just a bunch of stuff that happened", obnoxious use of timed missions, obnoxious glowie hunt, Timey Wimey Ball

Reviewed on: 10/1/2010
Level Range: 40-54
Morality: Neutral
Factions: Generic, Banished Pantheon, Ghosts
Architect's Keywords: Challenging, Save the World, Drama
My Keywords: Save the World
Character used: Vector Alpha/Virtue; David Moonbow/Virtue
Difficulty: +0x2+B-AV

For starters, this is still listed as a Work in Progress, so the arc may change substantially following this review. Second, the character used the first time was a level 40 KinMelee/SR Scrapper not on the web page (I really have to update that sometime). The second time I used a 35 TA/A Defender, who failed.

On the one hand there's something said for trying to be different. On the other, it can be hard to remember sometimes when you're trying to be different that you're supposed to be trying to be good first. This arc falls short in the latter department.

The mission here is to investigate a missing Mender at the behest of Mender Lazarus. "Mender Anomaly" vanished on her last mission, completely erased from the time stream, and all of history appears to be going with her. You, for Timey Wimey Ball reasons, are a "fixed point" so you are capable of looking into this for them. This requires a series of timed missions, each with decreasing time limits going from one hour down to five minutes. You eventually discover that Anomaly managed to accidently kill a younger version of herself, "Sister Johanna" (author insert), and have to travel back to just before she does so to clobber her first. I didn't fail any of the earlier ones; on my second try I failed the last mission with the EB at a sliver. I had some very bad luck during the fight and probably could have won it if the breaks had been even. If you fail the last mission Silos makes the whole thing unhappen at the cost of imprisoning both versions of Anomaly forever.

The arc does make nice use of text formatting in the briefings, but then giving the player lots of nicely-done text to admire in an arc with short time limits on most missions may not be well-received. Act II has a hostage with no approach or release text. Act III has no hostiles, just 30-someodd glowies to click with a 15 minute time limit which is really not much fun. Act IV has a defeat-all objective that is not clear (it appears from the nav bar you only have to reach the hostage). Acts III and V use Nemesis Automatons seemingly as patroling pedestrians but they're not relabeled.

The arc's gameplay suffers from the short time limits. You're pressured into racing for objectives so you don't get much time fighting; this also clobbers the ticket value of the arc. There is no real theme to it, so with low gameplay and reward it's hard to see any reason to recommend the arc.

Re: Review of "Cause and Effect"

Fair enough, and I appreciate the review - this arc is really more for testing timing mechanics and boss mechanics, so I can then go back and improve story (which I know still needs a lot of work). 3 stars is more than I was expecting, TBH, so no hard feelings there.

Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite

Arc #519044, "Grunty McFisterson's Two Step Guide to Winning Respect"
tl;dr: 3 stars. Offenses: weak theme, not that funny

Reviewed on: 11/8/2011
Level Range: 1-14
Morality: Villainous
Factions: Hellions, Skulls, Longbow, Legacy Chain, Wyvern
Architect's Keywords: Easy, Solo Friendly, Comedy
My Keywords:
Character used: Amelia Escobar/Virtue
Difficulty: +0x2+B-AV

Fight promoter "Grunty McFisterson" offers your starting villain his help in building up your reptuation. You're going to do this by taking out the leaders of the local Hellions and Skulls crews. Of course, Longbow has to stick their head into your business and as usual, nothing in the Rogue Isles is exactly what it says on the label.

The arc doesn't do anything clever with mechanics or gameplay. The final boss's spawn does appear to be kicked up a notch, which isn't really welcome at this level. There's a theme of sorts but not much is done with it and some of the jokes are over the top.

There's nothing really wrong with this arc but there's nothing really right with it either. If you're looking for MA arcs to fill in the gaps while leveling or such there are worse choices out there, but there's nothing here worth going out of your way for.

Arc #459592, "Interdimensional Headache"
tl;dr: 4 stars. Offenses: overpowered ally, hijacks the character, some technical flaws, "just a bunch of stuff that happened"

Reviewed on: 11/8/2011
Level Range: 41-54
Morality: Villainous
Factions: Generic, Custom Group
Architect's Keywords: Custom Characters, Complex Mechanics, Sci-Fi
Character used: Amelia Escobar/Virtue
Difficulty: +0x2+B-AV

Dr. Mafred Ludak of the Arachnos Exploratory Science Division needs your help What could possibly go wrong? Newly-discovered dimension Sigma Tau 6-1 has some OVER 9000 psi energy readings he wants you to check out. This leads to exploration of another dimension and encouters with some unexpected characters from back home.

The contact's dialog is very well-written; slightly affected with some quirky humor. The firs act is very evocative (the later two, less so). There's a lot of triggered activity that keeps the maps from being forty guys pounding their fists in a warehouse.

An objective in act II I was supposed to lead an NPC to was functional before I arrived with the escort. (Yes, I passed the hostage and cleared the path first.) A hostage in act III had the default bio for his rank. Act III also has an overpowering ally hostage. It's optional at least, but I expect at least some players will be forced to take it if they don't have the stealth needed to slip by or a fortunate out-of-the-way spawn location. The arc powerposes your villain as going straight at the end which is likely to disagree with a fair number of players. The enemy factions are all custom mobs, some of which are interesting but the majority are pretty vanilla.

It's a good run and fairly quick (three acts). I'd recommend it for red-side characters with a science-fiction bent.

Arc #456200, Arena
tl;dr: 5 stars. Nits: corrupt critter issue, ending a bit unclear and abrupt

Reviewed on: 11/9/2011
Level Range: 40-54
Morality: Villainous
Factions: Generic, Freakshow, Shining Stars, Siren's Call Phantom (factions evidenly corrupted)
Architect's Keywords: Solo Friendly, Drama, Romance
My Keywords:
Character used: Amelia Escobar/Virtue
Difficulty: +0x2+B-AV

N.B. this is technically a re-review; the arc was previously published and re-published with a new number.

You've been tapped by Arachnos to provide security at the Arena Gladiator World Championships, taking place at the Giza between the American champion Castle and the reigning champion Pohsyb of the Etoile Islands. Due to the political climate these matches now have a very high propaganda value so you can expect some skullduggery. Even your contact, reporter Amanda Vines ostensibly there to cover the event, has her own agenda.

For those who don't know, this arc is a homage to the musical Chess. It's very heavily scripted; make sure you read your clues because there's a lot going on in there. The architect adapted the musical's storyline to the City setting very well. Some of the dialog copies lyrics from the musical's songs; some might find that jarring but I thought it was appropriate.

There is a typo in Act II's mission-accept clue ("advice"). Act II also appears to have a problem with corrupt critters in Pohsyb's faction. The ending kind of drops the player off a cliff; all the pieces are there but you may have to stretch a bit to put them all together. This doesn't detract from the mission but I'll mention it as a cavaet: there are two hostage escorts, one of them long, so you might not want to use a stealth-based character to run this.

Minor flaws notwithstanding, this one is recommended.

Thanks for the re-review of "Arena".

The corrupt critters have been fixed this afternoon.

Arc #459586, "Legacy of a Rogue"
tl;dr: 4 stars. Offenses: Idiot Ball, borderline Shoot the Shaggy Dog, gameplay issues

Reviewed on: 11/12/2011
Level Range: 30-35
Morality: Heroic
Factions: Circle of Thorns, Family, Paragon PD, Custom
Architect's Keywords: Solo Friendly, Drama
My Keywords:
Character used: Amelia Escobar/Virtue
Difficulty: +0x2+B-AV

Yes, I'm using a Widow to run Heroic arcs. Come and get me.

Gertrude Bellstaff, once the hero Condor Girl, wants you to take on her old mentor's son Harrier as your sidekick. She promised to help the kid but she's no longer hero material herself thanks to a war injury. An encounter with the Circle of Thorns give the impatient youngster an opportunity he can't resist and you have to deal with the consequences.

The dialog is well-written for the most part, particularly the clever use of the declining-health mechanic to give Harrier some lines during the mission. Gertrude has a tendency to lapse into "repeating what the protagonist is probably saying" mode though, and some of the dialog in act III is spotty. The story is pretty rich, though it does have flaws addressed below.

The kid is a Martial Arts/Willpower LT with Heightened Senses, meaning his agro range is roughly "the map". Non-support ATs may have their hands full trying to keep him alive. The same goes for an ally in Act IV. Act III throws the Idiot Ball, asking the (ostensibly heroic) player to break a criminal out of the Zig. Act IV has an obnoxiously-large ambush in it, and two objectives spawned for me in a transposed order relative to the Clues they dispense. The final battle in Act V has way too much "help" in it. If it wasn't for some impressive character development in some of the secondary characters the arc would be a Shoot the Shaggy Dog story.

This was heading for three stars until the end, when I bumped it up to four. It needs a lot of improvement to hit the top, though.

Arc #494099, "When the Words Stop"
tl;dr: 4 stars. Offenses: what the hell did I just play?

Reviewed on: 11/12/2011
Level Range: 41-54
Morality: Neutral
Factions: Generic, Custom
Architect's Keywords: Complex Mechanics, Non-Canon Story, Magic
Character used: Amelia Escobar/Virtue
Difficulty: +0x2+B-AV

You find a woman's diary on a bookshelf in a Circle of Thorns lair, which leads you on a strange journey of discovery. And by "strange journey" I mean What Do You Mean It Wasn't Made On Drugs?

On the plus side, the arc has some clever custom mobs and the architect at least appears to have put a great deal of work into the clues and dialog.

On the down side the symbolism is so all over the place that the story could be about practically anything. I could tell you what I got out of it....

Arc #457506, "A Very Special Episode"
tl;dr: 5 stars. Nits: mobs maybe a little overpowered

Reviewed on: 11/12/2011
Level Range: 30-54
Morality: Heroic
Factions: Nemesis, Crey, Freakshow, Family, Custom
Architect's Keywords: Origin Story, Comedy, Drama
Character used: Amelia Escobar/Virtue
Difficulty: +0x2+B-AV

N.B. this is technically a re-review; this arc was originally published as "Have a Blap, Blap, Blapy Day!" and redesigned.

Blappy, the beloved superhero kids's show host, has gone missing! You must find her! Television says so! But then, you shouldn't believe everything you see on Television....

Techincally the contact isn't Television itself but "An Abandoned Television" in Paragon City, but the dialog faithfully duplicates the canon contact's voice. There's a good story in here about the nature of celebrity and a Behind the Music-esque fall from grace. The humor is low-key but very effective.

The worst thing I can say about the arc is some of the customs have irritating powers. Foot Stomp on a Minion is a bit much, as is Ignite on some of the LTs. There's a mob in the first act with a dubious background but it's easily rationalized with a bit of Fridge Brilliance.

Top marks for this one; recommended.

Arc #497506, "A Mosaic of Shattered Dreams"
tl;dr: 5 stars. Nits: ambush heavy, possibly broken objectives

Reviewed on: 11/12/2011
Level Range: 25-54
Morality: Heroic
Factions: Generic, Council, Custom, Arachnos
Architect's Keywords: Solo Friendly, Custom Characters, Mystery
Character used: Amelia Escobar/Virtue
Difficulty: +0x2+B-AV

The arc opens in media res as your character comes upon a burning building. Your contact is Katie Evans, the young child of a social worker you're familiar with who happens to be inside said burning building. Well, you're a hero, so in you go...but this is Paragon City and nothing is ever as simple as it appears.

The dialog and clues are all excellent. The arc pulls you in with a sense of urgency, even though it doesn't use timed missions or the like, and it keeps escalating towards the climax. It also makes use of the "deliberate fail" mechanic to give a moral choice at the end.

There are a fair number of ambushes, some of them large, so be ready with inspirations and the like. Act IV has a large number of "body bag" objectives that give the not-yet message when clicked on, but I never found any way to activate them. I don't know if that's intentional or a bug.

This is one of the best arcs in AE...or the entire game, for that matter. Highly recommended.

Hey,thanks for playing and reviewing my arc When The Words Stop.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Venture Offenses: what the hell did I just play?

I'll wear that badge with pride, TY. I saw David Lynch's movie Mulholland Drive when it came out. After it was over, a guy near the front stood up, turned to face the theater and asked "Can anyone tell me what I just watched?" I loved it of course - felt the same way, but loved it. These days I can read it like headlines on a newspaper.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Venture You find a woman's diary on a bookshelf in a Circle of Thorns lair, which leads you on a strange journey of discovery. And by "strange journey" I mean What Do You Mean It Wasn't Made On Drugs?

Looking over that link, it places my arc in august company!

I wanted to try my hand at, for lack of a better term (I'm sure at least seven exist in literary criticism, if not more) an elliptical form of writing. Rather than hopping out and stating straight up "This story is about cats... with cheeseburgers!" I wanted to write around the topic, circling it without ever casting it in concrete by labeling it. And I did that by coming up with a number of metaphors and such about said topic(s). Think of that cheeseburger-owning cat being only shown under shear fabric, or in cling-wrap, or submerged in murky water, etc. And yes,I wanted to try and do so in a super-hero story. Without drugs.

Whether or not I was successful or if the idea was worth doing in the first place ends up in rather subjective territory.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Venture On the plus side, the arc has some clever custom mobs and the architect at least appears to have put a great deal of work into the clues and dialog.

I was hoping too that the atmosphere might help more literal-minded folks past the murky-feline&foodstuff nature of the arc, but as long as you found things to like, it's all good. "Four stars" is still pretty decent.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Venture On the down side the symbolism is so all over the place that the story could be about practically anything. I could tell you what I got out of it.... ...but gods only know how close that is to the architect's intent, assuming he has one.

I'm not sure how symbolism can be "all over the map", except if there's lots of it going after the same feline&foodstuff from a number of different angles. Which I did - same topic, fifty-million angles ("pattering paws, twitch of whiskers, shining eyes in the dark, a gentle purr in the sun, curled up in sleep. With beef and Swiss on a bun.") . Everything the first three missions are about what's happened to Emily Yikes, presented foryou in a number of ways (and then, FYI, the last arc's pretty much just a peek into her past as she sees it).

You're a smart guy, I'm guessing you probably "got" the cat and the cheeseburger. Also,I've enjoyed hearing from others what they thought it was about, what that strange sandwhichy-looking thing was, etc.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Venture 4 stars for the effort, but this would benefit a lot if the symbolism was taken down a few notches.

Thnaks again!

Arc #381565, "A Favor For Liberty (The Megan Duncan Task Force)
tl;dr: 4 stars. Offenses: weak theme, poor dialog, spelling/grammatical errors

Reviewed on: 11/27/2011
Level Range: 12-15
Morality: Heroic
Factions: Generic, Hellions, Hydra
Architect's Keywords: Solo Friendly, Custom Characters, Canon Related
Character used: The Philosoraptor/Freedom
Difficulty: +0x2+B-AV

When you report for training, Ms. Liberty asks you to check out increase Hellion activity. Perfectly routine...and Elvis will be here any minute. Turns out the Longbow agent she's already sent is late checking in and said agent is Ms. Liberty's closest childhood friend. But hey, no pressure.

The opening briefing is cute; Ms. Liberty starts out giving her usual click-on text. There are a lot of carefully-crafted side encounters that convey the impression of things a world larger than the story. There is a theme but it's pretty weak, narrated by the contact as if it was an afterthought.

The dialog has some grammar and spelling errors ("lets" for "let's", others, too many to list). Worse, the quality ranges from awkward and stilted at the high end to nails-on-chalkboard grating at its worst. Some of the spawns were turned up higher than they should be in a "solo friendly" arc at pre-SO levels. There's a use of $name in the main description field which doesn't expand those variables.

There are a few "tribute clues" that contain pointers to arcs by other architects, which is a nice touch. The architect obviously put a lot of work into this, but the writing needs to be cleaned up a lot to make this top-drawer.