Profile for That Phony Nickel

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Displayed name	That Phony Nickel
Member number	7154
Title	Apprentice
Postcount	1
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Registered	Tuesday, May 23 2006 07:00

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a4 is the best game yet in Avernum 4
That Phony Nickel Apprentice Member # 7154	written Tuesday, May 23 2006 10:55 Profile #92 (riddled with spoilers) I finished up Avernum 4 last night, and I'm inclined to say I was disappointed with the experience. It was fun traveling through the length and breadth of the Avernum caves, of course. The new skillsets seem like they're getting about as close to perfection as one should reasonably expect, particularly First Aid and Quick Action (those two made me happiest). I liked the variety in the items, though it didn't feel like there were enough "epic" items involving long and dangerous quests. Think the five artifacts of Avernum 3 - insanely hard to get, but in almost every case (we won't talk about the Ring of Endless Magery), worth the effort. I also enjoyed seeing the evolution of certain towns, and the destruction of Blosk gave me a bit of a shake. Now, the downsides. The plot, as a whole, was just plain bad. The Darkside Loyalists, for all the hinting and eventual conflict, were poorly defined and not especially threatening as villains (especially since when I ran into Dorikas, I had his health down to 1 three times before he made his timely jump through the portal). The Rentar Ihrno angle was perhaps satisfying, but at the same time, kind of a "heard it all before" scenario. Nobody at all was surprised when we saw her as a Crystal Soul, I'm sure of that. I think some of Rentar's co-conspirators should have been built up stronger and functioned as more than "one conversation and kill" targets. That being said, now that Rentar is out of the picture, I can imagine Avernum 5 will be free to explore many new options. Next, the mugging. By this, I'm referring to the references to past Avernum games. Sure, I laughed in the Fissure Inn when the girl wasn't quite sure what happened at the Golem Tower, but on the whole, a lot of those comments felt like they should have neon lights blinking around them with the word "Flashback" highlighted. Connectivity is one thing, but I feel it was completely overdone in this game. The combat system may have been more fun in some ways, but around the end of the game, I got very tired of duking it out with villains that had a 50 percent Riposte rate but couldn't do any damage to me due to my high parry, gymnastics, defense, hardiness, etc. It made combat into a long, drawn-out affair in which every fourth shot drops one-tenth of their health. In other words, boring. Also, the total terror state was overused and too one-sided. A lower level spell to cure individual states of terror would've been much appreciated. Finally, I would've much rather that the Return Life spell be redefined as a function of First Aid. It could bring them back with minimal health and energy, and then you have to handle the rest yourself. Considering most parties have to limit themselves to one priest, as soon as that guy goes down, it's automatically a long walk to the local town/Giant Intelligent Friendly Talking Spider lair. There were little things that bothered me here and there, too, but I've covered the main points. I think this game could've been much better than it was, and though I enjoyed it well enough, I am hoping for better in the future. I hope this can be taken constructively. -------------------- I blame the media Posts: 1 \| Registered: Tuesday, May 23 2006 07:00

Author

Recent posts

a4 is the best game yet in Avernum 4

That Phony Nickel

Apprentice

Member # 7154

written Tuesday, May 23 2006 10:55 Profile #92

(riddled with spoilers)

I finished up Avernum 4 last night, and I'm inclined to say I was disappointed with the experience.
It was fun traveling through the length and breadth of the Avernum caves, of course. The new skillsets seem like they're getting about as close to perfection as one should reasonably expect, particularly First Aid and Quick Action (those two made me happiest). I liked the variety in the items, though it didn't feel like there were enough "epic" items involving long and dangerous quests. Think the five artifacts of Avernum 3 - insanely hard to get, but in almost every case (we won't talk about the Ring of Endless Magery), worth the effort. I also enjoyed seeing the evolution of certain towns, and the destruction of Blosk gave me a bit of a shake.
Now, the downsides. The plot, as a whole, was just plain bad. The Darkside Loyalists, for all the hinting and eventual conflict, were poorly defined and not especially threatening as villains (especially since when I ran into Dorikas, I had his health down to 1 three times before he made his timely jump through the portal). The Rentar Ihrno angle was perhaps satisfying, but at the same time, kind of a "heard it all before" scenario. Nobody at all was surprised when we saw her as a Crystal Soul, I'm sure of that. I think some of Rentar's co-conspirators should have been built up stronger and functioned as more than "one conversation and kill" targets. That being said, now that Rentar is out of the picture, I can imagine Avernum 5 will be free to explore many new options.
Next, the mugging. By this, I'm referring to the references to past Avernum games. Sure, I laughed in the Fissure Inn when the girl wasn't quite sure what happened at the Golem Tower, but on the whole, a lot of those comments felt like they should have neon lights blinking around them with the word "Flashback" highlighted. Connectivity is one thing, but I feel it was completely overdone in this game.
The combat system may have been more fun in some ways, but around the end of the game, I got very tired of duking it out with villains that had a 50 percent Riposte rate but couldn't do any damage to me due to my high parry, gymnastics, defense, hardiness, etc. It made combat into a long, drawn-out affair in which every fourth shot drops one-tenth of their health. In other words, boring. Also, the total terror state was overused and too one-sided. A lower level spell to cure individual states of terror would've been much appreciated. Finally, I would've much rather that the Return Life spell be redefined as a function of First Aid. It could bring them back with minimal health and energy, and then you have to handle the rest yourself. Considering most parties have to limit themselves to one priest, as soon as that guy goes down, it's automatically a long walk to the local town/Giant Intelligent Friendly Talking Spider lair.
There were little things that bothered me here and there, too, but I've covered the main points. I think this game could've been much better than it was, and though I enjoyed it well enough, I am hoping for better in the future.
I hope this can be taken constructively.

--------------------
I blame the media

Posts: 1 | Registered: Tuesday, May 23 2006 07:00