Approved
.
- Joined
- Feb 2, 2009
- Messages
- 217
So, after setting aside some time to play this I have got to say that I am pretty impressed. The map is fully complete and there were no game breaking bugs that I encountered through my playthrough. I selected sorcerer as my character for playing through the map, and overall it took me about 4-5 hours to complete.
The visual style is definitively warcraft 3, with most buildings and units to scale with what one might expect to find in a warcraft 3 campaign. Despite this the villages felt quite homely, and the major cities felt like large cities. This visual style ended up complementing the gameplay and narrative which both veered from the overtly complex into being much simpler to parse.
Considering the gameplay, it was easy to tell that there was restraint when considering Hero design. If the sorcerer is any indication, the gameplay was meant to be kept as close to utilizing a warcraft 3 hero as possible. This means no crazy innovative class resources or ability schemes, yet there was clear synergy. The sorcerer had three basic abilities and an ultimate, much like a basic warcraft 3 hero, but it was intelligently designed. I had a point and click stun, an aoe ability, and an ability for survival. This is all one really needs when playing an rpg, the diversity is important and allows a player to ask questions like, “When do I need to use this stun?” This choice in combat is what ultimately had me still playing even in to the later levels. Overall, the gameplay was quite nice save for some minor hiccups which will be listed at the bottom for convenience sake.
Considering the narrative, when encountering npcs and accepting quests, you were generally already known to be the protagonist or “hero” in their words. There was this expectation that you were there to beat evil and take names, and that you were all out of names. This is by no means pejorative; the map’s approach did not require nuance like say World of Warcraft. In World of Warcraft, you are but one hero of thousands even as EVERYONE is painted as essential despite the reality. Yet in this map there really is just The Hero, YOU, so it has a bit of charm. The story is fun, its fantasy, it’s a dark looming threat over the horizon. But the most important aspect of the story is that it had progression. I did not start out fighting Hulk Hogan, instead they started me out with Jake Paul. It felt natural. Despite this the transitions could use a bit of work, I felt as though there would be a bit of absent context for certain sequences into the next. An example of this could be around 1/4th of the way in to the map, where you have to hitch a ride on a boat after defeating a boss. I knew where the boat was because I had seen it after a skirmish in the area, yet I must have missed the logical sequence of events that would imply it obvious that I go to the boat. For something like that, a short cinematic or queue beyond just a quest objective would be neat.
Overall, the experience was quite nice, it is enjoyable enough that I believe it is worth playing. Yet despite my enjoyment, there are a few things that could be worked on:
-Enemy placement in some areas was a bit odd, I found that as a sorcerer I could outrange most ranged enemies and just kill them from beyond barriers.
-Side quests became less prevalent shortly after Thundermaw.
-The cinematics were riddled with typos beyond the third act. This is a minor hiccup and ostensibly did not affect my enjoyment, but it is still something to work on. One of the first typos as an example of what I am referencing is, “You can help by searching my lost dog.” Which is a line stated by Mayor Maxson at the beginning of the game.
-I mentioned the gameplay and hero progression before, the only moment that irked me was towards the end of the game where most enemies seemed to have an abundance of bash/stun effects. It seems to be common place in most rpgs so I could be missing something, but it is not to my taste and I also find that there are more interesting solutions to designing tougher end game enemies. My suggestion would be perhaps a combination of tamer stun mechanics and maybe some aoe ground effects? I did not find that I had to move around very much in combat so perhaps a few small range flamestrikes might mix it up a bit.
-The music did not always match up to the situation, for example the music in Thundermaw was super bombastic while the last boss fight’s music was overly calm.
These are of course my own criticisms and do not overshadow my enjoyment of the rpg. But in terms of my favorite things this rpg had to offer:
-There are subtle environmental hints for where you need to go next such as footprints.
-There was a fight on a bridge (I love fights on bridges do not judge me.)
-Item crafting in the late game is a cool way to balance out the progression curve and renew interest after playing for an hour or two.
-The story never held back and there was a certain comical ‘awareness’, it also held a few charming references that did not feel forced or overtly abundant.
-The dungeons and world conveyed atmosphere through the warcraft 3 visual style rather than ‘in spite of it’
Overall, The Power of Three is a great map and I recommend it to other RPG lovers! It is clear that a lot of care and time has been put in to this and it does not feel like some throw-away map. I will be watching this for major developments as a full playthrough is a bit of a commitment and unfortunately, I do not if I will have time for another one any time soon.
Right now, I am giving it a rating of 4/5 but I will change that to a 5/5 if either the music placement or typos are addressed in a future patch.
The visual style is definitively warcraft 3, with most buildings and units to scale with what one might expect to find in a warcraft 3 campaign. Despite this the villages felt quite homely, and the major cities felt like large cities. This visual style ended up complementing the gameplay and narrative which both veered from the overtly complex into being much simpler to parse.
Considering the gameplay, it was easy to tell that there was restraint when considering Hero design. If the sorcerer is any indication, the gameplay was meant to be kept as close to utilizing a warcraft 3 hero as possible. This means no crazy innovative class resources or ability schemes, yet there was clear synergy. The sorcerer had three basic abilities and an ultimate, much like a basic warcraft 3 hero, but it was intelligently designed. I had a point and click stun, an aoe ability, and an ability for survival. This is all one really needs when playing an rpg, the diversity is important and allows a player to ask questions like, “When do I need to use this stun?” This choice in combat is what ultimately had me still playing even in to the later levels. Overall, the gameplay was quite nice save for some minor hiccups which will be listed at the bottom for convenience sake.
Considering the narrative, when encountering npcs and accepting quests, you were generally already known to be the protagonist or “hero” in their words. There was this expectation that you were there to beat evil and take names, and that you were all out of names. This is by no means pejorative; the map’s approach did not require nuance like say World of Warcraft. In World of Warcraft, you are but one hero of thousands even as EVERYONE is painted as essential despite the reality. Yet in this map there really is just The Hero, YOU, so it has a bit of charm. The story is fun, its fantasy, it’s a dark looming threat over the horizon. But the most important aspect of the story is that it had progression. I did not start out fighting Hulk Hogan, instead they started me out with Jake Paul. It felt natural. Despite this the transitions could use a bit of work, I felt as though there would be a bit of absent context for certain sequences into the next. An example of this could be around 1/4th of the way in to the map, where you have to hitch a ride on a boat after defeating a boss. I knew where the boat was because I had seen it after a skirmish in the area, yet I must have missed the logical sequence of events that would imply it obvious that I go to the boat. For something like that, a short cinematic or queue beyond just a quest objective would be neat.
Overall, the experience was quite nice, it is enjoyable enough that I believe it is worth playing. Yet despite my enjoyment, there are a few things that could be worked on:
-Enemy placement in some areas was a bit odd, I found that as a sorcerer I could outrange most ranged enemies and just kill them from beyond barriers.
-Side quests became less prevalent shortly after Thundermaw.
-The cinematics were riddled with typos beyond the third act. This is a minor hiccup and ostensibly did not affect my enjoyment, but it is still something to work on. One of the first typos as an example of what I am referencing is, “You can help by searching my lost dog.” Which is a line stated by Mayor Maxson at the beginning of the game.
-I mentioned the gameplay and hero progression before, the only moment that irked me was towards the end of the game where most enemies seemed to have an abundance of bash/stun effects. It seems to be common place in most rpgs so I could be missing something, but it is not to my taste and I also find that there are more interesting solutions to designing tougher end game enemies. My suggestion would be perhaps a combination of tamer stun mechanics and maybe some aoe ground effects? I did not find that I had to move around very much in combat so perhaps a few small range flamestrikes might mix it up a bit.
-The music did not always match up to the situation, for example the music in Thundermaw was super bombastic while the last boss fight’s music was overly calm.
These are of course my own criticisms and do not overshadow my enjoyment of the rpg. But in terms of my favorite things this rpg had to offer:
-There are subtle environmental hints for where you need to go next such as footprints.
-There was a fight on a bridge (I love fights on bridges do not judge me.)
-Item crafting in the late game is a cool way to balance out the progression curve and renew interest after playing for an hour or two.
-The story never held back and there was a certain comical ‘awareness’, it also held a few charming references that did not feel forced or overtly abundant.
-The dungeons and world conveyed atmosphere through the warcraft 3 visual style rather than ‘in spite of it’
Overall, The Power of Three is a great map and I recommend it to other RPG lovers! It is clear that a lot of care and time has been put in to this and it does not feel like some throw-away map. I will be watching this for major developments as a full playthrough is a bit of a commitment and unfortunately, I do not if I will have time for another one any time soon.
Right now, I am giving it a rating of 4/5 but I will change that to a 5/5 if either the music placement or typos are addressed in a future patch.
