Lord of the Clans Campaign (Updated Review) Version 1.06: SKIP TO THE FINAL VERDICT IF YOU WANT TO AVOID SPOILERS.
Story: 5/5
Not much to say, I think the story does fit the themes and lore of the original story. Thrall's progression from a slave to the leader of the Horde feels very natural and well earned. He's no Mary Sue, and still has flaws in his character even at the end of the story. But seeing the plot unfold I could truly understand how Thrall became the Warchief we all know and love in WoW. As well as providing a nice transition to Reign of Chaos's Orc Campaign.
To be fair there are some changes in this adaptation that might annoy hardcore fans of the book. Blackmoore isn't portrayed as a mad drunk like he is in the novel, likely because the creator wanted him to come off as a serious threat even at the end of the story. After all he is the final boss of the campaign. Granted I think it might have been more powerful if Blackmoore just surrendered to Thrall at the end to show how much Thrall had grown over the course of the story. It would have been a great character transition as Thrall goes from being a helpless slave to a powerful warlord while Blackmoore goes from being a powerful Warlord to a helpless drunkard.
The new cutscenes used in the Gladiator mission do provide some much needed backstory for Thrall and Blackmoore which I liked. But I do feel that Thrall's and Taretha's relationship is still very undeveloped, I don't even think I would have felt sad about Taretha's death at "the Siege of Durnholde" mission if it wasn't for the fact that I was so familiar with the original novel. The book providing more backstory on why Thrall cared for Taretha so much and how they developed a sibling relationship over the years, which is only mentioned in passing in a few lines of dialogue here and there.
Regardless these are just nitpicks, as annoying as they are this is still a game and thus these details aren't that important to the overall gameplay experience.
In a nutshell the story is so good enough at world building and provide an interesting characterization of the orcs that I this campaign felt like it should have been included in the base game when it launched back in 2002. Thus I give this category a 5/5. Not only because the story feels like a Warcraft campaign but also because it ties in with the gameplay so well.
Models and Terrain: 4/5
To me there are pros and cons with the choice of models in this game. In terms of the positives, I am big fan of the new models for Durotan, Draka, Blackmoore, as well as the Veteran Orc Units. Most of those models being made by Hiveworkshop user Tauer. I would like to emphasize that I am a huge fan of the new Blackmoore model he looked like he was taken right out of the Warcraft Adventures game as well.
In the terms of the negatives, I am little bummed that the orcs from different clans such as the Frost Wolves or Warsong clan don't have different models to distinguish them like a clan insignia on their armor. Mostly to give each clan a greater sense of identity rather than being Mortal Kombat Ninja palette swaps . To note there are models for Orcs from different clans on hiveworkshop so it shouldn't be that difficult to implement.I am a fan of Tauer work but I always found his Orgrim Doomhammer model to be really damn ugly and barely resembles what Ogrim looked like in the lore specifically how his hair looks likes a black noodle and his eyes look like they were cut out with a knife, thankfully Tauer did update the model again a couple of months ago so this issue can easily be fixed in a future patch. I also strongly dislike the Young Thrall model who looks like a rehash of Hellscream, especially since it doesn't use the War3 thrall head. Normally this wouldn't be such a big issue but since you the player control this version of Thrall for most of the campaign it does come off as distracting to me.
The creator did a great job on the terrain, making each environment look distinct. You could always tell when Thrall was in Lordaeron or the High Mountains, or Durnholde. The different environments used in the "Path of the Shaman" mission is the big highlight terrain wise.
Overall the quality of the character models and the terrain are really good, however I can't feel comfortable giving this category a full 5/5 until the Orc clan models, Young Thrall, and Orgrim get a new models because of how distracting the issue is.
Dialogue and Quests: 5/5
The majority of the campaigns quests are really well done, most of them are pretty straight forward and serve to make each mission feel distinct from the other. My favorite quests would be the main quests for "Gladiator", "Path of the Shaman", "The Horde Awakens", and "Siege of Durnholde". Not only because of how these missions highlight the world building and character development in the story so well, but also highlight the most fun aspects of the classic Warcraft 3 campaigns. Whether its controlling an army, a dungeon where your character gets unique abilities, or a arena battle where you can use the environment to hurt your enemies.
In terms of quests that I dislike, I really disliked the stealth quest in mission 3, one because in order to escape you have to hit all the switches, secondly the stealth aspect of the mission is really boring. I am not asking for Hitman level of quality but honestly I feel this section should be cut out, maybe just turn it into a cutscene. Or change it from the ground up. The stealth quest in mission 5 for instance is a huge improvement over mission 3 because its more about timing and thinking quickly rather than doing a constant game of red light green light with the guards. Granted its almost impossible to avoid your enemies for 100 percent of the mission due to how tight space the environment is.
I also really like the dialogue, although I can't remember any exact quotes from the novel, the dialogue feels like it was straight out of Christie Golden's novel. Even the dialogue created for the original content in the campaign is really good, especially the humor. Yes there are plently of easter eggs and inside jokes that even non Warcraft 3 fans can apperciate.
I love the humor in Mission 4 specifically with the trolls and goblins commentary. The Lonely Wolf is the big highlight for me, as most of that missions is fill to the brim with great dialogue and character interaction.
That said there are a fair share of typos in this campaign which start becoming noticable in the Warsong Cave cutscene. And appear here and there in later missions.
The side quests are very well done as well, and feels like an extension of the main story and rarely do the quests feel like filler.
Regardless I am giving this category a full 5/5 because it serves its purpose within the main story, and the bad quests don't drag the campaign down enough to ruin the experience for me.
Difficulty: 5/5
Note I did play the campaign on easy difficult because I wanted to experience the story. I am glad I did, the campaign went very smoothly with little to no huge difficult spikes which is much appreciated. Thankfully the campaign experience was smooth as silk, I didn't die once and I managed to finish it within four to six hours. You can always pick the difficulty at the beginning of the mission to suit your liking. Personally I don't see what's appealing with playing the game on a higher difficulty for something as story based as this and with no reward beyond a "sense of pride and accomplishment." Anyway I this campaign is fair and enjoyable for the casually gaming crowd.
Triggers and Sound: 4/5
For future reviews I wanted to update this as I felt that music and original sound effects can add another level of immersion to the story. The only new voiceset I noticed was Draka's. Besides that most of the voicesets are recycled from the main game. To be honest though considering that you don't control that many different heroes or units within the main campaign this isn't such a big issue. The puzzles work really well and the game rarely lags, there may be an occassional glitch but its so minor its not worth paying attention to. I am also a big fan of the book cover wallpapers used in between missions.
But for me there is one big gripe I have in this category and that's the music. There are a couple of good WoW tracks in the game used mostly for cutscenes at the beginning and the end of a mission. These really help add immersion to the story but the problem is, the music isn't used enough. There were plently of moments in the campaign where a new soundtrack would have greatly added immersion to the story, but in most cases the creator just uses generic War3 music. Which I think is a real bummer, because most campaigns made on hiveworkshop use the generic Warcraft 3 soundtrack and usually its just background noise. I know its very time consuming to make these campaigns but I feel that this issue is very important. Because new high quality music can add a sense of immersion to the campaign that normally can't be accomplished with the game's vanilla soundtrack. "The Chosen Ones", "Rise of the Blood Elves", "Call of the Forsaken" all used new music to great effect to add emotion and I think future Warcraft 3 campaigns should follow their standard. I am not saying the creator shouldn't use Warcraft 3 music at all but I do think there should be more new music to balance out with the old.
OutsiderXe I am aware you like your campaigns to feel like an extension of the classic Warcraft 3 Blizzard made campaigns, but I still feel strongly that you can go above and beyond with this campaign's soundtrack, all the hard work you did improving the campaigns in all these categories, I only wish to see this campaign's potential reach its full frution.
Highlighted changes from 1.04 to 1.06: This part of the review examines changes made to between both versions, essentially this part determines if the improvements to this campaign earn an increase score. Naturally I picked 1.04 as my baseline as that is the version I played during my past review. Right off the bat there are new cutscenes and a much requested Thrall Gladiator section which I was very happy to see. It also adds some backstory to Thrall, Blackmoore, and the Foxtons which was really lacking in the older versions. Really great mission, a minor nitpick though. When you fight an Ogre there's a glaive that flies towards you that will only deal damage to you but not the ogre, even with video game logic it doesn't make any sense to me. The new cutscenes are well done but I like I said in the story section, I did wish we got to see more cutscenes about Thrall's and Taretha's relationship.
This section is mostly nitpicks and won't affect my final score.
(SPOILERS END HERE)
Final Verdict: 23/25 Highly recommend
Overall I think this campaign is still great, this new version specifically improves on what made the older versions of the campaign great. Unfortunately there are two big glaring issues that prevents me from giving the campaign a perfect score, that being the models and the music. While both categories are ranked really high, I still think the negative aspects of those categories is still glaring to ignore, especially considering the high standards set by Warcraft 3 campaigns in the past like "The Chosen Ones" and "Curse of the Blood Elves". Regardless anyone who loved Warcraft 3's campaign should play this as it feels like a missing part of the Warcraft saga that we never got to see in gaming form until this came out. And its better than ever before.
To OutsiderXe, I hope you don't take these criticisms personally as I feel your campaigns do so many things right that a lot of lore based Warcraft 3 campaigns get wrong. These few changes I feel is the only thing preventing your campaign from getting a perfect score.
Anyway I wanted to do this review not only to highlight the massive amount of work you do with each of these updates but also inform people and how to do a warcraft campaign right, and you set the bar really damn high my friend.
Anyway I look forward to seeing how you update your other fantastic campaigns.
Lok'Tar Ogar!
Approved
After 2,5 years log and hard work I've finally managed to let a dream come true. Starting and finishing a project and giving people the chance to play it. Naturally, I didn't spend the whole time on this project, the truth is, I was leader of a clan, had to manage our Homepage and took a lot of time-outs to play other games. But all this I can do now without having to think that I still have work to do. I hope that you have at least as much fun playing this as I had creating it.
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pretty weird.. you should make the fights wayy harder to match with the cinematic somehow, otherwise is just weird..(i suggest implementing some kind of mini boss or boss at the end, i think that will make it better and last waves should have way more units)
