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xyzzysqrlSo I'm easing off on the extensive journalizing, but some highlights:
Jason's Uncle is EEEEVIL. Who knew? Jason is like three minutes out of port when we get a cutscene that's just RIPPLING with compression artifacts, showing him meeting with... MASTER XENAHORT? ... Wait, no, it's some other tiny bald man dressed all in black with sunken eyes. Too bad, this almost became an AWESOME CROSSOVER.
One thing I'm sort of loving for stupid reasons is the complete lack of interest not just in historical accuracy (which I kind of expected) but also the lack of interest in mythological accuracy. Like, you go see a fortune teller and she's named PANDORA and it's like "ooh Pandora" but she's just this sort of vaguely grumpy old lady, so it's like -- Okay why did you evoke that imagery exactly? Or there are dudes hanging out who canonically died many years apart from each other. One of the quests has you beat in the face of a guy named General Xeno, except the famous General Xeno was -Roman- and maybe you meant Zeno except he was a PHILOSOPHER and also Jason didn't crush his head with a mace, so okay...
It feels like the ancient greek version of Diana: Warrior Princess, which is ironic because that was already a parody. I don't know. Maybe I'm reading too much into this. This is already HAM-FISTED TALES OF MURDEROUS MYTHOLOGY, why should a couple MORE inaccuracies bother me?
Also, in case I'm accidentally making this sound like a good RPG? It totally isn't. The RPG elements SO FAR:
An upgrade/skill tree.
You collect new weapons.
You are allowed to talk to people.
The combat system is clunky and doesn't quite work right.
It doesn't even have STATS, so clearly it is not much of an RPG. *sniff*
Aw. Medea is all like "meh oracles" and just decides to waitin the car on the boat. Oh well. BUT!! While dinking around on Oracle Island, I meet PAN. Pan is awesome. He's like a Cheshire Cat except he's a goat-guy. (And... not too shabby, either.) He will apparently be my STAND-IN MAGE while I hope for Medea to want to come along. I'm down with this. He has a lilty perky voice, too. Yay Pan!
Also the Oracle has a pet gryphon which has FLAMES jetting out of its eyes and face. Because why the fuck not.
Next it looks like I get to go to... uh... Mycenae, Saria, and Kythra, to search for "The Bloodlines of the Gods", except it's just three of the gods I guess. Then I come back to Delphi and MAGIC HAPPENS and we find where the Golden Fleece is, which I want to bring Jason's wife back from the dead. THAT'S WHAT THAT DOES, RIGHT? I have actually -heard- of both Mycenae and Saria, so I'll be hitting Kythra first.
Okay, so Pan can live as long as he wants, and he won't tell anyone HOW because the "world is better with some mysteries left in it", he loves to hang out at Delphi because "so many interrreesting people come to see the Oracle!", he's hitting up Hercules for ALL THE STORIES, and he's getting cheerful and bouncy because he LOVES hanging out with people at sea. If Pan's quarters aren't the one with the huge double-bed and all the weird bowls and jugs laying around, I will be SHOCKED. (Also, Pan for ROMANCE OPTION, may I be so bold as to ask? Sigh. It will NEVER HAPPEN. Which is a shame. His voice is adorable.)
Medea Status: still meditating. Her Spider Sense picks up a DARK POWER on Kythra, but it's not exactly EVIL, it's kind of wavering between good or evil. MYSTERIOUS. But it looks like she is not going to be an active party member at all, so I am feeling like a BALL was dropped. I was totally hype for ninja spellcasting antics. OH WELL THIS GAME CAN'T BE -THAT- COOL.
"The high priestess Medusa and her brother Perseus". ... Uh-huh! Island full of statues, you say. Cursed, you say. No visitor ever seen again, you say. GUYS I THINK I KNOW WHERE THIS IS GOING.
Oh, okay. Athena turned all the people to stone to protect them from the Ionians. This is totally a GOOD thing, that they were statues, because the Ionians couldn't kill them while they were rocks. *blink* Ssssure. And I have to find five of the most virtuous villagers and get them to open the temple with their virtues (AVATARRRR) and then I can try to find Perseus and Athena. ... Yeah, we can roll with this I guess.
Out in the forests, some dude was kept alive as a statue for years on end, in the middle of being stabbed with a spear, JUST so he could tell me some things and then die. Wow man. Your life sucked, even for mythology. Meanwhile, "blah blah blah this is how our city grew. All great things grow from smaller things." Hercules: "AND SOME KEEP GROWING! :D :D" Oh Hercules.
See, this is where you guys can be happy I'm playing this and not you. This line will take you maybe ten seconds to read. In those ten seconds I spent like four hours running around corridor forests while the framerate played merry hopscotch and I got lost repeatedly because the "Map" and "Quest" functions are more like VAGUE SUGGESTIONS of where something might be located.
I think I should... oh, good. Someone put the story Pan just told up on Youtube. ENJOY his LILTY VOICE ACTING. I sure am. This dude could read me aaaaanything.
I just won a debate against an EVIL BLACKTONGUE by playing the "Ah'm just a simple backwater country king, not given to spurious sophistry and loquacious soliloquies, but here's what ah DO know..." card and then pointing the control stick at random dialogue options and pushing A. I can't believe that fricking worked. Jason just goes off on a stream-of-consciousness rant about divine will and justice and courage that leaves an entire chamber of philosophers speechless.
"How did you refute all of his arguments?" "I simply spoke from the heart." "Your wisdom is the wisdom that will pierce veils of ignorance!" *kaminasunglasses.jpg*
So there's Perseus... and he's ... kind of a dingleberry. I mean, this guy is an ASS. Get over yourself, Perseus. I don't want this guy on my crew goddamn it. ... Okay, on to Medusa. OH LOOK GIANT SNAKES WHO KNEW. Apparently she's been cursed because she was too vain. That's a thing now.
...holy revisionist mythology, Batman...
And so in this version of the myth, Jason tells Perseus off for being a self-centered douche who thinks he knows what's right all the time, clears the temple of Medusa's twenty-foot tall snakes, and then breaks the symbolic representation of her vanity, causing her to revert to humanity and join the crew while Perseus sulks at home.
This is a thing now. I'm just... ridin' off into the sunset with Medusa. This is success. This... OKAY YEAH you know what? I never liked the original ending to that story anyway. GREAT! REWRITE!
Oh. And when we get back, Argos has been assassinated. BLACKTONGUES! *FIST TO SKY*
Next time: Mycenae or Saria? I DON'T KNOW! Do you guys want to decide?
Jason's Uncle is EEEEVIL. Who knew? Jason is like three minutes out of port when we get a cutscene that's just RIPPLING with compression artifacts, showing him meeting with... MASTER XENAHORT? ... Wait, no, it's some other tiny bald man dressed all in black with sunken eyes. Too bad, this almost became an AWESOME CROSSOVER.
One thing I'm sort of loving for stupid reasons is the complete lack of interest not just in historical accuracy (which I kind of expected) but also the lack of interest in mythological accuracy. Like, you go see a fortune teller and she's named PANDORA and it's like "ooh Pandora" but she's just this sort of vaguely grumpy old lady, so it's like -- Okay why did you evoke that imagery exactly? Or there are dudes hanging out who canonically died many years apart from each other. One of the quests has you beat in the face of a guy named General Xeno, except the famous General Xeno was -Roman- and maybe you meant Zeno except he was a PHILOSOPHER and also Jason didn't crush his head with a mace, so okay...
It feels like the ancient greek version of Diana: Warrior Princess, which is ironic because that was already a parody. I don't know. Maybe I'm reading too much into this. This is already HAM-FISTED TALES OF MURDEROUS MYTHOLOGY, why should a couple MORE inaccuracies bother me?
Also, in case I'm accidentally making this sound like a good RPG? It totally isn't. The RPG elements SO FAR:
An upgrade/skill tree.
You collect new weapons.
You are allowed to talk to people.
The combat system is clunky and doesn't quite work right.
It doesn't even have STATS, so clearly it is not much of an RPG. *sniff*
Aw. Medea is all like "meh oracles" and just decides to wait
Also the Oracle has a pet gryphon which has FLAMES jetting out of its eyes and face. Because why the fuck not.
Next it looks like I get to go to... uh... Mycenae, Saria, and Kythra, to search for "The Bloodlines of the Gods", except it's just three of the gods I guess. Then I come back to Delphi and MAGIC HAPPENS and we find where the Golden Fleece is, which I want to bring Jason's wife back from the dead. THAT'S WHAT THAT DOES, RIGHT? I have actually -heard- of both Mycenae and Saria, so I'll be hitting Kythra first.
Okay, so Pan can live as long as he wants, and he won't tell anyone HOW because the "world is better with some mysteries left in it", he loves to hang out at Delphi because "so many interrreesting people come to see the Oracle!", he's hitting up Hercules for ALL THE STORIES, and he's getting cheerful and bouncy because he LOVES hanging out with people at sea. If Pan's quarters aren't the one with the huge double-bed and all the weird bowls and jugs laying around, I will be SHOCKED. (Also, Pan for ROMANCE OPTION, may I be so bold as to ask? Sigh. It will NEVER HAPPEN. Which is a shame. His voice is adorable.)
Medea Status: still meditating. Her Spider Sense picks up a DARK POWER on Kythra, but it's not exactly EVIL, it's kind of wavering between good or evil. MYSTERIOUS. But it looks like she is not going to be an active party member at all, so I am feeling like a BALL was dropped. I was totally hype for ninja spellcasting antics. OH WELL THIS GAME CAN'T BE -THAT- COOL.
"The high priestess Medusa and her brother Perseus". ... Uh-huh! Island full of statues, you say. Cursed, you say. No visitor ever seen again, you say. GUYS I THINK I KNOW WHERE THIS IS GOING.
Oh, okay. Athena turned all the people to stone to protect them from the Ionians. This is totally a GOOD thing, that they were statues, because the Ionians couldn't kill them while they were rocks. *blink* Ssssure. And I have to find five of the most virtuous villagers and get them to open the temple with their virtues (AVATARRRR) and then I can try to find Perseus and Athena. ... Yeah, we can roll with this I guess.
Out in the forests, some dude was kept alive as a statue for years on end, in the middle of being stabbed with a spear, JUST so he could tell me some things and then die. Wow man. Your life sucked, even for mythology. Meanwhile, "blah blah blah this is how our city grew. All great things grow from smaller things." Hercules: "AND SOME KEEP GROWING! :D :D" Oh Hercules.
See, this is where you guys can be happy I'm playing this and not you. This line will take you maybe ten seconds to read. In those ten seconds I spent like four hours running around corridor forests while the framerate played merry hopscotch and I got lost repeatedly because the "Map" and "Quest" functions are more like VAGUE SUGGESTIONS of where something might be located.
I think I should... oh, good. Someone put the story Pan just told up on Youtube. ENJOY his LILTY VOICE ACTING. I sure am. This dude could read me aaaaanything.
I just won a debate against an EVIL BLACKTONGUE by playing the "Ah'm just a simple backwater country king, not given to spurious sophistry and loquacious soliloquies, but here's what ah DO know..." card and then pointing the control stick at random dialogue options and pushing A. I can't believe that fricking worked. Jason just goes off on a stream-of-consciousness rant about divine will and justice and courage that leaves an entire chamber of philosophers speechless.
"How did you refute all of his arguments?" "I simply spoke from the heart." "Your wisdom is the wisdom that will pierce veils of ignorance!" *kaminasunglasses.jpg*
So there's Perseus... and he's ... kind of a dingleberry. I mean, this guy is an ASS. Get over yourself, Perseus. I don't want this guy on my crew goddamn it. ... Okay, on to Medusa. OH LOOK GIANT SNAKES WHO KNEW. Apparently she's been cursed because she was too vain. That's a thing now.
...holy revisionist mythology, Batman...
And so in this version of the myth, Jason tells Perseus off for being a self-centered douche who thinks he knows what's right all the time, clears the temple of Medusa's twenty-foot tall snakes, and then breaks the symbolic representation of her vanity, causing her to revert to humanity and join the crew while Perseus sulks at home.
This is a thing now. I'm just... ridin' off into the sunset with Medusa. This is success. This... OKAY YEAH you know what? I never liked the original ending to that story anyway. GREAT! REWRITE!
Oh. And when we get back, Argos has been assassinated. BLACKTONGUES! *FIST TO SKY*
Next time: Mycenae or Saria? I DON'T KNOW! Do you guys want to decide?
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no subject
Date: 2012-07-28 12:54 am (UTC)I vote Mycenae for it's vague resemblance to myconid!
no subject
Date: 2012-07-27 09:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-07-28 10:09 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-07-28 10:32 pm (UTC)I have in fact wandered up on deck, to check out the conversations, although I don't know if there's more I'm missing or if I'm missing the precise timing for between-islands. I've been trying to get in some chatter-time with everyone on the ship before and after each mission, and right before picking a destination. (Now that there's more people aboard, this oughta be more involved.)
Unfortunately, between here and Dreamwidth, you're 2/1 outvoted for Mycenae. Hopefully you'll stick around for the full run as I china-shop-crash my way through this particular game!
no subject
Date: 2012-07-29 12:15 am (UTC)Anyway, I've no qualms at all. I certainly will stick around, and moreover, am looking forward to it! By the will of Ares, BEGIN!
no subject
Date: 2012-07-29 04:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-07-29 06:44 am (UTC)There also apparently used to be a punch, kick, and slap Dialogue UI options (honestly, that's their file name. DialogueUI_Fist_Punch_Icon, so on), which has me imagining Jason punching/kicking/slapping people on command. There was also more combat options (a running shield bash so you'd flip enemies behind you, throwing severed heads at your enemies), a weather system, and even ones for grass and cloth, and a Miracle and Torments system, where if the player neglected to seek favor with a god, s/he may step in and corrode your armor/blind you with mist or whatehaveyou. The opposite was true, where if the player favored a god enough, they'd help out. Send a spectral army, call a flurry of lightning (with a sparkle radius, even!), the like. A bunch of dropped characters (Plato, Aristotle, Hera, Chiron...) and the Argonauts used to have specific side quests and character arcs, too.
And the player could revisit islands and more stuff would happen. Story-wise, there was a monumental plot change to Saria, but I won't go into it, as you haven't jaunted through that island yet. Other than that, there's a few backstory changes and ton of dialogue and side stories that were scrapped, such as the Hand Taker being in the arena because he murdered Senator Anaxagoras's daughter, but believed that "these deaths," "they're not our fault," because "we're just the tools of the gods." And there was more interaction with King Lycomedes and...pretty much everyone. It's pretty obvious they scaled back. Publisher probably got cold feet.
...Wow. I went on far longer than I intended. Anything in particular you want to hear more about?
no subject
Date: 2012-07-29 04:41 pm (UTC)I imagine the publisher had a lot to do with it. Codemasters had a difficult 2008, closing down a few studios, having one of their big selling point Names die on them rather tragically the year before, some generally poor sales all around. At that, the developer (Liquid Entertainment) seems to have mostly a history of RTS games and ... adventure games based on TV dramas. Okay! I wouldn't be surprised if someone dreamed way too big and then had to trim for actual release.
I'm increasingly fascinated by this game and the contrast between what is and what could've been. Man this could've been a blockbuster of a game.
no subject
Date: 2012-07-29 10:02 pm (UTC)...You know, I didn't actually think to check up on how Codemasters was doing at the time. That's a lot of likely influences. Yeah - the developers, especially Ed Castillo - seemed very excited and passionate about Rise. Trim and trim and whoa where'd it go?
A blockbuster in story/writing/characters, atmosphere, and...expansiveness, perhaps (though I believe the game as it is now does very well with the former two). The animations are a bit...fumbly. And there's no doubt of hardware issues (glitches, texture popping, crashes). Though those can be fun in their own right, especially if it's timed perfectly with the dialogue.
"How does it work?"
[CRASH]