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High Highs and Low Lows

  • Sviel
  • 07/14/2014 05:11 AM
  • 1894 views
PART I

tl;dr This game is far more polished than most, visually, and evidently benefited from the work of several talented people. However, its successes can't gloss over its failures for the whole run, making it exciting to play at the start and mercilessly painful by the end. I'm conflicted on whether or not to recommend it because...the story/characters are ok, but not worth it...and the combat is not worth it at all, ever. The way each character progresses is very interesting, but not fine-tuned all that well and certainly not worth playing the game for. It seems like too good of a game not to recommend, but in the end, it's not fun enough to really say 'go for it.' Perhaps the best I can do is to say play it, but don't be surprised if you decide not to finish it.

Part I of this review will be spoiler free and such. Part II will leave little to the imagination. The former is to give info about the game and justify the rating and such while the latter is all for the devs and anyone else who might want to read the notes I took while playing the game. Speaking of rating, the game will be judged on Story, Gameplay and Presentation, with a tenth of the score awarded based on sentiment or w/e. Basically, on how the game felt as a whole once everything else was accounted for.

STORY: The way the story is related, at the beginning, is very well done. However, by the end, there's a whole lot missing. It's not super novel to begin with, which is fine, but then it doesn't really try to fill in holes or generally make sense beyond the basic premise. We never do find out what the Bad Guys were trying to do or why they were opposed to us. We never meet the Actual Big Bad and have no explanation for the Actual Boss or anything. We can guess, yes, but the most likely answers are not satisfying and raise even more questions.

What questions are answered are generally done so in a campy way. Like, the enemies foiling their own plans due to forgetfulness.

It's never offensively bad, just, it doesn't get good.

Usually, when this happens, it's because the devs decided to focus on characters instead. That is not the case, here. There are certainly some interesting characters, though, it's usually because they are the exact opposite of some uninteresting character you've seen before. The gag works for a minute then quickly grows stale.

That sounds worse than it is, so, allow me to go into detail...Alma, the main character, is easily the best fleshed out of them all. She's very static in that we know everything we will ever know about her very early on, but she's also legitimately interesting. There are nuances to her that you have probably not seen very often mixed in with other, more familiar fare. The result is that she doesn't feel like as good of a character as she is, but, this may be in part because of Elsa.

Elsa is the anti-lady, which is an opposite-character that has been done pretty often. She is not, however, very interesting. It's also hard to believe that she's a general of some country. Eventually, she does gain a few more dimensions, but never shakes that caricature feeling. Raising her IQ a bit or at least giving her some obvious thought patterns beyond 'destroy everything' earlier in the game would go a long way.

Ooze is executed pretty well, though, is still firmly a side character. Certainly not enough to carry the game. The same can be said of Ezekiel. Both are interesting and fleshed out, but don't get enough screen time or impactful scenes to be stars.

NPCs are actually really awesome. The world is crafted on their shoulders and shines because of it. Unfortunately, after an initial rush, they practically disappear from the game along with most of the other story elements due to the titular Spire.

Upon entering the Spire, the game turns into some sort of dungeon crawler. Consequently, the story takes a back seat. It never quite recovers...each time an installment is made, it leaves more questions than before. We also get a whole lot of screentime with the Not The Real Bad Guys who we have little reason to care about.

Eventually, we reach the ending. It wraps up just about nothing and includes a segment where a side character does The Thing that the main characters out to do. The required transfer of caring from one party to the other is too much of a strain. It feels like the middle of a game rather than the end of one.

Rating - A mixed bag of characters combines with an underdeveloped story that has too many loose ends and not enough impact. (20/40)

GAMEPLAY: This comes in the form of combat and puzzles, though mostly combat. Some of the puzzles are fun and challenging while way too many are just rote work. Most of them don't take so long that it becomes a big issue, though.

Of note, any items that can be interacted with are pointed out to the player within a certain radius around the character. This felt a little weird at first but was greatly appreciated over the course of the game.

And, with that out of the way...combat.

Each character has a totally unique way that they grow stronger. This is, at first glance, really cool...but the systems are not tuned very well so a great deal of the potential is lost. Overall, it's still a positive addition the game, at least.

There aren't too many items, which is great, and those that exist generally have some purpose other than just having higher numbers than the last bits. This is very appropriate for a shorter game.

In addition, each character has a different combat style, though the actual end result of said styles overlaps quite a bit.

All of this contributes to a potentially great combat experience, but it's dragged down by the lack of challenge in any of the early battles. By the time anything challenging does show up, it is far too late to salvage the combat experience...and a level or two will make even that battle easy enough. The type of challenge is usually either a Numbers Test or a Cripple fight. In the former, it's just a matter of if your stats are high enough and in the latter, you'll have something taken away from you, like all of your skills. Strategy seems to be intended, but is ultimately not delivered.

Then, while the Random Encounters start off as reasonable, some of the Spire floor designs force way too many of them. The result is that combat wears thin quickly; it becomes a chore.

Thus, the player finds themselves in the Spire with puzzles they don't like and combat they'd give anything to avoid. It becomes very easy to question why you're putting up with all this and the Story doesn't give much in the way of incentive.

Perhaps the most disappointing bit is that, when the stars aligned and a battle was appropriately challenging, combat was actually quite fun. Too bad it was the exception rather than the rule.

Rating - An intricate character progression system is let down by very poorly managed challenge. Level design is also inconsistent and at many times frustrating. (10/40)

PRESENTATION: This is where the game excels. I have little to say here other than everything is beautiful and fits well. The mapping is solid and full of life and even the menus are polished to a shine. Not to mention the abundant custom art that is impressive by any standard.

Rating - There are a few clarity issues in combat, but they didn't leave a sour taste, possibly due to the lack of challenge. Besides that, all seems well. (18/20)

OVERALL: Some games seem like more or less than the sum of their parts. This time, despite the ultimately disappointing composition, it was the result of two parts dragging rather than the three not putting their best collective foot forward. (10/10)

Total - 48/100

Part II

-The opening screen is simple, but leaves a strong impression.

-The player is dropped right into the story with no explanation. However, nothing confusing is said; the player gets all the necessary info and gets right to work.

-Also, the custom art is very well done.

-It seems that walking near a map element with some interaction to it causes an arrow to appear over it. This is nice in that it makes it impossible to miss things, but, it also takes the thrill out of exploration. Perhaps because it's utilized for things like 'antidotes' as well as critical story objectives. Maybe it's just because this it the beginning of the game?

-In the middle of the rampant ALCHEMY foreshadowing, I find the number 7775 scrawled somewhere. I wonder how that's going to become important later.

-I encounter a COMBAT TUTORIAL GOLEM and get a quick look at how progression is going to be handled. It seems like a reskinned version of skill trees, but is far more interesting because of it. Also, EQ progression is tied to it and the ability to add a party member. Much, much more interesting than a basic skill tree.

-After a long, seemingly pointlessly long room, I find a BOOKSHELF that demands NUMERICAL ENTRY.

-It seems that the game is going to have dual characters. I get switched over from ALMA to ELSA.

-ELSA has a unique combat style, but it seems like there is never a time where she would want to use a basic a attack. It seems like a rather extraneous option.

-Shortly thereafter, it is explained that ELSA gets a mechanic that gives her basic attacks a chance to kill on hit. So there's a reason for it, though...as of now, I'm not a fan of the low-chance insta-kill.

-What's nice, though, is that ELSA has enough healing to be the 'healer,' but has more interesting skills besides so that she also has ways to contribute when times are not so rough.

-Battles thus far have been quite easy, which is ok for the beginning of the game.

-It seems that the 'character leveled up' message after battle gets auto-skipped?
-UPDATE: No, just the battle HUD displays briefly in between text boxes, so the player sees the characters names flash in between notifications.

-ALMA and ELSA meet up. There's some dialogue, which is decent, but I'm not quite sold on the characters as of yet. They seem a little flat, thus far, though they haven't had much opportunity to show themselves off.

-With two characters, DIALOGUE happens pretty often. ALMA emerges as the more developed character while ELSA steadfastly remains the 'unlearned brute.'

-ALMA seems to fully complete her research in a single battle every time. Not sure what's up with that. No developments are available, yet, so perhaps more research will appear once these are finished?

-Seems that the COMBAT GOLEM is the only development? I wonder if I misunderstood how EQ worked.

-I find an OOZE and befriend it. Feeding it causes it to lvl up, but doesn't raise its current hp as well as it's max so that it ends up being very 'hurt.'

-Seems that OTHER STUFF can be developed only after the COMBAT GOLEM.

-There's some THING that tells me when I'm about to hit a RANDOM ENCOUNTER, but, not sure if there's any interaction with it.

-The ARROW EXPLORATION system is definitely more appreciated right now. In larger environments, I still have to explore to find stuff, but I don't have to check every single object. Thus, I get a very similar result without as much wasted time.

-I go into TOWN and people TALK. ELSA and ALMA both seem a little less interesting, though ELSA moreso. Both characters are familiar and static thus far, but ALMA is somewhat more complex...or perhaps, just not as common.

-In the scene where ELSA and ALMA reunite with OOZE and EZEKIEL, EZ refers to ELSA with 'miss.' In this context, it should be capitalized.

-I EXPLORE a bit. A PAINTER asks the party to model for him and gets punched in the face by ELSA. Then, the party models for him, perhaps out of pity. The dialogue during this bit is the best yet.

-There's a lot of...Message Bits? Like, Person A will say one thing, then Person B will say another that...ah, I'll just...
-A: My grandson's drawings look so much better than the stuff in this gallery.
-B: My grandfather doesn't realize I need real criticism to grow and improve.
or
-A: Mom won't let me dye my hair. Doesn't she realize that, as an actor, I need to stand out?
-B: My daughter needs to stand out through practicing her talent, not by wearing strange hair colors.

These aren't bad, though, I wonder what the ultimate goal of it is. There are other, more subtle bits as well. Notably, Alma makes a point out of mentioning that she's married quite often. Elsa takes offense to being called a lady or 'miss,' Ezekiel's story about a princess has her being dragged back to her castle by guards after she tries to seduce him.

All of these are fine, in theory, but taken together it kind of feels like all of Tumblr is going to be waiting for me in my bedroom with an AXE or some other pain-inflicting device, perhaps in order to have a nice chat. Bucking convention is, in these cases, positive and interesting...but doing it every creates an 'opposite day' atmosphere that is almost as bizarre as what it's trying not to be.

-I find a CHILD in town who I can introduce characters to, thereby changing their names. Nice touch.

-It really is Opposite Day. This is somewhat unsettling.

-In the LUXURY SHOP, the worker in the back forgets the 'e' in 'make' when talking about how the vampires protect everyone.

-In the SCHOOL, on the 2nd Floor? an NPC says 'form' instead of 'from' in the sentence 'There's a lot of talented people FORM all around the country...' Also, 'there's' should be 'there're.'

-This is definitely the game Tumblr deserves.

-THUNDER STORM seems like a lesser version of THUNDER BOOK?

-I should mention that, while ELSA's skill growth system is quite cool, making any headway on her BONE ARMOR really restricts her skill use and, therefore, usefulness. She doesn't become a burden, but she does become less interesting.

-I have now memorized the necessary sequence of inputs to defeat the SKELETON TRIO enemy group.

-It follows that combat hasn't become any more challenging than the beginning of the game. This might be because I'm using my available options very well, but, it's not like enemies hit hard at all either. Note, I'm using SUPER SPORES with Plant Ooze, then SANDSTORM with Alma. Everyone else is on clean-up, if needed. Works for every battle with basically perfect results. If GOLEM gets the MAT buff on ALMA quick enough, she deals an AoE OHKO.

-I find an AUDIO puzzle. At the moment, I'm able to solve it, so all's well there. RANDOM ENCOUNTERS are turned off for the puzzle, so that's a huge relief. Hard to conduct music whilst turning the undead.

-I talk to the BAND MEMBERS and figure out the proper order, but then when it comes to GO TIME, they're all numbered and I don't know who is who. Inspecting the instruments helps, but, since it's just a sample, isn't as helpful as it could be.

-There is a CUTSCENE where ALMA and ELSA talk about how challenging the monsters are. I beg to differ. I then reach the next section of floors, which is harder, but only in that it takes a bit longer to kill stuff. I don't have to adjust my strategy at all.

-I find a MAZE level in the SPIRE. With RANDOM ENCOUNTERS, the effective result is that I have no choice but to fight way more than usual as I attempt to get from place to place. The battles, however, are not interesting enough to support such gameplay.

-For some reason, SANDSTORM seems to be manifesting as a powerful basic attack sometimes? It doesn't go on CD, but something gets smacked really hard without the rock animation.

-Yep, the skill name that pops up is 'Attack.' It's not the same as her basic attack, though, because it doesn't fire more than once like the ELIXIR GUN.

-I get to floor 10 and fight the second BOSS. It dies in less than a full round of combat.

-The next section is dedicated to ICE. On the sliding sections, encounters are possible, so the rate plummets. With a bit of thought, ENCOUNTERS can be avoided entirely.

-I finally get attacked and fight more AoE FODDER. One enemy, though, uses a REFLECT type skill that makes all of my AoE magic damage turn back on me. For them, I simply use a physical attack and call it a day.

-I ENCOUNTER GENERAL FLIPPERS. Not sure why, but, ok. The fight is challenging enough that I have to change up my strat a bit, though I'm never really in danger. This is FINE. I rather ENJOY it. Here's hoping that happens more often.

-PLANT OOZE learns something that gives him 5 lvls of MAT...but thus far, has 0 abilities that are affected by MAT.

-GENERAL FLIPPERS returns, this time with a new crew, including the REFLECT WITCH. Strategy is much the same, but, there are alternative strats that are about equal in effectiveness, which is nice. A definite improvement over earlier floors.

-The next floor has pits at the end of the ice which I can fall into and then restart from a designated point. Takes a minute, but I figure out how to get around. The repeated walking is rather annoying, though.

-It is unfortunate that the floor with the best ENCOUNTERS thus far has the lowest ENCOUNTER rate.

-I fight the BOSS. It opens with an attack that drops everyone to 1% hp or something, but must be percentage as it killed no one. GOLEM brings the party back to near full right away, so the tension is about lost. Seeing as I've developed literally everything right now, there's no way that the GOLEM wouldn't be able to do that...so rather than feeling like I made a good investment, I feel like that was going to happen no matter how I chose to develop things.

-EZEKIEL'S betrayal was foreshadowed to the point of obviousness, which isn't necessarily a poor choice. The convo before fighting him gives ELSA a badly needed new dimension too. Hopefully, the betrayal makes sense at some point in the future.

-I kill him in basically two attacks. Two from ALMA, that is, meaning he does get one hit in.

-After BEATRICE whisks EZEKIEL away, there's an impassable block left on the ground if the player backtracks.

-The new POISON place has HUGE maps. There's no brainwork required to navigate them; just a willingness to slog though battle after battle after long, straight, paths. Doesn't help that the battles are back to being boring.

-It would not be unfair to say that the SPIRE feels like a completely different game from the rest, and not really in a good way as it sharpens the focus completely onto the battles...which are probably the low point of gameplay.

-The VENOMFLY's SPORES attack looks like an AoE, but actually only affects one person. Took a while to realize why people were being stunned since the animation doesn't target anyone.

-ALMA has been wearing the EXP boosting thing forever, but is only about half a level ahead of ELSA. It really does not seem worthwhile if it's going to max out at +1 lvls worth of stats.

-A few hours after getting the MAT boost, OOZE gets a form that combines PLANT and MYSTIC so that it can actually benefit from said MAT.

-Some "other worldly force" prevents me from opening a chest. K.

-The first ENCOUNTER in this MAGIC section has a mob that seals all of my skills right off the bat. Lovely. SPAM ATTACK is a go.

-Well, seems there -was- a way to make the battles less interesting.

-The next MAGIC floor contains a 'puzzle.' It requires no thought, just some running around.

-All of OOZE's forms are maxxed out, but I keep finding tons of food for them. Seems like the system wasn't meant for me to max out so early, but I've done literally zero grinding, so...?

-The ANCIENT SCROLL and his sealing is seriously not fun.

-Some odd cutscene plays, then I fight BEATRICE and her MANIONS. All of them are dressed only in their underwear. It's a fairly well-made point and amusing to boot.

-It's not a super hard fight, though a few members do drop, for once. It's a lot closer to what the RANDOM ENCOUNTERS should have been.

-After the fight there's more talking. Really feels like the game doesn't even attempt to capitalize on the weight of anything that just happened, though, we do get some interesting revelations about OOZE. Sort of.

-That is, apparently, not the end of the tower.

-I find a cross which tells me that ALMA was inspired to make new gear for ELSA. There's no dialogue, though, just a notification.

-I find a GLASS BRIDGE 'puzzle' which is, again, more of an excuse to make me run around and suffer RANDOM ENCOUNTERS.

-Seems like, by the time ELSA gets her BONE GEAR, it will be ready to be replaced by something else. I already have another set she could be using if boosting her attack was in any way necessary...she only gets to attack in boss battles, mostly.

-I fight the HOLY BOSS, which is inexplicably way stronger than anything else ever encountered. I LOSE, though it seems more like a failure of NUMBERS than a failure of STRATEGY. I wonder if that CAVE I found earlier next to the TREEHOUSE is open.

-I leave the SPIRE and make my way through hordes of weak enemies to get to the TREEHOUSE.

-I break the SEAL and enter. The enemies give very high rewards, though, thus far, they die to first turn AoE damage.

-After getting through the CAVE, I find the actual strong enemies.

-They're tough, and fun. I notice that OOZE is the only party member that deals relevant damage now.

-Given OOZE's super high magic damage, I'm not sure why poison would ever be a useful option.

-The 'other worldly force' still prevents me from opening the box on floor 20.

-I return to fight the HOLY BOSS. After that CAVE FORAY, it seems that I have become strong enough to OHKO her summons, thus making everything smooth sailing. And by smooth sailing, I mean she dies in three rounds. For reference, my last attempt went fifteen plus rounds. Winning, there, wasn't really satisfying since I know that it wasn't due to anything I did. Even if I had actually had to grind, I would have felt like I expended some effort to win...instead, I just did some other content first, then came back and steamrolled the fight.

-Seems the next fight is the FINAL BOSS. I have MIXED FEELINGS going into this.

-FINAL BOSS drops in just over a round of combat? I'm guessing there's Something More?

-THERE IS. EZEKIEL's betrayal (again?) is handled pretty well, though, I still know next to nothing about what's going on.

-Suddenly, I AM the EZEKIEL.

-He needs DP to use attacks, but it builds very slowly. Meaning, nothing to do but SPAM ATTACK for a while.

-More accurately, nothing to do but SPAM ATTACK until I die.

-PROTECTION PRAYER seemed to have no effect?

-GAME OVER again. And again.

-In the interest of BEING DONE, I decide to just spam RESTORATIVE ITEMS.

-The ENEMY lowers my ATK/DEF to the point that I'm dealing ~15 damage per attack. Bleh. Time for DISPEL CHARM spam, which, btw, removes one stack, not two like it says?

-Next up is a 1v4 battle with an enemy that repeatedly seals all of my skills. Oh joy. Said enemy gets healed for half the amount I can attack for each turn, to boot.

-Or not? Apparently, the OTHER BOOK was doing it?

-Anyway, the fight is not difficult, just a DRAG.

-The next enemy deals purely POISON damage. It does not build DP like other damage, leaving EZEKIEL with little to do but bust out fifteen damage ATTACKS unless he specced for starting DP.

-But, unless one starts with enough DP, their stats aren't high enough to build DP due to the enemy's super high defense or w/e. I don't think the dev realizes how frustrating this 'guess the right build' gameplay is.

-Still searching...rather, no build seems good enough for a decent shot, so just retrying until I get lucky enough to be hit with a damaging skill before I lose too much hp.

-Having exhausted STRATEGY, I move on to GRINDING.

-The SUPER EXP enemies quickly spike my power, and I BULLDOZE the BOSS. As in, she dies in the first round to my first attack.

-So does the next boss.

-And the next one.

-The SPIRE powers up EZEKIEL? The explanation to this is literally, 'why not?'

-STUFF happens. The game ENDS, more or less. A whole lot goes totally UNEXPLAINED, which might be ok, but the ending as is...is not even nearly worth the pain and suffering endured to get to it.

-Apparently, EVERYONE helped make this game.

Posts

Pages: 1
Well, I agree with the battles being too easy.
I didn't realize you could still have random encounters near the end, though. Which you needn't, btw, although it did rely on luck.

The reason Ezekiel can be powered up is because he is a demon. Your ability is also domonologist-whatever, and he mentioned it himself. It is obvious for anyone who played In Search of Immortality, though.
I must be really unlucky, then.

I got that, but since it wasn't powering him up before hand, it still felt like deus ex machina.
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