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After playing this, I had thought I had more of a problem with Ed's turn, but in hindsight, I don't think that's what bothered me. It's more of the fact that you have Anna get this big reveal and then get killed off, Ed's true character is revealed, and then a lot of the plot just kind of happens without explanation (like how Ed escaped) in order to force the way to the conclusion. I think if more care had been taken with those elements instead of dumping them all at once, it would have stayed together, but as it is, this is where I started to feel really detached from the story so that by the end I really did not care. There are also the minor annoyances. Like how the game goes awkwardly out of its way to call out Bennett on his cultural insensitivity but has no problem using the common misinterpretation of what a haiku is. Not to mention that Reno is borderline lazy exoticization anyway. Those are kind of balanced by the bright spots: I love how the 'parlous' bit is handled so smoothly. Ray & the detective do have some pretty good interaction.
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Jun 2, 2015 01:44
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Kangra posted:After playing this, I had thought I had more of a problem with Ed's turn, but in hindsight, I don't think that's what bothered me. It's more of the fact that you have Anna get this big reveal and then get killed off, Ed's true character is revealed, and then a lot of the plot just kind of happens without explanation (like how Ed escaped) in order to force the way to the conclusion. I think if more care had been taken with those elements instead of dumping them all at once, it would have stayed together, but as it is, this is where I started to feel really detached from the story so that by the end I really did not care. Everything you say in that first paragraph are things I liked about that segment. The reveal, and especially Anna's sudden death, effectively blindsides both you and the other characters, and the frenetic mess of events afterwards probably fits how Ray and Bennett must be feeling and experiencing things. As for Ed's escape, it seems the game plans to explain it eventually, otherwise there'd be no reason for Ray and Bennett to keep mentioning it. I do agree that Reno and the Japanese motif is awkward and a bad way of presenting the 11 Foundation. I think there needed to be a lot more to the 11 Foundation than "information collectors" to justify that.
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Jun 2, 2015 16:07
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 Ray and Bennet continue trying to trace Ed. Click on the image to watch the video.  So we found out a bit more about Ed's motivations and what happened before, but it's all still relatively unclear. Looks like Ed is planning to blow up the hospital. I feel that at this point the game's plot has gone just a bit off the rails. First of all, since Ed already gained access to the mainframe room, why does he even need to use the Resonance devices to destroy it? Second, how many are there stolen devices? Did he take more from the vault or what? In any case, and here is where the other issue with this game finally rears its ugly head, this is actually the last proper update. All that's left is to see the possible endings (which are not too long each) and we're done. Yes, for real. But we'll talk more about that after we're finished. Also, sorry again about a slight audio drift in this video.
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Jun 4, 2015 20:29
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EDIT: Oh hey you said that at the end of the post, lol. But yeah, things got interesting... obviously can't trust anyone. legoman727 fucked around with this message at 20:54 on Jun 4, 2015 |
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Jun 4, 2015 20:51
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If the Eleven Foundation were planning to use the Resonance devices, then why didn't they help Ed escape? Or kill Ed and take the devices for themselves? It would be much more fruitful for them to make a deal with Ed and to get their hands on the technology, reneging the deal later on if necessary. And yeah this is an extremely convoluted plan for revenge, Ed.
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Jun 6, 2015 03:32
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You know, I actually enjoy the ways Wadjet Eye games tend to explode into insanity in the last act. It uh, it keeps you guessing! Like, no, none of this makes ANY sense so far. The world they've presented is not one where hobo rasta man and his Japanese Mother Companion are information brokers of... everything... and Ed's entire life is bizarre and fuzzy, but darned if it isn't entertaining!
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Jun 6, 2015 06:08
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Is this a maximum point run?
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Jun 6, 2015 21:17
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Bacter posted:hobo rasta man ...with Manchester accent!  Mraagvpeine posted:Is this a maximum point run? No, definitely not, if nothing else because I skipped that optional wiring puzzle at the very beginning. However, nothing should be missed story-wise and I don't expect too many points to be missing (in fact probably they will all be there except for that puzzle and maybe one or two other small things).
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Jun 6, 2015 21:30
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ivantod posted:...with Manchester accent! He reminds me of Sol from Snatch, played by Lennie James. That dude was born in Nottingham, but his parents were both from Trinidad. In fact that's probably where they got the idea for the character.
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Jun 6, 2015 21:45
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Kangra posted:There used to be some sliding block mazes pretty similar to the puzzle box on mathpuzzle.com, but that site has changed over the years and I don't think they are there anymore. Still working my way through the backlog, but that puzzle design is actually a classic- it was actually used to teach me about set theory and some other stuff way back in the day.
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Jun 6, 2015 22:57
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 This time, we'll see the first possible ending of this game. Click on the image to watch the video.  So the first option is to stop Ed from destroying Antevorta--this is achieved by manoeuvring him right into the middle in between his resonance device and the other that Ray has in his pocket. Thus, killing him when the devices are activated. However, publishing Ray's article eventually seems to lead to the truth behind the project. Speaking of which, did you notice who was standing right next to the Vice-president during his speech? But either way, this potentially could be classified as a "not-horribly-bad" ending, albeit at quite a cost. You may be wondering how the ending changes if Ray opts not to publish the article. You can watch the video with the changed headlines here. As expected, in this version, Antevorta pretty much takes over the world. As a matter of curiosity I will note that this game is from 2012 and actually predates the whole NSA/Snowden scandal--not that people were not already aware of it before then, though, but that is what really brought it front and centre for many. There is one more possibility for ending, which we will address next time. And no, unfortunately, none of the endings involve Anna surviving this whole thing.
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Jun 7, 2015 17:21
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I kinda wish the game would show more of the Eleven Foundation, maybe from Ed's point of view. And can you show a list of achievements?
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Jun 8, 2015 02:31
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Mraagvpeine posted:I kinda wish the game would show more of the Eleven Foundation, maybe from Ed's point of view. And can you show a list of achievements? The achievements are all listed on this game's Steam page, here: http://steamcommunity.com/stats/212050/achievements. There doesn't seem to be any secret ones, which is kind of interesting as there are a couple that are a bit spoilery--relating to the endings.
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Jun 8, 2015 21:53
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I saw an achievement about a commentary mode. What's that about?
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Jun 8, 2015 22:22
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Mraagvpeine posted:I saw an achievement about a commentary mode. What's that about? Oh, yeah, there is an option in this game to play it with developer's commentary enabled--basically as you play, you get snippets of audio commentary from the creator (Vince Twelve) and the publisher (Dave Gilbert from Wadjet Games and his wife who also helped with coding). There are also some bits from a couple of voice actors (Abe Goldfarb and the guy who plays Ray). It's kind of interesting and I'll cover some of the tidbits in the last part next time.
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Jun 8, 2015 22:39
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This seems like a ridiculously convoluted way to make a false-flag operation. Which kind of goes along with what I said about Ed's convoluted way of destroying Antevorta. Ray proved to be one hell of a writer though, he somehow managed to convince people to put Amul and Reno on the global most wanted list! And that's despite all the evidence the Foundation no doubt fabricated against him.
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Jun 9, 2015 05:54
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 Hi, this is the last part of Resonance, in which we explore the other alternative ending. Click on the image to watch the video.  So this ending seems to at first make things better, but then the world more or less regresses back to where it was, with Eleven guys at large. I'm going to lave it up to you to figure out which of the 2.5 endings we saw is actually a good outcome! The one interesting thing is that here we don't get a choice whether to publish the article or not. * * * Well, that's the end of the game and the end of this LP. It was fun for me, and hopefully for you too. As for the game itself, I am kind of torn. It has many good points, but in the end, at least to me, it feels a little half-baked. Most importantly, even though it's not super short (when you add up all the videos, it comes probably to a good 5-6 hours), it somehow feels short, like there is in the end, not a whole lot to do in it. It's kind of weird, because to me, Anna always felt like the central figure of the story, but then she gets killed about 2/3 of the way through and the rest just seems like going through the motions a little bit. Interestingly enough, the game actually has a developer's commentary option where as you play you can hear occasional insights from the author Vince Twelve and also Dave Gilbert from Wadjet and a few of the voice actors. As I have mentioned before, the game was largely a labour of love of one person (Vince) until Wadjet stepped in to help finish it out with Dave Gilbert's wife helping as a developer. Overall I have to say that technically, the game is quite good for its genre/type with nice music and voice acting and good graphics too. Not to mention the interesting game mechanics like memory and managing multi-person team which both work quite well I think. To me it always seemed a bit like the game was cut shorter that it was supposed to be, but it seems not to be the case based on the commentary. The scene in the vault was always meant to be what it is now. In fact, the game was intended to start there and then flash back to the beginning, but ultimately it was decided that it would be too much for the player to digest all that after just starting the game so they changed it around. In a way, up until the vault, it feels like a really exciting prologue to a big story, but then it kind of doesn't end up going much of anywhere with it. I feel that there's a bit too much random stuff in the game that just falls by the wayside as the story goes on--for example the computer guy that keeps popping painkillers, we never see him again. A few other things, but most importantly the Eleven foundation, which seems just a collection of random elements that don't really seem to fit together very well. Like, what's the deal with the Japanese lady? Turns out, Vince's wife is Japanese and they lived there for quite a while. In fact she even voices that character. There doesn't seem any other reason for her to be what she is. And then there are just plain plot holes, if you ask me. Like the whole mainframe thing--would they really just have all of that on one mainframe and no way to recover it if gets destroyed? I am sorry, but that's a bit too much to swallow. In the end, as I've said, the game is quite topical with its themes of government surveillance and secret databases and so on, even though it does predate the whole NSA scandal by about a year. And it may seem that I am really unloading on the game right now, but in fact that's only because it has so much potential that it can't help but feel a bit unfulfilled at the end. All right, I've been talking enough, I will leave you here and probably see you soon in another thread with something COMPLETELY different than this! Once again thanks to everybody for watching and participating!
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Jun 9, 2015 19:17
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Ray couldn't you convince Ed to turn himself in and get Bennett on your side that way?ivantod posted:As for the game itself, I am kind of torn. It has many good points, but in the end, at least to me, it feels a little half-baked. Most importantly, even though it's not super short (when you add up all the videos, it comes probably to a good 5-6 hours), it somehow feels short, like there is in the end, not a whole lot to do in it. It's kind of weird, <Insert major development of plot or gameplay> and the rest just seems like going through the motions a little bit. This is basically .txt for a lot of indie games nowadays. This is almost always the case. They are either too short because the developer didn't know how to space the story better, or they are padded with filler to make them feel longer. There is rarely a middle ground. I will give this game credit, there were very few parts where I would have had to rub my entire inventory on something before continuing, but it still feels like a disjointed story.
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Jun 9, 2015 21:00
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SSNeoman posted:This is basically .txt for a lot of indie games nowadays. This is almost always the case. They are either too short because the developer didn't know how to space the story better, or they are padded with filler to make them feel longer. There is rarely a middle ground. Not that I'm advocating "rub everything on everything else" puzzles, but I think part of the problem with this game is kind of in that area: if you look at it carefully, you will realise that probably about half or even 2/3 of it is basically people standing around and talking. Sure, the dialogue is actually decently written and they are talking about interesting stuff, but it feels like you only very occasionally do a couple of things before hitting the next dialogue section, doesn't it? Again, I don't even think this is a bad game (and for $10 how much it costs, you can do a LOT worse), but even though it has a seed of something good in it, and its heart is in the right place, it is for sure extremely flawed in execution--not so much on the technical side as there it's actually quite decent, but on the writing/pacing side. Basically, it feels very front-loaded: e.g. there is that long puzzle section right at the beginning when Ed gets at the lab for the first time, but there really isn't anything like that later on any more. Oh and here's another tidbit: Sarah Elmaleh, who plays Anna, is actually the one who brought in Logan Cunningham. Basically she already knew him from before and suggested it to the producers and they said, "no way, he's not going to do it", and she said, "well, why don't you ask him", and they did and he said yes.
ivantod fucked around with this message at 21:18 on Jun 9, 2015 |
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Jun 9, 2015 21:15
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