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This post has been edited by Jewels: 15 October 2008 - 09:34 AM
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Exodus 6.85 (9.1/5.0)
MultiQuote#2 Guest_Tyranicus_*
Posted 09 March 2008 - 08:59 PM
Nice, TM. 
Kel continues the epic tale set in Bahssikava in Exodus, but Exodus is not the same as Bahssikava to any extent. There is just as much outdoor exploration as dungeon crawling. Overall, the plot and gameplay are good, but there are a few incredibly aggravating things. The fracking berekh pit is a good example. I almost gave up in disgust at that point. Also, the slime quest was much more difficult than it should have been. The ending seemed a little forced too. It was almost like he didn't know how to end, so he added a trip to the underworld for fun. Perhaps Kel was one of the writers for Monty Python?
All in all, Exodus is a scenario that is worth playing at least once, but be prepared to scream curses a few times while playing.
6.2
Kel continues the epic tale set in Bahssikava in Exodus, but Exodus is not the same as Bahssikava to any extent. There is just as much outdoor exploration as dungeon crawling. Overall, the plot and gameplay are good, but there are a few incredibly aggravating things. The fracking berekh pit is a good example. I almost gave up in disgust at that point. Also, the slime quest was much more difficult than it should have been. The ending seemed a little forced too. It was almost like he didn't know how to end, so he added a trip to the underworld for fun. Perhaps Kel was one of the writers for Monty Python?
All in all, Exodus is a scenario that is worth playing at least once, but be prepared to scream curses a few times while playing.
6.2
#3 Guest_Nioca_*
Posted 09 March 2008 - 08:59 PM
The second part of what appears to be the trilogy called Bahssikava, this scenario picks up where the first left off.
Like the previous one, this scenario is comparatively massive in size. It also aesthetically gets the job done, with a stunning outdoors, and a lovely indoors. The story flows smoothly, though it does have a few kinks, and the dialogue was excellent. The special spells were nice, and I made regular use of them. I particularly liked Death Knell.
However, under it's beautiful veneer, there are some flaws. First, combat was a little too challenging. Don't get me wrong, I like difficult combat, but the difficulty I was encountering in there could easily have been reserved for boss fights. So much so, in fact, that the bosses aren't that much more difficult than their henchmen. This happens from the first fight to the very last.
Also, certain spots were tedious filler (Berekh Hive, 'Ark' quests) that could easily have been cut out without causing any problems in the scenario. Yes, there's symbolism to the second one, but it doesn't really add that much.
Finally, I was saddened to find out that there was only one small spot where Phaedra could travel with me. I enjoy having extra characters in my party.
Overall, an excellent scenario. Beware, though, as this scenario will push you to the limits of your adventuring skills.
EDIT: I played it again just today.
It actually was even better then the first several jaunts through. Several parts that irritated me before actually weren't that bad this time through. I liked the challenge the fights provided me. My score is changing to reflect this.
Final Score: 9.1
Like the previous one, this scenario is comparatively massive in size. It also aesthetically gets the job done, with a stunning outdoors, and a lovely indoors. The story flows smoothly, though it does have a few kinks, and the dialogue was excellent. The special spells were nice, and I made regular use of them. I particularly liked Death Knell.
However, under it's beautiful veneer, there are some flaws. First, combat was a little too challenging. Don't get me wrong, I like difficult combat, but the difficulty I was encountering in there could easily have been reserved for boss fights. So much so, in fact, that the bosses aren't that much more difficult than their henchmen. This happens from the first fight to the very last.
Also, certain spots were tedious filler (Berekh Hive, 'Ark' quests) that could easily have been cut out without causing any problems in the scenario. Yes, there's symbolism to the second one, but it doesn't really add that much.
Finally, I was saddened to find out that there was only one small spot where Phaedra could travel with me. I enjoy having extra characters in my party.
Overall, an excellent scenario. Beware, though, as this scenario will push you to the limits of your adventuring skills.
EDIT: I played it again just today.
It actually was even better then the first several jaunts through. Several parts that irritated me before actually weren't that bad this time through. I liked the challenge the fights provided me. My score is changing to reflect this.
Final Score: 9.1
#4 TM
Posted 09 March 2008 - 09:00 PM
Those who liked kel's previous monsterpiece will be in for a ride, and it's more-than-likely that the experience will be fulfilling and climactic. The rest of us, however, are likely to find this effort as weak, monotonous and dispassionate as its predecessor. It sure is long, but there's no real meat to it, and when it gets into gear, it quickly sputters out. Don't try pulling an all-nighter with this one; you'll fall asleep mid-way through and be wondering why you wasted your time in the morning.
...warning. Spoilers ahead.
It's better than its predecessor in certain ways. It looks better, for instance. Big deal, I know-- Kel's not nearly as good aesthetically as myself or Ephesos, but for what little this says about anything else, it doesn't look as unattractive anymore.
There are special spells. Yeah. It's a decent attempt to make things interesting, and tosses more variety into the encounter than BS had. At least, it's a very good effort.
Plus, there actually is a story with this one! I'll comment on it later, but it was nice to actually have missions towards the scenario that were more meaningful to the story than simply being tangential.
Now, for the negatives.
The combat sucks, and hard. Enemies are HUGE. Like, they take too long to knock down. Hit points and resistances have been cranked up WAY too high. There's little variety; there are summoners that bring forth larger piles of hit points, but that's ABOUT it. There's some variety towards the end-- being held in place was an interesting development in the combat. But you'll get bored by the vast majority of it. "Kill this random horde of evil-nasty sliths" gets boring quickly, and then keeps on going for another 40-45 towns' worth.
Oh! Speaking of which-- the villains of this scenario are "barbaric sliths". You know, the demon-worshipping kind. They're Evil with a capital 'E'. And then, there's the local fauna and flora.
Which would be more forgivable if half of the scenario wasn't simply "get from point A to point B". So for the majority of the time, you'll simply be doing gopher missions-- go for this, go for that... When those finish up, you get two incredibly inane and totally out-of-the-blue "fetch the item" quests. Yeah. The purpose of these-- that is, the explicit purpose-- is to annoy the player. They succeed at just that.
And then the REAL plot kicks in. Keep in mind-- you could cut the final third of the scenario off, have a SMALL scenario, and have the SAME STORYLINE. Just add a bit about crossing a lot of terrain and you'll have the general idea. And when you get there, the storyline is, well... It's distinctly better than its predecessor. Revelations happen far too quickly. Learning who the goddess is, then learning who she REALLY is, etc... it all comes far too fast for you to actually care. Kel makes sure to toss in a stupid and inexplicable dungeon or two inbetween each plot point, but since these dungeons are utterly and completely unrelated to the plot in question, you never actually learn to CARE. I mean, why the **** did kel stick a golem-infested city en route to the central plot point? There are far better ways to make a plot point stick.
Then, there's going to the suspiciously square-shaped land of the dead, where you... that's right... kill lots of high-level enemies. The average enemy here is ABOVE level 90. The amount of hacking and slashing that constitutes the final dungeon is enough to make Vlad the Impaler want to kick the designer square in the balls.
Oh! And I may be speaking out of order, but I'm going to go ahead and label the berekh hive The Worst Thing in All of Blades. It's horrible and awful and stupid. You'll have to experience it for yourself... unless you don't like hurting yourself.
If you liked Bahssfisshing, you may find this one enjoyable... but it takes the formula to its extremes. The combat is bad, the plot wavers between "stupid" and "irrelevant", and if I had to say, I'd actually call this one worse than the original. There are attempts made to make it better, but the badness of the original has been expounded upon in no meaningless fashion. If others haven't grown listless and beleaguered by the "senseless bloodbath" school of design yet, I suspect they will be by the end of this one. 6.0
...warning. Spoilers ahead.
It's better than its predecessor in certain ways. It looks better, for instance. Big deal, I know-- Kel's not nearly as good aesthetically as myself or Ephesos, but for what little this says about anything else, it doesn't look as unattractive anymore.
There are special spells. Yeah. It's a decent attempt to make things interesting, and tosses more variety into the encounter than BS had. At least, it's a very good effort.
Plus, there actually is a story with this one! I'll comment on it later, but it was nice to actually have missions towards the scenario that were more meaningful to the story than simply being tangential.
Now, for the negatives.
The combat sucks, and hard. Enemies are HUGE. Like, they take too long to knock down. Hit points and resistances have been cranked up WAY too high. There's little variety; there are summoners that bring forth larger piles of hit points, but that's ABOUT it. There's some variety towards the end-- being held in place was an interesting development in the combat. But you'll get bored by the vast majority of it. "Kill this random horde of evil-nasty sliths" gets boring quickly, and then keeps on going for another 40-45 towns' worth.
Oh! Speaking of which-- the villains of this scenario are "barbaric sliths". You know, the demon-worshipping kind. They're Evil with a capital 'E'. And then, there's the local fauna and flora.
Which would be more forgivable if half of the scenario wasn't simply "get from point A to point B". So for the majority of the time, you'll simply be doing gopher missions-- go for this, go for that... When those finish up, you get two incredibly inane and totally out-of-the-blue "fetch the item" quests. Yeah. The purpose of these-- that is, the explicit purpose-- is to annoy the player. They succeed at just that.
And then the REAL plot kicks in. Keep in mind-- you could cut the final third of the scenario off, have a SMALL scenario, and have the SAME STORYLINE. Just add a bit about crossing a lot of terrain and you'll have the general idea. And when you get there, the storyline is, well... It's distinctly better than its predecessor. Revelations happen far too quickly. Learning who the goddess is, then learning who she REALLY is, etc... it all comes far too fast for you to actually care. Kel makes sure to toss in a stupid and inexplicable dungeon or two inbetween each plot point, but since these dungeons are utterly and completely unrelated to the plot in question, you never actually learn to CARE. I mean, why the **** did kel stick a golem-infested city en route to the central plot point? There are far better ways to make a plot point stick.
Then, there's going to the suspiciously square-shaped land of the dead, where you... that's right... kill lots of high-level enemies. The average enemy here is ABOVE level 90. The amount of hacking and slashing that constitutes the final dungeon is enough to make Vlad the Impaler want to kick the designer square in the balls.
Oh! And I may be speaking out of order, but I'm going to go ahead and label the berekh hive The Worst Thing in All of Blades. It's horrible and awful and stupid. You'll have to experience it for yourself... unless you don't like hurting yourself.
If you liked Bahssfisshing, you may find this one enjoyable... but it takes the formula to its extremes. The combat is bad, the plot wavers between "stupid" and "irrelevant", and if I had to say, I'd actually call this one worse than the original. There are attempts made to make it better, but the badness of the original has been expounded upon in no meaningless fashion. If others haven't grown listless and beleaguered by the "senseless bloodbath" school of design yet, I suspect they will be by the end of this one. 6.0
#5 Guest_Smoo_*
Posted 09 March 2008 - 09:01 PM
I must confess: I finished Exodus with a god party. I initially played using my no spellwielding singleton, the very same that beat Bahs as a matter of fact. But when I reached the slime pit I realized that I had no interest in slowly biting my way through thousands and thousands of hit points. More on this later.
I think Exodus is currently the best third-party scenario released... to feature vahnatai. And TM, I did like Bahs, but Exodus mostly just annoyed me. It doesn't do anything spectacularly well.
I can safely say that Exodus is one huge scenario. It clearly tries to compensate for Bahssikava's lack of outdoors by providing zounds of outdoor sections for the player to march through. Granted some of them are a bit empty but there's a lot of them.
I can't really say I liked the overall town design. The friendly towns (as in actual towns) were a-okay but some of the dungeons were just plain ugly. For example, the berkh pit was really dull looking and the fact that I had trouble figuring out the height differences didn't help at all.
Thankfully Exodus has significantly less cut scenes than Bahssikava. This time Kel uses his scripting skill to make dozens of special spells both offensive and defensive. I only checked the offensive spells with a god party and a few of them were pretty neat. The addition of area effect spells was a welcome plus.
Exodus deals with the journey of a select group of (mostly) sliths. The characters are as follows:
Slithkoth - the greedy outspoken dumbass.
Ithkit - The literate poet-type.
Pithoss - The warrior with a dark past.
Phaedra - The pregnant badass warrior. Look how feminine she is!
Machorne - The comedic sidekick who fortunately doesn't do much buffooning this time. He also recaps what has happened recently in case the player hasn't been paying attention.
Kass - The religious zealot.
Ethass - Um, the motherly type?
Legare - The guy who mostly sleeps in his hut but everyone thinks he's cool nonetheless.
- Snarly, Bitey and Hissy - Pure awesomeness. (+ 0.1 points for them)
Personally I think the characters could have used a bit more work. Perhaps Kel could have
allowed the player to talk to them some more. With some characters you can only really talk about one thing. (Like Phaedra and her pregnancy.)
There's more to the plot this time around but there are some parts where it's lacking. The whole concept of scouting for the expedition was pretty good up until I reached the Lava Ocean. That part was terrible! There are way too many identical outdoor encounters for comfort in that huge motherloving portion of the scenario. After the Lava Ocean things picked up when the expedition's internal difficulties started. Unfortunately Kass' "do this for the temple" and "do that for the temple" quests kill the enjoyment once again. Why couldn't the player just say "this really isn't necessarry" in stead of Slithkoth putting a stop to Kass way too late.
[SPOLERS!]
When the troubles with the Goddess escalated I nodded my head in approval. When Kel finally killed off a character I jumped up and down like a giddy schoolgirl. Still, Kel my man, you should have killed more expeditioners. It would have added to the drama. Unfortunately the quest after the death was worthy of a facepalm. It's introduction went something like this: "Okay, now that he's dead you must travel to the underworld and free his soul from torment. Luckily the one and only gate to underworld is JUST AROUND THE CORNER!" Why? Why must it be so damn convenient?
[END SPOILER]
A word about the villains as well. They were slightly better than in Bahssikava. But still they were mostly demons and demon worshiping sliths. Nonetheless, Old One Eye brought a smile to my face. He/It almost... almost made up for the pure tedium that was the slime pits.
Alright everything holds together reasonably well so far. Unfortunately, in the combat Exodus deftly runs into a brick wall. There has got to be a better way of making high level combat than giving the enemies gajillion hit points. Even when the monsters have as "little" as one thousand hit points, I groan. But when the monster has more than three thousand hit points and resistance to melee damage, I spontaneously combust. *Shudder* I dread the day Kel makes the third instalment and the enemies have even more hit points.
Let me end this review by pointing out how much I hate sequels. It's a totally irrational hatred but I really dislike sequels in general and since Exodus leaves the plot unfinished again, I'll silently curse in my native Finnish...
7.2
Oh and one more thing. If I may extract a part of Kelandon's article "High Level Scenarios":
"Therefore you have to be careful when you hand the party rewards ... they'll be annoyed. The same goes if the reward for a tough quest is Arcane Blow at level 3 and the party doesn't have any mages." Yu-huh! I didn't.
I think Exodus is currently the best third-party scenario released... to feature vahnatai. And TM, I did like Bahs, but Exodus mostly just annoyed me. It doesn't do anything spectacularly well.
I can safely say that Exodus is one huge scenario. It clearly tries to compensate for Bahssikava's lack of outdoors by providing zounds of outdoor sections for the player to march through. Granted some of them are a bit empty but there's a lot of them.
I can't really say I liked the overall town design. The friendly towns (as in actual towns) were a-okay but some of the dungeons were just plain ugly. For example, the berkh pit was really dull looking and the fact that I had trouble figuring out the height differences didn't help at all.
Thankfully Exodus has significantly less cut scenes than Bahssikava. This time Kel uses his scripting skill to make dozens of special spells both offensive and defensive. I only checked the offensive spells with a god party and a few of them were pretty neat. The addition of area effect spells was a welcome plus.
Exodus deals with the journey of a select group of (mostly) sliths. The characters are as follows:
Slithkoth - the greedy outspoken dumbass.
Ithkit - The literate poet-type.
Pithoss - The warrior with a dark past.
Phaedra - The pregnant badass warrior. Look how feminine she is!
Machorne - The comedic sidekick who fortunately doesn't do much buffooning this time. He also recaps what has happened recently in case the player hasn't been paying attention.
Kass - The religious zealot.
Ethass - Um, the motherly type?
Legare - The guy who mostly sleeps in his hut but everyone thinks he's cool nonetheless.
- Snarly, Bitey and Hissy - Pure awesomeness. (+ 0.1 points for them)
Personally I think the characters could have used a bit more work. Perhaps Kel could have
allowed the player to talk to them some more. With some characters you can only really talk about one thing. (Like Phaedra and her pregnancy.)
There's more to the plot this time around but there are some parts where it's lacking. The whole concept of scouting for the expedition was pretty good up until I reached the Lava Ocean. That part was terrible! There are way too many identical outdoor encounters for comfort in that huge motherloving portion of the scenario. After the Lava Ocean things picked up when the expedition's internal difficulties started. Unfortunately Kass' "do this for the temple" and "do that for the temple" quests kill the enjoyment once again. Why couldn't the player just say "this really isn't necessarry" in stead of Slithkoth putting a stop to Kass way too late.
[SPOLERS!]
When the troubles with the Goddess escalated I nodded my head in approval. When Kel finally killed off a character I jumped up and down like a giddy schoolgirl. Still, Kel my man, you should have killed more expeditioners. It would have added to the drama. Unfortunately the quest after the death was worthy of a facepalm. It's introduction went something like this: "Okay, now that he's dead you must travel to the underworld and free his soul from torment. Luckily the one and only gate to underworld is JUST AROUND THE CORNER!" Why? Why must it be so damn convenient?
[END SPOILER]
A word about the villains as well. They were slightly better than in Bahssikava. But still they were mostly demons and demon worshiping sliths. Nonetheless, Old One Eye brought a smile to my face. He/It almost... almost made up for the pure tedium that was the slime pits.
Alright everything holds together reasonably well so far. Unfortunately, in the combat Exodus deftly runs into a brick wall. There has got to be a better way of making high level combat than giving the enemies gajillion hit points. Even when the monsters have as "little" as one thousand hit points, I groan. But when the monster has more than three thousand hit points and resistance to melee damage, I spontaneously combust. *Shudder* I dread the day Kel makes the third instalment and the enemies have even more hit points.
Let me end this review by pointing out how much I hate sequels. It's a totally irrational hatred but I really dislike sequels in general and since Exodus leaves the plot unfinished again, I'll silently curse in my native Finnish...
7.2
Oh and one more thing. If I may extract a part of Kelandon's article "High Level Scenarios":
"Therefore you have to be careful when you hand the party rewards ... they'll be annoyed. The same goes if the reward for a tough quest is Arcane Blow at level 3 and the party doesn't have any mages." Yu-huh! I didn't.
#6 ????
Posted 09 March 2008 - 09:02 PM
I honestly dont see whats so terrible about this. You people have huge standards, making a scenario is hard.
Fighting slith hordes got tedious after a while, but overall it wasnt half bad. It was worth the time I spent playing it, and thats all you can ask from a scenario, really.
Also, Terrors Martyr probably should go easy on the backhanded compliments. His entire post was either about how he was better or how the scenario was bad. He should hold his own scenarios to the light before he says something is just making you go from A to B (such as Mad Ambition).
7.5
Fighting slith hordes got tedious after a while, but overall it wasnt half bad. It was worth the time I spent playing it, and thats all you can ask from a scenario, really.
Also, Terrors Martyr probably should go easy on the backhanded compliments. His entire post was either about how he was better or how the scenario was bad. He should hold his own scenarios to the light before he says something is just making you go from A to B (such as Mad Ambition).
7.5
#7 Ishad Nha
Posted 09 March 2008 - 09:02 PM
The recommended level range is 55 - 70. I don't know where this figure came from, were the beta testers playing on Easy difficulty? I had no real trouble until the Breeding Pit, a few Heroic Brews or Invulnerability Potions were enough to get me through. But the Breeding Pit was bad news, and after all that the party was expected to defeat Dhalagant before resting!
Eventually I imported the HLPM towns 2,3 into the Exodus scenario and made the level 70 party into a god party. (I didn't want to start all over again. Empire Archer kept crashing town 3?!?) This solved all of my problems, but combat was way too easy, every fight was a cakewalk.
I am trying again with a level 250 party, this seems to be working so far. (I jury - rigged the HLPM so that the God parties are no longer necessarily level 250).
If the combat is made more bearable it is a good scenario. I have zero literary ability so I can't judge the worth of the plot.
By definition it will be a point A to point B scenario, with point A being Vasskolis and B being the homeland. I think some of the side quests made internal sense, Kass wanting to decorate the shrine for his own purposes because he is a zealot.
There were all sorts of minor glitches, I don't know if they are peculiar to my computer or not. For instance the Frahmann slith graphics had ghastly white backgrounds.
Overall I would give it an 8.
Eventually I imported the HLPM towns 2,3 into the Exodus scenario and made the level 70 party into a god party. (I didn't want to start all over again. Empire Archer kept crashing town 3?!?) This solved all of my problems, but combat was way too easy, every fight was a cakewalk.
I am trying again with a level 250 party, this seems to be working so far. (I jury - rigged the HLPM so that the God parties are no longer necessarily level 250).
If the combat is made more bearable it is a good scenario. I have zero literary ability so I can't judge the worth of the plot.
By definition it will be a point A to point B scenario, with point A being Vasskolis and B being the homeland. I think some of the side quests made internal sense, Kass wanting to decorate the shrine for his own purposes because he is a zealot.
There were all sorts of minor glitches, I don't know if they are peculiar to my computer or not. For instance the Frahmann slith graphics had ghastly white backgrounds.
Overall I would give it an 8.
#8 ????
Posted 09 March 2008 - 09:07 PM
For the record, I completed Exodus with a warrior singleton (who started at level 66 or so, ended up ~107) with enough mage and priest skills to haste and war bless himself. Some spoilers await below...
I really, really wanted this scenario to be good. I hoped the other reviews were wrong. For about the first half I just kept hoping, the next section, maybe the next section will be better; maybe I'll find some secret area, maybe the plot will take an enjoyably unexpected twist, just maybe... But it didn't.
The combat was, for the most part, incredibly frustrating. I can't sum it up better than frustrating. The breeding pit and the slime pits were probably the worst. Having to wait for a dungeonful of spellcasters who summon creatures that summon to take their turns is very exciting. Very. And after encountering the webbing slimes, dying, and reloading a number of times, I found my way to deal with them - lure one at a time, stay out of combat mode, and whack them. It was the only way to keep my singleton from being immobilized. Also, radiating paralysis or radiating fleeing was interesting, but as a singleton, it was nasty business.
The outdoor space was big. It looked decent (minus the purple and yellow cave floors), but I thought it was a bit emtpy. I wanted to explore and find more detail - old ruins, monster encampments, perhaps the remains of ancient sliths with accompanying info, etc. There were a couple side dungeons in the way of Dark Cave , the Drinking Pool, and the Temple of Sothana, but that was it. It was 'Go from A to B' most of the time. I wanted to discover and explore more, not just be told to go somewhere...
Which leads me to my biggest problem with Exodus: you don't have much choice as to what you do and the plot is not engrossing enough to make up for it. I never really was drawn into the plot; it was just... ehh. And in the same moment it becomes interesting, it loses it again! You find out the Goddess' identity and true identity all at once, then she exits stage left.
I also had a hard time caring about Legare dying. For that matter, I had a hard time caring about the characters at all. I wanted more CHOICE! Why couldn't I betray or mislead the expedition at every turn? (Yes, you could choose to kill Legare in the Lava Sea after encountering Dalaghant, but that was the only opportunity!) Why would I want to go find relics for Kass for his temple? Why couldn't I have more access to Legare? Why couldn't I refuse to go save Legare's soul? Why couldn't I incite more unrest among the expedition's members? For that matter, why didn't more expedition characters die? Why couldn't some unexpected attack occur on one of the expedition camps? Why couldn't something more interesting have happpened? Why couldn't the characters have had more personality?
Exodus is polished, but it has no meat to it. There are neat special spells, good graphics, few bugs and one can observe the effort put into its creation, but the mediocre plot, linearity without choice, and tedious, frustrating combat ultimately make it not very enjoyable to play.
Score: 6
I really, really wanted this scenario to be good. I hoped the other reviews were wrong. For about the first half I just kept hoping, the next section, maybe the next section will be better; maybe I'll find some secret area, maybe the plot will take an enjoyably unexpected twist, just maybe... But it didn't.
The combat was, for the most part, incredibly frustrating. I can't sum it up better than frustrating. The breeding pit and the slime pits were probably the worst. Having to wait for a dungeonful of spellcasters who summon creatures that summon to take their turns is very exciting. Very. And after encountering the webbing slimes, dying, and reloading a number of times, I found my way to deal with them - lure one at a time, stay out of combat mode, and whack them. It was the only way to keep my singleton from being immobilized. Also, radiating paralysis or radiating fleeing was interesting, but as a singleton, it was nasty business.
The outdoor space was big. It looked decent (minus the purple and yellow cave floors), but I thought it was a bit emtpy. I wanted to explore and find more detail - old ruins, monster encampments, perhaps the remains of ancient sliths with accompanying info, etc. There were a couple side dungeons in the way of Dark Cave , the Drinking Pool, and the Temple of Sothana, but that was it. It was 'Go from A to B' most of the time. I wanted to discover and explore more, not just be told to go somewhere...
Which leads me to my biggest problem with Exodus: you don't have much choice as to what you do and the plot is not engrossing enough to make up for it. I never really was drawn into the plot; it was just... ehh. And in the same moment it becomes interesting, it loses it again! You find out the Goddess' identity and true identity all at once, then she exits stage left.
I also had a hard time caring about Legare dying. For that matter, I had a hard time caring about the characters at all. I wanted more CHOICE! Why couldn't I betray or mislead the expedition at every turn? (Yes, you could choose to kill Legare in the Lava Sea after encountering Dalaghant, but that was the only opportunity!) Why would I want to go find relics for Kass for his temple? Why couldn't I have more access to Legare? Why couldn't I refuse to go save Legare's soul? Why couldn't I incite more unrest among the expedition's members? For that matter, why didn't more expedition characters die? Why couldn't some unexpected attack occur on one of the expedition camps? Why couldn't something more interesting have happpened? Why couldn't the characters have had more personality?
Exodus is polished, but it has no meat to it. There are neat special spells, good graphics, few bugs and one can observe the effort put into its creation, but the mediocre plot, linearity without choice, and tedious, frustrating combat ultimately make it not very enjoyable to play.
Score: 6
#9 Guest_Thralni_*
Posted 09 March 2008 - 09:07 PM
Before I go any further with this review, I'd like to say I played and finished it while playing with a god party. I didn't encounter any obvious bug that resulted from my choice of party, although I did encounter some other slightly weird stuff.
The way I'm gonna give a score is as follows: every major thing will earn its own score. I'll take the avergae of that, and then substract and add bonuses.
So let me begin with the design. It was horrid. I would say that in outdoors it was just a bit better than Crescent valley, and in the towns it was usually a lot worse. Mind you, though, that there were bits in the outdoors of Exodus at which my first reaction was to close my eyes. I mean, purple cave ground!? Yellow cave ground!? Sure... Don't get me wrong on this, not all of it was bad, but there was absolutely nothing in this startlingly large scenario (because the scenario is in fact huge, with over 50 towns, I think, and about 25 outdoor sections maybe?) that made me go wow. Now even something that I liked. It was all either average or mediocre, certainly not stuff that I would think of when thinking aboutan experienced designer such as Kelandon. I'm sorry, but I have to give the designing a scor of 2.
On to the next thing, the plot. Now that I liked. I liked the stuff about the Slith pantheon, and I liked how everything was written. it managed to pull me into the scenario. I also liked how the expedition interacted with its leaders (the mutiny, the rows, all that I found veeery well done). Though in hindsight I have the feeling hat I could have done without the story, this back bone was a very nice thing to come to know more about the Slith culture. So for this I give a score of 7.5.
Now I have a problem. The combat. As I said, I used a god party, because I already knew I would most probably give up in frustration. When I look at how I fought with this god party, and I realize that even with this god party, it sometimes took more than one blow from my melee fighters to take down a signle enemy, I must say that combat would probably be extremely difficult from time to time. And now this is a good point: there is a lot of difficult combat, but is it also fun? I think not. Lava lizards? Demons? You know, I miss the drakes. Where did you hide them Kel? Oh well. I figure that the combat is most of the time tedious and irritating, and there is too much of it too. Sometimes, combat was fun, though, so I'm gonna award it a 5.5.
The final thing I want to give a score is the credibility of the scenario. So yeah, sliths going to a homeland is not credible, and so is everything else in the Avernum trilogy. I do realise that, but what I want to talk about is something slightly different. Often I came somewhere and thought: "How can that be, that's just stupid..." What I'm talking about are thing like these two examples:
- Remember that city at the river with the two trees in it? Manikoss I think it was called. Okay, so this was stolen from VoDT, but putting that aside: you have a complete city, that died out because of pollution. I cna live with that, but the very first room I enter I am attacked by living, breathing monsters! I thought everything was supposed to be dead!
- The slime pit. While in itself a tedious hacfest, also not credible. Who in his right mind would make a city very deep in a cave, that has you walk through spiraling, small tunnels etc etc?
There are more of these things to be found, which disturbed me every now and then. For that I give a score of 5, because although there were some things that just did not fit, most of it was credible enough.
The average of these scores give us the following score: 5
And now it's time to nickle-and-dime, as Ephesos put it so nicely:
The very, very nice custom spells: +0.5
The nice, but sometimes overly long cutscenes: +0.1
The pregnancy and such (some details could have been spared...): -0.1
The characters at the expedition: +0.5 (I really liked those)
Vahnatai involvement (I usually hate that): -0.1
...but as it was nicely put in this scenario: +0.1
All the effort Kelandon put in the scenario: +0.5. I appreciated it, I really did.
So, my final score: 6.5
I know a lot of work went into Exodus. If you had paid more attention to designing (or maybe you did, I don't know, fact is I didn't like it) and kept out some of the strange incredible stuff, and some dialog problems I encountered, it would have been a higher score. I'm sure that the third part of the trilogy could be a lot better, learing from your mistakes in Exodus, like you learned from your mistaked in bahs, and therefor I'm very sorry you stopped designing.
The way I'm gonna give a score is as follows: every major thing will earn its own score. I'll take the avergae of that, and then substract and add bonuses.
So let me begin with the design. It was horrid. I would say that in outdoors it was just a bit better than Crescent valley, and in the towns it was usually a lot worse. Mind you, though, that there were bits in the outdoors of Exodus at which my first reaction was to close my eyes. I mean, purple cave ground!? Yellow cave ground!? Sure... Don't get me wrong on this, not all of it was bad, but there was absolutely nothing in this startlingly large scenario (because the scenario is in fact huge, with over 50 towns, I think, and about 25 outdoor sections maybe?) that made me go wow. Now even something that I liked. It was all either average or mediocre, certainly not stuff that I would think of when thinking aboutan experienced designer such as Kelandon. I'm sorry, but I have to give the designing a scor of 2.
On to the next thing, the plot. Now that I liked. I liked the stuff about the Slith pantheon, and I liked how everything was written. it managed to pull me into the scenario. I also liked how the expedition interacted with its leaders (the mutiny, the rows, all that I found veeery well done). Though in hindsight I have the feeling hat I could have done without the story, this back bone was a very nice thing to come to know more about the Slith culture. So for this I give a score of 7.5.
Now I have a problem. The combat. As I said, I used a god party, because I already knew I would most probably give up in frustration. When I look at how I fought with this god party, and I realize that even with this god party, it sometimes took more than one blow from my melee fighters to take down a signle enemy, I must say that combat would probably be extremely difficult from time to time. And now this is a good point: there is a lot of difficult combat, but is it also fun? I think not. Lava lizards? Demons? You know, I miss the drakes. Where did you hide them Kel? Oh well. I figure that the combat is most of the time tedious and irritating, and there is too much of it too. Sometimes, combat was fun, though, so I'm gonna award it a 5.5.
The final thing I want to give a score is the credibility of the scenario. So yeah, sliths going to a homeland is not credible, and so is everything else in the Avernum trilogy. I do realise that, but what I want to talk about is something slightly different. Often I came somewhere and thought: "How can that be, that's just stupid..." What I'm talking about are thing like these two examples:
- Remember that city at the river with the two trees in it? Manikoss I think it was called. Okay, so this was stolen from VoDT, but putting that aside: you have a complete city, that died out because of pollution. I cna live with that, but the very first room I enter I am attacked by living, breathing monsters! I thought everything was supposed to be dead!
- The slime pit. While in itself a tedious hacfest, also not credible. Who in his right mind would make a city very deep in a cave, that has you walk through spiraling, small tunnels etc etc?
There are more of these things to be found, which disturbed me every now and then. For that I give a score of 5, because although there were some things that just did not fit, most of it was credible enough.
The average of these scores give us the following score: 5
And now it's time to nickle-and-dime, as Ephesos put it so nicely:
The very, very nice custom spells: +0.5
The nice, but sometimes overly long cutscenes: +0.1
The pregnancy and such (some details could have been spared...): -0.1
The characters at the expedition: +0.5 (I really liked those)
Vahnatai involvement (I usually hate that): -0.1
...but as it was nicely put in this scenario: +0.1
All the effort Kelandon put in the scenario: +0.5. I appreciated it, I really did.
So, my final score: 6.5
I know a lot of work went into Exodus. If you had paid more attention to designing (or maybe you did, I don't know, fact is I didn't like it) and kept out some of the strange incredible stuff, and some dialog problems I encountered, it would have been a higher score. I'm sure that the third part of the trilogy could be a lot better, learing from your mistakes in Exodus, like you learned from your mistaked in bahs, and therefor I'm very sorry you stopped designing.
#10
BainIhrno 
- BoEnthusiast
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- Group: Members
- Posts: 347
- Joined: 26-January 07
Posted 16 March 2008 - 10:50 AM
I just finished playing it. While I can tell a lot of effort clearly went into it, it was still pretty bad. I could not stand playing it.
I'll start with some good aspects - The coding was good, the special spells were neat, and the graphics were a step-up from Kel's previous scenarios. I especially liked the Strange Cave graphics.
Plus, as TM said, this had more than just backstory. It had an actual 'plot.' It was somewhat interesting, but it's still only average.
What's bad? Where do I begin?
Like Bahss, the scenario is a giant hackfest. However, the combat was much more tedious here. The fire and ice lizards, the berekh hive, and the slime pit are shining examples of tedium. Really, about the whole scenario is, but those are just some examples of the worst.
Plus, there's lots of mandantory pointless quests tached on to make it longer. The Land of the Dead, as others said, was pointless and unnecessary. The whole thing could have been cut and the story would have been the same, and the scenario better. There was also plenty of other small stuff that is pointless filler.
Overall, while it took a lot of work, playing it was a blatant waste of time. It was frustrating, annoying, and it didn't need to be. While Kel has some good coding skills, it seems as if he uses them to make the scenario less fun...
5
...I know it's harsh. But it isn't fun, and it's so boring that it detracts from the mediocre story and everything else. Not worth playing. Believe me, if it weren't for the contest, I wouldn't be.
I'll start with some good aspects - The coding was good, the special spells were neat, and the graphics were a step-up from Kel's previous scenarios. I especially liked the Strange Cave graphics.
Plus, as TM said, this had more than just backstory. It had an actual 'plot.' It was somewhat interesting, but it's still only average.
What's bad? Where do I begin?
Like Bahss, the scenario is a giant hackfest. However, the combat was much more tedious here. The fire and ice lizards, the berekh hive, and the slime pit are shining examples of tedium. Really, about the whole scenario is, but those are just some examples of the worst.
Plus, there's lots of mandantory pointless quests tached on to make it longer. The Land of the Dead, as others said, was pointless and unnecessary. The whole thing could have been cut and the story would have been the same, and the scenario better. There was also plenty of other small stuff that is pointless filler.
Overall, while it took a lot of work, playing it was a blatant waste of time. It was frustrating, annoying, and it didn't need to be. While Kel has some good coding skills, it seems as if he uses them to make the scenario less fun...
5
...I know it's harsh. But it isn't fun, and it's so boring that it detracts from the mediocre story and everything else. Not worth playing. Believe me, if it weren't for the contest, I wouldn't be.
#11
Jewels
- Skribbane Smuggler
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- Group: Members
- Posts: 1,092
- Joined: 08-October 07
- Location:At my computer
Posted 17 April 2008 - 01:20 PM
I didn't like the story. I still liked the scripting. Since I didn't like the story my patience wore thin by the end. Bonus for effort.
7.5
7.5
Rubies are red,
Sapphires are blue,
But there's not a gem
That's as precious as you.
Sapphires are blue,
But there's not a gem
That's as precious as you.
#12
Iffy
- Unspecified Services
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- Joined: 16-July 07
- Location:Inside my comfortable box
Posted 31 May 2008 - 11:26 AM
Outdoor Design - 6
A lot of it was pretty good. However, a few parts made me want to stab my eyes out.
Town Design - 6
While a lot of it was pretty good, I saw some bad parts.
Combat - 5
So you make a whole bunch of overpowered monsters? No! You could have dumbed them down a bit. Plus, there are better things to do then fill a whole pit with 100 monsters.
Scripting - 8
Very good. The custom spells were a nice touch. However, a dungeon decided to shoot a rating a bit (200 points of acid damage every fourth step!?!.
Plot - 8
You managed to do well with the vahnatai. Few can do that. Other parts of the plot are good too. However, some things were just...bad.
Average - 6.6 +.4 for a great effort so...
Final Score - 7.0
(I would also like to add that with improvements, this scenario could be very excellent. The designer is also very excellent at making scenarios, in my opinion.)
A lot of it was pretty good. However, a few parts made me want to stab my eyes out.
Town Design - 6
While a lot of it was pretty good, I saw some bad parts.
Combat - 5
So you make a whole bunch of overpowered monsters? No! You could have dumbed them down a bit. Plus, there are better things to do then fill a whole pit with 100 monsters.
Scripting - 8
Very good. The custom spells were a nice touch. However, a dungeon decided to shoot a rating a bit (200 points of acid damage every fourth step!?!.
Plot - 8
You managed to do well with the vahnatai. Few can do that. Other parts of the plot are good too. However, some things were just...bad.
Average - 6.6 +.4 for a great effort so...
Final Score - 7.0
(I would also like to add that with improvements, this scenario could be very excellent. The designer is also very excellent at making scenarios, in my opinion.)
Don't judge a sentence until you know all the words.
Be grateful you have your unsellabe trowels -Goldenking
My BoA scenarios: Muffins n' Hell|The Triple Valley(Recently released)
Be grateful you have your unsellabe trowels -Goldenking
My BoA scenarios: Muffins n' Hell|The Triple Valley(Recently released)
#13
Ephesos
- Voice of Reason
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- Group: Members
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- Joined: 15-January 07
- Location:Somewhere dark... damn torch still won't light.
Posted 31 May 2008 - 02:19 PM
Bahssikhava II: This Time We Kill Things...
I call it half the proper name, half the TM-name because I'm torn about this scenario. On the one hand, TTWKT is an appropriate name. On the other hand, the scenario is a vast improvement over Bahss, and shows a lot of development on Kel's part. But anyway, TTWKT is shorter, so I'll use that for thiis review.
The plot of TTWKT is vastly better than Bahss. It has some real depth, a lot of which comes from the fact that the Slith pantheon is actually discussed a bit more in this one, so some more of it makes sense. Much to my surprise, by the end of the scenario, I found myself actually remembering the various gods/goddesses' names (or at least rough approximations therof... I mean, come on... Hathnazriakh?!). The goal of the expedition was clear: get downriver. Avoid dying. That was well-executed. I'll admit, I was starting to lose it by the time the Land of the Dead came up... the mythological ripoffs were annoying. But still, the plot was probably the biggest improvement over Bashingcarvea's. Oh, and how about the setup for the sequel?
Combat... I played on Normal, and entered with a roughly level 70 party. They left at level 100. Combat ranged from incredibly mundane hacking (shamblers, golems and lava lizards leap to mind) to the outrageously difficult (Deathcloud/Deathknell users, webbing slimes) to the flavorful challenges (the Presence, the Wicked Mage!). The last group made it worthwhile... otherwise, I would've been regularly opening the Editor and deleting monsters. I was already using it by Kathaneth to make sure I didn't stumble into a room with nothing but golems. But still, there was an appropriate amount of reloading that had to be done (though the Death- spell-wielders were not fun). But generally speaking, fights were very direct... and sometimes it was good. But after a while, I started liberally using the editor to reload on energy elixirs and SP.
Another major note on combat in TTWKT. Epic battles are cool. But BoA just doesn't handle them well, so TTWKT suffers. The Berekh Hive, while not quite as painful as TM deemed it, sucked (I think demon sex is completely unnecessary in a scenario). When I realized that the haaki lord had nice pants, I sighed and went back into the fray to kill him. And having to go through more pain to get to that spellbook was just not cool. Similarly, the huge battle in the Land of the Dammned was just stupid. It could've been done better, I'm certain. And I'd also like to say, enemies that web with their touch should never be given more than one attack per round!!!
Puzzles were thankfully not as excruciating as in Bahss. By which I mean, no huge beam puzzles. So, these were okay.
Dialogue was everything you'd expect from the Bahss plot... dense. But it was there, and it was always substantial. So it was good. Of course, it helped that some of the characters were familiar. (I object to Erika's presence, though.)
Cutscenes were... well, they varied. The water-parting was messy. The Khalthanad one in Thassaka marched my party onto a small lake. The various fights/arguments/gatherings in the camps were well-done. Any cutscene with Ethass was good. All in all, they evened out to 'meh'.
Scripting was naturally impressive, owing to the spell system, and the overall huge-ness of everything. I found bugs, but nothing which broke the game. Except for that one annoying auto-kill at the bandit camp, but the editor saw me out of that one... so it won't affect my score too much. The spells were impressive, though I wish I'd had some earlier (Destruction comes to mind). Not having to actually search bookshelves felt like cheating, though.
Items fit the epic-size challenges/combat/plot. Kel did a good job of spacing them out, though in the end my fighter felt like an avatar of sorts, with something like a +5 to ALL STATISTICS. That said, it started to make combat easier, so I shouldn't complain.
Towns and outdoors were unsatisfactory. The outdoors were just flat-out bad... sorry, Kel. Huge, boxy caves don't make a good setting. The first use of Luz's cave floor was nice... but the purple and yellow variations weren't. The outdoors were basically too big for the scenario, and rang like an echo of UV. Most towns were very similar, and furniture seemed to be thrown into rooms rather haphazardly... my personal style just made me cringe when I saw that kind of stuff. The Black Land was cool, though. However, the Land of the Dead was a huge disappointment in terms of terrain. For the glimpses of cool-ness that we see everywhere else, the goddamned Land of the Dead was dull. None of the towns really stand out enough for comment, either. Well, except for the constantly-moving camps... those were kinda cool.
So, I'm going to start with a rating of 7, and nickel-and-dime Kel for the rest... (I like that phrase, not sure why it came to mind)
+ Warning: Lava! ... +.1
- The Icy Longsword still does acid damage... you could've fixed that, Kel. ... -.1
- Machrone = Richard White? No. ...-.1
+ Phaedra gets a kid, and spells. Nice. ... +.2
- I'd like to take .1 for every level of webbing my party got, but that'd loop around the set of real numbers a few times... -.1
+ Running from One-Eye was fun, since I didn't want to fight. Sanctuary + Haste = Blatant thievery. ...+.1
+ Bitey, Hissy and Snarly... +.1
- Overuse of melee-resistance. ...-.5
- For labelling Ethass's cell. ...-.1
+ Just wanted to say that my archer had about 26 AP at one point in the fight alongside Pithoss and Legare. Not sure how, but it was cool. ...+0
+ Yay for Kel's apparent decision that summoning needed a boost... and thus Grizzlys were born, misspellings aside. ...+.1
- Boo for being able to summon a Phaedra with high-level Summon Shade. ...-.1
So, in the end, I'll give it a 6.6. I look forward to seeing what Kel tries to pull together for the next installment, should there be one. I'd recommend toning down the overall level, though... there's nowhere else to go from level 100 parties.
I call it half the proper name, half the TM-name because I'm torn about this scenario. On the one hand, TTWKT is an appropriate name. On the other hand, the scenario is a vast improvement over Bahss, and shows a lot of development on Kel's part. But anyway, TTWKT is shorter, so I'll use that for thiis review.
The plot of TTWKT is vastly better than Bahss. It has some real depth, a lot of which comes from the fact that the Slith pantheon is actually discussed a bit more in this one, so some more of it makes sense. Much to my surprise, by the end of the scenario, I found myself actually remembering the various gods/goddesses' names (or at least rough approximations therof... I mean, come on... Hathnazriakh?!). The goal of the expedition was clear: get downriver. Avoid dying. That was well-executed. I'll admit, I was starting to lose it by the time the Land of the Dead came up... the mythological ripoffs were annoying. But still, the plot was probably the biggest improvement over Bashingcarvea's. Oh, and how about the setup for the sequel?
Combat... I played on Normal, and entered with a roughly level 70 party. They left at level 100. Combat ranged from incredibly mundane hacking (shamblers, golems and lava lizards leap to mind) to the outrageously difficult (Deathcloud/Deathknell users, webbing slimes) to the flavorful challenges (the Presence, the Wicked Mage!). The last group made it worthwhile... otherwise, I would've been regularly opening the Editor and deleting monsters. I was already using it by Kathaneth to make sure I didn't stumble into a room with nothing but golems. But still, there was an appropriate amount of reloading that had to be done (though the Death- spell-wielders were not fun). But generally speaking, fights were very direct... and sometimes it was good. But after a while, I started liberally using the editor to reload on energy elixirs and SP.
Another major note on combat in TTWKT. Epic battles are cool. But BoA just doesn't handle them well, so TTWKT suffers. The Berekh Hive, while not quite as painful as TM deemed it, sucked (I think demon sex is completely unnecessary in a scenario). When I realized that the haaki lord had nice pants, I sighed and went back into the fray to kill him. And having to go through more pain to get to that spellbook was just not cool. Similarly, the huge battle in the Land of the Dammned was just stupid. It could've been done better, I'm certain. And I'd also like to say, enemies that web with their touch should never be given more than one attack per round!!!
Puzzles were thankfully not as excruciating as in Bahss. By which I mean, no huge beam puzzles. So, these were okay.
Dialogue was everything you'd expect from the Bahss plot... dense. But it was there, and it was always substantial. So it was good. Of course, it helped that some of the characters were familiar. (I object to Erika's presence, though.)
Cutscenes were... well, they varied. The water-parting was messy. The Khalthanad one in Thassaka marched my party onto a small lake. The various fights/arguments/gatherings in the camps were well-done. Any cutscene with Ethass was good. All in all, they evened out to 'meh'.
Scripting was naturally impressive, owing to the spell system, and the overall huge-ness of everything. I found bugs, but nothing which broke the game. Except for that one annoying auto-kill at the bandit camp, but the editor saw me out of that one... so it won't affect my score too much. The spells were impressive, though I wish I'd had some earlier (Destruction comes to mind). Not having to actually search bookshelves felt like cheating, though.
Items fit the epic-size challenges/combat/plot. Kel did a good job of spacing them out, though in the end my fighter felt like an avatar of sorts, with something like a +5 to ALL STATISTICS. That said, it started to make combat easier, so I shouldn't complain.
Towns and outdoors were unsatisfactory. The outdoors were just flat-out bad... sorry, Kel. Huge, boxy caves don't make a good setting. The first use of Luz's cave floor was nice... but the purple and yellow variations weren't. The outdoors were basically too big for the scenario, and rang like an echo of UV. Most towns were very similar, and furniture seemed to be thrown into rooms rather haphazardly... my personal style just made me cringe when I saw that kind of stuff. The Black Land was cool, though. However, the Land of the Dead was a huge disappointment in terms of terrain. For the glimpses of cool-ness that we see everywhere else, the goddamned Land of the Dead was dull. None of the towns really stand out enough for comment, either. Well, except for the constantly-moving camps... those were kinda cool.
So, I'm going to start with a rating of 7, and nickel-and-dime Kel for the rest... (I like that phrase, not sure why it came to mind)
+ Warning: Lava! ... +.1
- The Icy Longsword still does acid damage... you could've fixed that, Kel. ... -.1
- Machrone = Richard White? No. ...-.1
+ Phaedra gets a kid, and spells. Nice. ... +.2
- I'd like to take .1 for every level of webbing my party got, but that'd loop around the set of real numbers a few times... -.1
+ Running from One-Eye was fun, since I didn't want to fight. Sanctuary + Haste = Blatant thievery. ...+.1
+ Bitey, Hissy and Snarly... +.1
- Overuse of melee-resistance. ...-.5
- For labelling Ethass's cell. ...-.1
+ Just wanted to say that my archer had about 26 AP at one point in the fight alongside Pithoss and Legare. Not sure how, but it was cool. ...+0
+ Yay for Kel's apparent decision that summoning needed a boost... and thus Grizzlys were born, misspellings aside. ...+.1
- Boo for being able to summon a Phaedra with high-level Summon Shade. ...-.1
So, in the end, I'll give it a 6.6. I look forward to seeing what Kel tries to pull together for the next installment, should there be one. I'd recommend toning down the overall level, though... there's nowhere else to go from level 100 parties.
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