105 replies to this topic

[SpacemanDan]

Power of Geduina was one quest I really enjoyed, though I think I ran into that bug you mentioned. I've been stuck in level 2 for ages now. D: I'll definitely have to go back and give it another shot.

Great review! It definitely made me more interested in trying this one out again.

[Avaro]

I liked the last 3 reviews. Very nice. How could Power of Geduina be choosen if I requested it for the first featured review? Anyway, I liked it. Also, the great dungeon design, made me love the quest.

Edited by Avataro, 10 December 2011 - 12:34 PM.

[LinktheMaster]

We keep the requests from old entries. That way if someone wants a quest to be reviewed, he or she doesn't have to re-enter it each time.

[Kite]

With the holidays coming up, LinktheMaster and I have decided to take a short break from Weekly Random Review so that we can focus working on our own quest project for a bit. It is in need of some love after being pretty much neglected for over two months and this is pretty much the best time for us to do some serious work.

We will hopefully resume reviews in January at the latest.

[DarkFlameWolf]

Sad, but understandable.

[Eddy]

Dayummm I didn't realise you made a review of my quest (very late now aren't I?). But I really did enjoy reading the Power Of Geduina review.

Also, may a make a suggestion to review? You should review Quest Of Beings 2 (hell yeah I made a sequal). I just wanna see what you think of it (like the other reviews) and since I know you'll be back by late January, I think, mabye you could do Quest Of Beings 2 first or something like that. Well good luck with the reviews anyway!

EDIT: It appears I need to PM the suggestion. Curse me with not reading the instructions >_<

Edited by Eddy23911, 01 January 2012 - 11:27 AM.

[Russ]

So, is this going to be resumed again, or will you two be too busy managing the script database and making your own quest now?

[Kite]

My tentative plan is to do a review next week (probably in the middle of the week). I have a quest lined up already that I have played through a bit.

After that, we might run a trial to see if we can handle all of this stuff at once. Unfortunately, the Script DB and Fairy Dream's expo release have priority over Weekly Random Review. So if the trial doesn't work out smoothly, it's going to be a while before the next review (after the expo at the earliest).

[Eddy]

Well, I'm glad the weekly review is going to be resumed.

Can't wait for the next review (if everything goes out fine that is).

[Kite]

Unfortunately, it appears that Weekly Random Review is going to be put on hold until after the expo. LinktheMaster and I have several deadlines with Fairy Dream content that we have to meet within the next month for there to be a decent demo release at the expo. I personally also have to deal with some things in real life.

So the next review will probably be in April. Sorry if this disappoints anyone, but Fairy Dream has been in the works for years (it feels weird saying that) and we are not about to half-ass the demo if we can help it.

[Kite]

The Random Review #10 – 7/17/2012
Requiem for Hyrule by Link (Rocksfan13)

Last Updated: 06/21/2012
ZC Version: 2.50
PureZC Rating: 5/5

It has certainly been a while since the last Not-So-Weekly Random Review. Almost 8 months, actually. But we're back! At least for the moment. Since LinktheMaster and myself both have rather full plates, Weekly Random Review probably isn't going to be so weekly anymore. In fact, there probably won't even be a review schedule anymore. We'll instead probably take a cue from the other review threads and just post reviews whenever we feel like it and have time. Also, we are probably going to mix things up a bit through a combination of using the random number generator, requests, and just picking whatever we want.

For this review, I semi-picked what I wanted since I wanted a 2.50 quest that wasn't in the classic tileset. I have nothing against classic tileset quests (I really like one in particular that will probably be a future review), but I just wanted something different since so many 2.50 quests are done in the classic tileset. Randomly poking through the 2.50 quests gave me Requiem for Hyrule.

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First off, let me get this out of the way: I'm not going to call Rocksfan13 by "Link" in this review even though that is his forum name. It would be massively confusing and I'd end up spending most of the review thinking of Link puns instead of focusing on the quest. I'm far less likely to think of rock puns, so I think it's magnanimous of me to spare everyone the pain.

Anyway, I found out several interesting facts about Requiem for Hyrule by Rocksfan13 after I started playing. It certainly has a history due to PureZC being unable to support 2.11 and 2.50 quests.

• It was added to the old PureZC 2.50 Database that existed on the forums on 1/11/2011. For reference, it was added to the main PureZC Database on 12/07/2011 and last revised on 06/21/2012.
• It was added to the official quest database (AGN) on 11/17/2007.
• It was reviewed for PureZC's old Featured Quest of the Month on 11/21/2007. It received a 3/3. I know who reviewed it already, so please don't derail this thread about it.

I did not know any of that until I was already set on reviewing this. But having been around for a while and having been on Featured Quest of the Month, you'd think that this could be an okay quest.

Well... that depends on how you define "Okay."

In the words of the author, Requiem for Hyrule is "A semi-remake of the first quest. Only semi because the overworld is the only thing similar but not the same. Dungeons are in different spots and completely redesigned " As you probably don't recall, LTM reviewed Origins 2nd Quest, which had a vaguely similar premise. But I don't think Requiem for Hyrule is quite the same thing. The overworld is definitely taken from Zelda 1 for the most part. But a better way to describe Requiem for Hyrule would be "bizarre Xth quest" since the location of pretty much everything has changed along with random sections and paths of the overworld. I know this is mostly being nitpicky, but it's not a remake of the first quest in any way if the dungeons, entrance locations, and some paths are entirely different.

Moving that nitpick that has no factor on anything aside, let's get started with the gameplay.

Gameplay

No first screen sword cave for you!

One of Zelda 1's most well-known traits was the fact that a secret could almost literally be anywhere. You had to burn every tree, push every block, and walk against every wall to make sure you didn't miss anything. And it was fun trying to discover this stuff since there were rules of a sort to it. Secrets were rarely off to the sides of the screen (though I admit it did happen), walkthrough and bombable walls were always in the same location, and the same items would work to reveal secrets on the same types of tiles.

Requiem for Hyrule does not follow this formula exactly. Or at all, really. Secrets are pretty much placed in the most dickish places possible with the vaguest clues. If not for the blatant hint on the download page stating "Can't find the sword? Get the lamp first then use it just outside the village," I doubt anyone that doesn't burn every single tree in existence would get past the beginning of this quest without consulting the help thread. I spent 24 minutes right at the start of the quest wandering around. I managed to buy the candle, buy some bombs, buy a super bomb, and find level 2 without finding a sword. At one point, I honestly thought the sword would be in Level 1. I also tried burning every tree that wasn't at the edge of the screen. I only found the sword after noticing that hint on the PureZC download page and getting more ridiculous with my tree burning since the hint inside the actual game was just "Burn a tree or two to find your begining." Level 1 was also a b**** to find.

I would never have found this without help.

But I can somewhat excuse those two things since Zelda 1 wasn't exactly helpful in its hints and all things considered, burning a tree is logical for Zelda 1. Maybe I just suck at exploration quests that just set you loose with no direction?

Unfortunately, I wouldn't have given this so much attention if it were just limited to dickishly placed burnable trees. Dungeons often take secret combo flags to Hyrule's Christmas DX levels by having identical looking statues react differently. Some statues react to the boomerang. Some react to the sword. Others react to the wand. And then many do absolutely nothing. It's not consistent. Also, bombable walls are often in places you would not expect them. The first two dungeons helpfully mark them, but this behavior is dropped in level 3.

Would you think to bomb this wall?

The dungeons are the main gameplay draw of the quest since the overworld isn't all that different from Zelda 1. But while the design and flow of the dungeons is okay, most of the "puzzles" that act as the main obstacle outside of floods of enemies in cramped quarters are not so okay. Most puzzles I ran into in this quest can be summed up as "tiered flag experiments." You trigger a random flag (such as burning a torch) then move on to trigger another flag (such as burning another torch or boomeranging a statue) in an extremely linear order. There is often no indication of which object has a flag to trigger next. This can be attributed to ZQuest limitations, but that doesn't make running into this puzzle variation for the millionth time any less tedious or confusing.

Welcome to many puzzles in the game. Light torch, light next torch.

The whistle added a whole new level of OCD to dungeons. There is one point where you have to whistle on a random space of floor to open a passageway. There is no indication you have to do this. I hope I didn't have to grab a crystal and kneel in front of a dead end at some point.

But having said all of that, there are also some really creative puzzles in Requiem for Hyrule. They are kind of weird, but they are still creative. If you've played Link's Awakening, you might recall the blocks that you push over pits that had walkable tiles underneath them. Several puzzles in the quest are based on that concept.

Narrative

You can probably infer this from my frustrations with simply starting the quest, but some of the hints are really cryptic and not at all helpful. But to give Rocksfan13 some credit, there are also hints that did an okay job of directing me. Every dungeon seemed to contain a hint for getting to the next dungeon. Also, I guess Zelda 1 had its share of cryptic hints.

Is work another way of saying "walk every 16 pixels?"

There are some spelling errors thrown about, but it's nothing to really detract from the quest.

Design Attention

Oh boy... where to start with this. Rocksfan's design felt rather spastic. It was more like a design experiment than an actual quest at times.

Let's start with the subscreens. Most quests stick with one subscreen style for the entirety of the quest, only switching things up for the sake of the map or special DMaps. Rocksfan couldn't seem to decide on a subscreen layout, though. So instead, there is literally a new subscreen layout for every single area. Look at the submission screenshots on PureZC if you don't believe me. Or better yet, look at the GIF I've made that compiles several of the subscreens I managed to gather.

We're setting the bar so high for you other in-depth quest reviewers with our animated GIF prowess.

I would just attribute this to artistic license and leave it at that, but there is a problem. You may have noticed it, but several of these subscreens do not have all of the items. Notice how I have super bombs on the overworld and Level 2, but not in any of the other areas depicted in the GIF. If this were just an overworld only item, I'd understand. But you are required to use a super bomb on a random large block in level 2, so that excuse doesn't work.

There are some other questionable design decisions. Rocksfan decided to add combo cycling doors, but they open way too slowly. This becomes a problem when you enter a room from a door you previously unlocked and end up being stuck in the wall until the door finishes opening. Surely this would have been noticed playing through the quest, so it's clearly done on purpose. Why would someone do this and call it okay!? I know there are ZC limitations at play, but that's why people don't use combo cycling doors without some padding for Link to stand behind!

The inconsistency on secret flags also made traversing dungeons a nightmare at times, regardless of how okay-ish the layouts were. I actually gave up partway into Level 4 because I knew I'd just have to find the next ridiculous flag I'd never think to look for to trigger in order to advance. It was bad enough finding the random place to use the whistle I never would have thought to whistle. This was pretty much designed to be as annoying as possible since it forced you to be OCD.

And then there are the bugs and graphical errors. The tileset was not used appropriately at times (particularly the overworld) and there were graphical errors everywhere. I have over 100 screenshots of this quest though, so there is no way I can show everything and I don't have time to sort through it all. This review is long enough as it is.

X marks the spot where you can't walk. Also, Link's position on that first screen is where I exited the stairs.

But one common problem is that the overworld is filled with "layer X's," which are solid combos that are made solely to be hidden behind layers (they are mostly used for trees). But in Requiem for Hyrule, bushes and secrets will often bring them up if they are not just sitting there already. The overworld is also filled with exit warps going to weird places. While this was somewhat excusable in Zelda 1, I don't think it's quite as excusable if you are trying to do an updated spin on Zelda 1.

However, Rocksfan also made some nice design choices in the quest as well. Mostly in some of the puzzles that were not solely tiered flag experiments. As I said before, I liked the puzzles that let you push a block over pits to make walkable paths. It is an extremely weird concept, but it's also neat. I also liked a tiered flag "puzzle" that made pieces of a chest appear until the chest was whole and ready to open. There were also push block puzzles that required you to push pots. There was also a puzzle I encountered that made you go to the room twice from different directions without resetting. These were interesting ideas for mixing things up, but so much of the innovation was drowned out by the problems I mentioned.

Despite how weird it looks, I liked this puzzle.

For a quest that is 4-5 years old, I can't help but wonder why some of the bugs and problems I encountered have not been found and fixed. I mean, it's one thing to just leave a quest sitting there due to unstable betas or simply not wanting to bother with it anymore. But it has been submitted to two databases recently without any sort of note that it hasn't been touched for that long. The most recent update came last month! We have had the mostly stable RC3 for a long time now. This is why I seem a tiny bit harsh with this review. It's the equivalent of going "hey guys! I've released this new quest called Mario Quest for 2.50!"... except it's not new at all, it was still last saved in 2.10, and it still won't let you get past the first screen.

Suggestions

• Please do some bug testing. Seriously. I know that this probably worked a lot better in whatever build it was made with, but we've moved into really stable Release Candidates at this point. I'd normally not care, but PureZC only truly supports 2.50 quests made to work with the Release Candidates.
• There shouldn't be so many subscreen variations. All of the variations should also have all of the items unless there is a special reason for not doing that which makes some sense and is consistent.
• You may as well make that hint for the beginning of the quest clearer inside of the quest. It's kind of silly that I had to look at the download page to figure out how to advance.
• Consistency is a general theme Requiem for Hyrule lacks. There is no system to tell which item will trigger what in place other than by random guessing. Even Zelda 1 was consistent in the fact that trees could be burned and blocks could be pushed and whistles could dry certain ponds. There needs to be such a system.
• While I'm not expecting you to be a master artist (I'm certainly not), you need to use a bit of common sense in placing combos. Many of the combos in the quest seemed to be placed just because there was an impulse to place something there rather than it making sense for screen mechanics (like the layer x's on the overworld).
• Lay off on the lonely tiered secret combo "puzzles" that are just linear paths of lighting torches, pushing blocks, and whatnot. It's okay to have them, but they are not truly puzzles unless you throw some operational variety into them (like having to push a block onto a block trigger or leaving the room and returning from a different direction). You may have done this in later dungeons for all I know, but the first 4 levels were still filled with them.

Summary

Strong Points

• There were some nice puzzle ideas.
• The dungeons were, for the most part, graphically decent.
• The dungeons had decent layouts.

Weak Points

• The overworld has so many graphical errors and warp exit issues.
• You must be extremely OCD to properly play the quest.
• The bad combo cycling shutters.
• A new subscreen with a different layout for every area.
• The entire quest felt like a design experiment.

Rocksfan had some good ideas going for Requiem for Hyrule. But the few good ideas do not outweigh the bad ones.

Score: 2/5

[Evan20000]

Yay! I can't believe these are back!

Anyway, I remember downloading this a while back and getting frustrated at the sheer density of unmarked, unhinted secret triggers.

[Rocksfan13]

Nick,

You are correct.

Requiem was in fact my first go at 2.5 and truely was an experiment at a lot of things. Most notably the subscreens, layers, and combo cycling.

Yes, I realize the hints were quite vague, including the lack of consistancy.

However, many have said this quest is quite difficult due to the vagueness of secrets and hints.
Twice I have built quests that require the player to use something other than the sword for a while and have gotten back the opinion that this should be changed.

Actually, if you think this version was bad. You should try the one that I redesigned this one from. Pretty sure I'd get a 0 for it.

I honestly think the most vaguest of secrets in this one is the pushable walls. (Didn't come until after level 4)

Hence, the one I'm working on now is no where near as badly designed as this. I love secrets, I'll admit it. But no reason to have them in every room.

The tileset was just grabbed and I had not planned on using it to it's full potential.

What I really want to say is that I appreciate the review and your honest opinion on it. It certainly gives me pause to think of what I can work on for the next one.

[David]

This seriously needs to be revived. Do you know how much it makes people better at quest making since they take example and know what not to do for their quests?

[LinktheMaster]

After nearly double of one year, The Random Review is back for at least one more go!  And this time we’re in for double the fun – double the excitement – double the stupid jokes… or at least about a quest that promises as much.

 

The Random Review #11 – 05/03/2014

Doublevision by Mr. Z

 

Last Updated: 02/20/2003
ZC Version: 1.92 B163
PureZC Rating: 4.5/5

 

Doublevision is an oldie from all the way back in February of 2003.  It’s so old, in fact, that it wasn’t even released on 1.92 B182, and it was one of Mr. Z’s first quests released on PZC.  Really, it’s a testament to old quest style and gimmicks… most of which unfortunately don’t hold up very well simply because they’re… well… annoying – particularly in the way of overworld design.

 

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Overworld Design

I guess let’s look a bit at the history of overworld design.  Originally, there was the classic overworld design like in Zelda 1.  With this design philosophy, the overworld is pretty much open.  You can go pretty much anywhere in it.  Sure, it could be really annoying to get from one side to the other, but even if you happened to be on one side of the overworld, you still might be able to stumble onto a dungeon and still make progress.

 

I appreciate the attention to detail with the roof cracks, but I don’t think anyone would live here.

 

Then there’s the more modern overworld design.  Today, oftentimes quests will have a main overworld, but then you have side areas.  The main overworld is (mostly) traversable, but to get to side areas, you have to obtain the items throughout the quest.  It’s a design that gives players a sense of exploration while also keeping them on a path of progression.

 

Both philosophies have their pros and cons.  Doublevision, like many other quests of its time, is a cross between the two that sort of takes the downsides of both.

 

The overworld of Doublevision starts out as a long twisting path that doesn’t really offer any alternate ways of going.  Any paths that seem like alternate routes end up becoming a dead end quickly.  It really keeps you on one track for the beginning, and this continues for a few dungeons into the game.  While this in and of itself isn’t too bad, it starts wanting to pull a Metroid and require you to go back and forth between sides of the overworld a couple times, which can be an ordeal that takes a while.  This can end up being a very long and tiring endeavor which hurts the experience.

 

Oh, yeah. And there’s a dark world too.

 

Doublevision gets its name from the fact that it has a dark world. (Big surprise, huh?) Dark worlds were really popular in the day, and who can say that they’re surprised?  A Link to the Past is still deemed as one of the best Zelda games.  The unfortunate fact of the matter, though, is that most quests don’t use the dark world properly, and Doublevision is no exception.

 

A dark world is not supposed to just be a palette swap of the main overworld.  A dark world is not supposed to be an alternate secret combo method.  Unfortunately both are pretty much the case for Doublevision.  In a Link to the Past, the dark world is a place of death and destruction.  It’s supposed to be a bit frightening when you go there the first time.  There’s freaking giants tossing bombs.  Obviously Doublevision can’t have Hinoxes as enemies, but the basic thought is still the same.  The dark world is mostly the same as the regular overworld with pretty much the same enemies and locales.  The snow area of Hyrule is the snow area of the dark world, for example.  Both the light and dark worlds have similar enemies in different sections.

 

In the end, the dark world/light world concept is pretty much only used to get past certain obstacles.  Need a ladder to get up to a spot?  Go to the light world.  Need to get into this cave that is blocked off by rocks?  Go to the dark world.  It basically is a glorified secret combo system.  It gets to be tiresome and confusing.

 

If there’s one thing I love, it’s getting completely surrounded by enemies right after finishing warping.

 

So what do you do if you add tiresome linear overworlds with tiresome pointless light/dark world mechanics?  A really annoying overworld.  There were times where I’d be trying to get from one dungeon to the next, but I’d have no clue where I’d have to go.  You could check the map, but there’s one problem: you can only see half of the whole map at once.  You’d have to switch to the other world to see the rest.

 

Combine this with the fact that some secrets don’t make sense, and it gets to be downright frustrating.  The first bit that is a bit concerning is you having to hit an armos statue with an arrow to remove a wall.  Okay.  The big wall being there makes it somewhat obvious.  But then you have to bomb a barrel.  All of those rocky cave entrances?  Bombs do nothing to them.  Obviously you have to bomb the barrel!  Then, you have to hit a big statue with your level 2 sword to advance.  Seriously?

 

It’s just a big, off putting mess.  Sometimes you have to spend a good amount of time shuffling between the two worlds just to try to figure out where you have to go next.  This could make for interesting gameplay by roaming the overworld, but having to switch back and forth between the light and dark worlds and having to walk the same palette-swapped terrains just isn’t very appealing.

 

Dungeons

You might wonder why I haven’t mentioned anything about the dungeons yet.  And that’s because, honestly, there’s not much to say for the most part.  They’re pretty standard fare… but there are some odd and annoying bits of at least the first few dungeons.

 

Some rooms seemed to have extra puzzles and weird tricks just because.  It almost seemed like Mr. Z just wanted to sort of show off some tricks with ZC 1.92.  Most of the time it was okay since it was all easily ignorable, but sometimes it was downright silly.

 

Why?

 

The above screenshot is a good example.  This was really, really pointless.  It’s not particularly neat and clever.  It’s just a bit of a waste of time.  There was another room where there were some blocks preventing you from accessing the arrow item.  How do you solve this puzzle?  By walking onto the floor switch that was in the top left of the room.  I get that this was in level 2, but you couldn’t do anything more than that?

 

And then there are the rooms with pits.  Mr. Z seemed to enjoy placing pits underneath random pots and making you slash through them.  Not only was this done in a dungeon, but it was also done on the overworld.  These rooms aren’t particularly difficult or anything, they’re just a bother.  Walk forward, slash.  Can’t go there.  Turn, slash.  It’s on the same tedium level as invisible block rooms.  Oh, but don’t worry.  This quest had those as well.

 

Why do these exist?!

 

Some other puzzles were a lot easier than I think Mr. Z intended.  There was quite a few times where rooms would be filled with push blocks.  Some were left/right push blocks, some were up/down push blocks.  However, these were insanely easy, and some of the puzzles were put into dungeons as late as 4.  These just add to the tedium more than anything.

 

Admittedly, though, the puzzles do get better as the quest goes along.  There were definitely a few that had me stumped for a few seconds before I figured them out.  I’ll admit that some of the floor switch puzzle rooms were pretty good as the solution typically wouldn’t be what you would normally expect.

 

First: Good. Second: Bad.

 

Dungeons oftentimes seemed to lack any good themes.  You would have fire and ice in the same dungeon, but very little fire vs ice mechanics.  The enemies oftentimes wouldn’t match.  You’d have multiple kinds of enemies in a dungeon, then one random room of wizzrobes.

 

Before I move on from dungeons, I want to bring up tedium.  While not quite as bad as the overworld, some of the dungeons became very tedious.  Several dungeons suffered from having sort of “wings.”  Where this gets to be an issue is that you go quite a bit out of your way to go through these wings to get something (sometimes something as minor as a key), then you have to backtrack a long ways (sometimes as far as just a room or two away from the entrance).  Backtracking is something everyone knows to expect when it comes to Zelda games, but having to spend a couple minutes just backtracking so that you can open a door gets to be a bit annoying.  It’s also annoying when you’re forced to do block puzzles when backtracking.

 

Speaking of things being tedious, the recorder is a really annoying item to force people to use frequently.  Expect to use the recorder a lot in Doublevision.  The first dungeon has you use it a lot, and pretty much every dungeon after it has a recorder puzzle in it.  Plus, you have to use it on the overworld to open up warp points between the light and dark worlds.  This just gets really annoying since most of the time you switch the recorder to use it for the puzzle, then immediately get rid of it once the puzzle is over.  Who wants the recorder as a selected item?  It’s simply a really annoying item to have as a key puzzle item.

 

I hope you like Digdoggers – because Mr. Z sure does!

 

Bugs and Lack of Polish

This really isn’t a major thing, but it’s a bit baffling to me.  While I definitely expect bugs and missed things in ZC, they’re usually in things that are optional.  Maybe some undercombos for bushes are missed on an overworld screen.  Maybe some secret combos aren’t placed in an optional cave.  But, Doublevision had some thrown here and there in the main quest.

 

Some main puzzles that you had to go through for dungeons didn’t have secret combos set, for example.  There was a room in a dungeon where the side warp wasn’t set properly, sending me to a wrong room.  A room that was supposed to have traps unleashed when you collected the boss key suddenly had the traps vanish when you went back to the room (though maybe this is an odd ZC bug).

 

All hail the floating blue ghoma!

 

It just seemed a bit sloppy to me, as most of them were things you would have found had you gone through the game normally.  The polish really starts to be noticeable when you reflect on old dungeons once getting far into the quest.  Some of the first dungeons really don’t compete with the later dungeons.  Which, it’s understandable for people to get better as they work through a quest, but if that’s the case, then go back and fix up the old parts!  This concept seems lost on lots of people.

 

Suggestions

The biggest suggestion I have is to please be mindful of players.  We’re Zelda fans, so we like backtracking and exploration.  However, try not to force too much backtracking and try not to lock down exploration so much.

Try to vary bosses a bit more.  I don’t need to run into Digdoggers 4 times in the first 5 dungeons.

Rooms where you’re forced to kill 6-8 bats to open a shutter are really annoying.

Having to go back and repeat 2 rooms worth of puzzles because I goofed up on the 3rd is a bit unnecessary.

Make better use of a dark world!

Try to go back and make your quest consistent in quality if you improve as a quest designer throughout making it.

 

Summary

 

Strong Points

The dungeon design is good for the most part.

There were some great puzzle ideas later on in the quest.

The difficulty curve was actually pretty good.

 

Weak Points

Backtracking can get tedious if there’s nothing to shake up the journey.

Dark worlds shouldn’t just be palette swaps of the light world used for secret combo alternatives.

Having the recorder be used so heavily can get a bit annoying.

Some puzzles on the overworld simply didn’t make sense.

There were some very, very overused midis put into the quest.

 

Overall, the quest was okay.  Lots of these complaints aren’t anything specific to Doublevision, really.  It was a product of its time, so for that, I’ll be a bit lenient on the actual rating.  I’d say this is a good quest if you want something to see how far ZC has progressed. Obviously though this isn’t a good representation for Mr. Z’s abilities as a ZC quest maker as this is far from his latest work.  I remember some of his newer quests not having these issues.

 

Score: 3/5