Pros:
- There are a ton of sidequests from beginning to end. This creates an excellent pacing between advancing from one dungeon and event to another.
- Related to the variety of sidesquests - the player can become very powerful relatively early on by taking the initiative to do sidequests. Spoiler because there are some issues that can ruin the difficulty scale if a challenge is what you play for:
Spoiler
- Dungeon design is clever, cohesive, and never too gimmicky. The custom bosses are all well crafted and bug free.
Cons:
- My biggest gripe here is that I felt the dialogue, writing - independent of plot - and character developement was incredibly unpolished and hamfisted. I get that English might not be the author's native language, or if there was no proofreading or what, but the script was downright embarrassing at times to go through for the degree of simple errors. The script of this quest is in desperate need of an editor. The protagonists, antagonists, and other characters overall came across as one-dimensional, corny, "Muahaha-type" evil-doers versus confused good guys. Add in plenty of deus ex machinas as well, and you get something that just doesn't amount to good writing. Being that this is billed as a story-driven quest, the story is inexplicably lacking in refinement compared to the rest of the quest, and that drags the quest down a lot.
- As Moosh mentions, warps, traps, and damage tiles are so overly sensitive that it gets very frustrating at times. Some obvious instances that come to mind are dodging the "eye traps" in the "glory base," and the "skull traps" in sector 4 of level 7. However, dodging traps in general was a big pain throughout the quest and this is one of those quests where it's obvious the author loves spikes and other damage tiles. Maybe consider spacing these obstacles out given the sensitive combo point that Moosh brings up.
- The author likes using barriers in later parts of the quest that require items you found much earlier. I guess that this is intended to avoid the impression that said items are still relevant later on, but ultimately, result in a whole lot of L-R or start-menu cycling in the later levels.
One final point I will bring up, and this is more of a neutral I guess, is that I actually took notes when playing this quest. That is because the plethora of side quests, caves, and barriers one finds are often impossible to complete without items found later. If you're the type who has a bad memory like me, take notes while playing this.
I can tell that there was a ton of effort poured in to crafting the Glory Squad, but unfortunately, some simple things like editing and design philosophy weigh down what could otherwise be a 5-star quest. I would objectively give this quest a 3.5 rating, but I am compelled to go with a 4, because I appreciate the effort poured in - and there haven't been many quests released in recent years with this kind of effort - but also because the quest was a very good gameplay experience in spite of the cons.
5/5 for me.
