Edited 26 October 2016 - 04:27 PM
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Edit: Staff contacted me an basically told me that I'd have to bump up my rating for all quests I have ever reviewed by one star. Note that this does not reflect my own opinion on the matter, or the quest, but just that it was something I was made required to do.
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I have beaten level one through four at this point, though not in chronological order, so I think I have gotten a fair sample of the quest so far. While I intend to keep playing this quest more I have seen enough to solidify my opinion on where I stand on the quest, I don't think there is anything past the point of where I am in the quest currently that could make me consider the quest worse or better than how I see it currently. (But if I do run into something like that I will go back an adjust my review, of course).
Most of the content in this quest is fairly average, there is certain things that stick out as being good but I haven't ran into any content that amazed me. From that perspective I would have rated the quest a 3 (which is "good" in PZCs scale), labelled it decent and moved on with my day. Sadly, thing's aren't that simple, because this quest have a number of rather poorly designed aspects. I'll just go through a few that comes to mind but I doubt I remember them all:
The palette in the plains area burns my eyes, likewise it did the same for several viewers on my stream. The brightness on the ground really need to be tuned down a bit, probably the trees too. And while not as big of a problem in the mountains, the ground there is on the edge of what I find acceptable in regards to brightness. It's going to be a hard sell to make me play a game that physically hurts my eyes, and I doubt this is a problem that is exclusive for me.
The overworld secrets are overall garbage. Some of them are a bit clever but the wast majority of the secrets seem to expect you to bomb every plausible wall, burn every bush, play the whistle on every screen, etc. There are seldom hints for any of the secrets on the overworld. Perhaps this design methodology flew back when Zelda 1 was released, but that was also a game that expected you to take notes and share with your classmates as to collectively find them all. But that's not really how people play games these days, and I doubt that was the intention when you made this quest. Fact of the matter is that most players think it's a cope-out to have to look up all the secrets in a help thread. And that's not even starting on retarded crap like randomly hammering a rock without any indication that it would do something..., on a screen that already have another secret, I'm sorry but that's garbage design.
While there might be a hint for it somewhere in the quest, I had to be informed by one of my viewers when I got to level 6 that, no, the cross is in-fact in level 1..., in a screen not on the map. That's a very easily miss-able item that is crucial to progressing in the quest. That's a very awkward design choice since I think most people who have missed it would conclude that the cross is closer in the game to level 6, if not inside it, when they run into cloaked enemies.
The level 1 boss is hard for the wrong reasons. The bosses in level two through four are all easier, which is kind of awkward. The reason the boss in level 1 is hard is due to the traps in the boss room, there is just next to no room to dodge, and it honestly feels like victory over that boss was determined more by RNG than any skill my on part. (Given that the boss moves and shoots randomly, and I managed to get a patterned where it did not shoot a whole lot on my second go at it).
Level three over relies on the "enemies always returns" flag. It seems to be on for every single room. I did this dungeon after level four, and yes, it is easier. But it's also extremely tedious if you happens to die. Honestly, if a few screens didn't have that flag it would have been a much more enjoyable experience. The bombchues also seem a bit buggy on the latest build of ZC (exploding even if they don't collide with link), but that's not really this quests fault so I can't blame it for that.
The quest starts you of without a wooden shield..., yet most enemies and enemy placement early on seems to suggest that it was intended that you have one. So goal number one grinding up enough rupees to afford one (and finding the shop that sells it). It just comes across as kind of awkward that the quests starts of with a money grinding.
I think this quest could be good, maybe even great for the right crowd. But currently it's stifled with some awkward design choices that's really holding it back. There are some good things though, the music selection is great and really gives that retro wibe, and some of the dungeon designs are quite interesting and a bit clever.
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Epsalon ZX
and
Deedee
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