Feedback on the fight

[Big C from Cauney island]

As far as adventure games evolving, I don't think it's a bad idea. If they stayed the same forever, they would get stale.  As to how far they should change? who knows. The genre is obviously not as popular as it was in the 80s and 90s, not mainstream anyways.  Although I don't know much about elder scrolls, Skyrim from what I can tell looks like it has first person perspective and some RPG elements.  Looks like a cool blend. I don't think it's wrong to mix genres, as long as it fits the original canon well.  Didn't Mario have some sort of adventure game or RPG that was good? Look how different mario games have been through the years, but still stayed true while mixing ideas. Mario kart 64 was nothing like the original NES game, but cool and still mario. 

[oberonqa]

As far as adventure games evolving, I don't think it's a bad idea. If they stayed the same forever, they would get stale.  As to how far they should change? who knows. The genre is obviously not as popular as it was in the 80s and 90s, not mainstream anyways.  Although I don't know much about elder scrolls, Skyrim from what I can tell looks like it has first person perspective and some RPG elements.  Looks like a cool blend. I don't think it's wrong to mix genres, as long as it fits the original canon well.  Didn't Mario have some sort of adventure game or RPG that was good? Look how different mario games have been through the years, but still stayed true while mixing ideas. Mario kart 64 was nothing like the original NES game, but cool and still mario. 

Your referring to spinoffs, which are a breed apart.  Super Mario RPG/Paper Mario are spinoffs... in the same vein as Mario Kart, Mario Sluggers, Mario Golf, Dr Mario, etc.  The core gameplay experience of an established Super Mario game hasn't changed much aside from the switch from 2D to 3D.  With spinoff games, different concepts can be explored without diluting the base franchise, which is why games like Mario Sluggers and Mario Kart can exist and do as well as they do.  If Nintendo ever made a game called Super Mario Galaxy 3 that played like Mario Kart, there would be a problem.  This is what Damar was getting at and I agree with it wholeheartedly.

As for Skyrim, the Elder Scrolls series has always been presented from the first-person perspective and has a great deal of RPG elements in it, such as character advancement (via skills and, in the case of Skyrim, perks), free-form quests, equipment management, etc.  Skyrim may look a lot prettier than Arena or Daggerfall and it may have some different mechanics (Arena and Daggerfall, for example, had experience point counters whereas Skyrim does not) but it is still recognizable as a game in TES (The Elder Scrolls) series.  You won't find Quick-Time Events (QTE) in any of TES games, since QTE-style gameplay does not and probably never will mesh well within the confines of the established gameplay that TES series is built upon.  This is also what Damar was getting at and I agree with it wholeheartedly.

To put it another way.... ever wonder why the only game in the King's Quest series that had RPG-like gameplay systems is Mask of Eternity?  In fact, has anyone ever noticed that the title for Mask of Eternity is King's Quest: Mask of Eternity and not King's Quest VIII: Mask of Eternity?  At it's heart, it's a spinoff and not a part of the numbered King's Quest series.  While I have no insider information about why VIII was omitted from the title, I like to think that Sierra was probably planning on making a King's Quest VIII at some point and didn't want MOE to tie the series down storyline wise.  By omitting the number from the title, it exists outside of the established timeline(s) of the numbered games, leaving Sierra free to make other numbered King's Quest games without having to take the events of MOE into consideration (aside from having Graham live to a ripe old age, since he was in MOE).  That is just my theory on the matter and I mention it only to illustrate the spinoff concept.  None of the other KQ games had RPG elements, despite the success and popularity of the Hero's Quest/Quest for Glory franchise (which first appeared in 1989 as I recall, so RPG elements could have been implemented into KQ5-7).  The fact that the lead designer(s) of KQ5-7 didn't implement RPG elements into their respective games says, to me at least, that such mechanics don't fit within the identity and consumer expectation for a numbered King's Quest title. 

Oh sure you had the Mordack fight in KQ5, but that was a logic puzzle and not an actual fight.  The game actually stopped so you could select the spell needed to counter whatever form Mordack took.  There was no hit-point counter for either Mordack or Graham, so you either selected the right spell and moved on to the next form... or you died because you selected the wrong spell.

There were time-based puzzles in KQ6, most notably the clockwork room in the catacombs, the encounter with the minotaur, and the final encounter with Alhazared.  In the case of the clockwork room, this is a recurring motif in the KQ series.  There was a time-limit on many aspects of KQ3, for example (Manannon's sleep/travel schedule and the timer when preparing spells comes immediately to mind), so the idea of having a falling ceiling coming down on you if you don't react quickly isn't a big deal.  With both the minotaur and Alhazared encounters, they are identical in that there is no actual fight that involves hitpoint counters or fight mechanics.  You select the appropriate item (either from your inventory or from the background) and click on the opponent.  They are just like the Mordack encounter in that they are logic puzzles that are devoid of any RPG mechanics.

Moral here is that RPG-mechanics do not and never have had a place within the numbered King's Quest games.  Such is the realm of spinoffs, as established by Mask of Eternity.  However, here is where POS gets a pass.  The very thing that defines Mask of Eternity as a spinoff also establishes The Silver Lining as a spinoff.  Since The Silver Lining is not a numbered entry in the King's Quest series, it is classified as a spinoff, at least by the definition that I have presented.  This gives TSL the leeway it needs to exist outside of the numbered games and do things that otherwise wouldn't and couldn't be done in a numbered game.  It doesn't even have King's Quest in it's title, further cementing it's status as a spinoff.  Given that, it's OK to experiment with different ideas and concepts that wouldn't normally have a place within the King's Quest series.  That is the freedom that being a spinoff provides and it is here that I disagree with Damar.  If TSL was called King's Quest IX: The Silver Lining, everything that Damar has said would be applicable when talking about TSL, since the game would be a numbered entry in the KQ series and would be tied to a much more stringent franchise identity and consumer expectation.  Since TSL is clearly not called King's Quest IX, it is freed from the franchise identity and consumer expectation that comes with being a numbered entry in the King's Quest franchise and falls within the realm of creative interpretation... the very heart and soul of what a spinoff is. 

[drusain]

Honestly, in my point of view, having just finished the game, I'm finding that if there is a problem about this specific part, it's not particularly the puzzles that are the difficult part. The puzzles, in a vacuum, aren't too difficult and frankly are all were exciting.

I think the underlying issue, at least for me, was pacing.

From what I understand, this episode was Episode 4 with most of Episode 5 included, and so I think that the parts starting with Box puzzle were originally Episode 5, and as a result some parts were crunched together. I believe that this hurt the pacing a little bit.

Individually, the Box puzzle is manageable.

Individually, the Shadrack fight is great.

In a playthrough, though, the pacing is too quick. You start with this very interesting cutscene between Graham and Valanice and then get horrified and emotionally invested into Rosella being one thread away from being blasted to bits and then you're suddenly thrown into a puzzle without having the time to think about all of the stuff that just happened. As soon as you're done with the puzzle you get a cutscene that raises more questions than answers, or at least for me, and then you're immediately thrown into a battle with him. Aside from the autosave after the Box puzzle, there is no time for you to mentally recover from all of the story and all of the puzzling you've had to do up to the point of the fight.

If you were just starting the Arch Druid cutscene and go all the way through to the battle because there's no place to just save and stop, then you're just emotionally and mentally exhausted by the time the battle starts.

If there was a suggestion I could've made about this, I think that, after the Box puzzle, Graham should have gotten back into control on the Isle of the Crown docks. You could have made it so Graham couldn't leave, and the only thing you could do was interact with Edgar. That would give you the option to take a breather and save and be ready for the fight next time.

I think that if you can just spread out the action/twitch sections in Episode 5, anything you plan to do will be fine. In Ep.3, the Tower Sequence had exactly the amount of time allotted to it. For this one, I just felt that it was asking a lot out of the player because there was too much going on at once.

On a user interface perspective I had two problems with the boss fight:

1. The arrows are not distinctive enough from the rest of the amulet, which made it so I didn't even notice that the arrows were interactive until after my second death. My immediate thought was I needed to use the arrow keys because I didn't see any other way to go left or right. But sometimes I'm also just a dummy!
2. User interface should, in my opinion and from my experience, never do anything to make anything harder on the player ever. User interface is always there to be your friend. I understand why you made the amulet spin during the boat rocking, but I think that might be a feature that may need a "will this immerse the player into the puzzle or frustrate them?"

I mean I hope that you do receive this feedback well. I actually really enjoyed the fight, but since you're asking for feedback, here you go!

[DawsonJ]

I watched Dru's LP and Toegoff's LP of Episode 4, and I noticed that the Amulet had noticeable problems switching between Attack and Defense modes, to the point that Toegoff was killed/hit multiple times over it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uLfXIYDHd5k

[Thaumaturge]

First of all, Damar may well have a point regarding bias: since I enjoy RPG-like gameplay (or some set thereof, at least), I may well be biased in favour of this system as a result of its semblance of an action section.  That said, let me continue.

Given a little further thought, Damar might have a point on the plot-advancement element, although I think that we reach different conclusions.  While I continue to have no problem with the fight's inclusion (and still hold that it is more puzzle than action), I do feel now that it could be noticeably improved by including a little more plot.  The idea that occurs to me is to simply have Shadrack leaking bits of information during the fight, especially if any of what he reveals at the beginning might be worked instead into the middle; there might, however, be better ways to do it.

(And again, I suspect that introducing the gameplay mechanisms in smaller, easier sections earlier in the game would likely also help, since that tells the player to expect them.  Indeed, I think that I've seen it as common advice that a "boss" section should essentially test the player on the gameplay thus far, rather than introducing new gameplay.)

On another note, I think that I agree with drusain on the matter of pacing those two elements: a small section at the docks in which to catch one's breath, save (and thus know that a save point has been made) and jump back if desired would likely help that ending significantly.  I seem to recall that on my first run through, at the very end of Valanice's section I clicked on the box by mistake, hoping to click on something else in the hopes of an optional interaction.  As a result I ended up waiting and clicking through for some time (using my hand to reduce the probability of spoiling what was to come ^^; ) just trying to find a moment in which I could reload an old save.  (It might also have been preferred to have had an auto-save after the box puzzle, for that matter, since that was the point to which I wanted to return, and my own save at that point (likely unintended on your side ) seemed broken.)

[Numbers]

Well, I have nothing to say that hasn't already been said.  It looks like episode 5 is going to have a lot of action and puzzles, almost all of which rely on the amulet; and it also looks as if most of the players are going to be okay with it...now that they've experimented, trying to figure out how the thing works, anyway.

All in all, that's my only real advice: give a proper tutorial about the amulet at the beginning of the episode, and start out with simpler puzzles/action scenes before springing the tricky ones on the player.  However the finale plays out, it should be much more satisfying than the boss fight in episode 4 now that we know to what to expect.

I also wouldn't mind if it was possible to save after the finale so the players can re-watch the ending cutscene without having to go to the trouble of playing through the action scene(s) all over again (a recurring complaint with the boat fight).

[Tinu]

I didn't 'dislike' the fight, but I found it pretty buggy. It bugged up on me several times including freezing at one point so that I had to restart the whole fight or wound up randomly getting bombarded repeatedly by Shadrack's attacks (all at once) until I died. There were other things like Graham getting swept off the boat and then reappearing on the boat again to attack Shadrack while the death music was playing.

In fact, if it hadn't been so buggy, the fight would've been an interesting challenge.

One other thing I disliked was Shadrack's insta-kill wave attack. The interface was already difficult to use and the swivelling made it hard to get the right button. And on top of that you had to dodge it 2 or 3 times in a row. It's not like it was 2 or 3 attacks of minor damage, it was insta-kill. I mean, that's just broken dude.

On a slightly related subject, the Pandora's Box puzzle could've been improved with just 2 minor change: Highlight the selected figure on each wheel and indicate which ones had already been used. I would've rathered that be included in the easy mode rather than 'oh you got more time to stare at the spinning wheels that you can't really read anyway'

[kyranthia]

The one thing I didn't really like was that there was only 1 attack that you could use at the various points of the fight.  It seemed pretty repetitive that you saw the same animations several times.   I really didn't have many issues with it though it took my several tries before completing it.

[mapes]

I want to mention Pandora's box before I talk about the fight:

Generally, whenever I play a video game, I play it on the hardest difficulty available, and I'll be honest and say I was more confused trying to figure out the candles in the arch druids hut in Episode 3 than Pandora's box in normal mode. Why? Because I totally forgot about the fire/earth aspects of the scissors and the water/air aspect of the nightshade from episode 2 and slept on it for two days trying to figure it out (when I'm stumped with a puzzle, I like to turn off the game and think about it instead of trying every little thing on EVERYTHING). But after 1 minute of Pandora's box, I got the trick.  The hardest part of it was knowing which piece to select first, and which last.  It took me 2 times to get it.  The first time I just couldn't tell two, as I would call it, "undefined squiggly lines" apart on fast moving, fading, teleporting circles. So the second time I did it, I solved the hard ones first, and the easily distinguishable ones last.

But if you don't back away and think about it, and try again, I could see the frustration level from this puzzle being very high.

Unfortunately my fight with Shadrack was filled with some weird graphical glitches and paused moments...

However, after many attempts, (and several times exiting the game when the glitches compounded upon each other even after "retry"ing) I did defeat him.

If the bugs/weird glitches were resolved, it would have been much nicer for the user, and may be much more favorable.

Now for my thoughts on the fight: I felt though that the fight with Shadrack was well written into the story, it has a lot more challenge and dynamic than the fight scene in KQ VI, when Alexanders duels Alhazred and you conk him on the head at the right time to win, otherwise you get stabbed with the "touche" death remark. In TSL, you can get hit a few times unless you get went over the ship (which cause majority of my deaths) and you have to figure out how to defeat him (which doesn't take long to figure out either).

[Dobbs]

Don't know if this has been mentioned before but what ouraged me about the fight is that it is so unfair! Especially the boatroll is pure torture. Not because the boatroll is so hard, in fact it's quite doable but for some inexplicable reason Shadrack gets to have two more goes after that while Graham allways gets to attack once. Shadrack also gets to attack again when Graham is allmost dead whereas when Shadrack is allmost dead Graham has to wait his turn before he can attack again. Finally when Shadrack's healthbar is empty (so he basically lost) he suddenly gets to have one more attack on Graham (the earth attack) which you can counter with the earth attack but only the fire attack works and this where I got really, really mad bacause if you don't use the fire attack on Shadrack his healthbar magically fills up again and he can kill Graham off still. So this is in no way a fair fight and really felt like I was being tormented. Had this been a fair fight (They both get to attack once before it's the other guy's turn and whoever's healthbar expires first loses) this could've been fun or at least less annoying.

If you want to implement an action sequence in the finale then make it more like the tower sequence in ep3 which I thought was a huge lot of fun. I only died twice there and that was because of my own stupidity: the first time I ran up to the door but then realised the key was in the coach that had just been tipped over the edge. So I had Graham commit suicide by jumping into the smoke beastie. The second time was when I pushed the closet in front of the door opening but then found out I forgot to close the door resulting in the beast flying throught the gap and killing Graham.  

[flitchard]

Er, you DO realize he's a villain, correct? Generally, a villain SHOULD have an unfair advantage to overcome... Also, I never saw shadrack take an extra turn when I was low on health... Finally, about the wave, it makes sense, since each following wave is more powerful... it's just a combo...

[Numbers]

Don't know if this has been mentioned before but what ouraged me about the fight is that it is so unfair!

Er, you DO realize he's a villain, correct? Generally, a villain SHOULD have an unfair advantage to overcome... Also, I never saw shadrack take an extra turn when I was low on health... Finally, about the wave, it makes sense, since each following wave is more powerful... it's just a combo...

What flitchard said.  Bosses are supposed to be harder to kill than your character.  Get with the times, new roman!

(Sorry, I was just looking for an excuse to say that.)

[snabbott]

Get with the times, new roman!

(Sorry, I was just looking for an excuse to say that.)

*groan*

[DawsonJ]

Get with the times, new roman!

(Sorry, I was just looking for an excuse to say that.)

*groan*

Font Wars!!!

(I had a hunch that concept would be used by a YouTuber. )

[snabbott]

[Neonivek]

Hmm the fight. The fight overall felt like a tutorial

Especially since... as we all know... "Earth, Earth, Earth, Earth, Earth"

Reminds me a bit of the magic duels in the previous kings quests and I thought this was going to be a epic battle where I had to see what element to use at what time. turns out not really.

But WOW they really didn't skip on the power. I loved the rock animation and I seen it enough for it to barely not wear out its welcome.

The attack I hated was lightning, I still don't know how I am supposed to defend against it other then luck (though that could be intentional. It could have been in essence the time limit). Mind you this is more of a gamey hate not a real hate... as in "That attack is so tough to beat I hate it" versus "That attack should be stricken off the face of the earth it was so tough to beat"

[KatieHal]

The lightning, if I remember right works like so...

Spoiler (mouse over to reveal):

The side that the lightning starts building up on shows you what side it will strike on--which lets you dodge to the opposite side.

Been a while since I played or watched it, but I'm fairly certain that was the trick. We didn't want any part of the fight mechanics to be totally random and unfair.

[franzpaniero]

From what I've seen in the fan comments about the final action sequences, it appears to be a pretty fair split as far as like it vs. dislike it.  I enjoyed the Dragon action sequence from episode 3 (I think) and thought it was a good combination of not too frustrating and intense at the same time.  I think the action sequences in episode 4 were incredibly frustrating, poorly timed (back-to-back), tedious, and almost deal breakers for me wanting to finish the game. 

The primary reason for this is that I did Pandora's box on Normal mode and it was hard enough getting the first 3-6 symbols matched, but then as the movement progressions got more complicated, I had already had a significant amount of time/effort/frustration invested into it so I couldn't justify not finishing at that point even though I was completely over it by then.  By the end of the sequence I was pretty fed up with the whole thing and wanted to put the game down for awhile.  FYI the lack of a manual save in these two sequences was a HUGE mistake.  The game immediately goes into the cut scene for the boat conflict and again, I cannot save and guess what?  Right before the battle begins, the game crashes, without any kind of saved checkpoint and now I'm stuck right before talking to Shamir where my last save was and I have to endure that ridiculous puzzle again.  If I do decide to continue on, obviously I will chose Easy mode this time, but from what I've read, it's still frustrating.

While I don't think the puzzle/action sequences are necessarily out of place, I do have issues with the lack of saving and a more granular difficulty selection for people playing through again, or those of us that had technical issues and absolutely hated the puzzle in the first place.  Seizure anyone, lol??  ESPECIALLY since it's right at the end and climax of the episode ie. the payoff of doing all the work in the game in the first place.

[hobbydetective]

For me, I play adventures like I read a book: to be somewhere else, to exercise my mind. Therefore, I like a good story, complicated characters, much dialogue,  much to see and inspect, and clever puzzles which are relevant for the story.

In those aspects, this game is very good. Playing it is like having a mini-holiday.

On the other hand, I hate deadlines, I hate having to do something quick, within a certain amount of time. That's why I play adventure games, and not action games.

I hate those elements in this game.

The worst thing is that I didn't know beforehand: I would never have downloaded the game if I had known there where time-based puzzles and action sequences in it. I supposed it was an adventure.
It is cruel when you are that far in the story: you just want to know what happens, and the only way to get to know it, is to do something you really hate....

I had the plan to check the Cognition games, but now I first have to find out if they also have these horrible time-based puzzles and action games.

[RIDance]

I hate deadlines, I hate having to do something quick, within a certain amount of time. That's why I play adventure games, and not action games.

That's me, for sure. I freak out, curse at the screen and just start clicking all over the place. 

I like to have time to think about what to do.

But I thought the boss fight in episode 4 was a cool idea. I had no idea what was going on at first but then got the hang of it. I love turn based RPGs. I just like having more time to choose the attack/defense before the enemy strikes and rocks the boat.