While I did like parts of the story/game, I’m hoping with this potential sequel some things get addressed. Such as, while I perfectly understand in the beginning for our young hero to have some level of naivete and inexperience and thus flub various situations, the problem is–as others have mentioned in other threads–that these flubs and bumbling about is a constant. At no point throughout the narrative is the player allowed to get ahead of the situation or even given some semblance of pausing and plotting out ones own course, it’s simply a constant stumbling into one hapless situation into the next. And while that’s fun and interesting for a young upstart hero at the start of a narrative, it’s tiring to play throughout a narrative. And so I’m hoping that’s something that is addressed and at least immensely reduced in the would-be sequel.
Another concern is this, I could never shake the sense that the writer liked his NPCs more than he likes the player character/player, and perhaps in a small sense–even dislikes the latter. The reason why is because the PC/player is constantly being punished. Even when one is justified in their actions (SPOILER: your attempt at revenge to put the Victons in their place), winds up being yet another situation where the Villain Sue, Prodigal, magically manipulated things and thus the PC/player is punished. At no point is there a situation where there is any form of justice or satisfaction for the PC/player. Anytime it seems like there is, it is only later utterly quashed by one of the NPCs. The NPCs, especially those in the antagonist roles, far more often keeps the PC/player under heel, even in their time of “victory” (I put that in quotations because at no time is there any semblance of a real victory). I begun to realize with each knock down within the narrative that… I wasn’t playing a “hero rising” to anything, I was playing a victim trying to cope with a constant beat down. Whether I play an aggressor or someone genuine and gentle-hearted, the results remained the same in that regard. I’m playing a constant victim to circumstance, not a hero rising from circumstance.
What lead me to conclude that the writer enjoys his NPCs more than the PC/player (and possibly even dislikes the latter), wasn’t only the constant being put under heel regardless of what path or choice I made, it was actually the ending. Your supposed moment of triumph. Personally, I’ve played a lot of oWoD (Old World of Darkness by White Wolf, especially Vampire the Masquerade), where regardless of what campaign you play, you’re not looking at happy ending, it’s a game where in it’s setting at best you wind up with something “bittersweet” (and far more lenient to the bitter) but far more than likely will wind up with a very cold, pitiless and/or brutal “bad end”. But in those campaigns the PC/player can (one way or another) carve out some semblance of satisfaction against ones enemies before it all comes crumbling down around them (the player). In this game, anything of that sort is… non-existent and the writer clearly doesn’t want you to have it. Again, the ending is the pinnacle example, **SPOILERS** the writer truly goes out of their way to attempt to make you feel guilty for killing Prodigal to save by his own words “millions of lives”. Why? The Prodigal has by that point murdered hundreds, constantly victimized the PC/player, and is utterly unsympathetic in their actions… And the writer is trying to make you feel about this? Not only that but somehow these actions keeps the mass’ opinion of you in a state of limbo of whether or not a you’re a hero or even a good person? Really? What sense does that make? I mean, sure my “Legend level” (which was a stat that made no sense with whatever you did within the narrative half the time) was in the middle rung, it wasn’t lacking–but does that really have to be the big indicator for whether or not saving “millions of lives” is a good deed accomplished by you? Seriously? But it didn’t end there, it ends with Victon and his nimrod son giving you shit and informing you he’s going to crush you. So… here… even in your moment of false triumph… you’re being placed right back into being a victim in the end. I mean, really? The writer just couldn’t keep it to an addendum at the end “to watch out for Mayor Victon and his boy”, the writer really just had to have piss all over you there? So, not only are you denied satisfaction of getting some form of poetic justice against the Victons, in the end you’re just turned into a further victim of theirs just as you were as a child with your parents… All that ran through my head was, “Really? After all that?.. This writer really hates his own player character and the customer… Yeesh.”
I’m going to leave it there, but quite frankly… I haven’t really delved into any of my criticisms I have for Rebellion, The Millennial Group… the groups NPCs of whom really have nothing to do with (and makes one wonder what the point of them was and why it wasn’t just the Rebellion seeking to obtain a protege, making the narrative more personalized), why the writer felt it necessary to give a laundry list of tragedies for Prodigal suffered (another attempt of the writer trying to make one feel guilty for killing her, sorry, sir, I felt nothing) because to make a great villain–that’s not needed in the least, keep it simple and pithy–it enables the player to relate to villain as well not just the hero/PC; but then of course I still have numerous criticisms for the player being constantly knocked down throughout the narrative, thus not really being a hero but merely a victim to circumstance reacting to whatever the NPCs place before the PC/player. A hero is someone who volunteers to be in–or places themselves in danger, whereas a victim merely finds themselves in such situations completely out of their control. While in a certain regard the former can be the latter… still… who wants to constantly play a hapless victim of circumstance? But I’m going to refrain from continuing only because I already wrote a massive wall of text here.
What I liked about the game was that the setting was amusing, it reminded me of City of Heroes and Mutants and Masterminds, both are games I thoroughly enjoyed. And personally… I rather did like Black Magic (I had her look like Alicia Keys–sexeh!), she was a fun character to me. In any case, while I did really just babble on and on criticizing the negatives, those I didn’t mention I either liked or simply didn’t see anything wrong with it. But, my hope is… those concerns and criticisms don’t end up in the sequel or are at least downplayed SIGNIFICANTLY in comparison to the first, because… if I play the demo and I’m finding myself right back in the exact same disposition of being the hapless “hero”… I’m just going to walk away from it.