ArrowRose

Originally Posted by Coulomb2

In Pursuit of Liberty (Arc ID#221702, 3 stars)
A relative of Ms. Liberty - Liberty Rose - (her niece?; the exact relationship was a detail that I don't remember) is 'destined' to become a great hero, and, in the process, also stop a very dangerous threat that could spell doom for the future of Paragon City. But she needs a mentor of sorts to help her at very key points in her career. It started with Pro Payne being sent back in time to rescue her after she'd been kidnapped by the Family. In doing so, Pro Payne is introduced to the 'Liberty League' (a supergroup dedicated to fighting for liberty) and the 'Anti-Liberty League' - a villainous organization lead by the mysterious 'MAL', and dedicated to opposing the Liberty League. MAL is very intent on destroying all that is good and just, and will ultimately usher in a very dark future for Paragon City if he is not stopped. But to stop MAL, Pro Payne must first acquire a costume for Liberty Rose (from the aforementioned dark future), the Swords Liberty Rose will use as her signature weapon, and then actually help Liberty Rose in her ultimate confrontation with MAL and his Anti-Liberty league. Thankfully, with Pro Payne's help, MAL is beaten, the future saved, and Liberty Rose goes on to great things.

Pros: The story is billed as a 'light hearted fairy tale', and the author does a very good job of presenting it as such. Much like the first arc of today's reviews, the story is 'cute' and, in my opinion, did a good job of hitting the kind of campy, over-the-top story telling I typically associate with fairy tales. The plot isn't overly complex (not bad given it's a time travel story), and the custom faction is very, very well done. In fact, I think they deserve special mention: I was impressed with nearly all aspects of them: visually they were very well designed, had good descriptions that fit the overall theme of the arc, and, in spite of having a fairly wide variety of powers, were still well balanced...

Cons: ...which is why it was such a pity that they were barely worth any experience - the XP hit was so large (37.5% normal) that they just didn't feel worth fighting. That was, for me, actually one of the largest technical flaws in the arc, and one of the rare times I've rated something down for the amount of 'reward' it gives: and the only reason I did so is because it is a problem that can be fairly easily fixed by the author. The issue is that the bosses in the anti-liberty league are intended as unique characters, so they are set to not spawn 'normally' - which leaves the faction without anything that could serve as a 'default' boss, setting the already "nerfed" XP for custom mobs (which I *can't* fault the author for, and wouldn't grade down for) to half what it would normally be. Combine this with the fact that the first mission is against level 40+ family (which are themselves only worth about one-third the normal amount of XP), and the appearance of several boss-class allies that do a very good job of sucking up the already meager rewards, and what you've got is an arc where the rewards are so low that it gets pretty hard to ignore. That alone might have been enough to give the arc an 'official' 4-star rating (i.e. 5 stars online), but there were a few aspects to the story itself that also took just enough away that I felt the arc needed some work, and ended up with me giving it 3 stars (4 in game). First, I really wanted to see MAL developed more in the arc - there's more of a story there than is actually in the arc - until you get to the very end, where you just get nearly all of MAL's origin and back story all at once (in his description). Given that Liberty's story is developed through the arc step-by-step, I think perhaps developing MAL's story in a more step-by-step fashion throughout the arc would improve the story. Also, MAL's appearance and defeat in the last mission raised an issue for me: I actually stumbled across MAL and beat him long before finding Liberty - or the other two Liberty League allies. In effect, it felt like I robbed Liberty of her destiny - I defeated MAL for her, without her having any chance to help at all!

Feedback: For this arc, I do actually have some specific suggestions that I hope will help the author out. One, you may want to actually consider treating the first mission like an Oroborous flashback, complete with Ms. Liberty even warning you that because you are going nine years into the past, you might experience some temporal scaling. You can then cap that particular mission at level 29, and use the level 20-29 Family, which are worth full XP, rather than the dismal amount the 40+ Family are. Yeah, the whole XP thing is the dev's fault (well, really, the farmers' fault) - but at least there's a workaround, for now! Also, the Anti-Liberty leave really needs a boss that is set to spawn in: either a 'generic' version of one of the unique bosses, OR, you might consider making one of the minions or lieutenants in the existing group a boss (in particular, the Fatal Followers, or the Dark Followers - or whatever those dark guys were called - seem like good canditates, but any will do). To a lesser extent, you might want to consider making the allies lieutenants as well: a lieutenant is still reasonably hard to actually defeat when facing enemy minions, but doesn't have the overwhelming combat presence of a boss (which even from a story standpoint gets troublesome - if the members of the Liberty league are so powerful they can likely clear the map on their own, then why exactly is my help so important?) Finally, I think the story would be served much better if you set MAL to spawn after rescuing Liberty Rose in the last mission - at least that way it's much more likely that she'll be there to participate in that fight, which makes more sense, story-wise.

A few other tidbits to help too: I did find myself wondering why MAL and his forces were in that big graveyard? Adding some mission objectives giving them a climactic master plan that needs foiling would also give the arc a stronger ending! (Imagine it: MAL and his forces have littered the graveyard with machines and crates of chemicals and nanites that, when released, will "infect" the dead, causing them to rise as an army of bio-mechanical zombies under MAL's control, that will spread through Paragon City! Or something like that - something to make that moment in time the 'fulcrum point' where Liberty Rose saves the city from disaster.)

Alright, that's all the time I've got for today. For Friday, I intend to post reviews of "Whack A Mole" and "The Daybreak Patrol Needs Help" (and, time permitting, "The Superadyne Revolution").

Until then!

Originally Posted by Aisynia

Hi Rose. I just played your arc and sent you a bunch of feedback. Overall, enjoyed myself

Please check out this arc: The Most Important Thing.

I would adore some feedback in that thread too. If I play your other arc, could I get you to play one of my girlfriend's arcs as well?

Also, let me know if you want a full on review in my new thread, as I would like to get it some attention, and this would be a good start

Thanks for reading

Originally Posted by Marc_L

Hi! I think this is a great idea. Please play my arc (#320650 ) and tell me what you think. I will play yours a little later this evening.

Edit: Sorry, Arrow Rose, it seems your arc is a little too high for me right now. I've only got a lvl 36 and a lvl 9.

Marc

Originally Posted by ArrowRose

I would love a quick review of my arc.

Arc ID: 221702
Arc Title: In Pursuit of Liberty
Author:@Gypsy Rose
Morality: Heroic
Number of Missions: 5 (but some are short - about 1 hr total play time)
Description: Work with Ms. Liberty to turn a willful young child into a hero. Travel through time, fight evil villains, solve a mystery but most of all, have fun! This arc is a modern fairytale spanning nine years in the life of Liberty Rose Jones. Help her find her destiny and in the process, find yours!

Thanks, I hope you have fun.

Originally Posted by ReclusesPhantom

If you could play my arc The Fall of Rapture that'd be great
I.d: 299507

EDIT: Played the arc and left feedback

Originally Posted by Geek_Boy

Well, first of all "interesting" doesn't always mean "good."

I'm a big fan of Roger Ebert and have mentioned him many times in discussions about the quality of reviews around here. He believes that a review should judge a work based on how well it accomplishes the goals its creators set (obviously there are technical considerations too, but that's the big one). He's given a lot of movies he didn't personally enjoy good reviews because he knew they deserved them, no matter his personal biases. Basing a review on a narrow opinion of what is good or bad with your own personal checklist of no-no's is not helpful to the author or the potential consumer and really just serves to stroke the "reviewer's" ego.

Not everyone who is opinionated is cut out to write good reviews. Its the difference between working for a prestigious newspaper or magazine and having a crappy blog no one reads.

Unnecessarily harsh criticism does not make you serious or your opinion important. Its all right to be picky. Its all right to be honest. Its even all right to be blunt. Insulting the creator of the piece you're looking at, no matter the medium or genre, just makes you a jerk.

While not everyone enjoys everything, there are folks here who get that you can discuss what you did or didn't enjoy about something while tipping potential consumers off on whether they might enjoy it or not and giving the creator some tips on what they did well and what they might do better. There are folks that are completely incapable of doing any of those things. There are folks somewhere in between. We've got reviews that go all the way from one end of the spectrum to the other, but I'd rather see more Roger Ebert-style reviews than, say, Perez Hilton-style snarky egotistical drivel.

In the long run, well good reviews (as in: well balanced, well written, fair ones) are going to be more interesting than even the most entertainingly bad ones. I think if we can raise the level of quality, there might be more interest in this forum. I like the mix of in-character reviews and purely out of character ones here. I wouldn't put one over the other and just view them as "different."