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Played the new HoT story up to Auric Basin - Not Happy
Yeah, I know, first thing first: why in the world am I paying attention to the story anyway?
Well, see, it's not that I particularly want to pay attention to the story, but rather because the game keeps telling me that its story is Really Important. Like, seriously, did you not read how much Effort was put into the raid wings' dialogue trees? So...yeah, unfortunately, when you keep promoting about how your story is soooooo important to your game design, I'm gonna pay attention.
Also, since the story happened in an unskippable cutscene, I kind of had to watch it anyway. So.
Point is, let's just say that I was never a big fan of either Faolain or Eir. And yes, I do know that they were going to kill 'em. Yet, with all this warning, I was still caught off guard at how unceremoniously the two characters were killed off. I mean, really? Faoloain stabs Eir while running away and Eir stabs her back by throwing the stick into her chest? What kind of pointless death is that?
And to top it all off, the only reason Eir died is so that Braham can get his character development and become the Dragonhunter. So. Stupid. Most pointless fridging of a character ever. As for Faolain...what was even the point? She could have been an interesting narrative with respect to the Nightmare court and make the player have to confront the fact that not all Sylvari are hiveminded creatures and do in fact have free will, and not to mention that it introduces a weird little wrinkle into the Sylvari vs. free will development and can make for an interesting story, but all of that is squandered because, fuck it, let's just kill Faolain, because it's not like she was a kind of an oddball of a Sylvari and gave this really bland race some depth. Right?
Fuck that noise.
I'll be the first to admit that I have zero fondness for the Sylvari, as their original implementation was too much "let's make elves, but green this time" BS. But, there was some stuff that could have been interesting. They're confirmed to photosynthesize, they have a hive mind and no free will, yet something went weird and suddenly free will was developing in the race. Not all of them are necessarily evil, as some are just self-serving (a la Faolain and Canach). Because the Sylvari are a young race, they could serve as a medium to discuss the concept of how free will developed (or really, sapience). The hivemind could have been an allegory for natural instinct, while sapience contradicted instinctual reflexes. It could also have indulged in exploration of what it means to be born "good" or "bad" and seriously challenge some of the values that the players hold (like is killing really bad or is it okay to just wholesale slaughter things because that's what the game mechanic is saying?).
Yet, instead of trying to introduce actual complexities into the story, what we get is some stupid flavor text with people being horribly racist, and when the player choose to be fearful rather than accepting of differences, what we get instead is the narrative agreeing with the player, rather than making the player have to confront the fact that they may have made the wrong decision.
I would go into deeper discussion, but I'm functioning with very little sleep right now. In short, I find the entire HoT a very, very bad misstep for GW2, in terms of lore, mechanics, and even map design. While yeah, it's nice to find a little cove to be able to hide in when the jungle is over run, I shouldn't have more fun sitting behind a waterfall, than when I'm out there discovering new areas and new places. And finding out more about the world shouldn't make me wish to go play in a different world altogether, like Avengers Academy, where at least characters are fun or in Puzzle and Dragon, where everything looks cute and there are fun dialogues between your party of monsters with the dungeon boss, especially if you use one of their servants to defeat them.
I'm just saying when Puzzle and Dragon, a match-three phone game, has a better story and mythos than your AAA huge, sprawling MMO, you have a problem.
Well, see, it's not that I particularly want to pay attention to the story, but rather because the game keeps telling me that its story is Really Important. Like, seriously, did you not read how much Effort was put into the raid wings' dialogue trees? So...yeah, unfortunately, when you keep promoting about how your story is soooooo important to your game design, I'm gonna pay attention.
Also, since the story happened in an unskippable cutscene, I kind of had to watch it anyway. So.
Point is, let's just say that I was never a big fan of either Faolain or Eir. And yes, I do know that they were going to kill 'em. Yet, with all this warning, I was still caught off guard at how unceremoniously the two characters were killed off. I mean, really? Faoloain stabs Eir while running away and Eir stabs her back by throwing the stick into her chest? What kind of pointless death is that?
And to top it all off, the only reason Eir died is so that Braham can get his character development and become the Dragonhunter. So. Stupid. Most pointless fridging of a character ever. As for Faolain...what was even the point? She could have been an interesting narrative with respect to the Nightmare court and make the player have to confront the fact that not all Sylvari are hiveminded creatures and do in fact have free will, and not to mention that it introduces a weird little wrinkle into the Sylvari vs. free will development and can make for an interesting story, but all of that is squandered because, fuck it, let's just kill Faolain, because it's not like she was a kind of an oddball of a Sylvari and gave this really bland race some depth. Right?
Fuck that noise.
I'll be the first to admit that I have zero fondness for the Sylvari, as their original implementation was too much "let's make elves, but green this time" BS. But, there was some stuff that could have been interesting. They're confirmed to photosynthesize, they have a hive mind and no free will, yet something went weird and suddenly free will was developing in the race. Not all of them are necessarily evil, as some are just self-serving (a la Faolain and Canach). Because the Sylvari are a young race, they could serve as a medium to discuss the concept of how free will developed (or really, sapience). The hivemind could have been an allegory for natural instinct, while sapience contradicted instinctual reflexes. It could also have indulged in exploration of what it means to be born "good" or "bad" and seriously challenge some of the values that the players hold (like is killing really bad or is it okay to just wholesale slaughter things because that's what the game mechanic is saying?).
Yet, instead of trying to introduce actual complexities into the story, what we get is some stupid flavor text with people being horribly racist, and when the player choose to be fearful rather than accepting of differences, what we get instead is the narrative agreeing with the player, rather than making the player have to confront the fact that they may have made the wrong decision.
I would go into deeper discussion, but I'm functioning with very little sleep right now. In short, I find the entire HoT a very, very bad misstep for GW2, in terms of lore, mechanics, and even map design. While yeah, it's nice to find a little cove to be able to hide in when the jungle is over run, I shouldn't have more fun sitting behind a waterfall, than when I'm out there discovering new areas and new places. And finding out more about the world shouldn't make me wish to go play in a different world altogether, like Avengers Academy, where at least characters are fun or in Puzzle and Dragon, where everything looks cute and there are fun dialogues between your party of monsters with the dungeon boss, especially if you use one of their servants to defeat them.
I'm just saying when Puzzle and Dragon, a match-three phone game, has a better story and mythos than your AAA huge, sprawling MMO, you have a problem.
no subject
Eir: Her death was pretty much predictable from a mile away. It's so horribly Hollywood cliche it hurts.
In-story treatment of sylvari: I've pretty much stopped following it in my headcanon since what they did with Scarlet Briar over the course of the living story, where they turned her from a potentially interesting rebel against the two established sylvari factions into a brainwashed lunatic. Doesn't help that I don't particularly find Canach interesting. (Why no Malyck...WHHHHHYYYYY?!)
Personal story: After doing it up to Tarir on...11 (?) characters and up to the 2nd to last mission on 6, I've pretty much learned to zone it out if only for sanity's sake. The PS is there to give me shinies, no more and no less. I mean, who even pays attention to the normal PS anymore when slogging through Claw Island for the nth time? Skip skip, alt tab to browser while unskippable cutscene plays.
Anyway, if you really can't stand HoT and aren't aiming for any of the HoT-specific shinies, then the core game is still viable. Silverwastes is still in like the top 3 best money makers. There's also the core mastery track which gives you auto-loot, the pact supply agent vendors, and perma speed boost in cities. Those are all pretty awesome stuff. They've even buffed dungeons back a little with the pseudo-GW1-dungeon-book-mechanic (basically complete 8 of any unique dungeons including story mode to get 150 tokens of any type).
>> Puzzle and Dragon, where everything looks cute and there are fun dialogues between your party of monsters with the dungeon boss, especially if you use one of their servants to defeat them.
Wait, what? My teams never had dialogue... how do you get that?
no subject
I only know this because my housemate can read Japanese and was browsing Japanese PaD sites for hints and tier rankings. That's how she found out there's apparently special dialogue if you take in specific monsters. Also, there's an actual storyline involving the REM monsters that's posted on the Japanese release site. So...yeah. Those REM monsters are fighting dragons and there's some soul-sucking thing going on. With brothers that are trying to avenge somethingsomething. Basically, there is an actual plot to PaD. o.O
Faolain: Okay, fair enough, but she dies anyway and that's really stupid. So...yeah.
Eir: There's no real reason why she had to die. The only "predictable"-ness to her death is that the story is cheap and needed to fridge someone. It's stupid.
PS: I'm sure once I start playing it repeatedly on multiple characters, I'll start tuning it out too. I'm just pointing out that I don't like where the story is being taken and quite frankly, I wish they would stop trying to shove story down our throats since they suck so bad at it. I mean, I already thought GW1 story was pretty bad, but it's freaking classic literature compared to the really shitty story that GW2 has been pushing. I really think the Sylvari thing was a big misstep and they could've done a much better job if they stuck to the GW1 races instead. Why not make the centaur playable rather than making up a whole new race? (Yeah, yeah, spilled milk at this point. But it just doesn't make any sense!)
I actually got maxed pact commander, so the autoloot was very nice. Of course, it hasn't escaped my notice that this ability should have been a QoL UI change that involved a ticky box, not an exp grind. And that's what makes me so bitter. The release is trying to sell basic QoL changes into content, which it really isn't. I don't know why they couldn't just boost in-city speed across the board for everyone or allow autoloot to be a thing that you check in the control panel. If they made pact commander unlock things like new NPC dialogue or waypoints or even gave extra boon duration, then sure, makes sense to grind for it. But no, instead, we get things that should've been a UI change instead. (I mean, I know there's the new karma vendors, but there should've been a whole new shitload of karma vendors, like at least four or five per map.) -- Also, so bitter there's no decrease to waypoint cost. You'd think as pact commander, you can get some sort of usage discount. Not reduce it to zero, and I think keeping the base waypoint cost of 1s is important, but maybe reduce the cost for longer teleports, so that it's like half usual distance cost.
Well, I guess I'm gonna try for the exalted backpiece, if only because, hey, much easier to obtain ascended backpiece. The legendary back looks so ugly, it kind of hurts.
What bugs me most is that just by playing this game, I'm helping to support the game that I wish was different. It annoys me to know that I'm helping to provide content on this MMO that's so very, very disrespectful to its player base by telling a shitty story and never bothering to balance anything. (And so bitter that the scrapper class mechanic still doesn't work in PvE.)