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Partisan Legacy I vs. Shadowiii
Partisan Legacy I HOLY CRAP! THEY STOLE ALL MY FURNATURE WHILE I WAS ASLEEP! DANG THIEVES!!!
Minnek
Download: 392 KB
V.S.
Shadowiii
Play Time: 2-3 hours and 00 minutes
Review # 10 for Shadowiii HOLY CRAP! THEY STOLE ALL MY FURNATURE WHILE I WAS ASLEEP! DANG THIEVES!!!
Them's Fightin' Words
    "Hey! You are an RPG main character!" "Wha...? How didja know?" "Because you have no memories!"

*cough*

Partisan Legacy I suffers the "generic RPG superhero" storyline. Its incresingly bizzare that so many people lose their memories so frequently. I mean I still have all of mine, so I think. PL1 is a decently written game that has decent graphics, fun and balanced battles, a strangely unique and entertaining items system, and well placed ripped music, but still suffers from a cruddy story. This is too bad, because with just a few touch-ups, this could very well be an utterly fantastic OHR game.




Graphics
    Graphics range from "Wowzers!" to "Eh...". The overall feel graphic-wise is moderate. Overall the graphics aren't mind-bendingly beautiful (think FFH or Time Flies), but they are decently done. One thing I'd like to comment on before going into specifics is that this is Minnek's first game and he DOESNT RIP ANYTHING. I'd have to say, maybe there is hope for newcomers after all. Very well done on that point, Minnek. Keep it up.

The NPC's are definatly a weaker point. They aren't overly beautiful, and they give a feeling of needing some touching up. The story style is the kind that usually is paired with "super-deformed" and we get a slight touch of that, but NPC's have little or no hair, and their heads are square blocks. There is little or no shading besides putting a darker colored outline over each part. The only seriously shaded part is their hair which, frankly, is drawn so it looks like the main character has a receeding hair-line. :) The animations themselves aren't bad; they are certinaly acceptable. I'd personally recommend at least shading the NPC's before next release.

The Battle Graphics have good points and bad points. One thing I liked about them is they looked a lot like their respective NPC's. That is, the style and body proportions remained similar. However, as mentioned above, the NPC's aren't beautiful, and niether are the hero battle graphics. The characters are all based off of the same frame and it is obvious. The game I thought of first when I saw the battle graphics was Eggie's "Urban Fantasies." Although these are slightly better done, they need a lot of work. And Partisan's battle stance is very ackward.
The battle backdrops are bland. When fighting in a forest, there should be TREES, not green ground and sky (and thats it). The backdrops are griddy and bland, they offer no appeal whatsoever. They do improve as the game goes along, but the overall feeling of emptyness is still there.
Enemy graphics range from decent to "wow!" I really liked ol' whats-his-name that was an enemy rather then imported with the backdrop. The enemies look decent and are acceptable for this game.

Maptiles range from "great" to "holy cow!" The forest was lush, beautiful, and HUGE, while the house you start in was boring and bland. I failed to understand why my house was placed in a barron wasteland, but when I stepped outside I was in this gorgeous forest. A bit more touching-up is recommended to keep balance, but if you can tilemap like that forest...wow. Very well done.




 
Storyline
    Ah...story. Usually where every OHR game falls short, and this one trips right into the hole. Basically you are a warrior with no memory (suprise! Never seen that before!) and you decide to go find it (only pratical thing to do, right?) So on your adventure you meet various people and help various people because you can, and in the end still dont' find your memory, but you do have some friends.

Now explain something to me again; how is wandering around talking to people going to make your memory appear? Wouldn't you sitting in bed thinking help a bit more? I can understand that maybe he'll run into somewhere familiar, etc, but still...its just pointless.

However, despite the fact that the story was decently unoriginal, I still managed to keep playing. The introduction with you and your shadowy-cloaked "brother" was intreuging, and (unlike most OHR storylines) actually made me anticipate what was to come. The characters, though your main character is somewhat bland, tend to have decent personalities. Overall the storytelling was decent, though the story itself seemed a bit pointless.




 
Gameplay
    Most people's first OHR games suffer from either extreme difficulty or extreme easyness. I personally find easy funner to play then hard (I'm a wimp ok?), so I may be a bit biased towards this game. However, I'd have to admit, the balance wasn't all that bad. In fact, it was decently acceptable. Even though you pratically couldn't die when you had the healer with the free 'heal' in your party, the game was still fun to play, and since most enemies moved faster than you and struck hard, you had to choose who to heal.

It was fun to play, though I wish the random-enounter in the forest was down a bit, simply because the forest was so FREAKIN HUGE I fought a ton of battles.




 
  Battle
    Fun? Eh. Easy? Yeah. But an easy fun, I can say that much. Basically the battles run something like this (at least in the beginning)

Patisan attacks
Girl Heals
Partisan attacks
Girl Heals
etc.

Its not all that original. However, there was one aspect I really liked; the girl wouldn't fight. Even though she had the command, she refused to fight. This gave us a nice taste of her personality, which was an utterly brilliant idea. Also, the fact that "heal" was her first option was a great idea as well.

What I didn't like is Pray. It remined me too much of Pray from (you guessed it) FFH. It was pratically the same thing with the same text "your prayer has been answer," "your prayer was not heard", ...etc. If you are going to keep that ability, at least change what the text says. It sounds way too much like FFH to make me think it was a coincidence.




 
  Map Design
    Maps range from amazingly huge to tiny. Luckily, the ones with good, beautiful tilemaps are big, while the ones with somewhat ugly tilemaps are small, so I can look at the beatuiful tilemap while wandering for hours in the enormous forest.

Overall, the big forest idea was cool, but only if you'd added some puzzles or something to pass the time. Wandering through the woods isn't the least bit exciting (well, maybe in Real Life (tm) but not in an OHR game), so perhaps you should cut down on that map's size. Another option is to have ALL your maps be like that and punch down the random enounter rate.

The real world is huge, no doubt about it. I really like the fact that your forest isn't a completely linear path; its realistic and plays fun. However, the novelty of it wears off fast, as the forest gets boring fast. Add something fun to spice up the journey in all your maps; that'll make me keep playing.




 
  Balance
    Balance was (as mentioned above) relatively easy. I don't think I ever died, though I did get pretty close. Save points are basically wandering men, which means you have to FIND them, which is a PAIN. Wait, this is balance, not general gameplay. Oops.

Well, the balance is good. The hero speed isn't boringly slow (most of Friend's game suffer this problem; I get tired of waiting for my turn to fight), so the game is relatively fast paced. You can have some variety in attacks if you want, but really it isn't anything exceptional. Too easy, if anything.




 
Music
    A few songs were ripped, but most were original. The original ones were well written and well placed, and I compiment him on that. I'm still humming a few.

A nice advancement would be to competely transfer to original music. There is a link on the community page to free RPG music, and Aaron Waltz also offers a lot of titles (after asking permission of course). As for now, they are good enough, but you'll want to replace them before the final release.






 
Enjoyment
    The game was decent. A bit bland in places, but still decent. Unlike many OHR games, I actually didn't really hate playing this game, though I definatly won't play it again until the battles are more exciting. They need spice, something to keep the player going, and they are about 50% there. Which is good, because this is the 50% release. :P

Bottom line: Unlike the last "newcommer" game I played (Urban Fantasies), this game actually was enjoyable. I had a decent time playing it.




 
Final Blows
    The fact that everything in the game is original simply blows me away (heh, that might say something about the community as a whole...) but anyway, fantastic work. I'm very glad you didn't rip any graphics. The music can be worked on, but I'm glad you took the responsibility to draw your own graphics, which was a great idea.

1. Gametest your maps and see if YOU get bored. :)
2. Pop the NPC and Hero Graphics up a notch
3. Make the battle backdrops exciting
4. Remove the final few ripped musics and make the game 100% original.
5. Rethink your story with originality and character development in mind.

This game is, however, a fantastic start. Keep working on it and it could be incredible.




Now THAT'S a forest!

Now THAT'S a forest!
Final Scores
Graphics: 5/10.0
All original, which was a plus. Tilemaps are obviously his strongpoint, Hero+Battle Backdrops his weakpoint. Keep working on it, and improve off your old style.
Storyline: 3/10.0
Your generic, run of the mill RPG plotline. Little or no character development, and a dull story. However, the "teaser" type opening did offer some appeal (and showed the story was probably thought out somewhat) which was a good thing. But it still needs work.
Gameplay: 4.5/10.0
Battles tend to be bland and boring, and maps follow suite. The gameplay is acceptable (that is, there are no major flaws) but it needs some spice to flavor it up.
Music: 7/10.0
The original music was well written, and the ripped music was well placed. Also, there wasn't much ripped music, which was great.
Enjoyment: 6/10.0
I had a decent time playing it, but I probably won't play it again until the next update. Played it, beat it, deleted it basically. There is nothing to leave us thinking, "Wow! That was super fun! Can't wait for next update!" which was a bad thing. But this game does have potential, and it shows.
Overall Grade: C-
Final Thoughts
    One of the best "first" games I've ever played. It is obvious there was a lot of effort put in and an decent amount of planing. If Minnek keep up this determination and hard-work he'll have a great game on his hands in no time.  


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