/-/S'pht-Translator-Active/-/


Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 Moontanning
Posted By: Steve LevinsonDate: 1/6/05 2:11 p.m.

In Response To: Eternal Volunteers, G3 Moontanning (blake37)

First of all, we should probably state up front that this is a vacuum level and that it's a timed level. For those who don't already know, this is a branch point similar to Hairy Legs in Rubicon, the first of 5 that we will encounter in Eternal. In fact, one might say that Eternal is a bit too formulaic - in each chapter there are a few common levels, followed by a branch level, followed by a couple failure levels capped by a failure dream level and a couple of success levels capped by a success dream level. If I were Forrest I would have varied this a bit from chaper to chapter. Anyway, this is a timed level and success or failure depends on how quickly the player smashes both sets of wires. The clock starts as soon as the player activates the switch in the opening room, so the initial battle with the compiler, hunter and hulk is off the clock.

: We start out in a large room with sludge in the middle for some reasone. The
: first thing i see is a terminal with an old school S'pht. Weird, they fire
: M2 style bolts. Anyway, as i dodge the bolt, i see, woah, a hulk and a
: hunter. take care of them, read the term and find out that tycho is a good
: guy, and that Hathor is the bad one. Hit the switch opasit of the term and
: go through the doors that open up and duke it out with some troopers, also
: old school. a few of them were trying to get through the doors to the rest
: of the level after i opened them, but couldent. pretty funny to see. go
: down the hall and help out the bobs with the s'pht and then read the
: second term of the level. This one is from hathor, admitting that she sent
: you to the bug ship, but begging you to help her anyway, evidently she
: hasn't been reading up on how to bargin :P

This approach does not work on TC. In order to succeed, you cannot battle all the monsters. The object is to get through the level quickly. The terminal from Hathor provides some important backstory and should not be missed the first time through. Hathor refers to us as Marcus and alludes to our past lives. She also says she knew we would side with "them" - we always do. Interesting. She concludes with this very interesting tidbit:


If I were still human, I imagine that you might even love me. We have so much history together, Marcus, though under far different names than these. I even dream of you still. At least, I pray that they are only dreams.

: take the path back from that room (after hitting the switchs) and go through
: the now open door. take out the hunter and whatnot that may be in your
: way, and go to another little control room. do what you need to thare and
: keep going untill you get to the little room with the switchs. Hopefully
: you save some grenades so you can shoot the far ones. go through the path
: that you cleard and into the big room with the breakable panel. break it,
: get some O2, and go back to the beginning (the first control room, i
: suppose) and repeat those same steps, but going the other way. after all
: that, go through the little hallway in the side of the circut room and
: into the room with two terminals. if you did it like i did, you'll get the
: good job message from tyhco. since we want to fail this time around, i
: went back out to kill some monsters and time, and saw a juggie patrolling
: outside the windows, as well as the bug Dr. John mentioned with the
: enforcers, but this time with a hulk, and going counter clockwise. I went
: back to the term room, and found the fail one glowing. onward we go!!

Hmm, you shouldn't have time to read Hathor's terminal (at least not in depth), fight all those monsters and still get the success terminal. In fact in the earlier marks the player didn't even have time to recharge their O2 or save their game until the end on TC. This may still need fine tuning. Regarding those switches that can only be activated with grenades, I have a big problem with this, as it's all too easy for the novice player to use up all the available trooper grenades just fighting the other monsters and be left with an unplayable saved game. I would suggest making the Pfhor staff able to activate switches on this level only.

: over all, i like this level, but even taking my time as i was, on normal, i
: still got the sucess (sorry, can't spell) message the first time around,
: so i feel the time is too long, but i'm sure steve will argue that, on the
: grounds that he's playing on TC :)

On the contrary, there has to be a much better than even chance that the player will fail the first time through and succeed the second time through, and this has to be the case at all difficulty levels. We might need to enlist a bunch of beta testers with varying skill levels to try this out. And you're absolutely right, your spelling sucks worse than just about any other poster on the forum.

: adam, if you want to keep the helm, be my guest.

I'm just glad that the two of you are helping out!

: otherwise, how did i do?

As I told Adam, too much of a walk-through and not enough analysis. Try to delve beneath the surface and tie things more into the story. Otherwise, not bad for a first attempt.

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Pre-2004 Posts

Replies:

Eternal Volunteers, G3 Moontanningblake37 1/6/05 1:18 p.m.
     Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 MoontanningAdam Ashwell 1/6/05 1:39 p.m.
           Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 Moontanningblake37 1/6/05 1:53 p.m.
     Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 MoontanningSteve Levinson 1/6/05 2:11 p.m.
           Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 MoontanningForrest of B.org 1/6/05 2:48 p.m.
                 Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 Moontanningblake37 1/6/05 3:14 p.m.
                 Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 MoontanningSteve Levinson 1/6/05 7:29 p.m.
                       Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 MoontanningForrest of B.org 1/6/05 8:38 p.m.
           Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 Moontanningblake37 1/6/05 3:13 p.m.
                 Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 MoontanningYossarian 1/6/05 4:16 p.m.
                       Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 Moontanningblake37 1/6/05 4:55 p.m.
                       Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 MoontanningSteve Levinson 1/6/05 7:19 p.m.
                             Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 Moontanningblake37 1/7/05 10:24 a.m.
                                   Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 MoontanningForrest of B.org 1/7/05 11:01 a.m.
                                         Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 MoontanningForrest of B.org 1/7/05 11:12 a.m.
                                               Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 Moontanningblake37 1/7/05 1:20 p.m.
                       Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 MoontanningD-M.A. 1/8/05 1:15 a.m.
                             Re: Eternal Volunteers, G3 Moontanningblake37 1/8/05 3:45 a.m.

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