After recieving such a positive, well written first review of Moratheia, I decided to create this thread to help new players get a better idea of the game, and I'm hoping other players will submit their reviews too.
MasterTaffer was the first player to publicly announce completion of Moratheia, and kindly submitted a review at the same time. MasterTaffer included ideas for constructive changes in future version Moratheia, which I will submit to the version development thread.
MasterTaffer's review, 09/16/14 (MDY)
Now that I've finished Moratheia, here's my review.
Simply put, I really enjoyed this game. The 2+ years worth of work Ben put into it really shows. Every area looks great, and the character and item models are all superb. This game is quite an accomplishment, as it is the only SOM game I know of that uses entirely custom resources. Just about everything from the consistent art design to the soundtrack work perfectly in conjunction to convey a unique dark fantasy atmosphere that you just don't see in many modern games anymore.
The combat is surprisingly refreshing, as you'll encounter new enemies throughout the game that often force you to change up your tactics, so you can't always rely on the usual circle strafing and hit & run tactics like in most other King's Field type games. The saerirs are a good example of this; they are extremely fast and can kill you quickly, the only way I found to deal with them is to use a fast weapon and low cost magic spell to keep them constantly stunned.
Level design is similar to King's Field 3, in that it's for the most part a linear progression of non-linear maps that occasionally intersect. It's pretty easy to figure out where to go with the exception of dark caves, which are easy to get lost in without a map. The level layout isn't perfect though, as you can often find yourself backtracking for no real reason after completing certain quests. Maps also feel quite empty once you clear out all the enemies. I think a few more respawning enemies in certain areas and maybe some wall signs & additional details would solve this problem.
I really enjoyed the story. A lot of the NPC dialogues are well done and are often hilarious, many of which are actually easily missable. It just goes to show how generic storywriting is in modern RPGs when I'm feeling more attached to a voiceless NPC telling me to "bugger off" than I ever felt to any of the bland characters in Skyrim. My only gripe is that most NPCs are gathered in towns, so it can get tedious having to run around trying to exhaust the dialogues of 15+ NPCs in a single area. It'd help the pacing of the game if they were more scattered throughout the world.
As I stated above, probably the biggest issue I have with this game is the backtracking that is required after completing certain quests. It'd be nice if there were more shortcuts and maybe a warp stone system like in King's Field 4. A select few areas also felt a bit unfinished, like I noticed there were a lot of empty houses in Scala, compared to Calethan, which had houses full of detail. It'd also be great if some of the sellable items had more purpose, like being able to trade the ore you find throughout the game to the blacksmith in Scala to get special equipment would be awesome. Lastly, there were a few immersion breaking bugs I encountered throughout my journey, though, the recent patches seem to have fixed most of the major problems.
Overall, I'd highly recommend this game to any King's Field fan. I think that, over time, it could become something truly special if Ben kept at adding new content and features in future patches, maybe some new areas too? (Here's hoping we get to visit Kranth).
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My comments
16/09/14 (DMY)
I agree with most points you made for improvements in the game, however some of the suggestions would not work in the game. I tried hard to keep warping (or lazy travel) from my game, so that the player felt the accomplishment from walking to and from areas, enjoying the scenery and level design as they did so, and it also increases the chance of players finding items they previously missed, meaning they wouldnt have to tediously return to the dungeon. Respawns are do able, I actually found out that a full extra level's worth of experience would not have hurt the difficulty level.
Signs and wall etchings could be applied in moderation, as not to detract from exploration and isolationism. I appreciate the point.
Combat was something I often found unbearably slow in Kings Field, so I decided to increase it as best I could, and was a main focal point in my game. Its great to know that you enjoyed it.
NPC dialogue was something I really worked hard at, as many of my most enjoyable times in games came from NPC interaction. Your point about having 'floating' NPCs that crop up in strange places is something I would like to add more of. Certain NPCs were deliberately hidden carefully to add more secrets to Moratheia for not having secret walls in my dungeons - instead you have secret NPCs, items, abilities etc.
Scala is a bit more deserted than Calethan (in version 1.0) because I was working flat out to hit my deadline, and had to prioritise other areas of the game that needed more polish. Expect to see more Scalan culture in future versions.
I really appreciate this positive review!
Verdite / Ben
