(AB) Glass Pyramid: Chapter 1 (Beta, staring Maxim and Its_A_Random) - COMPLETE

[The Wanderer]

And with that, the beta test of Chapter 1 is complete, and the thread now open for discussion.

And I think I'll start it by addressing the Gyarados in the room: It is blatantly clear that Malcolm needs an overhaul. Yes, Max and Random took the hard route. Yes, going that path is supposed to make Malcolm a wake-up call boss. No, Malcolm should not be so powerful that it takes a fucking Regirock to stalemate him at best. I already have some ideas on how to fix this, although I can't bring them up here. Not yet, at least.

Unfortunately, I can't offer any input on the zubat horde fight, because it never happened. Nothing beyond speculation, anyway - if Malcolm was anything to go by, it's possible the horde might be pretty broken as well, so I'll look into that, too.

Max brings up a few good points about clarity. I could've done some better foreshadowing about the machine through the fight with the Zubat trio, but I didn't. As for Malcolm...well, he was supposed to panic if you bypassed the horde, but going bonkers and completely savaging the party was more me trying to explain six levels of bulk up. Honestly, it's likely I'll just nix hardmode altogether.

 

[Maxim]

Right, I'd better post something here before I completely forget.

First off, I liked the introduction, just dumping you into a rather crappy village overrun by vampire-wannabes. I thought that was a nice touch. The stuff after...it was solid, if a bit bland perhaps? Granted it is the first chapter so I'm not expecting a ton of originality. Admittedly your writing made it a fair bit more interesting, thanks to the stupidity of the Bidoof among others, but as far as required content goes it seems a little bare bones. The final encounter I think needs to be entirely rewritten, weaker boss (although we didn't try the normal mode boss, so jury's out on whether he's too strong), more obvious hard mode trigger (if you decide to keep hard mode in at all anyways), and a bit more explanation about Horace and how escorting him will win the game for you. The flavor of the boss fight and epilogue were great though.

Overall, I think the idea is solid, and the flavor is typically quite good. My main issue with the story right now is clarity, if I didn't have inside knowledge, I would never have guessed that the machine destruction stopped the Zubat horde, or that going in the back door would cause Malcolm to go bananas. Main things are, rewrite the final boss, and fill in some of the gaps between there and the village, and you've got a good chapter ready to go!

Glass Pyramid Approved