Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 3:35 am
My gelert looks funny without her spots.... Hmm... I don't quite see the point of the whole "Why do purple pets have orange spots?" question, nor do I see how it relates in anyway to the spots. So there were some fighting orange and purple grundos, not much of a correlation if you ask me.
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 4:01 am
butterflygirl wrote:My gelert looks funny without her spots.... Hmm... I don't quite see the point of the whole "Why do purple pets have orange spots?" question, nor do I see how it relates in anyway to the spots. So there were some fighting orange and purple grundos, not much of a correlation if you ask me.
True.
Kym wrote:I think it was nice how Neopets tied up all the loose old Neopets facts and made them related.
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 4:13 am
About the above: This plot was supposed to explain why purple pets have orange spots (I think it was mentioned in an NT editorial). For some reason, that's totally missing - even though they still have purple/orange for the grundos...
I have to agree with most of the sentiments here... The plot steps felt disconnected from the story, the ending felt rushed (we didn't participate at all in the climax!), a lot of grinds... To me, it's as if they put in the last couple of plot steps as busywork or an afterthought to drive things to an end (we hadn't even reliably gotten the acid-making figured out!).
But I personally enjoyed figuring out the cooperative token-testing steps, the first few times around. I just wish they properly finished, and tied up the loose ends. I submitted an editorial question about the whole purple-with-orange-spots loose end, and I'm still wondering about that authorization code for the robot guarding the mines. I wonder if the Vending Machine of Doom will still be around, and what's happened to Parlax.
Did anyone else notice that the rectangular block for the "The End" sign is too tall? It seems like it's made for two lines, but "The End" is only one line. Hmm....
The epilogue really begs for a continuation. Please please please tie up all the loose ends!
I have to agree with most of the sentiments here... The plot steps felt disconnected from the story, the ending felt rushed (we didn't participate at all in the climax!), a lot of grinds... To me, it's as if they put in the last couple of plot steps as busywork or an afterthought to drive things to an end (we hadn't even reliably gotten the acid-making figured out!).
But I personally enjoyed figuring out the cooperative token-testing steps, the first few times around. I just wish they properly finished, and tied up the loose ends. I submitted an editorial question about the whole purple-with-orange-spots loose end, and I'm still wondering about that authorization code for the robot guarding the mines. I wonder if the Vending Machine of Doom will still be around, and what's happened to Parlax.
Did anyone else notice that the rectangular block for the "The End" sign is too tall? It seems like it's made for two lines, but "The End" is only one line. Hmm....
The epilogue really begs for a continuation. Please please please tie up all the loose ends!
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 4:24 am
Some people are upset at loosing their spots. Maybe they can win the spots back as plot prizes or maybe buy wearable spots. I think that would be interesting if it happened, because if the spots became wearable, then any color pet could wear them. Then we could get white and orange spotted pets or maybe shadow and orange spotted or other interesting colors which might look nice.
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 4:31 am
So ... that's it? *disappointment*
I like the idea of purple pets recieving a wearable orange spot item. Then, those who like the spots can leave it and those who don't can remove it. Why not?
I like the idea of purple pets recieving a wearable orange spot item. Then, those who like the spots can leave it and those who don't can remove it. Why not?
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 4:41 am
*scratches head* That's it? Really? Maybe it's just that I'm used to plots that lasted a few months, but this one just seemed really short to me.
Did any actual Neopets players ever find the "real" Space Faerie token? I hope they did. Because if not...well, I'm having a hard time finding the words to describe what I think of that. Cheated, maybe. I mean, the chances are astronomical (heh) that any one team would actually find the real token, but just imagine for minute that it happened, and you were on that team. Wouldn't that be awesome? To have beaten the odds with a rag-tag group of your fellow PPTers or other Neopets players or what have you - you may not get any actual physical rewards for finding it aside from a temporary spike in popularity, but still!
But by just giving us all a few days (weekdays, at that!!) and then just having the comic characters find it, well, that just kinda robs us of that little thrill. Sure, yes, there's something to be said for just doing the group work too, that's its own positive feeling. Some pretty smart and understanding Neopets players came out of the woodwork, and I had fun working alongside them. But taking away the whole point of the group testing and even the individual activities (rod forging, acid making, singularity gathering), not only makes it that less fun, but makes me personally feel like we didn't really matter a whole lot, as far as the plot went. If that's how they were going to do it, well, it wouldn't really matter if hundreds of thousands of players did the activities, or just one person! That...just doesn't sit well with me, and is probably my biggest gripe about this plot.
My second biggest gripe is that, for being the most notorious Neopets villain, Dr. Sloth turned out to be one of the most boring, imho. (Or maybe I'm just spoiled on fun and interesting villains because I'm a rabid One Piece fan.)
Aaaaaanyhow...it's a shame, because I liked pretty much everything else about the plot. The Battledome opponents were at about the right level of difficulty, as were the puzzles. The art in the comics was, for the most part, consistently great. And even though I still think writing is one of the areas where Neopets is weakest, this storyline was much better than usual. I was pleasantly surprised when Ylana actually said, "I have a better idea. How about the loser...dies?" I didn't expect them to flat-out use the word "die", even though, in that case, it was the perfect one to use. And the little secret comic at the end with the epilogue made me chuckle. Commander Gormos actually was (is?) listed in the Gallery of Heroes, but there's no easy way to get to it and I always forget to bookmark the stupid thing. Gorix and Cylara were in there as well - it would've been nice to have had links to those provided in the news or something, but perhaps the information about them no longer fit the plot or something? (btw, The Gallery of Evil is also "lost" now too, isn't it?)
And yay for no more ugly orange spots on Purple pets! Sorry, but I never was a fan of them. Plus it just bugged me that for one, Purple was the only color with another color stuck onto it, and two, why bother with that anyway when we had a Split color that was purple and orange?
Did any actual Neopets players ever find the "real" Space Faerie token? I hope they did. Because if not...well, I'm having a hard time finding the words to describe what I think of that. Cheated, maybe. I mean, the chances are astronomical (heh) that any one team would actually find the real token, but just imagine for minute that it happened, and you were on that team. Wouldn't that be awesome? To have beaten the odds with a rag-tag group of your fellow PPTers or other Neopets players or what have you - you may not get any actual physical rewards for finding it aside from a temporary spike in popularity, but still!
But by just giving us all a few days (weekdays, at that!!) and then just having the comic characters find it, well, that just kinda robs us of that little thrill. Sure, yes, there's something to be said for just doing the group work too, that's its own positive feeling. Some pretty smart and understanding Neopets players came out of the woodwork, and I had fun working alongside them. But taking away the whole point of the group testing and even the individual activities (rod forging, acid making, singularity gathering), not only makes it that less fun, but makes me personally feel like we didn't really matter a whole lot, as far as the plot went. If that's how they were going to do it, well, it wouldn't really matter if hundreds of thousands of players did the activities, or just one person! That...just doesn't sit well with me, and is probably my biggest gripe about this plot.
My second biggest gripe is that, for being the most notorious Neopets villain, Dr. Sloth turned out to be one of the most boring, imho. (Or maybe I'm just spoiled on fun and interesting villains because I'm a rabid One Piece fan.)
Aaaaaanyhow...it's a shame, because I liked pretty much everything else about the plot. The Battledome opponents were at about the right level of difficulty, as were the puzzles. The art in the comics was, for the most part, consistently great. And even though I still think writing is one of the areas where Neopets is weakest, this storyline was much better than usual. I was pleasantly surprised when Ylana actually said, "I have a better idea. How about the loser...dies?" I didn't expect them to flat-out use the word "die", even though, in that case, it was the perfect one to use. And the little secret comic at the end with the epilogue made me chuckle. Commander Gormos actually was (is?) listed in the Gallery of Heroes, but there's no easy way to get to it and I always forget to bookmark the stupid thing. Gorix and Cylara were in there as well - it would've been nice to have had links to those provided in the news or something, but perhaps the information about them no longer fit the plot or something? (btw, The Gallery of Evil is also "lost" now too, isn't it?)
And yay for no more ugly orange spots on Purple pets! Sorry, but I never was a fan of them. Plus it just bugged me that for one, Purple was the only color with another color stuck onto it, and two, why bother with that anyway when we had a Split color that was purple and orange?
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 6:35 am
this plot seemed a little little little slow... 
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 7:10 am
Thats it? o0 I'm kinda a little peed about that to be honest, We didn't even fight a boss, no sloth, he just got trapped in a bloody Thing, woopidoodledoo, There wasn't hardly any plot at all, I was hoping for more puzzles to complete or at least a couple more battles, but we get nothing.
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 9:01 am
I managed to...create one bar for the last step. That was it. And I don't fight in BD, so my score will be pretty sad.
/cry
Why couldn't they have given us some more time for people in different timezones, or those with school?
/cry
Why couldn't they have given us some more time for people in different timezones, or those with school?
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 9:11 am
Ledi wrote:I managed to...create one bar for the last step. That was it. And I don't fight in BD, so my score will be pretty sad.
/cry
Why couldn't they have given us some more time for people in different timezones, or those with school?
You had an entire week (assuming any testing done after the token was found counts).
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 1:54 pm
Wow. The end (not of the comic, but of our part) felt so anti-climactic. I guess I was hoping for something along the lines of LDP, or at least even TOW -- but the last puzzles weren't really that hard, and there was no progression in difficulty. And the group testing was annoying because people kept leaving or didn't know what they were doing. I didn't know about PPT when LDP came out, and I didn't really know what plots were -- so I never even finished mapping my temple. But I've read through the solutions to past plots, and they seem a lot more involved -- and fun. Even the "mini" Altador plot had more steps! Ah, well, at least we had a few good puzzles. And the battledome part did have various levels for different skill levels.
After the disappointing end to JLI and now this, I suspect this might be the future -- shorter plots with less complicated steps. I guess the kiddifying continues... I'm just sad I never got to participate in the "cool" plots back in the good ol' days -- if only I'd found PPT sooner!
After the disappointing end to JLI and now this, I suspect this might be the future -- shorter plots with less complicated steps. I guess the kiddifying continues... I'm just sad I never got to participate in the "cool" plots back in the good ol' days -- if only I'd found PPT sooner!
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 2:15 pm
Very disapponting. I couldn't even get passed that crazy code step so I just ended up battling.
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 2:21 pm
yea wasnt all that good in da hood xDD
umm all i can really say is i want to participate in the next plot as much as i can
umm all i can really say is i want to participate in the next plot as much as i can
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 4:56 pm
Ugh...another bad-guy-stuck-in-a-token solution? You'd think that they would figure out it's not so great an idea since it didn't work for the Darkest Faerie before. We'll definitely see Sloth again.
I'll say what I said before. This was a really great plot! I loved the comics, puzzles, even the battling. However, there are just too many things unexplored. For example, a vague connection between Sloth and the Lost Isle was presented, but not explained. It would have been nice to have a comic about his testing/perfecting of his mutations and what (if anything) went wrong. There were other things like this throughout the plot.
In conclusion: great plot, terrible ending.
I'll say what I said before. This was a really great plot! I loved the comics, puzzles, even the battling. However, there are just too many things unexplored. For example, a vague connection between Sloth and the Lost Isle was presented, but not explained. It would have been nice to have a comic about his testing/perfecting of his mutations and what (if anything) went wrong. There were other things like this throughout the plot.
In conclusion: great plot, terrible ending.
Re: The Return of Dr. Sloth [Split 11]
Sat Mar 15, 2008 5:00 pm
Lee wrote:Moongewl wrote:I wonder if there's going to be a part 2 to this somewhere down the line. It feels so rushed and neat. And they left the token where one of his loyal minions or a Sloth clone could get to it.
Same here. Sloth will one day return. It's going to happen, we just don't know when.
I agree, the left behind token seems to leave things open for a sequel. Also, look at the creepy red eyes flashing in the token in the last frame, it's almost like signaling for yet another Sloth's return.