Overall the story is a mess even though individual pieces are great. Some, they even brought me to tears. The death of Tybalt for instance wrenched my heart and even Forgal’s death made me sad even though I was expecting it. Can’t say I cared much when Sieran died though, she was just rather unlikable overall. There were, sadly, parts that made me wonder what happened next. Sad because what happened next always fell flat on its face.
The big problem with the story is: it feels like it was written by a thousand different people, all with a different goal and direction. Even the character dialogs feel like they were pieced together from multiple characters. During the racial story lines, the characters seemed more interesting, more likeable. The moment you step beyond you find silly choice after brain bendingly bad dialog.
The three most powerful groups in the world, facing planetary extinction… can’t get along enough to hunt down a couple dredge? (Norn storyline) Some how you, a random up and coming moron, green from the creche is, supposed to make these ancient orders work together? It is hamfisted and shortsighted.
A big problem I think is the transition from “you are the hero” to “you are the support cast” This is fine in theory, but the way it is written, you keep getting treated as the hero while you are written as support. If I am supposed to be supporting the differen’t orders, or destiny’s edge, the pact, or any of the other groups, write it that way. There should be an overarching goal that I’m attached to, but not directly responsible for. It would be nice to have something that say… it would all fall apart if I didn’t succeed, but I shouldn’t be leading the charge every step of the way. I thought it was kinda cool when you finally forged the pact, but that is forgotten almost immediately. It was my character’s hard work that put it together… that makes me the hero…
Treherne, there I said it, kittening Treherne. I don’t mind if he is the ‘hero’ of the story, this can even make for interesting writing… the problem comes in when we are given missions that do all the important stuff, and he just falls on his kitten and mopes around. He is incompetent, he is not fit to rule, and he is not a hero. You want a hero? Make him a hero, make him almost poiwerful, standing stalwart against a greater foe while you run around cleaning up other things. Make him smart, solving a problem while you stand by to protect him as hes busy dealing with the big picture. More often than not he’s just in the background throwing magic at the wildlife while you’re fighting the big boss. Then when its over, he acts as if HE defeated the boss?
I think the concept of being the support cast could be great. But to be support cast, you need to be supporting some one else, you need some one YOU can look up to.
Now lets talk about the other elephant, destiny’s edge. They get a big stamp of “WTF?” on their foreheads, all of them. The only real likeable ones in my opinion are Rytlock and Eir. Caithe is too busy worrying about some ex girlfriend to bother saving the world. Logan is…. 1 part prince charming, 1 parts chicken kitten running away from battle, 2 parts late (the only time this actually works out is when he shows up with the air ship), and 3 parts incompetent moron who’s on his kitten 90% of the battle. (I’m looking at you caudecas mannor). Zojja is alright some times, when shes dealing with only the private story stuff, but the moment you mix in the others… she changes characters completely. Snaff is obviously dead, but you don’t feel anything for it
Now lets talk early storyline. For the most part these work. But there are a few specific things missing. You are told your history, briefly, but its so disconnected that you cannot associate it. I don’t know when the asura arrived, I don’t know where they come from except, some where underground possibly driven up by primordius. When it starts out, I’m introduced to an asinine culture that has a striking similarity to the gnomes from Warcraft. Seriously guys, give us some more dimensions to the characters other than crotchety old farts and bat kitten crazy genius. How do any of them even get along long enough to reproduce?!
The Charr on the other hand, they were probably the best written of the bunch, but mostly because they actually had backstory that people were interested in. But then the norn are pretty flat, sylvari are almost empty except for the curiosity that they might be created by the jungle dragon. To me they mostly come off as both childish morons and mary sues. Even my own sylvari elementalist annoys me at times.
