http://www.spore.com/sporepedia#qry=usr-iceman2%7C2268850369%3Asast-500384729408

Would love a reviw of mine,if you get the time.
It is a longish epic adventure with what I think is a great atmosphere.Let me know what you think!


http://www.spore.com/sporepedia#qry=sast-500387466677

Yo ho. Gots another one I'd like ya to review:

Flaxius - The Ultimate Sacrifice

Zanzibar196's Adventure Reviews

Looooooord dude. . . You're going to hate me after these. I found these adventures next to impossible, I couldn't complete a single one. I know they are completable, but frankly I didn't have the patience. . . Also I had to knock the score down on these because, except for your 'Survival Planet' adventure, they're marked as 'Story'. Meaning they should have a coherent story to be followed. Holy Grail doesn't suffer so much from that as, well, it follows the movie 'The Holy Grail' and does it quite well. Zanzibar's Zany Fun however, suffers. Majorly. Survival Planet is marked as 'Explore' which I have no idea where the exploration is, it's more doing insane quests to find your way off of the planet, not sightseeing.

Ok. . . Adventure marking aside, lets dig into our first one. . .

Zanzibar's Zany Fun Poor

I hate rating something poor, especially since this one obviously had time and detail slapped into it. But the time and detail aren't the problem, it's the twisted torture that is the level progression. . . Allow me to explain.

Pros: The creatures are cool in some cases. Ultra Metal-mech was neat, the environment is detailed in places, like the buildings and walls and the arena are nice. Health power ups and weapons are in good places even if they're not well outlined. . . Alright, so lets move into it.

Critique: Ok, admittedly I had some bias before I even loaded up due to the fact anything with "Zany Fun" in its name gives me a pessimistic feeling. I half expected to spawn in a pile of bombs. However, the problem off the bat. . . Was the fact that this was an eight act long adventure with three sections in each act. And every single objective his hidden.

Let me explain to you why this drove me on the brink of insanity. . . Or, rather, more insane then I already am. . .

Well, Act 1, teleport in. No idea what I'm supposed to do, quests are all hidden. . . So I knew I had to be careful, if I missed one thing or killed something I wasn't supposed to I was going to auto-fail. Sigh. . .

Luckily Act 1 is easy, you talk to a guy in front of you, and I really gave up on semblence of a reasonable plot the moment he said "OMG! It's you!" . . . "Omg?" Nevermind. . . Anyway, you're wanted for dinner which in the plot is never brought up again or mentioned. However they also don't give you any hint as to what you need to do next except "We can't keep dinner waiting" which has no bearing on what you need to do next.

You also need to examine some sort of weird grass on the floor on the way, which I never would have caught if I didn't mouse over it. . . However you follow the road, go down it, take a right to a. . . Rather pointless dead end. . . Nevermind! Guess out of the two ways I could have gone I went the wrong way! Turn around and head into building with weird heart funnel. Which teleports you into what I have no doubt is the reason so many people never completed this mission. . .

A maze, This is now Act II, you have two choices. Red or Blue teleporters. With no clues to be given even though there's a sign right before it that could give you a hint, but doesn't, instead it just tells you "Hey you're doomed!". . . You're up a creek without a paddle. After some trial and error I eventually found there was no way for me to do this easily and decided I didn't have a paddle, but I had a jetpack. So I cheated, I got to one of the rooms with an open roof and jetpacked to the roof. After walking along the roof I eventually found the room that only had one teleporter in it, which must have been where to go.

Fall in teleporter, now I'm faced with. . . A house with one leg and a bird's head. . . A cuckoo clock. . . Why am I fighting an Epic Cuckoo Clock? Why is it here? How is there an Epic Cuckoo clock? Why is it in an arena? Never explained. . . But like I said I gave up on story. The epic hits hard, chips off about 1/3rd of your life per shot if you don't have a life booster and only some armor. I eventually figured out that the fruit piles were health, at first I just figured they were environmental pieces. No one tells you, there's no indication, so much like the Skyviour mission there's no way of knowing they're there. But unlike the Skyviour mission this isn't forgivable because you NEED them to beat this Cuckoo clock. If I got too low on health I had to beat rush for the health, so eventually I figured to just sit back and blast it with my blasters and move over to grab a fruit if it hit me.

They're on a five second respawn counter, but if I or the monster are too close then they don't respawn at all. So a lot of times if it came at me I needed to stealth, disengage the clock and move off and wait for the picky respawn system to respawn it. Sigh, anyway, you kill cuckoo clock. . . Which appearently was the second act's last goal, it's first being examine the sign and it's second being take the teleporter to the arena.

However you can easily miss the sign as there's no marker or indication and it's on the edge of your screen when you teleport in. You starting to see why these hidden objectives were driving me crazy? I'm not even two acts into this and already I'm horribly lost and confused.

Ok. . . Act 3, first goal is that the gates to the arena have opened and you need to walk through them to a hidden teleporter. Ok, then you're transported to an outpost somewhere with Ultra Metal-Mech who asks you for a coconut. . .

. . .Why not. . .?

So you take a teleporter next to him, once again you have no indication to do this so I spent my time looking around like an imbecile trying to figure out what this island he's talking about was until I decided to go for broke and take the teleporter. And you may say, "Oh but the teleporters there! It's obvious!" Well remember all these goals are hidden, so you have to be really, -really- careful. If you go too far ahead you can completely screw everything over. For example what if there was something else I needed to do in that camp that led to Act Five? But instead, I took the teleporter which didn't have a teleporter back. I just failed and now I'm horribly confused and frustrated.

So you take the teleporter, to find this guy a coconut. An island with enemies and weird balls that I could only assume were the coconuts strewn about. Well! Thankfully I have a captain with Stealth!

SO, I grab a coconut under my enemies noses, go back to the teleporter that I assumed lead back to the outpost. Walk up to him and give him the coconut and. . . Nothing? Whaaaaat?

Ugh, Ok,-fine-. . . I go back to the island and repeat it, maybe he wants two coconuts? He has two hands afterall.

. . .Nope. . .

Head back again, now I'm frustrated, so I kill all the enemies. . . THEN, Act III completes. . . HOW was I supposed to know I had to kill them?! There was no mention there'd even be enemies on the island! What are they even doing there? Why are they hostile to me? Why is it absolutely necessary to kill them? There's no explanation in the story as to who these guys are or why I need to kill them. Fine, I just passed it off as they're 'evil' and obviously must die because they were born that way. . .

Ok, so Act 4, I auto pass the first part because I gave him a coconut which to me looks more like a soccer ball that had a layer of human skin sewed over it a-la Necronomicon style but hey whatever. So you talk to Metal guy again to find out you now need a Sparrow to carry the coconut. . .Fourth wall blatantly broken by reference to the coconut needing to be taken to a friends adventure and a quote from Holy Grail. . . Ok. At least this task they've given me some semblance of a reason. Mind you not a viable one but at least it's a bloody reason.

Now what? Out of raw guessing and simply not caring I decided to take the teleporter again, which to my reluctance led to a new area and Act 5.

Now I'm led with three creatures, a bizarre four eyed creature, a dipping bird and a worm with two heads and only one of them can be the sparrow! So I should talk to them to figure it out. . .

. . .Well why do I need to do that? There's only one bird it's the only thing that makes any viable sense! Nevermind. . .

Anyway. . . Moving along, you talk to all three. After a bunch of fourth wall breaking and blatant asking to be rated up which only made me want to rate them up less you escort them back to Ultra Metal-mech via the teleporter.

SO! I take them to the mech AND. . . Nothing. I talk to mech guy to find out he's going to attack the three guys who followed me because he hates them. OK! So that must mean I have to fight him right? So I kill him and. . . Mission failed?

What?

Ugh, fine whatever. . . Go through the entire mission and get to this part again. Bring them up to him again, nothing. . . Ok, so what I obviously have to do here then is help him by killing the three guys you were escorting, you've been helping him this far right? It makes sense.

So you kill them, mission failed. . .

. . .

So, I go through it -again-. This time when going through the cuckoo clock part I suddenly noticed that the Cuckoo clock somehow got outside of the arena. Considering he's so huge when he moves around he jumps around a lot so it didn't surprise me the thing eventually glitched outside the arena. However I didn't notice this at first, and decided to get some frustration out. Noticing most of the crates could be destroyed I started just busting things up. . . Then I noticed a pile of crates in the arena hold grenades! Not all of them, some of them!

Why is there no indication there's grenades? For people without a good weapon layout like me they'll be hopelessly lost against that boss! They'll have no idea you have to bust open the crates to get grenades to throw at the boss! Ugh. . .

So, finally, I use my jetpack and start chucking grenades off the side having had spotted the birdbrain outside glitched and killed it. Got back to Metal man, got the three guys I'm supposed to escort and SUCCESS!

. . . Wait what?

What did I do differently?! I eventually went to the editor to check this out. WELL! That blade of grass you examined earlier? You need to bring four eyes to that, and the two mouthed worm? He needs to be brought to Metal guy. Given they count as crew, you can't control where they move. So unless they're in JUST the right place, you're not going to complete this part.

It. . .Is. . . Next. . . To. . . Impossible. . . Because. . . The. . . Quest. . . Is. . . Hidden.

I NEVER would have known you have to take four eyes to the grass while having the worm touching the Metal guy! And there's only a small chance of this actually working because it completely depends on if the finicky A.I. decides it wants to move there!

*Pant pant.*

. . .Yes, this part frustrated me. . .

So. . . Kill metal guy NOW, because it's bad to do it before Act 6. Automatically completes the second act after he dies, why? A gift spawns under the boss which you have to collect. Thankfully since you're usually stabbing your laser claws in its face you're going to get it anyway. You have to keep the sipping bard alive during this which isn't easy. Why?

He's set to the enemy team, that means the AoE of my laser claws hits him, so you can wear him down to death. In fact I failed this part the first time through. Once again, quest his hidden mind you this so you have no idea what you're doing. . . But since the trio are set to the enemy team the bird and its friends start attacking YOU because they're set to the enemy team. So only naturally you think, "Maybe they need to die too?" So you kill them, and fail.

FINALLY figuring this out, I get to the final act, talk to the stupid bird who's pecking at my face while I talk to him, finally I'm just about done! Take the teleporter one last time, now it leads to the beginning! Oh thank god I'm almost done, run to the teleporter at the beginning, completed two of three parts!

. . .Now what?

Ok, one last section of the final act. I run everywhere. . . There's some limo boat out on the ocean, do I go to that? No. Do I kill it? No. Do any of the people talk to me? No. After this I just get too frustrated, quit, and go to the editor to figure out what the heck I missed.

. . .A bag of money spawns back at the back of the outpost. . . Apparently you need to collect it before going in the teleporter. However it's on the OPPOSITE side of where you just fought the Metal guy, and it's behind you so you don't see it unless you get the compulsion to turn around before going in the teleporter.

Ironically the bird thing DOES tell you that you need to get the sporebucks! But by this point you're so used to having to guess at what you have to do and the talking text being less then useless that you end up just skipping over it or you think the Sporebucks are pass the teleporter or GAH!

So, after growing gray hair far earlier then what I should. . . I just gave the mission a poor and couldn't bring myself to go through it again to finish it. It's too non-linear, it doesn't even have fragments of a story, the objectives are confusing and in some cases near impossible, if you do anything out of order you're screwed. The mission objectives need to be visible, because otherwise you're running around blind as a bat. Or if you want them invisible -at least- clearly state what it is you want the player to do in mission text. This isn't even to mention it's in the completely wrong category, it either needs to be changed out of the story category or stripped down and started over so it has some semblance of a story.

Also the begging throughout it for rating it up just, makes you want to rate it up less. . . In all honesty it just needs to be designed better altogether. It's got a lot in it, and there's a lot to do, but going about doing those things is all wrong and more painful then fun.

Survival Planet Poor

It's better, I'll admit. . . But not by enough that it saves itself from the poor category. It still lacks any coherency and fun, and the overriding problem that "Hey most of the goals are hidden" slaps you in the face.

Pros: Once again, environment is good and buildings are well made. Arena was cool and there are powerups in the right places even if, just like last time, they're not well outlined.

Critique: Knowing this is categorized as an 'explore' mission I can't ream it too hard for lack of a plot. . . Or so I thought, but the introductory text states 'It's up to you to find out what's going on here on this mysterious planet'. So, unlike Zanzibar's Zany Fun that blatantly breaks the fourth wall even before you begin thus killing any hope for a story, this one -does- leave you with the hope there's going to be a story by reading the introductory text, a gripping mystery. . . And it certainly starts that way. . .

Act1, GAH THE OBJECTIVES ARE HIDDEN AGAIN! Ok, well, to be fair not -all- of them are in this one. But still most of them are and it makes this a real pain. We can start off the bat right here in Act 1 why it doesn't work here either. There's the ruins of a house behind you down the road where you start. However, the road curls around into a fire pit, so it makes sense to turn around and complete the first objective, looking at a house that is demolished and has been abandoned.

Well right away it leaves the intrigue of a story, "Gee what -did- cause this? Where is the family? Are they ok? What happened?"

Moving down you find some ruins where a camp had been made that you have to examine, ok so something camped by here, adding more to the intrigue. Then you see a Monolith ahead. However, putting your courser over it, it doesn't come up as examinable, so you figure right away it's not an objective . . . However exploring rest of the area, yes, yes it is. . . You have to walk up to it and touch it.

Obviously.

So, you're teleported to an arena. Where FINALLY a visible goal, you have to befriend the announcer. So you talk to said announcer, who just says you're pathetic and lets see what you can do. . .

. . .Why am I befriending this guy?

Anyway, you do so, which with my basic social parts I managed. . . But then I have to do something else.

If you stick around a while you find him yelling about his Microphone. WHY not put that in the text when he's talking to you? Note, still no explanation as to why I'm befriending him. So I search the place and eventually find the yellow mic against the yellow ground and hand it back to him. Wait what?! I got shocked by lightening on the way?! You turned on Hazards?! Sigh. . .

Ok so now on top of having mysterious hidden objectives I'm now limited due to natural events that could come out at any time and zap me to death. . . So no time to sit around and think about these things anymore I gotta rush!

Act 3, Ok two monsters are fighting in the arena! However the visible quest I need to do involves getting a controller of some kind. . . Which is in the middle of the arena. Ok, so, I figure I just need to avoid them, grab the remote and bam.

. . .Well no, after a bit I figure out I need to kill the duo. Thankfully there's some meteors laying on the ground nearby that you toss at them and explode! Once again no indication that those are there and can be used for that purpose but whatever. . .

So, kill them, Act 4 time, head to a teleporter that teleports me to a tribal hut with some random NPC in front of it. Oh! Good! Back to the plot maybe?

. . .Nope.

Ok so, 'Maken' as his name goes just says Hi, can you please get my pet, it wandered off by the volcano. Ok, so, the other two quests. There's an un-hidden one that basically says you need to take the Alien Pet, so I figure it's move to alien pet or something. So, it's off to finding the pet at the volcano.

Unfortunately, this is a plent covered in lava instead of seas and mountains. So saying 'Find a Volcano' is like saying 'Find a particular fish in the ocean'. Ok there's billions of them. . . Sigh, ok so it's got to be more linear then that. Even though the quest is showing, the alien pet doesn't show on my minimap, wonderful. So it's as good as hidden. I walk down the first thing I see which is a path leading to some random hut in the middle of nowhere. . . Ok that was pointless. Follow it back and then look around. Eventually I find a road off to the side somwhere that curls around and leads to the side of the volcano.

So, I jump down. Now I have to add the alien pet to my crew by befriending him, which is a pain in the-- Yeah. . . This is because he moves fast, real fast, and he's constantly running around the volcano. So when you stop him to befriend him, your captain has to stop to wave. The alien pet keeps running off in the distance, -THEN- stops when your animations done. Problem with this is the red fog of the dense atmosphere of the planet. It shades out the Alien Pet if he walks off too far and you can't see what he's doing to respond for the social game.

So, eventually, after some effort I got it done. I take him back to the elder and. . . Nothing. . .

. . .Ok what the hell?

I head back to the volcano, walk over a jump pad that I never bothered to use because I have a jet pack and. . . Passed? Ok. . . Upon going to the editor the hidden objective is you need to go over both jump pads. However there's no way to tell that! NONE!

Anyway. . . Act 5, surprisingly linear. You talk to Maken who says his staff was taken by some monster called a Baltog. All of this is visible so it's easier to see what you need to do. You need to kill the Baltog, and it's children. It's defenseless children in their nest. Why? I have a stealth helmet, can't I just sneak up, take the nest and let the poor things be? And why is it 'evil'?

Anyway. . . You kill the Baltog and it's defenseless children in their nest, Act 6, take the staff back, or so you assume. You have no idea, this part's hidden too. I ended up taking it to Maken, and since it wasn't in just the right spot, it didn't pass it, and as such I figured, "Ok, maybe I need to give it to someone else. . ." So maybe this other guy he's talking about? Fred?

Go to Fred, nothing. Ok whatever, now he's rambling about crystals, maybe that's the goal? So I go off and grab a crystal, bring it back to him. . . Nope.

. . .At this point I gave up, I could have done anything wrong and I just didn't have the patience to figure it out. I went to the editor to see the rest.

So after this you give Fred a crystal, not that it's easy to see where they are. . . He gives you the powder, you take it back to Maken who says he actually didn't need the powder but he'll teleport you out anyway. So he summons a giant coin you need to step on, which teleports you to a spaceport where you can go home.

Wait, that's it?

What about the plot?! What happened to the planet?! Why's there an arena?! Where are the people?! What's going on?! What was the POINT of all of this?!

Ugh, so in the end, nothing's explained and it feels like a very hollow victory for all the trouble you had to go through. Just like Zanzibar's Zany Fun the hidden objectives make it harder then it should rightfully be, the quests are confusing and backwards, the story falls flat on its face, and all in all it's just a pain. It's got its ups but it really needs refining, a long adventure with lots of objectives doesn't make a -good- adventure.

Anyway. . . Last one.

The quest for the Holy Grail Fair

Ok looking at your comments I didn't have high opes for this, but I was surprised. THANKFULLY none of the quests are hidden which I wanted to kiss your feet for.

Pros: No hidden quests, it's linear and simple. The dialog matches the Holy Grail well. So all in all it's a faithful adventure that's simple and too the point. It's problem. . . Well you already know it.

Critique: Getting to it, Acts one through three are simple, talk to this guy, do this, and reminisce on some of the fine scenes of Holy Grail. Nothing's hidden and it's fairly pleasant. However. . . Then you hit the duck.

For starters, no it's not Maxis's fault that the quest is backwards. You can drag the markers on the side on the objectives tag to reverse the wording so you have to bring Knight to Duck. But really that's not the problem, because you could bring the Duck to the knight, kick the duck from your party then add the Knight. That's not a big deal.

The problem is how hard they are to befriend. My captain is decent at befriending things, he befriended your announcer in the last mission and others. He has all four social skills of level 2 or higher. The problem is even then you need -more- to socialize and befriend them. Maybe even the captain parts, so you need a particularly social captain to do the job.

All I can say is, I can't do it, and it looks like by your comments quite a few other people have it too hard where they can't either. If you have a captain that can, maybe you should lock them in? Otherwise that's it's only and major downfall.

I went into the editor and blew pass this part by auto-passing it, then I went through the rest. All the rest was pleasant and alright. A faithful reenactment, the leader of the Knights of Ni was cool.

All in all, it gets a fair. It's got that social problem, and it's very straightforwards, otherwise it's nice.

Boba Fett Stories (Prologue) Great

Ahh, what a fine adventure. I think this is one of the few adventures I didn't cringe on when I saw a locked captain because. . .

. . .I mean because it's Boba Fett. . .

How are you gonna cringe at Boba Fett unless he has a rocket pointed at your face?

Pros: Wow the accuracy of these things is amazing. I rather enjoyed the Star Wars rhomp, it was fun if a bit too easy and shallow. However there's just something nostalgic about walking around the palace seeing familiar faces. So without more delay, lets get into it.

Critique: Act one starts with Boba Fett in front of his ship, he goes over his logs reminding him that he's here to see Jabba the Hutt. Most of Act one is spent trudging through the desert fighting Tusken Raiders as you go. Obviously they pose little to no threat, but. . . You're friggin Boba Fett, what do you expect?

All of the creatures you see along the way are familiar and incredibly well made, it's very impressive and the single thing that brings this to great status. It's just a very accurate and well done reenactment of the deserts of Star Wars and Jabba's lair. You eventually get too Bib Fortuna, with his wonderful show of how the A symmetry mod should be standard in the game.

You go and talk to Jabba for act 2, who tells you to get settled in before he gives you work.

For act 3 you talk to a Twi'lek and a Gomorrean outside, it's really kind of a short spoken and pointless conversation, but it does help set the mood. After that you head back in and talk to Jabba who gives you your mission for act 4.

You have to go kill tusken raiders, fun.

So you go out and find a Tusken Raider village, if you didn't kill all the raiders on the way, none of the raiders you kill in the desert count towards your total. You have to kill the ones inside the village. Which I guess is so you explore the whole map instead of just killing the ones by the wrecked Sandcrawler. Anywho.

You head back to Jabba who's impressed with you, then tells you to take his pet rancor inside.

Immediately you think this is suicide until you realize this is quite some time before the Rancor was fully grown, so he's just a cute baby for now. Now, you have to take him inside the palace, but I found it passes if you just walk into the camp so, its kind of pointless overall and I'm not sure if that's a glitch or not. . .

Anyway, with my baby Rancor standing outside of the cave rather then being in it, I went back and talked to Jabba who simply thanked me.

It's short and accurate to the story, however it does lack content. I feel there's more you could do here and frankly more challenge that could be injected. But then again this is a prologue, an introduction, so who's to say what could happen in further installments? All I know is it's beautifully designed and well done. Good job.

Anyway, I'm off to celebrate 4rth of July with the family, I'll get back to reviewing tomorrow. See ya everyone.

hey Raptor, are you going to do a review on mine? if the link is a problem here is one that works...i hope. if it doesn't PM me and let me know.

http://www.spore.com/sporepedia#qry=ftr-adventure%3Ausr-MKCSTEALTH%7C500220492929%3Asast-500378158614%3Aview-newest

again, its Red vs Blue, worth 86 points and Very Hard (don't downrate it cause its Hard.)

I finished this last night. It's my first adventure.

Here's the link.

BOBA FETT?!

Oh I am SO down.

First of all, I want to thank you for taking the time to both play through and review my adventure. It's greatly appreciated.

What took up the vast majority of the complexity bar were the *trees*. Over 90% of all plant life that the player goes through was hand placed since the flora seeder screwed me over and left the area I terraformed almost lifeless. I noticed you also went through the adventure pretty fast, I imagined an 8 minute romp through the woods. There were three allies (one of which is near the beginning but it's an animal simply with a unique name) for the non-combat oriented captains, the priestess was click able after the sixth act, and the scrolls were click able; they explained who Jokt is. The animals were indeed placed there just for ambience, I mean, how much trouble could a plant-like insect pose to an interstellar traveler? But I will take your comment to heart, as the next adventure I'm planning has wildlife too, but they're meant to be more dangerous. I do have to fix the Carnter though, apparently some of the birds fly too close to him and he chases after them, even if it means falling off his cliff. I'll probably modify some of the text too, about the Rykre.Currently they're around the same power level as this adventure so I'll be upping it.

I will add dialogue to the spy explaining that it was him who found the priestess and he expects his rewards. For the weather, I was torn between simply making it rain, or what I chose. At first I chose making it rain throughout, but adding water droplet animations to the entire jungle was tedious (it was a decision I made after placing the trees). I was hoping for something like this:

Sun and Rain

but obviously failed on the delivery. Sadly I can't change how the sky looks regarding cloudy/sunny, only day or night.

This was an introduction to a series of adventures I plan on creating which expands vastly upon the story. The one I'm currently working on sadly, ended up being more gameplay/exploration than story, but it touches mostly on the Alroaxt. But since you said you enjoyed the details, the world, you'll probably like my next one which does not have as simplistic gameplay (but still only one goal per act in the beginning). Here's a sneak peak:

*Edited in when I can find where my pictures go to!*

Double post

Well, why not? I do find it cool and helpful that you are taking all of this time and effort into making these reviews.

Aquatic Execution



http://www.spore.com/sporepedia#qry=sast-500388019422

This is part one of a three part adventure series that I will be making. I wanted to have you review the first one so I can improve when I make the other two.

RaptorZefier,

Here's an adventure of mine that I would like you to try.

Megan part 1
http://www.spore.com/sporepedia#qry=usr-Damien519|2262712940%3Asast-500437304423

Its the first in a series that I'm working on. I don't think you mind quick play missions with locked captains. Hopefully it will let you download it. Sometimes when I try to download someone Else's adventure there is no download button.

thank you for my review on my boba fett (prologue)

RaptorZefier wrote: Zanzibar196's Adventure Reviews

Looooooord dude. . . You're going to hate me after these. I found these adventures next to impossible, I couldn't complete a single one. I know they are completable, but frankly I didn't have the patience. . . Also I had to knock the score down on these because, except for your 'Survival Planet' adventure, they're marked as 'Story'. Meaning they should have a coherent story to be followed. Holy Grail doesn't suffer so much from that as, well, it follows the movie 'The Holy Grail' and does it quite well. Zanzibar's Zany Fun however, suffers. Majorly. Survival Planet is marked as 'Explore' which I have no idea where the exploration is, it's more doing insane quests to find your way off of the planet, not sightseeing.

Ok. . . Adventure marking aside, lets dig into our first one. . .

Zanzibar's Zany Fun Poor

I hate rating something poor, especially since this one obviously had time and detail slapped into it. But the time and detail aren't the problem, it's the twisted torture that is the level progression. . . Allow me to explain.

Pros: The creatures are cool in some cases. Ultra Metal-mech was neat, the environment is detailed in places, like the buildings and walls and the arena are nice. Health power ups and weapons are in good places even if they're not well outlined. . . Alright, so lets move into it.

Critique: Ok, admittedly I had some bias before I even loaded up due to the fact anything with "Zany Fun" in its name gives me a pessimistic feeling. I half expected to spawn in a pile of bombs. However, the problem off the bat. . . Was the fact that this was an eight act long adventure with three sections in each act. And every single objective his hidden.

Let me explain to you why this drove me on the brink of insanity. . . Or, rather, more insane then I already am. . .

Well, Act 1, teleport in. No idea what I'm supposed to do, quests are all hidden. . . So I knew I had to be careful, if I missed one thing or killed something I wasn't supposed to I was going to auto-fail. Sigh. . .

Luckily Act 1 is easy, you talk to a guy in front of you, and I really gave up on semblence of a reasonable plot the moment he said "OMG! It's you!" . . . "Omg?" Nevermind. . . Anyway, you're wanted for dinner which in the plot is never brought up again or mentioned. However they also don't give you any hint as to what you need to do next except "We can't keep dinner waiting" which has no bearing on what you need to do next.

You also need to examine some sort of weird grass on the floor on the way, which I never would have caught if I didn't mouse over it. . . However you follow the road, go down it, take a right to a. . . Rather pointless dead end. . . Nevermind! Guess out of the two ways I could have gone I went the wrong way! Turn around and head into building with weird heart funnel. Which teleports you into what I have no doubt is the reason so many people never completed this mission. . .

A maze, This is now Act II, you have two choices. Red or Blue teleporters. With no clues to be given even though there's a sign right before it that could give you a hint, but doesn't, instead it just tells you "Hey you're doomed!". . . You're up a creek without a paddle. After some trial and error I eventually found there was no way for me to do this easily and decided I didn't have a paddle, but I had a jetpack. So I cheated, I got to one of the rooms with an open roof and jetpacked to the roof. After walking along the roof I eventually found the room that only had one teleporter in it, which must have been where to go.

Fall in teleporter, now I'm faced with. . . A house with one leg and a bird's head. . . A cuckoo clock. . . Why am I fighting an Epic Cuckoo Clock? Why is it here? How is there an Epic Cuckoo clock? Why is it in an arena? Never explained. . . But like I said I gave up on story. The epic hits hard, chips off about 1/3rd of your life per shot if you don't have a life booster and only some armor. I eventually figured out that the fruit piles were health, at first I just figured they were environmental pieces. No one tells you, there's no indication, so much like the Skyviour mission there's no way of knowing they're there. But unlike the Skyviour mission this isn't forgivable because you NEED them to beat this Cuckoo clock. If I got too low on health I had to beat rush for the health, so eventually I figured to just sit back and blast it with my blasters and move over to grab a fruit if it hit me.

They're on a five second respawn counter, but if I or the monster are too close then they don't respawn at all. So a lot of times if it came at me I needed to stealth, disengage the clock and move off and wait for the picky respawn system to respawn it. Sigh, anyway, you kill cuckoo clock. . . Which appearently was the second act's last goal, it's first being examine the sign and it's second being take the teleporter to the arena.

However you can easily miss the sign as there's no marker or indication and it's on the edge of your screen when you teleport in. You starting to see why these hidden objectives were driving me crazy? I'm not even two acts into this and already I'm horribly lost and confused.

Ok. . . Act 3, first goal is that the gates to the arena have opened and you need to walk through them to a hidden teleporter. Ok, then you're transported to an outpost somewhere with Ultra Metal-Mech who asks you for a coconut. . .

. . .Why not. . .?

So you take a teleporter next to him, once again you have no indication to do this so I spent my time looking around like an imbecile trying to figure out what this island he's talking about was until I decided to go for broke and take the teleporter. And you may say, "Oh but the teleporters there! It's obvious!" Well remember all these goals are hidden, so you have to be really, -really- careful. If you go too far ahead you can completely screw everything over. For example what if there was something else I needed to do in that camp that led to Act Five? But instead, I took the teleporter which didn't have a teleporter back. I just failed and now I'm horribly confused and frustrated.

So you take the teleporter, to find this guy a coconut. An island with enemies and weird balls that I could only assume were the coconuts strewn about. Well! Thankfully I have a captain with Stealth!

SO, I grab a coconut under my enemies noses, go back to the teleporter that I assumed lead back to the outpost. Walk up to him and give him the coconut and. . . Nothing? Whaaaaat?

Ugh, Ok,-fine-. . . I go back to the island and repeat it, maybe he wants two coconuts? He has two hands afterall.

. . .Nope. . .

Head back again, now I'm frustrated, so I kill all the enemies. . . THEN, Act III completes. . . HOW was I supposed to know I had to kill them?! There was no mention there'd even be enemies on the island! What are they even doing there? Why are they hostile to me? Why is it absolutely necessary to kill them? There's no explanation in the story as to who these guys are or why I need to kill them. Fine, I just passed it off as they're 'evil' and obviously must die because they were born that way. . .

Ok, so Act 4, I auto pass the first part because I gave him a coconut which to me looks more like a soccer ball that had a layer of human skin sewed over it a-la Necronomicon style but hey whatever. So you talk to Metal guy again to find out you now need a Sparrow to carry the coconut. . .Fourth wall blatantly broken by reference to the coconut needing to be taken to a friends adventure and a quote from Holy Grail. . . Ok. At least this task they've given me some semblance of a reason. Mind you not a viable one but at least it's a bloody reason.

Now what? Out of raw guessing and simply not caring I decided to take the teleporter again, which to my reluctance led to a new area and Act 5.

Now I'm led with three creatures, a bizarre four eyed creature, a dipping bird and a worm with two heads and only one of them can be the sparrow! So I should talk to them to figure it out. . .

. . .Well why do I need to do that? There's only one bird it's the only thing that makes any viable sense! Nevermind. . .

Anyway. . . Moving along, you talk to all three. After a bunch of fourth wall breaking and blatant asking to be rated up which only made me want to rate them up less you escort them back to Ultra Metal-mech via the teleporter.

SO! I take them to the mech AND. . . Nothing. I talk to mech guy to find out he's going to attack the three guys who followed me because he hates them. OK! So that must mean I have to fight him right? So I kill him and. . . Mission failed?

What?

Ugh, fine whatever. . . Go through the entire mission and get to this part again. Bring them up to him again, nothing. . . Ok, so what I obviously have to do here then is help him by killing the three guys you were escorting, you've been helping him this far right? It makes sense.

So you kill them, mission failed. . .

. . .

So, I go through it -again-. This time when going through the cuckoo clock part I suddenly noticed that the Cuckoo clock somehow got outside of the arena. Considering he's so huge when he moves around he jumps around a lot so it didn't surprise me the thing eventually glitched outside the arena. However I didn't notice this at first, and decided to get some frustration out. Noticing most of the crates could be destroyed I started just busting things up. . . Then I noticed a pile of crates in the arena hold grenades! Not all of them, some of them!

Why is there no indication there's grenades? For people without a good weapon layout like me they'll be hopelessly lost against that boss! They'll have no idea you have to bust open the crates to get grenades to throw at the boss! Ugh. . .

So, finally, I use my jetpack and start chucking grenades off the side having had spotted the birdbrain outside glitched and killed it. Got back to Metal man, got the three guys I'm supposed to escort and SUCCESS!

. . . Wait what?

What did I do differently?! I eventually went to the editor to check this out. WELL! That blade of grass you examined earlier? You need to bring four eyes to that, and the two mouthed worm? He needs to be brought to Metal guy. Given they count as crew, you can't control where they move. So unless they're in JUST the right place, you're not going to complete this part.

It. . .Is. . . Next. . . To. . . Impossible. . . Because. . . The. . . Quest. . . Is. . . Hidden.

I NEVER would have known you have to take four eyes to the grass while having the worm touching the Metal guy! And there's only a small chance of this actually working because it completely depends on if the finicky A.I. decides it wants to move there!

*Pant pant.*

. . .Yes, this part frustrated me. . .

So. . . Kill metal guy NOW, because it's bad to do it before Act 6. Automatically completes the second act after he dies, why? A gift spawns under the boss which you have to collect. Thankfully since you're usually stabbing your laser claws in its face you're going to get it anyway. You have to keep the sipping bard alive during this which isn't easy. Why?

He's set to the enemy team, that means the AoE of my laser claws hits him, so you can wear him down to death. In fact I failed this part the first time through. Once again, quest his hidden mind you this so you have no idea what you're doing. . . But since the trio are set to the enemy team the bird and its friends start attacking YOU because they're set to the enemy team. So only naturally you think, "Maybe they need to die too?" So you kill them, and fail.

FINALLY figuring this out, I get to the final act, talk to the stupid bird who's pecking at my face while I talk to him, finally I'm just about done! Take the teleporter one last time, now it leads to the beginning! Oh thank god I'm almost done, run to the teleporter at the beginning, completed two of three parts!

. . .Now what?

Ok, one last section of the final act. I run everywhere. . . There's some limo boat out on the ocean, do I go to that? No. Do I kill it? No. Do any of the people talk to me? No. After this I just get too frustrated, quit, and go to the editor to figure out what the heck I missed.

. . .A bag of money spawns back at the back of the outpost. . . Apparently you need to collect it before going in the teleporter. However it's on the OPPOSITE side of where you just fought the Metal guy, and it's behind you so you don't see it unless you get the compulsion to turn around before going in the teleporter.

Ironically the bird thing DOES tell you that you need to get the sporebucks! But by this point you're so used to having to guess at what you have to do and the talking text being less then useless that you end up just skipping over it or you think the Sporebucks are pass the teleporter or GAH!

So, after growing gray hair far earlier then what I should. . . I just gave the mission a poor and couldn't bring myself to go through it again to finish it. It's too non-linear, it doesn't even have fragments of a story, the objectives are confusing and in some cases near impossible, if you do anything out of order you're screwed. The mission objectives need to be visible, because otherwise you're running around blind as a bat. Or if you want them invisible -at least- clearly state what it is you want the player to do in mission text. This isn't even to mention it's in the completely wrong category, it either needs to be changed out of the story category or stripped down and started over so it has some semblance of a story.

Also the begging throughout it for rating it up just, makes you want to rate it up less. . . In all honesty it just needs to be designed better altogether. It's got a lot in it, and there's a lot to do, but going about doing those things is all wrong and more painful then fun.

Survival Planet Poor

It's better, I'll admit. . . But not by enough that it saves itself from the poor category. It still lacks any coherency and fun, and the overriding problem that "Hey most of the goals are hidden" slaps you in the face.

Pros: Once again, environment is good and buildings are well made. Arena was cool and there are powerups in the right places even if, just like last time, they're not well outlined.

Critique: Knowing this is categorized as an 'explore' mission I can't ream it too hard for lack of a plot. . . Or so I thought, but the introductory text states 'It's up to you to find out what's going on here on this mysterious planet'. So, unlike Zanzibar's Zany Fun that blatantly breaks the fourth wall even before you begin thus killing any hope for a story, this one -does- leave you with the hope there's going to be a story by reading the introductory text, a gripping mystery. . . And it certainly starts that way. . .

Act1, GAH THE OBJECTIVES ARE HIDDEN AGAIN! Ok, well, to be fair not -all- of them are in this one. But still most of them are and it makes this a real pain. We can start off the bat right here in Act 1 why it doesn't work here either. There's the ruins of a house behind you down the road where you start. However, the road curls around into a fire pit, so it makes sense to turn around and complete the first objective, looking at a house that is demolished and has been abandoned.

Well right away it leaves the intrigue of a story, "Gee what -did- cause this? Where is the family? Are they ok? What happened?"

Moving down you find some ruins where a camp had been made that you have to examine, ok so something camped by here, adding more to the intrigue. Then you see a Monolith ahead. However, putting your courser over it, it doesn't come up as examinable, so you figure right away it's not an objective . . . However exploring rest of the area, yes, yes it is. . . You have to walk up to it and touch it.

Obviously.

So, you're teleported to an arena. Where FINALLY a visible goal, you have to befriend the announcer. So you talk to said announcer, who just says you're pathetic and lets see what you can do. . .

. . .Why am I befriending this guy?

Anyway, you do so, which with my basic social parts I managed. . . But then I have to do something else.

If you stick around a while you find him yelling about his Microphone. WHY not put that in the text when he's talking to you? Note, still no explanation as to why I'm befriending him. So I search the place and eventually find the yellow mic against the yellow ground and hand it back to him. Wait what?! I got shocked by lightening on the way?! You turned on Hazards?! Sigh. . .

Ok so now on top of having mysterious hidden objectives I'm now limited due to natural events that could come out at any time and zap me to death. . . So no time to sit around and think about these things anymore I gotta rush!

Act 3, Ok two monsters are fighting in the arena! However the visible quest I need to do involves getting a controller of some kind. . . Which is in the middle of the arena. Ok, so, I figure I just need to avoid them, grab the remote and bam.

. . .Well no, after a bit I figure out I need to kill the duo. Thankfully there's some meteors laying on the ground nearby that you toss at them and explode! Once again no indication that those are there and can be used for that purpose but whatever. . .

So, kill them, Act 4 time, head to a teleporter that teleports me to a tribal hut with some random NPC in front of it. Oh! Good! Back to the plot maybe?

. . .Nope.

Ok so, 'Maken' as his name goes just says Hi, can you please get my pet, it wandered off by the volcano. Ok, so, the other two quests. There's an un-hidden one that basically says you need to take the Alien Pet, so I figure it's move to alien pet or something. So, it's off to finding the pet at the volcano.

Unfortunately, this is a plent covered in lava instead of seas and mountains. So saying 'Find a Volcano' is like saying 'Find a particular fish in the ocean'. Ok there's billions of them. . . Sigh, ok so it's got to be more linear then that. Even though the quest is showing, the alien pet doesn't show on my minimap, wonderful. So it's as good as hidden. I walk down the first thing I see which is a path leading to some random hut in the middle of nowhere. . . Ok that was pointless. Follow it back and then look around. Eventually I find a road off to the side somwhere that curls around and leads to the side of the volcano.

So, I jump down. Now I have to add the alien pet to my crew by befriending him, which is a pain in the-- Yeah. . . This is because he moves fast, real fast, and he's constantly running around the volcano. So when you stop him to befriend him, your captain has to stop to wave. The alien pet keeps running off in the distance, -THEN- stops when your animations done. Problem with this is the red fog of the dense atmosphere of the planet. It shades out the Alien Pet if he walks off too far and you can't see what he's doing to respond for the social game.

So, eventually, after some effort I got it done. I take him back to the elder and. . . Nothing. . .

. . .Ok what the hell?

I head back to the volcano, walk over a jump pad that I never bothered to use because I have a jet pack and. . . Passed? Ok. . . Upon going to the editor the hidden objective is you need to go over both jump pads. However there's no way to tell that! NONE!

Anyway. . . Act 5, surprisingly linear. You talk to Maken who says his staff was taken by some monster called a Baltog. All of this is visible so it's easier to see what you need to do. You need to kill the Baltog, and it's children. It's defenseless children in their nest. Why? I have a stealth helmet, can't I just sneak up, take the nest and let the poor things be? And why is it 'evil'?

Anyway. . . You kill the Baltog and it's defenseless children in their nest, Act 6, take the staff back, or so you assume. You have no idea, this part's hidden too. I ended up taking it to Maken, and since it wasn't in just the right spot, it didn't pass it, and as such I figured, "Ok, maybe I need to give it to someone else. . ." So maybe this other guy he's talking about? Fred?

Go to Fred, nothing. Ok whatever, now he's rambling about crystals, maybe that's the goal? So I go off and grab a crystal, bring it back to him. . . Nope.

. . .At this point I gave up, I could have done anything wrong and I just didn't have the patience to figure it out. I went to the editor to see the rest.

So after this you give Fred a crystal, not that it's easy to see where they are. . . He gives you the powder, you take it back to Maken who says he actually didn't need the powder but he'll teleport you out anyway. So he summons a giant coin you need to step on, which teleports you to a spaceport where you can go home.

Wait, that's it?

What about the plot?! What happened to the planet?! Why's there an arena?! Where are the people?! What's going on?! What was the POINT of all of this?!

Ugh, so in the end, nothing's explained and it feels like a very hollow victory for all the trouble you had to go through. Just like Zanzibar's Zany Fun the hidden objectives make it harder then it should rightfully be, the quests are confusing and backwards, the story falls flat on its face, and all in all it's just a pain. It's got its ups but it really needs refining, a long adventure with lots of objectives doesn't make a -good- adventure.

Anyway. . . Last one.

The quest for the Holy Grail Fair

Ok looking at your comments I didn't have high opes for this, but I was surprised. THANKFULLY none of the quests are hidden which I wanted to kiss your feet for.

Pros: No hidden quests, it's linear and simple. The dialog matches the Holy Grail well. So all in all it's a faithful adventure that's simple and too the point. It's problem. . . Well you already know it.

Critique: Getting to it, Acts one through three are simple, talk to this guy, do this, and reminisce on some of the fine scenes of Holy Grail. Nothing's hidden and it's fairly pleasant. However. . . Then you hit the duck.

For starters, no it's not Maxis's fault that the quest is backwards. You can drag the markers on the side on the objectives tag to reverse the wording so you have to bring Knight to Duck. But really that's not the problem, because you could bring the Duck to the knight, kick the duck from your party then add the Knight. That's not a big deal.

The problem is how hard they are to befriend. My captain is decent at befriending things, he befriended your announcer in the last mission and others. He has all four social skills of level 2 or higher. The problem is even then you need -more- to socialize and befriend them. Maybe even the captain parts, so you need a particularly social captain to do the job.

All I can say is, I can't do it, and it looks like by your comments quite a few other people have it too hard where they can't either. If you have a captain that can, maybe you should lock them in? Otherwise that's it's only and major downfall.

I went into the editor and blew pass this part by auto-passing it, then I went through the rest. All the rest was pleasant and alright. A faithful reenactment, the leader of the Knights of Ni was cool.

All in all, it gets a fair. It's got that social problem, and it's very straightforwards, otherwise it's nice.

Well see... this is what I need to polish these... so, let's address a few things... and see if they are better, eh?

1) Zany Fun... it's not really supposed to have much of a plot... it's just an abstract sort of adventure... I just felt that having a teleport maze in there would make it challenging. I will make some of the objectives less hidden... I suppose that won't hurt any. It's also a supposed to just be a satire to poke fun at the inneficiencies that are the rating system... and to show off some of my better creations. I don't know how to make a pile of fruit more obvious then hey... this COULD help you win this fight!! And well, the grenades in crates... yeah, that's supposed to be a hidden power up on purpose. The fight is definitely easier then it looks if you use your wits some. I wanted to make the fight LOOK intimidating, but easy to win if you are clever! I will also try to see what I can do to fix the cuckoo from wandering too far...

2) I'm not sure how to put a dead carcass of a Baltog in the 1st act. That would draw the story together a bit better, I think. Either that, or a Baltog track... still not sure how to do that... Maybe I could somehow edit the text when you examine the 2nd object. Since the monolith is a cleverly disguised teleporter... and the objective is to move to it... I didn't want it to be TOO obvious... but well it is a exploration adventure and it *is* a rather out of place object... Examine --> Teleporter I don't believe works in the editor. I'll try it though... Making friends with the announcer was added in there mostly because there's no way to set... "Dance for the crowd" in the editor... and well, you are *supposed* to show the announcer some moves... I probably should make the mike visible I suppose... Probably should increase the announcer's dance skill so you have to dance more... since your next objective is under a very *explosive* crate... lobbing a rock at it gets the 2 battling monsters dead... so don't see a reason to make killing them blatantly obvious... you will probably do it anyways just getting the visible objective. I know the planet's haze makes it a bit difficult to see the *only* super-huge volcanic mountain on the planet, but I did add a lot of fire, smoke, and other effects to it to make it stand out a bit more. It is "Survival Planet"... so yeah, I wanted the dangers on to make it FEEL like your life is constantly threatened... when it's really not. Also, more piles of fruit near Maken and Fred heal you 100%... so again, I don't think it's a bad thing. Just kinda makes ya wet your pants when a flaming rock burns you a bit... hehe. Again, look for these updates soon!

3) I'll have to look at mr. metal pants who doesn't social well better since too many people are finding him impossible to ally. I did rather like his look for bedievere though... I suppose I could give him some captain parts to *lower* his skills, eh? Of course, once he is *part* of your posse, it does make socialing the other 2 knights much easier... Well, in the movie arthur does bring him a duck, and it is do-able... you *can* bring the duck to the knight... so that isn't bad verbage... just note, it also works in reverse... you can bring the knight to the duck and skip booting the duck out of your posse! Since this is the major bottleneck, I suppose I'll have to revamp it. Thanks for the input, and once I revamp... care for another go?

PLEASE review the second verison for "Acropolan Frost" now, it is much better, just skip Acropolan frost version 1 and do version 2 instead.

here is the link again
Ok here is my adventure, version 2 of Acropolan Frost

http://www.spore.com/sporepedia#qry=sast-500387421595