2013-08-11, 08:44 PM
I tried Legends of Dawn (needed a little vacation 
) and it's not bad, but it has some significant "balancing" issues. It made me think how important a well designed stat/price system is in game making. Legends of Dawn has a crafting system for spells,weapons,armor,potions and several other categories. It could have been quite fun, but because of poor balancing, the whole system falls flat.
For example, if you defeat a wolf, you might get a "Damaged Wolf Pelt" a "Normal Wolf Pelt" and some "Wolf Meat" (Ewwww, but anyways) strangely, the damaged pelt sells for more than the normal. You can repair the damaged pelt (convert it to "normal") by combining it with "Linen Thread", but the thread costs more than you get for selling the pelt.
I think it was set up this way because the pelts are meant to be crafting items more than sellables, but all you can craft with pelts are Leather Armor items whose stats are worse than the gear you find during normal gameplay. And all the leather armors pieces sell for less than the wolf pelt to begin with. Not only does that make no sense from a logical standpoint, it feels like you're being penalized for using the crafting system. All the crafting categories are like that. You can buy "fire wood" and "spices" to craft the meat into a healing item, or you can spend 1/10th as much to just buy "Bandages" that do the same thing.
My point being, no matter how nice a game looks, or detailed its environment, if its system of rewards falls flat, it can really hurt the experience.
) and it's not bad, but it has some significant "balancing" issues. It made me think how important a well designed stat/price system is in game making. Legends of Dawn has a crafting system for spells,weapons,armor,potions and several other categories. It could have been quite fun, but because of poor balancing, the whole system falls flat. For example, if you defeat a wolf, you might get a "Damaged Wolf Pelt" a "Normal Wolf Pelt" and some "Wolf Meat" (Ewwww, but anyways) strangely, the damaged pelt sells for more than the normal. You can repair the damaged pelt (convert it to "normal") by combining it with "Linen Thread", but the thread costs more than you get for selling the pelt.
I think it was set up this way because the pelts are meant to be crafting items more than sellables, but all you can craft with pelts are Leather Armor items whose stats are worse than the gear you find during normal gameplay. And all the leather armors pieces sell for less than the wolf pelt to begin with. Not only does that make no sense from a logical standpoint, it feels like you're being penalized for using the crafting system. All the crafting categories are like that. You can buy "fire wood" and "spices" to craft the meat into a healing item, or you can spend 1/10th as much to just buy "Bandages" that do the same thing.
My point being, no matter how nice a game looks, or detailed its environment, if its system of rewards falls flat, it can really hurt the experience.