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Why I Hate Lemuria (and how to make it better)
dynamech
Posts: 111 Arc User
Let me start by saying that, by far, I really think the design and potential of Lemuria is fantastic. I think the stuff in it is interesting, and I think visually, it's one of the more fun and fascinating zones.
That said, it's absolute (literal) wet garbage.
Now, I know Lemuria has an important part in the game, ancient artifacts, civilization and civil war, monsters, ghosts, it's all very interesting. So why don't people go there to check it out? Well, let me share why I don't go and share some suggestions.
#1 - Travel is no fun
This, by far, is one of the biggest issues with Lemuria. Now, I can understand, hey, we're underwater, maybe some travel powers work better than others (Oh, hey, sorry Fire Flight, we're underwater, yeah. Too bad for you. You too, Swinging.) But the fact is, you rarely get any visible indication of your travel powers working or not. Last time I went, it was all swim swim swim, whether in my armored suit or my fire-winged Magician. I know I'm going faster because of my travel power, but ... seeing my armored hero doing the breast stroke looks weird.
Solution #1 - Show Power FX
This is the simplest solution, to have all viable powers show their effects. Things like the sundry forms of leaping and swinging are totally out of luck with this, but even showing the aura of some of the powers might be a nice change of pace. Some people suffer with this, but maybe you could give some consideration to people with other powers, like different animations or something ... but that pushes us toward solution #2.
Solution #2 - Stuff
Create different animations and effects for the underwater use of powers. Have flight users "torpedo" through the water with bubble or distortion effects, have people with swinging firing their guns forward instead of up, and have leapers give one powerful kick with a burst of high speed, rather than a continuous speed rate, while speedsters have a constant bubble effect around their feet to show the superfast kicks. This of course requires more work than #1, but would also be more satisfying to players.
Solution #3 - Quests
OK, so this is kind of a tangent, but HOW ARE WE BREATHING IN LEMURIA? Ok, let's assume everyone has a gadget, a spell, or mutant gills on demand. No, actually, let's not. IF you have Science / Arms / Mysticism at, say, 100 (let's be gentle with this since the current crafting system does not lend itself well to actual skill increases) you can skip the initial missions and just build stuff yourself on the ship by collecting ship items and building something. Otherwise, everyone starts with a slow swim, limited powers and a breath meter. Get some initial quests running to "waterproof" your powers and abilities (say three quests, gathering kelp or machine parts from wrecks and the like.) The quests can be done in any order, but allow for faster swim speeds (and FX like Solution #1 above,) full use of powers, and no need to breathe. This isn't a great solution, but it adds some meat as to why we have no "shrinkage" underwater.
#2 - That Dang Reef
OK, I love the Reef with all its caves and enemies hiding underneath shelves and the like, but what I hate is battling my way down one cave, then finding out that my entrance is in another cave, all the way on the other side of the reef OH WAIT NO, it's the one under this one I just now battled into and ... wait, where is this place anyway?!
Solution #1 - Cave Names
I'm sure the Lemurians know all these caves by heart. Why not pry the cave names from them and flash them on the screen when you enter and, just for fun, include the names in the mission briefings as well. This way, I don't have to trash a pile of Lemurians just for hanging out in the equivalent of a regressive fish-man coffee house.
Solution #2 - No More Caves
Seriously, do we really need, what, four caves? Five caves? Either have all the missions point to one cave or seriously, just put the zone entrance at the top of the cave and have done with it. Let those Lemurians congregate outside or just inside.
#3 - Lemuria Itself
Lemuria itself seems small, barely worth the time. It would be really nice to see missions inside Lemuria itself, like the domed cities. See the interesting architecture, maybe hang out with some of the non-regressed people under the sea. It would be nice to see something other than the Lemurian civil war, maybe providing some good will against enemies from the surface (like Argent exploiters or VIPER terrorists, or something.) It would seem there could be a lot of interesting mission arcs, but a lot of the missions just feel like "go here, kill x of y and come back."
Solution #1 - More missions!
Really, if you want people to come to Lemuria, it's the same solution as leveling characters. Provide alternate stories and alternate paths. Lemuria (like Vibora) seems to have an overabundance of mysticism and mystic enemies. It would behoove Lemuria to have as interesting and diverse a group of enemies as, say, Canada or the Desert. Granted, this is a lot of work, but I think this would really help out the zone in terms of playability.
You could even obviate the need for new underwater travel FX if you made some indoor missions in the different Lemurian domes.
Anyway those are my feelings; Aside from commenting on stuff like "other stuff needs fixing first," (which, I know, I know, there's any number of things to fix and improve) anyone share these ideas or have more?
That said, it's absolute (literal) wet garbage.
Now, I know Lemuria has an important part in the game, ancient artifacts, civilization and civil war, monsters, ghosts, it's all very interesting. So why don't people go there to check it out? Well, let me share why I don't go and share some suggestions.
#1 - Travel is no fun
This, by far, is one of the biggest issues with Lemuria. Now, I can understand, hey, we're underwater, maybe some travel powers work better than others (Oh, hey, sorry Fire Flight, we're underwater, yeah. Too bad for you. You too, Swinging.) But the fact is, you rarely get any visible indication of your travel powers working or not. Last time I went, it was all swim swim swim, whether in my armored suit or my fire-winged Magician. I know I'm going faster because of my travel power, but ... seeing my armored hero doing the breast stroke looks weird.
Solution #1 - Show Power FX
This is the simplest solution, to have all viable powers show their effects. Things like the sundry forms of leaping and swinging are totally out of luck with this, but even showing the aura of some of the powers might be a nice change of pace. Some people suffer with this, but maybe you could give some consideration to people with other powers, like different animations or something ... but that pushes us toward solution #2.
Solution #2 - Stuff
Create different animations and effects for the underwater use of powers. Have flight users "torpedo" through the water with bubble or distortion effects, have people with swinging firing their guns forward instead of up, and have leapers give one powerful kick with a burst of high speed, rather than a continuous speed rate, while speedsters have a constant bubble effect around their feet to show the superfast kicks. This of course requires more work than #1, but would also be more satisfying to players.
Solution #3 - Quests
OK, so this is kind of a tangent, but HOW ARE WE BREATHING IN LEMURIA? Ok, let's assume everyone has a gadget, a spell, or mutant gills on demand. No, actually, let's not. IF you have Science / Arms / Mysticism at, say, 100 (let's be gentle with this since the current crafting system does not lend itself well to actual skill increases) you can skip the initial missions and just build stuff yourself on the ship by collecting ship items and building something. Otherwise, everyone starts with a slow swim, limited powers and a breath meter. Get some initial quests running to "waterproof" your powers and abilities (say three quests, gathering kelp or machine parts from wrecks and the like.) The quests can be done in any order, but allow for faster swim speeds (and FX like Solution #1 above,) full use of powers, and no need to breathe. This isn't a great solution, but it adds some meat as to why we have no "shrinkage" underwater.
#2 - That Dang Reef
OK, I love the Reef with all its caves and enemies hiding underneath shelves and the like, but what I hate is battling my way down one cave, then finding out that my entrance is in another cave, all the way on the other side of the reef OH WAIT NO, it's the one under this one I just now battled into and ... wait, where is this place anyway?!
Solution #1 - Cave Names
I'm sure the Lemurians know all these caves by heart. Why not pry the cave names from them and flash them on the screen when you enter and, just for fun, include the names in the mission briefings as well. This way, I don't have to trash a pile of Lemurians just for hanging out in the equivalent of a regressive fish-man coffee house.
Solution #2 - No More Caves
Seriously, do we really need, what, four caves? Five caves? Either have all the missions point to one cave or seriously, just put the zone entrance at the top of the cave and have done with it. Let those Lemurians congregate outside or just inside.
#3 - Lemuria Itself
Lemuria itself seems small, barely worth the time. It would be really nice to see missions inside Lemuria itself, like the domed cities. See the interesting architecture, maybe hang out with some of the non-regressed people under the sea. It would be nice to see something other than the Lemurian civil war, maybe providing some good will against enemies from the surface (like Argent exploiters or VIPER terrorists, or something.) It would seem there could be a lot of interesting mission arcs, but a lot of the missions just feel like "go here, kill x of y and come back."
Solution #1 - More missions!
Really, if you want people to come to Lemuria, it's the same solution as leveling characters. Provide alternate stories and alternate paths. Lemuria (like Vibora) seems to have an overabundance of mysticism and mystic enemies. It would behoove Lemuria to have as interesting and diverse a group of enemies as, say, Canada or the Desert. Granted, this is a lot of work, but I think this would really help out the zone in terms of playability.
You could even obviate the need for new underwater travel FX if you made some indoor missions in the different Lemurian domes.
Anyway those are my feelings; Aside from commenting on stuff like "other stuff needs fixing first," (which, I know, I know, there's any number of things to fix and improve) anyone share these ideas or have more?
Post edited by dynamech on
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I found it amusing that my Munitions Bots gained flippers when swimming.
The initial Lemuria mission actually address the breathing part. It won't let you leave the submarine until you take it. But an alternative to grabbing glorified kelp would be nice.
As you mentioned, it's a SERIOUSLY GORGEOUS zone. But, like everything else in this game, it REALLY needs work.
"Champions-Online and Star Trek Online contained hundreds of hours of mediocre content!"
and "nothing was polished".
--Jack Emmert
As for breathing - you got the option to do a breathing apparatus helmet thing on the character creator. If it matters that much use it.
More missions? For whom? The what 50 odd players who actually do anything besides hanging round the Ren Centre? I'm not against this but it's just not going to happen, unless they get rid of those ****ing alerts.
Would love to have the crisis queue fixed so that it actually pops now and again.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
The one who can't shut up formerly known as 4rksakes
About the @handle - it's a long story.
Profound quote.. "I'm not a complete idiot - several parts are missing."
Unlike the MI Crisis, Lemuria Crisis seems to require a full queue (for whatever unholy reason). Best bet would be to beg for a group in MC and let them leave after it pops. You don't even get sidekicked down, so it should be a breeze at 40.
As for travel powers underwater, I think a very simple solution would be for players to receive a device that allows enhanced swimming when activated.
I think the breathing "issue" underwater is handled well enough already. And not all player characters need to concern themselves with drowning.
I have several costume slots for my heroes, and I always use one slot for SCUBA gear (if the hero needs it).
A social instance WOULD be nice in Lemuria, maybe with a force-field wall to allow you to swim in and dry off or have a section set aside for the water-breathers. Even if it's just a canned movie of sea-life playing outside, it could easily double for Center Neptune (if anyone gets THAT reference.)
And seriously, yes, some compelling missions other than "Hey, Lemuria wants your help," and once you're there not getting the feeling like you're helping one whit.
And yes, Ghost Pirates are a mess. Fix required. Swabbing the Poop Deck is required.
While she has been rescued
what diabolical mastermind
was behind the devious brain-napping of
the Volterrific Dr Cerebellum?
But a rocket booted power armor does look silly flopping like a dolphin.
Wait? Whaaaa..?
One was using Lemuria as a primarily underwater zone, with everyone swimming around, aquatic menaces, and the like. As originally presented Lemuria, although located beneath the sea, was very much focussed on the air-filled domed city itself, as well as the extensive caves and tunnels beneath it where their Mole Men slaves lived and worked. The air-breathing, pre-reptilian Lemurians got around by means of some nifty magitech vehicles, including some pretty big ones. Developing those areas would have avoided the underwater travel issues that many players have complained about. If CO ever revisits Lemuria, I would suggest those areas would be prime for expansion.
The other element is that Lemuria was originally very much an "enemy" nation to the surface world. Arvad was a SOB of the first water; Lemurians almost universally despised the human surface-dwellers, as well as their longstanding Empyrean foes, and had fought against both repeatedly. There weren't really any sympathetic NPCs, from a human standpoint, built into their society for non-Lemurian Player-Characters to form bonds with or feel compelling desire to help. Such things would really help connect players to Lemuria.
Specifically Jump speed.
I swim a great deal faster using Swinging rather than energy slide.
See, now this is fascinating ... it would be interesting to arrive as a power-deprived prisoner (perhaps as a result of letting your Nemesis mess with the Empyrean Tech) and have to fight your way free, rallying the Mole Men to throw off their oppressors etc. etc. You could also have a built-in Respec reward for some sort of "Radiation Accident" of exploding a Lemurian power source (either Resources or a free power retcon) with some special "mutated" costume pieces to create a new costume slot with.
Anyway, the Lemurians feel 'tacked on,' there's really no feeling of continuity or connection with them, IMO ...
Wait? Whaaaa..?
The biggest problem with the 3D fighting for me is always that it seems so much harder to guess the distance to the mobs, and thats of course a big problem especially for melee toons and it also makes it easy to pull unwanted aggro.
And for those Cave-Entrys .. at least for the Unity Missions, there is a map on the Wiki, and if you did them 2-3 times you mostly know how to find them without that
It's an UN submarine and they have no single aqualung for heroes without underwater capability, instead their captain gives this idiotic quest ripped from cheap fantasy novel? Who wrote it?
2 - NO TP cancelling and NO slower movement. Travelling in Lemuria is indeed tied to jump speed. About the only powers really performing there are jumps, acrobatics and teleport. Teleport probably because it removes player from all states related to the environment.
Every other travel power is busted. It needs to be changed.
Location should not punish players for their power choice.
Lemuria is abandoned because it's not very playable. It's a case where someone tried to be innovative, but it ended with being annoying and tiresome.
It's not a matter of immersion. If anything, Lemuria is a great proof that immersion should never be forced at the cost of playability.
Which is a pity, because save for those issues this zone isn't as annoying as is Vibora Bay with its overlengthy crypts.
Only thing is you don't see the animation, you always are just swimming. I think there was one of the crafted TPs that had also shown an animation in Lemuria, however not totally sure about that at the moment.
They don't work. Drop in speed is noticeable. I was testing swimming with or without jet boots active and there is neither no increase in speed, or it is a very small one.
But with acrobatics difference in speed is very noticeable.
The travel power thing is a close second.
That Dork In The Suspenders, signing out.
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Tab or Click to Target, Follow to remove all your spacial guessing woes. When in range...hit mobs. Personally, never had any issues with the 3d environments on melee or ranged. I usually level there in patches just because it's quiet. Sometimes I just want to go out into the peaceful blue and get my mission on.
meedacthunist: Off the top of my head, RAD Sphere works in Lemuria. It doesn't roll you up into a ball but the graphics and speed both work.
tdits: Honestly, I do not know a single person in my group of friends who uses those arrows. Those and the role icons are one of the 1st things I disable on a new toon. That's not to say that you don't have a valid point and that if a feature is in the game then it should work(Try finding the Beast Cave on MI if you're a newbie, I hear lost people in zonechat all the time on that one). The workaround would be just to put a marker on the map and follow that.
Join Date: Aug 2009 | Title: Devslayer
Whoever you are, be that person one hundred percent. Don't compromise on your identity.
Retooling it as a mid/high-level (25-35) option would be cool.
One thing that bothers me is the storyline that is confused if you do not do the Crisis (which is nigh impossible to do). You do not understand what the domes are at least not right away since you never fought in the civil war part, the domes are way too small to be cities... and so on. The Empyreans are never introduced properly... you waste the story potential of ultracool giant ?golems?. They look like stupid machines attaccking anyone in range...
My Characters
No.
Because then players will have no option but to suffer Vibora Bay Failpocalypse and Vibora Fail crypts, or mandatory alerts on their way from 35 to 40.
Lemuria gives the choice of not suffering through VB. Take few quests in Lemuria, take late quest on MI and you are fine.
Thanks to Lemuria I don't have to play VB and its annoying, overlengthy, mandatory crisis.
And I know I'm not the only one.
Leveling choices at 35-40 are more needed than at lower levels.
Oh, and Lemuria is at least endgame zone for actual superheroes, not a cheap idiotic Buffy the Vampire Slayer knock-off.
Yeah, it would be a bad turn to be forced to level in VB. Even since i really love the crisis and it was one of the best moments in Game when i played it the first time, it starts to get old when you did it 20+ times.
And leveling in VB is simply soooooo slow :redface:
The crypts are awful, however the open air quests are nice, the VB zone is good looking. Certainly the whole classic horror theme + Buffy is a fail for superheroes overall. I mean Marvel has them all too, but are really powerful and unique adversaries, not hosts of vampires and werewolves and so on...
So yeah.. let Lemuria alone level wise
My Characters
And its really "funny" if you have that mission where you have to kill 50 groups !! of Vampires, and at the end one is missing, and after long search you finally find a single mob that is locked in a wall :rolleyes:
There you go. Proven by science.
Wait? Whaaaa..?
It needs a rewrite which makes the apocalypse more the result of Caliburn being an idiot (which he is) and less the result of you being ridiculously gullible. Honestly, Valerian doesn't even really try to hide the fact that she's evil. All you need to do is make her act convincing enough that it doesn't make your character look like a complete moron for falling for it.
Caliburn already does a good job of making himself look like the bad-guy; Valerian Scarlet's bad acting are what ruin the arc.
More on topic, it'd be nice if they fixed that spy mission in Lemuria. I've never managed to complete it because the guy doesn't spawn. It's bad enough that mission is in one of the reef caves, could it at least be completable?
Also, a bunch of the Lemurian mission don't even have a circle on the mini-map, so manually placing a marker requires a lot of memorization or guesswork. I'd enjoy Lemuria a lot more if I didn't have to make such an effort to find the darn missions areas.
An area with a still inhabited dome would be cool too, surely Shadow Destroyer's army of mutated Lemurians couldn't have conquered the entire kingdom. The resistance must live somewhere.
That Dork In The Suspenders, signing out.
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What if...just just listen, what if we Remove all the water from Lemuria?
I support "Sell Z-store items individually" & Japan Zone
It's 3D so Cryptic just filled all 3Ds randomly with bad guys and whatever willy nilly. This means there's no theme to it like neighborhood gangs in MC, and it makes travel a pain in the **** because you can't see everything that might attack you and you end up fighting all weird WAY too much when you just want to get from point A to point B. There should be a shuttle or something to the four quadrants unlocked after a mission just to simplify this.
Next, neighborhoods - they're poorly defined, and the entire zone lacks the cohesive structure of progression (story and level) found in other zones. The entire zone is one giant playground with missions strewn about, and worse, they require the aforementioned crappy travel and dealing with mobs, and suffer from the citizen mission habit of making you wander around a poorly defined location that now becomes even worse because of the 3D (think UNITY caves).
Finally, there needs to be a better narrative other than "Lemurian civil war again!" to keep players invested. This is partly related again to the 3D - there's a lot of space that's not being used simply because it's open ocean, without taking advantage of what the ocean has to offer plotwise. The sub missions were good, but were pretty much the only ones to use the setting. On top of that, because it's 3D, the ocean floor is barely used, so missions don't have the path structure you find in Westside leading you through the neighborhood and picking side missions along the way.
And other stuffs.
Let's face it, the underwater environment is CO's weakest point. Just like that, playing the VB apocalypse again would feel like a mercy spot. Hell, I would want Cryptic to scrap Lemuria altogether and replace it with another environment.
I disagree, I think it has a lot of potential for a unique story and environment, but it was used poorly and thrown together haphazardly. To be fair, there's no real basis for such a level used effectively; this was a first attempt that did a few things right, like forcing players to think about the Z axis, and vertical hazards like the jellyfish area, and the bubble dome deaths idea (that could be an awesome plotline involving tragedy, the folly of technological hubris, coming to terms with humanity and terrors of the depths aside from the obvious big **** sharks, and recovery of a civilization after catastrophe), but without anything to look at, and learn from, and with no follow-up to speak up in favor of consolidation of what works into MC, it just never went anywhere.
There's also a huge potential for comedy (magic kelp, huge coral formations, underwater ghost pirates vs superheroes in nuclear subs, tiny cramped submarines, a lack of ocean life), new game mechanics (the enemy's gate is down!), a change in life perspective (70% of the world is water, and there are civilizations down there).
It's a huge bubble of potential.
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Chemical Plant Zone and Aquatic Ruin Zone are some of my favorite levels. And the water levels in Vectorman were awesome as well. Labyrinth Zone from Sonic 1 sucked though.
I wouldn't say that all "water levels" suck, just that it takes more effort to make them work. And most people don't do well when extra effort is required of them.
That Dork In The Suspenders, signing out.
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Yeah, and the funny thing is that for me Lemuria is still the best form of underwater fighting that i have ever experienced in any MMO. And i will never understand when people in other MMOs always want underwater levels :biggrin:
It needs to be skippable. That's all.
I don't care about story, it isn't that good anyway (I don't care about fighting fantasy angels and demons, I want actual supervillains).
It's just too long and to tiresome for something that is mandatory to unlock the whole zone.
Really, who designed it? It's an epitome of a bad design.
Can rival Lemuria easily.
Name one situation in any media where the hero isn't gullible.
Tintin. That guy trusts nothing and no one.
Wait? Whaaaa..?
Point. But still. My point is, you do what you think is the right thing, but you might actually worsen the situation.
As Spaceballs' Dark Helmet puts it: "So, Lonestar, now you see that evil will always triumph, because good is dumb."
In the end, only evil can defeat evil.
Mind not trying to make me laugh?
I'd like to see stuff actually DONE with B17 down there, I thought the random Russian nuclear submarine was awesome, but random and cramped in a way that made it a poor gaming environment (I get that it's a 'real' nuclear submarine and they're cramped), I like the questing paths that exist... but feel most of it just ends abruptly.
Which... when I consider the issues that exist in Lemuria, particularly back at launch, I wonder if Lemuria is actually an unfinished zone.
Like most people here, not a fan of the stupid caves. I don't understand what people's issues with fighting in 3D is-maybe if people fought more aerial duels instead of always using N2tG? Mini sub escorts are still awful. The treasure hunt quest is annoying in the dome city, the dome city seems like a really big asset to not to be used...
A reskinned moonbase turned "Sealab" would be awesome.
I dunno. I've done a lot of Lemuria, and honestly, my biggest problems with it are how abruptly the quest lines end ("I didn't save the day yet, what do I need to do next? Hello? HELLO!?") and it's general feeling of incompleteness. Couple this up with how both Lemuria and MI tried to tie up their story arcs inside those AWFUL lairs-REALLY looking at Mandragalore and Andrith, but neither VIPER instance, Moreau's Lab, Telios Tower, Burial Cave, and Destroyer's Factory are much better. All of them feature a lousy sense of resolution and bugs. Last I checked, Andrith is STILL the most bugged instance in the game-just less so now.
They make you go through HELL to unlock Therakiel's Temple, but at least it's epic.