Review RPG Codex Review: Serpent in the Staglands

[Bubbles]

The review is very spoiler-conscious, which probably hurts its clarity a bit. I would describe the C&C in SitS as "there's one default ending, but the game gives you hints on how to get a different one on the second playthrough if you can avoid the bugs." 99% of players would never meet the "extra conditions" without meta knowledge.

A spoiler-heavy review could have compared SitS to

Spoiler

Undertale,

which might make for a very interesting comparison.

 

[Fenix]

In the real world people judge you, yes. In the Staglands world you're the only intelligent human. It's a software program judging you like a multiple choice test. Where's the value in that?

There is no you in SitS, only softwares programs. )

 

[ushas]

A spoiler-heavy review could have compared SitS to

Spoiler

Undertale,

which might make for a very interesting comparison.

Would love to read that after the playthrough

 

[shadow9d9]

This is going to sound odd, but my favorite aspect of Serpent in the Staglands is how it treats the player like an intelligent human being. You won't find a 30 minute tutorial explaining how to walk, manipulate items, or fight in this game. You will have to read the huge and detailed manual, and most likely consult it several times while you play, in order to understand its arcane user interface.​

​

So, it treats you like an intelligent human being by having a terrible interface and being too lazy to teach you how to play in game. Instead, it points you to outside sources to read and reread. It is lazy design. Telling you to read a manual and having a terrible interface doesn't treat you like being an intelligent human being. It treats you like a fool.

 

[gaussgunner]

I thought the UI was intuitive enough by crpg standards. It ain't casual. Do you think it's easy to program a guided walkthrough? Speaking from experience, it's a pain in the ass. It clogs up the engine code with garbage that serves no purpose after the first 2 minutes of gameplay, in which it says "this is not the hardcore rpg you are looking for". Indie developers with limited time should definitely save it for gameplay and substantive content.

 

[Mustawd]

Telling you to read a manual and having a terrible interface doesn't treat you like being an intelligent human being. It treats you like a fool.

How so? That's quite a leap of logic. Hold my hand baby tutorials treat you as a fool. You got it backwards man.

 

[an Administrator]

This

My main tactic was to position one of my melee characters just at the edge of an enemy's field of vision to get him to attack, then retreat back to the rest of the party, overwhelming the suicidal enemy with ranged attacks and superior numbers.

The AI was terrible in combat. Enemies just detect the nearst character and follow him forever!

Also the reviewer forgot the describe the amount of fun in killing chickens.

 

[Deuce Traveler]

1xp per chicken if I remember right. But that got old fast...now if it were 100xp per chicken there would have been a chickapocalypse.

 

[hell bovine]

Yet the game weighed the balance against me because my good intentions weren't recognized by its arbitrary moral compass. Serpent in the Staglands manipulates you into performing horrible actions and then accuses you of wrongdoing even when you never intended any harm.
...
I understand the thinking behind this narrative decision, but the game takes away too much of your free will as a player, forcing you to play an immortal with a long history, and making you act in a certain way at the end even if you never envisioned your character acting in such a manner.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
(sorry, it was too tempting)

In the review this sounds like a criticism, but for me that's actually intriguing. The premise conveys very strong message. If that was intended, keeping players in dark might be a sort of requirement for that. Trying to understand and adapt the game's moral system if one wishes to become Stagland's Avatar can also be part of the equation. Games are often making it too easy for players to choose to be 'good' (or 'bad') and to be recognized as such.

And yeah, I know it can be done poorly and I have yet to play the game. However, I would rather be challenged and disappointed by an imperfect attempt to make me think out of the box, than mindlessly experience the same engineered safespace over and over again.

Considering that this game was done by two people, I'd say the evil vs good options are better than what you get from professional developers nowadays. It is refreshing to explore a story that doesn't take the standard "you are the hero!" approach, where playing good lacks any challenge, while evil feels tacked on as an afterthought. In SitS you start as a selfish deity, whose previous actions indicate they don't care about mortals much. If you want to be good, you have to be careful, because as a god your actions can have lasting consequences, regardless of your "good intentions". (and this is in my opinion as it should be; trapped in a mortal body you might be, but that doesn't make you one)

That said, I found it easier to just cheese through combat with a squad of ranged characters with poison. Using spells to solve puzzles was fun, though.

 

[Orobis]

Thanks for the review Deuce Traveler, was a good read.

I just couldn't get into this, the combat is dull and slow paced, bad ai and long loading screens put me to sleep. Like deuce said in the review it was too grimdark to a fault, i just couldn't find the motivation to care about anyone or anything in the game, it was all just very boring.

Gameplay/Story wise it's a decent RPG, but just not a fun game.

 

[MrBuzzKill]

The clunky interface and combat is supposed to give you that feel of playing your first CRPG in the 90s. It delivered as far a I'm concerned.

 

[Jazz_]

The clunky interface and combat is supposed to give you that feel of playing your first CRPG in the 90s. It delivered as far a I'm concerned.

Well that's...odd. Implementing bad features that were most likely forced by technological limitations just for nostalgia's sake? Meh.

 

[shadow9d9]

Telling you to read a manual and having a terrible interface doesn't treat you like being an intelligent human being. It treats you like a fool.

How so? That's quite a leap of logic. Hold my hand baby tutorials treat you as a fool. You got it backwards man.

It requires you to read a lengthy manual out of game to make up for the deficiencies of the game. The interface was absolute garbage. Only a fool would wade into such a poorly made interface. It was the opposite of enjoyment. Poorly designed game.

 

[shadow9d9]

The clunky interface and combat is supposed to give you that feel of playing your first CRPG in the 90s. It delivered as far a I'm concerned.

Well that's...odd. Implementing bad features that were most likely forced by technological limitations just for nostalgia's sake? Meh.

But but... designing a game well makes it like baby hand holding! Derpy derp! Make it so bad that it reminds you of poorly designed games of the past. That is the ticket!

 

[Mustawd]

It requires you to read a lengthy manual out of game to make up for the deficiencies of the game. The interface was absolute garbage. Only a fool would wade into such a poorly made interface. It was the opposite of enjoyment. Poorly designed game.

 

[V_K]

To be fair, I'm not sure they could have made an elegant interface given the game's systems.

 

[Mustawd]

I think I have to pull a Blaine and ask that you get relegated to the 2016 class. Cuz you're truly a retard.

 

[IncendiaryDevice]

Maybe someone would be kind enough to ask these detractors to actually elaborate on what was wrong with the interface, cos I had no problems with the interface beyond the usual pedantry and 'could be betters', and as for the manual, it was pretty useless and didn't tell you anything you needed to know that wasn't already in the game, to which working out how to play a new game is an enjoyable experience - well, maybe not always, and this game did overload you with 'new' which made the game initially harder to get into, but it still ended up being worth the effort, which is why I say it can be fun working out new systems, even if those systems 'could be better' - which is how most systems are described anyway.

 

[vean]

The fonts are terrible.

 

[ArchAngel]

I hated the UI and spells are pretty boring and unbalanced (some are too good, most are useless). Still I kind of had fun playing it ( cleared the southern area of the map, so played about 1/4 of it).
I can see myself going back to play it whole at some time in the future when I got nothing else to play. I just never got a feeling from it that I must play it every waking hour like I did with Underrail or BG games or many others.

 

[MrBuzzKill]

The UI is perfectly fine actually, the only thing I disliked was the next-to-useless journal that you're supposed to write in manually (as somebody earlier said it's just easier to keep an IRL journal). As retro CRPGs go, this game is very good in my opinion.
>no hand-holding
>lots of extra stuff to learn and explore
>UI design good enough for non-retards, pretty to look at
>nice retro style graphics and mood-setting music, solid if not very rich sound design
>good fairly original lore and story that I really wanted to unveil as I played
>got some overpowered and fun stuff in the late game
Potentially bad things include
>useless journal
> BIG PIXELS that I personally dislike and had to play in a window to get it semi-right. Pixel art is great when it's not needlessly blown up.
>almost zero companions interaction.

 

[Cadmus]

The game is unplayable because the pixelated shit font is unreadable. Secondly, I can't tell what the fuck is going on because everything consists of 3 pixels of different shades of brown.
I guess the art style looks nice in screenshots but it looks like shit ingame because it's way too low-definition.

 

[gaussgunner]

lol.. right on Cadmus.
I never liked the fat pixel look even in the 320x240 days but I've seen it done better than this. Bastard Bonds for example. Big metallic looking fonts and vibrant colors... it's almost enough to overlook the fact that it's super gay. If SitS looked like that and had turn based combat, I'd give it a go.

 

[Gauldur's Bait]

Thanks for the review - I have to check the game out properly very soon. Have only had a look at the character generation and the first indoor area. I don't mind the graphics and the UI - they seem clear enough in Full HD and I suppose you use the keyboard shortcuts anyway once you get into the game. Music is important for atmosphere, and at least in the first area it fit the setting really nicely. These were just initial general comments, and not aimed at any specific points of your review.

 

[Irxy]

Judging from this review, the devs should spend another year on this game instead of making a new one.