Castle Paradox

[msw188]

I'm afraid that I'm giving up on Wingedmene for the time being (see my I'm so happy thread on the lounge board). I also saw that Multi-Colored Wizard wrote a review, so I thought it'd be okay to not worry about it for a bit. I also figured that I ought to write what I thought about it as far as I got right here, in case you were curious about a newbie's thoughts.
First of all, I only got to the Red Tower, but I did not get the stone, I can't remember what it's called. I saw it through the locked door, went back to get Laubea (I don't remember the spelling - it's the Twin Flute guy) and was on my way back.
The graphics are pretty good, especially the way the overhead tiles are handled (it seems to me that your hero has a constant z-pixel increase, or something like that; however you did it, it was well done). Battle graphics are pretty good, especially for the different attacks. Enemy graphics were okay. Overall, I think the graphics were pretty good (at least, much better than mine!).
The background story seemed interesting, but not entirely understandable. I assume that more becomes clear as the game progresses. The plot was okay, as far as I got. I think that in the beginning the player is introduced to too many unfamiliar names, but that seemed necesssary for your idea, so it's okay. I just felt a little lost trying to keep track of who was who. At least the plot and story were pretty original, and good.
I had mixed feelings about the gameplay. The distances make things seem very vast (which is good), but the random encounter rate is high enough to bog me down while I'm playing, especially given the difficulty of the battles. It doesn't help that players are forced to walk to and from the Red Tower more than once. My suggestion would be either turn the encounter rate down a bit, or make a switch that makes it so that getting to and from the Red Tower is easier after you do it once. Also, I found the constant missing of my attacks against the "Insane Equine"s (I think that's their name) kind of annoying. Can their dodge be turned down a bit? I do like the Twin-Flute idea, though.
Overall though, the game is very good, and my suggestions in the gameplay section here are rather nit-picky. In truth, this game does not need much changed at all - it is a very good game, and I will hopefully play more of it in the future.

[msw188]

Oh yeah, I forgot before that I also wanted to comment on your Air Plane Towns, which I feel required too much walking. Big towns are fine, but I would connect more of the areas so that a player doesn't have to walk linearly up and down certain areas every time they return to the town. I'm also one of the school that believes that places such as the inn and shops that you will probably return to often should be close to the entrance/exit. I must admit that I cheated and used the F11 key in the towns just because I knew I'd get to places eventually, why elongate the time by having to walk so roundabout just to get from the inn to the exit? Just my thoughts, nitpicky again I suppose. Really, I don't mean to sound like I'm complaining very much; I really think that the game is very well done in general.

[Aethereal]

I think I should just quickly point out that the Wingedmene review that MCW wrote is converted from Operation: OHR.
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[Setu_Firestorm]

Huh huh! Aeth ALWAYS spells it right! I'm a frickin' retard!

*practices his spelling book*
Wingedmene
Wingedmene
Wingedmene
Wingedmene

Okay, I think I got it right now! It's Wingedeme! .........Wing....D'oh!
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