Hi all, I’m posting my thoughts here so that everyone can comment and disagree/agree. I just want to make the disclaimer that I’m not working in any official capacity on this game, just as a volunteer moderator for the forums. ---- I still find the connection puzzles at the end of each object to be too vague and frustrating. I think that’s because of two reasons in particular. 1) There is no clearly defined starting point: Although the answers are supposed to connect with the object on the table, many of the objects are not clearly defined (e.g. is it a spilled cup of wine? Of (symbolic) blood? Does it go with the candles or is it on its own?) This leads to problems starting the connection process, and, with the sheer amount of connections to be made, does not allow a “foot-in-the-door” to the puzzle solving. 2) There is no verification process: Because the game only tells you whether you are right or wrong, a player is left unsure about whether or not they are on the right track. When combined with the starting point problem, a player is left clicking almost blindly. I don’t know if it would be best improved by one or the other, but I still consider the most enjoyable one of these that I’ve done to be [Table 1; Cactus] because you can immediately see the link and it’s a matter of finding the fit. A solution for the first point could be adding a simple hint, bound to the object itself, that is just made explicit instead of implicit. It just needs to be clearer what the dreamer sees the object to be, compared to the player. For the second point, maybe there could be a mix of red and blue sparks when at least one proper connection is made. I don’t think I would want to see specifics that a particular answer is wrong, but I think having “at least one correct” verification would be a lot of help. Hope this helps, nikel
Hi Nikel! We had a lengthy discussion about the connections part of the game. This phase is more frustrating than rewarding, one of the fundamental problems start with the fact we give 12 red herrings for three right answers. There is no notion of an investigation; many people try to brute force the link. One option is to start the connection process with a clear direction: a puzzle or a riddle about the core object. From there, your goal is to connect the fragment to its 'core' link. When connecting some fragment correctly, we could adjust the particle effect. The more fragment you have, to more intense the connection get. We agree 100% with your observation. Sadly we didn't have the time to add these improvements to Table 2 since the artifact took a lot of time to develop. Does anyone have comments or idea on this part of the games?
I will not be much help here because I didn't find connections as frustrating. BUT I definitely know a few people who did and/or said that connections made little sense to them. Only one connection was brute forced on our side.
In my view, I share some of the frustration pointed out by Nikel, although I enjoy the "oniric" atmosphere of Ahnayro, compared to the research logic of TBW or the technological approach of NT4. Sometimes, I feel annoyed by the fact that the connections have less sense than some of the red herrings. In some puzzle, I was fairly sure about the logic of a connection, only to discover it does not work and the "correct" one is a more obscure one.
