Atebus Revolution Masquerade

[Kamil]

Or, tell the players from the start that: if you turn them in and you're right, you get your shit back. If you turn them in and you're wrong - so sad, too bad, no pretty evidence for you.

Also, if you turn them in and you're right, you get them back and your prize increases by _ levels/you get _achievements/you get a new forum title. If you turn them in and you're wrong - remember the too bad part? Yeah, that.

At least give players SOME idea of risk/reward ratio, and then let them pick for themselves.

But saying - hey, you can keep them if you want, and it might not matter to your prize -- then again, it might just screw the entire thing up, and you might plummet ten prize ranks because you were a GREEDY GREEDY PLAYER.

Or, it might not matter at all. You decide.

Not helpful at all, and again, exactly like not mentioning until after the fact that that achievement you just got by tossing the flower in the pond? Cost you all of your islander points. Bet you wish you'd known that first, huh?

After the screaming and gnashing of teeth that trick caused, you'd think someone would've decided on full disclosure on things like this.

[bonecrivain]

Yeah, I should say that I have really loved the art. That's why I've been so grumpy about losing items! I know ripped pages might seem useless to a lot of people, so of course trading them in for the possibility of something else is a no-brainer, but they're perfect for one of my pet's treasures. I'm pretty sure that any prizes connected to a steamworks plot and robots and probably robot pets will be perfect for another of my pet's treasures, so therein lies the rub, for me.

I wouldn't have liked the option of having to turn in items, but I almost like this weird choice-but-not-a-choice-but is-it-really-impacting-anything less. At least if we HAD to turn in the items, we'd know something. Right now, we're in some strange limbo, where we just have to guess at what will be less disappointing. I don't see why that's necessary at all. As Huggles and Kamil said, clarification really isn't that difficult and should be taking place in official news posts.

So yeah, I've loved the art and the items, but the plot process itself left a lot to be desired. At some point, I'd really like to see Subeta develop a plot that actually requires some intelligent thinking and puzzle-solving. The pirate/islander plot, as Topher said, had troubles of its own but had a lot more potential than this one. It was too drawn-out, too, but there was variety.

And the thing is, I love murder mysteries! I don't understand how a murder mystery with robots could have been this boring. It was just full of endless clicking through pages that yielded little to no useful information, which seems to be a rut that Subeta can't fully pull itself out of.

[AngharadTy]

Huggles said it perfectly, and then Kamil said it perfectly.

And DAMMIT I WOULD NOT HAVE THROWN THE DAMN FLOWER IF I'D KNOWN IT WOULD COST ME ALL MY UNSPENT POINTS GODDAMMIT I WILL NEVER NOT BE ANGRY ABOUT THAT and I will probably keep posting to agree every time someone mentions it because I'm still so pissed. I don't care that I didn't have many points, they were mine and I wanted to spend them.

So, in part because of the past islander crap, I am very afraid that doing something will be the mistake. Tossing a flower was a mistake. Turning in evidence could be a mistake. Not turning in evidence could be a mistake. There is absolutely no way for me to know. But I'm not exactly working from a position of trust here.

And even if I did guess right on the murderer--and it was a guess, because there is no way to know for sure, and that means this is not a mystery solvable by a reader, which is generally considered a fail in the mystery genre--I didn't read the post about "if you win you get your evidence back" until too late. So, damn me for sleeping, I guess.

Just in case it seems like I'm made of nothing but complaints: I loved the art on the NPCs and the ballroom and the items and the pages. And although the pages needed proofreading, they were fun to read. And overall the idea of a murder mystery is fantastic and being able to interact is very innovative. It just needs some tightening up on some fronts, and my past bitterness does seep in. (I am an islander, dammit!)

[Red Mask Corgi]

I turned in the evidence that I thought supported my accusation the most (and even then I kind of regret who I picked..). I kept most of my stuff since, one; in case I could give them to those who lost them or gave them up but really wanted to keep them. And two;...I didn't even realize that turning them all into Thrope could even lead to possible prizes D:

But either way I think I'll be pleased since this was technically the first event I actively joined in with and I enjoyed it :3

[Goldenchaos]

...so, like....the detective dude, doesnt want to talk to me. And now I cant go into the study because he took my key..(3 and the thing is a million SP so Im pretty much screwed. I didnt even guess who the murderer was. Oh well.

[Seerow]

Well I'm happy I didn't wait up for the plot to finish/killer be revealed. When you give a midnight deadline, you should probably try and stick closely to that, especially when you've had threeish days to get the content ready.

I don't mind the turning of something in to gain a new mysterious something else idea in general. However in this plot it isn't clear at all and is just complete guesswork. None of the evidence really points strongly to any one character and I'm sure most of those are red herrings to throw people off. If we had a clearer idea of who the killer was and it was nothing more then guesswork then I'd be fine with how the system was currently set up (ie you get them back if they are right).

Pretty much anyone could have done it as evidence leads to all of them. Garret is a strong loyal hothead. Jules had plenty of personal reasons. Victoria was an angry hothead. Adriette was upset about him not taking her advances and seemed far to innocent. Issac is a robot, enough said. Marcel is a poor ex? partner of Vernon's who lies. Anyone could have done it.

Teera I hope you/other staff can see this from a user's prospective. You guys already know who the killer so you know what evidence leads to what already and for you guys probably leads to a clear killer. Users are not so enlightened. I hope you don't take our (or at least mine, I can't talk about everyone) frustrations on this plot as an invitation not to post here. I generally love when staff post random tidbits.

Overall I liked this event and that is was probably the most plot like thing I've been a part of on site so I hope Subeta follows that trend for some of their other holidays. The art of course was great and I liked the idea behind the various tasks we had to perform. As I said earlier I hope talking with NPCs gets an overhaul if that aspect is brought back again as it's currently very buggy.

I wish the npcs from the dancing were more involved though, the ones who sent you letters. They seemed to have no impact on the plot at all really

[Marah]

Teera, it sound like you worked hard on this event and I thought it was fun for the most part! It's just that the parts that were most frustrating to me all had to do with not knowing.

At first I wasn't sure if following every option of talking with an NPC was a requirement or not. To give an example: at the end I couldn't talk to Isaac, but some kind person was posting all the possible conversations with the NPC's on the forums. Was it enough for me to read that and have the information, or was the actual clicking in the conversation a plot step that was logged somewhere. So if I failed to click it, at the end I might be told: You did not finish this part of the plot...

And as for the items, from what you say I understand that your first intention was to have us all turn them in? I think it is very nice that you changed it because you felt people wanted to keep them, but as you can see it does create a bit of a confusion as to what is expected of us to do to finish this plot. Just like it was possible to read them to our pets. Apparently that was not what we were supposed to do with them, but some people tried. (some people always have to be the first to try something for the plot to advance) but instead of nothing happening when you did something that was not related to the plot, the items got "lost" plotwise.

In a nutshell: plots are fun, I don't mind spending time on them, or having to think hard about them. But spending time and energy on it and then choosing the wrong option (allthough what defines wrong or right might be different for each user), well that is frustrating. And I have my real life to do that, I don't need it from my online games. (I'm looking at you moltara plot and your beerbelly of doom!)

As for the positive, I liked how we were a part of the plot, as attendants of the party and how the NPC's existed as subetans, with a profile and all. The art was, of course, very pretty and a murder mystery is always fun. For now I will sit back and see how it all ends.

(One thing I'm curious about, when you/subeta staff "wrote" the story, did you at some point ask somebody who didn't know the murderer to read it? I ask because I once organised a murder mystery weekend and that was the one thing I always regretted that we didn't do. Hints we thought were so very obvious ended up being completely misread by our participants and conversations we considered to have no meaning were turned into motives!)

Edit Seerow posted when I was writing I agree with this:

Teera I hope you/other staff can see this from a user's prospective. You guys already know who the killer so you know what evidence leads to what already and for you guys probably leads to a clear killer. Users are not so enlightened. I hope you don't take our (or at least mine, I can't talk about everyone) frustrations on this plot as an invitation not to post here. I generally love when staff post random tidbits.

I second the part that I appreciate the fact that you came here and posted. (the fact that you said that all clues were given out helped me a lot timewise.) I also appreciate the effort and time that went into this, it is noted! Just in general people will talk about what could have gone better. that doesn't change the fact that plot > no plot.

[covet]

Argh. I know I'm late - I've been ill and missed the last couple of days, but it just let me turn in all my evidence but won't let me accuse anyone. Thorpe just says he has nothing more to say to me.

Gah.

[Officer 1BDI]

Aaaand the final (?) page is up.

I'm not sure what else to add to the current thread of discussion; I agree with pretty much everyone here that this plot had a lot of great bits (the art!) and some not-so-great bits that have been covered in detail. Teera, I apologize if any of my rants earlier sounded like they were aimed directly at you, because they weren't, nor were they directed at any particular staff member. For what it's worth, this has been my favorite plot on Subeta so far (the pirate/islanders plot was decent, but it had its own share of troubles that undermined it) and I'm confident that as the staff has more opportunities to create new plots and get a feel for what does and doesn't work they'll only get better.

[Alicorn]

I ditto Officer. And everyone else said what kinks were in the plot a lot better then I could. While it had it's kinks I enjoyed the plot as a whole. And yes it was a bit slow going but I must admit I'm glad it was because of selfish reasons, I was quiet busy during parts of the plot so I needed the extra time to get things that were needed. And I know staff will listen to the feedback and will work on those kinks for the next plot they do. But I can tell they put a lot of work into this and are improving on their plots. I think I enjoyed this one a bit more then the Islander/Pirate plot.
And I must admit I am quiet happy I was right. ^-^ The scenario didn't quiet fit what I had in my head but it was darn close. Yay for following my gut! And I'm quiet happy my Jules is innocent. **hugs Jules doll** Now I can't wait to see what follows. **rubs hands together**

[Teera]

No need to apologize, I understand. I'm more frustrated in myself. And, to be honest, I would prefer the rants/complaints were directed at me. Everyone else has worked too hard on this, and I'd prefer to take the brunt of any and all criticisms.

The plan had been to get that page up close to midnight. Again, on me.

It's a learning experience for all of us, to be sure. The dialogue engine is new, and we were all quite excited about that. I don't want to go into too many more making-of details, since that seems rather odd considering... well, let's just say that's not the final page.

[Griffin]

I misread the post about the deadline being Saturday night--totally glazed over the word "Saturday" and thought it was midnight of the day it was posted, so I cast my vote for Isaac then. And then the Cog Bookend appeared and I knew I was wrong.

I wish all the plot items had been in the office at once, then I would've confidently voted for Marcel. I suspected him from the beginning for no other reason than he seemed to be the most disposable character. The main characters who've existed since last year's ball had a lot of love poured into their designs and backstories but Marcel just showed up and he's not all cool and sexy so hey, who cares if he gets carted off to jail? We've got our young, good-looking protagonists. But anyway, before the Bookend that was my only line of reasoning, so. Oh well.

[Bacon]

Wait, there was a bookend, too? OH MY GOD. If you're going to start accepting items to be taken INCLUDING the key to get in, do NOT add items at the last minute.

Honestly, I loved the look of this plot. The art was extremely pretty. That being said, it could have been planned better. Items could have come out all at the same time, it could have been faster, etc.

What I do not agree with is everyone saying that you should know the consequences of turning in your items. When has the real world worked that way? If you don't turn in evidence, you can't catch a criminal. I think that is extremely straight forward... Life is full of choices. Either you be greedy or you see if helping to solve the murder will get you something better. I liked that. Well... I WOULD'VE liked it more had all the items been at the office at the time his office was "found." I don't go on the forums on Subeta enough to follow the list of items to find...

[AngharadTy]

I don't play Subeta for the realism. Animals do not have buttwings. When has the real world worked that way?

This is a game. Games are meant to be fun. That is the definition of games. If you run a game and you want to add something, you must ask yourself, "Does this increase the fun?" If the answer is no, then you should reconsider adding it. You can also ask, "Am I just adding this for the sake of realism?" And if the answer is yes, go stab yourself in the foot, as it will be a more productive use of your time.

[Ierosbats]

You didn't need the key to find the bookend. It wasn't in Vernon's study, it was crammed in the wall decoration thing in the room with Jules and Garret. It wasn't even a luck-click like the journal pages; everyone I talked to found it on their first click.