Game Master's Challenge 2018 Opinions:Theme: Knights (led by Brynn) Vs. Raiders (led by Hanso)
Good theme, thumbs up from me.
Honestly it's more Brynn vs Hanso, the team names sort of matching them and you'll probably be joining the team based on who is leading them (it doesn't seem to be split between action vs. puzzle as other years).
Challenges: As always, there was nice challenges and hair-pulling challenges. Here's are the notable challenges this year either I (on Team Knight) experienced or heard Team Raiders had problems with. Also note that I'm relatively good at games so some games some would consider challenging I may not. So let's begin:
Skies Over Meridell (Team Knights - Day 2): This game. It should not be a Challenge. It's archaic in design, probably meant to be played on older/slower computers. It has both dodgy yet sensitive hit detection, in all the wrong ways. It's not fun, you'll spend the first few games of it just learning what you need to do then the next hour or so trying to come up with a strategy or hoping to luck out, or both. It's funny how TNT gave games like Ultimate Bullseye and Destruct-O-Match remakes when they didn't need to while they let this game, one which could use an update, exist as is. Like even they pretended this game didn't exist.
Piper Panic (Team Raiders - Day 2): Now Skies Over Meridell's problem is it being difficult to play but the score isn't that high. Piper Panic's score on the other hand was so high that you couldn't even use JN's guide to get to the score, luckily TDN's guide had a higher scoring route but that should still say something about how high the score is. 5.5k is only 1k below the high score, another telling sign. Not a bad game for a challenge, but maybe not let AAA choose the score...
Lost In Space Fungus (Both Teams - Day 3): Not hard, and not a high score, and any guide/video can be used. But still had some rather annoying moments like levels where a micro second click too early or late means you'd have to restart the level. Though I wouldn't call it a bad Challenge, because it was fair, it's just one for the books.
Zurroball (Team Raiders - Day 4): Was this year's DD not a sign this shouldn't be a DD or GMC game? You even required the score to be AAA's score! I think this is one of those games like Skies Over Meridell which was meant for older/slower computers.
The Great Desert Race (Team Knights - Day 5): Eh, wasn't that hard but I don't really feel this game was meant to be a GMC game. Don't know how to explain it, it just feels odd that you go from playing this arcade games to a board game that can take some time to end even when the game is over because you or the computer hadn't rolled the right number yet to land on the final space.
The Great Qasalan Caper (Team Raiders - Day 5): I would maybe list this under Lost In Space Fungus. I think the score is fair but the game has some annoyances and leans on luck more than LISF's asking for time perfect placement.
Shenkuu Warrior (Team Knights - Day 7): Why wasn't this game moved to the Game Graveyard? Shenkuu Warrior II is a much more superior experience. The original Shenkuu Warrior is one of those games probably meant for older/slower computers, which is why they made Shenkuu Warrior II.
Aside this there was another oddity with this year's GMC which last year also had. Instead of the normal formula of # Challenges being 2, 2, 3, 3, 4, 4, & 5, one day had less challenges then the previous day. In addition it feels like halfway through they dropped the non-scoring challenges until the last day asks you to have played 50 games on the list. I'll cover this in the summary but GMC's current set-up is showing its age and I feel needs a new Challenge system.
Challenge Prizes: In general I always do like to see how for challenges which are different between teams how they combine those games themes together. While some are simple like the Snow Twirly Fruit, we do get some creative ones like the Princess Terrana Kookith. Of course we also do get the lazy ones like Cobrall Cannon.
Surprisingly not a lot of wearables, though there is a pretty one with the Mosaic Tile Background and Thick Glasses if you need a classic nerdy/elderly looking glasses (not to mention there's also the neat sign-up bonus prizes, this time shoulder armour for Knights and fingerless gloves for Raiders; lot of fun potential with those!). Surprised we got two Peptets this year, Princess Terrana Kookith and Desert Lyins, both are pretty snazzy. Collectible this year is a Charm instead of Stamp which is a nice change of pace. And a lot of food, maybe would have replaced those with either a wearable of book which we only got one of.
But there is one thing we need to talk about: the Magic Gridlock Gun. A small controversy when this was released, it did 3 of each icon for 21 icons. Thankfully they just made it 2 each for a more reasonable 14, though that is still pretty powerful if you think about it. Now yes, any shield would severely weaken this weapon, but not a lot of 1-Player uses shields. Also with all the other powerful weapons they've been releasing this one feels like it'll probably get lost in the shuffle. A 14 iconer being not that impressive... that should tell you how much the power creep has skyrocketed in recent years. Not from more powerful HT weapons that cost millions, but from many generally free or easy to get weapons who had been given more icons then they probably should have had. And this is only for multi-use weapons, all other kind of equipment like Shields, Healers, Freezers, and even one-use weapons are being ignored. If they maybe focused on these other equipment type they wouldn't feel they need to outdo the previous OP multi-use weapon they made. Also a lot of these multi-use weapons are just flat damage, there haven't really made weapons which had a damage range. I'm glad they decreased the power of Magic Gridlock Gun, but it's just a small part of a larger problem.
Lulu's Challenges: Lights of the Night is a pretty background, can see a lot of use of alien/science fiction/paranormal customizations.
Not sure why its call Chop Prop, but you can't complain about a karate gi that's flame patterned. That has a cheesy 1970s martial arts movie customization written all over it. You've heard of Fist of Fury? This is Fist of Fiery!
The Knight Raider Coat could look better, like I get a bit of Raider but not exactly Knight. Maybe needed some armor pieces here and there.
Trophies: I like the Trophies, moreso the Knights than the Raiders. The Knights have a sort of "Sword in the Stone" feel to them, a sword blade down into a pedestal. And as the Trophy increase in rank these vines appear around it, like it's further trying to hold it down into place. The Raiders sort of have that but it's a dagger tied to a shield(?)... until you get to the final one where its two daggers sticking out on the top of the shield with the vines now just tied around the shield for some reason. Don't know what they could have done else with the Raider's trophies but think it needs its own theme than trying to be like the sword's.
Final Prizes: The wig feels a bit thrown together. It's not a bad idea combining Brynn's and Hanso's hairstyle but it doesn't look drawn quite right.
Spoils of Victory, what's not to like about a chest full of treasure be you a knight having defeated a dragon of a raider looking over your ill-gotten goods!
And just as I was done complaining about no variety of weapons of course we get a weapon that drains! Though it's not by much, 17 HP, arguably only helpful in low level play. But hey, it doesn't take up the healing slot so if your Neopets is at the point where 17 HP would be a useful heal guess it doesn't hurt to have it.
Summary: So another GMC comes and goes... how many times have I said that? Well, I guess its true, but gives an air of it not being rememberable. Which it isn't. Sure we remember the frustrating games or maybe the theme, but there's not really any excitement. Unlike Daily Dare which has a challenging element to it with AAA's score and it running for an entire month, GMC pales in comparison to the point where you ask why it's even still going? Surely they could combine GMC and DD together, though doing that would mean there's one less annual event (which I wouldn't mind if they could find something to replace it with, maybe a battling annual event...).
But if we're to keep GMC it does need a bit of an update. I feel the easiest thing they could do is instead of having each day has its own list of Challenges, there's a single list for Challenges and everyday more are added. In addition, some Challenges have "tiers" added onto them. For example, thoughout the event they could have a "Play # of games from the list" Challenge and each day they add a new tier to it asking for more games to be played. For Challenges which require a score they could have the initial challenge be a low score and add more tiers that go higher and higher (for example, a initial Meerca Chase II challenge would 300, then a day or so later will get a new tier for 500, and then get a final tier later for 700). Also wouldn't mind if the hosts gave some commentary about the Challenges or back-and-forth banter to each other, would actually give more of a reason to have the hosts.
Honestly it's more Brynn vs Hanso, the team names sort of matching them and you'll probably be joining the team based on who is leading them (it doesn't seem to be split between action vs. puzzle as other years).
