Review of Symphony of Eternity

[1oldtymer]

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Faceoff: Joe Newbie versus IBM's Watson
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JN: Man, that game was kinda fun, but not very tough.  I breezed right through it.  All the treasures were in visible chests, I skipped talking to the NPCs, and the entire game was a simple linear progression with no chance to get lost.

W: It took me 6,351.2 hours and 17 seconds.  How long did it take you to complete the game?

JN: I don't keep track, but probably a little less than that.  What took you so long?

W: Decisions, decisions.  There are so many choices of skills to learn, and since there is no way to know which skills might be important, I learned them all.

JN: All?  There must be a 100 of them!

W: I counted 149, but if I include mastery of all of them, it is a few more.

JN: I'm sure I missed a lot of that, and probably lots of treasures, too.  I just got enough money to stuff my pockets with restore items and went toe to toe with those stupid monsters.

W: That is very inefficient.  I found two restore points in the dungeons and spent time there pumping iron to prepare for battle.

JN: My battles did go on a bit, maybe 10-15 turns.  How long were yours?

W: Some were like yours, but with all my skills and increased levels, a few were only 5 or 6 turns.

JN: So you spent all those hours grinding and obtaining skills to save a few turns in battle?

W: It is important to be efficient.

JN: Did that help with the subquests?

W: There are no subquests.

JN: What about the 6 post-game monsters?

W: There are 7.

JN: Well, do I need all that grinding and skill mastery to defeat them?

W: Special items are required.

JN: But can't you just buy them, if you have the gold?  So you don't need every skill, or even skills beyond what I had to finish the normal game?

W: Correct.  But perhaps you might find monster #7  too difficult at your level.   It is wise to prepare for all unknowns.

JN: Hey, Watson, I bet you liked the golem characters, you being a computer and all.  I liked all the different characters and their competitive but friendly rivalry.  It was cool when some of them switched teams and you had to play with a different group.

W: I don't "like" anybody.  It was not efficient to battle without my healer and characters who hadn't learned lots of skills.

JN: Well,  the change added some variety.  It is a big game, but I liked it.

W: I don't "like" anything, but it was a good game.

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Three years ago I was like Joe Newbie as I played the game.  I recently replayed it using a Watson-like approach.  I enjoyed both experiences, and I put monster #7 (a true monster monster) in my Monster Hall of Fame.