The Results of the 1999 Survey

Strange Bedfellows

Strange Bedfellows. Nothing seems to be more as it is supposed to be. You decide to go to the Hammerites, for help. And you find another changed place... and luckily, enough deadly broadhead arrows and mines to feel really well eqipped for the changed place. Through the broken altar of the temple, you enter another tunnel maze. And at the deepest place, some besieged Hammerites who give you a new quest, a map and a key. And then you have to find the Highpriest, grab him, and carry him to the besieged Hammerites. In the higher difficulties, you have also to find the Builder's Chisel and eliminate the Bugbeasts - if you have not avoided any contact with them. The place is inhabitated by Bugbeats, Apebeasts, Frogs, Hammerites, and Spiders. A new monster type is also here: Huge red Spiders who throw webs at the player and who attack from the distance. Additional atmosphere is added by the corpses of civilians on the street, and in some other funny places.

[Descriptive Data], [Scores], [Comments], [Final Comments]

Descriptive Data about this mission

Sadly, another one of the not so highly preferred missions. Both the mean score and the modal score are low. Nevertheless, this mission was also the absolute favorite of some people.

The distribution of the scores

Score	N	%	Y-axis: "N", X-axis: "Score"
1	1	0.4
2	10	4.4
3	7	3.1
4	14	6.2
5	8	3.6
6	19	8.4
7	19	8.4
8	30	13.3
9	31	13.8
10	30	13.3
11	32	14.2
12	21	9.3
13	3	1.3

Note the interesting fact that this mission was only the extreme preferred or non-preferred mission of really few people (1 rated it on place 1, only 3 on place 13). It seems to be a solid mediocre mission, but more in the lower part of the middle. ~ 50 % of the people scored the mission between place 8 - 11.

'Bedfellows' correlates positively with 'Escape' (.28 ***) and with 'Maw' (.29 **). Both are missions with Trickster beasts and with a surrealistic atmosphere. And both are also in the end of the game. It correlates negatively with 'Training' (-.23 **), 'Bafford' (-.18 **), 'Cragscleft' (-.27 **). 'Bonehoard' (-.35 **), 'Assassins' (-.18 **), 'Sword' (-.15 *), 'THC' (-.22 **). That means, with the first few missions of the game. A effect of the sequence of the missions, I would dare to say. It can't be caused by the surreality of the mission, because that can't explain the high correlations with 'Bonehoard', 'Sword', 'Cragscleft', or 'THC'. This should be analysed deeper in the comparison between the people who played the game definitely more than once (or only a 'half once') and the people who played it only one time.

Comments

Short Summary

(Huh, isn't it cool how I try to create a balance between the positive and the negative points every time... *g) The negative points seemed to be in the majority, again.

The positive points were the twisting of the storyline, the atmosphere of the level, the destructed Hammer temple, the creepyness of the deeper floors.

The negative points were the shortness and easyness of the mission. Too fast and too easy for the 12th mission of the game. And about the monsters, and the lack of human opponents. Very interesting is the point: 'Helping the Hammers? Doing good? Never!'. The turn of the game that Garrett starts rescuing the world was not highly appreciated, it seems.

Positive Comments

'Very creepy! Ace!'
Very dark. Much sneaking.
The level design. The trashed Hammer temple. The creepyness of the lower levels.
The Highpriest-quest.
The atmosphere.
The monsters: Apebeasts.
The ironic twist of the storyline: You help the Hammerites for a change.
The underground river.
The Apebeasts conversations with theirselfs.
'A personal favorite because the way you see the Hammer temple totally destroyed and you think 'Ooooh no...' '
'The stage lead in was awesome (love all those corpses that for once you didn't put there!)'
The remnants of fighting.

Negative Comments

The monsters: The Spiders. The Bugbeasts.
The storyline.
The level-design.
Too short. Too easy. Too simple for such a late level of the game.
Not surrealistic enough.
Some bugs with the changing objectives (chisel).
'I personally hate Hammerites.' - 'Help the Hammers? Never.' - 'Religious nuts and criminals teaming up? Are they republicans?'
Too linear.
The replayability value of this mission is not good.
'Too hard. It was almost unfair.'
'Why does this Hammerite guy know who I am?'
The end was not rewarding enough.
The bugged raft: The Highpriest tends to fall from it after the waterfall.
'I didn't like the thought of doing good.'

Some personal comments

Strange Bedfellows. It is a mediocre mission for me, somewhere in the middle of the ratings. It is a cool thing to avoid the extra quest about the eliminating of the Bugbeasts. And I personally enjoy the Spiders as opponents, and of course the dead Hammerites everywhere. The negative point is that this mission is really far too short - a mission that ends after about 30 minutes (after two missions that need more than 1 ½ hours) is far too short for that stage of the game.

And, same as some others, I did really not like the thought to form a alliance with the Hammers. I personally hate Hammers (yes, I do. But that quote above was not from me.) and I would have preferred if the world would have fallen into the Trickster's hands (Trickster = nature), instead of this dawn of the metal age. Garrett makes his own life more difficult by this odd 'Now I go and help rescuing the world' syndrome... Metal age means: More lights, metal surfaces, more Hammers. No good.