i finally finished raiders post-game the other day so i wanted to share my thoughts on it and hear what other people think !!!
before i get Into It™ i wanna say i truly ENJOYED playing it! the gameplay mechanics, the great design and amazing soundtrack (as per usual) and the very impressive final boss fight blew me away.
i've seen a lot of praise for the game for these reasons, but i haven't seen a lot of ppl talk about the rather lackluster story.
it feels soooo similar to how i felt with the main story in Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom: the story had the POTENTIAL to be truly great with some compelling beats that felt like they'd lead to something huge. but then they don't really go anywhere or are barely explored. my biggest issue is that the middle part, AKA the biggest part, is just plain BORING.
SPOILERS UNDER THE CUT (for Raiders AND TOTK if u havent played that)
the middle of the story suffers from the exact same issues that TOTK's did, and despite people complaining PLENTY about that ("DeMoN kInG? sEcReT sToNe?") it seems they didn't learn from it at ALL. we get this exact same temple boss format AGAIN?
make your way into a temple with this one character
you learn a little about their ancestors and special ability through boring exposition
use it to defeat the boss
rinse and repeat
this becomes extremely predictable and repetitive after the first time, with practically the exact same cutscene after each boss. at least raiders only did it 3 times and not 4 LOL
TOTK did this better than Raiders gameplay wise, since Deep Cuts "showstoppers" weren't actually specifically counters against the boss (to my understanding) and felt pretty generic, whereas the TOTK descendants' abilities were very different from each other. some bosses (like colgera and paincourse) are also cooler and more fun to battle than others... (both mucktorok & dessurt were lame as hell sorry)
i was also hoping we'd learn more about Deep Cuts past like their clans and relationship with their families and each other. about salmonid culture and religion, about Big Runs, etc.
i especially wanted deep cut to learn something that challenged their worldview, or experience actual loss, conflict and hardship. i know this is an unrealistic expectation cause it's Nintendo we're talking about and they LOVE to play it safe to a fault. they didn't even have the guts to properly end TOTK by having Link lose his arm (which would have made the ending actually interesting after they also just simply REVERSED the IRREVERSIBLE curse on Zelda...)
TLDR: gameplay good, story bad. the middle of the story is boring, the main characters get zero development, and the ending was unsatisfying because of this. i don't think i'll ever replay it. for a stand-alone, story focused game i was expecting the story to actually be a little bit compelling. #DISSAPOINTED
(then again, it's not like the Splatoon franchise has ever made a compelling story except for Octo Expansion IMO so idk why i got my hopes up. at least the zapfish didn't get kidnapped AGAIN this time)
idk if anyone else felt this way. whether u agree or disagree i'd love to hear what other ppl think about it!! i'm mostly hoping that this talented fandom with amazing writers and artists will continue to create art, AU's, headcanons, theories and edits to fill up the gaps in this story or make it more interesting...
Pick any of the Dynamo-like Rollers put it down then try to pin it against the edge of the stage. Here I was using a 5 star primo Engine Roller upgraded to +8, the speed tank with pot shot and booyarang (this one had auto-activate). It is a fairly consistent method. It works best with the ink efficiency Roller but all of them work (50 +8 was the lowest level I was able to readily clear this stage consistently)
