Apparently, the people at Ubi Soft are mathematicians of some sort. They subscribe to the theory that
A) The shortest distant between two points is a straight line
And, therefore, it logically follows that:
B) When a player clicks someplace they want to go, they don’t REALLY want to get there, they just want to see how far along the straight line they can go without running into some unpassable terrain feature like a tree or a wall or one of those invisible things that you can’t see, act upon or even know it’s there, but by golly it will completely disrupt your straight line-ness.
Yes, I’ve been playing Shadowbane again. But I would like to state for the record that it is not my fault; I’m obviously a product of a violent environment and unattended computer access. I’m currently pursuing plans to sue the video game industry, my parents, society, and God. (Although God may be dropped from the label if I suddenly win the lottery or if Gillian Anderson parachutes into my lap).
I’ve heard TONS of bad stuff about the game. So I went in prepared for a bit of annoyance – I even expressed my frustration at not being able to get into the game right away. I didn’t vent about my fury at losing several hours worth of experience (yet). But despite that rough start up, I’m enjoying it so far. Granted, the only reason I’m enjoying it is because so far I’m having a lot of ease leveling. Apparently the word hasn’t gotten out yet about my ability to bring Death to an entire party faster than you can say, “What the hell was THAT?”
So I’m playing a lot of it. But one thing that just makes me bite RIGHT through the leather straps is the pathing AI. Apparently, when you click “here,” the AI seems to think you mean “I’d like to wander around for a bit unless something gets in my way, or something pretty catches my eye, or really, if you just feel like dropping me off on the same continent as where I clicked, I’ll be fine with that.”
It’s completely normal for me to have an experience like this (inspiration for this comic blatantly stolen from an idea by Phil, who was planning on stealing it from Family Circus anyway, so there):
And as if it weren’t hard enough to get from point A to point B (never mind C or that bastich D!), they then put tons of CRAP in the way! I think I can understand that – I mean, if I were the Rogue Trainer, and every five minutes some goombah came running up to me yelling “OMG HI PRZ TEECH ME 2 USE SWERD!1!!,” I might find a stack of bags to hide behind, too.
But I ask you: are there no Safety Inspectors in this town? Do you have any idea what sort of liability these store owners are opening themselves up for with this stuff piled up everywhere? All it would take is someone to stumble over a bag of grain, sprain their ankle a bit and WHAMMO! They’d have lawsuits up the wang about their unsafe public areas! Why, a shady sort could own a store here with nothing more than a bit of clumsiness, a bit of overacting and a big mouth! Hrm…actually, I have to go now. I forgot to…uh…pick up…supplies, yes, supplies while I was in town…I have to hit the provisioners…and then I think the blacksmiths…oh, yes…Kwipville shall be!
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