Player Comments on Magellan 3: Journey to New Horizons

I’m certainly a fan of the format that Will uses for his storygames. Some storygames published are ‘more story than game’, others are game/puzzle focused, but Will’s are the perfect blend of story and game. As he has one of the most (if not the most) published games on the site, I guess that makes sense. Still an impressive feat though and that’s why I wanted to bring it up first.

The opening page reminds me of a “ready room”. You know, like before you enter a game of laser tag where the staff member explains the rules and how to point a fake gun at little kids (spoiler alert: it’s the same way you point a real gun at little kids). All that’s to say, I felt like I was gearing up for a real mission right from the beginning.
As this is the first Magellan game I’ve played, I have to assume your two best friends (Eva & Naomi) were given more backstory in the previous two. Or at least playing the others creates a backstory for this one. Still, I enjoyed their dynamic character traits and vastly different personalities.

One thing that I found a little distracting were the bold ship names. Bold as in black and thick, not in the daring and courageous way. I would have preferred simple capitalizations or even italics. Bold text is just too much in my opinion. Are the ship names really that important?

Some thoughts the text provoked:

-The writing style seems quite formal, which is fitting for the story.

-The many characters are hard to follow without the inventory list. You’re not forced to pick it up, but you’re kind of lost without it.

-There didn’t seem like many choices that weren’t simple shifts in branching. I suppose that’s what you want from a storygame, but I didn’t really stumble upon any dead ends or choices in the path I was following. Maybe it’s all in my head, but it felt like each choice took me to a different story rather than meaningful changes on the current path I was taking.

I have to say, I enjoyed the author’s note at the end. It was neat to “see behind the curtain”. Not only that, Will encouraged us with real life application. Real neat! Go out there and Journey to New Horizons, folks.

You getting a lot better, but you still have a spelling/grammar mistake on the page "The Western Passage". It said, "Both Naomi and Eva below you (I forget what words are exactly after, something about anchoring)." It should be "Both Naomi and Eva bellow to you."

Also while you are getting there with character relations, keep in mind that Magellan is short, and so you should have a sort of break or pause from the story, like during sailing through empty sea, and during that moment, have the hero ask the character about their lives, provide a list of questions about things like how they grew up and why they wanted to become a sailor and stuff, so we can kind of get a feel for what they like.

Thirdly, Some characters are disjointed between stories.. For example, in Magellan 2, near the end, (SPOILER IF YOU HAVENT READ MAGELLAN 2), Leo says he loves Eva Freer, and Naomi Swift says she loves Leo. I didn't find a single mention of that, or any awkwardness, in this story. And as I mentioned in Magellan 1 and 2, make it so we can go more in depth with characters.

Finally: Cranking out a series in only a week or 2 doesn't help very much. You might as well stick them into one big story and have different chapters with short recaps of what happened between stories. You have no hook at the beginning or end, and for me, sailing stories should be longer. Where are all the hardships at sea and what happens on the ship itself? I know more about sailing than what goes on inside Leo Trapa's ship, and I don't know HOW to sail.

Reached Matan ahead of everybody else.

I love the continuity from the earlier entries in this series. I do wish that there were more branches and decisions in this episode though- there's really only 4 real branches and most of the decisions were inconsequential.

NOCIe

In Part 3 of the Magellan saga, we have a somewhat less complicated plot than in Part 2. The previous entry in this series described an entire war, with all of the drama, reversals, and tragedies that come with that territory. Notwithstanding the fact that Magellan is intended as a 5-part series, Part 3 felt very much like the middle child in a trilogy: it serves to mop up the aftermath of the previous story while clearly setting up the next one.

In terms of writing style, this one seems a bit more relaxed and enjoyable than Magellan 2, although it persists in the strange avoidance of commas that make most sentences read as run-ons. Having read several of Will's stories, it is clear that he has a formal, detached writing style -- meaning that he provides you the information you need to know to understand what's going on, but not the details required to make this an immersive experience.

As a game, Magellan 3 is still a notch below Magellan 1, in that there seemed to be only one real challenge: don't dawdle too much, just get where you need to go.

The branch-and-bottleneck format did lead to a continuity problem, in which I encountered Azai early in the game, and then had to be reintroduced a few pages later as if the first encounter never happened. Otherwise, when I didn't reach the destination in time to beat the queen, it was easy to back up a few pages to the point where I went wrong and then set things straight.

Overall, the underlying story is interesting to keep me coming back to read each story.

Thankfully, I get to spend more time here with characters I really like, someof whom, I think, loathe me, but with whom I love to tangle, invariably unsuccessfully. I am a huge fan of Magellan 1 and 2, and at first this one didn't feel like it had the vast branching of the 2nd game. The stakes felt a little smaller here (instead of a high-stakes diplomatic mission, there's a "strange visitation" of a "man in strange clothes" which, while it *turns into* something cool, doesn't kick off the action quite as well as in 2. What happens there would be rather spoilerific for me to say, but it does fell somewhat linear there, with seven or so pages in a row with loads of text and no choices, where I desperately wanted to make choices in the interaction with Kenshin and Ieyasu.

In spite of the generally linear structure of the larger branches (and there is some serious branching going on here, just with long stretches of straight narrative *within* those branches) this was a rollicking sea adventure. There may not be a *ton* of choices (like in #2) but the choices there were were fun and more than a little nervewracking. I am a little horrified by the ending I got in spite of the scene with Naomi. I think you being able to horrify me with who things turned out politically and militarily is a really good sign.

All in all, I like it a notch less than 2, but still a very, very good read, with well-crafted prose.

OK, now I understand a bit more about Magellan 2. Very enjoyable. Keep them coming!

I really enjoyed this one as well, although this seemed shorter than the first two. Maybe I just read it faster.

This was Great!!

Very good!

very nice. betrayal, how awesome.

Thanks for Malk, Mason and CurseofTime for the feedback and I'm glad you enjoyed it Steve (Swift is too withdrawn about asserthing her opinions but maybe she will improve with time), I think Anonymous's comment is one of the more intelligent and thoughtful I've received recently so I will spend a little time responding.

I do make a lot of grammar and spelling typos I shouldn't (partly because I type on computers in China with dodgy spellcheckers) but especially in this series as I have a real writing enthusiasm atm. I've tried to put the storylines into the events so they develop naturally as the reader progresses through the story, I do not want the reader to miss something important because they have taken a different path. If I made the stories longer I guess they'd be different relationships to pursue but for a multiple-choice story writer I'm alarmingly narrow minded :) Haha hopefully this will change with time.

There are a few references to Leo's love of Eva in the story but I feel I should have written that more strongly. All writers write from experience or imagination and lets just say my shortfall is writing about romances :D

I appreciate your point about writing the episodes of the series too fast, it's a major criticism of mine for people who publish in parts. I believe if something has a clear beginning, middle and end and is rated 5/8 or 6/8 in length you can justify calling it a series. Homo Perfectus is a great series. This is a good series but I agree if you haven't read the previous parts there will not be much interest in the current part, a shortfall not shared by HP where ever story (in my opinion) is as good as the last. Essentially you are right I should spend more time on these stories but I consider them almost as episodes of a series rather than a feature length film. When my current career allows me enough time to write something full-length like Hunting the Ripper I'll be more happier than anyone else to shut myself in a hotel room or seaside cabin and type away for a few months.

Essentially I agree that these stories deserve a 5/8 or 6/8 if people are feeling generous, as I'm a decent but not especially talented author (unlike some of my favourite site members curse them... in a nice way) which means I need to spend a lot of time to try to put out something really good. I hope to have the time to do this soon, until then I'm content showing that not all the new stories submitted here have to be brain-torture :) (I know there's a lot of good new stories but lately for me they seem to be getting swept away by the tide of sewage... but that's probably just me being negative) :)

Anyway, thank you for everyone's feedback and thank you for everyone who has the time, patience and interest to read my written ramblings :)

This was amazing. Best of the seekers in my opinion, although 1 comes closes for not being depressing as shit. The characters were great and I really cared for some, and hated others. It had an intriguing plot, although I was annoyed Swift waited until after the pirates were executed to speak up because they were cool, it had fascinating cultures and a great setting. Truly so great storygame. Well done.

It just keeps getting better and better. Just enough detail without me tearing my hair out. Great Job. :)

Oh my God, Will I love it! First of all, I LOVE the Magellan series. I just love playing through the crew and trying to carry out wicked deeds for the Queen and wonderful rebellious quests, it truly was an adventure.

There otherwise was no grammar or punctuation mistakes I found. The plot was genuinely written-out, so I see nothing wrong with it. The characters were truly a challenge and fun to interact in.

In all, the next episode in Magellan was truly a good, written-out story readers of most ages should be able to sit down and enjoy.

7/8. You deserved it :D

Your games are always a pleasure, Will.