Reply To: Revisiting Albion
The dungeon beneath the great library made me ask myself questions about why Albion has both 2D and 3D environments. The first part of Drinno is unusual in that it’s played from the top-down perspective that you’ve so far used for wandering around and talking to people – your characters have never been in danger in this mode before (unless you count trying the local Iskai alcohol).
But it highlights that the 3D mode isn’t really necessary – every switch and floorplate puzzle works arguably better from this perspective because you have so much greater visibility and agility. Just turning round on the spot to face a different direction is so slow in the 3D dungeons, and you never feel like you have enough awareness of what’s beside or behind you because the field of vision is so low. The maps are obviously based on a rigid grid, and I wonder if it would have been better if you were also confined to grid movement to make things easier to navigate.
I’m surprised to learn that monsters don’t respawn in the 3D dungeons – once you’ve cleared them out once, you don’t have to worry about them coming back. Given that, I was able to get to the third floor basement of Drinno before looking at a walkthrough – when I discovered I was meant to raise a portcullis directly without looking for a switch despite that never having been possible anywhere else! Grrr.
Also finally encountered a fourth monster. There really aren’t very many.
