Original Commentary

Here we are back in Final Battle Advanture On-Line. Yes, Robert's character got a new helmet. All will be explained in the near future. So, Solar Globe? It's a Macguffin - it doesn't particularly matter what it is, specifically, but it moves the plot along. When I needed a name for it, I went through all of the Robyn Hitchcock lyrics I could find and this was one of the few usable ones. I don't recall any of the ones I discarded, but I think they were from "Acid Bird" and "DeChirico Street" - Terrence

Modern Commentary
Note that Brisbane didn't unpack any of those boxes during his stay at Robert's apartment. I figure Brisbane opened one box, asked Robert where things should go, and Robert told him to just tape the box back up again- Terrence

Original Commentary

Ok, so it's a slow build. I debated what to put into this comic. It's obvious that it's a computer game. I hope people remember Final Battle Adventure Online, as it's the only computer game that's been mentioned in the last year. And 40 xp? The hardest part of writing this is providing numbers. FBAO draws upon several different games with entirely different mechanics. 40 xp is kinda low in most any game. But take damage, for instance - In Dungeons & Dragons, 50 damage is instant flaming death. In Maple Story it's about 10th level. In Final Fantasy VII it's a fumble. In World of Warcraft it's...well, I'm not sure. But you get my point - Terrence

Modern Commentary
First he talks to Jake about it. They both understand what's going on; Jake knows the significance but things are not explained.

Tomorrow, he'll talk to Brisbane who does not understand this bit of FBAO lore so he (and the audience) gets an explanation. But Brisbane wouldn't be able to appreciate how this is a big deal - Terrence

Original Commentary

Finally, the explanation of the last two days. I had in my notes "Find a cooler name than Red Wizard's Dungeon". I couldn't. No, it's not a Final Fantasy reference. As I've mentioned before, the Party Quests in Maple Story tend to involve an hour or more of waiting, which is not-fun. So instead FBAO has a really rewarding quest that requires a very rare item. I need to mention that it's rewarding somewhere - Terrence

Modern Commentary
So there's a quest locked behind a rare drop that requires you to grind non-optimally for weeks or month.

Is this good game design?

A MMORPG will have a lot of content. You will reach level 50 long before you finish all the level 40-49 contents. You're not going to see it all and that's ok.

People choose what to do and mostly, they go with the easiest and/or most efficient path. But you want to give folks incentives to go off the beaten path a bit. That makes the prime content less crowded, gives the players a bit of variety, and helps all of the developers' work be seen.

On the other hand, they're blocking off this part of the game from 99% of the players. This is because the folks who run FBAO aren't always very good at their job - Terrence

Original Commentary

Finally, I mention the name of the game. I was originally going to have Jane ask him "Sorceress?" with either curiosity or apprehension, depending on the draft. Yes, it's kinda cheating for it to be a character profession that obviously denotes gender. I mean, if he had a spare level 56 thief, you couldn't immediately tell the gender from that. Jane's line in the second panel gave me such trouble when I was writing this. I think I got the point across, though - Terrence

Modern Commentary
I mean, it's sweet that he wants her to be part of this. Jane is entirely correct about this. Not easy to go from zero to "able to contribute meaningfully to a high-stakes event using a complicated character"

If Jane was playing other similar games on a high level or had a background with FBAO, she probably could've tagged along. But if she had joined, this would have ended with Robert yelling about how she needs to press the red button and Jane yelling about how there's six different red buttons - Terrence

Original Commentary

Ah, yes. The planning session. I wanted to stress that this is a rare, mysterious event and that the boys have very limited information about where they're going. It wouldn't be as fun if they did. And yes, as far as FBAO goes, Brisbane may be enthusiastic but Robert and Jake are a step ahead of him. To be fair, though, Brisbane only heard about this quest that morning. And yes, I should've specified "healing potions" - Terrence

Modern Commentary
One of the little unique touches in FBAO was that healing items were going to be expensive and/or rare.

This is because I felt that games get into the rhythm of "get hit, heal back to 100%, repeat" if there's no cooldown or expense when you heal - Terrence

Original Commentary

After this set of comics I made a new rule for Terrence when writing scripts: always tell me where the crap the characters are during the comic. First he had Robert talking with Jake, then to Brisbane only. Then all three of them were talking together. It was confusing for me because I had no idea where they are. But, I think it works... Robert met with Jake for breakfast or lunch, then talked with Brisbane during work, and then they all got together after work. -Isabel

Modern Commentary
The "that girl" that Jake is talking about in the first panel is some rando that he just met.

Is it one of Cedric's many side-accounts trying to scam Jake for in-game loot? We didn't explicitly say so, but that's the kind of thing he was always up to back then - Terrence