They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot/Video Games: Difference between revisions

** Azjol'Nerub. This underground city of sapient spider-people was huge when it was first seen in Warcraft III, spread out across three single-player missions, when most missions are one single city or battle. According to the lore and previous games, the Nerubians aren't actually evil or hostile to playable races, just incredibly alien. They are distantly related to the Qiraji empire that were major villains in vanilla Warcraft, though. The Nerubians fell when the Lich King invaded their underground city. To defend themselves, they [[Dug Too Deep|dug deeper]] to retreat further underground, maybe contributing to the awakening of the nearby [[Eldritch Abomination|Old God]]. All in all, it sounds like great potential for a raid or major quest hub. Developers discussed implementing Azjol'Nerub as the first underground zone in [[World of Warcraft]]. What actually happened? Two five-man instances, one of which was cool-looking but tiny and the other of which was cool-looking but unoriginal.

** Uldum, in ''Cataclysm''. The zone was one of the most anticipated in the run up to the expansion, as lore-wise it's been alluded to ever since an intriguing dead-end quest chain in classic WoW, and the massive, sealed entrance (guarded by [[Elite Mooks]] no less) taunted players for years. It was the subject of many [[Epileptic Trees]] with regard to its connection to the Titans, and the first info released discussed a mysterious new race of catpeople connected to the Titans, who were in the midst of a civil war. The vast majority of the zone's story ended up being devoted to one long parody of ''[[Raiders of the Lost Ark]]'', with comparatively little development given to the Tol'Vir and their dealings with [[Big Bad|Deathwing]]. Many story elements weren't even explained in terms of the Warcraft lore angle because the focus was on shoehorning elements into the parody and handwaving it under [[Rule of Funny]] (ie: Belloc Brightblade is an [[Expy]] of Indy's rival, but we never get an in-universe explanation for why the Horde's main archaeology trainer is working for the bad guys, and he's gone just as quick as he shows up). The zone has become something of a [[Base Breaker]] as time goes on, and a flashpoint for players growing weary of the increasingly heavy use of pop culture references in the game.

* ''[[Darkest of Days]]'' had an amazing premise: you're an MIA of the Battle of Little Big Horn whisked away to the future due to your minimal impact in history to join the [[Time Police]]. In the hands of a good developer, it could be an amazing game. Unfortunately, the guys who came up with it were a small Iowa based studio who decided to use the concept for their debut game. The result was not pretty. I understand wanting to use this idea as soon as possible but there IS such a thing as aiming too high...

* ''Crackdown 2''. What's that, you say? A government military initiative bred unthinking, unquestioning, supersoldiers with incredible physical abilities and firearm skills, and they're using them to enforce what ''might'' be a secret police state? The agency in question (might have) planted and detonated a bomb ''in their own tower'' in order to kill a crowd of journalists who spoke out against them? They might have engineered the entire zombie plague (or at very least are deliberately withholding a cure) just to convince people that their presence was needed? Yeah, they might've, but the game sure as heck doesn't do anything with that beyond the subtlest of implications.