Kinda a shame that most of my crit wasn't applied to the fullest extent, or some of it was just ignored. This page still feels barren and empty. Better format, but a lot of this still lacks a lot of work and length to actually feel interesting.
The mystery is still meaningless as the amount of text on each part clues eyes into which part obviously matters most. Each other location gets one paragraph, apart from the temple, which has like 4? Obviously people are going to instinctively recognise that that's the bit that matters. There's more to describe, or at the very least there's more written. and, when they read it, they know it's the important part as that's where the mystery lies. Everything else is just too brief to have one.
Not to mention the images. I suggested to add more images of recovered artifacts, to make sure that people didn't realise the Temple was the really important part of the mystery, but that was done on a very surface level. The image for the maze is filler, basically. It's just pots. the pots don't have a mystery, a commonality, or anything among them. Whereas the image for the Temple reveals the logo for something which is explicitly stated to be weird and anomalous. Obviously it's very easy to tell which one matters more, and then it's obviously easy to tell (yet again, might I add) that the temple is all that matters.
It sets up mysteries with no conclusion, too. Which I know is intentional, but there's also no cliffhanger to these mysteries. There's no "big breakthrough" to lead into the stuff that comes after this page, unless you want to count the note from the lost (which hopefully I'll detail by the time I finish this, providing I don't forget to). Not explaining a mystery is fine, especially considering this is meant to be an introductory Pantheon page, but there's no hook or intrigue to the mysteries here. It just very matter of factly states what the unknown parts are, and then kinda leaves it at that. Not that I'm wanting some cringe second offset that goes "oh holy shit we've discovered the Keymaster" or whatever, but some kind of evolution of stakes throughout the page would be neat.
(told you I'd talk about the note) The note is about as close to an evoution of stakes as you can get in this page, and follows some very nice cause and effect. The M.E.G. find the level by complete accident, The Lost learn about it (which, come to think of it, isn't explained?) and write to the M.E.G. to tell them to leave it. It's probably the best segway into future stories as it gets, but with no actual name attached to it or any kind of length to even remotely explain things leaves it feeling about as hollow as the rest of the page. Which, unfortunately, is what this is.
I'm not downvoting this cus it's Pantheon. I mean, I dislike the canon, but for every Pantheon page I pick up I try my hardest to ignore my bias and review the content in a matter of fact, objective POV. I mean, I'm a TV student that studied how to do TV reviews in my first semester of Year 1, it's not like I can't, haven't been taught to, or don't want to. Critiquing this shit actively helps me get better at my studies lmfao. But this page feels like it exists solely to be a Pantheon tie-in. Level 51 was cringe, but its vague greek themes made Mickey latch to it cus they believed they could turn those greek undertones into something Pantheon-y. (which, really, kinda shows how generic the canon is. but again I wish to keep my bias' out of this review) I'm not going to armchair phycologist my way into the author's head and accuse them of phoning it in or running out of ideas, but this page feels like a Pantheon tie-in first, and an actual story and level second. It has its priorities in a twist.
There are neat details, I like how The Lost put "level" in brackets in their note. It kinda shows they're wanting to cooperate with them by using their lingo, but are also so ancient and from such a bygone group of societies that the name level attributed with the Backrooms is so alien and strange to them. I like the fact that the dripping black ooze is probably Kirai, (I don't like Kirai, but it's subtle worldbuilding that'd go over a newbie's head, but would be noticed as an acute detail by fans) and I at least like the fact that it sets up a basic enough premise for Pantheon. It has its main linked faction, eludes to the later gods, sets up the society that were built around the gods, and is overall a neat attempt at worldbuilding. It's just not an engaging one.
Hell, there is surprisingly little Pantheon in this too. It honestly just feels like a bunch of people accidentally finding where The Lost used to live. I want to reiterate I'm not downvoting cus of Pantheon, as much as my reputation would mean I probably would if I were more dickish, but just because it's not engaging and I feel as though I can sense the author intent, and the downfalls that came with that.
Better luck next time, I suppose! But that's strike… Uh… Idk, Probably at least strike 12 for The Pantheon? At least Puzzle's tale was a fun concept.
