The thing I like best about Nightmare Mansion is that it pretty much embodies my general feelings about mansions. I think it ought to be possible to get all treasure in the mansion, but I don't necessarily think it should be easy. In the case of Nightmare mansion Easy, it's pretty easy to get to the end. It's less easy (and obvious) to get everything, because it's easy to take a wrong path that will prevent it. To me, it adds to the fun of trying to find the right path.
As satisfying as it is for me to gradually learn the right combination that will let me get everything, it's equally frustrating for me to play another mansion where there are no combination of right moves that will get the same result. There are two things that make this situation worse in my opinion:
* If all the other mansions work in such a way to make me believe that it should be possible to get everything.
* There is no hint (or sign) that warns that this very simple
rule
may not apply to a mansion. I spent a *lot* of time playing Falcon Manor Normal, which has two large exclusive forks, thinking that there must be a way - undoubtedy hidden that would enable me to take both paths. I thought I must just be missing it.
Despite the fact that there was nothing written that encouraged this expectation, I did expect it, and ended up feeling like the designer wasn't playing
fair
with the mansion. Over the years my opinion has been a bit more nuanced about such mansions, but to this day, Falcon Manor Normal remains my least favorite of all MM mansions. Early on, I found it unsatisfying, and I still do today, although I do admire certain aspects of it.
I do not put Nightmare Mansion in the same category, in fact if you look at my recommendations for NM in the key imbalance topic, you notice that they change very little.
Brell, my point isn't so much that players *must* always see every part of a mansion - that's not quite it. I don't think it should be mandatory or even easy. I just think it should be possible. Again, though - this point of view is limited to built-in mansions, only *especially* Easy variants. In the Easy version of Falcon Manor, it's actually possible to explore both forks. I don't mind the feature as much in Normal or Hard versions.
I do think it's clever in NM Hard, that the abundance of keys contribute to the challenge at the end where there are lots of monsters, and Jack can carry so few desperately needed shields to protect himself because of all the keys.
Anyway... I'm sure we all have our pet likes/dislikes. I recently discovered that I'd accidentally messed up one of the forks in Falcon Manor NORMAL when I was doing some clean up. As much as I disliked the fork, I wasn't about to modify it on the sly simply because of my personal preference, and I restored it. Even though I feel strongly about it, I realize that maybe a little diversity isn't such a bad thing.
Deep down, though... there's a small part of me that wishes I hadn't restored it. [smiley=evil.gif]
