Having reviewed around thirty "main event of the month" parties for this site, it has become hard to write intros for my reviews. Why? Well, it always feels like I'm saying the same thing. For the past several years, each Club Penguin party has continually shown the same attributes: quality takes several steps forward while also taking several steps back. Whether the forward steps beat out the number of backward steps really depends on the party, but one can not avoid the fact that in this modern age of Club Penguin, content shows periods of strong growth but is always eventually pulled backwards.
And so we come to the Fashion Festival of 2015, which displays this point perfectly. This party is the definition of a mixed bag. I like a lot of things about it, I shake my head at others, and there's nothing major that stands out that I really love or really hate.
Since I generally like to remain optimistic (though my numerous pessimistic blog posts on this site may suggest otherwise), let's start with the things I didn't like. First off, we've seen variations of this same theme several times in recent years - including once in 2015. The "get rich and get famous, as you strut down the red carpet on a beautiful night where the sky is a pretty purple-red, you [movie star/music icon/fashionista]" concept has been used at the Ultimate Jam, Hollywood Party, and SoundStudio Party and is anything but unique. Much like how the Forest kept being turned into some variation of a public park at party after party, we keep seeing these celebrity events crop up on Club Penguin with essentially the same idea but disguised as a whole new adventure. Frankly, it's extremely boring.
This party was also plagued by other familiar elements, like pesky bugs and decorated rooms that didn't even extend beyond the center of the island and didn't dare to touch any interior rooms. But, I've wasted far too much time talking about this stuff in the past, so I'll move on so I don't sound any more redundant than I already do.
With my next point, I'm allowed to get wild and crazy because CP decided to create unnecessary trouble for themselves with the reintroduction of a newly designed and seemingly mentally altered Dot.
Now, for the record, I've never been apart of that crowd who thinks everything from the beginning of CP is sacred and should not be touched. As Screenhog once pointed out, Club Penguin is supposed to be a living, breathing metropolis that evolves. So, no, I wasn't at all concerned when all of the mascots suddenly decided to get shirts at about the same time or when rooms were permanently redesigned. But, with Dot, it's different.
Those previous examples of change that I provided all had a purpose: to modernize the art style of Club Penguin without completely changing the core DNA of the game. Dot's redesign doesn't fall into this category because we've seen some artwork over the years where her original outfit was updated to fit the current art style, so she had already entered the modern age. Additionally, this new outfit bares almost no resemblance to her old one and she appears to have traded in her smart secret agent persona for a more stereotypical fashionista personality, while all of the other mascots were barely altered beyond a new item or two and basically maintained their attitudes after their transformation.
I have to ask: why was any of this necessary? Was Dot not hip enough so CP decided to reboot her? And, if so, doesn't CP know they have Cadence to fill the role of the trendy millennial? They did three years ago, when they had Cadence visit the Fashion Party in the Gift Shop. This switch is not only completely abrupt and useless, but also unprecedented; the closet example to a situation like this would be when the Penguin Band went from basically middle-aged to young and stylish, though that was with the distinct purpose of matching them with the current art style - not to mention the fact that the four are just as two dimensional and uninteresting post-makeover as they were pre-makeover.
With that out of the way, we come to the stuff the party actually did right....and, ironically, we find Dot here as well. I mean, yeah, I don't exactly like the direction CP went with Dot's character and her lack of a stamp doesn't help the argument that the team is sort of lazy at times, but anytime there's a new mascot - particularly one that has been rumored for years - I'm definitely going to celebrate it.
This party also had other pros. For the first time in quite awhile, we heard brand new music that was neither stolen from the soundtrack of a takeover's source material or a remix of something we've heard before. The rooms had nice designs as well, with the team learning from their mistake at the SoundStudio party and giving the entire island a night sky. There were no free items at this party, but we did get a very impressive Penguin Style catalog instead that brought back items that haven't been seen in over seven years. The submission process - the party's main attraction - was also a gigantic plus, giving us a very enjoyable party activity that actually required thought and provided tons of replay value. To add to this, the staggered theme roll out didn't seem gimmicky either (now if only we could get inventories to load faster and find a better way to sort our items...).
And there you have it: the Fashion Festival of 2015. It was a party that dared to create an activity for everyone, but couldn't find the courage to decorate more rooms. This is no classic Music Jam, nor is it the 2014 Music Jam. It's just a passing attraction. See you soon, Descendants.
Score: 7.5/10
No comments:
Post a Comment