I really liked the surprise of the opening of act 1, but cutting from the moment before the crash to the last city was such a jump that I felt like I had slept through half of a movie. I was looking forward to some "Last Rights TTK" style change of plans mission, but we didn't even get an explanation for what went down outside of a single line from an NPC. Even just an extra cutscene in-between, but preferably an extended mission would have been much more engaging and exciting. I understand the team wanted us to get access to the new mechanics of this episode sooner, but I feel like the need to push gameplay hurt the story. The wind kind of fell out of my sails when we just jumped ahead like that, I got excited for such a drastic story beat only to be denied exploring it. In the future don't cut moments like this out, even if it means dragging things out a little further.
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I mean, if you wanna see how much they actually spent on anything with the HELM, just go up to the old wartable area and look out the window it's just sitting in a giant featureless box (despite it being shown getting repaired outside). I think they just wanted to make the new season hub area the center of attention and just glossed over the HELM.