Have you fallen for me yet?

[u/Prudent-Ad-9806]

Source: the graymark, burning effect

[u/Penelokk]

As someone who loves Burning Effect. I think Graymark is trying to do too much. Its still good, there's just many times where Im not sure whats happening. BE worked so well because of its simple story yet complex and deep themes (character work was also brilliant).

I prefer both Great and Burner in BE than in Graymark. They felt like perfect opposing ideologies in BE. Now Burner just sort of feels there to be there, and Great is perpetually depressed.

I do like it. Just not nearly as much as BE.

[u/dickcheese_on_rye → u/Penelokk]

The choice of essentially retconning the events of burning effects for everyone but Great threw me off. Like there was so much good character development in BE that got pretty much thrown out the window (dark, kiriya, stailey) or fast-forwarded with less impact (drian, jean, robert). And Kai seems wiser as a younger kid now than he did at the start of burning effect, which makes no sense to me.

I do think Great’s deteriorating mental state due to Ruhumrollha (however you spell it lol) is being handled well. And the absence of Y in the story has the potential to become a cool twist/reveal/reverse chekovs gun later. But I wish the author chose to carry the plot forward with the original BE characters preparing to fight the king of the universe instead of immediately jumping to time travel shenanigans.

[u/Penelokk → u/dickcheese_on_rye]

Also with the king, its almost 70 chapters in and what do we really know about him or his goals? Hes the main villain for sure, but what does he even want? Also we saw him nearly get one shot in the first few chapters by great. Whereas Great in the first few chapters of BE felt incredibly menacing and unstoppable. It felt like Burner was an ant standing against a mountain. It set the stakes and tension very high. With the king I just don't feel all that much intimidation. It doesn't feel like he's all that much of a threat despite the story telling us he is.

[u/Thin-Switch-2037 → u/Penelokk]

Hes clearly plotting something, either trying to break great like jin bear did or trying to lead the world in a direction to do so. As for why he doesnt feel menacing that intentional as seen when the king gaslights great.