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 What the hell is this? Back in the good olde early days of adventure games, there was this Scottish guy named Fergus McNeill who wrote a lot of text adventure games. Several of them were parodies or pastiches of existing stories, like Robin of Sherlock (Sherlock Holmes meets Robin Hood sort of thing), The Colour of Magic (based directly on the Pratchett book of the same name) and Bored of the Rings (unrelated to, but inspired by, the Harvard Lampoon work). He was also responsible for the text adventure adaptation of Murder Off Miami, a book slash interactive mystery that was LP'd on this very forum not long ago. At one point, McNeill hooked up with SCi, the company that would eventually become Eidos and subsequently Square Enix Europe, where he worked on games like Carmageddon. While at SCi, McNeill wrote and produced a point-and-click adventure slash role-playing game to be released in 1996: Kingdom O' Magic. The game can be best summed up as "Extremely British comedy that can loosely be described as a parody of a variety of fantasy and sci-fi works, most significantly J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle Earth". It features an enormous amount of that classic 90s CGI, both animated and not. SCi attracted some real talent for the voice work in this game, too, including comedian John Sessions and voice actress Lani Minella. Too bad we won't be hearing most of it. Why screenshots? This game has voice acting and a lot of 90s CGI, so you might think that a video LP would be a better format. However, all the aimless wandering and conversations in this game - see below - makes that a task that would require so much editing as to virtually make it a screenshot LP anyway. The game has very little music, and the voice acting outside of the lead cast is generally disappointing anyway. So is this a good game? Well... no. By 2015 standards, this game is bizarre, clunky, full of nonsensical puzzles and completely lacking in a coherent plot. Somehow, it was well received in its day, though, and received moderately high marks in gaming magazines. The game includes a lot of randomly walking around trying to get your hands on some item or another, and then trying to figure out what to rub that item against to progress. There's a lot of backtracking involved once you do figure out what to do - and at no point is it really clear what you're supposed to be doing in the first place. Several of the puzzles are complete red herrings. The humor is scattershot and on occasion juvenile and clumsy. This is not a must-play adventure classic by any stretch of the imagination. This was also a game people rightfully forgot everything about in short order, so it's hard to find clear instructions or walkthroughs online today. The only one I could find is just a collection of hints. I will do my best to remember - yes, remember, as I played this game to completion when I was younger - the solutions to everything and trim out all the pointless walking around and dull conversations. Nevertheless, there will be a few videos here and there, to highlight especially bizarre encounters, and an abundance of animated GIFs to go along with it. As usual, my comments are in italics, and anything else can be assumed to be straight from the game's vile, confusing mouth. Table of Contents Introduction, and Choosing of a Quest Quest #1: The Good, Old-Fashioned, Traditional Quest Part 1: Flake Town Part 2: Backwoods Part 3: De Lorean and the Western Lands Part 4: Edam Part 5: Rivendull Part 6: Baker's Island Part 7: Rhitegard and Minar Tragedy Part 8: Murder Spree Intermission: The Easy Way Quest #2: The Bizarre and Slightly Twisted Quest Coming soon! ... Thread Contributions Everdraed is confused about communication: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4QuTzmpwjMo Hyper Crab Tank fucked around with this message at 19:09 on Jan 10, 2016 |
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Nov 11, 2015 16:49
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Introduction The very first thing you see upon starting the game is an introductory cutscene that really has to be witnessed first hand. The video below covers the intro cutscene and the initial choices we get to make as players. I won't comment on the cutscene itself, since it's pretty self-explanatory, but the second half of the video is reproduced with comments below. Here's the intro: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91fzF_u9VLA Okay, that sure was something, huh. All of those characters show up in the game, though not necessarily in the context shown in the video. Immediately after the introduction ends, we're introduced to...  ... this weirdo. He has no name that I'm aware of. He is the narrator of this game, and will be with us throughout.  Hello, and welcome to the Kingdom O' Magic. I'll be your host, as you attempt to survive and succeed in this comedy epic. But now, without further ado, let's choose which character you want to play... We can choose one of two characters to play as in this game. We will be playing as both, eventually; we'll get to that.  Thidney. He's mean, he's green, he's a questing machine! Fond of power tools and small children, he's no magician, but he's a bit handy in the combat department!Thidney the Lizard Bloke is the first of our two choices. He's... a lizard man thing, voiced by fairly famous British comedian John Sessions. As the narrator explains, Thidney is much better at physical combat than his counterpart and has more hit points. Wait, combat? This is a point-and-click adventure game, right? Yes, and no... we'll get to that, too.  Shah-ron. She's smart, she's gorgeous, she's not thrilled with the costume we've given her! A magic specialist, she lists her hobbies as particle physics, writing crime novellas, and making fools suffer gladly.Shah-ron the Girlie is our other option. She's voiced by Lani Minella, known for literally hundreds of video game voice acting roles, including Rouge the Bat and Ivy Valentine. Shah-ron plays exactly like Thidney, except she has fewer hit points and is better at magic than physical combat.  Who will you choose? At this point, we get a choice: Thidney or Shah-ron? As far as I can tell, the game plays out the same regardless of who you go with. The only difference is in the details of how some of the jokes are delivered, and of course the previously hinted-at combat mechanics, but the general progression through the game and ending is unaffected by your choice of character. You've chosen... Thidney!  Oi ya beauty! Yeow..!For the first part of this LP, I'm going to go with Thidney. Later on, we'll be switching to Shah-ron when we go through the game a second and third time. Why are we playing the game multiple times? You see...  All right, now let's pick a quest.... this game consists of three separate quests, all taking place in the same world. The locations are the same, but the characters and circumstances you run across are different, and the goals are different. Some puzzles are shared between quests, others are unique to each respective quest. Others yet are completely pointless to go through in one quest or another, but you can still do them if you don't know any better. We can pick new characters for each quest.  The Good, Old-Fashioned, Traditional Quest. What fantasy product would be complete without a good, old-fashioned, traditional quest? I don't know, but we have one here, so that's all right. In the good, old-fashioned, traditional quest, your chosen character must rescue the dragon, steal the princess, and kill the treasure. Actually, there isn't a princess, but you get the idea. This is probably the easiest of the three quests.As the narrator somewhat clumsily explains, the goal of this one is to find and slay the dragon. Where said dragon is, and how to go about slaying it, is not explained. We'll have to find that out as we go along.  The Bizarre and Slightly Twisted Quest. In this, the weirdest of the quests, you undertake to save the kingdom from a fate worse than something horrid by seeking out and recovering the Lost Lava Lamp of the Ancients and, time permitting, thrashing the Dark Lord to within an inch of his life. This is the toughest of the quests, and should not be attempted by old women, or people named Julian.The description of this quest outright lies. The lava lamp does not need to be "recovered" in any real sense.  The Magnificient 7-11 Quest. When you learn that the sleepy metropolis of Flake Town is under threat of invasion, you offer - nay, promise! - to round up between seven and eleven unfeasibly hard fellows to defend the liberty of the town and protect its inhabitants from harm. This is quite a difficult quest.The description is technically correct; we do need to gather up a number of defenders that is between seven and eleven, inclusively. Okay, you've seen the scenarios, now... CHOOSE YOUR QUEST! I'll be going for the Good, Old-Fashioned, Traditional Quest the first time through the game.  Aha! You've chosen the Good, Old-Fashioned, Traditional Quest. Well, let's not waste another moment. On with the adventure! The dragon doesn't animate in this shot at all. It just roars awkwardly. That's it for the introduction sequence; we'll start our new adventure in the next update, which should be immediately below! Hyper Crab Tank fucked around with this message at 11:48 on Nov 12, 2015 |
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Nov 11, 2015 16:49
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The Good, Old-Fashioned, Traditional Quest: Part 1: Flake Town   The first thing we're treated to is a Star Trek: The Next Generation-style sequence with a CGI toilet taking off on a galactic adventure, because this has something to do with a fantasy game somehow.  Then this little thing plays to show us that it's now daytime. This, and a corresponding nighttime animation, will show up several times throughout this game. You see, Kingdom o' Magic has a day/night cycle system, and not all characters or locations are available during one time or another. Inns are always open, though, and you can pass the time by resting for the night, though it will cost a small amount of money to do so. It won't be a problem for us.  And here we are, mean and green and ready for adventure. Thidney appears at the beginning of the quest in the Jolly Mutant Tavern, next to this handy-looking fellow, who presumably is the innkeeper. First, let's get used to the interface.  That orange hand is our cursor. Right now, since I'm not hovering over anything in particular, it's in "walk" mode and will just make Thidney waddle ponderously towards wherever the cursor is.  Hover over an interesting object, and it changes to this sparkly finger shape. Click the thing, and...  ... a context menu opens. Some of the options are disabled here because the innkeeper is a living being and some of them simply don't apply. From the top and proceeding clockwise, the actions are pick up, fight, talk, examine, use, and cast spell. Fighting, talking and casting spells apply only to characters, picking up and using only to inanimate objects, and examining works with pretty much everything.  Examining a character shows a little profile screen with a full-body sprite and a few vital stats. Most of these are completely irrelevant and just vehicles for jokes. "Health" is important; this can either be a number, or a description (such as in this case). If it's the latter, it means the character is invincible and that fighting it is only going to end in tragedy. At the bottom, you can see what items the character is carrying. Usually there's some means or another by which you can get your webbed green paws on those items, either by fighting or by solving some puzzle or another.  Hovering over the bottom bit here lets us access our inventory.  Thidney is carrying very little. Aside from himself and his suspiciously pink fist (called the Fist O' the Western Star), all we've got to start out with is an axe (the Dirty Great Axe). We can look at the axe with the same action wheel we used before. It's a dirty great axe, the sort of thing that can be So important in persuading other people to see your point of view!Examining items typically prompts a line or two from the narrator about the item. There's so many things you can do with a fist, but for now let's just use it to hit people!Fighting with the fist is pretty much never a good idea as long as we have the axe. Shah-ron doesn't start with a weapon, so all she's got is the fist.  We can examine ourselves via the "ME" item. Note that this is also the only way to find out how much gold we're currently carrying. Gold has a function in this game, though you never really need a lot of it and you can sort of grind for it if you need it. Now then, since there's nothing particularly interesting in this room, let's talk to the innkeeper.  Talking to characters brings up a screen like this, with a portrait of the character talking up top and three options at the bottom. The three conversation options typically correspond to "nice", "sort of average" and "mean/sarcastic". By the way, te scrolling here is hellishly bad; your mouse cursor is hidden while you're in this mode, and moving the mouse both changes what is highlighted and scrolls the too-small display up and down. So you're the Jolly Mutant, are you? Jolly Mutant. Right here. I figured maybe you named the establishment after yourself. I mean, you're obviously a mutant. Let's see you being jolly. Ha. Ha. Ha... Ha. Hmm, that wasn't very jolly, was it? I'm sure you can do better. I ain't bustin' a gut just for you. I only make the effort for a coachload of tourists.We're booted out of the conversation at this point, but other options might lead to further choices. It is entirely possible to piss people off enough that they won't talk to you anymore, too. Anyway, the innkeeper serves mainly to provide us with a place to rest if we're low on hit points or just want to pass the time. There are other innkeepers much like this one in other places.  Hovering over the edge of the screen or doorways will change the cursor to indicate we can leave in this direction. This way leads to the toilets at the back of the inn.  Exactly as advertised. The only thing we can do anything with here is the "KomDom Machine" on the wall. A machine of vending! What luck! Here you can purchase all manner of nasty little rubber novelties, protective latex-wear, and party balloons! But no! Cruel fate has put salt in the sugar bowl, for today the machine is empty! I guess that Big Jim Slade has been here before us!The narrator has a tendency to go on long, "humorous" monologues like this when you examine random background items. It's only going to get worse as we go along. Before we leave, we can actually look at the mirror, too. You don't want to look at that - you'll break it, you unsightly green thing, you!As you can imagine, this reply would be different if we were playing as Shah-ron.  The only other exit from the inn takes us here: the North Square of Flake Town. That name was mentioned before, and yes, that's a straight-up parody of J.R.R. Tolkien's Lake Town from The Hobbit. From here we can go left to The Structurally Insecure Pier, right to Main Street, or into that little shop what isn't the inn. You might be able to read it - it says "World of Wigs" - but we can also examine it.  Stillgaar, do we have WigSign? Oowsul, we have WigSign the likes of which even God has never seen!... okay, I guess what the game really needed at this stage was a Dune reference? This line is spoken by a hitherto unheard voice who is not the Narrator. But, yeah, this is a wig shop. Since it's daytime, the shop is open, but for now we're going to let it be and have a look at what else Flake Town has to offer.  This is Main Street. We've got a barbershop and an old lady in a rocking chair. And what's that she's got on her porch?  Ah! A caged child. Hungry little fellow by the looks of him, but he doesn't seem to talk much... Unlike the caged child, grandma is a person.  By the way, while we were ogling grandmas and their children, this fellow walked in from off screen and continued on to the right. Another feature of Kingdom o' Magic is NPCs that move around a lot, and I do mean a lot: characters that are set to walk around can end up in all sorts of inconvenient corners of the world just by pure chance, which can be a real bitch when you need to track down one of them for a puzzle. This particular guy is a dwarf; we can talk to him, but we have no reason to just yet.  And here's the Southern Square, accessible from the right end of Main Street. Interesting features include the Flake Town Disco on the left there, the palace in the middle, and the Costume Hire Shop on the right. We can examine the posters outside the disco:  Remember that one for later. There's also a big bronze statue in the middle there. Occasionally, it undulates its arms.  The statue is actually a person - the Elfis Golem - and he has a plunger, the game helpfully informs us. So, if he's a person, we can talk to him, right? Wow! An Elvis impersonator! Go on, sing something! Great! I finally discover an Elvis impersonator, and the only number he does is Silent Night! ...The golem doesn't seem very talkative. At this point, we're given three more options to choose from. The top and bottom answers basically kick you out of the conversation and make it so you can't get back into this particular conversation again. The middle option, though...  This is another one best... experienced in video form: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEliGaogags Oh, what's going on here? If only I had some sort of clue... Jesus christ what are you.  Are you stuck trying to figure out your next move? Not sure which troll to kill first? Hi, I'm Saul Gribnick, President of Hint Helpers Inc. And I want you to know that no matter what situation you find yourself in, we've got the helping hints for you! Sure, we charge more than those other guys... but when it comes to winning, aren't 2 gold coins worth the price?We get three conversation options here, but we're going with the easy option. Yes, I can't believe you're able to offer such a fine service at such a low, low price! And if you take advantage of our Pay-First-Ask-Questions-Later deal, I'll personally throw in this lovely set of wine glasses at virtually no extra charge! I'm convinced. Take my money! How about that! Give him a big hand, everybody! Okay, okay! Now, Thidney, I'm sure you can't wait to hear your hint, am I right? You sure are, Saul! Of course I am. So here goes, your hint is... MIKE HIM! I'm supposed to know this Mike guy? Nooo! Mike him... you know, with a mike... Mike... no, sorry. What about a Steve? Will a Steve do the trick? A mike! Mike! Mic... ro... PHONE! You've lost me... Ah! Hey, what about the set of glasses you were going to throw in? Insert noise of glasses breaking here. We lose two gold coins for engaging in these shenanigans, too. I need to go have a lie down. Hyper Crab Tank fucked around with this message at 23:44 on Nov 13, 2015 |
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Nov 11, 2015 16:50
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I'm beginning to see why it took such a long time for people to ever consider games to be something approaching 'art' if THIS was coming out in the day.
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Nov 11, 2015 16:55
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I remember playing a demo of this back then. The humor was spot on for a teenager. All I remember is the greeting Thidney uses for Granny, something about gingerbread men and a mill. Time has not been kind to this game.
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Nov 11, 2015 18:23
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Well this is a blast from the past. I remember it being fairly random...I didn't remember it being as random rear end as this though.
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Nov 11, 2015 18:30
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I remember reading about this game in preview section in a games magazine back in 1996, next to The Quivering, thinking that those games have to be the funniest poo poo ever. Now it looks like cheap Quest for Glory ripoff. Bookmarking this one, I want to see if there are any redeemable things in this crap.
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Nov 11, 2015 18:41
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This is... surreal.
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Nov 11, 2015 18:59
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The thing that Thidney enjoys is "power tools", I believe.
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Nov 11, 2015 19:10
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Are you high? Are you Elvish?
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Nov 11, 2015 19:22
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Nidoking posted:The thing that Thidney enjoys is "power tools", I believe. Yup. This might make more sense if you consider a later... weapon, I think? I had pretty much forgotten everything about this game until this thread, but I know that it features power tools.
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Nov 11, 2015 19:42
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Nidoking posted:The thing that Thidney enjoys is "power tools", I believe. That's my guess as well. This is going to be a trainwreck from start to finish, isn't it?
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Nov 11, 2015 21:52
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inscrutable horse posted:Yup. This might make more sense if you consider a later... weapon, I think? I had pretty much forgotten everything about this game until this thread, but I know that it features power tools. From the sounds of it so far, it features a lot of things, not many of which are coherently connected. I can definitely see why John Sessions signed up for it. The man can be a riot, a talented voice actor, and has a lovely cheeky grin to boot, but I do seem to remember his routines could leap about a fair bit, and had sometimes surreal humour himself. But the best-worst thing about John Sessions? Here's him back in his Whose Line heyday (DISCLAIMER: He's still funny)... And here's him now. It makes me horribly envious.
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Nov 11, 2015 22:02
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Man, I remember this thing. My wife and I still occasionally quote lines from it at each other. It's bad, but in a kind of endearing way. Thidney and Shah-Ron are just weird fantasy pronunciations of Sidney and Sharon, although maybe that one's a bit obvious. Those are kind of stereotypical ordinary slightly-lower-class British names, which is presumably the intended joke. It also might be worth noting that Big Jim Slade is a character from the Kentucky Fried Movie, a Zucker, Abrahams, Zucker production - those are the folks who made Airplane and its sequel, Top Secret, the Police Squad series and the related Naked Gun movies, and a bunch of other eightes/early-ninetines comedies. (Zucker later went insane and made An American Carol, but whatever.) The Kentucky Fried Movie was basically just a series of sketches; the relevant one involved an ad for a record that taught virgins how to make love for the first time. It can, and should, be seen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tINTtHWsxg
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Nov 12, 2015 01:46
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I'll be reading it. Loved that thing back in the day, then I grew up I guess but the fondness remained. Will be waiting for the choice bits I remember. BTW, you could really use a Thidney mugshot there, it's kinda grating especially since you're narrating it. I know, italics, but still.
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Nov 12, 2015 02:05
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Regarding power tools: You know, I listened to that little bit of recording before posting over and over until it stopped sounding like words at all, and I could never hear the "ls" at the end, but you're right that I really don't know what else it could be.  Pierzak posted:BTW, you could really use a Thidney mugshot there, it's kinda grating especially since you're narrating it. I know, italics, but still. Could you elaborate a little? There are mugshots whenever Thidney says something.
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Nov 12, 2015 11:15
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:Could you elaborate a little? There are mugshots whenever Thidney says something.  Disregard.
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Nov 12, 2015 13:32
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Fergus McNeill was also responsible for the... unique... game for the Amiga CD32, The Town With No Name. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WeV18bZGMqc E: Defining moment of the video. Whybird fucked around with this message at 23:58 on Nov 12, 2015 |
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Nov 12, 2015 23:53
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The Good, Old-Fashioned, Traditional Quest: Part 2: Backwoods After wasting our time and gold on a hint for a puzzle we could probably have figured out anyway - and, as it turns out, is completely pointless for us to solve this time around anyway - we have a choice of a few locations to visit. There are three obvious ones on this screen.  The disco is closed during daytime, so we can't go in. We could come back later, when night has fallen.  The palace is just plain locked.  On the right there is the Costume Hire Shop, and we could go in there right now, but we won't, since it's only good for a puzzle we don't have to solve to beat this quest. Instead, we're going to go down - see that little sign with the arrow on it? It marks an otherwise invisible exit.  The bridge leads out of Flake Town and into the rest of the Kingdom O' Magic. This particular location has nothing relevant in it, so on we go.  There we are; a good old crossroads. Flake Town is in the distance back there, there's a giant mountain on the left, and two more paths leading down and right. We can also examine the ground to the left there (the Patch of Grass). It's grass. We were going to give you some other way of cutting it, but SCi have other, different games for people who like lawnmowers!SCi did the video game adaptation of the 1992 movie The Lawnmower Man. All right, let's check out that big, suspicious-looking mountain, eh?  Look at that 90s CGI at work. Isn't that just a beautifully textured vaguely cone-shaped object?  We are helpfully told this is Dwarf Mountain, and that the Dwarven Halls O' Stuff are just past the cave mouth there. As you might be able to gather from the position of the mountain being near Flake Town, this is a reference to Lonely Mountain, another Middle Earth location. Which, if I know my Hobbit, means...  ... that we've found our amazingly lazily animated dragon. He speaks in an exaggerated faux-medieval accent. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wocrb-W52ZY  I bid thee welcome, stranger. Who art thou, and what art thou? Er... the name's Thidney and um... I'm just a harmless little green fellow who's incredibly sorry to have disturbed you and... um... Green thou most certainly art... now, what goeth well with that, red wine or white..? That was a close one. You know, there's a lesson to be learned here: don't go up any strange passageways without taking precautions!What nonsense! We have a dragon to slay, so get right back in there, you!  Oh dear. Pursuant to our previous encounter, I sent word unto a friend at Burger Kingdom. They flame-grill their meat, as do I. He didst reccommend [sic] a suitable drink that wouldst compliment [sic] thy tastes!This line is full of typos in the text, something that will persist throughout the game. Well done. Thou shall be! 'tis better to burn up than fade away, I supposeth. Whelp. That didn't go entirely as planned, did it? On the upside, we found the target of our quest, but we're not in any sort of position to do anything about it. For now all we can do is reload our save and wander around elsewhere for a while in search of a solution. This is one of those games that will not hesitate to murder you if you misstep, with very little warning, so keeping saves on hand is a good idea.  Let's try the other route from the crossroads this time.  Gorgon's Valley, eh? Sounds like a warm and inviting place. There's an unusual-looking statue sitting over there that we can have a look at. It's an unusual statue, staring through a pair of stone binoculars at something further along the valley... how odd. The book at the statue's feet is the Big Book O' Spells, which we can use to get our hands on our first spells! (As Thidney, anyway - Shah-ron starts with a spell instead of the Great Big Axe.)  Spells sit in your inventory like other items. These two are the Spell O' Floater and the Spell O' Kick-In-The-Shins. The Spell O' Floater will cause your enemy to rise up into the air, perhaps even to drift away! Hmmm... Spell O' Kick-In-The-Shins... this causes a small amount of discomfort, roughly equivalent to being kicked in the shins by a small man with a mustache.It's not always clear, even with the descriptions, what spells do, but they all target hostile characters and are all useful in combat one way or another. Spell O' Kick-In-The-Shins is a simple, weak damaging spell, and Floater does, well, pretty much what the description says.  Further down the Valley O' The Gorgon are these expertly crafted human statues. Like that one on the left there: What's this guy supposed to be doing, aerobics? Well, I suppose he could do with loosening up a bit - he's rigid!Or the one on its back on the right: Great action pose! If we had another statue that we could put on top... then it would be quite childish, really.The main thing we're after here is that sword you can barely see lying on the ground in front of the statue on the left: the Sword O' Normalness. The fabled Sword O' Normalness. There's nothing special about this weapon. No kidding - it's not even a weapon! It's an ordinary item and can't be used for fighting with. This is part of a puzzle we have to engage with much later. Say, why don't we check out that cave to our right?  So much for interior decor, I guess...  Oh, hello there. What's this shadow on the w--   Thidney is not doing so hot in his encounters with horrifying monstrosities so far. We'll reload from just outside the cave again and leave with our loot of sword and spells in peace.  Since both the mountain and the valley are dead ends, let's try this way.  Welcome to Backwood, presumably a parody of Middle Earth's Mirkwood. We've got a bit of stuff on this screen; there's something glowing dangling from the branches over there, there's a white rectangle by the path of the right, and of course a highly conspicuous pair of smoking shoes right in front of us. A burnt out pair of shoes, smouldering spats, all fused to the hard ground as if... as if... as if some big simple soul had been wandering through the woods when they spontaneously combusted... It's a security door-entry card, marked with the name Mr Wolliston...After examining the shoes, we get this blue keycard for our troubles. I imagine all this must be a reference to something specific, but I don't know what that could be, alas.  The thing on the ground is a List of Instructions (not O' Instructions, as you might have expected, oddly enough). It's a note from the game's designers, and it reads 'USE THE DOOR ENTRY CARD ON THE MORONICA DOOR, YOU MORON!'Moronica is, as you might have guessed, this game's version of the Mines of Moria. We won't be going there in this particular quest, but we may have to do so for one of the others. We can pick up the sign, too, so I do. The last thing we want on this screen is the dangling, glowing thing on the left.  ... which turns out to be a 1996-era mobile phone. If we ever run across a phone number, we can call it with this phone. You can actually call the official help line - as in the real-life telephone number listed on the CD-ROM - and get hints in exchange for gold, but we don't need that. From here the path splits, so we'll take the left for now.  Eugh. Spiders.  You certainly do. These, of course, are references to the spawn of Ungoliant that gave Bilbo and company so much trouble while traveling through Mirkwood. The puzzle they are related to is not necessary for beating the Good, Old-Fashioned, Traditional Quest, so we will be leaving them alone.  Moving on, we find this fancy-looking suspension bridge. The green guy who isn't Thidney is an elf; there are maybe a half-dozen identical-looking elves with names like Eden and Paris and Eternity randomly walking around this part of the game.  You might notice this guy has the same nickname as the innkeeper back in Flake Town. As it turns out, these repeat a lot, which is vaguely disappointing. Let's talk to it. Hi. It's a lovely day, isn't it? I dislike you enormously, by the way. It makes no difference to me.The elves all speak in annoying, high-pitched voices (think Tiny Tim and you're pretty close) and none of them have anything useful to offer us right now beyond a few hints. Before we go any further, we should check out the location immediately left of here.  There's a big, evil-looking tower here. I'm not really sure if this is a reference to anything in particular; it's not Isengard, if that's what you're thinking, because that's elsewhere in the game. I guess Dol Guldur? Anyway, the door doesn't work. The cursor changes to an exit sign, but Thidney won't actually enter. Examining the mail slot in the door explains the situation:  We're shown an interior view of the door, which is blocked by a big pile of mail. Actually, it doesn't look too big for a stiff push to dislodge, but anyway - if we want to get into the tower, we need to get rid of that pile of mail somehow.  The sign outside the tower has this to say. Say, didn't we just acquire a telephone a few screens back?  This is what the phone looks like when used. We'll punch in 0-1-100-111-1111 and see what that gets us.  A short animated sequence with some pleasant music plays.  This is not the tower we're looking at right now, although it is a location in the game we will visit eventually. There are some words highlighted in red; those are hints for puzzles in that location.  That's the one. The word "Palantir" is highlighted, which is of course a direct reference to Middle Earth again.  This is another location we won't be visiting in a while yet, and a minor clue for a puzzle we'll need to face when we get there. After this, the cutscene ends, and we get booted back to the tower. That's all Backwoods has to offer us. Next time, we'll cross the suspension bridge and find out what's the other side, and then maybe try to solve some actual puzzles instead of just running into a bunch of pointless red herrings. Hyper Crab Tank fucked around with this message at 20:20 on Nov 14, 2015 |
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Nov 13, 2015 23:44
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That Lawnmower Man joke came up just as I was starting to think the graphics looked a little familiar. Now I know why.
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Nov 14, 2015 02:49
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Oh, lord, I've seen this game reviewed once as a kid. Waaaaay back in the 90s, before internet review sites were quite a thing, they instead had review site magazines that were sold on CD-ROMs, with movie files of reviewers talking about games. I can't remember the name of it at all but it reviewed this game. Pretty decent stuff for its time, if it was a proper internet review site today those guys would be doing well.
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Nov 14, 2015 02:59
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You really haven't experienced this game until you've heard one of the elves say "EVERY day is a LOVELY day in the forest!"
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Nov 14, 2015 03:18
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idonotlikepeas posted:You really haven't experienced this game until you've heard one of the elves say "EVERY day is a LOVELY day in the forest!" If anyone wants to know what the elves really sound like, here it is! http://tindeck.com/listen/zwghg
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Nov 14, 2015 09:25
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Oh my god, this game. I've played this game. Heck, I've had a friend of mine that lived in Europe SEND ME A COPY of this game when I was really younger. It wasn't very good, but it made 15 years old me laugh sometimes. Never got very far into the plot or puzzles, however.
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Nov 14, 2015 18:59
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:If anyone wants to know what the elves really sound like, here it is! http://tindeck.com/listen/zwghg Oh Jesus, I must've blocked it out.
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Nov 14, 2015 20:17
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The Good, Old-Fashioned, Traditional Quest: Part 3: De Lorean and the Western Lands We're almost done with Backwood for the time being, but before we go, we should pick up that thing just sitting right next to Thidney there. The little white and red thing. Aha! The Spell O' Slowmo... your enemies won't be in such a hurry to mess with you after this spell hits them!I can't remember ever actually using this spell, but there it is. Time to cross that suspension bridge and see what's on the other side!  Why, it's the verdant elven lands of De Lorean! The Middle Earth equivalent would be Lothlorien, of course. This is where most of the elves hang out when the random pathing algorithm isn't busy getting them stuck in weird corners of the world.  The riverbank is almost entirely unremarkable.  The sign expresses the ancient wish that you please keep De Lorean tidy and dispose of your litter thoughtfully, all written in Helvetica runes.That doesn't look remotely like Helvetica! Anyway, this room is pointless. Besides going back towards the suspension bridge, we can go left and right; for now, let's go left.  Treehouse and park furniture. Sounds like elves, all right. Gaze now upon the fair banqueting table of the high elves. In the early days it was here, under the bending boughs of the gold-leaf wood, that the Elven forefathers, and three mothers, did feast upon the bounty of the forest, eating venison, robbing the rich to give to the poor, until the wicked Sheriff of Nottingham came and... sorry, as you were! Wrong story!This one actually made me chuckle a bit. The patio furniture on the left can also be examined. Ah yes, the hallowed seats of the high elves. Many is the elven buttock that has graced these fair furnishings at meetings of the High Council... and the PTA.Let's check out that treehouse.   Thidney sure can jump, though I suspect it's mostly as an excuse to not have to do a complicated climbing animation. Up here are these two regal-looking fellows.  That's some... interesting weaponry the queen is packing, there. She does actually have a name which we're not told at this point for some reason.  Likewise, here's the king. For some reason the king and queen are a fleshy pink tone instead of green like all the other random elves. The only other thing in this room we can look at is the couch on the right. Another superb item from Don Elrondo's World O' Wicker - tasteless yet impractical furnishings for today's elf - don't delay, call today!I don't know about you, but I'm a bit tired and sure could use a sit down on that wicker couch. You want to sit on the Wicker Thrones of the High Elves? Are you high? Are you elvish? No? Then you've got no business sitting on the thrones, have you!All right, all right, let's just talk to the king and queen. I bid you good day, your royal highness. Er... I thought so. Begone!Aw, rude. Maybe the king is more forthcoming. Good day, your majesty. The king has the most gloriously lazy talking animation, by the way.  I wonder if he's related to that dragon. He won't tell us anything more after this, but we will come back here eventually once we figure out a way to help him with his drink problem. For now, we'll just go back down, from where we can go left or right. Right takes us to an area we don't need to visit for a while yet; our next destination lies to the west.  Another transit area with nothing interesting in it aside from a sign and a litter bin.  It's a sign.Even the narrator can't come up with anything interesting to say about it. The litter bin? It's a bin. Somebody's carved "Hamsters at my mail!" on it in graffiti runes.This is actually a clue to a future puzzle, although it's nowhere near the puzzle itself, or its solution. Hey, looks like we can use the litter bin. Only two kinds of people go through other people's trash - tramps and private detectives - and you're neither... so stop it!Or not. Let's just keep going.   Kalibre Pass is most likely a reference to Middle Earth's Caradhras, the mountain peak below which Moria is located. Kingdom O' Magic's equivalent, Moronica, is indeed somewhere below us right now. The path leads back into DeLorean - the other branch takes us back to the suspension bridge - or west through the pass.  Hey, look, it's a disgusting pile of bones, guts and festive party balloons. That's our health bar - since we haven't been in a fight before now, we hadn't seen it yet. Every second we spend in this particular room we lose a little bit of health. It might look like our health is halfway down already, but it actually starts around there and we're actually at almost full health. The health loss here is so small and we have little reason to hang around, so there's nothing to worry about.  We can enjoy the view for a bit, though.  Er. If you like scenic views, then you'll enjoy this lovely picture of the Marina del Rey Hotel, Los Angeles, where the game's writers sat by the pool coming up with character dialogue. Lucky bastards.Okay then, moving along.  The west end of the pass is entirely unremarkable. We don't even lose any health here.  That's a... toilet. A Very Public Toilet, the game helpfully reminds us. Thankfully, we can't use it - it's all clogged up - and we don't need to, either.  Moving along, we come upon a crossroads, complete with traffic bollard and mysterious black-robed figure glaring menacingly at Thidney. Note: I accidentally screwed up the original recording, so the video below is taken from a different place in the game with multiple ringwraiths, but the conversations are the same. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wz6jumCFsXg Behold a Ringwraith! One of nine black-robed fiends who scour the land in search of one thing... they have only one desire, one all-encompassing passion. Food can not satisfy their insatiable hunger. Sex means nothing to them. Computer games, movies and other forms of entertainment do not interest them in the slightest... the Ringwraiths each have a single burning purpose - to seek out a Magic Ring!So... yeah, these guys are just straight up ringwraiths, straight from Middle Earth.  Watch how this one sniffs the air for a whiff of a magic ring... but unfortunately, there aren't any magic rings in the Kingdom O' Magic... so these hard-as-nails Ringwraiths are wasting their time. It's quite pathetic, really. Rings! Rings! There aren't any magic rings in the Kingdom O' Magic. I've heard about you. You have? Nothing slanderous, I hope? You're the one going round telling Ringwraiths that there's no magic rings in the Kingdom O' Magic.You can indeed say this to all the ringwraiths, and they all react slightly differently. Somehow we ran into this one on the first go. Well there aren't. It is you! Okay, it's me. You're just a freewheeling iconoclast, that's all you are!So here's the deal with the ringwraiths: there are nine of them, some of which start on this side of the map, and some which start way over on the other side. Why half of them are over here will become clear fairly soon. These guys walk around randomly and try to start conversations with you. Some of those conversation options lead to combat, or you can just start fights with them manually.  Here's what they look like. Note that they have a health number - in other words, they can be killed. They also carry around gold.   This is how fighting works in this game. You use a weapon on a suitable character, you have a cartoony slap fight for a second or two, and you both lose some health. Some characters are aggressive and will walk up to you and force you into fights, others aren't.  A few repeated applications of the axe later, and the ringwraith we just encountered is dead. Dead characters leave behind little gravestones which you can examine to take all their items. Here's why gold isn't actually much of an issue in this game: Ringwraiths are pushovers. At least, during the daytime they are. At night, ringwraiths cast spells at you that hurt quite a bit and don't give you a chance to fight back. Avoid them at night, but by all means kill them for their gold and assorted other stuff (spells, mostly) during the day. Okay, so, back to what we were doing. Four exits. East leads back to the Very Public Toilet. Let's try south.  Ah, yes, Rivendull, the other elf settlement (and reference to Middle Earth's Rivendell, of course). Let's go inside!  As you might be able to imagine, this elf speaks in a kinda weird Italian-American accent - more Philadelphia than Brooklyn to my ears, but what do I know - you tell me! Invitation and gift? He, heh... of course I know that. I'm no jerk... however, I am a bit asthmatic and seem to have left my inhaler at home. I'll be right back.Rivendull is actually the home of Don Elrondo, a name was referenced earlier, and he's throwing a wedding party. I bet you can tell already what he's going to be a parody of (besides Middle Earth's Elrond, that is). But, alas, there's no way we can go in there without an invitation and a gift, so we have to turn back.  On the way back we run into more ringwraiths. Here's another one of those Ringwraiths, who scour the land in search of magic rings. If you have any pity, bestow it on this poor creature... or kill him. It's not up to me to tell you how to play the game. Up north is this place. A cave, a cookpot, some big ol' logs... all in all, a reference to the trolls that tried to make soup out of Bilbo and company in The Hobbit. There's also a spell sitting over there. Why! It's a genuine first-edition Spell O' Left The Gas On. Cast this spell, and your enemy will think he's left the gas on and possibly go home to turn it off!As far as I can tell, this spell makes creatures walk towards wherever they spawned in the world, or possibly mill around in confusion. I've never used it much. Anyway, let's check out the inside of that cave.  Okay never mind, we're getting out of here. Yeah, those are the trolls.  As you can see, the trolls are fightable and can be killed... but there's no way we can take them on right now. Not only are they super aggressive and will keep fighting you repeatedly, which is trouble when there's three of them that will just take turns beating on you. They deal a shitload of damage and have more health than we can quickly deplete. Fortunately, the trolls have an aversion to sunlight and will stay in their cave during the day. We'll just go back to the crossroads and try the western path.  A road with a wrecked car. It's a '69 Passion Wagon; very rare... sadly someone appears to have stolen the engine, but look! They've left the crank handle behind! Which we'll pocket. Not much else going on here; the ringwraiths like to congregate here when they're not doing anything more interesting, but they're all elsewhere right now.  We've reached a river, and a rope-based ferry. Fortunately, we have just the thing to get across: the crank handle we literally picked up one screen over, where it was just lying around. Not much of a puzzle, this one.   Some nice '90s CGI there. This was totally awesome back in the day, yo.  Okay, here we are. Nothing on this screen except the ride back.  And here's the reason for all those ringwraiths: the Shire is over here. It's got a big, fat "closed" sign on it, though. The Shire - Closed... ah yes, I heard something about that. Black riders cruising the countryside, riotous parties, dogs and cats living together, it was a mess. It's a shame, because this was the Kingdom's biggest tourist attraction, but that's what happens when the Dark Lord thinks you've stolen one of his magic rings...I thought you said there were no magic rings in the Kingdom O' Magic. Anyway, there are two more exits from this location. One is to the left, following the path, and the second is practically invisible unless you accidentally hover over it and notice the mouse cursor turning into an exit sign. For now, let's go west.  Ah, it appears the sun has set. It is now night-time; trolls come out to play, ringwraiths get stronger, shops close, etc. Well, that shouldn't be a problem. You have reached the gates of Edam, a famous town where the rich and frivolous spend their money and their weekends. Looks like a classy sort of place. I can't wait to get myself some of that frivolity. (Alarm system): The gates are closed. Do not touch the gates. Move away from the gates. Any further attempts to approach the gates will result in this message being played again! Aw, what gives? Barely-visible guard dudes, tell me what's up here!  You seem familiar. Why not? Because it's night-time. All civilized folk are tucked up in their beds, not roaming the streets... Civilized people? I'm not one of those. I've lied, cheated and stolen on my way here. And you should see the trail of corpses I've left behind in my wake. I'm not civilized at all. So your rules of admission don't apply to me.Impeccable logic. You're right. There's a special rule for punks like you. What's that? Try to get in before morning and you get a spear in your vitals.Looks like we're not getting in just yet. Oh well, we'll just wait for morning. By the way, Edam is a reference to the town of Bree in Middle Earth. Get it? Bree? Edam? Let's just go back to the previous screen and try that other location.  Oh, that was quick. Never mind, let's go back to Edam. The sun sets majestically behind the walled town of Edam... Yeah, what about that, huh? The same thing happened last time I came here. Some coincidence. It's no coincidence. Didn't I explain about that? No you didn't. I must've missed a bit. Ah, here we are. Edam, a famous town where the rich and frivolous spend their money and their weekends. Edam is under a curse of Perpetual Night where the rays of dawn may never reach. Any more information? That's all it says. Thanks for being so efficient a Narrator. That's why I'm here.Lame. Okay, so, gaining entry to Edam is a puzzle we're going to have to solve. Right now, we don't have the means to do that, so we're going back to that other location north of the Shire after all.  The Sinister Bearing Downs, reference to the Barrow Downs of Middle Earth, where the dead rest fitfully and Frodo finds a magic sword or three. And look - a doggie! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXSuhgKk87Q  His name is Timmy the Dog. Uh, he doesn't actually bark so much as say the word "bark". He also sounds vaguely Californian for some reason. Nice doggy. Nice, nice doggy. Nice doggy? Not me. I'm a Hound O' Hell. I'm trying to sweet-talk you with comforting words you - you nice, nice doggy you. Why would you do that? I'd like to establish trust and friendship between us, so I can walk past you into the barrow. Oh. No go on that frontier. I'm here to guard the tombs against unwelcome intruders and, if necessary, tear them apart with my teeth- Unwelcome intruders? That means you, chum. Bark. Bark, bark.Timmy here blocks our path to actually getting into the barrows. Which is too bad, because there's stuff in there we're going to need. This is, of course, another puzzle, and this one we are going to solve... next time. In the meantime, why don't you all see if you can figure out what we need to do here? The means to getting past ol' Timmy here is actually within our grasp right now. It's... kind of bullshit, though. We can actually get into Edam once we've done that, too. Hyper Crab Tank fucked around with this message at 22:55 on Nov 20, 2015 |
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Nov 17, 2015 00:28
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:
The characterization of the elves as basically middle-class suburbanites is one of the parts of this game that is, generally, actually pretty funny. Hyper Crab Tank posted:Let's check out that treehouse. If I recall properly, whenever your character does this jump, the "activating the bionic powers" sound from The Six Million Dollar Man plays. Hyper Crab Tank posted:
This is another line where the voice acting (?) really makes it. Also, sometimes they will randomly wander into elves, fight them, and die horribly.
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Nov 17, 2015 01:30
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:
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Nov 17, 2015 07:16
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The Good, Old-Fashioned, Traditional Quest: Part 4: Edam Okay, we've got some puzzle-solving to do! We want to get past Timmy here into the barrows. Watch closely now, this might get a bit technical.  First, we need to backtrack a little to this location, between the barrows and Edam.  We go back to Edam again. The sun sets once more, but there's no cutscene this time.  Now that that's done, all we have to do is go back once more...  ... and little Timmy is now much more docile. And immobile. Wait, what? Hey, don't wake me up! I'm all barked-out. Ain't you heard you gotta let sleeping dogs lie?Puzzle solved. Really. In order to get Timmy to let you past into the barrows, all you have to do is walk back to Edam and then return here. That's it.  This beef... there's something... pharmaceutical about it.While we were gone, some unknown soul apparently felt the need to drug poor ol' Timmy with a spiked slab of beef. We'll pocket the beef, and we can also walk around behind Timmy and enter the barrows as much as we like.  The eastern chamber is pretty boring. There's a sarcophagus, and some rocks. It's a deluxe stone tomb, air-conditioned with a spacious interior, mahogany lining, and all the words to "My Way" inscribed on the lid.The real reason we're in here is for the mallet sitting on the left there, called the Comedy Mallet. It's a weapon, and although the game is not very clear on numbers and such, I believe it's better than the axe we had. The impact is rather small overall, but it will make fighting ringwraiths a little easier if we have to. Let's check out the other barrow.   : Tremble with fear, mere mortal. I am the ghost of this barrow, and you're trespassing. Leave this place immediately, or you will suffer regret.Immediately upon entering, a disembodied voice informs us to get the heck out of its tomb. I think that's a northern accent? Lancashire, perhaps? Go have a listen, it's quite peculiar. Anyway, screw that; there's a Pile O' Gold, Jewels And Other Stuff to pick up! You can't carry all that! Look for something more manageable, you greedy thing!Oh, all right. How about that tomb there? The words "Here lies King Olaf the Ninth, undisputed winner of the 'Let's See Who Can Lean Over The Cliff Farthest competition.'Well, maybe there's some treasure in there, th--  : Right, you've been warned. This is for your own good, you grave-robber from outer space, you!That was a reference to Plan 9 From Outer Space, a legendarily bad movie by director/producer Ed Wood starring the (already by that point deceased) vampire character actor Bela Lugosi. I'm not really sure why that movie is being referenced here, but all right. The original title for that movie was, indeed, Grave Robbers From Outer Space. Either way, we've died for our impudence. But no worries. We've gotten everything we wanted from here for now, though we'll be back later once we have a way to placate the ghost.  Beef in hand, we can now gain entrance to Edam.       Always eat strange cuts of beef that appear mysteriously on the dirty ground right before your feet, kids. Especially if there's a suspicious-looking lizard-person staring at you intently while you do it. With the guards dispatched, we can finally enter Edam.  This is pretty much the entirety of it. There's a big ol' inn, and not much else. The Hung Horse... these tavern names just keep getting worse!There's nothing much of any interest to us out here right now, so let's just go inside.   This inn is considerably nicer than the one in Flake Town. The only person here is the innkeeper, so let's chat him up. Tell me about Edam. You look familiar, too. I can't imagine why tourists come.There's nothing here except this inn of yours. Which must be why I get so much business. Look at the Visitor's Book, it's brimming with signatures!Wait, this place is on lockdown during the night, which is perpetual. We only got in by tricking the guards into eating pharmaceutically enhanced meat products. How are all these tourists getting in? Do you want me to sign it? Are you famous? Not yet. I will be when I've completed my Quest. I'll be a Hero of Heroes, songs will be sungabout my exploits and streets will be named after me Better sign the book then. Nice scrawl there. Hey, what's that entry just above ours?  Oh my. Looks like our standoffish elf queen - whose name is Galadrag, in reference to Tolkien's Galadriel - had a little tête-à-tête with Big Jim Slade at some point in the past. Very interesting. Thidney! Not THE Thidney?! The very same. You've heard of me? No. Just practising. Thidney takes the opportunity to steal the guest book while the innkeeper is busy getting the hang of our name. Strictly speaking this is not required for this quest, but we're doing it anyway.  The only other place we can go from the inn is the upstairs hallway. There's a room on the left we can sleep in by paying the innkeeper a gold coin or two, but we don't really need it yet.  There's a cat sitting in the cupboard over there, and as you can see... the cat is fightable. For now, let's try the second door, leading to the Honeymoon Suite.  This must be the room with the red light we saw from outside. It has an "Electro-Vibrotronic Bed" we can look at. Hello! There's something under the bed! Why! It's a ladies' hand mirror!Examining the mirror itself gives us a little more information: It's a small, lady's hand-mirror and it is inscribed "Property of Queen Galadrag, Queen of De Lorean".Physical evidence! Again, though, this is extraneous stuff, but we might as well grab it while we're here.  What we're really after is this white sheet in the cupboard next to the cat. Unfortunately, if we try to pick it up, the cat swats and hisses at us and refuses to let us have it.  Unfortunately, the only way to get the sheet is to fight the cat.  The cat goes down easy, and a little cat spirit with "9" on it floats away. Then the cat reappears in the exact same spot. Nothing to do but fight it again...  ...and again, and again. We need to fight the cat nine times in total - nine lives, you see - until it goes away for good, and the cat packs quite a punch. Thidney almost throws in the towel himself in the process, but we do eventually get our sticky green paws on the white sheet we're after. It's a white, white sheet, not unlike those ones you see on washing powder commercials.Before we go, we should have a good night's sleep to get all those lost hit points back. It's bedtime. In Edam, it's always bedtime. That's why there's so much extra-marital activity... one gold piece, please. For extra-marital activity!? You'll have to make your own arrangements on that score. One gold piece for an empty bed.This is a way to get a clue towards getting the guest book if you didn't pick the right option in the first place.  All right, now that we've got the white sheet, we can finish up our business in this part of the world for good.  Back at the Bearing Downs...  ... we can wear the sheet, in order to disguise ourselves as a particularly comical ghost. We can now safely enter the western barrow. : Hello! You must be my new neighbour-ghost from the next barrow. I expect you've come over to borrow a cup of sugar or something, haven't you? Yes, of course you have... well, here's a gold cup-like chalice-thing... sorry I haven't got any sugar to put in it... bye! How neighbourly! The ghost gave us this item, conspicuously called the Wedding Gift. Hmmm... an expensive little trinket and, thanks to our uncommonly subtle naming of game objects, not unfeasibly difficult to work out what it's used for...Indeed, we will be using this to gain entry to Don Elrondo's wedding party. First, though, we need to secure ourselves an invitation. Next time. Hyper Crab Tank fucked around with this message at 22:54 on Nov 20, 2015 |
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Nov 20, 2015 22:34
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Additionally!idonotlikepeas posted:This is another line where the voice acting (?) really makes it. I screwed up the Ringwraith part of the original recording, so I had to go back and re-record it, but belatedly, here's the ringwraith conversation(s), slightly out of order! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wz6jumCFsXg This, meanwhile, is going in the OP!
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Nov 20, 2015 22:47
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:Additionally! Thanks for covering this. It's fascinating. The jokes, dialogue, backgrounds - they all feel just a bit incomprehensible, like I can tell and understand its a joke, it just doesn't quite feel like a joke.
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Nov 21, 2015 06:30
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xrunner posted:Thanks for covering this. It's fascinating. The jokes, dialogue, backgrounds - they all feel just a bit incomprehensible, like I can tell and understand its a joke, it just doesn't quite feel like a joke. This is the game Fable wishes it could have been.
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Nov 21, 2015 17:24
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:I screwed up the Ringwraith part of the original recording, so I had to go back and re-record it, but belatedly, here's the ringwraith conversation(s), slightly out of order! This is 10 times funnier when you can hear it. Somehow the deadpan English accent just makes it.
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Nov 22, 2015 00:23
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The Good, Old-Fashioned, Traditional Quest: Part 5: Rivendull With the ancient, ghostly Wedding Gift in hand, we're halfway to being able to crash Don Elrondo's wedding party. Why we would want to do that in the first place is besides the point - we're an adventure game protagonist. If there's a thing that can be done, it should be done. Unfortunately, the part we still need is a wedding invitation, and we haven't seen one around. Well, that's not entirely true - we have seen it - we just weren't in a position to hang around and pick it up at the time. We'll fix that soon enough. For now, we need to backtrack...  ... all the way...  ... back to Flake Town...  ... and the hair salon we ignored earlier.  What a pithy sign.  Here's what it looks like on the inside. As an ugly, green lizard-thing, we're not exactly in any immediate need of a haircut, but we can talk to the hairdresser anyway.  As I'm sure you can guess, the hairdresser has your stereotypical affected voice. Look, he's even got the limp wrist going on. Anyway, the item we really need in here is sitting on the uncomfortable-looking seating area there.  It's a brochure; a brochure of Sun, Sea and Tomfoolery! Do you want to catch some rays, to bronze up and get a tan? Well, affordable sunlight drips from every page of this informative publication!We can just pick it up, simple and easy. Now that we've got the brochure, we need to go all the way back to the west side of the world again.  Did I mention this game has a lot of backtracking involved? I mean, yes, we could've picked up that brochure the first time around, but it's easy to overlook. Anyway, it turns out to be just what we need to solve our little troll problem.  There they are again; we have to act quick, or we'll get stuck between a rock and a hard place fast. All we have to do is use the brochure from our inventory, and...      How gruesome. The description of the brochure wasn't lying; opening it violently lights up the room, instantly killing the light-sensitive trolls. This is a puzzle with multiple solutions... you can also kill the trolls through physical combat, although it's much harder to do so since they're terrifyingly strong, or you can come here at night while they're out walking the roads.  What we're after is over here. Oh dear! This mailbag is all that remains of Jim "Lightning" Loftus, the fastest mailman this side of the Kalibre Pass. I guess this is the ultimate occupational hazard - delivering a letter to the trolls! A little to the side is some undelivered mail that's relevant to our interests. Hmmm... a wedding invitation from Don Elrondo, complete with a non-negotiable gift list...Perfect! With both invitation and gift, we can finally get into Rivendull and have ourselve some wedding cake or whatever it is we're after in there.  I'm sure you know nobody gets inside without a wedding invitation and a gift. You think I'd come all this way unprepared? Yeah, you look like the stupid kind. Well, surprise, Guido! Feast your peepers on this. That's a dry cleaning receipt. Oops. Gotta remember to pick up those shirts on Thursday... here's my invite! All right, go on in. We made it! Look at all that glorious 90s fantasy video game architeture. As soon as we enter, the guard on the left strikes up conversation with us.  That's right. Unless you know something I don't. Of course I do! I was the Jeopardy $100,000 Champ, two years running. Balls! What are round spherical objects used in sports and sperm production? Quite impressive. That's exactly what Alex Trebeck [sic] told me.There's a generic elf called Paris hanging out in the courtyard. Hi. How's it going? Verily, I'm not sure. Of one thing am I certain, and that is that the Don knows how to have a great party! The Don? Don Elrondo! The Godfather of all elves! Not an easy man to see... I guess. You have come at the time of his daughter's wedding, but he might see you.Paris slurs his voice as if drunk. Which is what he probably is. He's entirely useless, though. What we're really after is inside that unassuming door in the back, on the right side. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2m2dW0dwDE   We're in the presence of Don Elrondo, godfather of all elves. As if it wasn't painfully obvious already, he's straight-up elvish Marlon Brando. He looks a lot like the king of elves, too, complete with hilarious mouth animation.  You come to my house, on the day of my daughter's wedding... you bring a lovely gift, you show respect... what exactly are you after? Nothing, Don Elrondo. I'm just glad to be on the guest list!Technically we stole the invitation, so I'm not sure how we're on the list, but... Ah yes, the guest list! For some reason the Don takes the opportunity to feed our invitation to his paper-shredding hamster. Probably in order to clue the player into the hamster's existence and function. Are you sure there's nothing I can give you? Well, when I was at school there was this really nasty teacher... And you want I should take care of them? Well...  I'll be honest, I have no idea what this flashback is supposed to signify, exactly. It's taken care of. Go and be well, my friend. Well, that was fun, but we screwed that up, actually. We actually need the Don to do a different favor for us - I just wanted to show that off. Unfortunately the way back in is now blocked by the guy on the left of Paris, there, who the game calls the Annoying Italian.  Sheesh, no kidding. So this guy just beeps very loudly at us and won't let us in to see the Don again. We could fight him a bit to gain re-entry, but it's easier to just reload a save and pretend that never happened.  Let's ask for something else this time. That's a handsome paper shredder. This hamster has been in my service for years. I give him to you. Don Elrondo, you are too kind! Let me kiss your ring again. You'll wear that joke out if you keep using it. Go and be well.The paper-shredder hamster is what we wanted all along. He's a cute little fellow, hungry for paper...Now that we have the hamster, we're done on the western side of the world. There's no real reason for us to come back here for the remainder of the quest. Let's go put that hamster to good use.  Remember this place, with the door blocked by a mountain of mail?  Using the hamster on the mail slot removes the obstacle, and we now gain entrance to Backwood Tower!  Unusual camera angle. The bottom floor is dusty and boring. On the table there is a goblet that's rolling gently back and forth. I know what you're thinking; you think this is just some random glass rolling backwards and forwards across the table, but you're wrong! This is in fact, a very important scientific experiment into perpetual motion or "looping animations" as we in the trade refer to them... fascinating, isn't it?I'm sure. The only other thing we can look at down here is the cupboard in the background. It's a cupboard, and it's broken. You know, this reminds me of a cupboard I had when I was a boy... oh yes, those were happier times, just me and my cupboard. We'd spend days together, not saying anything, just sitting in the sun, looking up at the clouds... I thought those days would never end, but they did of course. One minute I'm an innocent youngster putting an item into my cupboard, next thing you know I'm a bitter old man with a door that's come off in my hand... oh, fickle fate, you send your dog over to take dumps on my lawn!Remember what I said about the narrator sometimes going on long rants about things? Yeah. Let's just climb up those stairs there.  Oooh, spooky. That object on the pedestal there is called the Palantire Stone, and we sorely need it for a future puzzle. It is, of course, a reference to the palantir from The Lord of the Rings. A new, wide-screen palantir, with digital picture stabilisation and surround sound.See, the palantir being here is why you might think Backwood Tower is, again, supposed to be a reference to Orthanc, since that's where the palantir comes from that eventually makes it into the hand of the fellowship. This is not the case, however. There's a different location in the Kingdom O' Magic that's clearly supposed to be the Isengard parody - we haven't visited it yet, but we will soon enough. Next time we'll see about safely getting our hands on the palantir, which will prove less than trivial. Hyper Crab Tank fucked around with this message at 12:18 on Nov 26, 2015 |
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Nov 25, 2015 22:54
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The Kalibre Pass from the 3rd update might also be a reference to the Khyber Pass, which for some reason crops up quite often in older English literature.
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Nov 26, 2015 12:30
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Those 3D animations are so cheap and stiff it's unbelievable.
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Nov 26, 2015 20:50
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The Good, Old-Fashioned, Traditional Quest: Part 6: Baker's Island We've made it to the top of the Backwood Tower, and we're ready to inspect that lovely palantir.   Huh. Looks like the thing isn't quite working, for some reason. A clue as to the reason why is in the message there, but it's really hard to know it given that we haven't been near the location it references yet. Oh well, we can pick the palantir up and carry it with us while we figure that out.  Um.   That was weird, and spooky. That's the Dark Lord, by the way - we're not actually trying to defeat him in this particular quest, but that's what he looks like. Anyway, I'm sure that little animation didn't mean anyth--  Uh, that's a really big spell, there.   Ow! That hurt a little. Okay, so here's the deal with the palantir: as long as we're carrying it in our inventory, the Dark Lord's going to use it as a homing beacon for his spells. The good news is that the spells don't actually hurt that much, all things considered. The bad news is that he will never stop throwing them at you, and sooner or later they'll whittle you down. The upshot is that we can't actually carry the palantir around with us just yet - we need to find some way of taking it without incurring the Dark Lord's wrath. For now, I'm going to reload and try to solve that before we go back to the tower.  Remember this place? That's the Jolly Mutant Inn right there, and to the left is the Structurally Insecure Pier. We never went there before, but it's time to do so now.  There's some police tape and a really dubious-looking policeman hanging around here. You can see a house way out in the water there, too.  There's something really off-putting about the way the policeman is rendered. Officer! Officer! Now now. I'm on a very important case. But I'm in crisis. Then call your shrink.The cop is extremely unhelpful right now. He mills around in this room, doing nothing much other than remind us to go away now and then. The only other things to look at in here are the sign (which just restates that this is indeed the Structurally Insecure Pier) and the police tape. It's that excellent police tape, you know, the stuff with "Police Line Do Not Cross" written on it in speical law-enforcement runes.Besides going back, we can climb down those stairs to the jetty.  There's a boat, and a boat-captain.  Missing a hand and a leg, huh. Very pirate-y. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7bi31waGcE How did you come to be so gruesomely lacking in limbs? In case you decided to skip the video: the ferryman talks like a pirate. Just imagine the most stereotypical "Bristol pirate" accent you can, and that's what he sounds like. I'm listening. But that's all part of the package tour. A leisurely trip across the river with me, your genial courier providing the commentary and added personal history. How much for this spellbinding excursion? Return journey to Baker's Island just three gold pieces, all-inclusive. Life and luggage insurance all-in. No surcharges. Book your ticket in advance to avoid disappointment. The other options don't do anything at all. There's only one way we're getting across the water, and it's by paying this guy. You won't regret it! There's no ferry on these waters to rival mine! But yours is the only boat on these waters. And the best! Climb aboard and we'll--PIECES OF EIGHT--embark on the journey of a lifetime.That's an interesting verbal tic, though appropriate for a pirate, I suppose. Where's my ticket? There's no ticket. That's part of the sales hype. I should've used a registered travel-agent. Ah well, since I've paid... Many years ago, the baker was spurned by the rest of the town for his "unnatural experiments with dough". Clearly this "donut" was the devil's work and, without a moment's hesitation, the town leaders sawed off the Baker's bit of town, and cast it adrift. It finally came to rest some distance to the east where it remains to this day. Mothers scare their children with stories of the twisted bread master, and a sinister glow can still be seen across the water on certain nights, as the ovens of evil bake forth their satanic wares! Here we are on Baker's Island. There's a nice big house, and a fellow made of water.  We can talk to him, but for this quest we don't need to and he has nothing interesting to tell us right now, anyway, so we'll just head into the bakery there.  Hello there. What are those spindly, flat gentlemen there?   There sure are a lot of people who chose to adopt "The Red Baron" as their nickname, huh. So, these guys are gingerbread men; appropriate, I suppose.  And they're real feisty and hankerin' to fight!  Not only that, but they hit extremely hard - that loss of life there was from a single fight - and, to seal the deal, they're completely immortal. We couldn't kill them no matter what weapons we used. There is absolutely no way we're going to be able to go in here without figuring out some way of getting rid of these gingerbread guards first.  This is our next stop. To solve the puzzle of Baker's Island, we need to have a chat with good ol' grandma here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_PAQkioc1k Hello, sweet old granny. How are you today? I'm sure you could. Please feel free to dribble on until I DIE of boredom. Well, when I was a girl we didn't have all the luxuries you young folk have today. Don't know you're born, most of you... You gotta hand it to the old lady. She literally made us die of boredom. Uh, that last piece of dialogue there is pretty weird, by the way, which you might have noticed if you watched the video. The voice clip is nothing like the subtitles... but the end result is the same. Let's try that again. So, tell me about the caged child. He's my grandson. Looks just like his twin brother, the resemblance is remarkable. He's a bit of a porker, isn't he? A healthy appetite is natural in a growing lad. He seems to be doing most of his growing in the horizontal plane. Things haven't been the same since... since... the accident Tell me about this... accident. Oh dear. However, this is a vital clue. That caged child over there is just what we need to get into the bakery, but it's not like granny there is just going to let us abscond with her grandchild. We need to distract her.  I've never been spoken to like that in my life! Well, you have now. Tell me, as a new experience, how did you rate it? I don't have to sit here to be insulted by you! Correct. We could go across the road and I could insult you there as well. Watch your words, you young whipper-snapper. You wouldn't want to upset me now! All you have to do is keep insulting her until this dialogue option appears. When we mention the word "tea" to her... Cup of tea? Oh yes, a nice cup of tea would be lovely. I'll just go and put the kettle on...  ... she just ups and leaves us alone with the caged child. Thidney instantly seizes the child in his clammy, vise-like green paws.  Now that we have the caged child, we can simply use them on the Baker's Island jetty.  Insert a lot of crunching noises and screaming here.   The child swiftly eats the gingerbread men before locking himself in a box. Now we can safely enter the bakery without fear of getting pummeled. What a lovely box/chest/what-have-you. And there's a hungry child inside, who isn't coming out!That's okay, we're done with the child anyway. The thing we're after is up the stairs to the right there.  Here's the Inner Sanctum, and the item we want is just underneath the mouse cursor there. Mmm... donuts!Who do we know that might like some donuts?  Oh, so it's the donuts you want, is it? That's right, Einstein. Now drop them nice and slow.How stereotypical. Hey, man. Easy with that gun. Let's not do anything we might both regret later. Yeah? Like what? Like rent one of those Police Academy movies. Whatever happened to Steve Guttenberg anyway? He's producing... now give me the goods.  Feeding the donuts to the cop makes him swell and crash through the poorly-constructed pier, leaving behind an empty donut box and a pair of very, very shiny sunglasses. Wow! Genuine Trendai brand sunglasses, with mirrored lenses inside and out!What we really wanted was the box, though. It's exactly the right size...  ... to hold the palantir stone.  We simply combine the two, and we can now safely carry the palantir stone around. It feels like we're not really getting any closer to our goal, doesn't it? We're supposed to be killing a dragon, right? Trust me, all this stuff is necessary to defeat the dragon the way the game intended you to. This is essentially how the game operators: you solve puzzles, some of which are relevant and some of which aren't, until you happen upon the item that directly solves the quest. We're still quite some way away from that, though, and things are about to get even more convoluted, so hang tight for next time.
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Dec 2, 2015 23:08
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Whew, it's been longer than I intended. Sorry about that, folks; you know how it is, real life gets in the way and LPs are not at the top of the list. Unfortunately, the holidays are almost upon us and I will soon be without access to this game for a while. So here's an extra-long update to make up for that! The Good, Old-Fashioned, Traditional Quest: Part 7: Rhitegard and Minar Tragedy  So here's a reminder of where we are right now: we invaded Baker's Island, killed the Baker's gingerbread cronies (the baker himself is nowhere to be seen), and stole some donuts in order to give to a cop so he'd fall through the boardwalk and leave us with his reflective glasses and an empty donut box. We used this empty donut box to safely pick up the palantir at the top of the tower.  Unfortunately, the palantir shows nothing but static. You can kind of see that there's a room behind all the static, but not very clearly. We're about to find out exactly what the palantir is supposed to show us, if it weren't for the interference.  Going southeast from this location takes us somewhere we haven't been before.  We have to pass through this empty room first, though.  Dimwit Dale is kind of... bland and empty. There are ringwraiths here, though, and one of them decided to beat Thidney up a little on the way. There are actually a whoopin' four exits from this screen, but you can't really tell. One is back where we came. To the left is the entrance to Moronica; we won't be going there in this quest, so I'm skipping that for now. Sort of up and east takes us to yet another location that's not relevant right now, and straight east is where we're going.  Oh hey, tombstones. So here's another thing about all those randomly walking NPCs: some of them like to fight each other. In particular, ringwraiths and elves fight a lot. The only problem there is... elves are literally unkillable, so the ringwraiths always lose. As a result, this part of the world tends to fill up with ringwraith tombstones. Not that we mind - it means free gold for us!  The next location has another ringwraith tombstone with some more gold in it, but nothing else of any interest.  The exact same thing can be said for this place. The southern reaches have a lot of filler rooms.  Finally, something different! There is nothing of any interest in this location either, but the path splits again. We'll be going east a little later; for now, we're taking a look at what's to the west.  It's Rhitegard, this game's Isengard stand-in, complete with orc lackey standing guard outside. There's also a big "Beware of the hog" sign. I wonder what's up with that...  ... okay, then. This has no ill effects on our health or anything like that. It's just... something that happens when we examine the sign.  The orc, on the other hand, is quite insistent on talking to you. If you try to get past him without talking to him, he will just force you into the same conversation anyway. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwN9CWpDDn8  These guys have the most ridiculously posh RP accent. I recommend watching the video. Steady on! I don't want any trouble! Then you-sah, have come to the wrong place, don'cha'know! Trouble is what I have, trouble is what I am, and - by cracky! - trouble is what I'm going to give you! The orcs are quite a bit tougher than the ringwraiths and not really worth fighting. They will pursue you and try to get into fights with you constantly, though. We'll do our best not to get into too many fights like this.  Unfortunately another orc showed up almost immediately.  All the orcs have the same voice actor and talk the same way. Do I know you? You orcs all look the same to me. Ooh! That's harsh! True, but harsh! And I bet you all fight the same, too. That last one was hardly worth the thrashing I gave him.I'm not sure that's entirely accurate... Choose your next words carefully, for they will soon be engraved on your tombstone, making any errors rather difficult to correct. Sorry, what was that? I wasn't paying attention. Tragic. Let's fight!We're not here to butt heads with orcs, though. What we want is in the tower itself.  A lot of valves, and not much else of any obvious interest to us. A miracle of modern plumbing. There are some valves and controls here, but they require the proper tools to turn them...We will eventually want to muck about with the plumbing, but we lack the tools to do so just yet.  Interestingly, the game indicates there should be an exit here, but we can't access it right now... there is a trick to making it appear, though.   And by trick I mean you need to step on this specific spot over here on the floor. There's nothing else to it. You just have to chance to walk across the right pixel that triggers the steps to appear. You can spend a long time just walking around in this room randomly even if you know what to do (as I had to do). Anyway, let's go upstairs.  Oh, hello. You must be Saruman. (His actual name is Marshgast, which is rather strange, since that seems to be a more direct reference to a different Tolkien wizard, Radagast the Brown.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFIlmbuU_Vw  I... okay, there, old man. Slow down on the crazy a little. Excuse me, but you're not making much sense, old man. Oh, that's all right. But I've already been to Cleveland and frankly the water was tepid. Which is why I insist that the world must be mine! You truly are a nutcase. First I suggest we build an arsenal. You do have an arse, don't you? Were you in the Navy by any chance?I don't get this joke. I'll show you mine if I can see yours.Your what? Wait, no, that's quite all ri--     That was quite ugly, I feel faint.Thidney automatically flees all the way out here upon witnessing that gruesome scene, and I can't blame him. The upshot of it all is that we can't go up there while Marshgast is still around. Aside from arse-aulting us with his old man buttocks, he also casts damaging spells at us and is entirely invincible.  We'll be back at Rhitegard, but for now we're going to check out what's east of here.  The Ringwraith interrupts us to say this, which I thought was bizarrely funny.  The room immediately to the east is this, another filler room as far as we're concerned at the moment.  The only other exit takes us here: the field just outside Minar Tragedy, which is that town over there. It's a reference to Minas Tirith of Middle Earth, of course. Just across from it, east of here, is the Dark Lord's realm. We're not going there for this adventure. Before we move on, let's check out that statue. The noble statue of King Vasilax IV, last true king of Minar Tragedy, stands here, his hand raised in the traditional battle-salute of the Tragwegians, his head stolen by vandals. Which is ironic, because in real life his head was stolen by vandals, thus ending the royal line.That's not what ironic means.  These are the gates of Minar Tragedy. We can look at a bunch of stuff, but nothing is relevant to us now.  Unlike Edam, there are no annoying guards keeping us out this time. We can just march right on in. On the left there is the local inn, called the Jolly Mantrap. On the right side of the street...  ... is this place: the House of the Rising Bun. It's a bakery.  Run by a ninja. He doesn't even irasshaimase us as we enter. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NC0_HKoibFg Hello there, Mr. Ninja Baker. The ninja has the same voice actor as the elf guards, and makes no effort to hide that fact. Er... no. I've never seen you before in my life actually. You do not deceive me, Doctor Sukiyaki! I know it is you! Your feeble attempts at trickery do not fool me for a minute! I see through your pitiful disguise in an instant! You're mad, aren't you? That's why my arch enemy Doctor Sukiyaki always said to me... you are Doctor Sukiyaki!!! I am Doctor Sukiyaki?Please stop saying Doctor Sukiyaki. So! You admit that you are Doctor Sukiyaki, my old nemesis! Surely now you will meet your doom at last! I will not meet my doom... and don't call me Shirley. Thank you. You dishonour the sacred jokes of our ancestors! For that you will pay! Cash or charge? Cash. And let that be a lesson to you! You certainly showed me! Go about your business, and trouble me no more!The conversation does not end here, however.       Hai Karate was a cheap brand of aftershave from the 60s. Here's an actual trailer for it. This game's jokes are... not exactly fresh. What's wrong with it? What's wrong with it? It's a fire hazard, that's what! You have insulted the aftershave of my forefathers! You have no honour! I shall fight you! The Ninja Baker is invincible, so this is just, I don't know, punishment for picking that dialogue option? We'll be coming back to the bakery eventually, but for now we're done here. Kind of weird how this game has two weird bakers in it, actually.  Here's the Ninja Baker's stats, for the curious.  This is the next location further up along the street. We can either continue to the palace, or go in that little store on the left there. The one with the green sign above the window.   For being a general shop, this place is actually pretty dull. There's almost nothing interesting to interact with in here.  Yes! I have come here to shop! ... and you can't even buy anything useful. In fact, you can't even buy the empty action figure box. Ah sorry, too late! The Gorgon bought the last action figure a few days ago - this is a non-functioning display item and not for sale. The shop is entirely useless, so the place we actually want to go is here, up the street. Those are some tough-looking guards over there, wearing traditional orc armor.  As you can see, they are invincible. We can exit to the right from here, so we will.  ... except the guards won't let you. Naturally, they have the same voice actor who voices the Ninja Baker and the elf guards.  What thing? That ugly face of yours. Only kidding. That weapon. You can't enter the Palace with a weapon. In that case, will you take care of the weapon for me? I sure will! Very good. Now stand with your legs spread. After a quick body search, we're free to enter the palace, sans armaments. They get removed from our inventory after this conversation, but we'll get them back once we're done in there.  Such an inspiring courtyard. There is only one thing we can look at here: the middle tree in the closest row of trees, there. The game calls it "The Tree". It's a tree.I can only assume this is a very oblique reference to the White Tree of Minas Tirith. Anyway, the whole reason we're here is to see a very special person, although I don't expect it to be at all clear to anyone just why yet: the High Steward of Minar Tragedy. He's right inside the palace doors there.  Yep, those doors. This is particularly odd filler location. Let's go inside. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaWgY6uzy18  [Voiceover] You join me outside the splendid palace of Minar Tragedy, where another unarmed adventurer has mistakenly wandered into an audience with the High Steward. This is Rex Montana, returning you to your regular scheduled viewing.  This cutscene is really short, and weird, and the only reason I made a video of it is to point out that the voiceover sounds remarkably like that in The Town With No Name. I can only assume that's Fergus MacNeill himself, though I'm not 100% on that. So, all that happened when we walked in there was that cutscene, and we lost a little bit of health. If we go in again, the same thing will keep happening until Thidney dies. I'm going to end this update here, but we'll continue very shortly, hopefully tomorrow or possibly later this week. We should only need one more update to wrap up the Good, Old-Fashioned, Traditional Quest. We've actually seen every relevant location except for three, one of which is a filler location. I'm really curious about whether anything we've done so far makes any sense, and if anyone who hasn't played this game can predict where the hell this is going - if so, I'd love to hear about it. Hyper Crab Tank fucked around with this message at 00:55 on Dec 21, 2015 |
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Dec 21, 2015 00:51
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Uh... give the palantir to the dragon so that the Dark Lord zaps it to death?
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Dec 21, 2015 03:07
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Hyper Crab Tank posted:
nope and nope but im still having a great time!
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Dec 21, 2015 06:25
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