[Let's Play] Fun in Mystara! Let's play Order of the Griffon Part 11: Opening a Locked Door and Stuff

This update is 6 pages.  If I had done this all as one update it would have been ridiculously huge.  This is why I am glad I broke it up. And it means we get out updates faster.

[Let's Play] Fun in Mystara! Let's play Order of the Griffon Part 10: We Belong to the Undercity, We Belong to the Something Something

This update was taking so long and got so massive I had to find a spot to end it otherwise this one might not have gotten out till Thursday if not next week sometime.

And a potential improvement on picture size.  Its a touch bigger but not too much.  Might be perfect and save me about 15 minutes an update.  Let me know what y'all think.

Now its time to get my Splatterhouse on and hopefully I can pop out another update Thursday night/Friday morning.   If not next week.  I'd like to get to the next dungeon myself.

More Let's Play is Coming.

But this newest update is friggin HUGE so its taking some time.  Plus I am sort of looking over new goodies and distractions:

The PS3 game "Splatterhouse" is taking up a bit of my time.  Its a 3d brawler with Quick Time Events (Think Dragon's Lair/Space Ace type PRESS X AND LEFT NOW sort of gameplay) for boss/"Splatter Kills", and 2d with 3d graphics gameplay sections.  2 College students go to the mansion of Professor West who has nefarious things in mind, capturing Jennifer, and leaving her boyfriend Rick to die.  Yet an ancient mask makes a deal to save Rick.  All he has to do is put the Terror Mask on and power will be his..)

And considering this is his girlfriend I can completely understand our hero Rick willing to put his very soul on the line to save her, even if the Terror Mask takes great glee in reading his mind and egging his dark side to take control, killing and slaughtering monsters in massively horrific and bloody ways..

While playing the game in story and survival modes you find picture fragments, many of which I am unable to show on my blog as they are very R rated.  This one even comes close to being too risque.  I had to play one Survival mode arena like 3-4 times to get all the fragments for this one.  But when you complete it, you get more information on Rick & Jennifer's relationship so its possibly the first time in my 3 decades of videogame playing where I am actively trying to unlock everything even fanservice pictures.  Just so I can know more about them.

You also unlock journal entries of the Bad Doctor, excellently voiced over in case you can't read the cursive script.  It even makes him a bit of a sympathetic villain, describing what turned him into the vile killer that he is.

You also unlock 3 of the 4 previous Splatterhouse games!  The arcade original which had a port on the Turbografx and one of my favorite videogames of all time and the reason I bought this disk, and the 2 Genesis sequels.  (This game is basically a remake of the first, but far more graphic.)

The emulation seems pretty good.  If its got a filter on the graphics I can't seriously tell.  I think it does but its done in a way to not be blatant.  It doesn't look like the games have Vaseline smeared all over the screen.  Its not widescreen so there are black bars to the left and right sides.  But the picture takes up most of the screen so you shouldn't notice it.  This is from Splatterhouse 3 which turned the side scrolling platform gameplay of 1 and 2 into a TIMED Double Dragon/Final Fight/TMNT styled brawler with multiple cutscenes and endings based on your performance.

And the 30-45 minutes or so Survival mode in action.  20 waves of enemy monsters, a picture to collect in each of the 6 arenas you unlock through the story mode, and even a ranking for completing it.  The purple bar is your life, the red your blood meter which charges as you kill things.  It can be used to cause super kills, regenerate life, or go into a powered up super mode which even kills lower level bosses fast and without the need for the Quick Time Event kills you normally need to do.  At least when the game doesn't bug out.  Which it does from time to time sadly.  Not often but now and then.  Not too bad in story mode which saves you at checkpoints every 5-10 minutes or so, but when you play in Survival for 40 minutes having it bug out REALLY SUCKS.   Yes I am a sad dork for wanting all the pictures but.. I need to hear everything about Rick & Jen's relationship.  Its just.. half of them are R rated ones.  Though my favorite is one with her fully dressed hugging a stuffed mascot dog.  Rick is such a dork.   A dork with a Mastodon Tee shirt.  (The game has music by them and Five Finger Death Punch among other modern metal bands.  The kinds some of the local 40K crowd listen to.  Who say nothing is music unless it has "Breakdowns" whatever the hell that means...)

In story mode once you complete the first level and if you survive a Survival mode arena you can use your score to buy improved powers for Rick.  More life, new combos and attack moves, extended weapons use, ect.  In story after level 1 you can hit Select and upgrade at any time, your points constantly upgrading.  Sadly Survival only gives you points or allows upgrading AFTER finishing the arena.  You probably won't be getting far in any of the arenas without Health, Mask, and Weapons charged way up.  Roughly around the 3-5th story mode level.  A nice thing though is your points accrue in story even when you die so it does help make things easier.  Which is good because I died a LOT on Level 1 till I understood the mechanics and the game introduced me to how to regenerate health.

And my birthday gift to myself.  From 3 different hopefully not radioactive (donate to disaster relief charities of your choices folks.  Between the stuff going on in Japan, New Zealand & Australia, Mass, and the midwest there are a LOT of communities that could use a helping hand!) places in Japan I got a model kit of Phantasy Star Online's  favorite maid/tutorialbot (what is it with Japan and maids anyhow?  I guess it beats a schoolgirl outfit at least..) Elenor since I am a total whore for anything Phantasy Star.

And 2 TurboDuo/Pc Engine CDROM games.  The 4th or 5th remake of Valis, and the PC Engine version of Valis 4.  Both of which are apparently the best versions of these platforming action games where you take a Japanese schoolgirl and kill demons in a fantasy land.  I chose the third game (Valis 3 DUH), and Star Control as my birthday game choices when I was 16 waaaay back in the early 90s and it just seemed appropriate to finish up the series collection.  Though I do need the superdeformed remake of part 2.  (There is also a Japan only cellphone game and thus unobtainable.  And sadly a computer game that does what Japan normally does with high school girls and demons in it.  Turbografx and Valis fans don't like talking about it.  Thankfully it went away quickly as such disgusting garbage should.   Way to go Japan.  Sicko stuff is why their entertainment industries are taking a pounding on the world stage.  Make stuff for creepy perverts and normal people run away screaming.)

Whenever I finish my Order of the Griffon Let's Play I might cover either the model kit or the Valis series as my next project.  

You know, provided I quit playing the "Good" but flawed Splatterhouse.   If you can find this game for 20 its worth it, though the bugs and minor gameplay irritations might be a factor.  But I loved the original on the Turbografx and enjoyed to varying levels the 2 Genesis sequels so I have some nostalgia for the property.  Mainstream sites were REALLY hard on it, but fans seemed to enjoy it. 

I'm easily distracted AND work has me busier this last year than I have been in close to a decade.  But the next LP installment is already 8 pages long and only about 2/3rds done.  So work is progressing.

[let's Play] Fun in Mystara! Let's play Order of the Griffon Part 9: Well We Found the Dungeon Part of this D&D Game..

This update took forever.  Mapping, playing the level, inking the map, then doing up 11 PAGES of information.  

And that means my promised update a week schedule is still being held to.  Heck, first weekday no less. My schedule is kind of tight.  But I have made time, especially since I want to PLAY these sorts of games and not just write about them.  But its fun to do and it keeps me focused on completing the bugger.  Possibly an update towards the end of the week but no promises.

My AD&D 2nd Edition Character, Let Me Show You Her

Thanks to Meetup.com I happened to stumble upon a 2nd edition AD&D group being formed.  We had a nice meet and greet today and it seems as if we and our schedules should mesh rather well.

(I would link the group but I doubt most of my readers are even in the same state.  Hell, many of you aren't even in the same COUNTRY.)

While I tend to prefer GMing, I am certainly not unwilling to play.  Sometimes its fun just to be a player.  No fuss, no muss, no real prep work, just make a PC, pay attention, don't be a dunderhead.

We did some character generation and my rolls were pretty dire, and even 2 rerolls just made for a meh Bard, which was going to be my first choice.  (A Male Human)

But.. we were allowed access to the Complete Book series, and the reduce an attribute by 2 to raise another by 1 deal.  So why not bring my 4th ed Essentials character back in a 2nd edition form?  A Deep Gnome Thief?

This can be workable.

So here is my newest PC, hopefully who will go on to have lots of fun in a good RPG campaign full of adventure, cool loot, and tons of exp as she shoots sharp pointy things through soft evil squishy things that scream and bleed.

Feel free to use her as an NPC for your own games, or as inspiration for a character.

And here she is, Sneakycheeks!  (Big pictures so the text is totally legible. I can read it in smaller sizes but I apparently have good close in eyesight or something.  Character picture taken in Neverwinter Nights 2 thanks to Windows Snipping Tool.)

                          (Character Sheet thanks to AD&D Core Rules CDROM 2.0.  May it never be scuffed.)

Background:  Sneakycheeks (real name unknown) is mostly in it for the fun.  Of course having grown up in the Underdark her idea of fun is killing monsters, and putting a kibosh on any evil plans any sapient race may have, especially the Drow.  At an early age she took to sneaking out of town, finding things to hide behind, and putting arrows through things that couldn't see her, then enjoying the chaos it caused.  This did put her in hot water with her family and the settlement she lived in as Deep Gnome females are rarely encouraged to leave the safety of a town, much less engage Drow and the various other nefarious denizens of the Underdark alone.

(Not that this ever stopped her any of course.  To her it was even more amusing to see the disruption her actions caused at home too, especially when she probably saved the settlement a quarter dozen times or more.)

One day her uncle Jhasti Dhaggerdhiggin (Deep Gnome L 9 Illusionist) was visiting the town with a band of adventurers looking for parts for his Spelljammer, a small Drow craft with the shape of a Spider.  When the group had collected what they came to the Underdark for they headed back upworld, not knowing Sneekycheeks (who obviously had earned her nickname by this point) was following close behind.

Upon reaching the surface, a days long trek, the group had no choice but to let her tag along on their planetary and dimension hopping adventures to stop the actions of Galthik the Aurak.  Being the flighty, easily distracted type she is, on whichever world the Nentir Vale resides on, she hopped off when the ship had landed for supplies and got involved in that world's Keep on the Borderlands Incident where her mostly self taught skills of archery and thievery helped save the Keep.

(Some would say she got involved as much to help people as she did to embarrass and harass the Knight Rufus Landale.  According to her, their differences aren't anything some Oil of Slipperiness can't solve.  Unsurprisingly Rufus got himself overly injured in the Borderlands Incident and wasn't around most of the time.   He is currently travelling with Axecrash the Dwarf Machinist, and the Hasegawa Sisters Ryoko (Samurai), and Haruhi (Shugenja), much glad Sneakycheeks has gone elsewhere.)

In the final battle of the Borderlands Incident a powerful otherplanar machine attempted to finish off Sneakycheeks and her friends (Elven Cleric, Human Cleric, Half Orc Barbarian, Human Wizard) but was destroyed.  Being the stuff of another reality, infused with the powers of the Outer Planes it exploded, sending Sneakycheeks into another planet at a different time.  She found her abilities and equipment had been altered by this flux in reality.

Now its a new world with new people to meet, new bad guys to irritate, and more trouble to cause.

And causing trouble is what Sneakycheeks likes best!

Roleplaying Notes:  Sneakycheeks is a troublemaker, albeit a well intentioned one.  Her jokes on fellow adventurers are mostly harmless, though usually with some intelligent intent behind them.  ("Uhh barbarian?  Could you take a bath sometimes?  I think the Owlbears on the next continent can smell you.")  Against evil and selfish foes she takes no prisoners and shows no concept of honorable combat, choosing to hide and shoot from out of sight.  She has no problem running from a losing fight, or leaving behind anyone too stupid to know when to fall back.  To save a burning orphanage full of small children?  Fight till you can't.  When outnumbered 2 to 1 and there is a nice line of retreat?  MARINES WE ARE LEAVING.

To her, its better to run away and fight again some other time, hopefully with a large army and having set up a massive ambush.

She is fair minded when it comes to things like treasure, magic items, and returning things to their rightful owners, provided the owners earned it through honest work and not murder, slavery, or corruption/greed.

To her its more fun causing irritation and discord in intelligent evil as opposed to outright destruction.  Having lived in the Underdark for much of her life, she knows full well most evil will destroy itself.

Sometimes it just needs a shot in the ass to get things started.

Quotes:  "If they catch you they will kill you, but first, they gotta catch you.  So let's not get caught.  That would suck."
"Fair fights are for suckers."
"The only good Drow are the ones killing each other.  Which is every Drow.  Waitaminute.. I need to rethink this one.."
"But I don't WANT to form a battle line.  They can see me.  And that means they can hit me.  I'm allergic to death.  And too cute for it!"
"These monsters?  Oh my Uncle Jhasti has fought em.  He calls them Godscursed mother$*&*ing oozing sores on an Owlbear's (*& after its just been *(&^$ed in the *(&$&# by a Terrasque with Herpes.  Its funny shooting them in the head.  They get so bent out of shape!"

[Let's Play] Fun in Mystara! Let's play Order of the Griffon Part 8: I Was Promised Sailors and all I get is Manbearpig

This is my last attempt at improving picture size for both clarity and ease of reading.  If this isn't good enough its all giant pictures from here on out.

Not just one update this week but TWO, and improved quality on all the previous installments.  That's love right there.

My Thoughts on Modern Television in Comic Caption Form

There is a place that is running a fun little contest to take a picture and caption it.
This has lead to my piece, a simple commentary on so called "Mature Content" entertainment.

When most adult programming is just crude, vulgar, offensive, and generally something only a boobs and gore obsessed 13 year old boy would love, is it any wonder why I mostly play videogames and tabletop games, & watch cartoons?