Session 15

Ok. So the last few sessions've been REALLY yappy. I feel like I've been talking to people for ages without getting a juicy quest. Don't get me wrong - I love the exploration and chatting, but I'm ready to go get stuck in!

To this end I immediately tell Mellthas to take me to the dungeon! The screen fades down to black, then back up again with me stood outside a door in some kind of public library.

I guess that the druids didn't chose where the demon layer would connect with the rest of their HQ - but still, it's been 400 years! They could've bricked it up, moved the library, put a little ante chamber on it. For goodness sake, they could've even put a sign up saying "careful - demons". As it is, the entrance to the crypts of the fire worshippers is just a door off the reading area... :S

Anyway, I'm sticking to plan - just head down, get into this cave! No dawdling thinking about the incredible laxness of concern the druids have for the safety of their students. I'm ready to go! Ready to quest!

Straight through the door, and down the flight of steps into:

BASEMENT 1

This is going to be so awesome. The first room is some kind of starter chamber, I ignore it and bust into the next area. There's a load of spikes and a pressure plate! This is going to be so cool.

Via the magic of an isometric viewpoint (weirdly this dungeon isn't first-person like the other ones I've visited...) I can see a load of warniaks in the next area. I don't care I can take them on. There does seem to be quite a few of them... But whatever - if these are the demons the druids are scared of then this should be a breeze in the park! Although actually, I've not got a lot of health going on in my team... But I'm going to barge into this and to hell with the consequences... Barge right on in... Any moment now I'm going to get barging... just getting my strength up for the barge... any second now...

The team head back out of the dungeon and back through the library, up a flight of stairs and round the top floor of the Druid's layer until they find a healer.

"Are! You lot are looking for Bero! I shall heal you up for free in gratitude for your kindness"

"Thankyou! But we've no time to chat you understand! We're DEFINITELY just going to just careen headlong into the this adventure like the dungeon-crazed kill-addicts we are"

"How many health points would you like me to restore?" (weirdly the game really does ask you how many HP you want back when you go for healing!!!)

"Hmmm... well I know it's free... but would it be rude to ask for all of them?"

"Oooh no, I mean, you're only 4 away from max strength anyway. You may as well have the whole lot"

"Well I just wanted to be SURE I was prepared before I charged headlong into whatever danger might await me, not giving a second thought to the consequences..."

"And I'll cure you of poison while I'm at it."

"Right. We're off! We're not even stopping to pick up any useful looking potions. Unless they're blue ones like that. Or this green one. But we're definatly not going to trawl the area for more..."

"...except this one in the work room..."

"...and this one in someone's office..."

"...and this one in this other room..."

Ok. So back down through the library, and down again into the dungeon.

Weird how the druids are allowed to build their base underground. I know they weren't mining for ore, but they HAVE got quite an extensive catacomby HQ. And the walls are all made of carved bricks that must've been dug up. I wonder why the goddess doesn't mind this, but will aparently throw an eppy over digging for iron...

The first room (that I rashly ignored earlier) has a bucket and a basin of water in it. Tom picks up the bucket and fills it with water on the basis that if it's lying around it's very likely going to be important. On the same basis he picks up a spoon that's just on the floor.

The next room is a fairly straight forward pressure-plate pressing puzzle. And amazingly there's a flame that's blocking the way which you can only put out with a bucket of water! Easy! There's a second bucket which I pick up, then I head back and fill them both with water. Again, this turns out to be prescient because round the next bend is a load more fire that needs putting out! Still no use for the spoon yet...

I pop back and fill the buckets with more water because you never know how often you'll need them. I tried to fill a cup with water too (a blue cup I've been carrying around since I was on the toronto at the start because it reminds me of AGS - which has a blue cup for its logo... or at least it used to back in the days when I used it at uni. But I don't know if it does still... just googled... turns out it does http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/ )

Turns out that cups don't work on this planet. Or maybe earth cups don't work with Albion water...

Anyway, off into the dungeon we go. There's a few fights with Warniaks but nothing I can't cope with.

In one corner I find an obvious secret panel, but there's no sign of a way to open it... Until I round a corner and play "Guess the order of three pressure plates". This is an incredibly easy game and after only 2 tries (what do you mean "luck" - it was total skill!) I'm rewarded with a message saying "You hear stone moving back to the west".

Sweet - a secret(ish) chamber! But oh no! More Warniaks! And tough ones too!

At this point I notice Mellthas's rather aloof combat position. While everyone else is huddled over in one corner of the combat grid, he's stood alone and miles off to the side. Not exactly helpful.

Thankfully, he can do magic (weirdly without a Trii - I shall have to talk to him about that some time). Fireball sounds like a good spell. Although "Boasting" sounds rubbish! Aloof AND up himself! It's probaby just aswell this guy's mute...

Although, come to think of it, if he's mute - what's he going to do to boast? Write "I'm well good at magic I am." on a bit of card and show it to the warniaks? What'll they care? People pay good money for their orbs - how many druids can say that?

Hofsteadt is munched on by a monster at this point, but it's actually not so bad since Mellthas saves the day with is awesome fire-magic! Turns out that the fire-ball he conjours is EXACTLY one of the bubbles from the opening cut-scene! Only without a spooky face or tank or flower in it... It's all coming together! Tom's dream WAS prophetic somehow... We just need to find the glowing yellow gingerbread man with the knives baked into it and we're BOUND to unravel the mysteries of this planet!

In the chamber I find some weapons, a nice silver necklace (that I give Hofstedt because it at least covers up a little part of him... Although now that he's been naked for a while, I'm sort of liking how it's becoming part of his character... He's not just a bumbling scientist, he's a bumbling naked scientist). Even more excitingly I find potions! Sweet sweet potions!

I'll list them since they're pretty cool! I found:

Cures for poison

Cures for sickness

Cures for insanity

Cures for red

Cures for violet

Cures for blue.

A friend of mine in real life gave me a pamphlet about herbal tea the other day which listed all the things you might like to make an infusion of against the thing that it helps to cure. There was some surprising stuff in there - cures for indecision, cures for self love (why would you want to cure this?) cures for "Unendurable desolation" (apparently you just need to brew up some sweet chestnut - if only someone'd told Queen Victoria). But being able to cure red? Now THAT's medicine!

I pack all the stuff away and take a rest before carrying on. That'll bring Hofstedt back and re-fuel my magic users' mana.

ONLY IT DOES MORE THAN THAT!!!!!!

As my characters bed down amongst the spike traps and secret doors (couldn't they be bothered to walk back up to the safety of the inhabited parts of the druid base?) Millthas decides this is the right time to study the Iskai in the gang.

Turns out he's not just mute, he's also deaf and the cat people's unusual mouths make for an interesting challenge for him. Curious about their odd faces, he reaches out to poke Sira in the Trii.

This is shown as a full screen still image of Mellthas (looking a lot like Jesus) poking Sira (naked cat woman with a freaky face and one nipple on display) in the face (it looks like he's just poking her in the eye).

This was such a striking image I did a screen grab immediately and now have it as my desktop backdrop. It's just such a mad picture!

With this picture on screen, Mellthas and Sira discover they can communicate psychically - and what happens, I can only describe as incomprehensible!

Through a sequence of psychedelic/poetic psychic exchanges the two characters seem like they're falling in love. At first it all seems like it's quite moving (sort of). There's lots of LITERALLY nonsensical yammering about the amazing sensation and flood of emotions for which there's no words. Mellthas (I think) talks about how he's actually a poet and how this experience is more than he's ever been able to convey.

Then it sounds like it goes a bit sour - he says something like "I'm drowning in your amazing thoughts!" and then she doesn't like it and he's all "ooh, bad imagery?"

uh-oh, she's poetry super sensative? Or maybe it's the talk of drowning... Which is a good way of murdering someone... And she's a murderess (probably)...

"It's just that we're flowing together... like a beautiful river!"

"If we're a river..." says Sira (probably building up for some scathing remark)... "We need to find a bed huuuuurroww!"

She actually does say "huuuuurroww" - she wasn't feeling guilty because of having probably killed her dad, she's just going totally randy for the face-poking male of a DIFFERENT SPECIES.

The game doesn't say they did it right there and then on the damp floor of the abandoned demon-riddled dungeon while the rest of the gang try awkwardly to not notice and find a way to look away at something else but not wander away from the nice warm campfire into the jaws of waiting monsters... But I think it's pretty heavily implied. Certainly I'm lead to understand that after this sexpiphany, Sira and Mellthas are now in love.

I know that Iskai grow up quicker and live shorter than humans - but Sira is listed as being 12 while Mellthas is clearly old enough to have quite a thick bushy beard. Ok, so she's an adult for her species... but still... when you're using that as a justification for the age difference between you and your partner, you've SURELY got to stop and really think about your standards...

Anyway, in the morning we set off back out into the dungeon. Kill a few more warniaks, find the arm off a lever, still no use for this spoon though.

Then we come to a large 3x3 grid of pressure plates on the floor. Clearly another game of guess the pattern - but since there's so many more than before it's hard to believe that you'll have to trial-and-error the answer... I wander around on them for ages but nothing happens - except that I'm nobbled by another set of monsters who're presumably attracted by the incessant clunking of floor panels in a tomb exclusively inhabited by flying monsters.

In this fight Dirr panics. I dunno what spooked her so much, but since she's my star fighter it's quite inconvenient for her to be running around like a headless chicken! It's not SO bad, I still win the fight, but in doing so I discover a neat mechanic in the game!

Turns out that if your magic users run out of mana they CAN still cast spells, it just costs them health instead of MP. That's GENIOUS! I love it! It means that your magic users aren't quite completly useless even if their ammo's spent! They just have to risk their lives to help you! I don't know why you don't see this in all sorts of RPGs! It's a really neat mechanic and adds a little bit of tactical choice to the otherwise quite straightforward fights - Do I cast fire-ball again and hope that it kills the warniak outright, knowing that if it doesn't quite manage it Mellthas will be left alone in a room with half a hitpoint and an angry flapping monster...?

After the fight I use potions to heal up my characters. Don't think I can stomach another love scene. Than I notice that there's a seemingly pointless cluster of flame traps in a + shape just to the north.

Brilliantly I deduce that this means I must press the pressure plates in the same pattern and Huzzah! I'm right! A row of spikes descends and I'm able to nip into the next room.

From here I use the old bit of lever to open a second secret chamber (this time stocked with lovely jewels!) and then a door through to a stair case down! Down to:

BASEMENT 2!!!

oooh - first person mode! I love the way this game is able to have the dungeon experiences from both Ultima 7 AND Eye of the Beholder by simply arbitrarily switching between perspectives. And it's cool how the differently viewed sections of the game come with very different gameplay. In isometric areas it's all about puzzles and using your brain - where as in the first person sections it's much more just about exploring a space, keeping your path lit and navigating...

Ok, I'm not going to get bogged down over-analysing! I'm meant to be throwing myself into this quest! Charge!!!

Oh, hang on, the way is blocked by grilles. Bah.

No fear though! I find a small button in one of the walls! On pressing it a text box appears saying "The wall glides downwards into the ground".

Only in real life it just switches off without so much as a "poof" effect.

"What an effective mechanism" says Hofstedt (these are his ACTUAL words) as though to highlight the absurdity of the game trying to make out like the wall could move downwards so fast that the re-fresh rate of my PC didn't even have a chance to register it.

Down the corridor this reveals I find some warniaks (easily dispatched) and a pile of trash (containing a second silver necklace that I give to Tom, so that he doesn't feel jealous of Hofstedt).

There's also a lever to open the gates to let me progress. Nice!

Along a little further is a large room with huge flames skittering around in the darkness. There's an array of pressure plates here too, obviously some kind of puzzle...

But actually I'm more interested in just exploring at the moment. I can come back and solve these plates when I've found what they're going to open for me. Tom and the gang just saunter through the room and down a large corridor on the other side.

There's seemingly nothing that those plates would activate... the way forwards is totally clear - weird. Maybe they open a secret panel back in that room... I must remember to go back and look for it at some point...

Round the bend I come to a fountain at a crossroads of the passages. It's clearly significant - I fill a bucket from it just to see if I can (and since I can, I'm BOUND to need to...).

I pick the right hand branch to explore first and find myself in a fairly small chamber.

Nothing to see at first, but as I move around in it I find tables and chairs - over-grown with moss and mildew.

Slightly hauntingly, these are a reminder that this isn't just some arbitrary dungeon. It's not meant to be a crypt, designed to keep grave robbers out or hide a monster's treasure trove. These corridors were once living quarters for Druids that were later barricaded up and re-appropriated for a dreadful under-ground conflict!

I imagine the horrible claustrophobia of druids of different religious faiths battling in these tunnels - turning dining rooms into barracks or make-shift field hospitals. The fire worshippers, trapped in these lower areas - the other druids standing between them and the sunlit world above ground! No wonder they would turn to summoning demons - no wonder they were driven to rig the whole place with booby traps to protect themselves! These tables and chairs - made of stone, so they were probably too heavy to move out of the way when the fighting started - are an artefact of what this place used to be before some kind of horrific conflict swept through these tunnels. I imagine the sequence in Watership Down where all the rabbits are getting killed in their tunnels - only with human beings instead of rabbits. Human beings who can throw fire-balls...

I reverently walk out of the room and am immediatly set upon by a HUGE number of warniaks! Dirr tries to take as much health off the tougher ones as she can - but is overwhelmed pretty quickly! Hofstedt curses this stupid rushing-ahead-to-get-to-the-excitement policy and is promptly killed! Mellthas and his new girlfriend manage to subdue a few of the weaker beasties with their mystical take-downs, but it's not long before their out of juice!

Tom rummages frantically for something to help him in his rucksack and pulls out a red sword he's been carrying around for ages.

With no idea what it does, he just closes his eyes and hopes for the best! If it doesn't come up with the goods they're all dead now - so there's no use panicking!

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!!!

What the EFF!!???

HEAPS! HEAPS AND HEAPS of fireballs drop out of the sky! The floor catches fire and all the warniaks are killed outright!!!

What the effing eff???!?!! Mellthas and Sira stand agape at the carnage! Talk about over-kill!

"Did you know it did that?" I imagine Mellthas scribbles on his note pad.

Tom's too gob-smacked to respond though. All this time he's had some kind of devastating uber-wand on him and he never knew...

"I think..." I imagine Sira piping up as she surveys the unconscious bodies of Dirr and Hofsteadt, and ponders the depth the team has just blithely wandered into an allegedly demon infested under-world "...that maybe it's time to run away. Any objections?"