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 What is this? Chronomaster is a point 'n' click adventure game that was released in 1995 by DreamForge Intertainment. The plot was written by Roger Zelazny, an award-winning novelist of many works, which turned out to be his last project as he died before the game was completed. In the world of Chronomaster, specialists have created a business in creating pocket universes for their own or other people's design. Someone has found a way to hack into these universes and putting them into temporal status. We take on the role of Rene Korda (Voiced by Ron Perlman), who was once a designer of these universes but has since retired. The retirement doesn't seem to last long as we are soon called up and hired to find out who is responsible for hacking into these universes. This is a standard point 'n' click in most aspects, we also have a fancy ship with some neat functions. This is also another game from my youth that I remember fondly, even though I never completed it as I died a lot and ended up losing patience each time I tried to so. Did I also mention that Brent Spiner plays a character in this game too? LP details This is going to be a VLP and I will be recording commentary as I record. The first videos commentary is a little sketchy as I'm suffering from a cold and its affecting my vocal cords, my time over the next couple of weeks is going to be severely limited and this was the only window that I had to start the LP. As it stands right now, I'm aiming to upload one video a week. If you need to talk about anything not seen in the videos, please use the spoiler tags. I may record some additional footage of the death scenes as and when I find them too. Let's Play: Chronomaster             Bonus Videos (Additional Scenes & Dialogue - Urbs) (Additional Scenes & Dialogue - Aurans) (Additional Scenes & Dialogue - Fortuna) (Additional Scenes & Dialogue - Cabal) (Additional Scenes & Dialogue - Verdry) (Additional Scenes & Dialogue - Dyce) Rocket Baby Dolls fucked around with this message at 16:32 on Dec 13, 2020 |
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Oct 8, 2020 22:11
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This is one game I have honestly never heard of. It hardly seems real, like an amalgamisation of every 90's pre-rendered introduction put end to end.
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Oct 8, 2020 22:29
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Let's talk about that opening cut scene for a moment. Why is grandma wearing an Eartha Kitt style body suit with a chain-mail halter and green gardening gloves, and toting around a pistol in her Samsonite luggage?
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Oct 9, 2020 00:15
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EricFate posted:Let's talk about that opening cut scene for a moment. Why is grandma wearing an Eartha Kitt style body suit with a chain-mail halter and green gardening gloves, and toting around a pistol in her Samsonite luggage? It's the future.
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Oct 10, 2020 00:12
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Powerful Journeyman Project vibes from this. Though... Capstone? Goddamn, that's not a dev I expected to see any games from getting LP'd, I thought they mostly did incredibly bad FPS games.
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Oct 11, 2020 08:48
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Zelazny is my favorite author (outside maybe Pratchett) so I'm excited to see this!
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Oct 11, 2020 22:06
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I thought that I had the sound levels at a good rate but I wasn't counting on the cold to dull my speech so much. I need to make some volume adjustments for the next recording any way as there are parts which overshadow everything else going on. I intend to have another video up next weekend, I'll be making preparations in a few days time.Tombot posted:This is one game I have honestly never heard of. It hardly seems real, like an amalgamisation of every 90's pre-rendered introduction put end to end. EricFate posted:Let's talk about that opening cut scene for a moment. Why is grandma wearing an Eartha Kitt style body suit with a chain-mail halter and green gardening gloves, and toting around a pistol in her Samsonite luggage? The Lone Badger posted:It's the future. If anyone can make sense of that introduction I'd be very grateful. It's quite an anomaly to have a point 'n' click in this style, especially with the old pixel style being very prevalent at the time. These kind of graphics were more common with 1st person adventure games. I've done the Journeyman Project games, The Space Bar is high on the list for a future LP at some point even though I have no idea right now of how I'm going to complete it. PurpleXVI posted:Powerful Journeyman Project vibes from this. They only published the game, they didn't have any hand in the development. It was the penultimate game that they lent their name too before they went bankrupt. Weirdly enough, their website is still active and it looks like it hasn't been touched since the company went under: http://corridor7.tripod.com/INTSITE/index.htm I think someone really needs to tackle an LP of William Shatner's TekWar at some point, I still have the CD-Rom lying around somewhere. Jen X posted:Zelazny is my favorite author (outside maybe Pratchett) so I'm excited to see this! I grew up reading a lot of sci-fi and fantasy, Zelazny was always available to me but I was too engrossed in Heinlein, Harrison, Pratchett, Eddings and Gemmell. I'm working my way through the Sherlock Holmes collection and will probably finish off reading through the rest of the Witcher series, but I will definitely consider his works in the future.
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Oct 11, 2020 23:15
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I've read some of the Amber books at some point, they were decent. Oh man I kind of remember the TekWar game being some atrocious trash like the books were, there was a show even starring Shatner as some kind of mentor or something too.
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Oct 12, 2020 04:41
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Rocket Baby Dolls posted:They only published the game, they didn't have any hand in the development. It was the penultimate game that they lent their name too before they went bankrupt. Weirdly enough, their website is still active and it looks like it hasn't been touched since the company went under: http://corridor7.tripod.com/INTSITE/index.htm I saw Civvie11's video on TekWar and I don't think I'd wish an LP of that on anyone except maybe as a Toxx clause for some sort of irreparably broken idiot haunting the LP subforum.
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Oct 12, 2020 09:15
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This video is the second part of Urbs. I've started to cut out traversing to various locations in this video as there Is no fast travel system once you're on the ground, some areas aren't so bad but there are a couple of times where we need to make a fairly long trek with nothing in between. There are different ways to approach some puzzles in this game, there are also some slight variances with the dialogue in some places which can range from helpful to generic. The more helpful ones can give you a hint into taking actions that cuts out some problem-solving time, in this case, they popped up during a practise run and not during any recording time. There are also consequences for your dialogue choices in this game, but they're mostly someone reacting kindly to you, or negatively, or killing you. I'll start recording additional scenes and dialogue soon to show off the differences in speech and actions.
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Oct 17, 2020 08:24
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I've played adventure games before that just throw you in and tell you to get clicking but this is on a whole new level of that for me. It took me the whole first episode just to realize that these are already the pocket universes. I guess there's probably some stuff in that encyclopedia but these are a lot of concepts coming fast and loose.
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Oct 21, 2020 07:42
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Kibayasu posted:I've played adventure games before that just throw you in and tell you to get clicking but this is on a whole new level of that for me. It took me the whole first episode just to realize that these are already the pocket universes. I guess there's probably some stuff in that encyclopedia but these are a lot of concepts coming fast and loose. This game can be very unhelpful and unforgiving. It doesn't help that some of the more helpful comments are sometimes, and usually, obscured by generic comments. The test play through of the fort area provided some helpful commentary from Korda in how to approach a couple of the puzzles there. During the first attempted play through I cut it short as I wasn't getting the same responses as i originally had, it was just giving me either something generic or off-hand. I also experienced the same thing in the museum too when interacting with each of the displays. You can click on the same thing ten times and get something generic or off-hand each time, or you can get something helpful on the first try or the eleventh. With the test recording, Korda mentioned that he could take the armour and afterwards remarked that it was lucky that it fitted him. After inspecting the missile loader he hinted about using bottled time on it and gave a more helpful response when examining the launcher. But this game does throw you into it without much help apart from some of the mechanics. I'm returning home from Scotland after taking my daughter home, I'll have more free time to devote to recording footage. I'm going to try to capture some of the more helpful responses as well as alternative dialogues and scenes. I might start with taking screenshots of the current encyclopedia tonight and try to get them up within the next day or so. I'll add more screenshots as it fills up. This is a very unforgiving game though, there are numerous ways to die very easily. The autosave is there and within easy reach for a reason. I'm not sure if there are any ways to engage a fail state, I can just remember finding this game impossible to progress after certain points when I was younger.
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Oct 21, 2020 18:41
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Encyclopedia Entries (Part 1) There are a lot of entries to go through in the PDA, I will start off with a big selection of the entries that I believe that we have seen already. I will post more with each update, either relevant to the update or additional ones that are added to give more lore to the game world. Archives                   Personal Log      Personnel File      Inventory (Urbs)  Ship Specifications    
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Oct 21, 2020 21:49
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I don't mean to triple post but I would like to confirm that this game hates you and everything that you know and love about adventure games. I'm playing the next section of the game and the first puzzle in the new world is a complete bastard. Edit: After playing more, now I remember why I never got far in this game. Rocket Baby Dolls fucked around with this message at 22:41 on Oct 21, 2020 |
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Oct 21, 2020 22:18
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Welcome to Aurans, the place of a thousand and one quits. This is about the furthest that I got with the game originally as pretty much everything about this planet is absolute bullshit. Most of everything beyond this video is going to be new territory even for me. This recording went slightly more smoothly than I had anticipated, there's a couple of areas with cheap deaths that can trigger as there are no indications to danger zones. During the test playthrough, I was running in and out like a daredevil and nothing could touch me, during an attempted recording last night I was triggering everything in sight. I will be recording additional footage soon, I'm still adjusting to my schedule getting back to normal at the moment. The screenshots that I'm going to include in this update will relate to what you see in the video, they mostly centre around religious holidays and celebrations. The first puzzle in this game is terrible as there aren't any hints unless you have read through the PDA and linked up some of the entries with some of the objects that you have picked up for it.              
Rocket Baby Dolls fucked around with this message at 23:30 on Oct 24, 2020 |
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Oct 23, 2020 23:29
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I've unlisted the third video as I neglected to pick up on the choppiness of the recording. I had a small window to record and upload and didn't double check before uploading, which i should have as this game is a pain in the arse to record. I apologise for uploading the video in this state, I will try to re-record and upload the episode again later.
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Oct 24, 2020 18:19
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I guess "I've got sand in my boots" is what qualifies as a hint for the sandals here. Is there something that tells you about what the feather does?
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Oct 24, 2020 19:41
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Kibayasu posted:I guess "I've got sand in my boots" is what qualifies as a hint for the sandals here. I'll take a closer look when I record again later.
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Oct 24, 2020 19:50
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I've re-recorded this video as the last one had some audio drop-outs that I missed. It's rare that I don't check a video before uploading it and usually, when that happens there's an issue with it. The gameplay is in the same order, there are a couple of minor additions which don't require re-watching if you've had your fill already. Firstly: Kibayasu posted:I guess "I've got sand in my boots" is what qualifies as a hint for the sandals here. I examined the feather further in the video and there is no indication of what it does or whether there is anything special about it. You have to figure out that you need to use a feather on a lake all by yourself apparently. The second addition that I can think of is drinking the water in the area where you collect the fruit. It is drinkable and Korda enjoys it.
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Oct 24, 2020 23:59
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I've just recorded a video of alternate scenes on Urbs. I'd like to think that I've been thorough but I haven't been through it like a fine-toothed comb, I've stuck with the more obvious alternate choices and the unchosen dialogue paths. If anyone knows of anything specific that you know about then please let me know via PM or with spoiler tags. I did promise a death reel and already it seems like it's going to be a long video, I can still put one together at the end. Numerous deaths happen during dialogue choices or are related to alternate actions taken, I've decided to include the footage of bad endings within the videos relating to specific environments. I've had some failure with trying to capture different dialogue for hotspots within certain scenes, I'm not sure if specific things are needed to trigger them.
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Oct 28, 2020 00:47
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Bonus Videos (Additional Scenes & Dialogue - Urbs) Here are the additional scenes and dialogue that I recorded for Urbs. Timestamps are included in the description. Flattering Nizzim Rochtar, Bluffing Clia Trifit, Bluffing & Intimidating Statue, Bomb Countdown, Bypassing The Bomb, Insisting The Guard, Talking To The Guard Again, Using The Panel, Alternative Flag, Firing Squad, Alternative Tico Higgins Dialogue, Dusting For Prints, Saving The World and Alternative Council Dialogue.
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Oct 28, 2020 12:38
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I think I got 4-5 worlds into this game before I gave up. Don't worry, it gets much worse.Rocket Baby Dolls posted:
I think the idea is that you're supposed to realize "dates of fasting" is a pun for "calendar dates of religious fasts", but Passover isn't a fast day. But I wouldn't be surprised if they just screwed up.
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Oct 29, 2020 02:31
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Not The Wendigo posted:I think I got 4-5 worlds into this game before I gave up. Don't worry, it gets much worse. I'd say that's Silent Hill 3 levels of required "outside" knowledge but SH3 probably stole that from adventure games already.
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Oct 30, 2020 02:19
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Kibayasu posted:I'd say that's Silent Hill 3 levels of required "outside" knowledge but SH3 probably stole that from adventure games already. Yes. The instant game publishers discovered there was money to be made selling Hint Guides and frustrating people into calling 1-900 Hint Numbers, this became the norm.
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Oct 30, 2020 02:34
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This video is the second and last part of Aurans. It's another romp of little to no hints through a maze, a couple of duels, a desert and a palace. I spent around half an hour making a map through the maze, only to discover that it wasn't necessary at all. There's going to be plenty for the bonus video of Aurans that will come at some point soon as there apparently different ways that we can tackle some of the puzzles, naturally I chose the easier pathways for this playthrough. This also includes Haring, which I visit at the end of this video and I discovered that a completely different scenario happens if we had visited at an earlier point in the game. Encyclopedia Entries - I thought that with this update I would include entries for the Mult-tool functions and for other technology in the Chronomaster universe. I've also included the report of Aurans underneath as well as the profiles of some of the people that we met.                    Aurans Report   Character Profiles     
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Nov 1, 2020 16:03
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EricFate posted:Yes. The instant game publishers discovered there was money to be made selling Hint Guides and frustrating people into calling 1-900 Hint Numbers, this became the norm. I can't remember there being a hotline for this game, but I can definitely remember calling up the official LucasArts hotline as I was stuck on a puzzle towards the end of Monkey Island 2. I also remember that one of the few ways of getting cheat codes was by buying games magazines and praying that it had one for a game that I was stuck on at the time, adventure game walkthroughs were a rarity unless they were pretty short. I must have three or four books that I bought which were a pile of miscellaneous codes and walkthroughs for a bunch of different games just so I could get past a few puzzles in some of the more adventure games back in the day. The only walkthrough that I can't seem to find anywhere is one for "The Space Bar" as it's almost impossible to get through the game without it. I live in hope of finding it one day.
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Nov 1, 2020 16:11
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Bonus Video: (Additional Scenes & Dialogue - Aurans) Trying to solve the second Ketter Beast encounter was a nightmare, it took far too long and I eventually gave up. I managed to find the solution on a Dutch website at the eleventh hour of posting an update. Timestamps are in the video description: Exploring Haring Before Aurans, Death On Haring, Bluffing, Threatening & Lies (To) The Djinn, Feeding The Wrong Fruit, Sinkholes & Rock Slides, Going For A Swim, The First Ketter Beast Encounter, A Terrible Way To Travel, Déjà vu, The Dark Web, This Drink Is Going Places, Fighting The Tough Guy, Advising The Cook, The Flute & The Spider, Another Unfriendly Spider, Talking To Dwistor A Second Time, Death To Dwistor, The Gift Of Water, Alternative Way To The Palace - Canteen, Alternative Way To The Palace - Whirlwind, Giving Money To The Vendors, Threatening The Man In The Bath, Electrocuting The Man In The Bath, Playing With Our Flute In The Bath, Stealing From The Treasury, Giving The Ruby To The Vendors, Entering The Guarded Corridor, Dealing With The Ketter Beast, Threatening The Woman In The Harem and Attacking Deter.
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Nov 1, 2020 22:38
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When people talk about adventure games being killed by their design this is the game they were talking about. This is an oversimplification for comedy's sake As an observer I have to say I'm pretty disappointed with the death cutscenes. This is after Mortal Kombat! You can do better than that.
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Nov 4, 2020 05:52
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Kibayasu posted:When people talk about adventure games being killed by their design this is the game they were talking about. This is an oversimplification for comedy's sake You are not wrong, this game is notoriously hard and unforgiving. There is a lot to explore in this game and most of that is punishment and a big gently caress you for doing so. There are ways to work around failures of some situations, but most of the failures for puzzles result in death and there are no workarounds for that. I think that there are so many ways to die in this game that they made the death cutscenes simple to compensate for it. I was going to do a death reel but that concept has been blown out of proportion before I finished the second world.
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Nov 4, 2020 10:13
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Kibayasu posted:When people talk about adventure games being killed by their design this is the game they were talking about. This is an oversimplification for comedy's sake The worst part is that this game got glowing reviews at the time of release.
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Nov 4, 2020 13:44
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EricFate posted:The worst part is that this game got glowing reviews at the time of release. For it's time it was a pretty good adventure game, it just suffers from needing to save scum due to the number of stupid deaths. Now that I've been recording bonus videos I've discovered that if you fail a puzzle it's still possible to continue on another path. I just don't think that twelve year old me had a lot of patience for it back in the day, which is a shame as the storyline and concept is still interesting to me even now. It's been a nice experience coming back to it and overcoming what I couldn't twenty-odd years ago.
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Nov 4, 2020 23:16
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This is the first part of Fortuna. For the first time, it's a planet that is not in stasis we get a warm greeting and so far it seems to be fairly safe compared to the previous worlds that we visited. Encyclopedia Entries - These entries all relate to Fortuna:                 
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Nov 5, 2020 15:45
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This is the second and final part of our adventure on Fortuna. This video features a lengthy conversation with a new and important character, this conversation drives the plot even further and changes a lot of things. I'm not going to spoil anything about this video. I'll work on additional scenes and dialogue over the next few days. I think that I may have resolved the issues surrounding choppy videos. I wasn't having any issues during recording, the issues seem to arise during the encoding process. I've turned off some unnecessary settings and have set the encoding process to its normal settings instead of higher ones. As much as I want to upload high-quality videos, they may be slightly overkill for low-resolution adventure games. I decided to install Kingdom O' Magic and play it for the first time as it seemed like an interesting prospect for a future LP... It's definitely a game of the '90s and I'm not sure whether to be wary of it or not. Encyclopedia Entries - For this update, I've included a couple of miscellaneous entries, one relating to this update and a multi-tool function that I missed. I've kept this short as there is another journal entry and several new character entries.         Journal Entry  Characters      
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Nov 8, 2020 00:04
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Well its nice to have some story finally, and even a concrete goal (though I bet the puzzles will remain equally obtuse). That casino seems like a place ripe for a soft lock. Is it possible to run out of credits for what you need?
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Nov 8, 2020 05:32
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Kibayasu posted:Well its nice to have some story finally, and even a concrete goal (though I bet the puzzles will remain equally obtuse). After this update, I'm not entirely sure that you need the credits. Setting up the resonator is optional and you can steal the Glifnod from the box from where we stole the electromagnetic chip.
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Nov 8, 2020 09:48
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It s always enjoyable to watch you play these 90's adventure games. This might not be on the same level as Journeyman's Project, but it still has some charms.
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Nov 8, 2020 13:45
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OutofSight posted:It s always enjoyable to watch you play these 90's adventure games. Thank you for your kind words and I'm glad that I'm able to bring you some enjoyment. The Journeyman Project was a great series, despite the frustrations from playing them originally they always held a lot of fondness and fascination through the years. One of the joys of doing these LP's is that I'm actually playing these games again for the first time in a couple of decades, or in some cases for the first time ever. After a quick check, most of the games that I've LP'd are games that I played but never completed back in the day. I'm always open to recommendations as the '90s were rife for quality and questionable adventure games and I have an everchanging mental list for potential future LP's. Part of it depends on how brave I feel, the next LP could be Grim Fandango or Total Distortion. I started to record additional footage for Fortuna but it's started to become frustrating. It seems like there is actually a soft lock on this world and I don't know whether it's linked to screwing over the beggar or from stealing the Glifnod from the security office. If you spend some of the winnings you lose the option to give the beggar anything at all. I've not found a use of the playing card, the other items that are acquirable from the bartender, the paralysis gun or the particle accelerator.
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Nov 9, 2020 02:11
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I'm amazed and glad that we've finally managed to hit some comprehensible plot. It was beginning to feel like Zelazny was wasted on this medium. Though what was up with Brent Spiner's bizarre dialogue delivery. Did they have to chop the audio up into mono-syllabic chunks and then re-combine it on the playback?
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Nov 10, 2020 08:49
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EricFate posted:I'm amazed and glad that we've finally managed to hit some comprehensible plot. It was beginning to feel like Zelazny was wasted on this medium. Though what was up with Brent Spiner's bizarre dialogue delivery. Did they have to chop the audio up into mono-syllabic chunks and then re-combine it on the playback? I believe that Zelazny fell ill soon after the development of the game started and died six months before it's release. The development team kept the plot and concepts but most of the game was completed without his input. I'm surprised that it has taken this long to hit an important plot point, considering that we've been walking around a couple of empty wastelands for most of the gameplay so far with little plot development. I'll be attempting to record more footage of Fortuna later, I still have no idea what half of these items do. I'd have thought that there would be a way to use the card in the card game, but no, nothing. Maybe it can be used on the games that we can't play upstairs? I have no idea what the paralysis gun does either. Rocket Baby Dolls fucked around with this message at 14:24 on Nov 10, 2020 |
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Nov 10, 2020 13:55
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Bonus Video (Additional Scenes & Dialogue - Fortuna) Firstly, I'd like to point out that the last video shouldn't have ended up that way. We were supposed to win. The guide that I'm using didn't mention that you had to physically pass the particle decelerator to Milo, I only found this out from a Russian walkthrough which was very helpful in pointing out the use for several of the other items and gave me alternative ways to work around some puzzles. I will be starting the next video off with the correct sequence of events and we will go from there. It was also very helpful in netting me 105,000 credits from two spins of the wheel and betting it all on the regatta tip.  Timestamps are included in the video description: Security Schmecurity, Changing The Odds, Departing From The Dealer, Declining The Beggar, The Dead Man's Hand, Folding, Cheating At Cards, Betting It All, Korda's Drinking Problem, Clearing The Dealer's Debts, Korda's Finest Performance, Breaking The Deal, Intimidating The Nervous Alien, Poking The Bomb, Paralysing The Nervous Alien & Arresting Milo (A Bad Ending).
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Nov 11, 2020 00:22
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