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TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016







What the hell is this?

Stygian, Reign of the Old Ones is a computer RPG set in the works of HP Lovecraft. You play as a survivor of Arkham Massachusetts, where, after an event called the Black Day where Arkham got sucked into some kind of messed up dimensional rift ruled by the Old Ones, you are trying to find a way to escape and get back to Earth. You must contend with the deadly 1920s Chicago Mafia, horrible flesh-eating ghouls, dark sorcery, the cult of Cthulhu, and more! See the video trailer below! Can you survive the physical and mental terrors of Arkham?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgAEAbBpbVM

That looks cool! How does it play?

This is your standard vaguely infinity engine isometric RPG. You get a party of Lovecraft characters/Lovecraft's real-life wife, you roam around doing quests and whatnot, and because this is Lovecraft you have a sanity bar that doubles as your MP. Combat is turn-based on a hex map rather than real-time with pause. Where this game differs from most of the rest is in its sanity mechanics. As you go more and more insane from looking at Cthulhu and witnessing various horrors, you pick up terrible mental afflictions that overwrite your standard dialog tree with "The Voice of Madness". I will be showing this - as well as the other unique sanity mechanics - off in this LP!

Are you going to include more pretentious literary bullshit? No one liked that!

Shut up. Yes, I am - I've read most of Lovecraft's works, and a few of his inspirations such as Edgar Allen Poe and Robert Chambers. We're going to be taking what Lovecraft actually wrote and comparing it to what the developers are giving us here. Don't look at me like that! It's relevant for once!

Hey Lovecraft was a big racist, he named his ca-
The game is going to address this. Hold off on that right now. We will get to it.

Oh man, Great Evil King, are you going to be playing an actually good game for once?

No. Did you watch the trailer and think "this looks like a cool game with great atmosphere?" The game is Lovecraft as filtered through two fifteen-year-old kids trying to tackle adult themes. One of the character classes is "sex wizard", and they recover sanity by reading porn magazines while resting. Really. The sexless town of Arkham is full of prostitutes and other weirdos, and the sanity mechanics include an "angst meter" that, as you get into fights, forces you to select mental illnesses to screw over your character. That "voice of madness" mechanic I referenced earlier?



Yea. The gameplay is a miserable mess of survival horror and losing control of your character because a trained soldier who fought in World War I saw a dude get killed by ghouls. Combat is slow, tedious, and RNG prone, and the developers sudden whiplash between horror and juvenile comedy makes it impossible for the game to maintain a consistent tone. I am playing this so you don't have to!

Audience participation? Audience participation? Au-

Yes! You, heroic goons of Something Awful, get to inflict whatever character you want on me, and I will be stuck with him or her. I'll be going through the character creation process below, and I need you all to vote on which unfortunate person is going to wander the land of Cthulhu and prostitutes.



We can be male or female.



We need to choose an age. Young characters get an attribute boost but lower skill points, Middle Aged characters are the balanced option, and Old characters eat a stat penalty but have higher skill points. You get more skill points as you level up, but not attributes.

We need to choose an archetype.



Each of the archetypes has 4 sub-archetypes - one that has no boosts nor penalties, and three that have a tradeoff.

Scientist: Generic Academic, no penalties.
Researcher: Faster Scientific and Medical Research, -1 Physical Defense
Psychiatrist: +1 Psychology (used to determine motives), -1 Supernatural Defense
Physician: +1 Medicine, -1 Melee Attack, -1 Ranged Attack


Patrician: Generic Aristocrat.
Prodigal: Start the game with more money, but lower sex appeal.
Cursed Bloodline: +1 Occult (magic), +5% critical failure chance (misfiring guns to hit our allies, etc)
Bankrupt Royalty: +1 Survival, less money.

Note that Aristocrats come with a butler companion who is pretty handy in combat.


Gangster: Generic criminal.
Thief: +1 Stealth, -1 Melee Attack. Note that ammo is fairly scarce in this game.
Hitman: +1 Firearms, +50 ANGST (the not XP for mental illness not-levels)
Con Artist: +1 Speechcraft, -1 Physical Defense


Adventurer: Generic Explorer
Pathfinder: Lower chance of random encounters, but smaller inventory size. I've never had inventory be an issue in this game.
Mountaineer: +1 Athletics, -2% Critical Success Chance
Big Game Hunter: "Higher damage to beastly enemies", -1 melee attack.

Note that explorers come with a friendly dog companion!


Detective: Generic investigator
Occult Detective: +1 Occult, +50 Angst.
Ex-cop: +1 Firearms, -5 total Sanity
Bounty Hunter: +1 Stealth, but you have to be Materialist philosophy.


Secret Society: Generic occultist.
Mesmerist: +1 Psychology, -5 total Sanity.
Alchemist: Considerably higher Medical Research rating, Lower Trading Value
Depraved Occultist: This one deserves its own screenshot.



Actor: Generic Performer
Movie Actor: Higher Sex Appeal, more likely to get addicted to drugs
Juggler: +2 Throwing, +5% Critical Failure Chance
Busker: +1 Subterfuge, less starting money.


Captain: Generic soldier
Military Intelligence: +1 Subterfuge, -1 Physical Defense
Marine: Starts the game with "Aimed Shot" ability, -5 max Sanity.
Bouncer: +1 Melee, -1 Reaction (Initiative, basically. Who goes first).

Next, we need a belief system for our character.



Our options are:
Humanistic: Regain sanity by performing altruistic actions.
Materialistic: Hedonism. Get high, get laid, whatever.
Nihilistic: Cannot regain sanity through actions, but has a higher mental resistance. You still get sanity through rest and whatnot, you just don't get any dialog options letting you ramble about Jesus or porn or whatever to get sanity back.
Divine: Gets sanity by praying and whatnot.
Rational: Get back sanity by doing science or medicine stuff. The game recommends we take the science or medicine skills.
Esoteric: Get back sanity by ranting about magic and reading Aleister Crowley books (really).

Lastly, we need a portrait and a name for this wonderful individual.

Men:



Women:



Alright! Give me a character, and we can get this show on the road.

List of updates
Sex Wizardry: Cuck Rising
Reign of the Bad Coding
Random Men On Street Break Game
Let's Not Talk About Race
Attack of the KKKultists
It's not Unoriginality, it's CANON!
Random Child Abuse
Ambush of Sheer loving Incompetence
PEE-PEE INTO FOO-FOO
Stop! Put those brains down!
Let's Not Talk About Manifest Destiny
It's Not Nativism! We Swear!
The Amount of Sheer loving Incompetence On Display Is Amazing
Clap Your Hands, Seals!
Sweet Jesus Make The Hurting Stop
The Care and Feeding of Dickmutants
Duel of the Cornutos
Absolute Garbage
Postmortem: Dunning-Kruger

TheGreatEvilKing fucked around with this message at 00:57 on Aug 22, 2020

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TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





ultrafilter posted:

Let's be a nihilistic elderly female prodigal depraved occultist named Bertha.

Unfortunately you have to be either prodigal or a depraved occultist, those are subclasses of aristocrat or occultist respectively.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





FYI:

Materiaiism is sex stuff
Esoterism is babbling about planar alignments and whatnot.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Sex Wizardry: Cuck Rising

You all voted on Bertha the old lady sex wizard. The thread was unanimous.



Woman, of course.



I drop her agility as our mandatory Age Penalty because I think "oh, we won't be using guns, we don't need it." This will bite me in the rear end...very soon, actually!



The wonderful thing about the Depraved Occultist is that you can just google all the artifacts on the internet as you still get the bonuses/penalties without them being discovered, so it's actually not a meaningful drawback at all!



There was a lot of waffling in the thread about which philosophy to pick, I went with materialism as that is more babbling about cringey sex poo poo.



Anyway here's Bertha the Dan Brown sex occultist. This is one of those games where you can take a bunch of skills and you have to predict which skills the game wants for which encounter. Medicine and Science can be used for a fair bit, and also lets us craft crack pipes. Really. Occult is set to the max of 2 because we are a mage, and that's our casting skill. Melee is 2 because ammo is super rare in this game, and I forgot how the shield spell my gimmick build was supposed to work around works. Subterfuge lets us pick locks, but it runs off agility and thus...we can't actually use it. A+ game design.



The loading screen has this kind of neat comic book motif where the heroes are getting chased by the game's KKKultists. Enough of that, we have an intro.



Really! It really does this! It's voice acted too! They're trying to do a cool, spooky fade in and some jackass left the subtitles, in addition to the opening title scrawl. Don't worry, it gets worse! "But, TheGreatEvilKing, you handsome devil, how can it get worse?"



Ok, that's the first screen. Keep watching!



HOW DO YOU DO THIS????



They even spelled "loved" correctly in the captions! Why do these subtitles exist?



Now, welcome to the only part of the game that's actually effective.



It's the dismal man!



Alright, let's follow him.



We can't just walk outside, we need to go over and pick up the glowing lantern in the corner.



We go into the Old Eel House proper, and the Dismal Man leads the way. The game is silent aside from the clacking of feet and canes, and it actually works!



Follow the creepy man!



These ghosts show up and start approaching each other as the game plays a waltz.





The music starts wailing as the ghostly couples start murdering the poo poo out of each other, while the Dismal Man walks into the ruined Miskatonic University. This is the standard Lovecraft institute of higher learning that has your forbidden books of lore that our protagonists find to deal with whatever hellish abomination some idiot conjured up this week. More on Lovecraft and the game later.





Oh, it was only a dream. A dream that lost us 15 sanity. Of course this game has sanity mechanics, why wouldn't it? Sanity also doubles as our mana bar because the game wants to make spellcasting dangerous and scary. It is, for entirely the wrong reasons.



Anyway, here we go! We start with 200 Cigs, our secret society medallion, a doctor's bag for doing medicine stuff, a blank notebook, 3 cans of food, camping supplies, and some water. We are wearing the purple dress we got for being an occultist. We have a ceremonial knife and a laudanum shot, which is the equivalent of a health potion in other, better games.



Welcome to the old Eel House! The couples at the table don't want to talk to us. Let's talk to the bartender, shall we?





YUP! The first line of dialog said by the first NPC is "Good morning, cuck". Really! That's what cornuto means!

: Can you separate dream from reality anymore?

: Oh I see, Cornuto is quite a philosopher...I find my own view simpler and more effective: Whether this is dream or reality or loving inferno, the question is, can you die?

: If you can kick the bucket, which is definitely still the case my friend, I guess this is real enough. But if you want to give it a shot, I can spare you a pistol.



: This trick is getting old, Marino.



: I pay for your accommodations, however poor they may be.

: Poor? I guess my rather poor services are still much better than being eaten by ghouls in a dark corner of a street, cornuto. They eat you alive, you know.



: You are really a good example of how low a person can go.

: Oh, please spare me your sharp wit. Later cornuto.

Let's talk to Marino to see why we have earned the appellation "cornuto", shall we?



: Why do you call me cornuto, Marino?



: But what is a cornuto?



: This is getting boring.



Oops.



Time to reload! We can't talk to Marino, which means we can't stay here and we can't buy his stuff.



: What does this have to do with me, Marino?

: When I was the bartender of Isola, a small Italian bar in Chicago, a man used to come in there every evening. Every single day.

: He didn't drink, he didn't seem to have any fun, he just kept looking at the patrons silently. Looking for someone.

: Then, after almost a year, I learned his story. He was looking for the man who hosed his wife. He came to that bar every day, staring silently...You're like him.



Interesting. He calls us "my friend" instead of cornuto.

: Someone hosed us all. Don't you see?

: Like I care.



If we ask him for a drink, that opens the shop interface. If we try to rest in the attic he laughs at us because it's occupied.

: What is the story of the Old Eel?

: Do I seem like the loving chitty-chat kind of bartender, cornuto? They say an old drunk opened the place after a dream or something forty years ago. Satisfied?



: Tell me about this Wax Face.

: Not a smart question at all, cornuto. Just remember he is the king on this side of the Miskatonic. He is the boss of the Mob, the Unseen Imperatore.



: What is the Mob doing in a remote New England town?



: I'll keep my mouth shut. You can trust me.

: I trust only the dead when it comes to these things. Forget it.

We end the conversation.

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: Good morning, cuck! I heard a lot of rolling over upstairs? Bad dream?

: Can you separate dream from reality anymore?

: Oh, the cuck is a philosopher? Well, guess what cuck, it doesn't matter where we are, but so long as we can die I know it's real. People die here all the time, I've got a pistol if you want to give it a shot. Anyway, you got real drunk last night and owe me a ton of cigarettes.

: This is getting real old. You're a scumbag Marino.

: Oh. Well, you're a regular, so I'll probably get all your cigs anyway.

: Why do you keep calling me cuck? I'm an old lady!

: Well, you remind me of a guy I once knew. Back when I bartended in Chicago, there was this dude who came to my bar every day. He looked pretty miserable, like he was waiting for someone. Turns out he was waiting for the guy who hosed his wife. Who hosed you, my friend?

: Someone hosed us all.

: Whatever.

: So what's the story of this place?

: Who gives a gently caress? Do I look like an exposition character? Look, the bar was founded by some crazy drunk forty years ago who had a dream. Now it's run by the Mob - I run it, Wax Face owns it.

: Seriously, why is the Chicago Mafia in this small town that has nothing?

: Oh no I'm not dying for that. gently caress off.



This guy in the corner is an insane darts playing man. We don't have the skills to beat him. If you have a high agility you can beat him, and then he throws a dart at you dealing health damage and runs off crying. This gets you an achievement and an encounter later where he tries to murder you with poison darts. Whatever.



Welp. Join us next time as we visit the wonderful world of Arkham!

TheGreatEvilKing fucked around with this message at 07:00 on Jun 6, 2020

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Hmm.

I can try to transcribe more dialogue, I suppose?

I'm still providing summaries so that you can skip all the mature and adult dialogue that was written by teenagers.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Reign of the Bad Coding

So I am trying these guys as PNG instead of JPEG because things were a little blurry. Hope it improves!

Today I demonstrate how to make Stygian unwinnable.



Welcome to Arkham! Get used to this map, as much of the game is spent running around the three Arkham screens until events fire to do things. If I haven't made it clear, this game is terrible.



The first thing you want to do is loot the trash. You might need those cigs! You will need those cigs!



Remember when I said Stygian was a land of Cthulhu and prostitutes? We just passed Cthulhu, so...



: Sure, I could use some relief.



Prostitutes prefer lesbians, you heard it here first.

: Understood. Let's go.



I am really glad this game didn't give us a drawn sex scene or worse, one written in Lovecraftian prose.



That's a third of our lost sanity back! We also got 3 earlier from asking darts guy about a prize, because that is "materialistic" or something.



: How did you become a, uhm, you know...

: A whore, you mean? Why the shyness now? We were moaning on a filthy street corner moments ago, darling. I know what you call me and I don't care.

: You think I was someone else before the Black Day? Not at all. I just continued what I've been doing. Nothing changed in that regard, and I'd lived to see all those respectable ladies fall...



: They will pay for their deeds one day, don't worry.

: Will they? Good-bye, darling.

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: Want to gently caress for 30 cigs? Haven't done gay for pay in a while.

: At last, I will reveal my sex magic to the world.

: They hosed, something that never happens in my books.

: Five whole sanity points! Ka-ching!

: Well, wasn't that great?

: Despite being a sex wizard, I am awkward about saying the word, uh, hooker, how did you become one?

: I was always a hooker! At least I got to see all the rich ladies who made fun of me for hooking turned into hookers by the Mob.

: They'll get theirs.

: Lol, whatever.

Ugh. This really just screams of the need to make this game "adult" like Marino calling you cornuto and whatnot. One of the notable things about Lovecraft's stories is that they're incredibly sexless. The narrators are usually all sheltered Lovecraft self-inserts and women appear rarely if at all. I would not harp on this so much if the game wasn't dedicated to clinging to the trappings of Lovecraft so hard leading to an awkward mishmash of all things Lovecraft. The game is set in Arkham near Miskatonic University in the 1920s. Lovecraft wrote about that era because that was the era in which he lived. His successors write about that era because they're unimaginative hacks.

I know you all are curious about what powerful sex magic Bertha knows, so let's take a look, shall we?



See anything missing? Say, attack spells? That's right! Stygian starts you off with no attack spells whatsoever. You have the Evil Eye spell you will never use because it throws down a mediocre debuff, and Blood Circle, which is actually kind of hardcore but you need 8 AP to cast it. That is more AP then most characters get, which means that you will continue casting till your next turn rolls around. Any successful attack breaks the circle, which means that for Bertha this is completely loving useless unless our enemies are melee only or we dope her up with cocaine.



Honest Bill's pawnshop is our next destination, as I want to buy Bertha a crowbar.





: Who are you?



: Cortellinis?



: I see.



: Is Charley the smiling blond fellow?



: Another thing.

: Get lost. You ain't no buyer, just a loving time waster.

Well, gently caress you too. We have to talk to him again.



: I'd like to trade.

: If you got the Cigs. And don't forget that the Mob pays good money for bullets.

Whatever. I buy a crowbar. This guy is your main source of guns and ammo. There's a junk dealer who sells homemade pistols and poo poo. Hit this guy first.

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: You gonna buy something?

: Who are you?

: Joe Clemensce, I used to be a cool guy in the Chicago Mob but now I am stuck in this lovely interdimensional town selling bullets. You should buy something or I'll have Charley kill you.

: You mean that dude over there?

: Yes, but let me throw in an incoherent metaphor and the word "gently caress" so you have more text to read. You buying?

: One more q-

: BAWWW STOP WASTING MY TIME.

: Ok, fine.

Joe also sells this:



Moving on!



There's a short cutscene where the ground shakes and it makes these guys very sad.



To progress the plot we need to grab that key on the ground where the Dismal Man left.



Welcome to the real Stygian experience: aimlessly wandering around until something happens! Meet Eduardo.



: Are you following me?

: No, no senora. But I cannot help to notice about you the scent of danger, of violencía...

: You have that scent on you. I've seen you talk to people, asking questions. While others wait for Santa Muerte, you have a mísíon. I don't know what it is, but you know the time will come and blood be spilled, no?



: Some of my enemies may not be human...



: What do you want in return?



Ah, yes, the lovely immature option.

: I've seen how you stare at me. Does it have a price, too?



: How much for bodyguard duty?



: Deal. Follow me.

: Bueno. Lead the way, senora. Eduardo Carnela, your angel protector is by your side.

TheGreatEvilKing summarizes posted:

: Dayum, girl, I've seen you asking questions and there's gonna be some violence in your future!

: I might be fighting weird inhuman monsters, you know that, right?

: Eh, whatever.

: What do you want in return?

: 24 Cigs a day!

: So, you keep staring at my tits, is there a price for bangin?

: Holy poo poo lady, I just met you! Although I do enjoy sexual intercourse...

: Ok. Bodyguard duty?

: 24 Cigs.

: Sold!



Eduardo joined the party. You want Eduardo because he has a bitchin gun and free ammo. You might notice he doesn't take up one of our three party slots, he is a "henchmen" and thus doesn't count against our party limit. The regular party members do. We have two slots, there are three party members in the game.



Moving on to the next screen we get a cutscene where this mafia guy shoots the dude for looking at him and goes into the club-turned-"crime fortress". Whatever. We don't care about that. We have an antique shop to go to.



RIP Random Guy. You no longer have to be in Stygian. Would that we were so lucky.



Our destination is Schmidt's Antiques.





: That's a very nice collection of keys you have.



: Why the interest in keys?



: What changed after the Black Day?



: I'll feel better knowing why you want them so badly.

: Very well. After the Black Day, like many others, I lost all hope. With no reason to go on, I decided to end it... you know what I mean.

: But what I desired most is forbidden to men. For days I fasted and prayed for Hashem's forgiveness, determined to end this misery of an existence...

: I passed out from hunger and exhaustion, and then I dreamt of two keys. One was gold and burning, though it was only warm to the touch.



: Go on.

: They were the keys to the temple of Solomon! I felt the Light inside me. Oh. Hashem... He spoke to me. (The old man's eyes widen and lose focus, as if he were in a trance).



: How can a bunch of keys help you escape?



: If the pay is good we can share that dream.



This is what the belief choices affect - if Bertha acts like a greedy, horny rear end in a top hat we get sanity points back. We want sanity points.



: What do you know about this key?



: From a mysterious man, but I found it because of a dream. Long story.



: It is not for sale.



: Tell me about it first and I'll think about it.

: Forgive me but I don't trust people easily. This particular habit also helped me tremendously in staying alive.

Then we're taken back to the 500 Cigs screen.

: I said no.



: Don't waste your breath. I won't sell it.



: Uh...a thousand for that? Alright, I guess.

This is a Bad Idea, but I'm sure we don't need the key to progress and he'll tell us where to go, right?



Look, we got 10 sanity and a thousand Cigs. This rules! We leave the shop and...





Alright, that was funny, I'll load the autosave and -



: I want to buy the key back.

You're loving making GBS threads me.



: What have you done with the key, it's not on you...[Subterfuge]



Really. We are traumatized enough by not being able to complete the game we gain ANGST.



Really?



gently caress YOU, STYGIAN!

TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:

: Can I help you?

: Sweet key collection. What's the deal?

: Oh, I got very sad when the Black Day happened, so I was going to kill myself. I fasted and prayed for God to forgive me, then I had a dream about a gold and a silver key that opened the Temple of Solomon! Now I collect keys until I find them.

: Can you help me with this key?

: Sweet key. I'll give you 500 Cigs.

: Dude, I need that key to win the game. Can you tell me how to progress without it?

: No. 700.

: I said no.

: 1000 Cigs.

: That's a lot of hookers, deal.

: Now we are both happy.

: You can't win the game now! Ha ha! Game over!

: poo poo, reload. Can I buy the key back?

: No, and I swallowed it so you can't steal it. gently caress off.

: You can't win the game now! Ha ha! Game over!

Next time: Terrible, terrible combat!

TheGreatEvilKing fucked around with this message at 04:43 on Jun 7, 2020

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Random Men on Street Break Game

By request, I'm putting the update on the test poster instead of directly in the thread. If people like it then I will move the previous updates to the test poster.

Stalking! Kabbalah! Banks! Hotels! Prostitutes! Game-breaking bugs!

Let me know if I should continue test posting or put the updates in the thread!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Seraphic Neoman posted:

Yeah this is good. Man our mystic background is not doing us any favors huh

It's worse than that. I did some playing around with the character generator. Remember how the Cursed Bloodline patrician got a +1 occult? Turns out that that isn't just a free skill point, it's a free skill point that breaks caps. The Outsider is a Cursed Bloodline Patrician, but if we had created a character who was a cursed bloodline patrician, we could have had the same 3 occult to start off with as well.

So if you want to be a badboy spellcaster, don't play an occultist, play an aristocrat. Really.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Keldulas posted:

Just looked at chargen again. There's also occult detective for that +1 Occult and a different penalty.

That doesn't work as well, the Patrician gets occult as a class skill and can sink max points into it.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Let's Not Talk About Race



Between you and me this is the banner this game deserves. Why, you ask?

The Guide The Developers Posted on The Steam Forums posted:

What good can my companions be to me besides Combat?

They can perform the rest activities that their skills allow. For example Nameless Soldier can be very effective in the “Keep Watch” rest activity while you get to allocate your precious rest points on research or other activities. They can research spells, protect the party, make scientific discoveries and a variety of actions in the form of Rest Activities.

With the 1.0.3 patch they are also able to perform crafting which adds a lot of diversity to the actions they can commit. We always wanted the companions to perform skill checks as well but for the welfare of other systems, we had to cancel that feature.

Also they can be your friends. And in a world which has lost all hope, that may help.

Seriously, gently caress this game!

Lunatics! Racism! Violence! Hobos! Science! Poetry!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Viola the Mad posted:

Since :sparkles:Kabbalah:sparkles: looks like it is going to be a part of this game, I'd like to announce that I went to Jewish school for eight whole years just so I could sperg endlessly at people about Jewish history/folklore/culture. So if people are interested in knowing how The Goyim Are loving It Up, I can give you allll the dirty details!

I'd love to hear it!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Attack of the KKKultists



One thing I do want to impress on all of you is that Lovecraft's word is incredibly racist in a way that can't easily be separated from the cosmic horror. Take the Call of Cthulhu - the narrator frames three separate incidents that basically consist of him sitting in his basement and reading papers. Said papers describe a cult with people described as "mongrels" whose destruction is imperative, and the story closes with the narrator panicking because now the scary black people are going to murder him next, because if the black people take control all morality will be cast aside. Really! The moral is that if you're adapting Lovecraft, you need to do work on actually stripping on the racist implications, because they are standing right next to every monster and sorcerer he throws at his self-inserts.

Unfortunately, the developers didn't bother doing this. I found this interview with the creative director, where he says that his influences are all poo poo like Vampire the Masquerade (I can tell!) and Planescape: Torment (really?). There's no attempt to read Edgar Allen Poe, Ambrose Bierce, or even Lovecraft's friends and correspondents like Robert Bloch, Robert E Howard, or anyone else who contributed to the mythos to try to derive some kind of horror theme or even to read Lovecraft deeply and try to apply the themes of insignificance. It's all just an ineffectual regurgitation of a surface reading, which is how you get crap like this!

KKKultists! Exposition! An astounding lack of creativity! Pissing on the last wishes of a dying man!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Viola the Mad posted:

By the way, what are your thoughts on Lovecraft's writing in general, EvilKing? I'm kinda getting a love-hate relationship vibe.

I like the ideas of a vast and uncaring cosmos populated by ancient horrors and sorcerers and crap that you can just kind of stumble into when you take a wrong turn, and that you can fight them to stave off doomsday.

Lovecraft's prose is terrible and relies on shotgunning adjectives in the vain hope that one lands and all of his stuff is intricately bound up with racism to the point that half the horror is hiding in a basement from black people.

EDIT: This said, what I probably hate more is most of the derivative media based off the tabletop RPGs where there's a ton of emphasis on how you couldn't possibly fight a seafood monster when in most of Lovecraft's work, standing and fighting is the superior option. Darkest Dungeon gets better than, at least, this game.

TheGreatEvilKing fucked around with this message at 02:31 on Jun 22, 2020

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





I will also recommend Moby Dick, as the fundamental unknown of Moby Dick is part of the novel. Pay attention to Ishmael's interludes- they're not just random crap to pad out the page count, they're Ishmael trying and failing to intellectually grasp Moby Dick and the doomed voyage.

Moby Dick is also one of Lovecraft's inspirations.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Hwurmp posted:

"Why's it gotta be white?!" - H.P. Lovecraft, probably

Boy has the chapter called "Whiteness" have a surprise for you!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





With the recent relevations this LP goes on hiatus until we figure out where everyone is going or the admins buy out Lowtax or something.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





This is probably going on the Beach once I back up all the images and their image hosting is up.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Viola the Mad posted:

Oh, nice. I just hope the whole community picks one site to move to, it would kill me to see us scattered to the winds.

e. EvilKing, if/when you start posting this LP elsewhere, will you post the link here?

That was the plan!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





It's not unoriginality, it's CANON!



So with the sale of the site to Jeffrey I feel better resuming this LP. DO NOT GIVE MONEY TO LOWTAX! In the unlikely event you want to get me an avatar or something, I accept silly MS Paint fan art.

Aliens! Blatant Allusions! Mobsters! Dark Magic! Random curses! People accosting us on the street! Trying to cuckold HP Lovecraft!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





anilEhilated posted:

Did the devs ever actually talked about the cut content or are those just kickstarter promises that weren't delivered on?

Worse. They actually had the system up and running in the game and had to cut it after release because it broke their fuckawful spaghetti code.

https://steamcommunity.com/games/779290/announcements/detail/2992010505929847539

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





The demonologist occultist got to start with Children of Pazuzu as one of their starting spells. They seem to have been removed from the game before I got it. Pity. I saw it in a few guides but cannot seem to find it now.

I've also never had this fight give me Enemy of the Mob - I assume its because we left no survivors and the character we are about to meet gets blamed.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Hypocrisy posted:

Was the game balanced around not having spell upgrades for occultists?

No, and they left all the upgrade components in the game. Its nuts!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Random Child Abuse!



Alcoholism! Dreaming! Tea Parties! Poison! Jizz Stained Pornography! Child Abuse!

Decisions Lie Before Us!

Vote on which two of three party members should stay with us: The Outsider, Sonia Greene Carter, or The Nameless Soldier

The internet seems to believe we can romance the Outsider, which may influence your decision.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





serefin99 posted:

FYI, I think you used the wrong screenshots at the beginning of the update. The first one is Wheat grabbing his whiskey and the second is him handing some of it to you.

Fixed, thanks for the heads up!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Votes are in, Sonia is out, but by popular request I'll try to show off what happens when you boot a party member. From what I've heard it happens inconsistently.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Ambush of Sheer loving Incompetence

This update features naked titties so maybe don't open this one at work.



I hope people aren't mad that I'm just summarizing some of the minor NPCs, but I transcribe all this poo poo from screenshots so it takes a while.

Dead horses! Ghouls! Dungeons! Pornography! Straight up naked tits! Dreaming! Bugs!

I'm now willing to say that, yes, this is the worst game I have ever played. Do not buy this game. Do not give the devs money.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





PEE-PEE INTO FOO-FOO



The developers desperately want this to seem ominous, but they are also marketing it to Lovecraft fans who have actually read his stories and are just rolling their eyes at how loving tedious and unoriginal this poo poo is.

Also this game actually does something kind of right for once. I'm as shocked as you are.

Madness! Prostitutes! Misunderstanding Lovecraft! Incompetence! Mi-go! BRAINS!

Apparently Wikipedia claims it could be Nyarlathotep or a Mi-go. Personally I think Wikipedia is full of poo poo.

TheGreatEvilKing fucked around with this message at 08:39 on Jul 18, 2020

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Stop! Put those brains down!



Detectives! Brains! Incest! Poetry!

Apparently Cultic Games announced their second game, which is about a broken family as seen by a housecat. I can't wait to see how they gently caress this one up! Is there going to be a meow button that formats your hard drive? Who knows! The possibilities are endless!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Keldulas posted:

I start the update and it starts with incredibly floral verbal diarrhea about Stanley's corpse. Try saying that poo poo all in one breath. That thing's an excessively run-on sentence, never mind how stupid it sounds.

I think they're trying to ape Lovecraft and his love of stuffing adjectives in long descriptive sentences. I went back and looked and yeah, that's terrible.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Tylana posted:

I don't want to make LPing this awful mess any harder but... would it be possible for in the screenshots to either mouse over the option you are going to take, or none of them? Or is it because the selected option is less readable in screenshots?

So one thing I have noticed but not mentioned in the LP is that the game gets blurrier with more lost sanity. As mentioned, the selected option is getting transcribed. Let me know if there's still an issue and we'll figure something out.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Let's Not Talk About Manifest Destiny



So I am by no means an expert in Abenaki culture, but this really doesn't seem like a flattering portrayal?

Racism! Ghosts! Manifest destiny! Sad magicians! Women in refrigerators! Pazuzu!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





It's Not Nativism! We Swear!



I'm really running out of ways to say "the developers did not understand their source material and are also incompetent", but that's the crux of this. I will die of shock if the cat game is actually good.

Ghosts! Stabbings! Terrible Old Men! Misreading Lovecraft yet again! Nodens! Suicide attempts!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





BisbyWorl posted:

So if you botch talking the Nameless Soldier down from suicide, does he actually kill himself? Does it actually take and leave us down a party member forever?

I can't find any sources either way, there are a few hints on reddit that he dies. If we proc the encounter again I'll savescum it.

That said, Sonia is still at Cornuto's so we can still have a full party. I suspect she is still level 3.


Narsham posted:

So they really have the pirate ghosts demand that you present evidence of their guilt in a dialogue tree when the game has already ensured that you are a witness to the last murder?

“I GUESS IT MUST HAVE BEEN SOME OTHER PIRATE GHOSTS AND I HAVE THE WRONG HOUSE?”

Yes. It's a whole long interrogation where you have to explain the murder weapon and the motive and blah blah blah from your investigation and reading Fredkin's work. It's again weird to me they made the pirate ghosts the murderers and absolved the TOM of all responsibility, or that the ghosts are immune to everything we can do despite Bertha having the occult power to bind and summon ghosts . For bonus points we get the lead jar that the original TOM used to put pirates in but we of course cannot learn to summon ghosts in combat, pirate or otherwise.


NAME REDACTED posted:

Also, I'm becoming mildly concerned that continuing this LP is a form of self-harm. You doing okay? This seems... Just Awful.

I play these games so you don't have to! Joking aside, I get a lot of cartharsis out of dissecting these games that insist that you play them for the story, subjecting them to the standard they think they hold up to, and laughing as they flop like a fish.

We're almost at least halfway done with the game I think. I'm trying to come up with material for a postmortem on the first half but there's so little here and what's here is just...bad. At least Numenera and Ash of Gods pretended to be about things!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





The Amount of Sheer loving Incompetence On Display Is Amazing



I keep thinking "ok, I've seen the worst this game has to offer" and it keeps getting worse!

Cultists! Necronomicon! Inept coding! Dogs! Psychopathy! WoOoOoOoOoO!!!!!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Clap your hands, seals!



Look at the Lovecraft references, nerds! Clap! Clap your hands like trained seals!

Cthulhu awkwardly shoehorned in! Technicolor Mary Poppins! Cultists! Game crashing bugs!

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Keldulas posted:

Is the next game going to be an outright virus or something? There's an uncomfortable quality dip with each successive game...

Honestly this game is bad enough I don't think I can find something worse that's not some weird disgusting sex game. Not sure what's next - was debating Pathfinder Kingmaker, Tyranny, or that Kingdoms of Amalur remake we are getting for some reason.

Alternatively I could do something I really enjoy, but where's the fun in that?

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Sweet Jesus Make The Hurting Stop



In today's episode of Stygian, we see one thing that actually works while the rest of the game falls apart into bugs, references, and dickmutants.

Cultists! Branding! Physical abuse! Religion! Movies! Ultraviolence! Something actually works! Bugs! Mutants with dicks hanging out!

Incidentally, i found a video of the theater cutscene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AuNAVPO5rsQ. I can grab my own at some point, but I'm actually amazed they put together a legit horror sequence without some rear end in a top hat dropping in a wall of misspelled adjectives with pointless Lovecraft references.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





The Care and Feeding of Dickmutants



Surgery! Colors! Space! Being bad at science! Witch Houses! Bad Game Design! The Point of No Return!

We have...three more areas to get through, which should take an update each, one vote, and then the exciting ending of Stygian!

Also I have off this week, so I might just force this game to whatever godawful conclusion these devs came up with.

TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Yea, I have no idea how the game expects you to do this because there are no hints this is even possible or something you can build for.

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TheGreatEvilKing
Mar 28, 2016





Duel of the Cornutos



The second to last update of this god-awful shitshow. It's been...not that long of a journey, and thank God. I, for one, am not about to complain that the meal was garbage and the portions were too small.

Spooky Occult Symbols! Shadows! Giant rats! Mental institutions! Marino being a creep! Aliens! Doctors! Lobotomy! Black Pyramids! TROLLEYS!

Decisions Lie Before Us!

Who are we sacrificing to the pyramid, The Nameless Soldier or The Outsider?

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