A DnD Tale: Waterdeep: Dragon Heist - Night of the Scarecrow

Arise, children of the dead!

Finally got another session going on the Dragon Heist game. With the mission to investigate the Scarecrow incidents in the northern fields they begin collecting information from the locals. Apparently it has been happening for almost a month, the same amount of time that they have been in Waterdeep. Apparently it coincides with the finding of an emerald stone in the fields, which they get is the stone that the wizards of the wine is looking for that have been taken by the city guard. Also, everyone think it's Hope and Immeral and Madam Eve that is the culprits since they think the ship they came with is full of witches. But I think I will let it be the necromancer from the second quest, but I have to make a story out of it.

So, they pay one farmer to use the roof for lookout since it appears the Scarecrows appear when a moon shows up, so I start using the weather chart in the DMG, which is kinda fun, since it spells constant rain for two days until the night before the full-moon when they finally can stalk the place. Of course, having a side-business they have to plan ahead a bit which leads to a fun conversation when Immeral gets picked for the first shift since Hope is the bartender and Freja is the entertainment. Immeral observes some rats trying to escape the field as the night lingers on until the others can join him, being kept at the bar due to some extra customers appearing. 

After getting together they begin watching until around midnight when they notices that three scarecrows have disappeared from their posts. Freja uses her speak with plant spell to talk to the maize to locate the scarecrows, but of course in true horror movie trope the scarecrow finds them first and surrounds them. Lucky for our heroes they are able to use the maize to restrain one of them while they hammer on the others. One of the Scarecrows actually got of its terrifying gaze on Hope, sadly for me it died right after making it rather worthless. I begin to see the problem with level 8 characters in an adventure for level 1.

They beat them up, get the reward from the Emerald Grove or whatever they are called and the game ends pretty much after that. Not much happened actually, but they got a fight scene and some roleplaying moments, as well as the first week of payment which they got the max payment out of (after two re-rolls since my sisters can't roll for anything). I was rather giving since I don't get how you can actually make money on this since it's very little for three people to share so I don't get how it's worth your time?

Sofiya and the Ancient Clan (Switch)

She was a magic girl!

Well, after finishing a 140 hours JRPG you really need something easier to  just reset the mind after pouring so much emotion into one game. And what's better than a cheap retro-platformer game that sells itself on sexiness that is developed by a company called  Hentai Room... wait, that wasn't in the description of the game! Whelp, I'm glad it's a couple of years to I turn 40 cause this is getting sad. I just saw the comercials on the Switch and it was gonna be a metroidvania like puzzle plattformer with very good graphics... mostly amazing backgrounds and yes, good sprites, especially the voluptuous main character that can't stand still making her bossom jiggle constantly. I'm probably beyond shame at this point. And what happened with the Metroidvania-elements I thought I saw? Damn those jiggle physics!

The story being that there was two clans with different philosophies on using magic, a war broke out and one side destroyed the other and now the witch Sofiya have learned the magic of the ancient clan that was destroyed and set out to stop her former master that destroyed the ancient clan. Pretty straightforward. So instead of a single metroidvania map, we instead get 3 chapters with a bit over 10 parts in each chapters. You jump around throwing magic spells defeating enemies, get to the end defeat a boss and find different books that give you pixelated picture with lewd art that tells a bit of story. Only a couple of hours. A bit stiff controls and such, but it works. Not fan of the instant kill spikes that is the most dangerous thing about the game. Overall, a distraction at most.

I thought that was that, but turns out I went into a rabbit hole by looking up this game. It was pretty much a hentai-game in its original release (well, when the developer is Hentai Room, I should probably have expected that). For example, I thought it was strange with a lot close-ups of Sofiya in the books with some lewd description and hinting of other people in the conversation. Turns out it was straight-up sex scenes. Ok, and one of the gimmicks of the game was that Sofiya could have sex with defeated enemies to get potions for health and magic. And the games original name was Sexcraft: Sofiya and the lewd clan. Clearly, I got the inferior version, this made the story make sense at least. Well, the console version have a bit of replayability in that you are fully powered up meaning you can defeat enemies fast if you go back to the first chapter and so, but I think you would get more from the uncensored release, even if it's just material for ones alone time. Console, one and done. Still, looks good and sounds good, a bit short overall. 

Look at those huge tracts of land!... I was talking about the backgrounds you perverts! Geez!

Xenoblade Chronicles 3 (Switch)

 

Well, we got the green grass in every other main game.

The latest in the Xenoblades series, actually the 4th game in the series, but since X is standalone compared to the others it might not count (still waiting for that X-2 or better yet, a Switch-port of X). It begins with the boy Noah together with his friends Lanz, Eunie and Joran running to watch the fireworks and then the timestops. And then we get the set up for the world. There is an eternal war between the nations of Keves and Agnian as they fight for supremacy. Killing enemies fills the flame clocks of their mobile bases and depending what level you reached you get more or less resources, all trying to get to gold class and a chance to end the war. The other way is to reach ten terms in the war and get the homecoming, a ritual back at the castle where they send the bodies, almost like Logan's Run with reaching 30 years old. It's actually 20 here. So we have child soldiers that are grown in tubes at the castle, get one year of training and then sent out for war in 9 years. Survival rate not high as we can understand. They are transfered to colonies that are lead by a commander that report to a consul that reports to the queen. Noah and gang belongs to Colony 9... ha! Nice reference!

One day after destroying an enemy colony Noah, Lanz and Eunie, together with the one month away from homecoming (aka retirement) Mwamba is sent on a special mission when an unknown energy have been located. Noah and gang belong to Keves and the Agnians have been sent out as well. During skirmishes between them the unknown energy seems to be from a cloaked ship that contains humans and are lead by... Vandham? From 2? Same voice as well. Great. He was on a mission to get an "egg" to "the city", but was shot down. Noah and friends fights the Agnians soldiers Mio, Sena and Taion. Vandham stops them from killing each other and activates the egg that gives them the power off Ouroboros. At the same time the real enemy behind all this appears, Mobieus. Who just happens to kill Mwamba... oh no, so close to retirement. This was a joke my friends made while watching the Ridley Scott Robin Hood, it was the same laughter here. They drive him of with their new powers, Vandham still croaks, but tell them to go to the city and escape the war. They don't listen, but go back to their own colonies, who now begin hunting them since they have been marked by Mobieus. They reunite and head of together, along with Riku and Manana, their nopon companions (and Riku is the most tolerable nopon in the whole series). 

Their travels take them around the world as they free the colonies on both sides with Lucky Seven, a sword Riku made that Noah got and is able to cut through anything (which he only uses to destroy flame clocks in cut scenes). It's revealed that Mobieus controls everything, the queen being robots and the consuls being Mobieus themselves. They are pure evil in their sadistic nature as they seem to delight in the suffering of humans, watching them on a screen, using them as chess pieces. Killing is just more fun for them. The city turns out being descendants of the first Ouroboros that began fighting Mobieus. Best moment in game is when the players have infiltrated a prison to get information on where the real queen of Agnus is hiding, but they are betrayed and it turns out that two of Mobieus, N and M is... I would say clones, but I think it's the other way around, or that both are clones of Noah and Mio. They get captured and Evil!Noah separates Mio and the rest as she only have one month left before homecoming where her body disintegrates. At the same time Mio and Noah had developed feelings for each others and that moment as he tries in vain to break out from prison, screaming her name as Evil!Noah describes in details how he will enjoy tormenting Noah with this. Spoilers, but it turns out Evil!Mio switched places with Mio so that she could end the constant cycle of death and destruction around her, which sends Evil!Noah into madness. 

You find the queen and it turns out that it's Nia from 2 and the queen of Keves is Melia from 1. Apparently the two universes that was created by the experiment by Klaus was on the verge of merging so to counter that the queens created origin to... restart the worlds after the merger? I thought so, but after getting it to work at the end it seemed like the universes was divided again? I don't get that really. Before that though it was hijacked by Mobieus led by Z that at the merging of the universes freeze time and created this constant world of war... why? Maybe to give life to Mobieus? After finishing the game and defeating Z, I still get what Mobieus deal was. They just appears to be sadist with no goal. The main thing they talk about during the end battle is that Z is some personification of fear that is clung to the present and don't dare to go into the future, to change... I get why the human Mobieus does it, they fear dying, but I don't get Z. That's where the game fell apart for me, it's no finding Elysium, or defeating the Mechonis, or finding the ship with all the people of Earth. Which isn't fair since the games play better than 2 since I actually got the chain link system and such, and no random system in side characters, here you do quest and get them and make another quest to level them up. And gems are back from one, but you only have a set that is shared between all the characters so just upgrade them and pick and chose for you. And the damn collection could be exchanged with Noppon coins instead, diminishing the aggravation to find every single item to upgrade weapons, classes or such. 

(After reading some reddit threads on the game it seems that Z was fueled by the fears of the people stored in Origin and keeping them in an eternal stage of war feeds that and continues to support Z) 

Music is fine,  the flute that is thematic for the game is an acquired taste, but it isn't bad. Graphics are on par with 2. Most fun is I got the game one day early so I could play it before anyone else, sadly it was the first week after my vacation so it still took me 5 weeks to finish the 140 hours to reach the end. And I had to restart the final battle after getting beaten at the very last second when my healers fell. So I used all my bonus exp to go from lvl 77 to 93, meaning it went a lot better. Didn't want to replay the three phases more than twice. Gameplay probably the best, but I still prefer X, and 1 story above this. I don't know about 2. It also freeze on me once so I had to restart from the last save, twice the sound went out of sync with the game.

Overall, good game, interesting concepts from the start with the black and white analogy, pacifism, war. One thing I don't agree with was some anglo-saxians saying it was a critique of capitalism... in what way is it about capitalism? There are two monarchies with a complete pyramid of resource distributions depending on how good at killing things you are. Really, they get out of that by trading with each other and not giving, but actually trading different things they have stocked and such. I guess it was an American that made that remark and they missing the points since the left seems to have wired to only see "capitalism bad" that they can't read it in any other way. Give me strength! *Ahem* Where was I? Yeah, the ending feels kinda flat and it seems to be most shared thoughts of the game. 

Phoenix Wright : Ace Attorney 3 - Trials and Tribulations (Switch)

The end of the beginning!

Third and last game in the original Ace Attorney Trilogy. Begins 5 years before present time where you don't take on the role as Phoenix, but Mia Fey defending Phoenix Wright from the accusation of murder together with Marvin Grossman by her side. There she exposes the vile machinations of Dalia Hawthorn, the demoness that have several people on her non-existent conscious. Really, half the cases seems to be either Fey or Phoenix Wright himself so I wonder what pays for all this?

Second case begins with not a murder case, but a case of the stolen family urn off the Fey family as it was being shown off in an exhibition. But the case turn bloody as a the same time as the theft an apparent murder takes place in the office of a security office. And they introduces the new prosecutor, Godot. So Phoenix gonna protect the man behind the mask of... Mask*deMasque. A very timid man named Ron Delite that apparently got himself married to the very carefree spender Dessie Delite... in her very nice biker outfit that... captures the curves... *ahem* What was I talking about?

I mean, look at her?

And it's also a blatant Columbo reference as to pin the theft on the culprit they use fingerprints from the investigator on the item from the episode with the art critic, you know the one where Columbo pulls out his hands wearing gloves during the gotcha-moment? Third case involve trying again to protect Maggy Byrde from being wrongfully accused of murder, this time in connection to loan firms, mobsters and computer viruses that destroys the police ability to work. Oh, and a phoney Phoenix Wright that put her as guilty the first time around. Fourth case is another look back where Mia defended Terry Fawles, a mentally challenged death row inmate that is accused of killing a police officer Hawthorne... wait, it's the same name as that other girl? And Edgeworth makes his first appearance in court as a prosecutor. No investigation in this one, but begins to tie the whole story together. 

Fifth and final chapter is the culmination of the series, getting references to all three games and solving mysteries unexplained. What happened to Misty Fey, Mia and Maya's mother? What is Morgan Fey gonna do to exact revenge on the main Fey family? We see Edgeworth and Franziska back in action as they duke it out in the courtroom as Phoenix lies in high fever at a hospital after falling from a burning rope bridge as he tried to reach Maya. So far he has broken through two doors and risked his life for her. It's a great ending and ties it all together... but I think prefer the ending case of Justice For All. Mostly since the threat level is there from the beginning. Maya's life is supposedly in danger from the moment she is trapped on the mountain after the bridge collapses, but it only gradually becomes apparent the danger she's in since we don't think the murder occurred there until the second day, and then the police already fixed the bridge. I mean, the assassin was there from the first 15 minutes of the case.

Overall, it doesn't have the low-point of the last game so it's on average probably better, but you get the same mechanic in case 3 where everything you press is a penalty, but I give it the benefit that the character in question is actually is someone "scary" so I buy that compared to annoying. And all the defendants are actually likeable. Which reminds me that I also have Apollo Justice on 3DS and I think I'm at the case with the mobster boy... *shudder*. Music is not as good as the second game, that one had force behind it. Also, I get the impression here is where they really upped the quirks of people in the court. The coffee-drinking Godot slowed down the game a bit more than earlier games and it will only accelerate from here when everyone is supposed to be doings quirks.

The trilogy overall, great. Although it's the same package as from the 3DS, they couldn't have thrown in concept art or such as they did for the Great Attorney games? It's a bit empty I mean. Been fun to revisit it. A problem though is that certain characters just disappeared after these games. Gumshoe that was there in the beginning haven't appeared beyond the Investigation games and a small cameo in Apollo Justice pre-present time case. Larry, Edgeworth and Pearl have made their presence known and even Maya. But the others? That was also fun to see characters appear again and again to build together the whole universe and I miss that. Hardly done by the characters in the new games either besides the lawyers. I think only Ema Skye would qualify actually. Well, summer vacation for 2022 is about to be over for my part so let's see what I figure out next.

Phoenix Wright 2: Justice For All (Switch)

Justice for one, justice for all
You get what you give when you've broken the law
Know what it costs before you commit
Don't start a fight, I won't let you win it

 The sequel. Begins with Phoenix getting hit in the head and having amnesia forcing him to relearn everything how it works against the starter prosecutor. Interesting enough it has a very peculiar cutscene in a dream sequence when Phoenix stands on a cliff and the judge strike him down while that horror music from Bach is playing. The rest is protecting this innocent police aspirant from the murder charge against her boyfriend. The real criminal was some paranoid scammer... which doesn't tie in to the rest of the game and is actually set between case 2 and 3. Mostly it's probably to keep Maya out of the way for reveal in the end. Which is nice since it's so fun to see them together again. 

Case 2 is their meeting each other again when a client of Phoenix requested a spiritual seance with Maya to get a dead nurse to admit to being responsible for 14 deaths at his hospital. Also have a nice cutscene with a car speeding though on the highway and crashing and exploding in flames with one survivor. This chapter is more learning about the Kurain spiritual technique that Maya uses to summon Mia. And introduce Pearl, Maya's cousin and probably the stronger medium since she actually is from the main branch of the family, but due to her mother's lack of spiritual power it was passed to Mia and Maya's mother who's been missing since the DL-6 incident from the first game. It sets up Morgan Fey as an arch-villain for this and the next game. It also gives us the psych-locks which is a mini cross-examination to learn secrets from people to get evidence or such to help in the trail. New prosecutor for the series is  Franziska von Karma that whips everyone.

Playing with hearts, is a dangerous game
So don't play with mine, I'll put you to shame
It's an eye for an eye, you're in a blind rage
And I'm standing my ground, no I'm not afraid

Case 3... pretty much seen as the worst case of the original trilogy. You have to defend a stage magician from a murder in the circus. Where you have an unfunny clown, an obnoxious ventriloquist and one episode in the trial where you can't press the witness (the clown) since he does a joke and you get penalised for it. Also, is it just me or is everyone fawning over the animal tamer a bit... gross? I mean, first off, she's 16 and the suitors range from 21 to 30... and to top it off, she appears a bit... mentally challenged? I didn't have that much trouble the first time playing and it's one of the more sadder episodes when it comes to why the murder happened. 

Then comes case 4, I would argue the best case so far. First off, it's the most callbacks to the first game, you're at the hotel where April May was observing the murder of Mia Fey. Powell, Oldbag and Lotta shows up and Edgeworth reappears with the greatest theme music in the series (for real this time). They use it like 4 times and every time it just pumps the mood. You have an assassin that kidnaps Maya to force Phoenix to defend the superstar actor so you have stakes in this. Franziska gets shot, Gumshoe gets fired and crashes his car racing to the courthouse with crucial evidence and Edgeworth returns to the prosector stand after spending a year away... I assume looking into the assassin's overall activities. This case, not a single bad thing about it. This is the high point of the game and I think my original statement included the whole trilogy. 

Sadly no extra 5th case in this version. But you got to search for electronic bugs in the final chapter which together with the blood and fingerprint in the last chapter from the first game would work for a detective series. I don't recall investigations worked like that, but that would have been fun. They introduced the ability to show people as well making it a more intuitive way to ask people about different people. Still the same thing with evidence that they aren't able to investigate them. Overall, the final case makes it wonderful, the second case you need to get the payoff in the next game, same thing with the first case since it affects another case in the third game. If you could I would maybe skip the 3rd case, but it has a point for a chapter in the newer games (I think it may have been one of the extra cases and not a main one, but it was so long ago I can't remember, probably with the murdering whale). 

A DnD Tale: Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft - Return to the house on haunted hill

 

What is a man?

Well, adding another player to the main campaign stopped that thread. I can't say that I'm surprised when that sister is a bit away compared to the others... and have family of her own. But what should we who want to play a bit more frequently? Well, I got a stack of books that doesn't add into the main campaign idea so why not try something else in the meanwhile? So we started the introduction adventure of the Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft, House of Lament. 

It's basically Death house from Curse of Strahd, but with enough difference to make it interesting. It has an ouija board for example and seances. One month after defeating Strahd Immeral and Hope gets a letter with directions and the hint of treasures. They set out once again got lost in the mists. They approach a crossroad where they see the figure of a man, but as they approach it turns toward them with its yellow eyes and flies away with its black wings. Two black feather remains and a planchette. A light brakes through the mist and leads them to a hill where a three-stored mansions stand with a tower. As they approach a door opens and they are greeted by van Richten who is yet again on an investigation. He invites them in and they set up shop in the parlor where there is an ouija board. Immeral and Hope walks around the bottom floor seeing visions of ghosts, Immeral nearly strangled by the vines in the conservatory, both getting an ear-bleeding scream in the ballroom and finding a muffin in an oven and having 15 minutes discussion if it was safe to eat or they would get poisoned. They get up to the second floor, but van Richten calls them down to start the seance.

They sit near the board and summons the spirit of Theodora, the last lady of the house and that was killed by the "hungry ones" (which I stole from a dialog bit later in the adventure), she told them to look for the witch stone and then she disappeared. As midnight have gone past van Richten began locking the doors, tying them with a rope and writing holy symbols on them to ward evil spirits before going to bed near the fire place. The others followed suit. In the night Hope gets a dream about a knight in a skull helmet trap someone in the wall, then she wakes up and she is trapped what appears to be a coffin. She is not strong enough to break out and screams for help. Meanwhile van Richten awakens Immeral and asks where Hope is. She is gone leaving no trace. Van Richten performs an augery and concludes that she is somewhere below earth. Immeral remembers the door to the basement they found in the kitchen. They go down and find her banging from within a wine casket that they break down. At the same time they hear the sound of meows from the back of the wine cellar. Van Richten uses the spell light too illuminate it and they see several grishkens, cat-like monster. They return up and end the session.

Fun beginning, not much prep time since we agreed on it the day before so I hadn't the greatest idea on how to make it all jell, but it worked out. We also put some restrictions like, no exp since we couldn't level up due to this being set in between the campaigns and my other sister wanting to play. They are still level 8 so they are way and beyond leveled for this campaign, but they are alone so no problem there. This will probably be something like 2-3 more sessions before being finished and will probably be enough. 

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (Switch)

 

Breaking the law! Breaking the law!

So I had to replay the Ace Attorney trilogy after playing the latest games in the series, and of course you start from the beginning. Which I apparently did in 2020 by playing the intro chapter and nothing more. Finished it in a couple of days and what a nice nostalgia ride it was. Last time was back in 2015... or maybe 2014, but I think I at the time still were rather close to play and release compared to now when I got something like 10 months of post already in the cue.

So, as I wrote back in 2015, the story of Phoenix Wright trying to help Miles Edgeworth leave the darkness that hangs above him, rumours of false evidence and so on. And now I watched a couple of Columbo episodes I can quite see a possible inspiration from that series. I mean, someone mentioned that Columbo was about an apparent bumbling police detective taking on the high and mighty who believed themselves to be untouchable by the law, and that premise is very much here. The defendant is someone everyone already dooms and it can't be that rich, famous or powerful person. So much so that I wonder if Gumshoe is actually an homage with the coat. The first chapter just establishing Phoenix, Mia Fey and Larry Butz in order to show off the gameplay. Second chapter is the death of Mia and the accusation against Maya Fey, Mia's sister. Third is the Steel Samurai episode that made me cheat my way through the whole game on the 3DS, which I didn't do this time (maybe due to having a save function that allows for easy retry, still got caught on some pixel hunting episodes). Fourth and final original chapter on the original GBA game is the trail of Miles Edgeworth. And I got a say, it feels rather short so I get adding another chapter for the DS version, but the ending feels right here. It's a bit like Ni No Kuni where there is a natural end, and then a tacked on chapter after for the upgrade to better console (in that case from DS to PS3). 

I'm not the only one seeing that right? He even have a dog!

Fifth chapter on the other hand is great. We have actual investigating to do. Ema Skye brings both finger prints and blood stains hunt, and to be honest I was listening to a couple of Gabriel Knight 3 playthroughs and I had some great cravings for that kinda gameplay. Of course Ace Attorney don't give the whole experience since it amounts to... what, 3 finger prints and 6 blood stains? They of course changed how it worked a bit since the 3DS had a touch screen as well as a microphone to blow away the dust, all changed to buttons now... thank god. Don't recall how often I had problems with the microphone not working correctly with the earphones plugged in. We can also investigate items in 3D which made it a lot more fun since otherwise the only thing you could do was press statements to change the meaning of evidence. The chapter also deals with corruption in the very top of the criminal law enforcement.

Bad things with it... I now get why I get the newer games to be a bit boring, they are so slow compared to this game. The statements fly by and it's easy to rush through if you press again and again. It doesn't work like that in the newer games, which is obviously blamed on the shift to 3d characters who has to show every quirk. I mean, Enoch in the Great Attorney 2 used what, like 15 seconds on every statement showing him doing the robot. You get the same problem here since they made a video tape I believe is made with 3d characters that move so slow and you can't fast forward enough. Other than that, it was a great game. The graphics are nice and the music top notch. Everything from the awaiting the trail to the piecing together to evidence to... wait, there's no Edgeworth theme here? Did they introduce it in the next game with Franziska von Karma's theme first? Well, that make me looks bad in the last post.