Ducktales (2017)

 

Woo-Hoo!

Had to watch the reboot series after the original. And... it's fine. It had some really fun moments. My sisters complained about the art style since it wasn't the original one, but I didn't mind, it looked much closer to Carl Barks drawings if I'm gonna be honest. And the references to all Disney afternoon-series like Gummi Bears, Rescue Rangers, Goof Troop, Darkwing Duck and Talespin made it rather fun for someone like me. Music also fine, but it's nothing compared to Ron Jones original. Best actually when they referenced the other shows.

Good things is actually have story arcs that tie everything together. Introducing Della Duck beyond the Don Rosa picture and the letter from the first Donald and nephews short. Also separating the nephews personalities so that they stand out from each other. Problem is that they are kinda unlikeable, Dewey with his self-importance and Louie with his greed. Huey probably the only likeable, but he also needs to be the center of things which the Junior Woodchuck episode showed. And all the kids have some kind of ADHD. Also, the humour can be fun, but I also feels that the meta-commentary and "hip" language makes it really dated and irritating at times. There is also that due to all that make the show feel cynical, take Gyro Gearloose who can't be a wacky inventor, instead a disgruntled employee of Scrooge that invents robots that threatens to take over the world because his mentor took his first robot and made it a destruction machine.

Yes, this is a scene where a supposed ghost strangles Scrooge McDuck, all played with suspenseful music, no equivalent scene in the new series.

Also the ending episode... works fine, but I can't say that it is as epic as the original ending. Here is just feels dumb since the main bad guy tries to stop adventuring, I think the meta-humour get a bit to strong meaning they can't make a serious threat. The original had the golden death engulfing the world, but that would be taking it seriously so instead we get something about family and clones and all with more references to the Disney Afternoon. Glomgold is another hint at that since here he is just stupid, he was threatening at times in the original, but here he is just a joke about his schemes. Actually, everyone is stupid to a higher degree than in the original. So mixed bag really. Might be nostalgia since I grew up with the original, but it felt more serious and the music really made it feel like it. This one is watchable and has great moments, but I would say nothing beats the original.

I mean, it didn't get more scary than this back in 1987 (or 1991 for this particular moment).

Tales of Symphonia Remastered (Switch)

You Inferior... Being!

Had to get this game, the first Tales-game I played and as I think still the best one, for the most part. Story is that the world of Sylverant is dying so as the Tower of Salvation appears the chosen Colette sets out with her friends Lloyd (the main character) and Genies on a pilgrimage to save the world. On their journey they have their teacher Raine, who is Genies older sister and Kratos, a mercenary paid to protect the chosen since the last several chosen have failed (I assume). They fight the evil Desians, half-elves operating from human ranches where they enslave humans to create exspheres, crystals that will empower the user under the right conditions, otherwise it turns you into a monster. So this part is basically Final Fantasy X, you travel the world visiting temples and Lloyd learns that Colette as the chosen has to sacrifice herself for the world to regenerate it. Meanwhile they encounter the assassin Sheena that intends to kill Colette, but ends up joining them. So, at the tower of Salvation Colette loses her soul and the truth is revealed, that the order of angels, Cruxius that is behind it actually is behind the Desians as well and uses the regeneration journey to balance the worlds of Sylverant and Tethe'alla (the opposing world that have been phased into a parallel dimension) as they fight for the sliver of Mana that is generated by the Karhlan seed.

They travel to Tethe'alla and meet the chosen of that world, Zelos, and girl named Presea and Regal, a convict on death road that was the former duke and president of a big company. They uncover the truth that 4 000 years earlier, the half-elf Mithos Yggdrasill ended the Kharlan War by splitting the worlds in two and now heads the organisation Cruxius in order to create a vessel for his sister Martel that died at the end of the war after being betrayed by a human. As well as creating the Age of the Half-elves by making everyone into lifeless beings in order to end discrimination as elves and humans shuns the half-elves. Basically a communist! He succeeds in using Colette to bring Martel to life again, but she just calls him out on his foolishness before deciding to give Colette back her body. He goes on a rampage as his friends and family have now all abandoned him, you get the power to wield the Eternal Sword in order to set it back, but you have to fight Mithos once again and after that set all right. Well, at least till the sequel.

I loved the game as a kid, it was rather complicated with several fractions fighting each other with spies everywhere, including in your own group. The moral of discrimination is bad is done very good with both racial and class aspects. But this Tales-game has the best villain of all I have played, you sympathise with Mithos, the great hero (and I learned way to late that the voice actor for older Mithos is Tidus in Final Fantasy X). And as his broken body just mutters "I'm going home", when you know he has been cast out by everyone. It's also rather fun to replay with the different ways you can play it, temples can be done in varied orders, your affection for different characters gives differences to certain scenes and you can actually play as different characters for the most part. The music is fine (made by famed Golden Sun composer Motoi Sakuraba) and the graphics still looks good, although looking at the original Gamecube on a modern TV I gotta say, the pixelated remnants as you move looks rather hideous. Which brings us to the remastered version on Switch... and it doesn't look good.

First off, I can accept that it isn't the original intro from the Gamecube version, and 30 FPS verses 60 FPS don't bother me that much either. But god damn, the loading times after finishing a battle can drive you nuts and then we have the lost effect of glass breaking as you enter combat. Doesn't help that the frame rate drops something fierce at "intense" areas, for example the very first town Triet and its desert storm or the amusement park with its attractions. I mean, everyone have already mentioned this, but the remaster is bad on the Switch. Now, as of writing they have mentioned that they are looking into fixing some of the problems (probably helped that the Switch version is apparently the best selling version), but who knows how long that will take (well, as of release of this post they have at least released two patches fixing some issues), Chrono Cross took a year to get an update. I might not replay it on Gamecube again since it looks worse now (even if it might play better), but the PS3 version might look like the better choice (it plays better than the Switch, looks better than the Gamecube and you have the Trophies for yet another reason to replay it). If they fix it the ease of play might make it worth it, but since it also misses the sequel (that was in the package for the PS3 and I have the original for the Wii) it might even put PS3 above the fixes as well). Stupid me also got the Chosen edition with a steel case and several poster cards. Strange decision to not include a normal red case, but I'm not that bothered, but my boss told me he preferred normal cases so that it looked uniformly. Well, it was fun watching the credits again... wait, the credits are also stuttering? God dammit!

Ducktales (1987)

Woo-Hoo!

Well, what Disney show to continue with? Well, why not the best one of them all, the original Ducktales. Of course it's good, it came out in 1987 like every good thing ever. Basic plot is that Donald Duck has left his nephews Huey, Louie and Dewey at their great uncle Scrooge McDuck so they go out on adventures for more treasures or stoping the reacurring enemies of Flintheart Glomduck, the Beagle Boys or Magica De Spell.

The second season introduced the characters Bubba the cave duck and Fenton Crackshell and his alter-ego Gizmoduck while getting rid of supporting characters like Doofus Drake, Donald Duck and shrinking the different Beagle Boys into the 4 regulars. 100 episodes total and a movie to boot. Being an avid Donald Duck reader this was the best way of getting to see your favourite characters on TV. Of course, season one was the best one, which incidentally was the one we sporadically had a couple of episodes taped on VHS or even bought some of the official VHS. The official ones are a real rip-off I might add, 2 episodes on a VHS which you gotta pay full price for. 

The official ones we had was the Lost Crown of Genghis Khan and the Money Vanishes (which was my tape) and Hotel Strangeduck and Super-Doo (which was one of my sisters). I also recalls one time I was sick and mom or dad had rented the tape with the Phantom Blot stealing the invisible jet (and I think it was the Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde that was together with it, hard to remember as I was sick but a faint memory of a Sherlock Holmes parody appeared in my head). The taped one was the viking episode, the killer whale sub and Aqua Ducks, Double-0-Duck, Scrooge First Dime, the hypnotist that get Donald to steal the navy's sub and Nothing to Fear. They also showed season 2 and onward on the Swedish public channel from 1991 so we taped all those episodes (except Scrooge Last Adventure for some reason, don't know why we didn't have that). We had one episode in english which was the Valentine episode with Aphroducky so my parents had to have taped it when they showed the valentine special back in 1990. That episode is also a bit strange since it's from season 3, but it doesn't feature either Bubba or Fenton so I always assumed it was part of the first season and it fits right in there, and I assume the intro wasn't there on the recording we had cause I think I would have been extremely confused by seeing Bubba and Gizmoduck in the opening (they were there when they showed the Swedish version, but then I was accustomed to their presence). 

Overall, rewatching it now I find it to be more fun than I remember. Could be due to watching it in english and getting a lot more of the references, and realising it actually is references. Also having gotten a taste for satirical parody and political topics. You can see the quality dropped a bit after season 1 (the colours aren't popping like the first season for instance). Another good thing is that the voices are more coherent than the Swedish version, Glomgold, Launchpad and even the ducklings changes voices from season to season, and worst is probably Bubba that changed voice from his first episode to the second (and it's the same voice actor in Swedish). The Swedish version has its moment though, for example the Hotel Strangeduck had a great moment near the end when Strangeduck explains the plot and calls his assistant a "silly boy", in Swedish he says "what an idiot" which was really fun to me as a kid. Would love a physical blu-ray release so that I can future proof it. Also a big shout-out to Ron Jones that did the music, it was amazing as every cue heightened the action scenes, made you sad at the sentimental scenes and very scared for the intense thriller scenes. 

Chip & Dale - Rescue Rangers

Ch-Ch-Ch-Chip & Dale - Rescue Rangers

Haven't been playing any video game during the beginning of 2023, mostly not feeling it. But instead I got a craving for watching old Disney shows. Started with the complete collection of the Chip & Dale Rescue Ranger that they released on blu-ray to coincide with the release of the movie (which I haven't watched). 

Basically it tells the story of Chip and Dale as they solve crimes together with Gadget, Montgomery Jack and Zipper. Apparently supposed to be a sequel-series to Bernard and Bianca's The Rescuers, but they changed it to Chip and Dale since the movie wasn't that popular, which was proven when the sequel failed as well. They stop the dastardly plans of Dr Nimnul, Fat Cat and other criminals, or just solving problems caused by accidents. We watched these on Disney Time on Fridays on channel 1, recorded most of them on VHS as well. That was mostly from the later half of the show, the one where they didn't have the white plane and red balloon, but rather the brown aeroplane.

I liked the show as a kid, well most Disney adventure shows so maybe not so strange. And I gotta be honest, the Swedish dub makes the show much better. First off, Dr Nimnul? Dr Grym in Swedish (translated as Dr Cruel) and Fat Cat becomes Svinpäls (directly translated as Swine Fur, which is a Swedish insult) which makes the villains sound more evil. And I guess the dub had to use more voice actors since it isn't the same 5 voices all over.

So, the blu-ray collection. Only english voices so that is a bit sad. It's also in production order, not story (the little there is) so you have the problem that the introduction adventure of how the rescue rangers meet isn't the first episodes, but in the middle of disc 2 or something like that. No bells or whistles here, so no commentaries or documentaries, not even the music video of the theme song. So mostly bare bone, but if it's the only way to have a physical copy of the show you get what you can. The quality is mostly alright, but one episode isn't remastered since it appear it wasn't saved. I also found it strange that intro varied from episode to episode with good or bad quality.

A DnD Tale - Waterdeep: Dragon's Heist - The Undead Shall Rise Again!

Aren't you a bit short for a necromancer?

And we are back with the most action oriented session of all the played games. And with a new player as well, Ulf, the unlikely paladin. A human paladin that used to be a farmer boy until the age of seven when his village got slaughtered by demons but Ulf survived when a group of Helm paladins and saved him, or what's left of him since he has a peg-leg (I suspect his player have played some Diablo 1). He ends up in Waterdeep one night as the rain falls down and spots a person heading into an alleyway and some beeping sound. Curious he follows and overhears the person talking to someone in the alley about a stone and an explosion. The person grabs something from the person on the ground when two drows jumps down from the roof and ask Vincent Trench, the private detective from the Tiger's Eye agency to give them the stone so that Jarlaxle doesn't get cross with him. Ulf tries to intervene and as the surprised drows turn around Vincent pulls up sleeping powder and douses them. The commotion causes the city watch to come to their location so he drags Ulf with him so that he can report back to Barovian. 

They wake up in the morning and is informed by Parker that the City Watch apparently was burgled during the night, but no one ones what have been taken. Vincent appears with Ulf and gives them a map he took from the destroyed Nimblewright he found in the alley and warns them that a third party have been known, the Bregan D'aerthe so they better hurry to the Dock Ward the map points out. They end up at Mistshore where some thugs from the Xanathar Guild tries to break in to an old woman, but they subdue them and is told that the stone is hidden in her family mausoleum in the City of Dead. They head there but finds the crypt open and by the footprints they deduce that people have been here and taken the stone already, leaving only a steel key. As they leave 4 duergar shows up looking for the stone for the Bregan D'aerthe. They fight them off and heads to a locksmith that tells them it belongs to Losser Mirklav that lives in the sewer in the Trades Ward. They sneak in and finds the door the keys fits into and go through it. They find a hidden door and on the other side they notice shadows and sounds of several skeletons. Unlucky for them, Immeral stumbles alerting them of their presence so a battle ensues where they fight off 12 skeletons. On the other side at the other door they find Losser Mirklav as he mumbles about the stone was a small price to get his hands on the magical emerald from the City Watch.

He finishes to attach the emerald on his staff and he summons 3 skeletons and 2 zombies and accuses them for killing his skeletons. An intense battle start as they try to destroy the other creature's first and the heavy hitters strike at Losser which I bumped up to a full necromancer wizard with a CR 9 since they are level 8 and pretty much stomps over anything in this adventure. So at first chance he cast Circle of Death which kills one skeleton and puts all but one zombie on 1 HP while most of the players get 24 necrotic damage. Then he dies next round since they still can beat him up fairly easy. And here we had to end since we had to get going to a LiveQuiz at the local theater. 

That was a rather intense session, pushing them on a full day of adventure with the need for haste as they chased after the stone, and yet it ended up in the hands of the Xanathar guild. In the adventure you're actually supposed to go through several other shorter sequences like a chase through the street as you run after an enemy carrying the stone after finding Losser Mirklav being almost killed by Xanathar, but the chase is based on character with maximum of 30 feet, while Immeral have 40, so if he goes before the kenku in this case, he will get past it and be able to take the stone without me contriving the sequence. So I gave them a battle against a hard enemy instead and setting up them having to infiltrate the Xanathar's Guild. Question is if I shall should do side-missions next session as they get information and centre it a bit around the new player so that he gets a bit more experience than battle after battle. 

A DnD Tale - Van Richten's Guide to Raveloft - The Fall of the House of Lament

 

The image of the missing picture!

So we continue the House of Lament story. As Immeral have waken up in the tub with the words of Mara in blood on the mirror he returns to the parlour where van Richten and Hope still sleep. They begin by returning to the third floor and the nursery to try getting in to the locked door. A vision of a shield appears... and here I gotta complain a bit about the book, since it clearly references the seal of a god, but in none of the books I got (and I got pretty much every official book from Wizard of the Coast regarding DnD 5e) I could find it, neither Player's Handbook, nor Dungeon Master's Guide or even the van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft or even Curse of Strahd. I don't even know where people got the image above, but I'm suspecting one of the older books? How can you miss that? Not all of us have been here since the 1970's!

Anyway, van Richten is mentioning that it is missing the Belladonna for the image to be complete and they recall that there was a lone living flower in the conservatory below so they go down to get it and then return and enters the room after presenting it to the visage. They enter the children bedroom and sees a skeleton in a rocking chair and hear the voices of a boy and a girl from two toys, a purple dragon and a tin knight. They tell them about the hungry ones and how there mother locked them in their bedchamber and prayed to the god Ezra to protect them from the darkness and they want to leave. They are told by van Richten that the spell protecting the room now is gone so they should take the toys with them. They return down, but in the corridor they hear the coughing from the master bedroom. They enter and sees something shivering under the bed sheets. Immeral pulls it off and from the bed rises a zombie plauge spreader. It's dispatched without any problem, other than I rolled so bad for van Richten that he didn't hit any.

They go back to the foyer and see that the mist outside now have crept closer to the house and they seem to be surrounded. They head to the parlour and take a long rest to prepare for the end and a final seance. They ask Theodora for help and they get the message of "GET THEM OUT". They are hinted to go to the tower where they saw the vision of the bricked up prisoners. In the gallery they are attacked by four flying death's head that came alive from the busts. van Richten missed every attack, but the other was able to kill the other's without problem. They enter the tower and sees blood dripping from the ceiling and forming an alcove in the wall as well as running to the floor and seemingly pain a stairway down. As they investigate an armoured hand breaks out from the wall and a ghastly voice screams for Mara. A armoured knight breaks out together with two boneless creatures. van Richten is able to go first and actually doing pretty well against the first boneless, but is still hit by it twice so that it begin entangle itself on him. The other's take care of the boneless so that they can attack the knight alone. As he falls to Immeral's strikes and the light within the armour extinguish, the stairway down appears. They climb down and finds a door that leads to a wall with a gate leading to the storage room that they investigated earlier (the supposedly correct way to get down here, but it was a bit hard getting that, and getting the knight fight made it more fun). A short rest later they investigate a pit where they except Hope hear their voices echoing in the dark. Hope hear someone calling her and a faint amber light. They enter.

They end up in a cavern with an amber pillar standing on a patch of land surrounded by some black ink. Immeral and Hope recalls the amber sarcophagus from the Amber temple. Hope touches it and sees a vision of a spiralling eye, the eye of Tharizdun together with the image of a spider. Call back to their mission to get the rod of law as well hinting about the evil that the Temple of Elemental Evil is trapping (I just now realised that I don't have a name for the wizard/monk giving them their mission, oops). Also rather fun how I used the books vague description that you can tempt the players with any of the dark gifts detailed in the book, but the Amber Temple only had one per god, meaning that this is some real powerful god. Sometimes inspiration strikes right at the last moment. Hope has the Mark of the Raven, an amulet that now begins to glow which causes the pillar to almost scream in agony. Five tendril arises from the dark ink and a spectre appears above them. Now, I don't know how you would make it on an ordinary level 3 party, the tendrils act like shadows and drain your strength with every hit, meaning that instead of the 60 hit points they usually have my party have around 10 Strength to worry about. Thankfully they have the sun sword that showers all enemies in sunlight and they are affected by disadvantage on every roll. They are able to kill the tendrils and stun the spectre with the Mark of the Raven. Hope uses the sun sword and gets a critical hit as she thrusts the sword into the amber and filling it up with light. Another round and she repeats the action and the light burst through the stone and it cracks and then explodes. The murky water disappears and the spectre leaves her sword behind. They get the treasures and head out. Theodora seems to have created a corridor through the mist and as they leave they see the shadows of the children in the toys appearing in the mist and running to their mother before they leave. The End!

Well that was fun. The most action in any game we played. And the ending battle with the amber pillar was fantastic really, maybe better if I thought through the consequences of putting a level 3 end boss against 2 level 8 PC and an NPC of challenge rating 5. Made some changes in the spur of the moment, in Theodora's path you actually just need to leave the house after getting the toys, but even if that the best emotional ending it doesn't feel that earned. So I dropped in both other endings as well. What's better than a gauntlet of fighting the undead and a cursed artefact below the house to seemingly allow Theodora to get them through the mist? So that is that side story. We are thinking about using one of the compilation books to play other adventures, but the problem is that most of them are quite high experience and they already are a bit miffed about losing something like 3000 exp in the final session? Still, two weeks to next game, and this time with all sisters plus another player. 

The Rusty Sword: Vanguard Island (Switch)

Another pirate game huh?

Well, been one of the non-playing times again so a huge backlog, but not feeling it for any game. And then I found this little game and besides the old-school graphics and music it was the description of a short game that caught my interest. And that it only cost 11 SEK (which is like what, 1 € or $?). 

So it begins with a pirate or adventurer arriving at the titular Vanguard Island in search of the Vanguard Relic. You explore the island and find the dungeon and defeat the boss and get the relic, the end. Yes, that was pretty much the whole game. There is a house on the island where you can get a life potion (which I didn't get till after finishing the game and start from the beginning to see what I missed). 

It looks good, sounds great and is rather fun playthrough. You have the option to play with a friend for some co-op. It basically a short Zelda game, they even references the old man in the cave at the start,  even use the same line, although it was just a sign telling us about the 2-player mode. 

Now, it feels like this is actually a tech-demo for a bigger game they would be working on. I would hope so. There is a lot of empty spaces on the character menu for more items beside the bombs. So, for a short break it is fun, no more than 15 minutes of play, if even that.

*After some googling* Well what do you know? They are actually developing a sequel and it's supposed to come out in Q4 2023? Sign me up!