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[scriver]

To be fair, the fact that the world ceases to exist only a few metres beyond the spooky house is extremely spooky

[ZebioLizard2]

Think they may have overcomplicated that endgame a bit without adding much substance, oof.

[Kagus]

So I've been running around practicing my boss-fighting, and it's all gone fairly shit for the most part. Even with every applicable bonus in the book, they're still extraordinarily aggravating to fight against... Primarily because they're really big, their attacks are even bigger and generally contain a LOT of area denial, and if you go outside to get more space to run around in they enter "rage mode" and start doing 10x as much damage and attacking faster.

The result being that you have to fight these dicks in cramped, littered corridors where you get full-stop cockblocked by an overturned nightstand, and they clip through walls. Also one of the boss types can only be seen via nightvision, with all the bullshittery that those damned goggles entail.

Some boss types also leech life and heal themselves, or other such nonsense. Good times.


In other news, we've just hit the hard level cap of 17! Yay! Also I messed up previously, there are a whole 5 reskills available, not 3. I've used one of them to get rid of throwing, so we will sadly never play another game of cricket as we've lost the ability to accelerate objects with our hands.

[Dunamisdeos]

Subsonica sounds like a sort of ok band.

[Kagus]

Subsonica sounds like a sort of ok band.

They're pretty underground, you probably haven't heard them.

[EuchreJack]

Subsonica sounds like a sort of ok band.

They're pretty underground, you probably haven't heard them.

Now that I have, they seem pretty good.

[Kagus]

Subsonica sounds like a sort of ok band.

They're pretty underground, you probably haven't heard them.

Now that I have, they seem pretty good.

Dammit, I didn't realize they were an actual band... Ah well.

Personally, while Subsonica is okay enough of a band name, I'm pretty sure Sporadic Vampire Magnets is the clear winner.


Quick update, HellSign pushed out a patch recently that's supposed to help some things. Namely, they fixed the ambient bird deaths (there are decorative crow-parrots in the trees surrounding each mission house, and you can shoot them for a couple achievements and the chance to soft-lock your game), and added a couple more achievements that nobody asked for. Such as, "KILLED A GHOUL EMU" and "FOUND A CLUE WITH THE LISTENING THINGY". As always, HellSign achievement names and descriptions are always in allcaps, because it's just that hardcore.

The patchnotes don't mention anything about another achievement of theirs, a hidden achievement called "DECAPITATOR" that 0.0% of players have accessed. Considering the image shows a bear trap, people thought it had something to do with killing trapped emus, using enough traps or managing to get the killing blow on an emu with a trap (difficult as they have around 50 HP, and a trap does 10). None of these methods resulted in anything.

Turns out, peeking at the hidden achievement description via a Steam info site will show "CHOPPED OFF A HOMELESS DUDE'S ARM", indicating that this was obviously supposed to be a plot cheevo related to our hilarious and totally fine incident with Lucky. Because, as we all know, "Decapitation" is the word for cutting someone's arm off. Just like how arachnids are a kind of rodent.


In actually game-relevant changes, they've fixed a couple particularly annoying bugs with the ghast... See, the ghast gets triggered by opening up and "activating" a room, but sometimes those rooms have shadow-trapped doors that catapult you into the shadow dimension instead, where you get to fight a few wombats on their home turf.

So what happens then? Well, you get hurtled into the shadow realm, the ghast alarm goes off and the screen goes completely wibbly, and then... The ghast sorta disappears, but all the wombats start glowing bright white with a fucked-up version of the ghast's own visual effects. While this makes the wombats considerably easier to spot and shoot, the ghast's health bar never goes away (I don't even fucking know why it exists, you can't shoot the thing and it either smacks you and disappears or hits a tripwire and disappears), and neither does the really annoying and disruptive screen filter. Also your game soft-locks and you have to hard exit out of the game in order to end the mission.

That got fixed, as did another whoopsie where the ghast would sometimes trigger at the same time a furniture ambush would start flinging interior decorations at you. This was also rather unfortunate, because you're prevented from running or exiting the room while furniture is flying at you, which means the ghast could just zero in on you and slap you while you had no chance of getting to the tripwire.

There doesn't appear to be a fix planned for dialing back the sheer annoyance factor of the spectral bugger, but life wasn't meant to be easy.



Speaking of ghasts, I had a lovely episode a while back where I managed to dash back to the tripwire just in time before the ghast hit me... In fact, he was winding up for his lunge right when I crossed through the doorway! What luck!

...oh, right, this is HellSign. The ghast then proceeded to complete his lunge animation THROUGH the tripwire, punting me across the room for 90% of my health bar and THEN triggering the trap and disappearing. So I was out the health AND the $60 for a used tripwire, despite it serving no purpose as the ghast always leaves after one hit anyways.

[Kagus]

Chapter (G'day m)8: Ghoast People

Another day dawns in Hell (better known as Adelaide, South Australia). However, we're asleep when that happens, as we only work at night. The graveyard shift, one might say.

Another day dusks in Hell. We awaken from our slumber and realize that the nightmare was indeed real, and that we are still driving a utility van. A quick breakfast of nondescription medicine later, and we're ready to put our cap on and get back to bashing interdimensional immigrants.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Since there's not an iota of discernable difference between the three currently available Hunting missions, we just pick whichever one happens to be nearest the cursor. We have no way of knowing if this place has a decent room layout, or if there are particularly irritating enemies, or if the boss is of a type that we can deal with, or really anything at all without physically going down there and checking it out while on-mission. For a game supposedly all about planning ahead and utilizing the right tools for the job, it doesn't really give us much in the way of information.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Wow, what a lifelike painting! It's like I can feel the individual hairs on his face! It hurts!"

Entering through the front entrance (a magnificent ornate double-door affair which is apparently the standard for Adelaide's suburban housing. For the family who wants to make a good impression, but can't afford a washer/dryer combination), we're immediately accosted by some fine art. It's not great, but it's fine.

Always the critic, Ken shoots the canvas until it stops squirming. One of the other paintings starts screaming, and we take a quick recording of it for the absolutely fire mixtape Ken "Lil' Piggy" Ham has been putting together over the holidays. Since this is our first audio recording after the vital achievement-related update, we pick up the "PARABOLIC PRESENCE" award, something that's designed to be awarded within the first 20 minutes of playing. Cheevo-mint get.


Moving into the main living/dining/kitchen/study room with the sprawling layout and arched partitions common to Australian architecture, we're again flagellated by a classic oil-on-canvas still life, which isn't quite as still as it probably should be. We shoot it a few times, ducking in and out of its target acquisition range, and the Rubenesque apples stop trying to rub us the wrong way. We still got thwomped a couple times, so we have ourselves a nice sit while contemplating the nature of bandages and their role in the life of a modern art critic.

We also discover this house's singular locked heavily chained door, which happens to be one of the building's 4 or so outdoor entrances, making its blockaded status completely and utterly irrelevant since we can just walk around it on both sides. We will be finding the key later, because it smells like every other clue until you pick it up.

Walking into the living room, we've officially "touched" five different rooms now (each archway in the larger sprawl counts as a room partition. Be very careful when dodging enemy attacks in any of these rooms, because you might hit one of the transitions and spawn another ambush on top of the one you're currently dealing with), and it's time for the ghast perimeter alert to pop up and tell us to place a countermeasure. Also the telly predictably spawns a few wombats when we get close to it, much as I'd expected it to.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"...the wombats they can never hear; the wombats, the wombats in the walls."

With the malevolent marsupials buckshotted (buckshotten? buckshat?) into submission, we very quickly place a tripwire nearby; as I've learned the hard way that while the ghast usually spawns 3-4 rooms after you get the first warning, it can also spawn immediately after you get the first warning. We have a quick medical squat to patch up our injuries, and continue with the "sweeping and clearing" portion of this Sweep and Clear operation.

Helpfully, we've set up the tripwire at a cluster of doors, so we won't need to do the countermeasure shuffle for

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"What mysteries lie behind door number FUN?"

First door revealed a gigantic mother rat and her abdomen full of little ratlings (Where will YOU be when dia-ratlings strike?) along with -horror of horrors- a billiard table with scratched felt.  Lacking the tools to burn the unholy abomination, we instead focus on the rats and turn them into a striking conversational piece.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Well, what's on the television then?"

"Looks like a rat"

After that encounter was dealt with using some good old-fashioned shotgun-based pesticides (and a bit of stabbing from our rat-kicking boot), we performed a perfunctory clue check and then moved to the next door in line.

Unfortunately, door two had foreseen this outcome, and we triggered its trap card. We were immediately sent to the shadow realm.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Well, at least it's cooler in here than it is outside!"

Then we killed the denizens of the shadow realm and were immediately sent back. Such is life.

At this point, we've collected enough clues to deduce that not only are there wombats and rats located on this map (bugger me, wasn't expecting that!), but that the big bad is a Shadow. Shadows are cunty bastards who don't even have the good will to exist in the material plane properly, and as such they're an absolute bugger to actually see and/or shoot... Despite being the size of a large shed, and having absolutely no issues with hitting US.


The third of the three readily-accessible doors is opened and reveals... Absolutely nothing. No clues, no monsters, no events. And still no ghast. This is worrying, because we've now used up all the nearby doors, and will now need to either have a longer dash to the tripwire, or risk removing the one we've got and setting it up somewhere else.

I do some laps back and forth in the corridor while pondering the dilemma. Nothing happens.

Running back and forth between the tripwire and the next doors down the corridor a few times, I check and see if the ghast is thinking about spawning now. Apparently not, as the dashes were completed without incident. So, with the coast clear, we pick up the tripwire and hastily move to reposition it.

...and, for once, it actually works! We weren't ambushed while carrying the dead tripwire! Woohoo! Time to open up a new room...

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Of course it's a bathroom. So now, when we're threatened by the ghast, we need simply do a dunny dash like we really mean it, and the spooky poof will respect our privacy by exploding. _{Dia-ratlings!}

Checked the door right across the hall from the toilet, nothing... Just a dead body, which as we all know doesn't actually count unless it's full of kebabs, snakes, or fruit. This is worrying, as we've now crossed 5 thresholds after getting the perimeter warning, and the ghast still hasn't shown up to give us our ectoplasmic wedgie. I do some running back and forth in front of the bathroom door to consider my options.

Hmm, no dice... Well, looks like we're tearing down the tripwire and moving it three meters down the hall. Should be fine, right?


HONK


Jesus Christ that noise is abrasive... Well, luckily for us, although the ghast *did* spawn unexpectedly without us opening any more doors, it spawned half a second after we fully relocated the tripwire. This is great, because even if we were standing directly in front of a usable door with the tripwire in hand, if the ghast had spawned before we'd set it up we'd have been up shit creek without a boat. See, having the ghast onscreen counts as "combat", meaning you cannot use bandages, set traps, or install tripwires. So even if the ghast spends 3 seconds floating around you harmlessly before going in for the spank, and it takes you less than a second to prime a tripwire, you'd just be left standing there like a lemon with absolutely no recourse as the ghast oiled and cocked his slappin' hand.

I also didn't manage to snag a picture of the ghast, because he spawned *inside* the tripwire's beam, dispersing himself instantly.


Finally! Freshly ghastless, we proceed to recklesly charge through the remaining rooms and encounters. Seriously though, fuck ghasts.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Poor bugger... Probably found a ghast hiding behind the sun visor, got spooked."

With that out of the way, we deal with a nest of snakes and the remnants of someone's extra-spiky kebab dinner in the remaining rooms, and find the rest of the clues we need. Working out the particulars, we discover that this is a Sub-Sonic Gaussian Shadow, meaning that it should theoretically be slower but sturdier, and be practically blind but with enhanced hearing. Alright, good to know. I'm not sure if any of that actually means anything yet, but we set out to prep the sponges and other necessities for fighting the boss (yes, we need a sponge. The book says so).

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Definitely not the ramblings of a madman.

I'd like to mention that when you've discovered specific weaknesses of a poltergeist, your van's inventory will helpfully point out the potential benefits you get from equipping the right tool for the job. It displays this potential benefit on every item of that type, regardless of whether or not it's the right one for the job, and ignoring whatever you've marked in your book. Very useful, especially seeing as that information (what kind of general bonus you get) is also visible in the Cryptonomicon, meaning that there's absolutely no reason for it to show up in the inventory as well. It serves no other purpose than to confuse people by showing big bonus numbers on the wrong items.

With everything checked off the list, and a chain of expensive one-use UV floodlamps set up trough the house (...gah), we get ready to pop this daddy mong-legs a new one! Or, more likely, get ourselves horribly mushed. We inscribe the summoning circle and listen to some spooking ritual chanting that is very clearly not coming from us.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Kay-athamuia, Kay-athamuia, ipso facto, dolor sit amet!"

I'm not sure why the progress circle animation (little blue ring in the middle) is there, because you can't actually cancel out of a summoning once you've started it, so you're just locked in place watching it fill up while the chanting also reaches a crescendo that notifies you of when the big bad is getting summoned.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

There, you see it? Well I know you think you see *something*, but that little dark shape in the middle of the ritual circle is a single leg. There's another leg reaching out back behind there that you can see over the top of the wall. Now, I'd like to mention that we're in one of the largest open spaces in the entire house, and he's taking up the entirety of it while still clipping through furniture and walls and everything. Which is fine, right?

Now, since this is the Shadow boss, it's obviously very closely tied to the wombats and the shadow realm. Remember how you're supposed to use nightvision goggles to see wombats? Yeah, that applies to the boss too. Not only that, but wearing the goggles is also kinda enforced because you get +20% damage reduction for having them.

However, you then have to deal with goddamn nightvision making everything ELSE considerably LESS visible. Not to mention the fact that for both wombats and the Shadow, the graphic that shows up on NVG is actually slightly displaced from their real hitbox, making aiming even more of a pain than it usually is (and it's usually a pretty fucking big pain, let me tell you).

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Yeah m8, gr8 visibility m8, I r8 it 8/8, would h8 it again m8.

I'm sure this would look pretty damn gnarly in some found-footage type horror movie, but in a game where you're supposed to react to the information provided and make quick split-second decisions on that information, it's kinda fucked up. How the hell do you tell when that thing's telegraphing a move? It's just a bunch of particle effects with a bad temper, fuck's sake...

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

I legitimately don't even know what's going on here, other than that half my health is gone and I just procced a dodge on something

So, Spidermong over here has a few attacks... A standard lunging tackle/bite that does a fair whack of damage but is easy enough to dodge because the cloudy portion next to the foggy bit twitches a little when he's about to jump, some sort of weird thing where he shivers a bit and then I've got tentacles coming out of my nostrils that slap my face (I honestly don't know what's happening here. It makes the same noise as the tentacle paintings, but I can't seem to get away from them? I don't see where they might be coming from other than just being attached to me), and another thing where he stands around inside a wall for a tick and then blobs appear and start flying upwards and then part of the floor goes black and it hurts.

Get all that? Good. He also likes to just instantly vanish/teleport somewhere else and then run through the walls from offscreen and poke my bum when I'm not looking (or can't see, which is most of the time).


The UV lamps don't seem to do much (if any) damage to him, but they do cause him to be "stunned" and stay in place for nearly a second (this is with the improved sponge-derived upgrade resulting in maximum targeted precision for this specific enemy type, and the longest stun time). I set up 5 lamps, which is the maximum you can have in a single stack at a time, and since you can't merge stacks of ANYTHING in this game (quite annoying when you've got one pile of 5 bullets and another pile of 3 bullets and your gun has a clip size of 8... In that example, you'd be able to have either 3 or 5 bullets in the gun, but never more than that unless you refill one of the stacks at the shop) and after a stack of traps is used up it becomes a stack of 0 traps that you can't swap out, that means that 5 is also the maximum number of traps you can have out and around the house at any one time.

I'm just going to gloss over the fact that I had to buy and use UV ammunition for this fight. I don't want to think about that.


We battled back and forth, I tried to outrun the evil floor and my weaponized nosehairs, he tried to crawl inside my bum while I was still using it _Dia-ratling!, and I shotted at him with my gunbullets.

After a long and brutal fight that saw me using up most of my drugs and nearly all of the floodlamps, he was still at a good third of his health... One of the issues with the fight is that really my only damage dealer is the SMG, which takes close to 2 seconds to reload. I'm not allowed to dodge or get hit during those 2 seconds, otherwise it resets the animation and I have to hit reload again and start all over.

I ran into the master bedroom where I'd set up the final floodlamp, and waited until he showed up... He powered through the doorway and was about to lunge at me when I put him on the spot by putting the spot on him, and unloaded a full clip of UV rounds directly into him (by this point I'd managed to more-or-less figure out where his hitbox actually was... No mean feat, lemme tell you). He squealed, shadily, and vanished from the room... But still had a sliver of hitpoints left. Problem was, I wasn't much better off. My new healthbar was approximately half of my original maximum, and it'd already had a few pieces nibbled off of it. I desperately reloaded my SMG, kept away from the walls, and waited... I saw him rushing at me from the walls, and in that moment I summoned every bit of tactical weaponmastery I possessed, and executed a professional spray-and-pray.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Wait... Did I win? I still can't fucking see anything.

He disappeared. And... Well, that was that. He was just gone. I guess it doesn't make much sense for a ghost to leave behind a corpse, but... Uhh... Well, that was pretty much it, his particle effects just stopped "effecting", and it was all over. The dramatic free license action music stopped playing, and the almighty corner text told me I could go. Yay?

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Crikey, it's nice to take those things off... Oh hello Mr. Snake, didn't see you there, haha!"

Yeah, naw, yeah, he was bung alright. Did a quick sweep through the house to make sure I hadn't left behind any clues or functional traps, and then went back to the ute to get out of here. It's a strange aftermath, but this was our first fully successful boss fight! Yahoo! I... Honestly wasn't expecting the best when I saw it was a Shadow in the house, could've easily gone the wrong way.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The swagman cometh

And that, swaggards and ladygents, is our take for this mission. Yeah. $35,000, plus nearly $4000 for the clues. Our total worth when going into this mission was just a hair over $34,000, so I'd say we did fairly well. Covers the material expenses nicely, even if the material expenses column does tend to completely twist itself around and make up funny numbers. Was never very good at maths, the poor bugger.

That's also another cheese mint unlocked! "SHADOW HUNTER", for having DEFEATED A SHADOW BOSS. Yeah, alright.


And that does it for chapter 8, I should think! We've proven that we can just barely scrape out a victory against a spooky spoder when utilizing every specifically-tailored skill and bonus in the game, and we're ready to see what the endgame plot holds for us! Yes folks, there is indeed some more *plot* to go through, and there may in fact even be another horrifying comic splash to look at! Until next time, folks...

...

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[EuchreJack]

Wow, good job!

[scriver]

Bustin' makes me feel good!

[Dunamisdeos]

A man is scaling a mountain in a terrible snowstorm. He labors for many days to climb the steep and deteriorating path to the top, where lives an ancient and wise hermit. Many times is his way forward blocked by ice and stone, only to miraculously open to a timely shelter or a clear lane leading to some higher crag along the arduous ascent.

After many trials and great hardship, he finally reaches the frigid and silent summit. Built of cracked stone and carved in times forgotten with unknown figures of yore, this is truly a place of reverence. The man has brought the secret offerings and begs but a single piece of knowledge in return. Slowly does a smile glide onto the hermit's wizened countenance, who declares that he will grant the man the base tenet of all his vast wisdom. This arcane revelation, he imparts, once compelled him to retire from the world and seek enlightenment in his own youth now many ages past. Amazed but afraid, the man thanks the hermit and prepares to receive the ages-old proverb.

The hermit sits in his place of comfort, the smoke from his incense flickering to and fro in the draft. As he prepares to grant his boon, the man tenses with apprehension until quietly, softly, the words are spoken. His life has changed forever.

Spoiler: So speaks the hermit: (click to show/hide)

[Kagus]

Just a couple quick snippets from the latest dev update regarding the roadmap and the future of HellSign:

Although we do enjoy seeing people die, we imagine getting lag raped by a kelpie can be frustrating at times!

So it’s imperative to improve combat & optimization as a stepping stone, before we can begin adding new enemies in ;)

It's worth mentioning that the main dev tends to end each and every response with a winky face.

"Hey, the game breaks at the slightest provocation and the combat is horrible. Please do something about it."

"Glad to hear you're playing! Thanks for the feedback ;)"
_{this is painfully close to some actual exchanges that have occurred}

We have some amazing stuff planned for you guys, and the first step is to lay some strong foundations!

I absolutely agree! Now, stand right there while I pour this concrete...

We’re pumped & super excited for the year ahead, with every patch we will make hellsign bigger, better, and thicker!

Keep it classy, Ballistic Interactive.

Chapter Nein Nein Nein: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Picking up from last time, we're a filthy bum. But now we're a filthy rich bum! With clearly nothing better to do, we head over to the one place everyone in Adelaide goes and dingo's diarrhea let's just get this over with.

Zoe immediately waves us over as soon as we go talk with her, because nothing happens in this town unless we're specifically there to poke it with a stick.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

And let me tell you; you really fuckin' do.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Baby's first edgefic

Ken Ham: "Well that is super fucking creepy... any idea why they were calling my name?"

(Give him time, he's a creationist)

Zoe: "Y'know, I could say something like 'I honestly thought you could tell me', but that would be dumber than a soup sandwich and I'd like to retain at least some character integrity, ey?"

Ken: "Yeah, nah, yeah, I understand... So if we're going to avoid talking nonsense for several lines, what does that leave us with vis-a-vis this conversation?"

Zoe: "Collect all the signs from a Hunting mission [reward: $1200, 560xp]"

Ken: "Wait, really? But... I've been doing that nearly every day for the past couple weeks, do I really need to do it again?"

Zoe: "I wasn't watching you the other times. Now go, you're blocking the light and I need to geek out about something and forget your name in order to try and recover some of my personality."


So now we have a plot location to go visit, which is apparently the place we plot-died the first time around and got our bitchin' ink. I know that neither Zoe nor Ken seemed to realize this, but it's extremely fucking blatant that that's what this place is.

First though, we need to swing by Noah and purchase two of every type of ammunition restock after we spent several hundred dollars on single-use floodlights (no wonder Australia had to switch over to Parkinson's energy to power everything; the sheer amount of disposable electronics is an environmental nightmare in and of itself).

Technically we could buy the Shotgun Underbarrel attachment, but there's no point. Yeah, it costs $46k, but it only holds two shots, is a complete disaster to try and fiddle with alternate firing modes when in combat, and its damage output is less than a third of the cheapest beginner shotgun in the game... 1.5 damage per pellet versus 5.4 damage per pellet. You would seriously struggle with killing a single rat with that thing.

And since it takes up the barrel mod slot, it also reduces the overall effectiveness of the primary weapon because it's using space that could've been spent on an actually effective modification! Woohoo!

As an aside, the cheapo shotty that does more than three times the damage of this post-endgame accessory costs a whole $200... Less than 0.005% of the supermodern attachment. Fuck this game.


After purchasing a few hundred more bullets and 9 Insta-Tan™ sunlamps, we head out to the very vibrantly-marked "PLOT MISSION" mission plot to discover... Well, it's an abandoned and slightly run-down house. What were you expecting?

"Something feels slightly familiar about this place..."

No shit, Sherlylocks.


We spend a few seconds sorting out the shitshow that is our inventory (remember, we had to swap out our helmet, all our accessories and gunmods, and our ammunition for the bossfight... Now we have to swap it all back), and take two goddamn steps towards the house.

Oh look, it's a bunch of fucking fuckers.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"It's a goddamn dirt kebab dildo parade!"

Now, the shotty absolutely murders these things. Unfortunately, I'm not holding the shotgun. Time to run around in circles while these wibbly cunts shake and obscure the screen for eXtreme cinematic effect.

Somehow, I manage to walk off the porch and directly into an invisible ghost-catwalk in thin air. Falling off before I could hit the screen capture button, I immediately run back and just do it over again because it really doesn't take any more than that before this thing starts falling apart at the seams.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"I'm walking on sunshine, wo-oah!"

While the aliens tried to tractor beam me up into a better world, we still have business to do down here in the magical fucking land of Oz. Sorry, extraterrestrial butt-spelunkers... Another day.


With the placeholder tentacle beasts dealt with, we're ready to open up the front door and bravely venture into another oh god please I don't want to do it.

We walk through the door, head into the first room on the right and oh hey it's a dead body up against the wall I wonder if maybe yep it's god an extra-large kebab in it ha ha well guess I just roll out the door and wait for it to fire three spikes and then utterly obliterate the thing yay ha let's go.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Oh boy, what a sensational spooking!"

We head back into the entryway, take out a couple attack-chaining emus after eating an entirely unnecessary amount of damage, and finally get the "GHOUL MEAT" achievement for having bested a single ghoul in personal combat. I'm sure I have no idea what a ghoul is, and we've definitely never seen one before. Must be some weird bug.

One of the many collectible paintings of Not-Napoleon starts shrieking at us, and we calmly add it to the collection of mixtape samplings.

With the TV room just next door, I plant a disposable sunlamp in an open area to catch the inevitable spooky wombats that always seem to be on channel 4 this time of night, only to be extremely shocked and bamboozled by... Nothing happening. Huh. Guess it's just reruns of Russell Coight tonight.

Also in the TV room, we find significant EMF activity around both the sofa and the armchair. Must've been part of a set of magnetically-themed interior design. Manages to be both attractive and repellent at the same time... Truly a commentary on modern style trends.


Oh yeah, looks like a few of the clues have had their graphics redone, because that was apparently a priority. While I admit the new doll clue indeed looks absolutely horrific, a couple of the others are complete phone-ins... Like some of the new structural clues, which are just the same images of the old clues but with a photo cutout pasted on top of it.

In order to keep things on the up-and-up, we also needed to update the Cryptonomicon... And, well... It's a bit hit and miss.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Seriously, this thing just looks horrible. At least it's fairly distinctive compared to what the other clues looked like?

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Okay, now you're just taking the fucking piss...

With the clues picked up and identified, we learn that this house is the housing house of another spooky spodermook. Huzzah. Luckily though, the plot objective is to just grab the clues and get out of here, so we don't necessarily need to fight the big meanie and risk having to do it all over again. We crack open a door to an inner corridor, and of course it wouldn't be a haunting mission without a goddamn ghastly drop-bear, so we plant our tripwire and start carefully popping open the-

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"What's that I hear from inside the door? Is that... chewing? Fukken termites!"

Oh, you cunt.

Yeah, so, it would appear that "spy-checking" the doors doesn't work, and I'll instead have to do the "nah nah nah" flyby maneuver on every damn door if I don't want to lost a quarter of my health to architectural munchies.


Door number three opens onto a scene of billiards gone wrong, with a broken cue lying on the floor, scuffs in the felt and woodwork, the triangle's completely fucked off somewhere and also there's a dead body on the floor.

I do a few tippy-tappy steps around the corpse, trying to see if I could push its buttons... But then I notice the ornate clock on the wall. Hmm.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Called it. I *knew* one of these damn clocks was going to screw me over sooner or later, so I pre-empted its sudden and inevitable betrayal by planting a packet of dynamite inside the room. Then it was just a matter of triggering the blood portal, watching the snakes pour out, waiting long enough for their stupid spawn invulnerability to run out, and then I pushed the big red button marked "CRIKEY"... Room full o' dead snakes.

I have to admit though, it's a little bit disconcerting that the maximum range of the remote detonator is almost exactly equal to the blast radius of the payload. Seems like a minor technical oversight, that.


Door number 4, I accidentally activate the house's trap card and get sucked into the Wombat Realm. The warlike marsupials are dealt with fairly quickly however, and I only get the one little scuff because the buggers had bunched up on each other so two of them attacked me with a 0.2 seconds gap between attacks, meaning that my dodge I-frames ran out before the second one connected. Fun times, bullets jingle, still no sign of ghast.


Door number 5... Christ, I hate ghast-hunting...


ALRIGHT! Caught the fucker! I just had to run through to the bedroom I'd opened a minute ago, touch the bed, and then fling myself back into the corridor before he managed to assemble his ghostliness into enough of a form to fall upon me and drain my vital fluids!

So, yeah, I made it back to the tripwire with barely a moment to spare, and if I'd tried to reposition the wire he would've bunged me. I guess that's just how things work around here.


A weeping lampshade coughs up a mysterious key that... Is used on the door directly adjacent to it. Seriously, this is the sex dungeon equivalent of hiding your keys under the welcome mat. Don't do it.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Always practice safe sex; remember to properly lock and barricade the doors."

Unfortunately there was no dungeon, nor was there any sex. Just a bathroom, with some bizarrely reflective shower curtains and absolutely no clues or monsters or anything. The previous owners apparently laid such an abominable deposit in the dunny that they felt the need to permanently chain and quarantine the whole room. Best guess, that's where the poltergeist came from.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Goodness Martha, what do you use to clean the stains off your curtains?"

"LSD."

Heading further down the corridor into the guest bedroom, we discover a body that's simply brimming with snakes. The bed then remembers some of the horrible things it's seen and begins screaming in terror. We make a quick recording for later.


With that taken care of, we check out yet another door down the line and discover a bathroom full of RAVE, specifically the zombie variety.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"Yeah, put your hands up and... Gurgle?"

Of course, a tiny half-bath is the perfect location to encounter RAVE, as it's forced to spawn directly underneath your feet and immediately start damaging you while also spreading out the door almost instantaneously, and you've got a very good chance of stubbing your toe on the toilet or the oddly-wedged door and getting yourself stuck inside the madness for a while longer.

So, yeah... Best Game Design 2018.


Once the RAVE had calmed down a bit, we went outside and found a rope underneath the patio table. And with that, we are D-U-N DONE with this place... Ol' Mr. "Sporadic Plasma" shadow longlegs can go sunbathing for all we care, we've got what we came for and I really don't want to risk having to do this nonsense all over again.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

And we're out! 9/9 signs, $1290 for deduction, yadda yadda yadda... Basically a hell of a lot more money than we're getting for actually completing the plot mission. Whatever, let's go talk to the Zoester.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Jesus H. Fucking... First of all, you told us we had to find all the signs from a job, and secondly it wasn't just "a haunted location"... It was specifically a plot-important Hunting mission! Excuse me while I loudly grumble over the background noise voice actors literally saying "background noise"...

Ken: "So, what now?"

Zoe: "Well, let's see... Hmm... The blood pattern indicates blunt force, even though you clearly identified it as a clean strike during the mission. Oh, etheral ectoplasm, interesting..."

Ken: "Etheral ectoplasm? What's that?"

Zoe: "I'm not sure, I don't think it actually exists. It may or may not be related to ethereal ectoplasm, but it's difficult to say... Especially seeing as you didn't actually bring back any ectoplasm at all from that mission."

Ken: "Uh... You right, Zoe?"

Zoe: "Hmm... Why is there dark matter ectoplasm here? This makes no sense Shane."

Ken: "Oh, phew... Good to see you're back to your old self!"

Zoe: "Sorry, Kevin. It's just that this indicates multiple poltergeists were working together, which makes no sense for reasons that have never been established."

Ken: "Right, and I take it this is unsual?"

Zoe: "It's... Wait, did you say 'unsual'?"

Ken: "Yeah, not sure why... I don't think that word means anything. Might need a lie-down after this, to be honest."

Zoe: "Anyways, where were we... Oh, right, multiple poltergeists. Well, in my many years of experience doing things that we've previously established are only tangentially related to actual ghost hunting, I've never seen anything like this! Poltergeists are usually loners and territorial, but the signs don't lie."

Ken: "You mean like hips?"

Zoe: "Precisely. And this would explain why a group of veteran scouts and hunters got taken down so quickly."

Zoe: "I just can't get over how abnormal these signs are... They're unlike anything you've collected dozens of every day of your ghost hunting career! I'd only heard about stuff like this in old legends and stories..."

Ken: "Great, did I mention I was spitting blood from yesterday's nightmare?"

Zoe: "No, you didn't. What nightmare? Yesterday?"

Ken: "I honestly have no idea why I said that. I can't remember any significant nightmare yesterday, and the last time I had a plot-relevant encounter like that, there certainly wasn't any mention of spitting blood."

Zoe: "I'm going to completely ignore everything you just said, and send you on a fetch quest for a useless plot item you'll have to buy from a completely hidden character that's inexplicably in the VIP section. [reward: 640xp]"

Ken: "I... But... Err, alright then."


We go over to the VIP area and chat with the bouncer we'd previously sold a few tender emu haunches to. He explains through an absolutely horrendous dialog sequence that we can't talk to Mr. Bishop (our deus ex machina character, who appears to be in possession of a macguffin we'd normally buy from Redback), but that the bouncy man can do us a solid and serve as an intermediary.

I really don't even want to think about how awful all the writing is, but the gist of this fetch quest is that Mr. Bishop is willing to lend us the "Grimoire Leshii" (apparently we need to talk with Eastern European forest spirits now?) if we can provide him with... Ugh...

Poltergeist parts.


I just, I don't fucking even... Fuck it.

Join us next time as we're forced to go hunt down yet another poltergeist and pretend like it's the first time, with absolutely no more ceremony than "bring us its spectral naughty bits".

...

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

"I believe I can flyyy..."

[ZebioLizard2]

Seems like the game is just slowly breaking down about you like the world has gone insane.

[scriver]

I just realised

Zoe the zoologist

Genius

[Kagus]

I just realised

Zoe the zoologist

Genius

"Cryptozoe" would certainly be a good name for her, considering how foggy it is to try and talk to her.

An update apparently dropped yesterday, which includes stuff like very slightly improving the thermal scanner and a new function called the Notebook, which tells you how things work instead of expecting you to just figure it all out. As one would expect, it appears to be poorly written...


While the single most-requested feature on the game's Steam forum seems to be a Russian localization/translation, I would very much like to see the game be translated into English before we get ahead of ourselves.