Abandonment Party 2 Draft 5: Chapters 5-9 COMPLETE.
Again, mostly minor changes throughout.
I suppose I can mention one thing without too much spoilers: exclamations!
Y’know, those things characters say when they’re shocked or frustrated. Kim kept bugging me because ‘oh no’ and ‘dang’ didn’t sound alien enough. So I found a way to change a bit of the slang in this book.
There are quite a few new characters that will use the new exclamations from the get-go, but Mean’s dialog will be affected as well. You could say she’s going to get in touch with her other-worldly roots and start saying more UNEARTHLY things.
This will be set up in the chapters I just finished, and it won’t be THAT big of a change. Just a little spice. She won’t be singing Klingon opera or anything. 😄
Now let’s talk about the games and shows I’ve been watching. Although, SPOILERS, it’s the same show I’ve been watching all freakin’ year. 😑
Monster Train 2: My birthday was the ninth, and I got gift cards galore! My brother also gifted me the new Doom: the Dark Ages game, but my computer won’t run it. No ray tracing. Such a tragedy.
But that’s okay; the sequel to Monster Train is here! 😎
The first game was one of the most unique card battle games I’ve ever played, and the sequel leans into the creative insanity that made the first one so good. I mean, look at this:
My guys are on the left; the enemy is on the right. Behold as my tower of mushroom guys protect my decay-spreading cannons and fungal commanders.
The enemy on the right is a titan-corrupted cherub that’s trying to eat platefuls of apples so that he can pump himself up enough to take me down.
I won’t go into the game mechanics here, but the creativity doesn’t end at the character designs. All of the cards are new. All of the troops, spells, and artifacts. I don’t see anything reused in this sequel; even the basic stewards you start out with have been divided into two separate roles.
I’m actually surprised no other game developers have tried to copy this gameplay formula of ‘defend three different 2-D rooms from waves of enemies’ yet.
I got some Nintendo eShop cards too, so I decided to buy a Switch game. Or rather, take a chance on something I would have otherwise avoided.
Fantasy Life i the Girl That Steals Time:
Yeah, I know right? ‘What sort of baby game is this?‘ That’s what I was thinking when I saw the reveal trailer last year.
But this game is like Animal Crossing on steroids. Or shrooms. Or both.
You create a character and then you find yourself on a ship hauling a giant dragon skeleton as cargo. It comes to life! Then another dragon appears and blows up your ship with rockets and laser beams. 😱
You wake up on an island 100 years in the past. It seems you can now travel through time for some reason, or rather, the animated dragon skeleton can.
After a few hours of starter quests, I then realized that there is a ton of stuff to do in this game. You have a town you can build like in Animal Crossing. There is also a ‘linear world’ where the game’s main story takes place. THEN there’s a THIRD world where you have open exploration.
Just now, I took this picture from the game I had paused. My guy is in the middle, wearing the giant bird helmet. Those other characters are my party. They’re called buddies. 😆
And this is an example of how the game gets addictive. All of the systems are interconnected. I found all of those party members, cursed to be inanimate objects, in the open world section of the game. THEN I took them back to my town to get cured. In human form again, they can now help me gather materials, craft items, or fight monsters in the other worlds. They can also live in my town.
And villagers are just one aspect. Almost EVERYthing you can do in this game can be useful for the other parts.
I just unlocked some randomized dungeons, for example. You must perform various tasks in order to make it through each room. Sometimes it’s killing monsters. Others it’s catching fish. You have to master all the different professions in order to succeed. I only made it to the fourth room, where I was thwarted by trees I couldn’t chop down yet. 😣
So now I must master fishing, logging, archery, alchemy, cooking….
Ah, but perhaps you’re getting bored. Let’s talk about season 8 of a TV series you probably haven’t watched in your life. Spoilers for Supernatural season 8.
Supernatural Season 8: Yes, this show is still holding my attention. I have slowed down, but that’s only because of all the work and driving around I’ve been doing. Curse you, landlord!
Do you recall what happened last season? Dean and Castiel were blasted into Purgatory, from which they will surely never return.
Episode 1: Dean immediately comes back from Purgatory. Then he runs off, digs up a grave, cuts his arm open, and revives a vampire with the goo that comes out.
Still with me? Next the vampire thanks Dean as ‘brother’ and gives him a hug before leaving. It seems quite a bit has happened in the YEAR since the finale, and we get to learn all about it all season through flashbacks!
This must be where Arrow got the idea of ‘I was trapped somewhere horrible in the past let me remember what happened there because it might help me in this episode.’ Wait. No, nevermind. I just looked up the dates for these two series. Arrow started at the SAME TIME as this season of Supernatural! Down to the month!
But this first episode doesn’t have much time for flashbacks. You see, Kevin the prophet has escaped from Crowley. It seems that Dick’s tablet has a secret way to seal all demons in Hell FOREVER. Things are looking up!
Kevin’s Mom and the Demon Auction: Yes, a secret auction where demons, angels, and gods bid on otherworldly items! Zounds, even the fabled hammer Mjolnir is up for grabs.
I forgot what the bros. were doing here, but Kevin’s mom gets possessed and Dean tries to kill her. This causes Kevin to leave. Oh no. How will they seal up Hell forever now? 😥
Heartache: Okay, I’m just going to look up the episode list for the correct titles. I’ll be careful. And what in the world. We’re already putting the main story of killing every demon forever on hold? It usually takes longer!
Anyway, while the bros. search for the monster of the week, Sam has flashbacks about how his year went. It seems that he fell in love! Aw! But what happened to this girl? I must know!
Bitten: Who knows, because now we’re following around some dumb teenagers and the entire episode is from their point of view.
It’s pretty interesting, though! Before the ‘POV’ segments start, the bros find some footage at a grisly scene. When they play it, they see the story of three friends who are in the middle of a love triangle. One guy gets bitten by a werewolf, and the conflict gets wilder from there.
Blood Brother: By the way, Blood Brothers is one of my favorite episodes of MASH. This episode, however, is just that vampire dude bro from episode one going on a quest for revenge while Dean ABANDONS his real brother to help out.
But it turns into a real party, full of danger and betrayal. Dean calls Sam to come help save him from the vampire bloodbath.
Southern Comfort: Well, I’ve noticed that Bobby is still dead. But it’s official: Garth is the new Bobby. He’s taking calls from hunters all over the nation, and handing out sage advice like popcorn and beer.
Dean takes this as an insult, and gets angrier with Garth as the episode goes on. He’s wearing Bobby’s old HAT for crying out loud!
Near the end of the episode Garth snaps. “Bobby didn’t just belong to you! He belonged to all of us! And we all want to carry on using the stuff he taught us!”
Something like that. Brought a Bobby-sized tear to my eye. I forgot what the episode was actually about, though.
A Little Slice of Kevin: This is usually the point where the seasonal story dies down and the monster-of-the-week begins, but now we’re suddenly getting plot?
Castiel is back! Another angel named Naomi freed him from Purgatory, and she has control of him somehow. He must travel with the bros, and find the word of God to protect Heaven itself.
Hunteri Heroici: But first we must stop an old, psychic man in a nursing home whose reality-altering powers have gone out of control, and he’s making cartoons come to life.
Yes, like Looney Tunes and Woody Woodpecker. Anvils are dropping on bank security guards. Cats are talking. And some poor lovestruck dude had his heart pound right out of his chest. 😍
The nursing home doctor is the one taking advantage of the poor elderly man, and WHAT’S THIS? This psychic grandpa looks familiar. No. NO WAY! It’s BJ Hunnicutt from MASH! (Mike Farrell.)
The final toon battle is pretty hilarious, complete with weaponized frying pans and magic black holes. When I told my brother about this one, he wondered why Buffy didn’t think of it first. 🤔
Torn and Frayed: There was more boring crap about that vampire bro, but now we’re back chasing angels. It seems there is programming in angels’ heads that Crowley wants to take advantage of. It’s also how Castiel is being controlled.
LARP and the Real Girl: Wow, this one is bad. Felicia Day is back and it’s almost as if she wrote this episode herself to become the magical heroine that rescues the fairy princess and saves the day without the bros’ help. Super lame.
Please, no more of this character! She wanted to leave the supernatural life behind! Let her retire to play World of Warcraft. 😫
As Time Goes By: And the very next episode is pure amazement. I love it when this happens. The thrill of watching a series blind!
The bros’ grandfather, in the past, comes forward in time after his secret society is attacked by Abbadon, a powerful demon. This society, the ‘Men of Letters,’ has vast amounts of weapons and lore that has been lost for decades. No one in the present knows about them.
And at the end of the episode the bros gain access to it all. After seasons of losing so much, the boys finally have a big win. I mean, they get their own Fortress of Solitude, pretty much! It’s a new set, filled with books and weapons, and the boys get their own ROOMS. After eight seasons of sleeping in filthy hotels!
Everybody Hates Hitler: Hitler isn’t in this one, but his Nazi necromancer squad shows up. Good thing a Jewish golem helps the boys fight back. The golem is just a huge actor with a bit of prosthetics, but he really sells it. The sound guys work overtime too, making these plodding, earth-shaking footstep noises as the golem paces. (Just like how my golems patrolled the area in Diablo.)
Man’s Best Friend With Benefits: I didn’t think this episode was great, but I have to mention it takes place in St. Louis, near my real world home. They really make you feel like you’re in Missouri, by the Gateway Arch pictures that hang above the boys’ beds in the hotel. 🤣
Remember the Titans: Hm, it seems that a man is dying and being resurrected every single day. He’s not a zombie, or a ghost. And he has no memory. The boys conclude that the only possible explanation is that this man is the titan Prometheus, cursed by Zeus to have his innards consumed by birds. Of course! 😅
So the brothers BOLDLY summon Zeus and demand that he undo the curse. Artemis, goddess of hunts, also shows up. It’s quite a spectacular confrontation, with lightning bolts and arrows a-flyin’.
Goodbye Stranger: Ah man, now I can only remember the song ‘Goodbye Stranger,’ that plays at the end of this episode. Castiel breaks free from Naomi’s programming somehow. He feels pretty bad, even though it wasn’t his fault! C’mon, man! Stay! I’m sure the showrunners can promote you to main cast!
But he leaves. Taking with him the tablet of God’s word, looking all forlorn as he takes a bus to places unknown. 😥
I’m sure a famous landmark will be hanging up on the wall of the next hotel so that I know where he went.
I also think Meg showed up? Sheesh, she’s been gone so long that the boys have to comment on her dyed hair so that the viewer recognizes her.
Freaks and Geeks: Oh no. I forgot about this girl. She was in a previous season’s episode as the annoying ‘I’m just a kid but I can handle hunting demons, you jerks!‘ Then the writer made Dean fumble during the final fight and the girl kills the Sirens herself. ‘See! I’m better than trained adults!‘
In this episode the girl is part of some high school-aged team fighting evil like they’re on Buffy or something. But it turns out their mentor had vampires kill all their parents to make them better fighters.
Ugh. This girl and Felicity Day need to have their characters killed off forever.
Why!? Why kill off Bobby and all the other good characters and not THESE weiners!
Ha,ha, I’m still having fun though. Ranting is also a type of entertainment. See you next time! 😃