Redesign & Reflection on History of the Lab

 If you have visited this site before a couple of days ago, you may notice that things have been changed around a bit. Then again, you probably have not because I've neglected until today to have Google crawl the new site or even update Google Analytics to reflect the new URL, http://retrolab.servebeer.com which should stay the same for quite some time unless I ever actually buy a domain or no-ip.org sells out. I've changed a lot to make things more flexible and more mobile-friendly. Some new sections to "Projects" will be added soon for my other projects, and there will also soon be a new page for the DPRK game. 

 Lab of Jizaboz was originally created in 1999 on a hosting site that offered free webspace called "50 megs". At the time I was working as a web producer for a local newspaper. My job at the time basically was importing tiffs off macs via a zip drive, importing them as jpegs and resizing them, and slapping HTML tags all around raw text dumps originally generated on ATEX machines. After it all looked good locally, I FTP'd it to the webserver and went home around 2:00 am. The website was a way of me having some sort of Internet presence as well as practice and learn new things for my job.

An ATEX terminal

 The site originally featured a tombstone in a dreary graveyard, with the words "THE UNDERGROUND LAB OF JIZABOZ" plastered across it. Of course there was MIDI music, a track called "devil" I found off some Halloween-related site with midi files and gifs flashing all over.  I had a main navigation menu table I had basically ripped off of slashdot.org at the time across the top with the URLS to my different sections, with slashes between them. The original content mainly consisted of random things I typed up about computers and video games, links to other sites, downloads for emulators and roms, and pictures of large, topless girls. The latter ended up getting me in a bit of trouble once I finally got a cable ISP and moved my site to their "free" website space.

 Eventually, once was actually producing things like my Doom 2 mod, maps for games, etc, all real "content" there became what I had made either by myself or with the help of a team. While the site has changed structure, domain names and types of content numerous times, the basic premise remains the same; this is my presence on the Internet, not Facebook.

MYFAROG - Week 1

Introduction:

This is a summary of a week within the MYFAROG RPG. The sessions ranged from one to three hours a piece, at about 1 session per every two or three weeks, starting on January 17th, 2015. The party members are Aquillius, Marcomer, Hecitas, and Eleni. I, the mythmaster, began by telling them a minimal description of the land and background, and the session begins..

 On the 13th day of Braidoblika, a band of young Halogi met for the first time in and around the small and rustic village of Beach. Here they met an old fisherman collecting mussels, and a mother who told them her son had not come back from a recent coming of age festival. The party investigated a nearby cave where they encountered a few wild dogs. The remains of the child were unfortunately found in the cave. It appeared he had tried to climb a wall of the cave to avoid conflict, then slipped and sustained a great injury when he fell. After informing the mother of the terrible news, she thanked them and the party left Beach after some light trading and foraging in the area. During their departure, they met a boar hunter who told them of boars in the nearby forest. No boars were found, but the party did manage to hunt some other large game. Marcomer also found an unidentified herb while foraging; which was later identified by a local nobleman who dabbled in alchemy as the main ingredient in a healing salve.

 The party then journeyed east, deciding not to enter a deep and dangerous-looking hole in the ground to the mountains to the west, they came across a small cottage with a simple fence around it. They met an old, odd woman who lived alone there who spoke of missing turnips and “rabbit man”; whom she said was a rabbit covered in ragged fur who stood as tall as a man and only came out at night. She had determined that this man-rabbit was responsible for the recent great loss of her turnips. 

 The party continued east, and spotted two suspicious looking men along the side of the road. The men did not bother them as they continued. After another day of travel, Hecitas had become rather ill on his stomach and had a hard time moving. It was around this time by chance they came across a man in fancy clothes who introduced himself as Cincius, a merchant. Cincius had a thrall named Aufidius who was in debt to him chained to a cart. The merchant had left a key item at Streamy Cove, and offered to take Hecitas there in the cart if he were to escort the thrall. The party agreed. Marcomer also made a trade with the merchant, despite local animosity towards merchants.

 In the village of Streamy Cove, the party met Drest the tanner & taxidermist, as well as Nulls the fletcher & spear-maker. Both of these men almost exclusively craft for the local militia that protects the village and surrounding areas. Marcomer convinced Nulls to get him to assist him in making two quivers in exchange for resources. This process took around six hours, during which the rest of the party foraged the nearby area and investigate more. When speaking with Drest, they learned that cattle had gone missing from the local cattle-farmers land, and 2 heads had been placed on stakes right outside of the farm.. a sign of Kopparmen. This was the first the party learned of this strange race from another land. 

 While Eleni was fishing at the coast, she noticed a pod of dolphins off-shore, led by a mysterious small humanoid being. The being turned out to be a sea nymph. While the sea nymph did not speak, it communicated with Eleni through gestures. When it was clear that the nymph suggested Eleni grab onto a nearby dolphin, she proceeded to do so and quickly disappeared into the sea. The remaining party who witnessed this followed her lead, and after being briefly submerged, they arrived in a pitch black cave, still floating in the sea with the assistance of the dolphins. 

 They swam a few feet from their positions to feel for a way out of the hole and onto the surrounding dry cave floor. Then, with the aid of knocking rocks together to create sparks for faint light to see by, they barely make out the rough dimensions of the cave as well as notice the nymph floating silently near them in the water. The sparks and noise alert a centipede nearly as long as a man. Due to the position of the centipede, and a stunning initial blow to its head, the party managed to slay it without anyone being poisoned. 

 Once the centipede was destroyed, the sea nymph emitted a blue radiant light which filled the cave, revealing a door at the end of the tunnel the monster had crawled from. This was far too small for anyone to squeeze through, but was just the right size for the nymph. The light also revealed some ancient, secret runes on the side of the cave. While they could not be translated, Aquillius scratched them onto his staff for future reference. The group then jumped back into the water, latched onto the dolphins one last time, held their breath, and emerged back in the open sea where they rode back to the beach of Streamy Cove.

 A woman named Tamara who cooks for a local inn of sorts in Streamy Cove and has two children has complained that her husband, who runs the cattle farm, went hunting for the Kopparmen and has yet to return two days later. Based on rumors and the cow heads placed on stakes in Streamy Cove, the party decided to journey to the north, towards Rottenwood where they have heard there is recent Kopparmen activity.

The party did not get far when they detected a scout trying to track them. He was scrawny, dark-skinned and has sharp teeth. He also has a string of what looks like human ears dangling from his belt. Assuming he was dangerous, he was sniped with arrow fire before being finished off. Hecitas  decides to go back to town and convince some of the local militia to journey with them in the direction they saw the scout. As night approaches, they see smoke coming from a small fire on a hilltop a couple hundred meters from the road. They stealthily investigate and discover 2 scrawny, dark-skinned men and one female. 

 The source of the smoke was a fire pit which they are spit-roasting a pale, human torso on. The two savages puts up quite a fight, but only manage to score light and medium injuries before being overtaken by the party and their followers. The female ran away. The party then went back to rest at the inn at Streamy Cove to recover from their injuries and fatigue. The militia members are relieved. 

 The next day, the party checked on the campsite once more to find no signs of further activity, then went to Rottenwood. Aquillius is afflicted with thsse same sickness Hecitas previously had, and has to camp out by himself for a brief time until he can catch up with everyone else. During this period, he has a bizarre dream involving a hallway with giant rats, a half-arrow shaped room where he sees the sea nymph again, a bonfire, and a man with the head of a rabbit behind a secret wall who leads him up stairs, transforms into a bear, then jumps down a slide that Aquillius follows him down, to be awakened. 

 Rottenwood was an almost vacant and wretched place, surrounded in foul bogs and bad, rotting lumber. Only a tavern (clearly marked by a stone on the ground right outside the door of the medium-sized shack), a large warehouse-looking building, and another building resembling a tobacco barn are visible aside from run down huts and smaller shacks. However, a large and almost pristine ship dock lines the ocean-side. The explanation for the lack of ships there and lack of population in general was given by the large woman running the local tavern was “It’s not fishing season.”. 

 In this tavern, they met a male and female couple who were traveling hunters. They were there to hunt boars and other game around the bogs. The group also meets an old man there drinking by himself, dressed in robes. It is revealed through the couple and the barkeep that this man is a mute and from an area to the north known as “Spell Lake”, but he himself remains nameless. The young couple also mentions not to stay the night here, and that they will be leaving shortly.

 The old man suggests they buy him another drink, then suggests they follow him outside into the night and towards the bog. He pauses at the edge of the bog where the party observes many wisps floating through the air. He bends down and gathers mud which he smears on his face in a certain pattern. The party members mock this gesture, and the wisps are revealed to be many lantern men. Eleni, the most charismatic of party, interacts with one of the nearby lantern men who shows her a mass grave deep in the swamp before floating away. 

 This grave was filled with naturally mummified remains of a battle from long, long ago. The rest of the party decides to head back to the tavern once they realize their elder guide has disappeared, but Marc insists on searching the dead, on which he finds 1 ounce of gold.

 After arriving back at the Rottonwood tavern shortly before midnight, they spot their guide asleep outside the door. Inside was a new patron to the tavern, an older Halogi who also had a ring of ears on his belt. This man was revealed to be the missing husband of Tamara, on his way back home to Streamy Cove. He was grateful to hear of all the Kopparmen the party managed to take care of, then left as the party began talking to the barkeep once more. The party asked if there was a nearby inn, and were told a man named “Carl” owns a place where he rents out rooms, yet the barkeep strongly suggests not to stay there, instead offering to let the party sleep on the floor.

 Apparently, outside of the tavern was the old man’s common resting spot when in town, although this seemed unusual when the barkeep boarded the doors from the inside and midnight approached. So the party slept on the floor of the tavern for the night, to the sounds of the old man snoring outside.

 The next morning, the party awoke a bit later than usual to find all normal in Rottonwood and the old man was gone. It was Easter, when people wander upwards into the hills for ceremonies, but it was too late in the day to participate in tradition with anyone else in the area, including the barkeep. After some debate, it was decided that the party leave Rottonwood as soon as possible and continue north to this land known as Spell Lake. On their way out, they were reunited with Aquillius, who spoke of the strange dream he had as they filled him in on what he had missed. 

 Along the way, they run into another young man named Aldin, who claims he is also from the area of Spell Lake. He kindly invites the party to be escorted by him there. They make quick progress to the north with the assistance of Aldin until they come across a fork in the road. They choose the north-eastern fork, and Aldin has no objections. Further up the road, they detect a chain sound and grunting. They spot two more Koppermen walking right off the road, with a dog leading them. 

 Perhaps the deities were upon the party this day as they were downwind from the dog and were detected. These Kopparmen, while perhaps slightly more strong than the last, were no match for the group of young adventurers assisted by Aldin once the dog was killed. 

Now, it is the evening of the 22nd of Braidoblika, and Aldin tells the party his home in Wedgewood is only another 4 hours or so of road ahead..

Three Days in DPRK & Red Star Linux 3.0

Since May of last year, I've said that a demo of my newest interactive fiction for the Hugo engine would be released soon to a few play-testers. That finally started to come to be a reality around Christmas instead. At this point, I just need to wrap up things involving the first player character meeting the second player character, and working out any consequences of that meeting before displaying another room or two and ending the demo. This should be done in within the next 2 weeks, and if not Valentine's Day should be the absolute deadline.

Why is it taking so long? I've been quite busy with work, I finally played and beat LA Noire, Wasteland 2 came out, I got MYFAROG around Christmas, and I kept getting distracted with things like this:

DPRK running in HUGOR on Red Star Linux 3.0

Django CYOA

This is a new project I worked on recently to learn Django and get more Python practice. It creates CYOA style games using a combination of Django admin and HTML/CSS, and Python 2.7. Below are some screenshots, and here you will find the git repository. See the README file there for more about how the system works and how to use it yourself if you are interested.


A short example game I created is included. Perhaps in the future I'll get time to expand on it or make a new, larger one.

Game View

Story Admin Overview

Story Admin detail

(more) Story Admin detail

 

IF Comp 2014 Reviews: A - F

There are a lot of entries this year, and I'm trying to at least try to play them all. Here are some short reviews of what I've played so far. While I'm not doing any scoring here, (I've been making private notes for that to use when voting time arrives) there are some spoilers here. If you don't want to risk spoiling any of these games you haven't played yet yourself, then don't scroll down.




S

P

O

I

L

E

R

S

- ALETHICORP -

First game on the list. I'll just click "play in browser" and away we go. No, wait. There's another link waiting for me there, to apply for a job. Interesting. Wonder what the pay rate will be? The 2nd job sounds like one perhaps I can do. Oh great, a personality test. I failed one of these miserably when I applied to Pizza Hut as a teenager.

"If you were a bear, what type of bear would you be?" I would most definitely be a Were-Bear. Unfortunately, that isn't on the list. Okay, Smokey Bear it is. Team player? 9, of course (total lie). A few more questions and.. accepted! Wow, that was easy.

As the game moves along, I find myself going through many texts in the form of emails, reports, and conversation logs while flagging some things as suspicious. The constant train picture and comparison in some of the emails is pretty humorous. I seem to be doing not such a great job, but not horrible either. One person who calls themselves "Alpha" is asking me to not do my job and delete as much as possible. I am ignoring them.

Eventually, when asked to make "recommendations", I recommend Alpha at threat level 9. Doing so results in my termination from the company, as it was obvious to everyone but me that I was letting all the bad people slide. Oh well. "Those 'Smokey Bear ' types are never reliable."


- AND YET IT MOVES -

x me
How very vain of you.

Okay, not a big deal. This is a game about Galileo and all, so I'm letting it slide.

"inventory" says I've got a travel case that contains what looks like useless scenery, but that I've also got a bag with a list in it. Hey, I'm going to start grabbing some stuff off that list! I remember seeing some fruit outside!

I go to take an apple, but can't due to my morals. However, I see a bit of metal, which is of course a key. I try to take the potato, and it tells me about the bit of metal again. A bit later, I discover a hint on an object referring to this key. I hope anyone reading this did not have trouble finding this key.

There are little slightly annoying bugs around but nothing game-stopping yet. Things like the latch on the globe can not be seen after the description of the globe telling you that it is affixed with a latch, which is locked. Soon, we are upon lack of capitolization in within various sentence beginnings. Pretty neat how it throws the items from the list into the bag once I buy them, though. Argh, multiple objects that seem to do nothing and do not have plural understandings; with exception to taking things.

Visiting the trinket shop, I notice there's no shopkeeper, so I'm going to loot the place. I start with the "marbles", and get 57 lines of:

marble: If you want that marble, pay for it.

Seems obvious the next course of action at this point is trying to find the new location of the bank so I can cash in the note so I can pay for the bookbinder's services. Found it.

"Now you just need some supplies, and you can be leaving for Holland. There is a market nearby, and you have a list of things to buy in your bag."

Cool. But I wonder what would happen if..

>give bag to bookbinder
(the bag to the bookbinder)
You give the bag to the bookbinder.

>take bag
Which do you mean, the bag or sack of coins?

>the bag
Which do you mean, the bag or sack of coins?

Very impressive and extensive hints system. Though the game seems a bit too simple for all of these. It also fails to tell me why I can't complete the 4th(out of 5 according to the hints) scene when I have paid to get the book bound and have walked into Alighieri street holding 2 apples, 3 pumpkins, a water vessel, and a veal slice. I did this with the items in and out the bag. Waited. Gave up.

Had good points and was fun at moments, but the bugs killed the experience for me.


- ARQON -

This game comes with a warning for anyone who may be offended by IF RPG. I will press SPACE to continue.

It doesn’t take long before a combat encounter begins in this game. I keep meaning to check out Kerkerkruip, so I can’t really compare that to this.

Starting out, I go check out a temple which houses a priest. I pray and receive bless and curse (strangely, the same 2 scrolls I already have with me). Praying again gives the same result. Over and over. You can’t actually talk to the priest though because “You can’t see any such thing.” You can ask the owner of the trading post about “the trading post”, but “ask trader about trading post” gives no reply. There is a free scroll referred to at the trading post, but I can’t seem to buy or take it.

The popular typo theme in this one seems to be missing ending sentences. While the game doesn’t describe my defeated enemies pooling into thin air, there’s no trace of the body after the combat to search for loot or whatever. After a while, I just became disinterested in this one and moved on to the next.


- BEGSCAPE -

Beg. Beg. Beg. Choice.

That’s where the choices end with this one. Your only possible action is “beg” over and over and then you asked if you should stay in the current town or move to another (unless you are kicked out.) Then you die. Then you restart. This being advertised as a randomized game, I gave it another try. I replayed it roughly 5 times.

The lack of options here makes for a disappointing experience. Descriptions of opportunities float by, yet there is no “ask dude @ bakery for a job”, etc option to click. Why can’t I stop begging after getting enough money for shelter for the day? There are very few options other than dying and seeing a slightly more detailed death message in this game. There’s no background to anything. WHY can’t I do anything but beg? I could start to imagine this for myself, but I feel the story should give me a lot more explain this lack of options. At least I can complete it.


- BUILDING THE RIGHT STUFF -

This game has an interesting layout, though it does look a little rough. I like the green coloring of the screen, but waiting on it to refresh can be kind of annoying. Checking bioscans between turns gives some cool results, it's just too bad that the game wouldn't let me go back to the menu and essentially froze on my 4th or 5th bioscan.

On my first play through, I accidentally exited the game by hitting escape. On the 3rd turn, the game ended due to "space sickness" despite talking to GENE as frequently as I thought to, though scared to do it too much in fear of triggering the freeze bug again. Bug fixes and some randomization of the messages would make this game more worthy of play.


- CAROLINE -

The game starts with a dinner date, and my date wants to play footsies. We leave after getting crappy wine from a creepy waiter, and away we go to her house. She agrees to cook spaghetti, but won’t give me her secret recipe. I think her disgusting secret is carrots in her spaghetti sauce. I like both, but the two don’t go together.

Again, I don’t feel like I have enough choices here. The “correct” ones seem obvious to keep from pissing off Caroline. Our next date is quite strange. “Do I forgive myself?” for what? I’ve been on my best behavior with Caroline. Whatever, I’ll say yes. I have to yes a few times once in the church to properly role-play. Doing this did make for an amusing (and pretty ridiculous) ending. No show-stopping bugs to be found, but the lack of choices going on here prevents me from rating much higher.


- CREATURES SUCH AS WE -

This game starts off as a typical CYOA style game, then (at least for me) quickly ended in a bad ending. Then, I was poked at in a “R U MAD, BRO?” sort of fashion. A few more replays later, I don't really find much fun to be had here.


- EIDOLON -

When this story begins, I mistakenly think there are flying saucers outside. Instead, there's some really strange and creepy things going on here dealing with insomnia, alternate realities, and dreams. We have a few choices here, but nothing story-forking. However, we do have some cool puzzles in this Twine game!  While there were parts of the story I did not enjoy, there was a lot that I did.

The game presented itself well aside from one typo that stood out to me which I will mention later, never bugged out, had a cool and solid story, and was genuinely fun to play.

The only hitch was in the end: ”and now I just want everything to over"


- ENIGMA -

Got off to a rough start despite not getting many parser errors, and looked at the walkthrough. Lack of paragraphs makes this one a bit harder to read. Way too much typing to think and examine instead of just “doing” things to make this much fun for me.


- EXCELSIOR -

One of the bricks in the tower wall is black. That’s odd, you didn’t notice it before.

> x brick
It looks just like the other bricks, except black.

> take it
That’s not a command I recognize. Type “help” for command info.

> push brick
That’s not a command I recognize. Type “help” for command info.

“help” reveals a “use” command which is usually completely alien to me aside from graphic adventures with text parsers. The game advertises a streamlined parser, but it just feels more limited and frustrating to me. Not being able to use more than one line at a time is annoying once I glance at the walkthrough.


- FIFTEEN MINUTES -

After some examining and waiting, it's obvious that there's some time-travel puzzling going on here. I used to get helplessly stuck in Day of the Tentacle, so I don't have high hopes for this one. After bumbling about a bit, I consult the hints, then the walkthrough. This just doesn't seem like it's a game for me. Moving on again.


- FOLLOWING ME -

The lack of indenting and paragraph spacing in this one gets on my nerves, but the story
feels like something bad must happen, and that keeps me interested in moving forward. As it progresses though, things get pretty cheesy and profanities seem tackily overused. A few more typos pop up like lack of periods and a random % mark. I'm not sure how much impact my choices are making, but 2 plays didn't reveal much.

I would have made those bad guys pay a lot more, for sure.