Gnome's Lair

Mar 16, 2006

The shortest walkthrough ever

Remember Apprentice Deluxe, a beautiful little adventure game I reviewed the other day? Good. Here is the complete walkthrough, directly lifted from the Herculean Effort website. Apparently it's the shortest one ever (seen by me).

Without further ado then, let me present you with the...

Apprentice Abbreviated Walkthrough

Brevity is…wit.

(Pib’s bedroom)

- TAKE scroll

- LOOK at scroll

- WALK to downstairs

(Downstairs)

- TAKE coffee bean grinder

- USE right cabinet

- TAKE ??? (sandwich book)

- USE Master’s door

- WALK to the far right side of the room (by the stairs)

- While Master is in the kitchen, WALK to upstairs

(Pib’s Bedroom)

- USE laundry chute

(Downstairs)

- TAKE broom

- WALK to outside

(Outside tower)

- WALK to cliff

(Tree by Cliff)

- TALK to snake (until you ask if you can borrow objects)

- TAKE book

- TAKE picnic blanket

- WALK to outside tower

(Outside tower)

- USE gate

- USE plant ID book with plant

- USE broom with sheep (left side of field)

- TAKE oregano

- USE picnic blanket with the grinder (or USE the grinder with the dish towel in the tower)

- USE oregano with grinder

- USE broom with sheep (right side of field)

- USE gate

- USE sandwich book with sandwich

- WALK to barn

(Barn)

- TAKE stool

- TAKE pail of milk

- USE stool with saddle

- USE broom with saddle

- WALK to outside

(Outside tower)

- USE picnic blanket with horse

- USE saddle with horse

- USE pail of milk with saddle

- TAKE saddle

- WALK to tower

(Downstairs)

- WALK to upstairs

(Ending cutscene)

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Doesn't feel that short when you play it. Believe me. And this post seems to contain quite a few spoilers. Ooops. You could still test your wits at And Then There Were None, or even try a nice board game.

Mar 15, 2006

The Cow Race is on!

It's rather obvious, isn't it? The second episode of Bone is ready to be unleashed. In April. The webpage over at Telltale's joint has gone live, previews are appearing all over the place (well at IGN and Adventure Gamers, to be more precise) and the official forums have just opened their gates. In case you haven't got it, the name of the game will be Bone: The Great Cow Race, and it seems like it will be richer, longer, more detailed and less action-oriented than the original Bone. Joy. Screenshot (for more take a look here):

Related Gnome's Lair articles: Apprentice Deluxe Review, And Then There Were None review, Sam and Max video, the 2005 AGS Awards

Related Tags: Bone, Bone 2, The Great Cow Race, Adventure, Adventures, Gane, Games, Telltale, News, Entertainment, PC

Mar 14, 2006

World of Warhammer: the paint 'em up MMO

Warhammer inspired video games have such a brief history, that I fully covered it here, at Gnome's Lair (follow the link just before the parenthesis and see for yourselves- wink, wink, nudge, nudge, etc). But, what about the human being? What about our planet, what about incoherent writing and the future of Warhammer games?

Things couldn't be more simple. We humans will be mass-abducted by incredibly advanced alien psychologists, who will eventually rape every living thing on the planet (to death, and yes, that includes flowers too), thus bringing the imagined Warhammer universe to an untimely end. Before those climactic events I have foreseen the release of not one, not three, but two more Warhammer video games.

The first one, and the one I am really interested in, will be the Mark of Chaos. Apparently, a visually stunning RTS, with minor gameplay twists and non-existent resource gathering. It will even feature the abominable Skaven hordes. Yes! At last. We will be able -for once- to kill-kill man-things on our monitor. Imagine the joy, and take a look at what some other imaginative people imagined about Warhammer: Mark of Chaos, or visit the official website. Oh, here's a screenshot:

The second game, as the title of this article subtly implies, is Warhammer Online. Again. Only that this time it seems to be in the hands of a more serious, relatively bankruptcy-resistant developer, Games Workshop isn't directly involved and the whole thing seems like World of Warcraft but with Warhammer inspired models. I guess Blizzard had it coming... They started it after all. They invaded Poland, and then they got heavily 'inspired' from Games Workshop's world. Anyway, follow the links to official info, to some screenshots (and see a Slayer with a shield!!-the heresy of it) and to an excellent teaser video.

Hurry. Alien doom is nigh.

. . . . . . . . . . . .

Related Gnome's Lair articles: WDfD (Warhammer Diverting for Dummies), Warhammer rumors, a review of Civ4 and some freeware games.

Related Tags: Warhammer, Warhammer Online, Mythic, Namco, Game, Games, PC, video games, news, rumors, video, Mark of Chaos, Skaven, Entertainment, Games Workshop, MMORPG, MMO

Mar 13, 2006

Museum Monday #5

Monday. One of the worst. Ever. Infuriating and mondayish. I could scream you know. But I wont. I will instead try to feel better by looking at pixelated and rather nude ladies, hosted by a very interesting Museum. A virtual museum of course. The girls of '64 archive, whose noble cause is to preserve the sexy side of the C64. And to wet your appetite, let me present you with one of the best known exhibits: the introductory screen of Covergirl strip poker.

Related Tags: Monday, Museum, Virtual Museum, blog, Strip poker, Covergirl, C64

Mar 12, 2006

Feel the flow...

The flOw is a beautiful (free) java game, created by a Mr. Chen as part of his thesis on game design theory, processes, innovation, yada and yada. Apparently Mr. Chen's studies have something to do with the "flow theory", and this is where it gets quite interesting. But, unfortunately, this is no time or place for theorizing. This is play-time. Go take a look at the flOw game. It's relaxing, it is.

Related Gnome's Lair articles: A fat and nice freeware games list, old PC emulators, online C64 fun

Related Tags: flow, game design, free, freeware, java, Game, Games, mini games

The Thorians have arrived

Inquisitor, a rare hybrid of RPG and wargame by Games Workshop (set in the grim Warhammer 40k universe, where dark eras and war is all you get), is a game I should have already reviewed for your eyes -oh! most revered and wise readers. Apparently I haven't, but I can promise I soon will. While you are waiting (please don't stand, take a seat, it might just take a while) you could of course download the free pdf version of the Inquisitor rulebook from the Specialist Games site.

Now, take a look at the following picture.

Good. Like it? Even better, for this is the cover of a very nice and totally free Inquisitor source book, just published from Specialist Games/Games Workshop. As you should have gathered it's about the Thorians, an inquisitorial cult dating from the ancient days of the 36th millennium, usually looking something like this:

You can download the Thorian sourcebook from here. Then again, you might just want to read something about Warhammer or even Space Hulk. Some rumors perhaps? No? Ok, I'll give you a simple tactics article instead.