Transcript
Speaker: Yeah, they never pushed that kind of thing up until then.
Speaker: But that was the time period.
Speaker: You just kind of like shoved something like that in there every now and then.
Speaker: It just made no sense.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: They were just trying shit.
Speaker: They were just throwing stuff at the walls and seeing what stuck.
Speaker: They were like, not the baby.
Speaker: And like, yeah, they go from not the baby to, oh, you know, the extraction of natural resources.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Dooms the future generations of this planet.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Good night and good luck.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Speaker: They were aiming for a Peabody Award with that last episode.
Speaker: They just.
Speaker: You know who else is aiming for a Peabody Award?
Speaker: Who's that?
Speaker: Hey there, everybody.
Speaker: Welcome back to Pixelit.
Speaker: My name is Kevin.
Speaker: With me as always is Phil.
Speaker: And today we're finishing up Diablo, The Black Road.
Speaker: I got a burp.
Speaker: There it is.
Speaker: There it is.
Speaker: Let it out.
Speaker: There it is.
Speaker: You got it.
Speaker: I got it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So we're wrapping up on this book.
Speaker: And we got a lot of ground to cover because we realized after the first two episodes, a little bit of a miscalculation in the amounts that we were supposed to read for episode one and two.
Speaker: So we're really going to hit the ground running.
Speaker: Let's just do it.
Speaker: We're going to blast our way through this.
Speaker: Let's blast the body into the marsh.
Speaker: Let's blast that body right into the marsh.
Speaker: When I tell you to dump a body in the marsh, you dump them in the marsh.
Speaker: So chapter 16, we got Derek.
Speaker: He's...
Speaker: He's listening to some old timer talk about the new healing church and the stone snake and all that jazz.
Speaker: And Derek is working aboard some ships, but he's not too fond of it.
Speaker: And they're on their way to a town called Seeker's Point.
Speaker: The old timer named Sahir, don't get used to him.
Speaker: He's not going to come back ever again in the book.
Speaker: Don't worry about it.
Speaker: Just don't worry.
Speaker: Don't worry about it.
Speaker: Just another transitional character.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: In a book full of them.
Speaker: Yeah, pretty much.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's what you get used to with this.
Speaker: These characters you think are going to stick around.
Speaker: Nope.
Speaker: Nope.
Speaker: They're on their way.
Speaker: Yeah, I got a whole list of them that never came back that I think would be that it's just kind of funny that they never came back.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Nell Odom says, I like my characters like tissue paper.
Speaker: Soft, strong, and disposable.
Speaker: I like it like toilet paper.
Speaker: Flushable.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Very much so.
Speaker: I wipe my ass with these characters and I flush them.
Speaker: So here the old timer talks about that the symbols that Derek kind of draws in his notebook when he's just like not thinking about anything were of interest to a sage that they're going to go see.
Speaker: And the symbol is similar to the one that the Church of the Prophet of Light uses.
Speaker: And the sage thinks that it might be evil.
Speaker: Ooh, a little
Speaker: Um, so when we last left off, we're, we're back to Chalik, uh, booyah Chalik.
Speaker: Um, when we last left off, he got shot in the chest with an arrow and he's pretty dang sure that he's dying and Cabraxas tells him to clear the room to heal him.
Speaker: So that, uh, so Chalik's like, all right, everybody leave.
Speaker: And the priests are like, but you're bleeding.
Speaker: And he's like, just get the fuck out.
Speaker: Chalik says, I ain't got time to bleed.
Speaker: I ain't got time to bleed.
Speaker: And Cabraxas says, you're damn right you don't have time to bleed.
Speaker: And Cabraxas pulls the quarrel out of Chalak and is like, Chalak's like, what was this assassin?
Speaker: And Cabraxas, why didn't you stop him?
Speaker: And Cabraxas was like, I was busy.
Speaker: separating conjoined twins.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: He has a very frank, I can't be in two places at once, despite being a demon kind of conversation with him here.
Speaker: It's kind of amazing.
Speaker: He's like, listen, buddy, I am also bound by the laws of space and time, despite being a demon.
Speaker: Look, I'm amazing.
Speaker: We all think I'm amazing.
Speaker: Can't be, can't be everywhere at once.
Speaker: So you've got to watch out for the occasional assassination attempt.
Speaker: You just do.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So Chalik is not resurrected.
Speaker: He's just healed.
Speaker: But Braxis tells Chalik now that he's resurrected in the eyes of the people of the church, the church will probably grow even more.
Speaker: And so that they'll have, you know, more people are going to come to the church.
Speaker: And they mention that Lord Darkulin, which... That name.
Speaker: Come on, buddy.
Speaker: This guy is so...
Speaker: specific with his names.
Speaker: We've talked about it before.
Speaker: He makes choices when it comes to these names.
Speaker: He sure does.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Darkulin.
Speaker: Darkulin.
Speaker: Who rules Bramwell and has been suspicious of the church, but Darkulin was in attendance today.
Speaker: So, chapter 17, Chalik wonders why Darkulin would have picked today to be in attendance.
Speaker: And Cabraxas is like, well...
Speaker: Somebody may have told Lady Darkulin that Lord Darkulin had some mistress and where she could find that mistress and where to get some poison to slowly kill that mistress.
Speaker: And Lord Darkulin might be trying to save that mistress.
Speaker: And Chalik is like...
Speaker: What?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like, I just I laid it all out for you.
Speaker: Let's let's go.
Speaker: Let's go figure that out.
Speaker: Childlike reveals himself to the priest to show that he's that he's healed.
Speaker: And then he talks to the girl who saw the assassin and she describes the man to her.
Speaker: And he's like, nope, doesn't ring a bell.
Speaker: And I'm like, really?
Speaker: Not a little bit.
Speaker: Not even a little.
Speaker: Not even.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Tiny bit.
Speaker: Man burn.
Speaker: Top half of his body.
Speaker: You can't think of anybody that that might be.
Speaker: All right, Charlie.
Speaker: All right, Charlie.
Speaker: I feel like you're being difficult here, buddy, but knock yourself out.
Speaker: Okay, fine.
Speaker: Whatever.
Speaker: So Derek goes to the blue lantern to meet with the sage.
Speaker: Um, and this is one of those annoying, uh, why I start really hating Derek and the second half of the book conversations where Derek's like, uh, I'm, I'm not answering any questions unless I get questions answered.
Speaker: And then the guy will answer questions.
Speaker: And Derek is like, I'm still not answering questions.
Speaker: God damn it.
Speaker: So the guy's name is Tiramis rhymes with Paramus in New Jersey.
Speaker: And the sage gives more backstory on Cabraxas's part in the Sin War and all that jazz.
Speaker: And he explains the meaning of the symbols and how Cabraxas's main tools are leadership, greed and covetousness.
Speaker: uh, Tremis says that he knows that Derek lost someone to Cabraxas and he too has lost people to a demon, his family.
Speaker: Since then he has been demon hunting and recently has become sus of the church of the prophet of light, which is the, uh, one in Bramwell, the DN Epstein, whatever Cabraxas is fake name is.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: Tiramis reveals that there is a sword that is near Seeker's Point, coincidentally, that could probably kill Cabraxas based on old barbarian tales.
Speaker: Also, that he knew everything about Derek already from the get-go.
Speaker: Derek didn't even need to tell him anything because he's like, oh yeah, you're Derek Lang, you...
Speaker: You used to be under Captain Tollifer.
Speaker: Your friend Matt was killed in action.
Speaker: You saw Cabraxas.
Speaker: He like lays out all of the facts and Derek's like, what?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Oh boy.
Speaker: Now for those of you playing the home game, this might sound suspiciously like the first act of most other stories slash movies slash books where a down and out
Speaker: sad boy gets approached by an elder figure with with a money adventure.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: This might this might to some of you sound like it doesn't it shouldn't go in the last third of a book.
Speaker: And I know because that's kind of what I thought.
Speaker: I feel like everything leading up to these past few chapters could have been a single chapter itself.
Speaker: A prologue, if you will.
Speaker: If you will.
Speaker: And now we're just getting into the actual meat of what the story Mel Odom actually wanted to tell.
Speaker: Because this is so weird.
Speaker: This is such a weird moment to be introducing characters like this.
Speaker: It feels completely backwards.
Speaker: Yeah, I agree.
Speaker: We jump back to Chalik for chapter 18.
Speaker: He's waiting for a guest.
Speaker: It's Lord Darkulon.
Speaker: After a tense back and forth, and there's just the last...
Speaker: back part of the book is just riddled with characters being very tense with each other.
Speaker: After a tense back and forth, Darkulan follows Chalik into the way of dreams.
Speaker: Darkulan tries to kill Chalik in the way of dreams, but Chalik
Speaker: catches the sword and throws it aside.
Speaker: Um, and they continue in and fall into an abyss.
Speaker: Uh, Chalik lands safely, but Darkuland lands, uh, into a bog of nightmares and is about to drown in the memory of killing a lover that he, that he had, uh, that was pregnant.
Speaker: And do you know where he put her body?
Speaker: Where did he put that body, Kevin?
Speaker: He put her body in the mosh.
Speaker: What?
Speaker: I thought he put it where some guy from John Hancock goes every Thursday to get a fucking blowjob.
Speaker: This ain't reality TV.
Speaker: Don't laugh.
Speaker: did indeed put her body in the mosh.
Speaker: And you know what?
Speaker: Darkulin, you can stick around, pal, as far as I'm concerned.
Speaker: As far as I'm concerned, you're good people, except for that whole infanticide thing.
Speaker: You did the bit.
Speaker: You did the meme.
Speaker: I'm for it.
Speaker: That means a lot to us.
Speaker: That's all.
Speaker: um so dark yulin accepts cabraxas into his heart to be saved and is reborn and the way he's reborn is cabraxas like crushes his head or something like that yeah he does that a lot yeah and and then rebuilds him um and after he leaves cabraxas tells chalak to tighten security because he's learned of a demon hunter who has picked up his tail oh no oh no
Speaker: Chapter 19, Derek is following along with Taramis and his group of demon hunters.
Speaker: They're going to a house of a man named Elig who may have the sword, and they're going to discuss whether he will part with it.
Speaker: Meanwhile, Chalik is going to talk to Cabraxas, and Cabraxas is getting more worried and shows Chalik that Derek, one of the people who lived from the events at Tarixport, is now with Taramis, and there's a whole lot of demon math here.
Speaker: Um, that's just my note.
Speaker: I forget why I actually wrote that.
Speaker: I think it's just like, Braxis is like, there's this and then that, and this is a reason.
Speaker: It just felt like very explainer video to me.
Speaker: It got a, it got a little like, look, here's, here's, here's the background on us demons.
Speaker: Kinda.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Cabraxis has sent the Lizante after the demon hunter group, um, back at the house.
Speaker: Derek is chilling and observing everything around him until Terramus calls for him.
Speaker: And basically, the thing is, down in this root cellar is a body.
Speaker: And it's the body of the last person who held the sword.
Speaker: And it's still holding the sword because the sword won't let anybody take it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then the sword won't let, it's like you have to be purified.
Speaker: heart or something like that.
Speaker: And you have to understand what you need to do.
Speaker: It's sword in the stone bullshit.
Speaker: It's sword in the stone, but the stone is a, is a corpse, which is extra fascinating to me.
Speaker: I love it.
Speaker: Basically.
Speaker: It's like the, it's the, uh, Mjolnir, uh, Thor's hammer rules where you can't pick Mjolnir up, but you, if like you could pick Thor up while he's holding it,
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: It's a very, can God create a boulder that he himself, that's so big that he himself cannot move it, you know?
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: Is there a loophole here?
Speaker: And they even explain that a lot, but they're like, whenever we had to move the sword, we have to move like the entire- We have to just pick the body up and we move it.
Speaker: Yeah, that's the only way to transport it, which makes you wonder, could like a strong enough guy like use the body as a form of weapon?
Speaker: You know, just like, could they just chop the hand off and yeah, yeah.
Speaker: And fashion like a little hilt around the arm bone and use how much have they actually tried with this one?
Speaker: I have to know what is.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Have they made the effort?
Speaker: Clearly they haven't.
Speaker: So there's like basically I thought this was a neat little mention.
Speaker: Diablo and the prime evils have personally they talk about this sword has returned Cabraxas to hell.
Speaker: One of the other times that Cabraxas was on the mortal plane was he got sent back to hell because Diablo and the prime evils personally came up from hell to send him back.
Speaker: And I was like, awesome.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: that is so Diablo.
Speaker: Like that's, that's that we've talked about the moments in the first book that like, where they were just like demons coming out, literally crawling out of the ground.
Speaker: And like, like that's, that's what I came here for.
Speaker: Fucking excellent.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: They don't like, um, the prime evals do not like Gabrax's.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: Chapter 20, Derek is studying the sword in the clutches of a dead man, and the sword's rather plain looking.
Speaker: And they're like, yeah, that's intentional.
Speaker: Would you expecting like, you know, something with jewels on it or something like that?
Speaker: It just looks like any other sword.
Speaker: It's like the Holy Grail at the end of Last Crusade.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And Tiramis is like, you're the one that's meant to take the sword.
Speaker: Oh, the demon math.
Speaker: Basically, whenever a demon comes out, the seed that can destroy that demon also is released.
Speaker: Yes, because you keep everything in balance.
Speaker: In balance, yeah.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: As Derek tries to take the sword, he begins hearing flashbacks of his father telling him how worthless he is.
Speaker: The sword fights Derek, taking it.
Speaker: But then when it seems like another presence joins him, Matt's like, you can do it, maybe.
Speaker: The sword lets him have it.
Speaker: And then the Lizanti attack.
Speaker: And they're lizard wolf monster creatures.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Derek using the sword and Terramus are fighting them off.
Speaker: Terramus wants Derek to just run, but he won't leave anybody behind.
Speaker: And Derek finds out that the sword has God of War Leviathan axe properties.
Speaker: So he can throw it and return it back to his hand.
Speaker: Yeah, pretty nice.
Speaker: And Derek thinks it's partially Matt's spirit that allowed him to pick up the sword.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: This is where we get kind of deep into the notion that, yes, we're dealing in a world full of demons and curses and spells, but the real enemy is daddy issues.
Speaker: The real enemy is daddy issues.
Speaker: Because he has got them.
Speaker: He has got a barrel of them.
Speaker: We'll get more into it, but if this isn't all a metaphor for Derek being an out gay man trying to live the life that he wants with his companion of choice while his father berates him,
Speaker: from beyond the grave, I, for one, would be deeply, deeply shocked.
Speaker: It is not a stretch to attach that metaphor here.
Speaker: Not even a little bit.
Speaker: Yeah, I agree.
Speaker: So in chapter 21, Derek has arrived in Bramwell, and he's looking over the town from a hill.
Speaker: He's like, I don't know if we can pull this off.
Speaker: We only have 17 people after that Lysanti attack.
Speaker: Um, one of the warriors named Ramble, um, comes to fetch Derek and tells him that Terramus has found a way into the church.
Speaker: Uh, all of the warriors in the group are suffering from night terrors.
Speaker: Um, and one of them tried to leave, tried to kill, and then came back, tried to kill himself.
Speaker: And then they saved him, uh, because of how intense these night terrors are getting.
Speaker: Um, and this is all from Cabraxas's influence.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: Tiramis outlines the plan, which happened.
Speaker: Basically, they built the church too big too fast.
Speaker: There's like old sewers and new sewers intersecting, and there's an old sewer entrance underneath this parapet.
Speaker: And they got to get in under there in order to get up into the church.
Speaker: And it's like...
Speaker: you know, your D and D party is just sitting there planning out a mission that, you know, somebody is just going to cast fireball at some point.
Speaker: It's all just going to go completely to shit.
Speaker: We all know where this is going.
Speaker: Let's be real here.
Speaker: So they cat-like tread toward the church.
Speaker: They steal a cargo ship in order to get close to the sewer entrance under the parapet.
Speaker: They pick one that carries whale oil because it's kind of small and compact and it smells bad and nobody really wants to pay attention to it.
Speaker: Terramis does an amazing job of walking onto the boat.
Speaker: There's only three sailors on the boat.
Speaker: He walks onto the boat.
Speaker: He's like, oh yeah, captain, uh, you know, what's his name?
Speaker: Uh, wanted you guys to have this.
Speaker: And we're like, captain who?
Speaker: Um, and then he basically boring conversation anyways, them and cast does like, does like a force push and knocks them all off.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: He asks them, how are they?
Speaker: And, and then just blast them off the fucking ship.
Speaker: It's how are you?
Speaker: How are you?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Oh, man.
Speaker: That was one of those moments that took my wife completely off guard.
Speaker: We've been rewatching all the Star Wars movies.
Speaker: She's never seen most of them.
Speaker: And like that, the how are you moment in Star Wars and the he could use a good kiss in Empire Strikes Back left her howling.
Speaker: She was like, I didn't realize these were that funny.
Speaker: I was like, yeah, I know it's Harrison Ford.
Speaker: Harrison Ford is, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I feel like the how are you thing had to be unscripted.
Speaker: So much of it had to be.
Speaker: Harrison Ford loathed playing that part just enough to be fucking around half the time.
Speaker: And they were just like, fine, just keep it.
Speaker: It works for the character.
Speaker: Let's get this over with.
Speaker: He won't stop fucking Princess Leia.
Speaker: We need to get him out of here before his entire marriage falls apart.
Speaker: Him and Carrie just keep sneaking off places.
Speaker: He's married, and we got to do something about that.
Speaker: We got to do something about this.
Speaker: We got to, yeah, nip this shit in the bud.
Speaker: Let's just finish this up.
Speaker: Um, so Terramis uses a wind spell to push the sails, uh, and the boat down the river.
Speaker: Oh, and I forgot to mention, meanwhile, uh, Ramble, uh, sets a fire to a warehouse along the river bank so that people don't notice the sailors in the water.
Speaker: So there's like, everybody's looking at the fire and not at the boat being stolen.
Speaker: Pretty good strategy.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Chapter 22, the blue Zephyr, the boat they stole, is rolling down the river.
Speaker: Derek gets use of sailing skills, calling out things like hard to starboard and shit like that.
Speaker: Um...
Speaker: Ramble, who had set the warehouse fire, jumps onto the ship from a bridge.
Speaker: And I just want to point out, it's interesting that the book ends up coming full circle, kind of.
Speaker: In the final mission is like a nighttime river raid.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And the first thing that happens in the book is a nighttime river raid.
Speaker: Yeah, that's true.
Speaker: See, I didn't even pick up on that.
Speaker: At that point, I was like, okay, we're going, all right, cool.
Speaker: Another one of these.
Speaker: Let's just grand theft auto our way through this book.
Speaker: That's fine.
Speaker: One more.
Speaker: So the church guards begin firing their crossbows at them as they approach.
Speaker: And Trammus decides to light the ship on fire.
Speaker: And now the ship is on fire and it's compact and it's speeding up the river and it hits the pilings and it causes the parapet, basically the back part of the church.
Speaker: They described it as like the waiting area to get into the church around back, just collapses into the river.
Speaker: And they jump off of the boat.
Speaker: Uh, they, they basically, or they don't jump off this boat.
Speaker: They can't see the entrance.
Speaker: It's too dark out.
Speaker: And then Matt starts talking to Derek in his head and tells him to call out the name of the sword.
Speaker: So when Derek says storm fury, this, the sword lights up bright enough so that it could see the shoreline and the entrance to the old sewer that they're trying to get in through.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: So they all jump off the ship just about just when the ship dislodges, gets dislodged by the current and heads deeper into Bramwell.
Speaker: And the group enters the sewer.
Speaker: And then Derek tells the group about Matt's voice in his head in order to convince them.
Speaker: It was like, you got to follow me.
Speaker: I know which way to go.
Speaker: I've got a voice in my head.
Speaker: I've got a voice in my head.
Speaker: I know where to go.
Speaker: Clearly, I'm the most trustworthy member of this party.
Speaker: Totally.
Speaker: Because I have two voices, not one.
Speaker: Not one, but two.
Speaker: My dead dad and my dead best friend.
Speaker: They're both tearing me apart inside.
Speaker: Tearing me apart, Lisa.
Speaker: I'm the one to trust.
Speaker: I am the stable leader here that you need.
Speaker: You folks need.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: So they come upon a group of rats who attack them.
Speaker: Classic.
Speaker: Classic.
Speaker: Meanwhile, it's Boo Yard time.
Speaker: Boo Yard.
Speaker: Boo Yard.
Speaker: Boo Yard.
Speaker: Boo Yard.
Speaker: Chalik realizes that someone has attacked the church and then we get some backstory about how in the past month he's been biggering and biggering the church and has been getting close to having permission to build in Westmarch.
Speaker: Chalik asks the captain of his guard what's going on.
Speaker: The guard's like, I don't know.
Speaker: We're looking into it.
Speaker: Let you know when we know.
Speaker: Other than there's like a dozen warriors and that the ship was being driven by magic.
Speaker: And then Chalik grand moff Tarkins.
Speaker: He goes, it's, I don't even know what he actually said because I wrote down what Tarkin said.
Speaker: Retreat at our moment of triumph.
Speaker: I don't remember what he said either, but I'm here to tell you that that's exactly what I thought of when it got to that point.
Speaker: And that, and it, and it superseded anything that Mel Odom wrote.
Speaker: Hey, Graham off Tarkin's just like the guy, the captain of the guard is like, uh, sir, we've analyzed their attack and there is a small chance that they could be successful.
Speaker: And,
Speaker: And Chalik is like, no, I am staying here.
Speaker: I'm not going to worry about these fucking teenagers.
Speaker: Come on.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: Chalik.
Speaker: And then Chalik is like, keep an eye out for a burned man.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: By the way, I'm not worried about that shit, but if you could keep your eyes open for a burn victim, I feel like that would be a good use of the time.
Speaker: And he's not wrong, to be fair.
Speaker: He's not wrong, no.
Speaker: Cabraxas tells Chalik then that he is going to handle it personally, and he should go back and continue the church services.
Speaker: Chapter 23, the gang is fighting off some rats while Terramus is trying to cast a spell to deal with them.
Speaker: And then Terramus, we get some moments of rats being cleaved in half.
Speaker: And then Terramus casts a spell, rending the rats to bone, just like all these hundreds of rats, just their flesh getting ripped off.
Speaker: That's sick.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Sick.
Speaker: Clavin, who he that that sounds like he was at he went to the bar at Cheers.
Speaker: You know, I was going to say it sounds like something that that Jerry Lewis, Jerry Lewis or Professor Frank Clavin Clavin.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: One of the warriors got his jugular ripped by one of the rats.
Speaker: And they're like, ah, we can't do anything for him.
Speaker: And then Matt tells Derek to use the hilt of the sword on the wound.
Speaker: Which does sound suspicious.
Speaker: I got to say.
Speaker: That sounds suspicious.
Speaker: Palette, one of the other guys, is like, no, just don't do that.
Speaker: And then Derek does it and the wound heals.
Speaker: Like, oh, okay.
Speaker: Magic is magic.
Speaker: We're going to keep on, keep on keeping on.
Speaker: They continue running down the sewer, but then are attacked by a monster created out of the bones of the rats.
Speaker: So they're surrounded on one side by the guards, and on the other side is a bone golem.
Speaker: And Derek begins fighting the golem.
Speaker: He's cutting off his arms one by one.
Speaker: At one point, Ramble saves him, but he gets a bone shoved through his arm.
Speaker: And there's a big battle of doubt waging in Derek's head.
Speaker: There's like the voice of Derek's father being like, you're worthless.
Speaker: You're worthless, son.
Speaker: You're the most worthless son anybody could ever have.
Speaker: And Matt's like, no, buddy.
Speaker: It gets to the point.
Speaker: It is like, it's like walk hard dad levels where like you think it's, it's become a parody of itself.
Speaker: It's just like, Oh, worthless.
Speaker: You're a stupid boy.
Speaker: Like, okay.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: That was kind of the problem that I was having with this as we kind of go on in these chapters to be like,
Speaker: I get it.
Speaker: Yeah, I get it.
Speaker: Shut up.
Speaker: More to the point, like nowadays, a father telling you you're stupid.
Speaker: Yeah, of course, you know, that that'll leave psychological damage.
Speaker: I feel like in a medieval setting or something like that, that's got to be more par for the course.
Speaker: I feel like that that doesn't wouldn't that.
Speaker: Maybe I'm being naive.
Speaker: When he carries much weight.
Speaker: Right, right.
Speaker: You're always going to have a little sadness inside, but it's 1,210.
Speaker: So that's just kind of a standard issue way of living.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, I didn't... Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, so...
Speaker: After some more combat and flipping and flopping, Derek is able to kill the golem and the group runs on with the guards chasing them.
Speaker: And then they're like, we're going, going, going.
Speaker: And then the sword leads them down another path and it's a dead end.
Speaker: Chapter 24.
Speaker: They're trapped.
Speaker: And Matt gives Derek the lowdown about how there were three people marked that night.
Speaker: And Derek is having more doubts as the guards catch up.
Speaker: Basically, it's just kind of like a standoff because the guards don't want to attack because they think there's too many people and they'll lose too many of their own.
Speaker: So they're waiting for the archers to get there.
Speaker: And, you know, we get some more information.
Speaker: Derek could only take the sword because Matt is like...
Speaker: in him.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Which I think, I think we get it.
Speaker: I think we get the, the message here.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: We get the message.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Matt is trying his darndest to convince Derek to stand fast and wait for the third man.
Speaker: And then who, who would you, it's, it's, it's Wraithan.
Speaker: It's Captain Wraithan, the burn man.
Speaker: He opens a hole in the wall and offers them a way out.
Speaker: And Wraithan apparently can hear Matt as well.
Speaker: Um, and he's like, your, your, your friend keeps, won't shut the fuck up.
Speaker: Frankly, I'm fucking sick of him.
Speaker: Uh, were you guys a thing?
Speaker: Nevermind.
Speaker: Don't worry about it.
Speaker: Were you, you know, woo-woo.
Speaker: You a shipwife?
Speaker: It doesn't matter.
Speaker: It doesn't matter.
Speaker: It doesn't matter.
Speaker: I didn't say anything.
Speaker: It's a different age.
Speaker: Different age.
Speaker: They go through the opening and Wraithan pours a barrel of oil into the opening where the guards are and lights it on fire, causing them to retreat.
Speaker: And then just the last note I have for chapter 24 is, it's all a prophecy.
Speaker: In the chapter 25,
Speaker: Tramis tells them of the prophecy.
Speaker: One lost in death, one lost in life, and one lost in himself.
Speaker: And then my next note is reading these verbatim.
Speaker: Shame this wasn't set up anywhere else ever.
Speaker: That's note number one.
Speaker: Note number two.
Speaker: Jesus fucking Christ, this is dumb.
Speaker: I hate it.
Speaker: Tell me, did you have any more notes after that?
Speaker: Yeah, I got more notes.
Speaker: There was a part of me that felt like that was like, that's it.
Speaker: That's all I've got for the rest of the book.
Speaker: I stopped writing notes on the book after that.
Speaker: No, I kept writing notes, but oh God, I don't, I can't tell you how much I fucking hate
Speaker: Like, first of all, prophecies are thin ice for me.
Speaker: You know, thin fucking ice.
Speaker: It is a very well, well-worn trope.
Speaker: You gotta walk that line.
Speaker: It's a tightrope that you gotta walk.
Speaker: To set up a third act prophecy...
Speaker: That takes some balls.
Speaker: To fulfill the characters that you already have.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That takes some fucking balls.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: To be like, that to me is not planet, like,
Speaker: To me, it seems like this book was not planned at all.
Speaker: It was just the guy started fucking writing and then he's like, well, I got these dudes.
Speaker: And then he's like, it's a prophecy.
Speaker: And that's why there's the three of them.
Speaker: Like what the fuck?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's, it's, it's a stretch to say the very least.
Speaker: It's more than a stretch.
Speaker: It's just, it's just kind of lazy.
Speaker: Uh, it's a real shame.
Speaker: It's a real shame.
Speaker: Uh, you have to, um, if you're gonna, uh, shoot a prophecy in the third act, it better be up on the shelf in the first act.
Speaker: That is.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Damn right.
Speaker: That's what I say.
Speaker: So anyway, they make their approach to the church.
Speaker: It's always, you know we're in a good episode when I hear...
Speaker: the, the, the copy written, uh, uh, exasperated sigh of, of Kevin just, we, we have to trademark it or something.
Speaker: It's just, uh, it never, it never loses its, uh, appeal slash, uh, just no, no, just appeal.
Speaker: Uh, your, your pain is our gain, Kevin.
Speaker: That's a fact.
Speaker: So they're going, uh,
Speaker: They're going down to the church and they open a secret door and they're looking through the door and there's a huge crowd and Wraithan is like, oh yeah, by the way, I tried to kill Chalik already once.
Speaker: Didn't take.
Speaker: They're like, okay.
Speaker: And Wraithan's like, I think he's immortal.
Speaker: And they're like, nah, that's probably not it.
Speaker: No.
Speaker: Anyone got any other ideas?
Speaker: Okay, no, probably not that though.
Speaker: So they open the secret door and they begin their attack and they're wading through the crowd and there's a lot of fighting and slashing and killing.
Speaker: There's guards and mercenaries getting hacked up.
Speaker: Taramis casts a winter spell causing to snow and chill inside the cathedral.
Speaker: Why?
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: He just does it.
Speaker: He just does it.
Speaker: It's too hot and too dang hot in here.
Speaker: He makes it cold.
Speaker: Okay, fine.
Speaker: Um, Derek is being chased by the snake, which has no consideration for other human life.
Speaker: It's just like slamming around, smearing people against the wall.
Speaker: Um, and then Derek is, uh, he's like platforming.
Speaker: This is like a little platforming level.
Speaker: Um, he, he jumps to child.
Speaker: He jumps to chalks platform and grabs him and slams into the wall and stops him from, uh, casting a spell.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: And then Derek gets back up and he throws the sword into Chalik's chest.
Speaker: And that's a picture wrap on Chalik.
Speaker: Chalik is dead.
Speaker: This is real dead.
Speaker: He then dodges the snake some more and pulls and does the lefithan axe sword pull back from the dead body.
Speaker: And then the snake swallows Derek and pulls him into the Black Road.
Speaker: Ah.
Speaker: And we get like pages of Derek just dealing with his father, trying to convince him to kill himself.
Speaker: Um, and then his father's just like, fuck it.
Speaker: I'm going to do it.
Speaker: I'm going to kill you.
Speaker: I'm going to hang you.
Speaker: Um, and it's just like, okay.
Speaker: It's really a bit overwrought at this point.
Speaker: It just, yeah.
Speaker: You know, for all you're talking about, like how there's, we get random ass things like a prophecy and all that shit introduced.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: You know, last second with very little buildup, no lead into these details.
Speaker: But this is this is one detail that the pudding is so over egged that it's just eggs at this point.
Speaker: And it's just an egg.
Speaker: It's just an egg.
Speaker: It's there's still shell on it.
Speaker: It is.
Speaker: It is.
Speaker: It cannot be mistaken for anything other than an egg.
Speaker: And it's too much.
Speaker: It's just normal egg.
Speaker: Yeah, it's just it's just innocent egg.
Speaker: It's just it's an egg.
Speaker: I just want, yeah, it's a lot.
Speaker: It's just a normal egg.
Speaker: Just an innocent egg.
Speaker: Just an innocent egg.
Speaker: Matt is trying his best to snap Derek out of it.
Speaker: Matt's like, look behind him.
Speaker: It's not him.
Speaker: It's the demon.
Speaker: And then Cabraxas reveals himself and Derek fights him while still having a noosary on his neck.
Speaker: And Derek cuts Cabraxas' head off, and he's back in the cathedral.
Speaker: And the stone snake still lives until the sword casts a blue lightning spell.
Speaker: And he's like, yay, that's it.
Speaker: The false prophet is over.
Speaker: Woo-hoo.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And we get an epilogue, and I didn't really take a lot of notes on the epilogue, but basically to sum up, Derek is like,
Speaker: Hey, you know, he's on the roof and he's been cursed by Cabraxas to be like part demon.
Speaker: He's also the portal from which Cabraxas could come back onto the mortal plane and he needs to carry the sword with him at all times.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And they're like, Taramis is like, all right, well, you want to get going?
Speaker: And he's like, nah.
Speaker: And it's like this awkward moment where he's like, I'm not going to ride with, I'm not going to go with you guys.
Speaker: But then they end up on the same boat anyway.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: They just do their best not to notice each other and just like look straight ahead.
Speaker: They said goodbye.
Speaker: And then they both started walking in the same direction.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: While they're on the boat, a little girl gets crushed in between the boat and the dock.
Speaker: And they're like, oh, no, she's going to die.
Speaker: That's that's a shame.
Speaker: She's going to die.
Speaker: And Derek is like, OK, and he goes down and he uses the.
Speaker: His healing power that he has now apparently through the sword and Cabraxas to heal the girl.
Speaker: But whenever he uses the healing power, he can hear Cabraxas's voice more clearly.
Speaker: So that's like any time he uses his magic now, it's like Cabraxas has a chance to try to influence him.
Speaker: Yeah, to kind of balance everything out.
Speaker: And people are like, oh, that's the guy, the people who killed our prophet, that's the guy.
Speaker: And then the mother's like, back off, he saved my daughter.
Speaker: So there's probably a good reason they killed that guy.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Because everyone's still worked up about the old church.
Speaker: Still only like an hour later.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Everyone's still kind of upset about that.
Speaker: And they feel some of them, it's actually pretty apt.
Speaker: You know, they, they, they say, you know, some of them realize their mistake and feel stupid.
Speaker: So they're doubling down.
Speaker: And some of them are still genuinely enthralled to the whole thing, but they're, they're not going to be, they're not going to be asking to take you out to dinner anytime soon.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: So it's, it's, it's interesting.
Speaker: It's interesting.
Speaker: It's interesting.
Speaker: But by the time we got there, I just, I was just done.
Speaker: Like I was so cool idea.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Um, and that's the end of the book.
Speaker: That's, that's how our book ends.
Speaker: Um, the Derek is off on adventures.
Speaker: Are we going to see more of him?
Speaker: I don't care.
Speaker: Um, Hmm.
Speaker: Seems like these Diablo books are just like one offs anyway.
Speaker: We're not.
Speaker: I think so.
Speaker: I think they've got they do have a Sin War, I think, trilogy that talk that's like Horace Heresy, like prequel style Diablo.
Speaker: But I think I think one of the interesting things about this, the Diablo series is that the fact that these are.
Speaker: They appear to be just one-offs within the universe.
Speaker: They're not based on any one thing, which it's kind of amazing that a game that does have a storyline, but does anyone really know it?
Speaker: Is anyone really paying that close of attention to it?
Speaker: I don't know what the, like... Yeah.
Speaker: I know ostensibly it's like...
Speaker: I know ostensibly it's like what you're going to fight, kill Diablo.
Speaker: I mean, name of the game, Diablo.
Speaker: You're going to kill Diablo.
Speaker: That's one.
Speaker: And then I don't know.
Speaker: I couldn't tell you a single inch of what two, three or four are about.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And I think that's how most people.
Speaker: I mean, I assume Diablo more, but.
Speaker: Yeah, sure.
Speaker: But it has this vague sense of like good versus evil.
Speaker: And don't get me wrong, I really enjoy the games.
Speaker: I haven't played the new one, but I enjoy them.
Speaker: But I don't play them for the story.
Speaker: And I think that's what's interesting about these books is that there is a lot of freedom afforded to the writers.
Speaker: And that's a huge positive right up until it's totally not.
Speaker: Uh, because at times I feel like the writers just don't know what to do with it.
Speaker: And I think this is a good example of that.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Um, this book, it's weird.
Speaker: It gets a lot of good ratings on the, the book apps and it's like, Oh, amazing characters and stuff like that.
Speaker: Um, here's the thing.
Speaker: I didn't like any of the characters to be honest.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: Derek is just an annoying, you know, piece of shit.
Speaker: There's like, there's like, it feels like he never gets better.
Speaker: Even to the very end, he just like hangs on by the skin of his teeth.
Speaker: And then he's like, well, I have a new reason to be sad.
Speaker: Right, right.
Speaker: Yeah, he doesn't like he doesn't like turn around.
Speaker: He's a Jedi Knight or some goddamn thing.
Speaker: He's just he's just sad for different reasons now.
Speaker: He's just sad boy.
Speaker: And I understand I can relate to being a sad boy.
Speaker: But, you know, that's not the story.
Speaker: I want to read a story about a character who goes from one point A to point B and has some change.
Speaker: This is just like Derek watched his friend die and then he pulls himself out of a drunken stupor just long enough to kill the demon.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Just long enough.
Speaker: Yeah, you're right.
Speaker: It has this... Look, I like...
Speaker: taking old fashioned narratives and old fashioned genres like, like sword and sorcery and adding a new spin to them, uh, and trying something new.
Speaker: I think that's great.
Speaker: I think that's very admirable, but I don't think a heavy handed bit of daddy issues is the excitement that we're looking for in a world where you're literally trying to exercise demons, uh, and, and send them back to hell.
Speaker: Uh, it's, um,
Speaker: I think Mel Odom has some really good pieces here.
Speaker: Like there are so many cool details that he puts in that you're like, oh, that's fucking metal as shit.
Speaker: There were so many moments that I was like, oh, that's really cool.
Speaker: The way he describes things, but they don't hang together very well.
Speaker: No, it's very loose.
Speaker: Yeah, it's like he needs, he's got all these cool people, places, and things, because I liked a lot of the characters, but he doesn't know how to get them from point A to point B, which made me think, and hear me out on this, he's an old school role-playing game guy.
Speaker: I feel like he might be one of the best DMs to be in his game, to play a game of Dungeons & Dragons with Mel Odom is probably divine, because he'll give you...
Speaker: all kinds of cool shit.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: You guys move it forward and take the plot.
Speaker: But as far as, as this novel is concerned, it just, it was, it doesn't hang together.
Speaker: It didn't hang together.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: The yeah.
Speaker: Jamming a prophecy in the last chapter, um, basically, um,
Speaker: is when it gets kind of like explained.
Speaker: It's felt a little desperate.
Speaker: Like, yeah, it's a little, little desperado.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Little, little bit, little bit.
Speaker: Also, what else?
Speaker: Oh, like you have these characters like, like Lex, like who seemingly is going to be important to,
Speaker: You know, because he's like, I want to I'm going to hunt this demon.
Speaker: I'm going to I'm going to figure it out.
Speaker: Like, what if what if Lex is the guy that he comes back around?
Speaker: You know, he instead of this new Terramis guy, what if it was Lex that he that right circling back around?
Speaker: It's like a year and a half later.
Speaker: You know, you you get Lex and he's like, you know, grown up a little bit, matured a little bit.
Speaker: And we're already a little invested in that character.
Speaker: So it's way easier for us to go along.
Speaker: I totally agree.
Speaker: I think that would have made a, that would have made the whole thing a lot more of a tight experience.
Speaker: It would have tied the whole thing together, you know?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then, I mean, we get Wraithen back, but we don't, there's a lot of the weird development of Wraithen, like his interaction with the woman, um,
Speaker: in that one chapter.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Which you thought was going to be.
Speaker: What the fuck is that?
Speaker: What is that?
Speaker: And we have this huge moment with this woman who, you know, he assaults her.
Speaker: She assaults him back.
Speaker: He's kind of amazed by her, her, you know, bravado and all that stuff.
Speaker: She's dead now, but wow, what an amazing woman and stuff.
Speaker: And you're like, okay, so what are we going to do with her?
Speaker: Are we bringing her back?
Speaker: Is she going to like haunt him?
Speaker: Like, no, she, it was just a moment.
Speaker: Um, and in a 300 and some odd page book, we don't, we, if you're, if you're writing a 1200 page epic and you want to include shit like that, yeah, sure.
Speaker: Fine.
Speaker: I mean, that's, that's one thing, but this isn't, we don't have time.
Speaker: You know what this felt like?
Speaker: This felt like a fan fiction book that was being written chapter by chapter and people were reading each chapter before the next one was written.
Speaker: And he was reacting to people's reactions.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: Like he starts out as a pirate story and then you get a bunch of people after the third or fourth chapter going, wait, I thought this is Diablo.
Speaker: Shouldn't there be demons?
Speaker: There is.
Speaker: There is a demon.
Speaker: There is.
Speaker: Don't worry.
Speaker: We're getting.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And it's like, OK, this I'm introducing this character and he's a pretty cool.
Speaker: Totally.
Speaker: He sucks.
Speaker: And then just kills him.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, it's a serialized, it was published, you know, it's 1912 and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is publishing, you know, Sherlock Holmes bit by bit in a newspaper or something like that.
Speaker: You know what I mean?
Speaker: It's one of those...
Speaker: It's one of the... And I can... You know what's funny is you can... If you read enough of those books from the first half of the 20th century, enough of those stories, when serialized novels were more common, like Invasion of the Body Snatchers, I believe, was originally serialized in a magazine.
Speaker: And there are moments in that book, if you read it cover to cover, you're like...
Speaker: oh, this chapter is just fucking filler.
Speaker: Right, right.
Speaker: He was just buying time.
Speaker: He was just trying to get a paycheck for this month.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: Because there's a chapter in Body Snatchers where they escape.
Speaker: They leave town.
Speaker: And they do all this stuff and then they go back to town at the end of the chapter.
Speaker: And it's like nothing gained in that chapter.
Speaker: You know, in fact, they're right back where they started.
Speaker: And it's in the middle of the book.
Speaker: And I remember I was listening to the audio book version and the guy who did the audio book was the son of the guy who directed the first movie.
Speaker: So the guy who narrated it and he did a great job narrating it.
Speaker: And he was talking about one of the things that he goes, one of the things I liked that my father did with the, with the adaptation of the movie is he cut out a lot of scenes that were just filler in the original book.
Speaker: And I was like, yeah, that makes, that makes a lot of sense.
Speaker: You know, you gotta, you make it leaner and you like to make a little bit meaner.
Speaker: Um, yes, I agree.
Speaker: This feels like it needed some editing.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: It just, yeah.
Speaker: You could have eliminated a quarter of the characters, made composites of them.
Speaker: There were so many.
Speaker: It felt, it really did feel like Mel had a story that he wanted to write and realized too late that it was too short.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: and realized that the book he'd written was only going to be able to work as like half of the second act and the third act.
Speaker: And he needed to expand on the first act.
Speaker: And it just didn't hang together.
Speaker: It really didn't.
Speaker: It's a shame.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Again, there are so many details that I thought were fucking excellent.
Speaker: I literally, at certain points, was like, I'm going to have to steal that for a D&D game or something like that.
Speaker: I'm going to have to put that detail in there.
Speaker: That is so cool.
Speaker: He's got ideas, but for whatever reason.
Speaker: And that's the thing with these write-for-hire books, which is 99% of what we read here.
Speaker: We don't know if it's just, if it's, if this was just a book in his universe that he invented and all that stuff, then we could very reasonably go, what the fuck?
Speaker: Like, like you, you didn't, you fucked it up.
Speaker: This is just a bad, this is just bad writing.
Speaker: But with this, it just leaves more questions than answers because we don't know if, uh,
Speaker: um, blizzard nixed something, or if the publisher said, ah, you gotta, you gotta expand on this or, you know, cause he's, he's writing this for a check and right.
Speaker: And you know, you're, you gotta, you're writing for your customer, so to speak.
Speaker: So yeah, who knows?
Speaker: Um, and as, as I noted, like more in the minority, apparently on, on disliking this book, it's, it's got great reviews on everywhere else.
Speaker: So,
Speaker: We were also in the minority for Dead Space, and I'm not going to... I'm not pulling back on that one.
Speaker: And I don't understand... I can't even... I could understand liking this book.
Speaker: Because as you said, as we said, there's a lot of neat stuff in it.
Speaker: And if you're just kind of like, oh yeah, all this is really neat.
Speaker: And it's not a very thorough examination of whether it actually...
Speaker: hangs together, then yeah, you, you can, you could definitely enjoy it.
Speaker: There's squash buckling, there's magic, there's sure there's demons, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker: And what's funny is Cabraxas is probably one of the most, uh, intriguing villains.
Speaker: Cabraxas was excellent.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: We have had in one of our books.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Um, I totally agree.
Speaker: I loved him.
Speaker: He was great.
Speaker: But yeah, I would say I think the other Diablo book, despite kind of fall, not falling apart, but kind of being a little bit slow at the end, I liked better than.
Speaker: Oh yeah.
Speaker: It definitely had a very cohesive plot.
Speaker: Everyone was.
Speaker: The narrative thrust was all going in one direction.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It just kind of had a weird, it also had kind of a weird dude coming up at the end.
Speaker: It's just like,
Speaker: ah, I am the deus ex machina.
Speaker: Oh, yeah, yeah, the old wizard guy.
Speaker: The old wizard dude who was mentioned in the prologue and then it's like, look at me, I'm that guy from the prologue.
Speaker: That's right.
Speaker: That's right.
Speaker: Yeah, they held off on him so long that I wondered if he was ever going to show up again.
Speaker: And then almost at the last possible second.
Speaker: Yeah, that one, I have a lot of positive memories of that one.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, I think it wasn't flawless, but especially after reading this one, I think that's definitely the strongest of the Diablo books, of the two we've read.
Speaker: Of the two that we've read, it is the best.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: So with that all being said, the body is in the marsh.
Speaker: It's not, it's, there is no guy from John Hancock getting his, getting his blowjobs by this one.
Speaker: So with that all being said, what are you playing?
Speaker: Okay, look, still playing Far Cry 6, slowly taking over this island town by town.
Speaker: I have nothing more to say about it.
Speaker: It is just something that is going to, I'm going to play it until there's literally nothing left to do.
Speaker: I'm going to finish it, uninstall it with a small sense of sadness and move on with my life.
Speaker: But I have played another game that I'm finding very intriguing right now.
Speaker: And I've seen it actually, now that I've started playing it, I've started noticing it on like TikTok and it's one of those flavor of the month games on social media and it's called Bramble the Mountain King.
Speaker: And this is a- Oh, I saw you mention this, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, this is one of your narrative-focused adventure, not point click, platformer games.
Speaker: It's based a lot around Norse mythology.
Speaker: It is, if you have played Little Monsters, if you have played Limbo or Inside, if you have played Brothers, A Tale of Two Sons, if you've played any of those games, you have played this game.
Speaker: It is the same basic idea.
Speaker: You do puzzles.
Speaker: You're a child in danger from horrifying, horrifying things.
Speaker: And the first 30 or 40 minutes I played of it, I actually thought I was like, I think I'm going to refund this one.
Speaker: This is just, it's just the same.
Speaker: And then something clicked in my brain and was like, yeah, but you loved all those games.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I went, oh, you're right.
Speaker: And suddenly I was able to just kind of wash myself in the fun of all of it.
Speaker: And I'm really enjoying it.
Speaker: It's a blast.
Speaker: I don't think I have much left.
Speaker: It's not a very... The one downside to the whole experience, there are two.
Speaker: There's one that it's like the...
Speaker: The platforming is kind of swishy.
Speaker: It's kind of like feathery.
Speaker: You don't have a lot of weight to you.
Speaker: And that can really fuck you up in terms of getting your jumps right and stuff like that.
Speaker: It's floaty.
Speaker: That's the word I was looking for.
Speaker: Floaty.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You're very floaty.
Speaker: And that can be a pain in the ass, but not a huge one.
Speaker: And it's $30.
Speaker: And I hate bringing up the price of these things because I think that they should be...
Speaker: judged without that but the older i get and the more responsibilities i take on uh the more i realize that that is absolutely a factor that is only fair to bring up and this game is 30 dollars i'm about two-thirds of the way through it i'm like two and a half hours into the game i i've looked it up and and most people agree that four four and a half hours is what you're gonna get and here's the thing
Speaker: With these kinds of games, I kind of think that's the perfect length of time because no matter how clever or beautiful the game is, and it is both, it's absolutely a stunning game and it's very clever.
Speaker: The puzzles are interesting and the storyline is wonderful.
Speaker: I think that's great.
Speaker: It's still $30 for that length of experience is going to be steep for some people and I can't blame them for that.
Speaker: So I think it's one of those games that it's like,
Speaker: Right now for me, if you see it on sale, then absolutely pick it up.
Speaker: But I can totally see if some people aren't hook, lined, and sinkered by this particular fairy tale platform or genre that has been picking up so much speed in the past 10 years, you know, then it might not be for you.
Speaker: It's scary.
Speaker: It's whimsical.
Speaker: It's kind of fascinating because I'll tell you what, the first act...
Speaker: is very tutorial based and it's you getting used to the world and you've got literal tall cap gnomes wandering around and one of the first things you have to do is play hide and seek with them and that's a way of showing you how certain mechanics work and they're hiding from you and they've got children's voices and they're not annoying children doing the voice acting so that's always good and uh yeah yeah and you're like oh this is charming this is so cute
Speaker: And then at a certain point later in the game, you're leading a bunch of them through an area, and one of them sets off a trap, and it kills the fucking gnome.
Speaker: Like, dead.
Speaker: Dead.
Speaker: Dead.
Speaker: And I spent 20 minutes just going, I'm sick!
Speaker: Sorry.
Speaker: Like just, just, they set it up for you to be hurt so bad.
Speaker: And the grim shit is, is very grim.
Speaker: The whimsy is very whimsical.
Speaker: Uh, it, it is a, it is a neck breaker of emotion.
Speaker: It really is.
Speaker: Um, and I, I'm a, I'm such a fucking sucker for that.
Speaker: I fall for it.
Speaker: So it's like little nightmares.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: vibe, right?
Speaker: Yeah, it's Little Nightmares.
Speaker: It's, yeah, Brothers, Tale of Two Sons, which was an early game that made me weep uncontrollably.
Speaker: You know, it's got a lot of heart and a lot of emotion behind it and a lot of genuinely terrifying moments.
Speaker: It is a horror game.
Speaker: Do not mistake.
Speaker: It is, the first...
Speaker: 30, 40 minutes will make you go, why is this kind of horror tech?
Speaker: It's a horror game.
Speaker: It's a fucking horror game.
Speaker: And it's a folk horror game.
Speaker: And how was I supposed to avoid that?
Speaker: And of course, you love yourself some folk horror.
Speaker: I love folk horror.
Speaker: And, uh,
Speaker: And Scandinavian folk are even better.
Speaker: Throw a troll at me.
Speaker: And it's a troll or, you know, it's that it's a midsummer or something like that.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Like all of that shit.
Speaker: Count me the fuck in.
Speaker: I love it.
Speaker: This is my particular brand of catnip, but I can't shake the feeling that not everyone's going to be talking.
Speaker: totally down with paying 30 bucks for that so that's my caveat for people who if anybody has heard me talk about this you know who you are like if you hear me describing this and you go yep i'm gonna go ahead and buy that you know who you are the rest of you you could if you're interested you could you could put it on your wait list wish list and like keep an eye on it and uh get it on sale or something like that you'll have a you'll have a great time
Speaker: So that's, I'm gonna probably have that finished by the time we meet up again next.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: It's a pretty fun game.
Speaker: So what are you playing, Kevin?
Speaker: I am playing the System Shock remake and it's still going strong.
Speaker: I ended up restarting my game just because I felt like I had missed some stuff and so I just went and restarted and I'm having a blast with my second start on the game.
Speaker: It's fun.
Speaker: It's very faithful to the original from what I know.
Speaker: There's like some changes that they made.
Speaker: Um, but it, it's, um, it's a lovely, lovely game.
Speaker: It has some horror elements.
Speaker: It's, uh, you can see how it, uh, has its, you know, like alien isolation and prey and all those games have their roots in it.
Speaker: Um, can't say enough about this isn't shock remake.
Speaker: Um, yeah.
Speaker: And then I also picked up, because everybody is playing it, and I got peer pressured, Street Fighter VI.
Speaker: Oh, okay.
Speaker: I got peer pressured into Street Fighter VI, so I'm in the middle of...
Speaker: Figuring out how to get good at Street Fighter 6.
Speaker: You're a more dedicated man than I. Yeah, we'll see how long this lasts.
Speaker: But it's one of the games where I'd be like, I looked at my library page for it, and it was like, seven of your friends are playing right now.
Speaker: And I was like, Jesus Christ.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That never happens.
Speaker: So far, I'm having some fun with it.
Speaker: I want to go through the... I did the world tour, started the world tour, but I want to go through the character creator again because you can create some real monsters in there.
Speaker: Oh, that's cool.
Speaker: I didn't know there was a character creator in Street Fighter.
Speaker: There's a character creator, and you can really, really freak him up if you wanted to.
Speaker: Well, I do like freaking up my characters, so yeah.
Speaker: Long arms.
Speaker: There's two different settings for height.
Speaker: There's height and sitting height, and the sitting height determines where their waist hits, so you can have...
Speaker: You can have like their height be really high and their sitting height be really high.
Speaker: And what that does, it means their waist is like, it's like their body is like this long and their legs are like tiny.
Speaker: I love it.
Speaker: Just like that ape-like long ropey arms kind of shit.
Speaker: Like, oh yeah, that's fun.
Speaker: You can make some real terrifying stuff in there.
Speaker: So we'll see about that.
Speaker: Oh, gosh.
Speaker: And that'll do it for tonight's episode.
Speaker: Next book we're reading is going to be XCOM UFO Defense, which I believe is...
Speaker: What was that written?
Speaker: I want to say it was like 92?
Speaker: Had to be later.
Speaker: I think maybe a little bit later than that.
Speaker: But yeah, it's an interesting idea for a book because, you know, obviously mid-90s were not huge for PC game novelizations.
Speaker: I mean, this is a novelization of a game that was...
Speaker: There was a PlayStation.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: 95.
Speaker: There was a PlayStation version of the original XCOM, if I recall correctly, but it was it was really a PC game for all intents and purposes.
Speaker: So, yeah, that's our next our next book.
Speaker: And then if you're interested in hearing more stuff from us, some bonus stuff, perhaps there's a website you can go to.
Speaker: Phil, which website is that?
Speaker: Can you remind me where?
Speaker: Oh, I go.
Speaker: If I'm remembering correctly, I think you're talking about patreon.com slash the pixel lit podcast where you can join up onto one of our three tiers, support us with as little as $1 a month and receive all kinds of cool bonus stuff, essays, polls, and actually some very cool bonus episodes, which Kevin and I are going to be getting into the mix with very soon.
Speaker: So check it out.
Speaker: Oh yeah.
Speaker: Patreon.com slash the pixel lit podcast.
Speaker: Uh, do it today.
Speaker: Tell a friend.
Speaker: Hello friends.
Speaker: Uh, also, uh, tell some friends about, uh, where else you can find us.
Speaker: You can find us on Instagram and Twitter at the pixel lit pod.
Speaker: or at PixletPod, rather, you can go to our website, PixletPod.com, where you can sign up for our newsletter and also find a link to join our Discord.
Speaker: All fun stuff.
Speaker: We love having people on and talking to us and all that great stuff.
Speaker: It's awesome.
Speaker: You guys are so much fun to talk to.
Speaker: It's great.
Speaker: Feel free to hop on and join the conversation.
Speaker: That'll do it for tonight's episode.
Speaker: So have a good night, everybody.
Speaker: Bye.
