#glockroach

meet my post-apocalyptic glockroach

(Sunday, August 9, 2015)

normalnancy: hi magic -*-MAGIC_*_ hi who are you Llord_Kuruku: Hope Bea shows up soon HNV: Geez, who even are all these people? anthony1998x: an1 here from cali say yo normalnancy: hi lord kurku normalnancy: hi hnv berd_snerglar: She's usually on by now wtf. GlockRoach: u think she got freaked out aroseahorseboy: nah, bea has enviable chill

Bea arrives at last, looking a little worn. "Son of a bee it's been kind of a crazy night but okay. All good now, thanks for waiting! Had a little drama in the hive"

"BEA YOU FORGOT TO FEED THE DOGS!" "...hang on.."

anthony1998x: wtf r your parents here??? HNV: Dude, she's a millennial, we ALL live with our parents. Llord_Kuruku: ohmygodareyoufuckingserious. bea you have to show us the dogs aroseahorseboy: doggiiiiies

"Okay! Ready, my swarm!" She returns. "No, no, get down! You got wet paws! Out! I need an actual studio for this or something instead of just my nerd room, don't I"

"Welcome once again to Press Bea, picking up with Joy Traveler, part 5, and things have been...weird. We had Box Baby 2 and learned more about the Spanunkos and I haven't gone any further.. yet. It's tempting but I want to plumb the mysteries of this machine with my hive by my side! No I'm not scared!"

normalnancy: hi bea DueyDecimal: This gets more awesome every episode you guys, seriously calm down and watch bug_snuggler: bea can you play some of the actual good games you have GlockRoach: Dude you gotta stop changing your name every time, pick one. pick that one. Syrupentine: Everyone calm down, Bea can play what she wants... which is going to be more Planet of Pisces, right??

"Well I was thinking, I'll pick one to start and then you guys can pick the next, seems to work out pretty well most of the time"

DueyDecimal: I like that. aroseahorseboy: buckle up buzzers

Screen 5 shows a pastoral scene with a sunny field, a swimming hole, and a tree with a tire swing! Seated in front are two children, a boy and a girl, holding hands with their backs to the camera. In the sky appear the names of the 12 games for this screen:

49: Berry Batty 50: Teddy Bear Ballet 51: Impact Crate 52: Pralines & Cream 53: Whack-O Golf 54: Planet of Pisces 2: For Super Players 55: Kaveman 56: Crosswalk 57: Whirlwind Football 58: Fuzzed 59: Cat Rate 60: Sunny Spring Mornings

aroseahorseboy: is... is that... Syrupentine: omg omg omg POP2!!! Llord_Kuruku: HOLY SHHIIIIIIIII HNV: It's a trap! Play the last one, that's got to be a fakeout!

"Ok I know what you guys are thinking, and it IS a weird order but I don't think that really means anything. Crosswalk just sounds dull but we've though that before.. Oh you know what's boring? Golf!"

Syrupentine: ...Golf. DueyDecimal: God has forsaken us. snug_buggler: guys we can leave til the boring is over. why u hate us bea?

"Remember what this game did to soccer? And cooking? And other sports? Cooking is a sport you can't tell me otherwise"

HNV: Oh shit, you know what shows up in sports games, right? Llord_Kuruku: ...Spanunko time? HNV: Totally Spanunko time!

"DANGIT, how could I forget. Sure they're evil undead abominations but who can resist the thrill of competition..."

Strangely this game doesn't have the same name that was listed on the menu screen: the title screen calls the game "Water Way." It also shows a little plumber character who is distinguished by his lighted miner's helmet, plaid shirt, and chinstrap beard with no mustache.

DueyDecimal: A plumber with no stache? Isn't that a violation of some rule?

"I love sewers, I was born in one! See I was a bee that drank some ooze, but, well you know that story. Hey, yeah, maybe he's gotta earn his plumber 'stache. You can't grow that, gotta earn it through battle"

berd_snurglar: true its a whole nother level of stache Llord_Kuruku: An Amish beard is LIKE a mustache HNV: C. Everett Poop

The game starts on the surface, with nowhere to go but down a manhole. This turns out to be the object of the game: go down. Each screen has a number of valves that must be turned on or off, and once the water pressure is restored, a new doorway opens. Some puzzles even require backtracking to change the flow in previous rooms!

Klickitat_Street: Oh, God. The whole game is a Water Temple! SugaGlyda: Or like that one SCP with all the rooms and it just keeps makin' them rooms

"This is kind of cool but jeez, plumbing is complicated! Who'da knew it?"

The fifth room complicates things even more-- the lights are out and Bea needs to find the switch. Luckily it's just a short walk away... but when the lights come on, the MONSTER wakes up!

aroseahorseboy: EYEBALL MAN

"OHHHHHGGGGGGFFFFFF I HATE YOU!! Jesus that scared the fuck out of me! I am out of fuck, thank to this thing!" time to flee from the horrid thing, trying to get from valve to valve

"I knew Sewer Adventure sounded creepy but they lulled us into a false sense of security!"

HNV: Geez, it's like the incarnation of "eyes peering menacingly out of the dark" Glockroach: Yeah sorry i took a big shit earlier that's probably it ate a lot of eyes Syrupentine: Maybe it goes back to sleep when you turn off the light?

"Let's try it out because it's fast and bad and I don't like it"

"Hehe they got a little remains of another plumber on the ground there, that's cute, HELP!!" She searches rabidly for the light switch!

When the lights flick off, all those eyes get heavy, and close one by one. That's the secret! But when the plumber's night light gets too close, they start to drift open again... which is why it's a good thing Bea just figured out how to turn her OWN light on and off.

"Well this is a survival horror now, I kind of dig it actually but I also am easily horrified as you just saw" She slinks away quickly, better get out of here before she wakes it up again

aroseahorseboy: i see where this is going now... it's gonna get darker and scarier as we go on, isn't it darker... and lonelier... and quieter... and BOO!

"Aro stop I'm afraid!"

Baconnaise: the eyes will get you bea. they'll get their gross eye gook allll over you

The next screen down is also dark to start with, but there are two much smaller monsters sleeping on the lower level, with only two or three eyes each... until Bea turns the light on, and it turns out it's just one WIDE monster with two clumps of eyes!

"All of this sounds delicious but speaking of, let's visit Marsha Mallow in her Candy Cane Cottage out in the Pixie Stix.. Or do you have to cross the Pixie Styx river to get there"

The Marsha Mallow title screen is REALLY cute, featuring what can only be Marsha, a soft-bodied little happy thing that looks like a more humanoid Kirby wearing a bow and barrettes, hugging a bunch of less human (but still smiling) candies and other treats.

Klickitat_Street: hoo boy here we go, this is going to be cookie cauldron all over again right? GlockRoach: Look at the candies, they have faces, clearly they're made with the souls and juices of children

When Bea presses start, an animated cinema sequence happens, showing Marsha and all her friends dancing happily on what looks like a kitchen counter, and then her friends start to flee because ants are getting into the kitchen! Clearly Marsha has to help them escape...

"Things were just! Too! Perfect! It could never last, it's sad, I know.. Hang in there Marsha, we'll get you and your friends out of this, somehow!"

..which leads into the game: you have to move Marsha around on the floor and bounce her friends to safety as they jump from the counter. It's very similar to the classic Game & Watch, "Fire", but with a lot of enhancements. For one, Marsha can temporarily EAT some of her friends, making her bigger and bouncier! It doesn't last long, though, and if she eats a cinnamon ball, she gets toasted!

"Sometimes you just gotta devour your friends to save your friends, but that's the way it goes sometimes when they're all edible and delicious"

berd_snurglar: this game is somebody's fetish Baconnaise: Yeah maybe mine now, uh-oh HNV: Is it bad that I'm disappointed that this game is cute and harmless with no spooky twist? GlockRoach: Screw you tough guy, I'm fuckin terrified of marshmallows

The game isn't strange or evil, but it does seem to get ridiculously hard as the levels progress. The floors get wider, and platforms for the food friends to walk on or ricochet off start to appear, turning it into a sort of juggling version of Lemmings.

"They can't all be spooky, what's wrong with just cute sometimes? Remember, some of these were made by kids!" She says as she grits her teeth and tries to not fail. "Sadistic kids. Horrible little brat-children!"

Not long before she's telling Marsha and her friends to burn. "Mmmaybe we can find something less frustrating like Super Pain Planet"

(Second attempt)

When the game starts again, the graphics are back to normal, to Bea's relief and the rest of the viewers. But, as soon as she loses a life, the Glem sprite starts to glitch out-- his hair is replaced by the letter G!

"DAMMIT G, get out of here and go eat something else! Am I gonna have to get through this without dying at all?? I am, aren't I.."

berg_snurglar: git gud, bea. git real gud real fast

The game may be far harder than the first, but she makes it past old ED the Angul this time. The next segment requires a highly precise set of wall-jumps over lava, on moving walls. Before she knows it, Glem's stomach is an E-- and the walls have grown double D's!

GlockRoach: double D joke goes here cause someone has to

"I have to dodge the spiny guys here but then the lava droplets shoot up and it's HARD to concentrate when everything's turning into the alphabet around me!"

One more fall and Glem's face has been replaced by an L-- his whole sprite is mostly the word "GLE", now.

"Wheel of Bea's Misfortune. Do I get an extra life or something if I spell his name?" Now it's a section where she has to duck into little side caverns, to dodge the huge torrents of lava that come flowing down the tunnel periodically.

The M she needs to spell his name is in the lava, every three or four little caverns it goes by but it seems like you don't want to dive in and grab it!

Finally, after several tense minutes of stress-inducing platforming, Bea brings Glem to the boss door, which has a big D on it.

HNV: Oh no, Ed's waiting back there, isn't he

"I can spell GLED, is that close enough?" she takes a moment to prepare mentally. Whatever the boss is it's bound to be tough, and she'll have to contend with whatever glitches are thrown at her. But she's feeling uneasy in a way she hasn't since Box Baby.

When Bea enters, though, it's a new boss-- in fact, it's that one she saw in the end cast roll, Wuggykins! It's a grossly fat, barely mobile reptilian thing, like Kraid combined with Jabba the Hutt, wearing an absurd blond flip wig!

Syrupentine: snrrk

"I was expecting.. Never mind, let's take him down! I feel a little silly, I was getting worried but this guy doesn't seem that bad. Famous last words, I know."

Wuggykins is not a pushover, but seems significantly sillier than the rest of the game. It (she?) gives hysterical shrieks when struck with the Discus, but also throws its (her?) own Discuses-- well, actually, they're plates, some of which still have food on them that will restore Glem's health!

HNV: What is this, Greg's spoiled daughter? Does he have his own Koopalings??

With the food plates restoring Glem's life meter, the fight is going on and on-- and every time Wuggykins lands a hit on Glem, another sprite tile glitches out becomes a letter. By the third hit, it's becoming clear what the letters are spelling.

Klickitat_Street: Why does it keep saying that?? DueyDecimal: You're playing Glem right now, aren't you? He's not dead! aroseahorseboy: maybe we're all dead and in hell and this is our paranoid delusion

"Yeah, well if 'GLEM DIED' could he still be doing THIS??" she says, scoring another blow on the monster. "What, is this supposed to be spooking me out? This game still doesn't know who it's messing with here! I don't spook. And I that's why I don't play most horror games, I'm just so fear proof that why bother!"

The fat monster is getting more and more wild, spilling out plates in a fan pattern now, letters filling the screen like alphabet soup.

Then, accidentally, in process of dodging, Bea maneuvers Glem just right to complete the full eight-letter phrase on the screen-- and it autocompletes itself:

[GLEM DIED and it was my fault]

Glockroach: wait wut

Some of the letters that were cluttering Glem's sprite come away with the words, but soon it happens again:

[GLEM DIED but that wasn't what i wanted]

berd_snurglar: who's supposed to be talking, is it the monster? what do you know that we don't, chubs

The letters are starting to fill the screen now.

[GLEM DIED but i couldn't stop it] [GLEM DIED and i was trying to help] [GLEM DIED because i wasn't ready] [GLEM DIED and i can't bring him back] [GLEM DIED and i never meant to hurt her] [GLEM DIED because i was jealous]

"Uugh, this is getting annoying. And kind of upsetting. This is probably some dialogue that's gonna come up later, like a bad ending? We've seen before this thing is screwy sometimes.. Man.. if I'm right this is gonna be quite the downer but at least it warned us.."

Syrupentine: I'm glad we're on a stream, I'd be scared as hell if I were playing this alone! DueyDecimal: Woody was right, WHAT IS THE POINT OF ALL THIS??

[GLEM DIED and it still feels like yesterday] [GLEM DIED but i didn't get what i wanted] [GLEM DIED laughing at my foolishness ] [GLEM DIED while his mother made pancakes] [GLEM DIED and nobody saw it but me] [GLEM DIED and i cannot replace him]

The boss fight doesn't end. Eventually neither the Glem graphic nor the boss can be seen. More phrases, lamentory and bitter, pile up on the screen.

"Come on guys, it's not over yet! We don't really even know what it means yet... uh.." her face falls as she continues reading, barely able to concentrate on the game.

...game? What game?

"I can't tell where I am! I can't see anything else, and I can't see the attacks, this is impossible!"

berd_snurglar: bea hit reset it's just glitchig up. try again next time aroseahorseboy: the irony here is, the boss still hasn't killed you so glem still hasn't died GlockRoach: Something that stinks around here and it ain't me for once

She tries listening. Even though everything is just clusters of letters, she keeps mashing buttons and listening for the boss's cries. "Now the sound's getting all f'd up, I dunno if you guys can hear but it sounds like bad sound bites of the text"

HNV: Yeah, this game is starting to feel sort of disingenuous. Do you think this was tampered with, Bea? Like, hacked?

"That, or it's not 'finished', like some of the others. The whole machine is a mysterious mess anyhow. This SUCKS, I was so looking forward to this game. Sorry guys but I guess this is where it ends, at least for now"

"G U R E E M U D A A I D U"

DueyDecimal: HOLY aroseahorseboy: now i need a mop Klickitat_Street: that sounded like a narwhal being eaten by a xerox mahine...

"WELLLL it's getting late isn't it! Time to wrap this one up for now, ahaha!" Bea's quick to reach for the reset button!

The last line written remains on the screen even after she resets:

[GLEM DIED and i can never apologize]

"You think that was bad try having it in your ears, FUCK"

Finally the 'Summer Vacation' screen returns.

Klickitat_Street: It's been a grueling twelve games DueyDecimal: You deserve another reward for being good, Bea. :(

"I'm fine, just tired. Spaced out for a minute there. Just feeling weird. Creeped. Worried. Sad. But otherwise, I'm great!"

DueyDecimal: I know, Bea. Look at the next screen, see if it's worth continuing next week-- maybe you'll have something to look forward to!

"Sure Duey, I do it for you. I admit I'm sort of ready for a vacation after that but here's a little preview!"


61: Special Treat For Super Players

62: Metal Warrior

63: Marsha Mallow

64: Spacial Delivery

65: The Wizard Of Ice

66: Planet of Pisces II

67: Bobotown

68: Hungry Hungry Every Day

69: Super Nova!

70: Brass Knuckles Boxing

71: Paradise Mall

72: Box Baby 3

"Hmmm, you know folks, you're right, I DO deserve a treat. Stream extended!" She's quick to choose 61! "I did my best, after all, under the circumstances!"

aroseahorseboy: i don't think there's any video games left for her to give you Syrupentine: ANOTHER POP2??? :DDD

"Yeah, POP2.5: Don't Freak Us The Hell Out!"

"I kind of just want to see a friendly face at the moment! I should be giving her something.. What do you get a collection of data as a present?"

There's a bit of deja vu at the very beginning: once again, the name on the title screen is different from the one on the menu. This game's 'real' title is apparently "Escape From Mount St. Kaboomius"!

It also appears to star the same character from Sewer Adventure / Water Way, the plumber with the Amish beard, but this time he's a miner.

"This is going to be a British animated TV special isn't it- Oh hey, it's Sewage Sam and he escaped the monster! Thanks to us, we pretty much saved the day back there."

Glockroach: Hey Bea if something jumps out at you this time watch with hte pottymouth, we've got sensitive ears here ButterflyDefect: Go fart your mother glock berd_snurglar: eat a.........dick sorry i tried

The controls are basically the same, very sharp and responsive just like Water Way, so this may indeed be the same character. Your equipment is different this time, though: now you can launch a small drill that burrows through rock in front of you, only stopping when it hits lava-- and there's a lot of lava. In fact, it's everywhere, and Sam(?) has to climb out of this room quick!

"You know what's a good incentive for anything? LAVA!" she has to bore out some footholds to keep climbing, but miss the shot and you could just release more lava! "Of course he'd already be dead normally but Sam hydrates real well, he knows his stuff.”

aroseahorseboy: I bet if you cut through those stackalacktotituses they'd make platforms in the lava damn, you beat me to it spent too long thinking of a funny way to spell stalactite

"No that was good seahawse, I'm going to start saying that now and pissing off a lot of cave fans"

SugaGlyda: and cavemen *cavepeople, rather DueyDecimal: Just use the correct word: speleothems!

The game progresses similarly to Sewer Adventure, but the rooms are much larger; less of a single screen puzzle game, more of a side scroller. Each room introduces new

toys to play with – icicles that freeze lava into rock when dropped, bombs left behind by miners that explode if touched by lava.

"Wait, can I.. Can.. Nope, nope. NOPE. Can't ride the drill after you shoot it, which, I understand but it still would have been cool"

ButterflyDefect: How the heck that even work? aroseahorseboy: maybe if you can pick up drill shoes that spin in the opposite direction... no, that's silly

"You just stand on the bit and run really really fast in the opposite direction. I don't know that drill surfing will ever be cool but at least we tried!" But she can surf on a loose hunk of rock she breaks free, riding it up to the next level!

HNV: Noice! Llord_Kuruku: Another puzzle platformer but this one goes up instead of down

"It's good to know that if I'm ever caught in a lava flow I can just do this!"

The next room up starts with a vertical tunnel that the lava fills almost immediately, allowing Sam to jump out the top onto a safe spot as it fills the room more slowly. There's a weird pattern in the big lava-filled tunnel he just escaped, though-- does it have eyes? Is it watching him as he hops around?

ButterflyDefect: IT HIM wait is it? the thing from the last one? Syrupentine: if he was lit on fire and became a horrible staring fire column...

"I don't know, let's stay far far FAR FAR away and not talk about it! Awww god that's horrifying"

Baconnaise: Give him a hug you monster, he needs it

This room doesn't give Bea much more trouble than the previous room, although there's a more complicated series of rock-floes to hop across and an icicle to drop to create more rock... but the higher the lava level rises, the sharper those eyes in the lava become. When the lava rises halfway, a mouth appears, grinning wickedly!

aroseahorseboy: WHY DOES THIS GAME INTIMIDATE ME

"Yyyyep this is fucking me right up. So I guess this is just Hell we're in then, great! About time."

ButterflyDefect: Bea can you like, hurry because I don't want to see what happens next Glockroach: Don't worry we'll fry to a crisp before heckface firefuck gets us

Three quarters of the way up, and now the face is laughing and sticking out its tongue(???) like a snake! But now Bea is free to escape to the next room up, and the lava face tenses up and gives an apoplectic SCREAM of rage-- or at least that's what the face is doing, the sound effect is not so scary.

HNV: ...was that a slowed-down dog barking? What was that?

"I don't know" Bea laughs nervously. "Just, make it go, it's ok now. You've done your job, we've got the idea." No doubt it awaits her on the next screen as well.

"I guess this must have been around Sam was like 'fuck this job, I'm moving to the sewer' "

"I mean, not moving to the sewer, getting a sewer job. Although maybe he likes to live close to work, who knows." aroseahorseboy: maybe he dug his way into this volcano at the bottom of the sewer? and he's making his way up to the top now??

Syrupentine: and he's going to end up in another wacky topsy turvy land where he has to dig back down to get home... poor Sam

"Well now I am hoping there's one more of these, I'd want to see where they'd go with it from here! I can imagine this in an arcade. When we had those, sigh.."

SugahGlyda: I've always been exceedingly bad at coin games :/ Glockroach: You're supposed to be. they eat your money they flash their pretty pictures and scream, COINSSSSS. like mario HNV: That's my favorite Mario catch phrase, when he just hisses "COINSSSSS" Klickitat_Street: I think someone was inspired by Spelunker to make both of these... specifically, inspired to make the opposite of a bad game like Spelunker

"I don't know that one. I've played Spelunky, that was good? I've plaaayed... there are no other games with "spelunk" in the name, huh"

aroseahorseboy: is that a verb or an onomatopoeia

The title screen shows a brick wall, suggesting this might be a stand-up comedy game? But the interface is very strange: an abstract, neutral-looking face staring at the player from a black screen, and a selection of words to choose from at the bottom: How? Why? What?

When Bea chooses one of the words, it flies above the face, and more words appear that could follow it. The object seems to be to build a sentence.

'I' 'Like' 'to' 'kiss' 'bottom' is the first thing Bea enters, paragon of maturity that she is.

The face makes an expression of abject horror at that statement!

"Sorry if my humor is a little too saucy for you, faceperson.. Okay, um, actual jokes.."

Glockroach: You can't even curse, fuck that. i'll say stuff like "poop" whenever I please, thanks Bee52: Maybe ask it "How do I play this game"?

"Yeah, good question.." she tries putting that in next, to see if she's even doing the right thing here

That one gets a big smile from the face and a laughing animation, but there's no sound. It now looks less neutral and more expectant, like you might be doing the right thing?

TaichouSenseiKun: Bea, I think you're maybe supposed to just talk to it

One problem with the interface is that only so many words appear to choose from, and you can't type new ones in. The words that the face likes, though, seem to influence the next ones that come up: the next selection includes more words like "game", "points", "score", etc.

"How do I score points?" she asks it next. It seems to think this question is hilarious as well!

"Knock knock, who's there, orange, orange who.. wait I didn't finish!" too late, it liked the unfinished one too!