Neo League 801 - #810: Choi vs Naerose

Description: NaeoLeague: ANGRY MIDGET battles Naerose across the spectrum of point and click adventuers. Try, just try and figure out what the designers were trying to get at with X totally random puzzle, or Y totally random riddle. Better yet, use the sierra help line, but warning, it's not free. (Winner:Naerose)



Strolheim has been a favorite of Choi. Mostly because of Yamazaki. The psychpath was out for Choi's blood, but Choi, well, Choi was trying to squeeze out his last few fights in the Neo-League before the hammer was dropped. The midget was actually surprised how his standings have held up. 14 fights, 16 points. He was down, but not out. Most of the people above him had beaten him at least once, except Alma (which was a draw)-

And Naerose.

The midget stood by the castle's shore, eyeing the judges and camera crew setting up the gear for record keeping. Naerose, the scarlet witch. Choi had fought her several times, and was always intrigued by her... erratic style. Some days, Choi thought about her, and wondered if he should, you know, feel like he does for Mai or 95% of all adult females. Instead, he thinks about how silly her hat is. It is very strange, like a G rating was surrounding her or something. Choi inspected his claw gloves, and looked over at the crew. Where WAS she?

There was a sign. It was not yet defaced, but that would change. The NL were clever this time, they brought a sign that crayon wouldn't mark on. A surface with some sort of oil on it that prevented the waxy crayon from sticking. Naerose gets really irritated at this, eyes the camera crew and uses a ketchup packet to smear an 'a' and make it Naeo League. The result? They clean the sign up, but that, that removes the oily surface and thus enables Naerose to use the crayon. From somewhere far off there is a chime, like someone had just scored points in some old point and click adventure game. And the plot would be thusly allowed to continue, as if Naerose was stuck in an infinate time loop awaiting that one defacement of the sign before the match itself could begin.

What was her motivation though? Get out of the cold country of Germany and into the warm country of California. Of course she couldn't afford to go or stay there, but it was warmer there at least.

"So.. ah. what is it we're doing here today?" Asks Naerose which illicits forehead slapping and groans.

"Something to do wtih.." She spots Choi, "A charity?"

Ah right. Naeo League. Choi stared dully at the witch's antics with the sign. The ketchup, the wipe-down, and then, the redrawing. The chime, however, noticeably disturbs Choi. Was it 1 o' Clock? Or maybe it was something the Germans did in the alps.

In any case, ANGRY MIDGET seems to be displeased at Naerose's presence. His claws dance in the air, awaiting battle. The staff wave Naerose over to the opposite corner of ANGRY MIDGET. What do you do?

*ASK WHAT WE'RE DOING*

ANGRY MIDGET shakes his head angrily. Boy, Naerose, it looks like you really made him made. ANGRY MIDGET swipes his claws through the air, and then, it speaks in a high-pitched voice. "Listen, toots, we are fighting, okay? Just put up your BROOM, and lets get this over with!" How rude! Maybe you ought to teach such a crass little man a lesson, Naerose!

Suddenly, a ring is heard, and the JUDGES wave their hands. Looks like the fight has begun, Naerose!

Right. So the ring means something. Of course everyone knows what a bell is and what it means, it only means one thing it could only mean one thing. That thing is. Drumm roll please. Dinner. And with dinner comes the person serving and that of course must be Choi being as he is the shortest one here. Therefore the witch turns her full witchy attention to him and is like yes please. but more like... you know, all expetant and stuff.

"So..." seh begins and then adjusts her shades a bit, expecting there to be dinner, but there isn't. There are claws though and she's not sure if that would be efficent cooking utenzils, but who knows, maybe.

"Umm, so what are yo uwaiting for?" the witch asks and adjusts her shades to stare at Choi. You would almost have to assume at this point hat she knows what is really going on even if she doesn't show it like at all.

COMBATSYS: Naerose has started a fight here.

[\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  <
Naerose          0/-------/-------|


COMBATSYS: Naerose focuses on her next action.

[\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  <
Naerose          0/-------/-------|


COMBATSYS: Choi has joined the fight here.

[\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////////////////////]
Choi             0/-------/-------|-------\-------\0          Naerose


*ASK ABOUT WAITING*

ANGRY MIDGET grins a sinister grin. Flexing his claws, the midget begins to dash along the ground, his claws dangling behind him. It becomes very obvious that he lacks any sort of food. Except that fedora. Maybe you could attempt to eat the hat at a later date?

Suddenly, ANGRY MIDGET attacks! He begins to dive at Naerose's legs, and jump right up, spinning like a top! Streaks of wind chi turn the little man a little blue, but he is still shooting right up! Watch out for those claws, Naerose. They might lead you to a CLAW-ful ending!

COMBATSYS: Naerose interrupts Tatsumaki Shippuu Zan from Choi with Glomp.
- CRAZY Hit! -

[     \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ///////////////////////////// ]
Choi             0/-------/----===|=------\-------\0          Naerose


Naerose see's the midget coming and while it looks like what happens next is awesome, there is a disclaimer that has to be added here first. When Choi came, Naerose didn't just succeed, she actually failed well over a hundred times and got the game over screen, which included a short animation of of Choi cutting her in half (not very gruesome though, vga graphics were kind of limited) and then the screen allowing her to load a saved game. Luckily Naerose saved often, in this case she saved just before Choi made his attack. It was about a second of time that the animation of Choi launching himself came, but it was enough time for her to make one choice. She tried going into her inventory screen, seleecting broom and then clicking it on him, but it didn't work. She tried multiple choices from her spell book (over multiple loads of saved games) also to no avail. She even tried going into her inventory screen and selecting Sylvester, but the game just returned a message box of her being cruel and Peta getting her, but still no success. It was as a last ditch effort that Naerose clicked on the hand icon on Choi, causing her to just sort of tackle hug him.

Yes, welcome to the Sierra point and click adventure HELL.

Roberto Williams thought about how to stop Choi. And then he thought about how midgets were like human puppies. And a warm feeling came over him. Puppies meant hugs. Being a game designer for Sierra, he decided that's how any normal person who deal with a killer midget. Hugs!

ANGRY MIDGET sails to the ground, Naerose's cuddly hug knocking him to the ground. His FEDORA falls off, scattering PHOTOGRAPHS and a pair of UNDERPANTS. Without his hat, the little man's BALDNESS is revealed! ANGRY MIDGET looks very confused. Struggling away from the witch, he suddenly backflips, trying to leap away from Naerose. He, however, makes sure to keep his foot out. Watch out for that kick, Naer-Bear! It could send you for a loop!

Jane Jensen wanted somethning occult. She wanted there to be a darker theme to this and thus chose a witch. Hold on. If you move your mouse cursor to the top of the screen it will bring up a menu allowing you to pause the game. Do this now, reactions come before poses.

COMBATSYS: Naerose interrupts Hien Zan from Choi with Spellbinder.

[              \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////////////     ]
Choi             1/-------/=======|====---\-------\0          Naerose


There was no real rhyme to the reason sometimes. When you were supposed to use your tape recorder to splice and then .. it made no sense. Luckily there were, of course, something similar to FAQS. They were, well, a little before the internet was there to save your life, or at least countless hours of impossible trial and error. In this case, it was going to a video game store and looking through the walk throughs in magazines and then not purchasing the magazine. Naerose was one such cheap skate. In this case when Choi comes in she uses the wrapper on the match object after using the eye object to determine that there is infact flash paper.. And.. the production cost was low on this title so instead of showing you how Choi gets hit.. The screen flashes and he is hit, like stars over his head. At this point the player should save as they likely have a limited number of time to click on the right object. Have to get those pixels perfectly lined up.

Man, Jane Jensen must have been cheap. Didn't she know that she could call the Sierra Hotline and get instant help on any part of the game? For only $1.99 a question, she could find out all the important puzzles in the game. She could learn how to get the banana from the monkey so she can defeat Sagat! Or even how to get past that darn rattlesnake! But no. She was doing the cheap way.

ANGRY MIDGET backflips, and suddenly, there is a flash. Now, he is on the ground, looking all too confused again. You could see the little duck flying around his head! And suddenly, he leaps right back up, eyes burning with a strange inner light. ANGRY MIDGET points a clawed finger at Naerose, and begins to speak. "So, NAEROSE, you think you can win this fight? Then I supposed you can answer a few questions!"

"On page 11 of the Book of Lore, what is the 3rd word of the 7th sentence?"

COMBATSYS: Choi takes no action.

[              \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////////////     ]
Choi             1/-------/=======|====---\-------\0          Naerose


OH NOES! DRMS! Indeed this is the dreaded make sure you own the game by asking you a question from the manual becaues everyone knows that no one actually bought these games. The internet didn't exist as web pages, but as FTP and BBS sites, already piracy was rampant and far to many people downloaded illegal copies of their favorite games and if you couldn't answer this question (often asked about three timse) then you were totally screwed. I mean you'd have to like, restart the game and try again.

The witch is shocked. SHOCKU!

"Ahh ahh." stammers Naerose, taken totally aback, but no less, the DRMS did not always happen at the start of the game, but sometimes let you play for a little bit first. You might ask. Why? Well.. Who knows, maybe they wanted you to get the flavor for the game so you'd actually go buy a copy.

"The!" answers Naerose, hoping that it was the right answer. As it turns out, 'The' was often a safe bet, not that it would be always right, or even half the time, but if you had to guess a word, that was usually pretty safe.

COMBATSYS: Naerose takes no action.

[              \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////////////     ]
Choi             1/-------/=======|====---\-------\0          Naerose


ANGRY MIDGET shakes his head, bringing up two claws. "Sorry, I must have heard you incorrectly. That was the WRONG answer." It looks like Naerose was beginning to look like a pirate.

Sierra doesn't like pirates.

Unless you stole Tribes, which then they reward you with FREE GAMES.

The midget suddenly began to spin in place, whirling faster and faster in place. Well, it looked like ANGRY MIDGET was evolving into WHIRLACANE, the most difficult creature in the game (we are playing Quest For Glory 6, aren't we?). Well, at least it didn't break your game. Maybe you should cycle through and reload if you can't take the heat! As the wind builds, the giant storm charges forward, attempting to take poor Naerose in...

COMBATSYS: Naerose parries Choi's Shin! Tatsumaki Shinkuu Zan!

[               \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////////////     ]
Choi             0/-------/-------|====---\-------\0          Naerose


Quest for Glory.. what? There is no 6! That series ended at like five! If this is six well then that just ruins the DRM entirely. Later games on cds before they could burned weren't worried about DRM's anyway, though people still sometimes copied them onto disks and nothing would stop you from just putting something directly onto a hard disk. The witch however knows that the truth of crazy attacks coming your way well, in the Quest for Glory Series, you could flee from most battles. So she does, she runs away from the impending Choi and then turns around, figuring she can go into her inventory screen, increase her her health with a potion or something and then charges back into the battle to try and win from scratch! The combat system concept in point and click adventures was kind of laughable.

So Mounting her broom the witch charges at Choi and tries to run him over. Like a rhino in Quest for Glory Three!

COMBATSYS: Naerose successfully hits Choi with Delphine Charge EX.

[                      \\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////////////     ]
Choi             0/-------/--=====|=======\-------\0          Naerose


*WHIRLNADO ENCOUNTERED*

*NAEROSE HAS FLED THE BATTLE*

And as such, when Naerose returns back to the fight, she finds out how lazy the programmers are. Instead of kicking in the DRM again, the ANGRY MIDGET is there, still as weak as he was before! And when she charges in with her broom to gain the first hit, it lands! Hard!

ANGRY MIDGET looks badly beaten now, his sprite changed to a much more beaten one. But now, the ANGRY MIDGET simply uses a normal swiping animation, bringing both claws across to tear her asunder. Hopefully Naerose put ranks in her Dodge or Block skill, even though as a Witch, she would need to focus on her Magic skills!

COMBATSYS: Choi successfully hits Naerose with Power Strike.

[                     \\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////////////        ]
Choi             0/-------/--=====|=======\=------\1          Naerose


Lazy programmers were of course the bane of these games. Which is impressive since they were the most linear games ever made. They pretended to be non-linear by letting you choose where you went most of the time, but the bottom line was there was only ever one puzzle to solve and until you solved it the game didn't progress. Worse yet, there was only one way to sovle the one puzzle that would be in one part of the game. There were sometimes other things you could do that would raise your score a little and your stats, but if you looked at the games, most of them that had stats they were meaningless and the score didn't change the story, infact side puzzles rarely had any impact on anything at all besides making your score easier. Still it was hard to get those perfect scores. Similarly if Naerose was attempting to obtain a perfect, she failed. Instead Choi whacks her soundily, because she was so sure skills were meaingless, she ignored them.

Not it was time to get her skills up. She was going to start with physical skill which meant spam clicking on Choi with the hand icon to indicate hit. Probably she'd miss for a while. A long while.

COMBATSYS: Choi dodges Naerose's Medium Strike.

[                     \\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////////////        ]
Choi             0/-------/--=====|=======\=------\1          Naerose


As Naerose expects, the witch's melee attacks fail to hit. ANGRY MIDGET holds back, letting her swipe nothing but thin air. As her attacks continue to spam, ANGRY MIDGET doesn't seem to find an approach. Well, that was awful. It looks like it was time to CHEAT. Yes, the programming was totally cheating now. Despite Naerose unleashing a constant stream of attacks, the midget somehow POKES through the waves of attacks, sticking a claw forward to poke at her RIGHT in the tummy.

Maybe it was a good thing you didn't buy this game.

COMBATSYS: Naerose blocks Choi's Quick Strike.

[                     \\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////////         ]
Choi             0/-------/--=====|=======\==-----\1          Naerose


The problem here was that the game was built to run on a certain processor and Naerose apparently didn't have that processor. That meant that the game either hung ridiculously slowly in many parts or went too fast in some parts, making it difficult to complete certain sections, in some cases, impossible. Such seemed to be affecting the current situation as now the ANGRY MIDGET seems to be moving in ways that she couldn't have handled before. the witch gives a stare and then decides her best bet is to try and defeat the midget out of the poorly coded combat system. She runs away again after holding the block button. Out of the battle the witch would use other methods to defeat her opponent. She would use her spells which could be used without actually engaging in many cases, or items .. In some games without a combat system this was good enough.

COMBATSYS: Naerose successfully hits Choi with End Creation.

[                          \\\\  < >  ////////////////////          ]
Choi             1/-------/=======|=======\===----\1          Naerose


Spells? Well, shoot, weren't you powerleveling back there, Naerose? ANGRY MIDGET is weak against magic, mostly from his lack of long range attacks! So as Naerose falls back and blocks all the attacks, the midget hustles along, using his high speed to close the distance. But that block causes stun animation, and ANGRY MIDGET holds in place. Naerose unleashes a spell, which takes ANGRY MIDGET down. He falls over, leaving 12 GOLDS and DELICIOUS SANDWICH.

NAEROSE GAINS A LEVEL!

NAEROSE GAINS 5 SKILL POINTS!

COMBATSYS: Choi takes no action.

[                      \\\\\\\\  < >  ////////////////////          ]
Choi             1/-------/=======|=======\===----\1          Naerose


COMBATSYS: Choi has reached second wind!

[                      \\\\\\\\  < >  ////////////////////          ]
Choi             1/-------/=======|=======\===----\1          Naerose


Hark, recalling that Naerose had wanted a sandwich long ago and that there was one and clearly you have to take whaat is left by your enemies, so the witch is quick to go pick up what the ANGRY MIDGET leaves, but doesn't even consider that he could get up again. In literaelly every single one of the games, she can't think of any that had something like that happen.. But then she shouldn't be too surprised. Background and foreground always looked different in these sorts of things. Well the older games all graphics looked equally bad, but in the newer ones sprites that could move always looked a little worse than sprites that cound't move and therefore it was evident when somethign was going to come into play and when it wasn't. Though that doesn't mean that unmoving sprites didn't need to be clicked on.

It was this way that Naerose is surprised that her opponent is alive still.

COMBATSYS: Naerose takes no action.

[                      \\\\\\\\  < >  ////////////////////          ]
Choi             1/-------/=======|=======\===----\1          Naerose


Suddenly, reality kicks in.

Choi rolls along the ground, looking horrified. What the HELL was the witch doing? She was fighting in the most erratic style he had seen. First, she begins swiping the air in a crazy manner, yelling at Choi for cheating and being a doo-doo head. And then, she points fingers at him. And then, she starts wailing on him.

WHAT WAS WRONG WITH HER?

The Korean holds back, scooping up his pictures. Oh, yes, he did take quite a beating. Worse yet, Naerose was... Why was she eating his shoe? The little man lost his shoe in that last blast of energy, she was eating his SHOE? Seriously! Dropping the pictures, he began to stagger towards the witch. Transferring into a flying kick, he aims his shoeless foot RIGHT FOR THE WITCH!

In these games the graphics were bad. You often couldn't tell what one object on the ground was from another until you picked it up. Unfortunately Naerose didn't use the eye icon and isntead just went straight to eating it. Wait wait.. No, hit pause again, she forgot to react before started to act..

COMBATSYS: Choi successfully hits Naerose with Light Kick.

[                      \\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////             ]
Choi             1/------=/=======|=======\=====--\1          Naerose


Right, the fight re-ensues and the combat music resumes. Naerose with a shoe in her mouth, but truly she thinks it's a sandwitch which makes it okay for her anyway. Yes, she was still in the 2d world of the game and didn't realize what she had in her mouth, but she does realize she got hit. Maybe if she hits the same button over and over again the game will register a hit and end the fight and she'll get loot again. Maybe even a second sandwitch. The witch thus tries to hit the same attack over and over again.

COMBATSYS: Choi dodges Naerose's Medium Strike.

[                      \\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////             ]
Choi             1/------=/=======|=======\=====--\1          Naerose


The midget's kick lands hard into Naerose. Unfortunately, it neither brings back his shoe nor the fight back into his court. But the witch promptly responds with... swiping her broom up and down. The midget sort of steps back, and stares. He just watches her swing the broom up and down, just short of the Korean. She was off in another plane.

The midget sort of inches around, trying to see if he could slip around the defenses. No dice. She was tracking him, despite the fantasy world she was trapped in. This meant something... more tricky. Suddenly, he dove hard to the right, and shot forward. Attempting to move past her spastic sweeps, he would just unload on the witch. Slashes, pokes, tears, rends, spins, almost EVERYTHING unto the opening that he found. As long as he kept the pressure on, there was no way he could get stopped.

Unless... Naerose used a HEX editor.

COMBATSYS: Choi successfully hits Naerose with Hou'ou Kyaku.

[                      \\\\\\\\  < >  ////////////                  ]
Choi             0/-------/-------|>>>>>>>\>>>>>>>\2          Naerose


Naerose doesn't have a hex editor! She doesn't have the other programs that make for better luck in the action sequences of any of these games. As if when being chased by mummies in a cave you only have one possible thing you could do to survive adn that might include, for instance, clicking on that vine, which somehow makes more sense than whipping out your crazy dagger, wait did he have the dagger yet? Welll how about just outrunning the damned things. Actually common sense and keeping things simple would say that many of the actions the heros are meant to take could of been handled a lot easier with taking a different more sensical action. So why then does Naerose get on her broom and shoot off at Choi after getting hit? Because she could of sworn she read on a bbs that it would bounce off the non existent mirror and hit the ANGRY MIDGET. Yes Kyrandia had a dumb ending sequence.

COMBATSYS: Choi blocks Naerose's Delphine Charge.

[                         \\\\\  < >  ///////////                   ]
Choi             0/-------/-----==|>>>>>>>\>>>>>>>\2          Naerose


Choi rips and tears, tears and rips into Naerose like the crazy little man he is. However, his actions seem to be... ignored? What? Why was she getting on her broom. The bald man's memory kicks in, reminding him of the entire sequence. Once in a while, Naerose would get all... witch like. It was really weird, but real. The Korean gave up on predicting her. As such, he moved into an alternate option.

Raising his arms up, he takes the broom head on, shoving it aside as it impacts. Oh, it hurt, that's for sure. And with the midget on the ropes, he didn't have much left in him. What he DOES have left is a pair of claws. Letting the move still move by him, he suddenly hooks his free arm around. As Naerose shoots past him, he was going to take an opportunity to yank her off her broom. Not his best attack, for sure, but darn right confusing for her. And from there, he could really knock it up a notch.

COMBATSYS: Naerose interrupts Quick Throw from Choi with End Creation End EX.

[                                < >  //////////                    ]
Choi             0/-------/=======|======-\-------\0          Naerose


In the valley of morning mist, you encounter the best music ever in the hand of fate. That had nothing to do with what Naerose was about to do. She gets confused allright and does what any good video game player would do. She sprays. Now there are no oppertunities to spray in the adventure games. You require a first person shooter. What you could do is just click on EVERYTHING. the result is she hits her spell book and then .. well the game does the animation of her shooting it, but nothing changes, except it crosses the ANGRY MIDGET and does the animation as if she meant to do that all along. That's becaues the programers don't have a true animation for spraying. Usually they had the sprite of you stand there and the sprite of you do something. So the game very poorly deipicts a confused Naerose spraying and destroying the hand drawn backgrounds (they'r quite invincable).

Choi had a problem. As he attempting to tear Naerose away... she sprayed him. Now, usually when a woman sprayed him, it meant either a very sexy thing, or a very NOT sexy thing. Naerose, being immune to the sex, immediately moves into the territory of NOT sex.

As such, the midget begins to reel, claws spread out. It looks like Naerose finally took him down. There was a chance in a billion that he would manage to snap out of this. A MILLION TO ONE. Erm. A Chance in a million, to one billion! In any case, the little man falls face-first... or face-first into a flip. Yep, he was trying to pull a front flip right at the witch, landing right on his...

COMBATSYS: Choi can no longer fight.

[                    \\\\\\\\\\  <
Naerose          0/-------/=======|


Bottom.

COMBATSYS: Naerose blocks Choi's Toorima Geri.

[                     \\\\\\\\\  <
Naerose          0/-------/------=|


"Wha." The witch blocks as a way of end fight animation, not because there was really any risk of her getting hit there and then says,

"Well. That shorten his fuse." She then smiles toward the monitor which has a bad 60 hzt or less refresh rate and hurts your eyes to look back at. Yes the monitor also only does 256 colors. Somehow her teeth still sparkle.

She clicks on the body of the defeated ANGRY MIDGET. She discovers another sandwich! Just like the first. This must be her lucky day. Of course she automatically gets the sandwich, goes into her inventory screen and eats it, while walking off. Man that meat is TOUGH.

Log created on 16:22:49 12/21/2008 by Naerose, and last modified on 00:06:00 12/24/2008.