The Twisted Tongue, Arc ID 1444, by @Days Heroic, Very Long (1 small, 2 medium, 2 unique maps).
Description tells of Freakshow using a device to force everyone to speak in the mangled way that they do. Im hoping for some cracking dialogue in this, then.
The level range is 20-54. Ill take in my lvl 37 Kin/Rad Defender The Accelerated Man
Arc had 50 plays, 4 stars as I started
testing, testing
[tap tap tap]
yes, that seems to be doing the thing
ahem
Alain Bejesus here, AKA The Accelerated Man, Journal X75b point fifty seven thousand
oh, Gavin, Ive just remembered
Leibniz needs to be taken to the Vets, hes sneezing a lot more than I think he should
right, where was I? Oh yes, my last mission
bit of a peculiar affair, to be honest
I was out testing out some new modifications to my feet in Steel Canyon when I received a telephone call from my old friend Professor Emeritus Cartwright
yes, we were at Eton together
hes a garrulous old sort, but a good man in a difficult debate
anyway, he needed my help, and since I was just around the corner, I popped round to see him with all due haste, as, er
he said
Anyway, apparently some ruffians had stolen some important university documents from him, and were as we spoke on their way to incinerate them. Stopping them was vital for old Carkers, as we used to call him at Bletchley. That would probably be quite dangerous, I assumed, and as I
was out field testing my feet I thought I might as well give them a Situational Hostile-Incursion Test. ..
[The contact, Professor Emeritus Cartwright, has excellent, overblown dialogue. Marvellous. he also looks the business, but doesnt have a bio]
Mission 1: Get the Stolen Papers Back
Activating my new feet, I proceeded quickly to the University annex
my feet seemed to be doing the job nicely
the left one was mufting a little, and the clinker tranche in my right heel felt a smidgeon oglish, but apart from that I was good
Once inside the building, I could hear the clank and grind of Freakshow in the floors below! I had no time to lose!! I rushed down the stairs and into the basement! I found a bunch of Freakshow all right, led by a giant metal freak spouting gibberish
yet there was something oddly familiar about it
[I wont spoil it, but the Freak Leaders name is great. As soon as I saw him, I grinned wide and decided I was going to like this arc.]
They put up a spirited fight, as the Freakshow usually do, poor deluded monstrosities
you know, Gavin, I think Id like to investigate the Freakshow more oftemn
I mean, look at them, theyre horrific, arent they, some of them dont have any
bowels, for heavens sake, yet theyre always so
enthiusiastic!
Well, after Id dealt with this lot, I retrieved the documents for the Professor
they were students dissertations and the like
one of the paper caught my eye
it was written in some esoteric form of mathematical formula that didnt seem to correspond to any maths language that I knew
which of course is impossible, since Im fluent in them all, even Half-Euclidean Septemporal Fento, which only makes sense on Thursdays
[LMAO AWESOME!!! The clue is brilliant]
The Professor was rather ungracious
I remember now that we also used to call him Old Grumpyknickers
and stormed off to see the students whod produced this drivel as he calls it
[lol his dialogue is pure gold. heres an example What's that? Freakshow, you say? Well, I wouldn't know anything about that. They don't publish at all, do they? ]
It turned out that this strange new language was called elite, and it was one invented by the students who had been kidnapped by the Freakshow. Cartwright wanted me to go and rescue them
it was the least I could do for an old friend, I suppose
although now that I was remembering, it seemed to me that back when we were together at CERN he was more of an acquaintance than a friend
Lord Frownyface, the interns called him
Mission 2: Rescue Students
The lead I had was pretty vague
Baumton! Thats a lot of ground to cover, eh Gavin? Still, it did provide me with some excellent results for my feet test. After some adjustment of the Frangler switch, I found that I could simultaneously boole with my left foot and cripe with my right
After a
lot of warehouses, I found the right one
my new feet were doing marvelous things by now, so the Freaks didnt put up much of a fight
first I located a music student, and dismissed her guards with ease
the poor girl said something, but it was gibberish! She was speaking in that crazy abnormal elite language, Gavin!
I continued through the warehouse. The Freaks werent very welcoming, but I was happy to teach them some manners
to cut to the chase, as they say, I found the other two students and freed them too, physically sound, but their speech, Gavin! Their speech was awful! It was like some horrid garbled alien language, devoid of all sense or reason! It sounded like the babbling of the idiots in Bedlam, or the degraded scratchings of an age-old rusted machine, sandstorm wrecked and unserviced for decades
it was the shrill of the baying crowd, the cawing of crows at the execution of civilisation.
If music is the language of Love, and mathematics is the language Reason, this, Gavin, this was the language of
Morons!
[Nice mission. Only the music student had a clue, however. All the students ran off immediately upon rescue, which made their speech bubbles a little hard to read. The NPC chat caught it of course, but maybe you could stick a short thanks animation in before they run, so players get a chance to read the great amusing dialogue they have in their speech bubbles before they go. The map was quite big too, but I had so much fun clearing the Freaks (and again after they rezzed lol) that it wasnt a problem.]
It seemed that the students had had their brains altered in some unfathomable and fiendish way
I reported back to the Professor to see what he made of it
I remember he always had an amazingly sharp mind when we were working at The Pentagon together
[Lol the dialogue from the Prof cracks me up
and I admit, Im really hoping that something happens to his dialogue later on
]
[LMAO Whilst I was playing this arc, BTW, I got a blind invite from someone called I3aden you couldnt make it up could you?]
The Professor told me that the students had been interviewed, but only the fellows from the IT department could understand them
they said that theyd been abducted from the student council offices
obviously, that was the next line of enquiry
Mission 3: Investigate Student Council Offices
So it was a matter of seconds to force entry into the student council offices
I had to investigate
and the building was swarming with Freaks! Luckily, my feet really were proving worth their weight in impervium. The flanging on the left one was still a little harsh, but the gribble thrufter of my right instep was working a charm! Gavin, it was almost like that time in Vancouver, haha!
ah
where was I?
Ah yes
after some Freakwork, I discovered a giant hole dug into the floor
its astonishing how many office buildings in Paragon have had unauthorized excavation work, isnt it
this hole led to some caverns, which in turn led to the sewers
that must have been how the Freaks gained access to the building, I guess
anyway, deep in these sewers I encountered an old safe, with recent signs of use
then lock was childs play, really
it contained schematics of a machine of some sort
seemed likely to have a scrambling effect on the brains neural pathways
[Im loving this arc]
Deeper into the sewer I went, Gavin
and there; in the depths, I found the twisted genius behind this whole fiendish plot. He was a Freakshow boss, and his plan, it seemed, was to use his grotesque device, the Tongue-Twister, to broadcast a signal that would change the entire worlds neural language centers so that we would all end up speaking this appalling elite speak! I had to stop him!
So I did! He gabbled at me in his squawking lingo as he fell
telling me
I think
the location of the fiendish machine!
[lol The Boss is wonderful. Anyway, tragically, its now far too late and Ive got work tomorrow, so Ive got to finish this off another session. Ive already played too long since Im enjoying it so much lol]
[And as if by magic, its tomorrow! The weekend stretches out in front of me, an oasis of booze, loose women, fast cars, jetskis, and gold. In my dreams. On with the review]
With the cretinous villain defeated, I rushed back to the professor
it was worse than I thought the device was due to activate within the half-hour! If it wasnt destroyed, it would mean that everyone in the world would be forced to speak in that disgusting brainless cacophonic babble! Think of it Gavin; nothing but the rabid gibbering hoots of idiots, with their powning and their futuwing and lolling! It was enough to give me the screaming abdabs! It had to be stopped!
Mission 4: Stop the Broadcast
I rushed to the area of town that the Freak had divulged
there were enough freaks around, for sure
but I had no time to lose! I activated my superfeeterator, and quartered the area at high speed. I encountered another Freak leader, who put up a short fight, and then the machine itself. There were a few Freaks guarding it, but Im not ashamed to say that I was quite hyped up, Gavin, and so they were but a mild distraction. I smashed the devil out of that diabolical contraption
and then things turned a little bit weird. When I was on my way back to the professor, the people I ran past were all speaking leet! What had I done? The professor was too; I couldnt understand a word of what he was saying! I had to resort to scribbling on a pad to communicate with the poor deranged buffoon
and then the horrific truth was revealed to me it was not
he whose linguistic neural pathways had been bastardized to those of a lobotomized ape it was I! I sounded like an absolute moron, Gavin. Me, three times Nobel Prize winner, reduced to talking like a total numpty! Is there anything, Gavin, any noise, any sound in the entire world, which more evokes the utter absence of intellect than that perfidious blather? I think not. It was awful
Id made a horrible mistake when I trashed the machine I was only required to switch it off! Something had to be done. Luckily, the Professors colleagues had a possible answer
[lol excellent. What I hoped for has happened. Lovely. One typo (lol), mY t3chn0l0g1c4l c0Lleg35 should be mY t3chn0l0g1c4l c0Lle4g35, I think?]
Mission 5: Follow Cartwrights Instructions
[The briefing had me hooting with laughter.]
at least, I
hoped they had a possible answer
the thing was, I couldnt really understand what the Professor was saying after his intitially telling me that I shouldnt have destroyed the machine
the damage to my brain must have been getting worse! he was pointing to the science department, so I assumed that was where Id find help. Sure enough, there were Freaks inside
maybe they could give me information on how to reverse the terrible imbecelic damage to my brain
[cool
I like the way this is set out.]
I soon found some Freaks willing to talk
and I/m ashamed to say that I found them all to easy tom understand
it was almost as though they were talking in an erudite and clear fashion! They were discussing the destruction of something
I continued
[lol the Freaks are speaking normally. Great. It doesnt make much sense, tbh, but its funny as hell, so /thumbs up ]
Up a floor, I met another Freak boss, and this one sounded even more intelligent to my obviously now dangerously stupid ears. He was also talking about destroying something
I reasoned that this was maybe what the Professor was trying to direct me to
and the Freaks were trying to destroy it!
[really nice to see these bosses from earlier in the arc back. Good map, too.]
Finally, I rushed into a lab to find a bunch of Freaks about to dismantle a strange humming device
this had to be it! I set about them with an absolute air of desperation! It was like a scrum, Gavin! There were quite a few of them but I was defending something very important; my mind!
[wow, hard fight, that. Boss and a crowd of Freaks. Good fun though, and I didnt die, so its all good]
I prevailed
well, obviously I did, or you wouldnt be hearing this now, youd be hearing the mangled bleatings of a dimwit. When I returned to the professor, there was a moment of fright when his speech seemed to still be in that awful patois, but it slowly returned to normal as my neural network reasserted itself. That was such a relief, Gavin, you cant imagine
. And thats it! So, tidy it up and print it off as usual, theres a good chap
oh, and make a sidenote
left foot seems to have developed a slight twitch in big toe
possibly the creniflex bassoon needs oscillating
Alain Bejesus, The Accelerated Man, signing off
right
wheres the ..ah-
[end]
A cracking arc, this. I thoroughly enjoyed every minute. The dialogue is absolute diamond stuff. The maps are the right size, I love fighting Freakshow, the objectives were simple and yet not too sparse, and I was laughing like a drain for loads of it. If your Players are grinning like loons for 90% of your arc, youre not doing much wrong. Its even got a great title. 5-stars.
Suggestions to improve it:
Give each of the rescued students a clue and a short animation to stall them long enough so that the Player can read their speech bubbles..
er, thats all I can think of lol. It was great.
Eco.
PS new colour for my out of character comments ok?
Looks ok to me on the villain skin, though the pic is a little wide for my resolution, you might want to crop/resize it. Love the look of the character though, very nice. Also love the ability to embed images and edit old posts, I've been spending way too much time fixing up my Time Shifter thread with embedded images (am editing every pic for the size issue, and many are too dark)
We might not excel at many sports [apart from rugby lately] but the atmosphere we generate at any kind of events is outstanding for a country of our size. Us welsh will never be said to be low on passion at welsh events, even if we know we dont really stand a chance. [anyone remember the atomsphere at the welsh response to the haka this year? Just listen to that crowd!]
