Adventuring in Gransys

I didn't expect to come up with another post quite so quickly. But after talking about adventures in other games, I thought I would share one of my latest.

Since getting Dragon's Dogma on Friday, I've been running across Gransys (that's the game world) having all sorts of fun over the weekend. So far, I've had my heart eaten by a dragon, became the Arisen, rescued my childhood friend, killed bats and wolves and eaten their meat, recruited a band of followers (aka pawns), and gotten my arse kicked by bandits and monsters bigger and tougher than me.

So sit down, make yourself comfortable, for I've a tale to tell.

Upon reaching the capital, I made my way to the pawn guild, where the guild master, Barnaby, asked me to head down into the tombs beneath the guild to find out the source of strange happenstances down there. Nodding to my main pawn, Triska, and followed by my two current pawns, we bravely headed down, following a ramp which spiralled down around the edge of a big, central chamber. Chancing to peer over the edge, I could see that the bottom was a long way down: long enough that the fall would mean certain death. Stepping back as I really didn't feel like taking that tumble, we continued on our way down.

It wasn't long before we met our first enemies.

Undead warriors burst from the ground, and skeletons formed themselve from the bones scattered on the floor. They were hard to kill, until out wizard enchanted our weapons with fire. In the end, we emerged triumphant, and I shared an exultant grin with Triska. It didn't last. For a while, I was lulled into a false sense of security. Now we had the measure of our foe, the undead didn't seem that bad. But, halfway down, we came across an ogre.

The ogre towered above us, a squat, muscular form, perhaps three or four times our size. Not as big as a cyclops, but still big. As one we attacked it, only to find our weapons did little damage. It's skin was dark and tough like leather. Hearing the fear in Triska's voice mirroring my own, upon realising this foe was perhaps too much, I was suddenly knocked back thirty feet by a mad swing of the ogre's arm, almost killing me. Picking myself up, I ordered my pawns to disengage, and we fled. It wasn't fear, I told myself, but prudence. We would come back once we were more seasoned. I didn't stop running until I reached fresh air.

Some time later, and many hours of adventuring later, we returned. The ogre and the mystery of what lay at the bottom of the chamber kept plaguing me, so after having fought our way across Gransys, and buying better equipment, as well as bringing two new pawns to accompany Triska and I, we returned to the chamber.

This time, the undead were easily overcome, and we soon came to the ogre. Having fought several cyclops, I applied a similar strategy, leaping onto the beast's back to hack away at the back of its skull, whilst my pawns danced about attacking it, and keeping it busy. Our attackes were working. It was hard, and slow, but we were killing it.

But the beast was flailing about, and I didn't notice that our fight was coming precariously close to the edge of the ramp. And then, inevitably, staggering under our blows, the ogre took another step. Only this time open air met its foot.

I had time to mutter, 'Oh shit,' as the beast plummeted over the edge taking me, clinging to its back, with it. I thought I was going to die. When we hit the bottom, the ogre crumpled beneath me, taking the brunt of the impact as it died. Bewildered at finding myself still alive, I stumbled off the corpse as my pawns raced down to me. Triska reached me first.

'Are you alright, Master?' she asked.

I nodded in response, brushing dust off my clothes. My legs were still shaking.Turning, I surveyed the chamber - our destination. There were pillars arranged in a circle around an indentation which glowed with an eery purple light. Stepping over to it, I examined the light. It was unnerving. Suddenly, snake-like monsters rose up from the floor. They were terrifying red, scaly things. Things that didn't die when we killed them. they were too much for us.

We ran again. But this time, I think were were wholly justified.

Anecdotal Evidence

I've read a lot of articles by game journalists who tell stories of their adventures in such-and-such a game, and some of my favourites come from the chaps over at Rock Paper Shotgun. Recently, they've been running a few articles about Jim Rossignols travels in DayZ, an ArmA 2 mod, which make for fascinating reading.

Personally, I've never really had many tales of my adventures in a game. That's not to say that they don't happen, just that I rarely have something I want to tell others. The closest I've ever come to that previously was in one particular playthrough of Halo 3. Having fought across Earth and the Ark, watched the death of good friends, I finally reach my end goal: the replacement to Alpha Halo, which I, as Master Chief, destroyed in the first game. But there's a problem. Between me and the control room are flood combat forms. Taking a deep breath, I charge in, aiming to sprint up as I know that no matter how many I kill, there will always be more coming. After a gruelling fight, I made it up two thirds of the tower. I've still got a rocket left in my launcher. Suddenly, Flood forms spring from the floor below, jumping up to my platform. Feeling crafty, I work out that several, including a heavy combat form will land a few metres from me. So I fired my rocket at the floor. But there's no explosion. Bewildered, I'm frozen as the Flood swarm in and take me down.

It was only after I'd finished, that I headed into the theatre to find out what had happened. Playing the video in slow motion, I watched as my rocket hurtled toward the combat form, only to be batted aside at the last moment, and go spinning away to explode harmlessy against the cliff face. It was amazing. I didn't even know the Flood was capable of doing anything like that! Really, it was just a chance combination of events and game physics. But it was still brilliant.

Except for that one event in Halo 3, the only other adventure I can think of occurred during a wander through the forest of the Rift, in Skyrim. I was minding my own business when a dragon swooped down and started attacking, only for me to hear the whoop of a troll. Knowing I can hide behind a tree as the dragon attempts to burn me, I turned and fought the troll, felling it with a few blows. That done, I turned back to continue my fight with the dragon, only to yell in surprise to find its face up in mine as its jaws snap shut on my life.

However, I think I'm about to find more tales to tell. On Friday I picked up a copy of Dragon's Dogma. I've been looking forward to this game for a few months. It had slipped under my radar, but once I learned more about it I got very excited.

I'm pleased to say that the game certainly lives up to that excitement. The world feels vast, combat is pleasingly punchy and visceral. True the story may not be up to much - after over ten hours, I've yet to even meet the king - but I don't really care. I'm having far too much fun