Battle Brothers: Warriors to the End

Part of the Fate of Heroes series - spoilers ahead!

While at the tavern, a contingent of House Grimmund soldiers arrive to announce that the war is over! The main horde is retreating into the wild lands, and any clans that remain can be wiped out without the need for mercenaries. Gander is still relieved, and when Sunbro jokingly asks for a raise for all the troops Gander happily agrees.

Despite the news, the Spears are given clean up duty - destroying an orc base in the rainy mountains where Hanke and Adam Chaplin are slain and one of the magic shields is cleaved in two! Gander returns the company to hunting thieves, dire wolves and easier escort missions for a bit - even enjoying a stint with a caravan of women offering the oldest profession. For 300g it's a bargain!

Escorting the caravan up the mountain the team fights off goblin raiders as well as large bands of brigands led by Ingolf the Red. Sir Lancel manages to slay Ingolf, but he and Gander fall in battle, leaving the monk Sahkarov now in charge. Upon arrival at their destination a rotund Grimmund knight named Sir Winfred Steinhart makes fun of the company, leading to a jousting contest between him and Sunbro Forever.

Sunbro easily puts him in his place.

Battle Brothers: The Green Sea

Part of the Fate of Heroes series - spoilers ahead!

Unwilling to lose any more cities, Gander marches the Spears back to the Western front - hiring the sell swords Oghren and Adam Chaplin on the way. Even with House Ruhmolt soldiers, the clash against goblin forces costs Emile and Stargazer their lives. Hakon also has his shield destroyed in the melee and his throat cut from ear to ear. Sid is traumatized by the experience.

Despite their victories, word arrives that Reinbruch - a village just across the mountains - has also fallen, and now the horde marches upon House Folsach's stronghold of Lazenfeste. The Spears are contracted to destroy the orcs forward war camp, gaining volunteers Sigmar the vagabond and Bertram the miller to fill out the long axe row at the back. Ironically, the Spears of the Church no longer use Spears.

Maybe this caught the orc warlords by surprise?

The war camp is easily destroyed, but since it was just one of many Lazenfeste falls under siege and the Spears rush to aid it with a company of House Folsach soldiers. They are terribly outnumbered, but find victory on the field, losing Harlech, Oghren and one of Sid's eyes to orc warriors as well as all but one of the House Folsach soldiers.

Hotel Inferno

[Post #10 of the Blaugust Challenge]

Yet another offering from Necrostorm (who made Adam Chaplin and Taeter City), this movie is entirely shot in the first person perspective of a hitman which is VERY cool. A simple assassination task in a hotel goes very weird, slightly scary and very violent when it turns out that the hotel is actually crawling with psychos and a demon. Plot wise it's pretty interesting and the lack of acting skills don't really matter here as most of the acting comes from the protagonist who you never actually get to see and his off screen contacts so it's really just voice acting which in the dubbed version anyway, is good enough.

One of the worst places for a vacation, that's for sure!

While the gore is still higher than your average movie I believe it's been toned down a tiny bit from the previous two movies. Strangely what lets it down are the FX. It doesn't do as good a job as its predecessors in tricking your brain that said person got smashed with a hammer or got exploded, though they are brave to do some of this in broad daylight and otherwise well lit areas.

Much like other first person horrors some people might experience motion sickness while watching this, but where this is different is that while the protagonist is running around he manages to kill a LOT of the baddies chasing him. Score wise I give this two and a half bullets out of five. If you've seen the Doom movie, liked the first person segment there and can stomach a bit of blood then this is probably for you.

Blaugust Bonus: Air pistols and air rifles are the extent of my firearms knowledge and experience. Tried a .22 once and the recoil made every shot miss so I didn't really get into higher caliber weapons. I really should try that again now that I'm stronger and a fair bit older. I got a firearms license before I got a drivers license!

Taeter City

[My ninth post of the Blaugust Challenge!]

From the same bunch that made Adam Chaplin, the gore fest continues in Taeter City. A place that solves crime by broadcasting a silent radio wave that forces potential criminals (and only them, because FUTURE SCIENCE!) to harm (often mutilate) themselves. This gets them the attention of the "Bikers" who then come around with ludicrously high powered weapons to finish them off. The corpses are then brought to the meat factory for processing because criminals taste good! Better not try eat anything other than criminals either or you might find yourself on the menu.

There are lots of things wrong with this movie even if you look past the setting, the bad acting (duh) and the tons of visceral gore. The ruling body called "the Authority" keeps interjecting ads throughout which kill some pacing, there's no real protagonist being followed, there is a very obvious stunt double in some parts (with close ups on the face) and most annoyingly there is a strange camera effect throughout the whole movie that while making it easier for the director to add his FX, will probably give a number of viewers a headache while watching it.

At least all shots of boobs don't have this problem.

I give this one a score of one and a half bullets out of five, and would probably recommend skipping it unless you really wanted a gore "fix".

Blaugust Bonus: I played with the thought of learning to ride a motorcycle in my youth but my mother was strongly against it. As a joke I would tell people that riding a motorbike would be fatal for me since my mom would kill me, but after seeing and hearing about a few of their fatalities I'm glad I don't ride one. Regardless of how the accident occurs there's really just too little protection for my liking. Take care on the roads everyone!

Adam Chaplin

[Post #8 of the Blaugust Challenge!]

Starring and directed by Emanuele De Santi this Italian film at its core is a revenge story that happens to be VERY VERY GORY. The basic plot is that Adam comes home one day and discovers something nasty done to his loved one. Seeking vengeance he does what any normal person would do: summon a demon from hell and sell your soul to it to become ultra powerful. Then you can smash and dismember all the bastards who did it and anyone else who gets in your way!

Yup. I seriously summarized the plot in that paragraph, but what a fantastically bloody journey it is to behold. From the very first moment you see Adam you know that he's more angry and violent psychopath rather than tortured hero out for justice. Also you might notice he is super fit!

This is one of the tamer parts of the movie.

There isn't much good acting in the movie (Adam himself might be the only passable one), but each new person that appears is a potential bloodsplotion waiting to happen so you tend to enjoy more fodder showing up... if you like your gore and violence that is. However, if you don't like seeing people getting their faces exploded, cleavered, set on fire, impaled, dismembered, chopped in half, and literally torn apart into seas of blood and intestines then this movie is probably not for you.

For everyone else I give it three righteous fists of demonic fury out of five!

Blaugust Bonus: I don't really have a problem with gore, maybe its because my older brothers let me play Doom when I was a child. The other thing they made me do is learn the weakness of all the creatures in Monster Manuals I and II of Dungeons and Dragons in case I ever ran into them. I still think that's pretty cool.

The Fury and the Drama/Saga

Wanting to take a break from the zerg overload at the Guildwars 2 invasion events of Clockwork Chaos I decided to try patch up Mabinogi to see what Generation 18, aka as the Drama or the Saga depending on what region you ask, has to offer. For me, not a lot since the downloader wouldn't even begin downloading files. Bummer. Not really in the mood for a full reinstall of the game at the moment, which is what was needed to fix it previously, so that's going back on the shelf for now.

Meanwhile Neverwinter Online has released The Fury of the Feywild with an all new campaign system. This isn't as nice as they make it out to be as it basically forces you to grind longer through a zone to quite literally unlock each new area with keys. Don't expect to do it in one sitting either, the quests that give you the materials needed to get closer to each key can only be done once every 24 hours. These keys also need astral diamonds. Yerp, pay (or grind more) to progress.

The update also made my Foundry created module vanish! No searches seem to bring it back, and when I try to get into the Foundry itself it says "Foundry editing not allowed." What the heck. A quick check on the forums confirmed I'm not alone, and visitors from Star Trek Online (another Cryptic game) advised that each patch usually breaks their module stuff too - it's normal. The only thing you can do is constantly fix it to comply with the new stuff. Sorry, but that's not a system I care to use after all.

To top it off I can't log in now at all - it just does nothing after loading up the zone. As you might be able to tell I'm a little... upset with this turn of events. Just a tiny, tiny bit.

Like Adam Chaplin.