Free Puzzle Presents

If you like exercising your noggin then here are a few free puzzle games on Steam you might want to try out. First up is the (ditsy) Victoria Clair and the Mystery Express, where puzzles are front and center as long as you can put up with the hand drawn art. The brain teasers are definitely varied in this one, but don't worry - your cat will give you clues if you can keep feeding it!

If you prefer your puzzles with a dash of horror instead, then Escape the Clinic might be for you. With jump scares and an overall sense of foreboding this might tick the box for some of you crazy people.

Horror isn't your thing? Maybe a first platform puzzler is what you need! EQI fills this role nicely, as its gimmick is you can rotate the map on its axis - changing where gravity pulls you (and a few other obstacles). Easy control and quick maps make it quite entertaining.

Or maybe you just want some WTF block-push solving. In this case, Helltaker is the game for you - so named because you play a guy picking up all the cute demon girls in each lair of hell!?! Very funny and the later levels are very challenging. Definitely worth looking at though!

I'll drink to that!

The Cursed: Charming Lady of Murder

[Part of the Cursed story line]

The Mariliths require severe magic piercing/negation to damage, and even force Catharina into slayer form to defeat. However, with all the focus on them - a sneaky succubus charms Sarevok who then relentlessly slays Imoen before Catharina can dispel it. Obviously he does the same to the succubus after. Alas, Imoen is in too many pieces to revive.

Healing up with potions the remaining pair destroy the last well and face Melissan and her glabrezus for the final showdown. They basically throw everything they have at her, and with Catharina down to 20% health, Sarevok and Melissan exchange killing blows and both crumble to the ground. The remaining minions vanish as a Solar sent by the gods appears.

She says Catharina is strong enough now to make a choice: relinquish all her power to become mortal and destroy Bhaal's taint for good, or take the throne and ascend to god hood. Covered in blood and shivering with power, she chooses the latter - becoming a balancing force for the world: The new Lady of Murder.

All hail the Red Lady!

Insight: Charm protection. It's a thing. I even had a helmet that auto-does it, but was it equipped? Nope!

The Cursed: A Tempting Maze

[Part of the Cursed story line]

To replace Anomen, Lu Lingqi begrudgingly asks Haer'Dalis (who has a clear crush on her) to join the team. The bard has an odd set of skills, but the most surprising is his fame. Almost everyone in town recognizes him.

The team returns to the Watcher's Keep and descends to Level 3, which is a bastard of a maze made of little rooms, some being magic dead zones. It's also filled with powerful, warring demons making it a slog to get through.

Aren't succubi horny little devils?

A room of succubi lustfully offer passage to the end of the maze for the prize of a kiss and Catharina agrees - getting level drained in the process. The succubi don't lie, but only after they leave do the team discover they don't have the key down, and must now go through the maze in reverse!

Insight: And that's what I get for trying to skip the level. Lol.

The Cursed: Durlag's Tower

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Rather than head for Baldur's Gate, Catharina opts to try explore the remaining areas on the map first and thus the team finds themselves at Durlag's tower, a massive abandoned fortress. The two initial Battle Horror guards set the tone right away, as more undead defend the place in sporadic groups.

One such group is led by a Doom Guard, who manages to slay Eldoth before Faldorn's summoned dread wolf can tear it down. The tower interior is quite cozy, despite all the ghouls and traps lining the place. At the top floor they manage to free a succubus, and on the inner parapets encounter greater basilisks.

Yeah, I failed my saving throw.

Fortunately by this time, the party has many potions of mirrored eyes and Khalid just drinks one then holds their aggro while the rest of the party pepper the lizards to death from range.

Insight: When properly geared, basilisks are pieces of cake. They don't move and only have the gaze attack, which they only use on the closest target. If that target is immune to gaze then they basically become experience pinatas.

Old TV Reviews: Chuck the Lost Black Orphan Girl

A continuation of my old TV show reviews.

Chuck (Finished)

When the titular regular nerd played by Zachary Levi "downloads" a ton of classified intel directly into his brain, he is thrown into the world of espionage, danger, and humorous shenanigans! This action comedy is one of my wife's favorites, with her staying up in the wee hours of the morning probably because of the underlying romance story. Lots of laughs and some lessons to be found, and might be worth a watch it you haven't seen it.

Stopping bombs with porn. It's great!

Lost Girl (Finished)

Proving that sex sells, this 5 season show is about a bi-sexual succubus who is looking for her place in the world. As expected, many other mythological creatures are present here too (most of whom are shagged by the main character), often just in "human form" to save the already lacking CGI budget.

Plot wise this one starts well, then sort of gets lost itself with many characters having severe lapses of judgement, and culminates with a ridiculous final showdown. One of the worst ones in my memory anyway. Still, Anna Silk (the succubus Bo) is easy on the eyes but my favorite is easily Kenzie - seemingly the only human around. Not really one I'd recommend though...

You said it Kenzie!

Orphan Black (Finished)

A show about clones, most of whom are played by the very talented Tatiana Maslany who manages to make each of them different. Following the unraveling mystery of how and why the clones came to be and how they interact with each other is great. Consistent is how I'd describe it. Never bad, but also never making it to my favorites list. If you haven't seen it, just watch the first episode - you should be able to tell from there if it is for you. If you prefer it with a Japanese twist, there's a remake called Orphan Black: 7 Genes - haven't seen that one myself though.

One actress, many personalities.

Dragon's Dogma: Aught to Kill You

Adventures of Skyrim - spoilers ahead! You can follow the rest of the story here!

Deciding that it is time to confront the dragon, I return to the Dragonforged who is nice enough to tell me where to find him. He also mentions that when he tried, he lost and is now just a ghost. That does explain why only I can see him! The beasts lair is beyond the Great Wall, guarded by hell hounds, succubi harpies, and gorechimera. It is also strangely familiar in that it is the same place I dreamt of at the start of all this... only Savan and his team were the ones hunting the wyrm.

More awesome than Zhaitan.

We eventually reach it and I am surprised that the tavern keeper Inez is a prisoner here, and the dragon offers me a choice: fight him and potentially end the world, or kill Inez (who represents my love interest I guess?) and live forever... which is what the mad Duke did. Obviously I fight the dragon - and what a glorious fight it is, covering a huge distance as we run through and a top of ruins, shoot at it with ballista, ride on it's back, and ultimately face it in a big arena!

Heat seeking magic arrows are very handy in this fight, but in the end the dragon goes down due to my learning how to double jump and grab onto its chest - followed by daggering its heart ad nauseum. After a long battle, the dragon falls and I eat its soul (Dovahkiin)! Well, not really - but he is nice enough to magically return my missing heart before disintegrating. Afterwards we take Inez back to Cassardis afterwards where she shows her appreciation, by giving free drinks and snacks all around! :P

Wizardry Online: Ghost Town

[Part of the journals from Wizardry Online!]

Apart from the Succubus, giant suits of loitering armor, oversized tarantulas, demon imps and ambient classical music in a minor scale it was a band of overly strong werewolves that ultimately prevented us from getting past the magical barriers within the House of Savage Lust. We did reach the library though, and from it we learned the location of some sort of experimental zone built by a mad dwarf named Azarm. Thanam decided to continue to try find a way past the magic barriers in the estate while I returned to Port Illfalo to resupply.

The town was even emptier than when we left it, with all the adventurers having evacuated due to the Armageddon threat. Even the Lost Souls board had a record of zero souls lost for the month, a number I had never seen before since our arrival. Being one of the few remaining people the arcane minister Zermu Terlu was quick to issue out a Dimento medal to assist with supplies in exchange for trying to stop the rumored "end". I also stopped by one of the still functioning guild agencies and found a note from Quark - that he and a handful of the remaining Porkul Pickers and their allies like Raven Daydream, Maco Meng, and Helga had packed up to try their luck on distant shores. They must have packed in a hurry since there was still equipment in the guild armory, some of which I decided to take for myself.

One of the priests at the local temple urged me to find his wand as he seemed to think it would help in our overall goal so I found myself heading back to the dreaded Temple of Oblivion and after poking around in places no sane man should I gained access to a secret lair inhabited by gargoyles! Fortunately I got the drop on them and managed to take them on one at a time, recovering with Dimento camps when needed. After the difficult combat I managed to retrieve and return the wand to the priest... alas all it seemed to do was cure his own speech impediment. Time is running out and I am unsure of what to do, but I know I cannot simply abandon these people to whatever horrible fate is about to pass.

I take heart knowing that if it is an end by gargoyles, I can take a few of them with me.

 

-Caanon

Wizardry Online: Lost Souls

[Part of the journals from Wizardry Online!]

Soon after sending our last report a strange wizard appeared in town offering people to strengthen their spirit via the Trials of Isic, an otherworldly realm heavily focused on combat. Thanam and I went in and though we could only defeat the first tier of challenges upon our exit we found that we had been gone for months! The once bustling streets are now very empty, and Quark no longer runs the Porkul Union for reasons unknown. There is also talk of some upcoming cataclysm in the Ministry of Magic but we have other things to worry about first.

Selenka is one of the missing and her cartography project hasn't progressed much at all. While the Adventurer's Guild as well as Zermu Terlu don't know of her whereabouts, the knave Arahawi suggested that she might have gone into the House of Savage Lust deeper in the mainland. From the rumours it is exactly as it sounds, being inhabited by Succubi (among other things). With no other leads the elf and I are going to investigate.

Maybe they'll make a movie about it! :P

-Caanon