Let's Play: The Bard's Tale - Tales of the Unknown

And a Human Rogue named Monk, for added amusement.

Hey guys, apologies for lack of updates yesterday and today. This week proved to be an unpredictable crunch week at work and I have guests this weekend, so I may not get around to updating until Sunday night. I really do hope to stick to something like an every other day schedule provided I don't have another crunch week at work.

Okay, work has been slow this morning because we're basically waiting on someone to arrive for a meeting. Thus I had time to polish this off:

To put yourself in the mood, you may want to listen to the tune that plays while in the adventurer's guild.


Come gather 'round folks and you'll hear of the day
That people set forth to unchain Skara Brae.

All new to adventure, their chances were small
They started their quest in Adventurer's hall

What they did have was hope! And moxie! And zeal!
So let's join the folks who made up Fight an 'eal



Pants: La la... who will ventUUUUre forth... to defEEEAt the tyrant MangAAAr...

Doctor Orpheus: Ye Gods, Man! If I weren't already committed to this cause, your song would turn me away!

Pants: Look, I'm sorry, but without an instrument I'm not really able to carry a tune.

Doctor Orpheus: What kind of bard doesn't have an instrument?

Pants: Instruments cost money! I just got out of barding school and have student loans to pay off!

Doctor Orpheus: *sigh* It's a good thing that I, Doctor Orpheus, am possessed of a noble sense of duty that compels me to help the downtrodden and oppressed.

Pants: Plus your deity will get super-pissed at you if you don't.

Doctor Orpheus: That too.

Pants: Anyway... we will fIIIIght the creatures... that infEEEEEst the town...

Meanwhile

Truckles: What is that noise? I want to smash whatever is making it!

Grissom: Now, now, my good man. Is your aim truly to extinguish the source of the aural irritation or really just to work off your testosterone fueled rage?

Truckles: Whuh?

Grissom: If we join him in his quest, you will get to smash many things!

Truckles: Ooh, that sounds good.

Yet more meanwhile

McNabb: So you're trying to tell me that bare fists and a robe can defeat a fully armed and armored warrior?

Gimmel: Absolutely! With the proper training and meditation, the sheer power of the human body can overcome anything.

McNabb: If I have a sword, I can slice you open. How are you going to slice me open with your hand? Grow your fingernails out really long?

Gimmel: No, no, you're missing the point!

McNabb: But you don't have any point at all! Or even a heavy bludgeon!

Gimmel: Grr... I know a way we can settle this.

McNabb: Uh, I'd love too, but, uh I don't actually have a sword, or armor, or really anything except this gold my family gave me to train to become a soldier.

Gimmel: No, no, I didn't mean we should fight each other. That out of tune bard over there is attempting to recruit people to clear the city of monsters. If we join their band, we'll each get to use our combat ways against the monsters and see who is more powerful.

McNabb: Sounds good. I'm in.


Thus Fight an 'eal's first party now was set.
But they did not know what to do quite yet.

Pants: Excellent. I'm so glad each of you is willing to take part in this grand adventure that I will immortalize in song: The ballad of Pants and the Murder Men.

McNabb: Pants and the murder men? That's an awful name.

Doctor Orpheus: Yes, clearly my presence should be emphasized since, after all, I, Doctor Orpehus, am a paragon of virtue who is nobly fighting against the evil of the land.

Grissom: Guys, I think we need a name for our group the properly expresses our motivations, desires, and strengths.

Pants: And Pants and the Murder Men doesn't do that?

McNabb: All it expresses is our... Pants-ness.

Pants: Look, Pants and the Murder Men is a song that will inspire others. Through pouring my heart into its composition I will...

Truckles: We should be called Fight an 'eal.

Pants: Uh huh. Anyway, as I was saying, I will craft a perfect combination of music and...

Truckles picks up Pants by his collar

Truckles: WE SHOULD BE FIGHT AN 'EAL.

Pants: Right then. Fight an 'eal it is.

McNabb: Anyway, our first order of business should be to get some equipment. After all, right now we have nothing but our clothes.

Gimmel: [shuddering, remembering what he just saw when Truckles picked up Pants] And some of don't even have pants.

Pants: I'm more comfortable that way!

McNabb: Explains how he got his name.

Grissom: Clearly it seems we should set out for Garth's Equipment Shoppe.

Everyone stares blankly at Grissom

Grissom: You know, Garth's Equipment Shoppe? It was mentioned in our adventurer's instruction manual and is marked on the map we got.

Everyone continues blankly starting at Grissom. Truckles blinks.

Grissom: Didn't anyone else read the materials in the packet they got when they signed up to be an adventurer?

There is a significant moment of silence

Doctor Orpheus: Right then, to Garth's!

The group set forth upon the streets
Not knowing what it was they'd meet



Grissom: It's a good thing we all have a great innate sense of direction and time.

Gimmel: And that Skara Brae is filled with handy street signs.

Truckles: Yeah, if you can read them.

Everyone stares at Truckles

Truckles: *sniff*

Pants: Did I ever mention my compulsion to enter unmarked doors? Because, boy howdy do I have a hankerin' to enter that door there opposite the adventurer's guild.

Gimmel: Why not?



Doctor Orpheus: *gasp* 'Tis the hall of credits! This is a great shrine built to honor the creator's of our world.


Fight an 'eal continued on their quest to get some gear.
Something, something, something something something... chandelier?

Pants: Well, we made it to the shop without encountering any foes. I'm sure this luck will continue with us throughout our journey.

Gimmel: I can't tell if he knows he's jinxing us or not.



Doctor Orpheus: Garth, my good man, I will take the finest equipment you have!



Doctor Orpheus: Ooh, I feel like a kid in a candy store!

McNabb: Wait, I know we decided to pool our money to buy equipment for everyone, but why should you get the best gear?

Doctor Orpheus: Please, I am a defender of virtue! I, Doctor Orpheus, must be resplendent in the best weapons and armor around.

Gimmel: Actually, seems to me that the three people in front should get an even split of the money to get the best equipment they can. Since they'll be the ones directly attacking and getting attacked.

Truckles: Truckles approves.

McNabb: What? You mean just because I happened to line up fourth I don't get any stuff? That doesn't seem fair. Grissom?

Grissom: I'm fine with it. I'll be the last to take any physical hits anyway and I can still toast guys just as well in the back.

McNabb: Pants?

Pants: You're right, McNabb, it's unfair. Surely I should get an instrument so I can inspire the party with my bardic tunes.

McNabb: Wait, that means you would sing more. On second thought, I'm fine with Gimmel's plan.

Doctor Orpheus: Alright! I'll take this... and this... ooh, and this!



Doctor Orpheus: Party on... err, I mean, thanks Garth.



Gimmel: Hey, look at this. The salesman is helpfully telling me what items of his I cannot equip myself with. I'm sure if I later go on questing for dragons or have a last fantasy this would also be the case.

Truckles: What's he talking about?

McNabb: Best to just let him have his moment and ignore him.



Doctor Orpheus: Ha, ha! Look at me, I'm a total bad-ass now!

Grissom: Doesn't your deity preach humility?

Doctor Orpheus: Humili-whuh?

Fuck, rhyming is hard.
Our heroes returned to the streets, where they were soon to meet their first foe.



McNabb: Pfft, how tough can these guys be? They don't even wear shirts.

Pants: Oh, so am I not tough because I don't wear pants?

Gimmel: No, you're just disturbed.


The battle was fierce (and I would have gotten pictures if I'd remembered how to slow down the text scrolling), but our heroes prevailed.



McNabb: Hmm... they were surprisingly tougher than I thought.

Doctor Orpheus: Oweee! I hurt. A lot. Oh the pain!

McNabb: Well, clearly you're in no position to stay at the front of the party. I'll just move up to the front row.

Doctor Orpheus: By all means.

McNabb: And now that I'm here, I'm entitled to the best equipment. So fork it over Orpheus.

Doctor Orpheus: Hey wait. What?

Grissom: While McNabb is removing all of Doctor Orpheus' armor, we should decide what to do next.

Pants: My predilection for entering unmarked doors says we should go in this one.

Gimmel: Why not?



McNabb: Oh look, more Barbarians. Well, if we handled two, surely we can handle seven.

Doctor Orpheus: *groan* For some definition of handled.

Grissom: Alright, clearly you'll need me this time to fry some foes.



Pants: Um, yikes. That's not good.

Gimmel: Poor McNabb. He was convinced his sword and armor would see him through.



Grissom: Did I say "fry"? I meant lightly singe.

Truckles: Ha, stupid Gimmel! Looks like your fists and meditation didn't do you any better.

Pants: Truckles, do you always insult the dead?

Truckles: Best people to insult. They can't get mad at you.

Pants: There is a twisted logic in that.

Doctor Orpheus: I hate to interrupt your conversation, but as someone who has already sustained major injuries and seen two people just die, might I suggest we run the fuck away!

Pants: The motion carries. Flee!

Barbarians are the toughest enemies you face in the streets of Skara Brae. They're pretty much bad news for any level one party and, as this party discovered, should always be run from. Fight an 'eal was unlucky enough to meet them in their first two encounters.



Grissom: Wait, so we entered this building, encountered Barbarians, ran from them, and are still in the building with it somehow being empty? How does that work? Where did they go?

Doctor Orpheus: Clearly it was the work of Brad.

Grissom: Brad?

Doctor Orpheus: My deity.

Grissom: Your god is named Brad?

Doctor Orpheus: You have a problem with that?

Grissom: Hey, if your God can make barbarians disappear, I'll call him Tits McGee.

Pants: So guys, two of us are dead and one is injured. How about we make haste back to the adventurer's guild where at least we won't get attacked.

Truckles: No more smashing today?

Pants: Time for that when we're not half dead.


And so Fight an 'eal's first excursion into the city of Skara Brae proved costly. Next time we will see if they can do a little better fighting off the nasties that inhabit the town.

<3 <3 Doctor Orpheus.

Being level 1, wouldn't it be cheaper to replace the dead rather than try to raise them?

Dude, that is cold.

Random battles in town? That's harsh.

So very worth the wait.

Brilliant! I was thinking about starting a LP for one of the early Wizardry or Might & Magic, but this is even better.

this game is tough! It's why I never got into PC rpgs until much later, thier difficulty level always seemed crazy high. Also I could never find my way around Skara Brae. I hated these early 3d world things...

If I ever gave any impression I was going to raise dead party members, I am sorry. It ain't happening unless they're at least level 3.

Though it saddens me to no end that McNabb died.

And people say that Etrian Odyssey and SMT games are hard.

I'm just glad Grissom's still alive. Those barbarians may be strong, but God is stronger.

i approve of this thread so hard.

Wow, this was a fantastic update. I didn't think I could be anymore excited about this Lets Play; thanks for proving me wrong, jerk.

Thank you, RH, for providing us with much amusement, which we enjoy.
This is the best LP since BrickRoad's FF1 thread.

uh, poetfox and loki disagree.

You haven't read the Arkham Horror and DQ1 threads.

The DQ/W thread was enjoyable, but this is shaping up to be better. I tried the Arkham Horror one, and, while good, it just wasn't my personal cup of tea.
The Lone Wolf thread is fantastic, but I'll have to have a huge chunk of time to devote to it to actually finish it (I kind of missed the boat when it was actually being written). Also, the Zelda threads were good, but overall, the FF1 thread is still my favorite, and if Hedgehog continues with this level of quality, Bard's Tale will definitely be a close second.

Great stuff, Hedgehog! Definitely worth the wait.

Oh, I'm by no means trying to say that this thread isn't doing well, just that there's some pretty good examples out there that were up my alley.

Major

Apparently I didn't save correctly before exiting my game last time (I guess I forgot to hold reset while pressing power) and apparently none of that adventure I just told actually happened. BUT......

I will pretend like it did. So McNabb and Gimmel are dead. I can't really give back the experience and gold for the two barbarians nor injure Doctor Orpheus, but those are relatively minor in the grand scheme of things. The important thing is that people died! Because that happens a lot in the beginning of Bard's Tale. Ooh, and actually there is a way to decrease Orpheus' hit points. I will experiment with that.

Hey, Hedgehog, where are you snagging these MP3s from? A game rip, or a site?

I'm particularly curious whether or not the "six bard songs" actually have some representation in-game beyond their names.

It's for.. it's for research. Let's say audience participation.

Hey, how do you get Apple IIgs emulation to run? KEGS is beyond my comprehension.

I am recording them directly from the game. I'm using a program called Audio Hijack to get the sound from the emulator and then Audacity to clean them up and make them mp3s.

And yes, each bard song has its own unique tune which plays while a bard is playing it. I plan to be putting up mp3s of those as I use them.

KEGS is... not user friendly at all. I'm running on a Mac, so I'm using Sweet 16 as my emulator. It was a friendlier interface and it has a built-in screen capture facility which makes things easier for me.

In KEGS, you must first configure it so that the disk you want is in the right drive (in my case, The Bard's Tale disk is in drive 5, slot 1). Then at a command prompt, you type "in#5" to have it read from drive 5.

Yeah, I DOSboxed it. Interesting in the extreme, but I can definitely see where we've gone beyond it. The LP has blown my mind, however.

I haven't had a lot of time to read TT lately, but I come on tonight and see that not only did you listen to my suggestion, but you made Doctor O. even more awesome than I could've hoped. Bravo.