Post For You Far Away

As I imagine that all of your lives are empty and meaningless without me, I suppose I'll take the chance to say hi, if only to give you all a few more lines of text to cherish and revere.

But naturally, I'm really wanting to talk about me. And my visions. Of world video gaming from OSK industries. Namely, my visions for Mario games and "You-wake-up-in-a-room" (I think 'll have to change the working title of that one, it doesn't quite have a ring to it).

Yes, I am aware that Mario games are property of Nintendo. But when a good friend of mine takes over the world, they will naturally hand Nintendo to me. Unlike my literary and theatric ideas, I feel I could actually finish the design of a Mario game. I can't come up with my own ideas, but I can sure as hell steal someone else's, point out its flaws, and better them to fit my wants and needs. Having just played Mario Sunshine, I like the format of it very much. I think the idea of having Mario 64-esque levels, just less of them with more stars each is cool. That way, each level is so much more developed and has so much more depth. I'd keep the format of the Sunshine levels- 8 "episode" stars, one 100 coin star, and 2 secret shines. But you see, there wouldn't be any of the "Secret of Ricco Tower" type stars. They were wickedly cool, but now that it's been done, it's been done. This would also add to the depth of the level environments, as there would be even more stars in the actual level. Also, the secret stars would actually be clever. As opposed to having to do such things as spray the sun and golden stars to reveal shines, you would actually have to work for these and they wouldn't just be random things. If I were actually able to replace the golden bird shine in Noki Bay, for example, I would make it much more difficult. You would have to walk around what appears to be the outskirts of the level. Instead of an invisible wall, you would find a ruins mark very, very far along the rock face. When you sprayed it, a maze formation would appear. It would be extensive, and the entire thing would be on a timer. It would be virtually impossible to get to the end before the timer ran out. The best you could really do is make it through the entire thing mere seconds before the last section closes. At this point you would recieve the shine.
But the kicker would be the end of the game. After you aquired all 120 stars (11 from each of the 10 levels, plus 10 evilly hard "castle secret stars"), Luigi would become a playable character in that fire. Also, a koopa will suddenly appear deep in the woods. When you find him, he will ask you for 100 blue coins. Although I hated the blue coin system, I would make it a bonus in this game, as opposed to part of the 120 stars. I do think it was cool how the blue coins always kept you on your toes. They would be so cleverly hidden, however, that you would only naturally run into 10 or 15 of them while getting the 120 stars if you were not looking for them.
If you were able to supply the 100 blue coins, the koopa would open a portal to a secret 11th level, Bowser's castle. Having already fought Bowser 3 times during the game (and seemingly defeating him in the last encounter) no one would expect to see him again. The level would consist of the same 11 stars as the other levels, but they would all be much more difficult. The first star would involve a Baby Bowser boss fight. Another would involve racing a paratroopa around Bowser's lava moat, and you're in a boat (a rowing system would be involved- Koops can attes to how much of a pain this would be). The level would only have 101 coins, and most would be hidden. The second secret star (only accesible after getting all 10 other stars in the level) would climax in a fourth Bowser battle atop the castle. If you beat this, you will get the 131st star and your reward will be knowing that you are the man. Other random details would be that levels themselves would be hard to find (think shifting sand land) and each of the four Bowser battles would have a different format (As an example, imagine a Bowser battle in which about a dozen huge magnets are floating in space. You and Bowser can jump from magnet to magnet. Your objective is to throw Bowser towards a magnet when it is aligned on the other side of an electric orb (of which there would be maybe three) so that he would pass through the orb on the way. Also, the game would take place in a larger playing arena. Not quite Zelda size, but an almost as massive landscape. This will make the quest for the 10 "castle secret stars" incredibly hard. You will need 75 stars to fight the thirdl Bowser.
But since making a Mario game will no doubt find me with a lawsuit, let's focus on my brainchild (or brain-fetus, rather) "You-wake-up-in-a-room". This is very much a copy of the "Kid wakes up on a boat" book, but is more practical in actually pulling off. Being landbound, there's much more for the main character to do.
It starts out with you waking up in a room. Go figure. Your character has no memory of who they are, how they got there, etc. Basic Hollywood amnesia. Initially, the game is a game of "Escape the Room". It then becomes a game of "Escape the Building". Much more complicated. You emerge from the building, having no clue what's going on, and find yourself in a city. You attempt to talk to people, only to find that you cannot understand their language and they cannot understand yours. Great.
The first huge section of the game takes place in this city, which lies next to an ocean. Without being able to communicate with anyone, you will have to collect items and execute a chain of devilishly hard actions and exchanges until you are presented with a way to stowaway on a ship heading out to sea. Basically these devilishly hard actions would mirror the style of the Monkey Island series- following logic every once in a while, but mostly having to do with thinking out of the box and trying unexpected things. You can imagine how difficult this would be with an entire city, and no understandable dialogue.
Having boarded the ship, you will have "Escaped the Nation". You arrive on another continent to discover a rural area with a low population. But they speak your language! But don't get comfortable, it only gets harder. Back on the first continent, you could be lucky enough to discover that stowing away was an objective. But there is no noticeable objective here, and tons of stuff to collect and interact with. The dialogue will be Monkey Island style- Essential, but challenging to use to get what you want. There is one objective that you can discover, which is finding a man who can teach you the native tongue of the first nation. This quest will take you about half the time it takes to do all of the other necessary, but seemingly pointless side quests on the rural nation. These will be frustrating because there will be a handful of long side-quests which bear fruit, but also a handful which are long and either lead you to items with no use or complete dead-ends. Once you have learned the foreign tongue and obtained the other knowledge and objects you need to on the rural nation, you will want to return to the first nation. You have now completed the first two parts of the game, but the third is the biggest and hardest. Using items and knowledge from parts 1 and 2, you will now have to use your knowledge of the native tongue to find new uses for them.
Just so you know, if you missed any necessary quests from part 1 that you need in part 2, or missed any in part 2 that you need in part 3, there is the difficult option of hijacking a small boat from the rural nation's port to make for easy transport. Hijacking this boat is eventually necessary, as it is the only way to get back to the first nation after part 2, as the boat you stowed away on remains in the second nation's port for the rest of the game. This will likely result in much motoring back and forth to find things which you missed earlier.
Once you do the necessary things in part 3, you begin to uncover the scifi backstory of the game. I haven't quite worked out the details, but basically your character was somehow inserted into this surreal, artificial world from "the real world". This game climaxes as it becomes a game of "Escape the World". This may seem like jumping the shark, but the scifi backstory and truth about the main character will be hinted at the entire game. I will make sure to make him seem a real character in an unreal world. Many dead-end side-quests will also throw some light on your situation without giving away the ending. Talking to some characters will do this same thing. There will be no cutscenes in the game, so planting these hints will have to be done subtley, but at the same time noticeably. I've always agreed that a good mystery is one where you couldn't have possibly guessed the ending, but when you see the ending, you realize that it couldn't have ended any other way. In order to escape the world, you will have to do something like find a portal back to your world. An idea I really like, though, is that this artificial world has strict boundaries, and by finding the means to launch into space, you could exceed these boundaries.
When you emerge back into your world, there would be a brief textual explanation of the events which ahd transpired, filling in some but not all holes. You won.
Crazy, I know. Awesome, I know. I really want to lay out a plan for this.

So it's 3 AM here and I probably should be trying to sleep instead of sitting here typing this long-ass post. I can't seem to sleep at all here, what with snoring relatives and a night club right outside where we're staying. Tonight was pretty quiet (I don't imagine night clubs are hopping on Christmas eve) but having slept 'til noon yesterday (My one solid night of rest thus far) I'm not in the least tired. I really hate sleeping away from home. Which isn't to say that I mind spending my nights playing Mario 64 o my computer a pain, but the day after is always hell. By the way, controlling Mario with arrow keys sucks. I consider my 84 stars thus far quite an accomplishment. I've been having a good time here, but I keep thinking of everything in terms of Mario. I find myself thinking "That would be an awesome surface to belly-slide down", or "I bet there's a blue coin around that corner...No one would expect that!" Each of these thoughts is followed by something along the lines of "Seriously, OSK?" So I'm happy and unhappy at the same time. This is cool, and I long for Mario. Once again, I apologize to you all for the horrible timing of this vacation, but only 5 days now! Having basically had a 12 hour time change (What with the actual time change and having to conform my sleep cycle to those around me) I don't know how I'm goin to be able to function that first night back, but I'll sure as hell grit it out. Maybe I won't sleep at all the night before and sleep on the way home, then hit the energy drinks hard. That sounds like a sound plan. God, I can't wait. How can I possibly enjoy this vacation entirely and still make it go by more quickly?

I need a montage.

-OSK

Is it bad that "teh" is starting to look right?