Let’s try something a little different this time, hm? 

 

Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey (NDS)
2010 Atlus- Dungeon Crawling, SYMBOLISM! 

SCHWARZVELD JOINT PROJECT DAY ONE 

From the datalog of Strike Team member 007455: 9/22/2010 

Basically, a localized black hole has opened up in the Antarctic. The public is being told that it’s a ‘ferric hurricane’, that forced the bases nearby to ‘withdraw,’ which is kind of accurate if you replace ‘hurricane’ with ‘wall of plasma energy’ and ‘withdraw’ with ‘horribly destroyed.’ The handful of unmanned drones to make it into the… thingy have sent back confusing photos of shopping malls and battlefields and so on. So, the only rational thing the people of Earth can think of to do is attach rocket boosters to big big trucks and shoot them into the eye of the storm, a far cry from the original plan for them- SUNDAY! SUNDAY! SUNDAY! A DEMOLITION EXTRAVAGANZA LIKE NO OTHER! 

So, as you might expect from a mission that starts off with tons of back patting and praise of our awesome human technology, the four trucks/ships are immediately separated and crash. And as one of the crew of the Red Sprite, it’s up to me to try and complete the mission. The noble mission of: 

1) Find out what the black hole is 

2) Find out how to kill black hole 

3) Pasta Fundraising Dinner 

Unfortunately, the ship can’t generate a plot-plasma AT field of distortion just yet, so it’s time for the strike team to set out and scout around. Whoops, wait a minute. Some douchebag left the hatch open in spite of having no power to be open in the first place. 

(pause) 

Um, ok, guys? We got invisible demons. Wearing our Demonicas, suits of powered armor that look as silly as the name sounds, we can however, rectify that from ‘invisible’ to ‘Missingno.’ Excellent. And oh, great, they kidnapped some people without murdering them on the spot. Guess we better go on a rescue mission since one of them is a named NPC and all. Oh yeah, the ship’s computer, Arthur uploaded the not at all suspicious sounding “DEMON SUMMONING PROGRAM” to us as well. I’m sure it’s just code, like how Commander Gore loudly announces he’s off to “tame the lizard” right before he [REDACTED]  

Not far into the tunnels, I meet a Pixie who all but forces her way into the party while coaching me on how I can talk demons out of fighting and helping me out. Pff. I’m a Subspace Marine. I have a Gun and a Sword. At the same time. They’ll be my interpreters, and you’ll be my healbitch. Charmed to meet you. I’m not the only one being glib about the sudden existence of demons, by the way- every other guy on the strike team is already wanting to compare what demonmon we’ve caught so far. After wandering around in the cold for a while, we did succeed in rounding up the kidnapped crew and getting the power back up. Human technology 1.5, Black hole, 1. 

With the Lab operational, I ask Crewman Irving if he has less stupid looking helmets in stock. He drools over some of the random rocks and organs I had in my suit pockets instead, so I guess that’s something. Next order of business: Use ‘Forma Scan’ to gather more random rocks and organs for him to make things out of. I’m not entirely sure how pieces of fur and random crystals equal new high tech inventions, but then again, that’s why I’m not a science officer! 

We had pulled pork for lunch in the comissary today. :)