Pile of Shame Sunday - 21st March 2021

Screenshot of Mordack calling you a swine in King's Quest V
Mordack calls you a pig

The following post is part of a series of posts that are published every Sunday to update readers on what Mark G has been up to with respect to finishing off games on his "Pile of Shame". The games to target are picked by Choicest Games contributors Choona, Luke and myself. As I'll be talking about my progress through these games, there may be spoilers ahead, especially for games containing a narrative. Consider yourself warned.


Disco Elysium

  • Picked by Me
  • Percentage Complete = 21%

Started my second day. Met some union gang called "the Hardie Boys" but it seems like it's going to be difficult to arrest them for the murder even though it seems likely they did. I also read a postcard from an old flame that caused my character to pass out, probably from guilt and shame. Finally, I managed to find some statistics about the character, such as the fact he has been a police officer for 18 years, has solved 200 cases and has killed 3 people. Apparently, Kitsuragi is impressed.


XCOM: Chimera Squad

  • Picked by Luke
  • Percentage Complete = 83%

Tried the second encounter another two times. Still the agents drop like flies. I'm not quite sure how to survive this encounter. It seems you have to lose an agent every time. It would be good to get rid of the two Ronin like characters for sure as they're the ones really stuffing things up. But how?

I went back to that second encounter later in the week and third time's the charm. I tried to be smart about my targets: I went for a mix of easy targets (e.g. Spectral Zombies) and also the two Ronin units as early as possible. This seemed to work since they were the ones that were really causing trouble. I'm now finally at the third encounter with all four agents ready to go. It's a pity you can't attack the Gatekeeper during the breach but I'm planning to focus all my fire on it to ensure no reinforcements come through.


King's Quest V

  • Picked by Choona
  • Percentage Complete = 100%

I completed the game with a perfect score of 260 out of 260! Although, I did have to rely on a hints guide towards the end of the game and it took several tries. In fact, I now get triggered every time I hear "Goodbye, King Graham of Daventry!". There are a couple more instances of "mazes" or labyrinths towards the end of the game but they weren't the parts that I got stuck on: again, the part I got stuck on was dispatching a foe in a comical manner (in this case, making it slip on some dried peas). This creature can be avoided altogether as it's a random encounter and indeed, the first time I tried playing this, I never encountered it at all. You're also not meant to trip the poor sod as soon as you come across it, you need to actually let it capture you once in order to gain a critical quest item. Argh! And there I was thinking this game was so easy. Like previous Sierra adventures, you also have to wait in real-time for certain events to occur (e.g. Mordack sleeping to steal his wand) but it's nowhere near as painful.

Anyway, now that King's Quest V is out of the way, it's time to try a Sierra game that is a completeley new experience for me: Conquests of the Longbow.


LINK: [ The Pile of Shame ]

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