Beige Binary Blog

Nethack is a fun text-based dungeon crawler. In it, you attempt to retrieve something called the "amulet of yendor" from a dungeon. I believe this amulet is located somewhere around level 100 of the dungeon. I have yet to get beyond the single digit levels. The following is an real-live blow-by-blow account of my sad, sad attempts to play nethack today. I really ought to get out more.

Characters #1-5

Made a new character. Killed and remade said new character roughly five times before figuring out how to move. Felt quite accomplished.

Character #6

The character I've ended up with is a male, human, lawful priest. First things first, I want to get on my god's good side, so I pray. My god hears my prayer, and immediately makes me several points stupider than I was. Ignoring any parallels I could draw to organized religions, I'm off to a roaring start!

Attempt to walk out of room. Hit door nose first. Am reminded quite vividly of the real world. The door appears to be resisting my attempts to open it. I smile serenely... and proceed to kick the door into tiny wooden shards. Behind it I find my first treasure; an engagement ring. Exactly who was being engaged to what in this dank, slimy dungeon is left as an exercise for the reader's imagination. After roughly 30 seconds of pressing random keys, I manage to put the ring on my finger. I do not die from this action; am pleasantly surprised.

I appear to have killed several monsters while walking. Feel impressed with self.

I walk down a flight of stairs to the next level. I find a strange scroll, which I immediately pick up and read. I find that my mace now glows blue! I also discover that I have a mace, a fact that I had not previously been aware.

Find a hobbit. Choose not to attack hobbit, as I have the sneaking suspicion that this will lead to my rapid demise. Become hungry, choose to eat clove of garlic.

Appear to have jumped to experience level 5. This is surprising, because I was simply walking down a hall. Suddenly faint from lack of food, ostensibly from my sudden, massive growth spurt, and get torn apart by a passing insect.

Character 7

Start new character. Choose to let the game decide randomly decide my character. I turn out to be a female tourist. Having sinking feelings about new character.

Wander through first floor of dungeon uneventfully, then walk down some stairs to the next level. Find rat. Watch helplessly while rat proceeds to gnaw me into small, tourist-colored bits. Tourists do not appear to be particularly strong.

Character 8

This character appears to be a lawful dwarven Valkyrie. The mental image presented by these attributes is... disturbing.

Go down the first flight of stairs, find a funny white potion. Drink said potion, and then discover that it appears to be a vial of opium. I am informed that everything looks "cosmic", and objects and monsters begin to change randomly in front of me. Am terrified of dragon coming towards me, only to find that the "dragon" is in fact a small pile of gold, and has not actually moved. Notice that I appear to be using a goblin corpse to bash my opponents with. I wander into a shop and stare dazed at the vast array of shifting, twisting items. Attempt to leave shop, only to discover that I have inadvertently picked up half of the shop's items. The shopkeeper does not take kindly to a druggie lifting half his inventory, and proceeds to display his displeasure by zapping me into a faint smudge on his store's floor.

Vow never to take drugs again.

Vow never to play Nethack again.

Feel pretty confident that I'll keep the first one.