admin
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File: Below Witherwood.hold (19.1 MB)
Downloaded 13463 times.
License: Other
From: Unspecified

The long-worked-on sequel to Witherwood Castle, this hold shows you what's below the castle. With a storyline, full voice acting, custom avatars and graphics. And you've been promised that none of the employees are going to try to kill you.

This hold also contains a brand new monster and several new dungeon fixtures.

calamarain
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Wheee, it's finally done! Many many thanks to everyone who helped me with the beta testing, and thanks to those who did voice acting as well. Hope you all enjoy it, and I hope that I've improved in architecture skills since Witherwood Castle.

And remember, the use of a potato is not required to complete this hold. Enjoy meeting the new monster... the warba.

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My Holds

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[Last edited by calamarain at 10-16-2007 02:08 AM]

Chaco
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This is a hold for DROD: The City Beneath 3.1.

I also was one of the voice actors, so naturally I recommend this

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Quick links to my stuff (in case you forgot where it was):

calamarain
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I'm kind of curious who put in the first hold rating Before it had even been downloaded! someone rated it 5/10 for both fun and difficulty.

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CuriousShyRabbit
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I was one of the beta testers, and I recommend it too!

I won't say too much here, lest I spoil it for other players. Below Witherwood has the exceptional polish we've come to expect from Calamarain. It has a good story, likeable characters, custom graphics and voice acting. It's also got good puzzles! This time around, Calamarain has dug in deeper to explore interactions between various game elements, which definitely makes for a more interesting puzzle solving experience than Witherwood Castle. Don't expect many tricky lynchpins, but do expect to put thought and planning into the solution of each room. You will also have the fun of playing with some custom game elements that Calamarain designed himself... there are several levels designed around these... well, you'll see...

After posting this, I will rate it a 9 with 6 brains.

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[Last edited by CuriousShyRabbit at 10-16-2007 04:11 AM]

Citrus
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I beta tested, though never got all the way through, and I have to say that I enjoyed what I saw as well. I will refrain from voting until later though.

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Call me Citrus.

Kevin_P86
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calamarain wrote:
I'm kind of curious who put in the first hold rating Before it had even been downloaded! someone rated it 5/10 for both fun and difficulty.

It wasn't me, but that's because, for whatever reason, it won't appear among the list of new holds in the game unless it has at least one rating. So that's usually what happens - someone will give it a default vote of 5 / 5 so it can be downloaded in-game, and then ideally that person will change it after they play it.

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+++++[>+++++<-]>[>+++>++++>+++++<<<-]>.>+.>-------.<++++.+++++.

jbluestein
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I was a beta tester. I enjoyed calamarain's first published hold (Witherwood Castle) quite a bit, but thought that it was missing...something.

Well, whatever it was missing was definitely present in spades in this hold. Great puzzles, beautiful rooms and superb voice acting. This is a high-polish hold, and while such a thing isn't enough to make a bad hold good, it's certainly enough to make a great hold even better.

So I strongly recommend this hold. Looking forward to calamarain's next hold.

I give this hold a 10 for fun and 6.5 brains.

____________________________
"Rings and knots of joy and grief, all interlaced and locking." --William Buck

Tahnan
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You know what sequel holds need (he said, still downloading this one)? Recaps. "Previously, in Witherwood Castle..." We've got cut scenes, so why not? I can't for the life of me remember what actually happened in WC, even though I did play it.

Of course, for all I know, this hold does have a recap. Anyway, just throwing it out there. Off to play it.

Edit: I just have to say a few words about these lines in the opening scene.

Those responsible for laying the foundations were of course fired.
We tried to dig them out, but they were buried too deep and we thought them lost.

Oh my second reading, I decided that it was the foundations they tried to dig out. On my first reading, I thought, "Wow, when they fire people..."

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[Last edited by Tahnan at 10-16-2007 05:23 AM]

calamarain
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Tahnan wrote:

Those responsible for laying the foundations were of course fired.
We tried to dig them out, but they were buried too deep and we thought them lost.

Oh my second reading, I decided that it was the foundations they tried to dig out. On my first reading, I thought, "Wow, when they fire people..."

When I first did those lines, I realised after that it sounded very uncertain which was which. I left the ambiguity in, it sounds cooler that way

And re: jbluestein, I thank you a lot. Saying that someone has improved is what I consider to be one of the best compliments.

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My Holds

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[Last edited by calamarain at 10-16-2007 05:54 AM]

hartleyhair
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I wish I had 3.1!

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I'm currently working on Jerrik's Dungeon, an oldschool Hold for TCB.

calamarain
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hartleyhair wrote:
I wish I had 3.1!

Then download the patch

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My Holds

hartleyhair
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Two words: Mac User.

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I'm currently working on Jerrik's Dungeon, an oldschool Hold for TCB.

Briareos
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hartleyhair wrote:
Two words: Mac User.

Two words: Boot Camp.

____________________________
"I'm not anti-anything, I'm anti-everything, it fits better." - Sole
R.I.P. Robert Feldhoff (1962-2009)

Elfstone
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hartleyhair wrote:
Two words: Mac User.

Same here - not that I can download 19MBs anyway! All the more frustrating, because I think I'm one of the voices in this.

(PS Mike is looking for Mac testers for 3.1 - the top topic in the Development board - I would assume that the more help he has, the quicker Mac 3.1 will be released.)

BTW Briareos, are you by any chance being a little disparaging of our wonderful Macs?

____________________________
Winner of: Novice Architect Excellence 2006.
FAPCA - Technical Design Excellence in Layout and Aesthetics

jbluestein
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Elfstone wrote:

hartleyhair wrote:
Two words: Mac User.

Same here - not that I can download 19MBs anyway! All the more frustrating, because I think I'm one of the voices in this.

(PS Mike is looking for Mac testers for 3.1 - the top topic in the Development board - I would assume that the more help he has, the quicker Mac 3.1 will be released.)

BTW Briareos, are you by any chance being a little disparaging of our wonderful Macs?

If you're a voice (which I am pretty sure you are), you should make calamarain send you a CD with the official version of this hold burned onto it. Slower than an actual download, but only if you can get the download to work.

Josh

____________________________
"Rings and knots of joy and grief, all interlaced and locking." --William Buck

Briareos
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Elfstone wrote:
BTW Briareos, are you by any chance being a little disparaging of our wonderful Macs?

More like endorsing another Apple (by-?)product...

np: The Orb - Blue Room (U.F.Orb Remastered)

____________________________
"I'm not anti-anything, I'm anti-everything, it fits better." - Sole
R.I.P. Robert Feldhoff (1962-2009)

hartleyhair
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I have Boot Camp, however I don't have TCB for Windows.

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I'm currently working on Jerrik's Dungeon, an oldschool Hold for TCB.

Dex Stewart
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Well, you can download it, you know. Even if you bought it for the Mac.

mrimer
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There is a 3.1 demo version of TCB for OS X on the Development board, but I understand there's at least one problem with it. Still, you can try using it if you carefully back up your Data directory first.

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Gandalf? Yes... That's what they used to call me.
Gandalf the Grey. That was my name.
I am Gandalf the White.
And I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.

Jatopian
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calamarain wrote:
Enjoy meeting the new monster... the warba.

So... we've taken a pacifistic annoyance and made it warlike? *shudder* Reminds me of KoL's War Hippies.

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Make your pressure plates 3.0 style!
DROD architecture idea generator

calamarain
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Jatopian wrote:

calamarain wrote:
Enjoy meeting the new monster... the warba.

So... we've taken a pacifistic annoyance and made it warlike? *shudder* Reminds me of KoL's War Hippies.

Oh, it gets much worse than that. This isn't just a wubba that can attack. It has some other totally unique characteristics that lead to some cool puzzles. e.g. (cut for spoilers)


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My Holds

Hikari
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Briareos wrote:

hartleyhair wrote:
Two words: Mac User.

Two words: Boot Camp.

Uh... that wouldn't work for pre-2006 Macs, though...

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Caravel Official Holds Progress:

Elfstone
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My apologies Briareos - I thought Boot camp was somewhere a bit nasty that one would send naughty people to!!

"Uh... that wouldn't work for pre-2006 Macs, though... " ah well, that explains it.

____________________________
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FAPCA - Technical Design Excellence in Layout and Aesthetics

Briareos
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Elfstone wrote:
My apologies Briareos - I thought Boot camp was somewhere a bit nasty that one would send naughty people to!!

Well, someone must've geeked out at Apple when they gave it that name, but oh well...

____________________________
"I'm not anti-anything, I'm anti-everything, it fits better." - Sole
R.I.P. Robert Feldhoff (1962-2009)

hartleyhair
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I believe it's intended as a slight pun - i.e, training your PC to 'Boot' in a different way.

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I'm currently working on Jerrik's Dungeon, an oldschool Hold for TCB.

Rheb
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I'm glad this hold is finally out! I really like most of the puzzles, and there's many completely original puzzle ideas in this hold. The graphics and voice actings are incredible!

It gets a 9 overall and 6,5 7 brains from me

(Oh, and sorry for not being a very good tester in the end calamarain, I had lots of other things to do.)

____________________________
Voligner is my very own DROD-like game. Please check it out!

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[Last edited by Rheb at 03-22-2009 05:36 PM]

Syntax
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Not finished this yet, but wow... Really enjoying this hold.

Rheb... 6.5? Better watch my back Been struggling with quite a few of these rooms.

9 from me too, but a 7.5 difficulty.

I'm slightly concerned about the vote distribution though. Seems a lot of people are voting this hold low and I'd like to know why.

jbluestein
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Syntax wrote:
I'm slightly concerned about the vote distribution though. Seems a lot of people are voting this hold low and I'd like to know why.

I was eyeing that myself. 9 votes, of which five have publically announced as 9 or higher, and the average vote is still 8.2 with a standard deviation over 3.

Of course, one of those votes will be from whomever gave the hold the standard 5/5, but I think that still corresponds to a number of low votes without comment.

Ah well, so it goes. The people who play and vote honestly will eventually grow, so if there are any dishonest votes (and I'm not saying that there are) they'll eventually be noise.

Josh

____________________________
"Rings and knots of joy and grief, all interlaced and locking." --William Buck

calamarain
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VIPCOOL wrote:

Syntax wrote: I'm slightly concerned about the vote distribution though. Seems a lot of people are voting this hold low and I'd like to know why.

I noticed that too. Yesterday, the rating suddenly went down from 9 to 7.9 . It might be because of the people who rate holds low if they're too hard.

Edit: Post Collision

Over time, it should average out to whatever the community thinks is appropriate, whatever that is.

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My Holds