Adventure Time 

You know the feeling you get when you wake up thinking it's Saturday but it's actually Monday, you have to go to work and it's raining? That's the feeling Arcturus had when he woke up thinking he was at home but realized he had to go search some ruins for a day and a half. He rolled out of bed, grabbed his tent and cubes of dried food and walked out the front door. Once outside, he jumped on a scooter he must have stolen and started the drive to the Celtic Ruins on the edge of town.

He really moved with purpose and just walked down a flight of steps dug into the earth like it was his basement. The large empty room he stood in was the start of an underground labyrinth where each room had somewhat of a puzzle to solve. These puzzles included:

1. Touching walls until they felt good enough about themselves to spin open.

2. Standing on panels that were very obviously meant to be stood on.

3. Reaching into dark holes and just feeling around for anything.

4. Pulling absolutely gigantic solid stone statues around like they were made of marshmallow.

After all that silly activity through about six different rooms, Arcturus reached the final puzzle room of the Celtic Ruins. It was a large area with another smaller room attached. The main room had a hedge maze, a few pedestals scattered about with trinkets on them, some locked doors along the edges and a gravestone right in the center. The smaller room had a tent for Arcturus to sleep in. After a full day of traveling underground, he decided to take a nap in the tent before conquering the final room.

If you were wondering why there was a tent set up this deep into the ruins, the answer probably lies with that skeleton in the corner or that plaque on the wall. Arcturus read the plaque and learned the skeleton's story. The person had entered this last area and the door locked behind him. The final puzzle posed too much of a challenge for them and they decided to chisel their story into a plaque, hang it on the wall and then just die on a mat. Didn't want to die in that tent and put anyone out. The skeleton's story was actually a little bit boring, to be honest. Arcturus got into his jammies and slept in the dead man's tent.

When he woke up, he ate a bit of dried food and walked over to the hedge maze. He had to get started so that he didn't end up like that skeleton. Thinking about the difficulty of the hedge maze, the skeleton and the gravestone in the center of the room put Arcturus over the edge and he... started to cry.

"It just looks so hard!"

When he was all out of tears, he started walking around. The funny thing about this hedge maze is that the hedges are below his knees. He could step over them if he wanted but he played it legit. You never know when a poison dart is going to shoot out of a wall because you broke the rules. Picking up small treasures scattered through the maze along the way (one of which was a 5,121 year old bottle of wine), Arcturus reached the final door. There was a pressure plate that needed to be held down in order for the door to open permanently. He looked to his right at the statue standing there and pulled it onto the pressure plate. The door opened and he walked through.

This made Arcturus think about that skeleton next to the tent. Arcturus couldn't quite wrap his mind around the idea that that person had died trying to figure this out. Dragging statues onto pressure plates was how he progressed into this very room so that skeleton was really dumb. Anyway, inside the final room there was a brightly glowing hole in the ground, a few statues and a confusing amount of graves.

Thinking about windows?

Arcturus's phone rang. It was Ahilac, the alien that had visited a while ago. He took the call. I'll assume that Ahilac was still on her home planet. So, with Arcturus 20 feet underground and Ahilac being a few light years away, it's safe to say that AT&T is not providing his service.

That's great... Oh, me?... Yeah, I'm lost and dying.

After the conversation, Arcturus went over to the glowing hole in the ground. This must have been where Elliot dropped his "thing" because it was the last room and it was shooting out some moon beams. He reached in the hole and felt something squishy. That squishy something was also moving so he pulled his hand out to find it covered in various bugs.

Brushing them off, he reached in again and pulled out... a baseball. This is what Elliot had Arcturus find? Arcturus spent 36 hours in this dungeon and nearly died for something he could've bought at Dick's Sporting Goods? Ok. If not for the reward, he'd take this baseball and throw it through Elliot's store window.

Arcturus looked around and noticed a door had opened in one of the walls so at least he didn't have to backtrack through the ruins to get out. Walking through the door found Arcturus in a small room with some pots and a flight of stairs. The pots were the most exciting thing he ever saw apparently. Not the staircase out of there. The pots.

Well, it was time to head back to town on his scooter. As it turned out, Elliot's reward was just some ancient coins that could only be spent at a special French merchant's shop. Arcturus would have to wait for his next visit to take advantage of those coins though. His time here had been spent and I was met with an immediate load screen sending Arcturus back to his home in Riverview.

France's final message:

Although this phase of the adventure is done, there are many more to be had in France. Return home, rest up, tell a story or two of adventures had, then return to France for another foray into the unknown.

Uhmmmmm, no thanks!

Home at last. Guess he didn't need to take any bags anyway, but I do wonder how he managed to change into his pajamas to sleep in that skeleton's tent that one time. Does he wear pajamas under that suit? Something to think about.

France for the Holidays

There was a time early on in this game when Arcturus's office asked him to go to France and interview five people for a newspaper article. When you think about how boring such an article would be, you wonder why the newspaper would pay for Arcturus to go there. Well, it turned out that Arcturus had to pay his own way so it wasn't really an interesting idea for him. More recently, I checked back to see if his job still wanted him to to go there for the interviews and they didn't. Oh well. He was going either way at this point.

After Arcturus awoke from his "Christmas coma", he picked up the phone and called France. I guess. Or maybe it was the taxi service. I don't know. He called somebody.

"Can I come to France?"... "Oui"... "Neat."

After hanging up the phone, the front door flew open because either the door sensed he was leaving or the lock was broken and the wind caught it right. Arcturus got, like, a little chill up his spine or something and his reaction to it was positively puzzling: stiff arms, crossed legs like he was going to wet his pants and a sheepish grin.

"Oooo, so chilly."

He trudged through the snow to the taxi. Didn't pack bags, didn't inform his office he was going on vacation, didn't put a coat on and didn't even close the front door behind him. It was just time to go. That's how baller he is. Good thing his front door closed automatically though. He got in the taxi and said, "France". The driver got confused by that statement and just crashed into a neighbor's trashcan.

Eventually, Arcturus made it to the airport or whatever. I don't get to see any of the traveling process as unfortunate as that may seem. No Indiana Jones type red line across a map or anything. There was just a load screen and then he was on the streets of a little town EAGames cleverly called "Champs Les Sims". When making this game, one of the programmers probably leaned out of his cubicle and shouted, "Anyone in here know a French word we can attach 'Sims' to!?" to which someone yelled back, "I think 'Champs' is a thing!"

"Champs Les Sims" actually means "Sims Fields", I think?

"I made a big mistake coming here. I hate it already."

They placed Arcturus right outside his new residence. There was a sparkling bulletin board on the curb in front of him that he was just dying to check it out.

He ran his finger over that board many times without
really reading anything. His mind had snapped.

The board provided some "opportunities"; small missions to accomplish in France while he was there. One opportunity, posted by an Elliot Saint James, read:

"I am looking for a daring soul who is willing to provide some assistance for an ample reward. I need you to do a bit of underground exploration for me. As it happens, my store sells tents and dried food. Head to the Celtic Ruins and find something I lost while exploring. You will know when you find it."

"As it happens, my store sells tents and dried food"? Oh damn. It's just a crummy commercial. But Arcturus was intrigued by the "ample reward" part of the request so he decided to visit Elliot and let him know the game was afoot.

"Vous voulez voir quelque chose, monsieur?"

Arcturus managed to find Elliot's store somehow and talked to him about his request. The man was happy with Arcturus's offer to help him find his "something" he dropped in the Celtic Ruins, but also had a more immediate situation that needed to be taken care of. He asked Arcturus to step behind the counter to look at a different kind of "something". 

"What are you holding there?... Oh boy."
"Etes-vous intéressé?"
"Huh? No. Get that outta here."

Arcturus quickly changed the subject to dried food and tents. He bought some materials for his mission and then just went back to his place. Unfortunately, his interaction with Elliot had traumatized him and he could not imagine continuing the adventure that day. He cried in the shower and then got into bed despite it only being 3pm. He laid there in silence, staring, thinking. Every once in a while, he would shake his head, roll over and mutter out loud, "Why me?"

Anyway, when he wakes up, it will be time to discover the mysteries of the Celtic Ruins and find that "thing" for Elliot.

Nice... apartment? hotel? hostel? I don't know what this is.

Here is the ground floor of the place Arcturus is staying.

This is the upper floor. Some private bedrooms for a lucky few.

Arcturus, however, has to sleep with a stack of strangers.

Winter is Coming...

The weather outside is frightful...

...but, oh no, Arcturus died.

The Visitor 

Somewhere around 4am, there was a weird noise outside. A really loud hum and bang. Arcturus was already up eating breakfast because he couldn't be late to another day of work. The noise didn't even make him flinch. "What's all the ruckus out there?" I thought because Arcturus apparently didn't give a flip.

What's that outside?

An alien. With a cane. Of course.

The monster rang the doorbell and Arcturus groaned. He's grumpy in the mornings. He opened the door and was face to face with an alien. Arcturus Mengsk is the first human to have contact with life from another world and this is how he reacts:

"Not impressed"

He just woke up and is acting like this isn't even the greatest thing he's seen today. Despite the look he gave her, it was love at first handshake. Somehow the language barrier was overcome and these two launched into a conversation. Her name is Ahilac Vajjevoo (dirty) and judging by the fact that she walked up to the front door with a cane, she's close to dying. That's unfortunate because Arcturus would definitely have an alien child with her if she was capable. He wouldn't even need to raise it, just impregnate her and have it exist. I'd love to see what a hybrid baby ended up looking like. Maybe Ahilac has a daughter?

So, Arcturus talked about orange and Ahilac agreed. Then Arcturus had a genius idea. He would interview her and write an article about her in the newspaper. Hopefully he wouldn't get fired for the insanity of writing an article about meeting an alien, but he would have to deal with the consequences later because this was happening. He broke out the notepad and started writing. Maybe I was quick to assume that a language barrier had been broken because despite Ahilac talking for quite a bit of time, all Arcturus came up with in the end was that she was charismatic. You can tell someone is charismatic even if you don't understand a word they're saying. She could have been telling Arcturus about her plan to destroy the world and Arcturus's reaction was basically, "Wow, you're really selling me with this enthusiasm."

Is this the face of  a man that knows what's going on?

Ahilac finally stopped ranting and Arcturus nodded. He put away the notepad and told her to look in the newspaper for the article. They just stared at each other for a little bit and then Arcturus reminded her that he had to get to work. Ahilac pulled out her cane and started down the driveway. She had a little smile on her face. It was either quiet happiness or evil. Not sure which one, yet.

"Byeeeeeeee!"

Ahilac got in her spaceship and took off. She just needed to make that one visit, apparently. It was the spaceship that caused the weird noise heard right before Ahilac knocked on the door. Hmmm. Unless it's launched into space, I suppose Ahilac won't be able to read Arcturus's article about her. Maybe he will get her to revisit once it's published. I think he got her cell phone number.

Another Date Night Gone Horribly Wrong

Frost was setting in. Arcturus got his favorite woman's coat on and went outside. Maybe the cold would make him feel alive. He stood there for a while. A tear ran down his face, froze and blew away in the wind, Schwarzenegger style.

I feel... nothing.

Oh well. Good try though. He went back inside and called Betty for a date, asking her to meet him at the Fall Festival that had swept into town the night before. She agreed to meet him there and he considered leaving her there in the freezing cold like she did to him in the storm. That plan wouldn't really help the relationship though, so he put his lady coat back on and started biking to the Festival Grounds.

It didn't take long to find Betty because there was only about four people milling around. They made out for a little bit while the food stand girl just stood there watching. Arcturus noticed the woman staring and asked, "Jealous much?" and the girl shouted back, "That coat made me think you were a lesbian couple!" Arcturus sheepishly walked away with Betty.

There were a few activities at the festival but Betty and Arcturus chose to enter a pie eating contest first. Two older ladies also felt like shoving their face in a blueberry pie in the freezing cold. They all lined up and bent over, ready to eat. I don't know who was running this contest. How would they know when to start? Why were they even doing this? Nobody was really taking it seriously and there was no prize for winning. The old lady on the end was thinking about sandwiches, Arcturus was thinking of his lifetime goals, Betty had cleared her mind in preparation and the other old woman was really hungry. Maybe that old woman entered this contest because she wanted some free food. Free food. Ha. Obama's America, right?

aaaaaand... Go?

The contest started and they all went for it. Sometimes they would pause and cough up pie but they weren't giving up. (Also, for some reason, Arcturus and Betty's winter clothes morphed into their regular clothes in the middle of the contest. That's probably something EA needs to patch, because it made no sense and shouldn't have happened.) The one old lady who was hungry wasn't just a little hungry, she was frikkin' starving, dude. That's when things got cray:

I couldn't believe I caught this on video. The woman just flat out died of starvation during the pie eating contest. As soon as she fell over, Arcturus, Betty and the other woman just walked away from the table. I was surprised they all had the decency to stop after a fellow contestant died. Arcturus was the first to stop which was even more surprising. All of their faces were covered in pie as they stood around dumbfounded.

Arcturus: "I'm kinda hungry too."
Woman: "Sir, now is not the time."

Betty ran into the dark and vomited. It must have been triggered by the terrific combination of hearing the dying screams of a starving woman and eating too much pie. Her throw up was neon green, leading me to suspect that she had eaten some Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ooze earlier. Arcturus came up to her when she was done and started making out with her. Did he not just see her throwing up radioactive waste? Her face was covered in pie and vomit. Certainly not the time, but I guess that's love.

Oh wait. Two, please, actually.

So, in typical fashion, Death showed up to take the starved woman's soul. He kinda waved his hands around like a magician and the woman turned into a green vapor. Then her tombstone popped up showing that she died of hunger and her ghost materialized. I bet she had no idea she was going to die when she left the house that night to attend the Fall Festival. Hmm... that's actually a little sad. Didn't seem to phase Arcturus though. Hey, where is he, by the way?

"Lovin' this burger."

Ah. Yes, he's having a picnic by himself. Of course he is. It's a good thing that he didn't turn around and see the woman's ghost because with that hairdo and pink color she looked almost exactly like Eileen Remington. It would have been terrifying memories for him. Betty noticed Arcturus eating by himself and, instead of joining him, she booked it to her car and drove away. Arcturus waved as she ran away but she didn't pay attention to that. He didn't care. Most of their dates end in Betty fleeing. Clearly, Arcturus needed to put a ring on it.

Arcturus headed home. It was a pretty interesting night. Fall festival date, a woman dying, Death himself showing up and a killer picnic to cap it all off. Sometimes these blog posts just write themselves.

"Shhh... Alright, alright, I'll tell him... Uhhh, ya got jam on your face, buddy."

Fall Actually Arrived!

Well, the leaves had to start changing at some point, right? Arcturus looked out the window and saw a leaf on his front lawn, so he went out to rake. About 99% of the leaves were still attached to the tree though. Hey, I know what that's like!

The pile was unrealistically large by the time he finished. Where did he find all those leaves? He went inside to get dressed for work and came up with a brilliant idea: set fire to the leaves instead of bagging them. A fine idea for an open field, maybe, but certainly not right next to a tree. Whatevs though. If his house burned down while he was at work, no big whoop.

The top of the pile touches the tree's leaves. Cool... Light it up!

At the sight of the flames, Arcturus paused and thought. Then, he pulled a full-sized rake out of his pocket and started to collect more leaves together. At the risk of being extremely late to work and losing his job, Arcturus decided it was worth it just to add some more leaves to the fire. I had to actually stop him and send him to work. The fire raged on while he was gone, but, amazingly, it only burned the leaves on the ground. The tree was untouched. I was actually a bit disappointed.

When Arcturus got home, Betty called and asked him on a date. He agreed and, despite there being a killer thunderstorm going on, got on his bike to go meet her. I followed behind him because I had no idea where they were meeting. He stopped at the gazebo in the center of Riverview and started to run to it. Was he late or something? Why run? He was already soaked from the ride over.

When he reached the gazebo, he just stood there. Looking around for Betty. There was music playing on the gazebo's stereo but she was nowhere to be found. Did Arcturus get the meeting place wrong? If he did, he made no effort to correct the mistake. He just sat in the dark and played chess by himself. I wish he wasn't so weird.

Is that the rain running down your face or tears?

Happy Birthday!

Sims only celebrate about five birthdays in their lifetime and the day had come for Arcturus's second to last. He just had to call all his... friends(?)... to invite them. The list included Shellie, Diana, Ursula, Constance, Hunter, Betty, a couple other work friends and some people he met on the street once. Oh, also "Slide Man". He was still pretty friendly with Slide Man.

At 5pm, Arcturus invited his friends to come over for a party. Usually people give a week or two;s worth of notice. Arcturus gave these people three hours. Luckily, all his invitees didn't have plans that night. He had set up his enlosed porch area for the party. There was a buffet table and a cake to blow out candles on. At 8pm, the guests actually came running across his lawn from several directions like they were extremely late. As they crashed through the front door, out of breath, Arcturus realized what a mistake this party was. He would actually rather have spent his birthday not cleaning the mess they were sure to leave. He didn't really even like these people, to be perfectly honest.

 

Everyone started talking amongst themselves. It looked like they were having fun, but there was no music, food or fun in sight. Arcturus's TV was, for some reason, missing and his computer was broken. Talking to each other was the only thing they could do. At the time when everyone had pretty much arrived, Shellie was telling Arcturus about how cool the sun is when it wears glasses, Hunter and Ursula were considering talking to each other and Arcturus's work friend, Hannah Jones, was wondering if she would ever be able to try Arcturus's famous plate of spaghetti. Shana Natcher, the dark haired woman in the black shirt and Ami Leavitt, the woman in the pink shirt, were talking about how desperate they were to have some fun. Arcturus overheard and said, "Sorry, ladies! Fun dies here!"

Betty and Shellie. Uh-oh. Do I sense jealousy?

Food was finally served and everyone went out to the porch to eat. They ate continuously. As soon as one plate was finished, they went to get their next. Each time they stood up, they looked to Arcturus with pleading eyes as if to ask, "Anything else going on tonight?"

Hannah, Tatiana Ivanov and Hunter Cottoneye wondering why they came.

Some of the people began to just mill around looking at the walls. Others started to read or play on their laptop computers that they brought. (Arcturus, if people bring laptops to your party, youre doing something wrong.) Constance took Ursula and Slide Man outside to tell scary stories. The others looked at them from inside wondering if they had lost their minds in this fun trap.

It was time to blow out candles! Arcturus had agreed it was cake time only because he had heard about five or six complaints about how late it was. Everyone gathered around him. Some people were freakishly excited about the situation. Arcturus was pretty excited about his birthday, but these people were taking it too far. He made a mental note to talk to them later about seeking help for birthday-related insanity.

Angel Leavitt (red shirt) doesn't care,... but Hannah sure does!

Sad, dude.

Well, maybe she's just probably excited cause she just saw cake.

"Cha! Cha! Cha!"

"Cha! Cha! Cha!? What the hell was that?"

Arcturus cut the cake and then shot everyone quite the look. It seems that he hated how everyone was still making noise a minute after the candles were blown out. He also probably hated that people said, "Cha, Cha, Cha!" at the end of the birthday song. He hates when people have fun. You'd wonder why he even had a party. But, hey, he's an old man now. He's seconds away from telling these people to "get off his lawn".

Then, out of nowhere, Betty and Hannah ran out the door. They just couldn't handle another possible moment of eating or boredom. They threw some gifts in Arcturus's general direction as they ran away. "Don't have another birthday anytime soon, please!" Hannah screamed as she jumped in a taxi.

After cake, Arcturus opened gifts. Someone had bought him a new outfit that he decided to change into in front of everyone. Pretty inappropriate. As he opened other gifts, people used those small distractions to run home. The way they broke out running made it seem like they were being held against their will and needed to take any possible chance to get out. Arcturus noticed the numbers of guests dwindling. He was kinda happy people were leaving.

When the last few partiers were heading home, Tatiana excused herself to the bathroom. She closed the door and turned around to see Arcturus hiding behind the shower. What the hell, dude. Get outta there! She wasn't happy with his games and gave him a big thumbs down.

"Hey, it's my birthday though."

"Boo, old man!"

Arcturus just walked out. Hunter, who was standing in the living room, just stared at him as he came out of the bathroom. "I'm going to bed," Arcturus said. Hunter continued to stare in silence. "Whatever," he mumbled as he went into his room. But, wow. What a night it had been!

Arcturus as a "young adult".

Arcturus as an "adult"?

Anyone... see a difference? I sure don't. He looks like the same exact dork with a new monkey suit.