The great migration

[Originally written September 3 2020]

With a plan in place, I loaded up Creatures 1 and set to work exporting all the Norns onto a USB in the KVM for easy transfer to the other computer. This left Greg rather suddenly the only creature left in Albia – and I couldn’t resist spending a little quality time with him before proceeding. 

Between bad lessons learned from the problematic food COBs in the base game and a few accidental slaps at the worst moments, Greg needed some one on one attention to relearn his previous good habits. I tried to get him to sample some of Jessica’s improved carrots, but he seemed to prefer the honey pot – and I can’t say I blame him! I don’t care for carrots, either. 

I also had to help him rediscover his love of the ball, which he’d been scared off of by a few smacks that were aimed at troublesome Norns (or even meant to be tickles for Greg himself – Grendels’ hunched pose can be problematic). I did eventually get him to sample a carrot, and then he enjoyed some downtime by the lemon trellis, where he demonstrated his restraint by resisting the siren call of the weeds. But looking was fine, so long as he didn’t touch!

Then it was into the kitchen to play with the top and take a nap by the fire. He seemed to be settling back into living a happy life! It must have been nice having all the toys and food to himself and not having gaggles of Norns tripping over him for once! Enjoy it while it lasts, Greg; there are 8 eggs lined up to be introduced to the world soon.

So I left Greg to his nap and moved to Creatures 2. I suppose I should probably talk about my world setup before I dive into the storytelling, so here it is:

• Frog Norn improvements! I have downloaded the lasting frogs COB, but I didn’t inject it – I simply hatch my Frog Norns (who use my new sprites).
• Sprite fixes to remove the extra tails on Ron, Forest, and most importantly Purple Mountain Norns, and to fix the male PMN ears and eyes.
• A pump fix to reduce accidental wallbonking by adding a pipe to move the water fountains a little farther away from the edge of the pond.
• Modified carrots, potatoes, nuts, and tomatos, in the same vein as Jessica’s C1 carrots – hide them when the creatures can’t eat them!
• And of course a host of updates and patches that ship with the Albian Years, as well as a few official COBs like the pufferfish and such.

And of course, one does not simply start a new world without a naming scheme! I batted a few around and ultimately settled on Lord of the Rings/The Hobbit names. Ironically, my first task was to get something out of a volcano – or alternatively, and perhaps more appropriately, getting Smaug out of the mountain. See, that was what I’d named the Grendel, and I knew time was of the essence; Grendels tend not to do well in this game due to living their lives in the radioactive volcano, so I wanted to get Smaug out before it did too much damage. I swooped in with the laptop, lured him to the lift, and brought him to the surface for an impromptu lesson on the most important vocabulary: “come hand.” 

He also learned “eat” and “fruit” in the process, although he refused to actually eat the coconut (ok, “masham berry” – it’s a coconut as far as I’m concerned) he picked up on the way.

Eventually, though, we made it to the Calendar Tree in decent health, where I taught him some more words and got him to eat some honey. Mission success! I left Smaug to his devices and checked briefly in on the other native resident of this world, Smeagol the Ettin. He was doing fine, so it was time to begin the migration!

I decided to start with only the girls. The point of this whole migration, after all, is to let this generation die off naturally (which wouldn’t happen in Creatures 1) so their offspring with fixed genomes can inherit the old world, and the Creatures 2 Norns can eventually succeed them in the new one. As such I don’t want my imported C1 creatures reproducing in C2 – there’s no way to back-port their offspring and I don’t want them taking over this world. The simplest way to prevent breeding is to separate the sexes. So I ushered Beth and Erika into the world! 

I must have exported Beth right on the cusp of aging (or perhaps she was somehow stuck in adulthood in C1), since she came into this world a little more haggard than I remembered her – and considerably purpler! Oh, C2 pigmentation genes, I really don’t understand you at all. Erika was also affected, looking quite blue – but hardly sad, as she was thrilled by the new invention called a water pump! 

One of the words I taught Smaug had been “weather,” and boy did he turn out to be a bit obsessed. He ended up following clouds across the bridge and into the desert, and I can hardly get him to pay attention to anything else when there’s a weather phenomenon nearby. What a character! I’ve never been too crazy about the C2 Grendel, but  I must admit I’ve gotten rather attached to this guy.

As I cycled through the creatures, I found Smeagol attempting to enter the dangerously radioactive volcano – thankfully I got there just in time and slammed the door in his face. But he took to just hanging out in the door area behind Pitz’s doghouse, where there was nothing for him to eat – and where nothing would grow. I left him a honey pot on the swamp bridge, but I feared that wouldn’t be enough. 

So I decided to plant the red mushrooms from the Life Packs in his chosen area. With enough of them, you can raise the inorganic nutrients in the soil high enough to start growing plants, and eventually I was able to turn the area into a thriving garden! 

The only trouble was it was nearly impossible to click on anything in there without accidentally uprooting the vital red mushrooms. Oh well.

I went back to the Norns and found that due to the increased number of object types in Creatures 2, the girls were actually missing a lot of vocabulary! So I gave them some lessons, which led to an amusing misunderstanding where Beth evidently thought she was supposed to bow to the fruit! The Norns did surprise me though, in that they’d learned more than I’d expected. Maybe Doozer-Sensei is also responsible for teaching them to bow!

For some reason the Norns were content to not leave the incubator area. I’m pretty okay with this, especially given where I found the next creature! I was quite shocked to find Smaug in the ocean, but very thankful that I’d injected the pufferfish into the world! Without it, it would only have been the sheer luck of my timing that could have saved him. Unfortunately the fish ejected him from the water on the volcano side, so I had to call him back down to the boat to cross back to the tree – but not before he grabbed a bat and, I can only assume from its disappearance, ate it! No, Smaug, that’s how you get Coronavirus!

Meanwhile, Erika and Beth were having regular slap fights that I was always too slow to intervene in; I don’t want to smack a Norn if I’m not sure they’re actually responsible for the slapping I’m hearing. This didn’t seem to bother Erika any, as she was happy as a clam with all the new toys in this world.

But as much as I’d like to end on that happy note, while cycling through creatures I happened to note that Smeagol’s life chemical was very low. They sure don’t live very long, do they? I’ve decided that to avoid using up a ton of names on them, all the Ettins will be named Smeagol, just like this one. Anyway, I’m generally not an Ettin person, but I thought it fair to stay with him in his final moments and make sure he was comfortable. He took one last nap, moved over to his garden, and curled up with Pitz for the final time among the greenery I’d brought to his little corner of the world. Rest in peace, little guy.

Settling into a new home

[Originally written August 21 2020]

Things went pretty well for a time after the migration! Loki and Freya performed the cutest drum duet together, while their mother preferred the ball. Horatio chilled on the lower level, as Treehuggers are wont to do, and Thor rested quietly in the treehouse. Lorenzo was a bit bolder, and got his kicks from exploring the Bridge.

Determined to keep the Bengal genes in the population and not thinking things through, I hatched a new first generation Norn, Baldur, whose birth also confirmed that the world’s notifications were still broken.  So I packed everyone up a second time, and moved once again to a new world. Once again, I had eggs in my inventory that I didn’t want to leave behind, so I hatched and exported them – but I’m not going to reimport them right away. Rather, they’ll just hang out in my export folder until I would normally hatch an egg.

This time I didn’t bother with intercepting eggs, I just went straight to the Comms room, injected and deleted the Banshee stone to update the Grendel voices, imported Tamora and Rosalind, removed the teleport pad, and locked the Meso door while I went to set up the world. I didn’t bother with putting grass in the Jungle this time, but I still set up the Aquarium, rescued the rhino beetle from the Jungle and moved it to the beach in the Aquarium room, added the awkwood creepers, put chili pepper pots in the appropriate places, put copies of the mini empathic vendor where desired, brought some balloon bugs to the Woodland to feed to the fish, introduced bramboo to the Woodland and Desert and tubas to the Jungle and Desert, stocked my inventory with my typical “medicine cabinet” of potions and cheese, and banished the C3 camera doodads to the “noisy corner” of the Bridge, near the ship’s lungs. Finally, I reimported the creatures and moved them to the Terrarium. Setup is intensive!

I had a brief balloon bug infestation in the Woodland – that tends to happen if you’re not careful about the bug you select to bring in. For some reason, balloon bugs can be effectively used as permanent fish food in the Woodland, but if you pick up the wrong one it’ll reproduce like crazy and some of the bugs will escape the pond. I was able to catch the escaped ones and move them back to the Desert, and eventually had things under control.

I also took the opportunity to add Grendel Man’s offline warp portals to my world – one in the Meso and one in the Terrarium. See, when playing Creatures I’m generally pretty obsessive about keeping them all in one safe place. Maybe that’s why I have historically favored the Meso. This time I’m actively trying to fight that tendency and let them wander a little more. As such, I have unlocked all the Capillata doors (except the ones leading to and from the Comms room) and put the Workshop teleporter pads in the Woodland, Aquarium beach, and Desert.

And now for something completely different!

[Originally written July 3 2020]

I already have an established Creatures 1 world that I’ve been playing at the same time, but I might as well document this one as well. This is what I’d call a “vanilla with a cherry on top” world – I don’t have a whole bunch of third party COBs or breeds or whatever, just a handful of modifications that I would consider to mostly fall within the realm of bug fixes and quality of life adjustments:

• Grendel Friendly. The world itself is hardcoded to change any interaction by a Grendel into a slap, regardless of what the intent was. This removes that script and allows the Grendel to make its own choices.
• Grendel Button. In Creatures 1, Grendels are not selectable without a COB like this.
• The Drive Computer. While I’m perfectly happy to use the provided Holistic Learning Machine in DS, in Creatures 1 and 2 I prefer to teach vocabulary the traditional way. There’s just one problem with this: in Creatures 1, as it comes out of the box, there is no way to teach adjectives. This COB effectively patches this problem without significantly altering the gameplay itself by adding a second computer under the temple that teaches adjectives.
• Sprite fixes for Pixie and Purple Mountain Norns.

As this is an already-running world, I’ve got quite a few creatures running around, so this post will mainly be an introduction to Albia’s inhabitants. The naming here has so far been alphabetical, loosely by generation – in the sense of when they were born, roughly, not how far removed from hatchery eggs they are. Even that’s rather loose and has more to do with my sense of time than the actual ages of the Norns.

	Angela was the first Norn in the world, and quite fond of the Grendel. Back in her day there were some soap opera antics going on; she often preferred Greg’s company over Aaron’s, and the latter was not happy about it. The hatchet has long since been buried though, and now Angela is an old lady who values her alone time.
	Aaron has not aged so gracefully. He’s just the provided male Purple Mountain Norn from the kit. He’s not always a good eater but he’s generally pretty obedient and gets along well with others – even Greg, nowadays.
	Beth, their first child, is… problematic. She listens when she feels like it, does what she wants, and enjoys hitting other creatures. She caught a very nasty illness when she was young that took forever to fight off, but she plowed on through with her high life force. I suspect she’s a Highlander or something because her life force is perpetually in the nineties, even when sick.
	Bill is Bill. He’s a hatchery Norn. I… honestly can’t tell you much more about him. This is, in itself, all you really need to know, I suppose.
	Carlos is Bill’s son with Angela. He takes after his father both in appearance and in being unfortunately forgettable. He’s not a very good eater and that’s all I can say off the top of my head.
	Cathy is Carlos’s sister, but she gets her looks from her mother. She’s a shy, timid Norn who reminds me of my dog Maggie: adorable but overwhelmingly terrified of random things for no apparent reason. She spends a lot of time running in fear, although I usually can’t tell what she’s actually running from, which makes it hard to get her to eat or follow the hand.
	Damien is the spitting image of his father, Bill, and has none of Beth’s Purple Mountain Norn looks. He did, however, inherit her temperament and love of bullying the other creatures.
	Derek was a welcome break from the parade of Banana Norns. He’s Carlos and Beth’s child. Quite the opposite of Damien, he got his charming appearance and high life force from his mother but thankfully not her aggressive tendencies.
	Erika is the newest Norn, child of Cathy and Damien. I have no idea how that pairing happened; they seem like the least compatible couple in Albia! There’s not much to be said about Erika yet, but I’m sure she’ll be quite a character.
	Last, but certainly not least, Greg the Grendel. I love this little guy! He’s easily my favorite creature of the lot, and by far the best behaved. He takes care of himself well enough, and is my most obedient creature, nearly always coming when called and eating when told to. While Norns get distracted by each other and by random objects, Greg will generally listen to me above all else – save for his precious ball! He’s also a shining example of why the Grendel Friendly COB exists; Greg is incredibly gentle, and doesn’t seem to have an aggressive bone in his body, early life conflicts with Aaron notwithstanding. He’s been on the receiving end of a few slaps in his time but tends to turn the other cheek rather than fighting back.

From what I’ve seen on the internet, most people’s C1 Grendels tend to spend their lives on the island. Greg, for whatever reason, can usually be found in the house, garden, or occasionally temple, although he sometimes nopes out to the jungle when a large crowd of Norns congregates nearby. Because of his usual location and his tendency to actually obey when he hears “come hand” it’s become something of a tradition for Greg to accompany young Norns on their journey to the adjective computer and sit through their lessons with them. This time, however, he opted out, and after briefly greeting Erika near the lemons, he went back to the garden. In his stead, Grandma Beth escorted her to the computer and back. 

Let's see where this goes

[Originally written June 30th 2020]

So I’ve been reading Discover Albia lately. Not just the entries but the conversations in the comments, encouraging people to blog their own Creatures worlds, and it got me to thinking. Now, I fully realize the creatures community is… a shadow of what it once was. And I’ve never blogged before. In fact I’ve never done much social media at all.

But still, I thought, maybe I should give it a shot. Even if nobody reads it, it might be entertaining to document my world. I’m about to start a brand new C3/DS world, after all – I had to uninstall and reinstall the game about six times and manually muck about with catalogue files for an hour and a half, but everything seems to be in full working order now. 

So I do want to jump in, but at the same time, I’m not sure I want to start a full-blown blog on such an odd whim. And I’m frankly too tired from work to figure out how blogging actually works at the moment, or decide whether to limit it to creatures or maybe include other gaming or even my adventures in baking – let alone come up with a name! So for now, I figure… why not just write it in Word? Maybe I’ll post it someday. Maybe it’ll just be a private journal. That’s for future me to figure out.

Right now, the Shee Ark awaits! I actually already got everything set up last night, but haven’t hatched any creatures – except the Ettins. I do want to keep Grendels so I snatched those eggs up and put them in my inventory for the time being. I’ve never cared much for Ettins though, so I’m just gonna let them do their thing.

I suppose I should start by summarizing all the world setup I’ve done – mainly the ecological adjustments and maintenance.

• I injected the Popping Pappus, Awkwood Creeper, and several Chili Pepper plants; in addition to the free-growing one in the Jungle, I’ve placed the potted ones in the Desert, Aquarium beach, the far right end of the first treehouse platform in the Norn Terrarium (or Woodland), and in the piranha pool in the Jungle (so that the dragonfly larvae have a plant to climb out of the water on).
• I’ve set up a few aquatic monitor/aquatic launcher combinations in the Aquarium. The left side has Orange Coral, Angelfish, and Handlefish, while the right side has Opal Coral and Clownfish. Both sides have seaweed, Neon Fish, Wysts, and Aquamites.
  
  
  
  
  
• I’ve set up a timer system (which resides in the rightmost airlock; hopefully nobody jettisons it) hooked up to a radio. The other end of the radio is situated in the Ettin hoard and tied into the volcano. This way it will regularly erupt and sustain the gnarlers.
  
  
  
  
  
• I added some Bramboo to the top left area of the Woodland, just because. More practically, I introduced a few ground-bound Balloon Bugs from the Desert into the pond; somehow they act as permanent fish food and sustain the Stickletrout population.
• I introduced Tubas to the Jungle and manually planted some tendrils and mushrooms in the lower levels. I also introduced some grass, just for looks.
• Tubas were also added to the Desert, and I also put some Bramboo in the upper section. Here, too, I added some mushrooms in the bottom level, and manually planted some desert grass on the top layer.
• I made a few copies of the portable empathic vendor and dropped them in the less-hospitable areas of the ship.
• Finally, I’ve set the breeding limit to 30.