My name is Mica Walters. Not Meeka, Mica; like a jersey guy talking about his favored mode of transportation: Mi-ca. Got it? Good. My You-niverse handle is MykaReviews. Like, follow, subscribe and all that jazz. Back to the review of Trick Tower, where do I start?

Notes:

Tutorial-

+Pros: Easy to follow, concepts and designs are simplistic and easy to grasp for even the most casual of players.

-Cons: Annoying ass beep that goes off until you finally acknowledge and click the button.

The beep went off every few minutes while I parsed the books in the wizard’s room. Thankfully all I had to do was pick them up and look at the covers for them to be added into my Journal to be catalogued. I could always read the entries at a later time if I got bored. The ‘B’ tab in the journal sparkled with multiple tiny stars indicating I had new things to look at, but I ignored it and the incessant beeping sound from my magic tutorial watch.

The text across the screen read,

[::ESCAPE THE TOWER::

TRACK NEW QUEST?

Y/N?]

Tired of the beeping, I clicked N. I wasn’t ready to leave yet there was still so much to look at in here! The notification crystalized and zoomed off into my see through HUD where a flashing white light pulsed on a small tab that now popped up on the right side of my vision.

[Quests are located in the Quest Tab. You may swap between what quest you’re tracking at any time by accessing this menu.] The robotic voice spoke directly into my mind once again as text came up on my wrist. I hadn’t explored that much of the HUD system yet but it seemed to be your standard fantasy style. Quest log on the right, inventory and data to the left. Magic spells on the bottom and two bars sat at the very top of the screen, one blue one red. Red stayed steady but blue had a sliver missing. I’d already cast some magic so that was the Magic Meter, which meant the other was my health bar. No numerical marking to determine JUST how much health I had. I suppose it adds to the mystery and the sense of caution players should be aware of when entering.

I moved on from the books on the shelves to the scrolls on the wizard’s desk. Yes, it’s snooping on a fictional wizard, but you never know what kinds of things you’ll pick up on in the starting area! I picked up several hastily written letters, these didn’t immediately copy into my journal. I double tapped them sending them into my inventory, who’s page I quickly opened back up to.

Uh oh. There was a carrying capacity based on my class’ strength, which was my wimpy real life ‘renews my gym membership every year but never goes after january’ strength. The Inventory page sported a yellow sub section labeled Fanny Pack, which had a white pulse around it. Looks like I’d have to explore the whole menu to fully finish out all these tutorials.

[When pulling an item from the Fanny Pack of Holding simply visualize what you’d like to pull out or select the item from your Inventory manual]

I frowned. Separate inventories were fine but I wanted an easier way of seeing all my items at once. Thankfully the HUD allowed me to click and drag to combine it into one screen. Items I shoved into the Fanny Pack were wrapped in a bright red, a higher difficulty rating for those who’d try to steal from me. That was reassuring. The fanny pack didn’t seem to have a weight limit but a size limit. Anything that you could fit into a fanny pack would go inside with little to no issue. Most books were too big to fit inside but that was what the Journal copy was for.

I pilfered everything I could find that would fit until I felt satisfied like a magical Brittish nanny. The telescope in the window was simply too large for me to shove in the fanny pack so regretfully I left it behind. I pulled my camera out from my inventory, it took several moments before it materialized as a thick black 90’s style polaroid instant camera only way more modern and with a small screen to zoom in. It’s heft settled into my hands, I hadn’t had one of these since I was a kid but I knew exactly how to work it. I snapped a picture taking one of the full object and another zooming in on the gold filigree details wrapped around it’s jet black casing. Ker-chuk.

[New Compendium Entry: Item-Telescope]

My wrist chirped and a new tab in my Journal popped up at the top labeled: Photo Compendium. A single picture of the telescope sat in the first icon spot with a white exclamation point bouncing over it. Click. The face of Jasper Reqor materialized hovering over the screen.

“Very good [Tourist].” The head nodded with Jasper’s slightly robotic old man voice, “Go forth into the Tower and ::Complete the Compendium:: by taking photos of everything you can. Do this for me and your work will become an in world item available for all players, credited to you: MykaReviews.”

I pulled up my ID tab where written out was my You-niverse handle rather than a place to put my name. That was kind of a bummer that they already put that in there for me. Still having my handle in this game in the canon would be so freaking cool and SUCH a leg up on those bigger streamers. They’d be on the leaderboards but I’d forever be part of the coding.

The other information on it were things like Steps Taken, Dogs Pet and Money. There was a way to get a good grade in petting dogs and I was going to get 9999. That aspect was ALMOST enough to get me digging back into my Quest Log to accept the ::Escape the Tower:: quest I’d declined earlier but I wasn’t done with this starting area yet.

Notes:

-Cons: Username changes accessible for players?

This was a wizard’s tower. Surely there’d be more blatantly magical things in here! I scoured, short of climbing the bookshelves like the short gremlin I’ve always been to see if there were any knick knacks I’d missed on the top. The watch beeped. A digital clock showed up unexpectedly reading in military time, twenty three hundred on the dot. Eleven at night.

A muffled static sound played from within one of the drawers at the wizard’s desk. The drawer was locked. I stole a letter opener of a swirling Long style dragon with a green gemstone for an eye from a cup on the side. I shimmied back and forth making short work of forcing the lock open. Static turned into a muffled voice that spoke words I couldn’t make out, like someone was talking over a walkie talkie from far away.

[Skill Increase: Lock Picking level 1]

[Weapon Skill Increase: Daggers level 1]

Huh! Neat. I can gain skill levels in weapons using non-lethal ways. I patted the letter opener opting to send it to my inventory, not the fanny pack, I wanted to be able to reach that one quickly if I needed to. I hope I wouldn’t need to. I opened the drawer and found a few empty pads of paper, and a long stick of graphite. Pat pat.

[::Guidebook Ghostwriter:: Quest pt 1 Completed: FIND A WAY TO WRITE.]

I’d forgotten I’d tracked that. Yay me.

[::GUIDEBOOK GHOSTWRITER:: QUEST PT 2

TRACK THIS QUEST?

Y/N?]

“Yes.” I confirmed aloud, that worked just as well as clicking. A relief, voice activated to save me from sitting there clicking like an idiot if I was in trouble or something. Looting around the rest of the drawer the noise apparently came from a smooth river rock that skittered out as I pulled the drawer further. That was surprising. The rock was partway into it’s speech as a voice emanated from it.

“—as you know I am your host, Balder Dash and you are listening to The Rock, and literally the rock.”

I couldn’t get my camera out fast enough to catalogue as I listened. Ker-chuk.

[New Compendium Entry: Wondrous Item- Listening Stone]

A listening stone that’s a [Wonderous Item] right off the bat? What a great find for those willing to stick around a little while into the tutorial! The smooth stone lent no options to respond back, less like a walkie talkie and more like a one way radio receiver. Balder continued, each word that came from the rock was better than the last:

“It was a nice balmy day out today, on floor eight according to Stewart the Farmer. Thank you, Stewart for your continued support and write ins, The Rock wouldn’t be around without listeners like you, thank you. The vulcandrakes of floor five were out in good number coming out of the south east exit at cruising speeds which was great for the denizens on that floor escaping their fields once again for the seventh time in the last week. Coming back around, floor six is still suffering that monster infestation and the King would like for me to remind you that he still seeks those who are brave enough to face down a legion of monsters. Backed of course by the king’s men -yeah way far back- AHEM.” Balder’s voice came from the stone.

It wasn’t robotic like the tutorial orb voice, but a warm voice that came from a person. Wow, they picked a great VA for this role. Balder Dash and the Rock, what a hoot.

[Compendium Updated]

More scrolling text popped up in my lower side bar of my HUD, updating the description of the Listening Stone.

[Tuned in to Balder Dash and the Rock. Twenty three hundred hours. Tuesday.]

Balder continued on describing the adventures of the last week of his life on floor six. About his trouble with the cobbler who was supposed to have made him a new pair of custom boots but they were too small.

“Get this. The man ACTUALLY tried to convince me it was MY fault for measuring my own feet wrong, and that if I was going to get another pair I’d have to pay. NO! I refused on the grounds that he could still sell the too small boots and turn a profit whereas I would be DOUBLY out the money I paid in the first place! I warn all of you now: stay far away from Yurik’s Shoe Shoppe and Shine if you value comfortable walking gear.”

There is a lot to be learned from just listening to someone else talk for a little while. If given enough time you’ll truly see into their minds. To see what they felt was important, what they poured their passions into. Balder loved his footwear. What a hoot. The man had a podcast over listening stones and I was not his only listener.

Several sets of tabs had small sparkling stars indicating new content, the Journal adding everything he spoke about into it’s databank. I sat fully engrossed in the stone and Balder’s tales as he rambled on. My watch beeped again, zero hundred hours. Midnight.

“That’s all for tonight. Don’t forget you can send in letters to me to be read during our little talks. Address them to me at His Majesty’s Postal Building Number 4 on Floor 6. I’ll be back again next week when the spell resets so until then: I’m Balder Dash and I’ll see you next tuesday.”

The compendium updated once more.

[Listening Stone- Station: Balder Dash and the Rock, Tuesdays @ 23:00- 00:00]

[His Majesty’s Postal Building Number 4; Floor 6]

It was late and there was no sense trying to do anything like leave the tower in the middle of the night. I had no idea where I was, what terrain or monsters would be outside. This room was already secure enough since there weren’t any viable exits that I could see. I settled on the bear skin rug in front of the crackling fire place. It was lumpy in places and not as nice as the mattress I bought last month and am still paying off, but it was comfortable enough. The gold celestial pattern on the ceiling shimmered in the firelight the paints made with glitter or magic. Probably magic.

What did the tutorial say about visualizing an item from my bag? I clicked back into the Inventory page. It was a perk of the Fanny Pack that I could instant summon something inside it by visualizing it. The only issue was even while closed the camera was ever so slightly too big to fit in the zipper. That was hardly enough to deter me however. I own a cat, I know how to wrestle things into containers when they don’t want to go in. The camera pixelated, zooming into the dark swirling interior of my fanny pack.

My wrist beeped and text popped up in the Journal.

[Fanny Pack of Holding- Rare Item (0/1 upgrades): Visualize to summon item from within. Anything that can fit inside the Fanny Pack once can fit in every single time no matter what.]

I pulled the camera back out by visualizing it. It appeared in my hand, the same way I’d forced it into the bag: closed. I opened it and snapped a picture of the golden patterns on the roof. Ker-chunk.

[New Compendium Entry: Item- Star Map (Basic)]

I touched the still open camera to the fanny pack. Nothing happened. Drat. Guess it had to close every single time I had to put it back. An annoying trade off for being able to summon my camera at my whim.

After swapping most of my items into the fanny pack for easy of access I laid back on the coarse bear fur. I read through as much of my Journal as I could until time finally caught up to me and I finally passed out.