Another LL2 review?
It is! Quite positive as always, because everybody knows you gots to respect the Toonyland, yo.
By the way, I had the bestest idea strike like lightning the other day, with regard to a future Loonyland game. I'd really like to do this one before Diwali Desert, just because my ideas for that game are very large, and this game could be much smaller and more do-able. Wanna hear about it?
First, I should confess something nobody seems to have suspected, despite the fact that Loony is clearly going to Easter Island at the end of LL2, and yet it says in the credits that LL3 is in Diwali Desert. That's because until the final chapter of Loonyland (You guessed it: Easter Island), we are done with Loony! There are other characters to introduce which will each have their own game, and then it will all come together in the final chapter. So, with that said...
Remember the big map of Loonyland I showed, and how The Northland was an island off the northern coast? Well, here's some history of the Northland. Northlanders are much like norse people of legend (and history too I guess), lots of oddly placed J's in their names for example (Mjolnir? Bjorn? Bjork?). But one key difference is that they love technology. Their entire lives have always been wrapped up in the technology they develop. Of course, you've seen the level of technology in Loonyland - it's not exactly the computer age. So they build steam-powered and clockwork robots (the LL2 clockwork robot is of course an example of Northland technology), and other crazy devices and contraptions. Everything they do is 'helped' along by this unstable and highly error-prone technology. When they go fishing, it's in a motorized boat with some sort of auto-net deployment system. When they cook, it's using a weird mini-factory machine that cranks out their food. Everybody in their society is involved in this. Fishermen work on the fishing boat machines, cooks work on the cooking machines. There isn't just some engineer group who does that stuff for others, it's a part of how everyone does everything they do. Some have even tried to develop mechanical boots to walk for them.
Unfortunately, technology can be dangerous. About a hundred years ago, someone developed a new model of clockwork robot that was self-replicating (reasoning, as Northlanders tend to, that if you can build a robot to build your robots, then you can finally sit back and truly do nothing at all!). We all know where that kind of thing ends, and so it did. The self-replicating machines developed new and deadlier models, spread all over the Northland, and eventually wiped out all animal life on the Northland. Now, only humans and robots remain. The humans are huddled into small villages desperately fighting to survive against the endless hordes. Many have of course run south for safety, but several groups remain, declaring that they will not cede the Northland!
That's the backstory. The nowstory is that you are Lars, a boy raised by one of the holdout clans. You are now old enough to attempt the trial of manhood. The trial is simple: go out into the wilderness, and don't come back until you've built yourself a robot from parts scavenged off of enemy robots. This demonstrates your might, in being able to beat them, and your technical aptitude (the most highly prized thing in Northland society!) in being able to construct a robot of your own.
And of course it goes from there, with the game revolving around building up your own little army of robots and kind of RTS (but sorta different) battling your way through the Northland. There's this really nifty system of components and robot building that gives you lots of creative freedom, and you sort of level up by studying the parts you scavenge, which helps you learn what other parts you can combine them with to make other things. Sounds like fun to me! Kinda iffy to go next in the series though - do you really want to go straight from Winter Woods to the Northland? People will think the whole game is on ice. Maybe it's time to hit Summer Springs or Forbidden Forest first. I do know exactly who all the other characters will be, and I think one of them probably belongs in one of those places. That plus Diwali and Northland should complete the set, except of course for Easter Island. I guess that makes Easter Island Loonyland 6. I hope I can pull it all off. If I can do it, it'll be the greatest thing I've ever done, a true epic of ridiculousness!
