Halloween Game the First
On October 31, 1999, a group of teenage guys (We’ve lost
the character sheets, so we’ll just have to know them by the player’s names:
Chad, Will, Paul H, Paul E, and Jason) getting together to watch a scary
movie on Halloween. After gathering at Paul E’s house, they realized
that no one had rented a movie. They journeyed to the video store,
where they were greeted by a creepy-looking old man with a lazy eye.
He recommended an unmarked black videocassette, saying
in a raspy, evil voice, “This one is sure to scare you.”
(Note: This happened long before we saw The Ring.
Creepy, no?)
Upon returning to the house, the teenagers popped the
video into the VCR. Suddenly, the room seemed to change, and they found
themselves, along with a few pieces of living room furniture, on a deserted
highway in the middle of a dark forest. Just beyond them was a large
roadway sign reading “Welcome to Halloweentowne”
Initially, they remained cool, a little confused, but
they did not panic. They had seen enough horror movies to know what
might be happening. After pushing a couch onto the road to stop any
passing vehicles, the teenagers crept down into the ditch to wait.
It wasn’t long before a pair of headlights came into view.
A dirty, old blue pickup truck stopped in front of the
couch. The teenagers took a quick vote, and then Chad stepped forward
to talk to the two men in the truck. He slowly began to explain what
had happened and ask where exactly they had come.
The window slowly rolled down to reveal a shotgun barrel
aimed directly at the young man’s head. The hick aiming the shotgun
calmly said, “This makes 37, Jed.” Chad had only enough time to knock
the barrel to the side out of his face before it went off, deafening one
of his ears.
Chad quickly ducked back into the ditch, and the teenagers
then fled into the forest. The murderous hicks thought about pursuing
them for a moment, but instead continued down the highway. The teenagers,
now panicking slightly, hid in the forest until they saw more headlights
approaching.
A convertible with a trio of goth girls stopped, and they
eagerly began talking with the young men.
“We’re headed to a great party out in the woods,” one
told them. “You just got to come along. It’s going to be great.”
As the teenagers discussed whether or not to go with the
attractive young ladies, another vehicle quickly sped into view. An
armored-over delivery truck, driven like mad, came to a sliding stop between
the two clusters of young people. A man in his mid-forties with long
scraggly hair, wearing a dirty plaid overshirt and jeans burst out of the
drivers seat and opened fire on the goth girls with a machine gun.
The goths screamed and tumbled over in a horrible pile of gore.
“Get in the truck!” the madman demanded. The teenagers
paused confusedly for a moment, wondering whether or not to obey the psycho.
Then the goths began to get back up. Still bleeding
profusely, they began to scream a horrible high-pitched chant. Their
bodies began to glow, and they floated slightly above their bullet-riddled
convertible.
The madman shouted again, and the teenagers obeyed, jumping
into the back of the truck. The madman threw a grenade at the goth
witches, which stalled them long enough for him to jump into the truck and
begin driving away.
“Let me guess,” the madman said to the rather disturbed
teenagers. “You just suddenly appeared here after getting something
from a creepy old man.”
They responded affirmatively.
“Thank goodness I found you,” the madman told them.
“If you had gone with them, we’d have to deal with the whole party of witches.”
The teenagers demanded an explanation, and the madman
told them that he’d explain everything just as soon as they got to a safe
place. They rode in silence until they reached a beat-up, three-story
house at the end of a neighborhood covered in defenses that even the most
paranoid member of the Minnesota Civil Defense would call excessive.
Razor wire, automated guns, floodlights, cameras, everything that could be
imagined defended the house.
The madman parked the truck in the garage next to a sleek
motorcycle. He shut the door, checked to make sure they hadn’t been
followed, and then escorted the teenagers into the house. The teenagers
then demanded an explanation again, and, settling into a chair next to a
tremendous security control console, he began the story.
“My name’s Greg Weiss,” he said. “I’m from the real
world, just like you. Of course, it’s been a long time…
“Every Halloween, something happens. There’s this
creepy old man, and he gives out some kind of teleportation device that brings
a group of people here. I’ve heard that it’s been books, paintings,
video games, nearly everything, but it’s always totally and evilly black.”
The teenagers told him about the creepy old man at the
video store and the black cassette.
“Ah, great. For me it was a record of what was supposed
to be spooky sounds. Anyway, every year a group of people come to this
dimension filled with Halloweentowne and the surrounding area. Along
with them, a monster appears, just like in any horror story or movie.
It really varies, sometimes there’s a horde of vampires or a giant monster
or who-knows-what. Those witches we met appeared back in the ‘60s,
for example. So then the people and the monsters have to duke it out.
If the people kill the monster, they get to go home. If the monster
kills the people, it gets to stay and kill people every Halloween.
Over time, the monsters have won out a lot more, so the place is pretty much
filled with them.
“Other than the monsters that appear every Halloween,
this town is pretty much a normal city. On Halloween, the unsuspecting
natives become victims to the horrible slaughter dished out by the monsters
and the whole town is wrecked. Once the sun rises on November 1, the
monsters disappear and the survivors begin rebuilding. By Thanksgiving,
everyone has forgotten about the whole mess. New people move in, the
town recovers, and everything is dandy. Then, on the next Halloween,
the monsters come back and the cycle repeats. It’s really, really horrible.”
Greg paused in thought, then continued. “If you
don’t kill your monster by dawn, you’re stuck here. I’ve been here
since 1976.”
“Why don’t you go after your monster?” one of the guys
asked.
Greg pointed out the window to a haunted-looking mansion
on top of a hill. “You see that! That mansion was just fine until
Halloween 1976, then it was packed full of horrible ghosts. I ain’t
going in there, it’s scary!”
Needless to say, seeing Halloween again and again had
tested Greg’s sanity.
“Anyway,” Greg continued. “After my two buddies
got killed, I decided to stay here. There was a guy here before me,
from the ‘50s, and he generally taught me everything I needed to know to
survive. He said that we have it easy nowadays, since back then they
had atomic super-monsters the size of buildings. A pair of werewolves
got him in ‘93, since then I’ve been alone.”
Greg sighed. “It’s kind of my duty to help out the
ones who appear. Imagine what would have happened had you never met
up with me. A giant worm could have ended you before you found out
anything. Anyway, I go out every Halloween and pick up the pieces behind
some of the monsters: banks, jewelry stores, etc. The police
are usually the first to go, so there’s not anyone to stop me. I use
the money to live on through the next year and to get everything I need for
next year.”
Greg stood and opened a closet full of body armor, heavy
and light weaponry, and nearly every explosive imaginable. “Black market
stuff. Costs a pretty penny, but it’s not bad for only working once
a year. Speaking of which, I should probably get going.”
After strapping several weapons to his body, he opened
a drawer and pulled out a bunch of crumpled pieces of paper. He gave
them to the guys and moved to explain.
“The first is a set of rules I’ve compiled based on experiences
here and watching every horror movie known to man,” Greg said. “Main
rules: be good people, and don’t take your clothes off. Of course,
by the looks of you guys, you don’t have too much to worry about that second
one.”
The guys felt rather insulted, but glad to get the list.
“The rest is a catalog of monsters with some dates about
when they might have come. I don’t know how accurate it is, but it
could help you figure out what is what. Add anything if you can, and
if it’s not there, it may well be your monster and your ticket out of this
wretched…” His speech trailed off into expletives.
Greg then left through the garage, speeding away on his
sweet motorcycle. He would rob many a bank that night to replenish
his funds and to buy more weapons to kill monsters next year (it’s every
American’s dream). The guys loaded up on weapons of their own from
Greg’s impressive collection. After that, they piled into the armored-over
delivery truck to begin the search for the evil that they are destined to
battle.
The guys then headed out into the terrifying world of
nightmare that is Halloweentowne. After driving a few blocks, they
came upon a limo transporting the town mayor, who, according to the list,
was a powerful evil wizard. The guys fought him for a bit, and finally
tossed a grenade into his mouth, which put his spell-casting days to an end
in a horrible explosion.
The guys continued to drive around, then came upon the
Halloweentowne Museum, where the delivery truck happened to die. As
they tried to crank the engine, mummies began to pour from the Egyptian wing,
threatening to kill them all. They duked it out with the mummies for
a while, and then something really, really bad happened.
A guy with shaggy black hair wearing a black trench coat
walked up slowly, staring at the ground. When he arrived, he looked
up and revealed that he has no eyes. A glance at the list of monsters
reveals that he was VERY BAD NEWS and appeared some time in the ‘80s.
(Note: This monster, named Destruction, is from an older game we played
known as the Haunted Campus. Man, oh man, that was a great game.)
At the last instant, the delivery truck started and the
guys escaped (a staple in horror movies). After a bit of discussion,
they decided they could probably use some holy water (just in case), and
they headed over to Halloweentowne’s main cathedral.
Here they met Father O’Malley, a really great guy.
He responded with only a little concern over the sheer amount of weaponry
the guys have, and it turned out he was a friend of Greg’s. Father
O’Malley was one of the few citizens of Halloweentowne who was in the know
about the monsters.
As the guys were filling up a canteen, there was a tremendous
roar and a crash at the front gate of the cathedral. Father O’Malley
looked through the door, shrieked, and recommended that they leave.
Outside is the Destroyer of Temples, a monster from the 16th century who
spent every Halloween destroying every holy place he could. The guys
sneaked past him and drove off in the delivery van.
From there, the guys drove aimlessly a bit more.
Then they came upon a teenage girl being chased by a giant alligator.
The guys accidentally hit her, though they braked enough only to knock her
to the ground and wind her. They took out the alligator, and then the
girl begged to be taken with them for protection. The guys argued for
a bit, and Paul H suggested the immortal line, “Bind her feet!” At
last the guys agreed to take her with them. She was a really impressive
shot with the pistol they gave her, and she claimed to have gained her great
aim in the Girl Scouts.
After picking up the girl, they met with increasingly
more difficult monsters. In one battle, Chad got severely injured and
they nearly escaped before he succumbed to his injuries. They quickly
drove to a hospital and charged in to get Chad some help. The guys
forced their way to the top of the list by their extreme weaponry.
In the emergency room, the doctors work feverishly, and then Chad makes a
sudden recovery. (Unbeknownst to the doctors and the other guys, the
girl was actually a demon in disguise and she had another demon possess Chad.
From here, Chad covertly plays as a demon and tries to kill the guys.)
Now the guys and their covertly malevolent girl headed
back to Greg’s to get their bearings and reload for another excursion.
They arrived to find Greg sitting in a massive pile of money, counting calmly.
Greg reacted with a bit of concern at the girl, though performing a good
deed of helping someone gives one bonus points on their survival rate.
Suddenly, Greg’s alarm system went off. His outdoor
cameras showed a horde of flying vampires approaching, ready to wreak destruction.
They all decided to run for it, including Greg who said, “I ain’t staying
there with a bunch of vampires.”
They piled into the delivery van and drove away from the
vampires, firing behind them in an effort to kill the vampires without direct
contact. Suddenly, demon-possessed-Chad flicked the pin out of a grenade
and dropped the grenade in a box of explosives. Greg, who saw the act
in the rear-view mirror shouted in terror and leapt out of the vehicle.
The guys were not so lucky, and all perished in the resulting explosion.
(Note: This action lives on in infamy among our
gaming circle.)
On October 31, 2000, the guys woke up from their slumber
of death. Greg had gathered their bodies after the explosion and had
them resurrected. He, Father O’Malley, and the Rabbi Krabowski, another
friend of Greg’s, performed an ancient Jewish ritual that could only be done
every 500 years to bring them back to life. (Coincidentally, there
is some kind of ritual like this that happens every year, duh.) Chad
was back to his old self, as the demon could not repossess his body in the
ritual.
“You guys were lucky,” Greg told them. “Usually
the monsters completely destroy the bodies and there’s no hope.”
Alive again and rearmed, the guys set out again with Greg,
this time to find those who had come to Halloweentowne this year. Because
the armored-over delivery truck was destroyed in the explosion, Greg now
had a military hummer with a machine gun on top. (It was a really beautiful
vehicle, but I will never forget the sheer coolness of an armored-over delivery
truck.)
They drove back out to the deserted highway where they
found some random bits of dormitory furniture, but whoever had been there
was now gone. After a brief discussion, they decided to drive out to
the goth witches’ party to find the newcomers. The party, which is
held in a field a mile or so off of the highway, was filled with witches,
many of whom were surrounding a bonfire chanting wildly. Among them
was a cluster of college-age girls who seemed very concerned with their decision
to attend to the party.
“Those must be them,” Greg muttered, and they quickly
hatched a scheme to rescue them.
Greg drove the hummer at full speed, tearing through the
party of witches. Meanwhile, the guys were hanging out of every window,
shooting wildly, and making good use of the machine gun. The element
of surprise distracted the witches enough for several of the guys to hop
out, blast a few witches, and then escort the six rather frightened girls
back to the hummer. Greg then revved the engine, and the very full
hummer tore away from the scene. The few remaining witches picked themselves
up enough to turn their bonfire into a flaming dragon that pursued them.
The dragon beat up the hummer quite a bit while the guys
fired many rounds at the dragon to no avail. At last one of them got
the idea to toss up a fire extinguisher. The extinguisher hit the dragon
and exploded, drowning out the dragon’s heat. Now free from the dragon,
the hummer drove away.
Greg dropped the guys off at a lake nearby Halloweentowne,
where, according to reports from last year, a monster had eaten several swimmers.
He did not recall the monster from before, so the guys hoped that this was
their ticket out. Then Greg and the girls hurried off to find more
weapons and pursue another monster. After the guys arrived, they noticed
a group of swimmers scurrying away from the shore. They soon noticed
a many-tentacled beast rising from the murky waters.
Then, at the most inopportune time, a dirty, old blue
pickup truck appeared. Jed and Frank, the two murderous hicks who had
appeared a year ago, drove onto the scene and fired wildly at the guys.
Frank, who was driving, was screaming at Jed not to take too many of the
kills, as they were both tied at 52 (victims, that is), and he did not want
to get behind. The guys fought both the monster and Jed and Frank,
killing the two hicks and wrecking their truck.
Then they turned their focus on the lake monster.
They lured it onto land, but were soon becoming overwhelmed. One by
one, it ate Jason, Paul E, and Will. While Will was doing his best
to hack at the monster’s esophagus after having been eaten, Chad and Paul
H worked to put an end to it. Taking a canister of propane from the
back of Jed and Frank’s truck, Chad lobbed it at the monster. Paul
H snapped off a great shot, causing the propane to explode and destroy the
monster.
The two survivors, Chad and Paul H, reappeared in the
living room they had left a year earlier. They were much scarred by
the horrifying experience, which no one believed, even though they could
not explain their year-long disappearance. Paul H lived a below-normal
life as an unthinking data processor. Meanwhile, Chad spent his life
vainly searching for the creepy old man who had started the whole mess.