Little Misfortune

0:17 Hello, everyone, and welcome back to The Other Castle. Surprise, it's The Other Castle. I'm Andrea. And my name is Tom. And here on The Other Castle, we do the plot, lore, and more behind all your favorite video games, usually in a season. But right now, we're just popping in to say, hello, we miss you. Yeah, we really do, you know, we are working really hard for season nine. Yes, and it is coming soon. Soon, yeah. This summer. Summer 2024. Exactly, thank you, Mr. Movie Phone. Yeah. Is that dated to say? Yeah, a little bit. That's very Y2K era. Yeah. But it is happening. I am playing through some games. I played through one that was so much fun to kill things in. Yeah, you had a good time?

0:59 And then I was like, I'm not covering this one until later. I need to put this down and play something else. But lots of fun stuff happening. And just as an interim, hey, what's up, hello. This is a game that we pulled from our Discord. Yes, we did. This is coming straight out of our game suggestions channel. Yeah, so if you want to join our Discord, the link is on the show notes and on our website, theothercastlepodcast.com. That's the othercastlepodcast.com. Also, there's a link to our Patreon. Patreon's free for the first week, and then it's $2 a month. Lots of extra bonus episodes. So you get surprises like this once a month. Yes, every single month, even in the off season. But this is just because we were like, man, I had a really good time in season eight, so I wanted to say thank you to everyone.

1:39 Yes, and we have been growing so much since season eight. That way we can give all of our new listeners something to hold them over until next season. Yeah, we're just coming very soon. But this title was brought up on our Discord by a handful of our lovely Discord friends. So thank you to The Alligator, Xanny, Jaxnator, Rock and Roll Aaron Show, and Jay The Stray for calling this game out or bumping it in their requests. I did a blind scroll of our Discord on the game suggestions chat and went, we'll figure it out. I went one, two, three, and we landed on this. So that's the power of Discord. And it also means that we do listen to you guys. Yeah. And if anyone else called this out, I apologize. That's who I saw when I just searched Little Misfortune in the search bar of that chat.

2:23 So if anyone else one upped it, thank you very much. It still happened. I honestly had never even heard of this game before they suggested it. OK, me neither. That's the thing. Like, there are way more steam players than you and I are. That's very true. I feel like the breadth of games that they get to play and access and get into is much wider than ours. Well, now I'm just stuck always doing games for this show. Yeah. So you're locked in. I mean, that's exactly what happened to me because I just played this game, Little Misfortune. I took Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth as like my one game that I get to just play for me, and I ended up playing for 94 damn hours. That's stupid. It was a little bloated.

3:04 I'm not going to lie. At 94 hours, yeah, I'd imagine so. What the fuck? Still had some good fun with it, but yeah, that was a little too long to be honest. Yeah, ugh, that's ridiculous. I don't like that you did 94 hours doing anything. Yeah, I know. I didn't like having to do it for 94 hours either. How long is Little Misfortune? Two. Two, all right. Maybe three hours, yeah. If you get down on it and you're like, oh, let me listen to all the voice lines. Yeah, probably about twice as long as this episode's gonna be. As we get into the episode, I do wanna say there is gonna be discussion of several types of abuse, and the trigger warnings will be listed in the show notes. So in 2012, married couple Natalia Martinson and Asik Martinson founded Kill Monday Game Studio while they were living in Stockholm, Sweden.

3:51 Before setting up a game studio, they had a lot of creative ventures like movies, music videos, and other fun shit like that. After establishing Kill Monday, they got to work on their first release, Fran Bow, which has also been brought up in our Discord. I was gonna say, that one sounds familiar. From Discord, yeah. Natalia was the artist and creative, and Asik was the programmer and composer and did kind of more of the techie shit. Through their partnership, Natalia was established as the CEO and Asik as the CTO of Kill Monday. They were completely self-taught, so setting up a game studio is truly a labor of love. To help get the studio and project off the ground, they turned to Indiegogo with a goal of $20,000.

4:32 They ended up raising over $28,000, which is awesome. That's pretty good. Yeah. And in the first month after release, Fran Bow had moved over 10,000 copies. Wow. It's not bad for a freshman title from a small indie studio. So small, it's literally just two people. Yes. It's kind of just an eccentric hobby, to be real. Like this podcast? Yeah. It's a couple that's like, we like video games, how can we be a part of this? Yeah. After Fran Bow launched in 2015, Killmonday moved from Stockholm to Hedemora, which I feel like I butchered, I apologize, which is still in Sweden. And they got started working on the follow-up to Fran Bow. They started on a game called Different Galaxy, which was about a cat.

5:13 Love that. We love a cat game on this show. Oh, so much. That game got put on pause. And in 2018, the studio announced that they were working on another secret game alongside Different Galaxy. And that one would grow into Little Misfortune. Little Misfortune has largely been lauded as a funnier game counterpoint to Fran Bow, but is still staunchly an indie horror experience. A funny indie horror. Which I did not realize this would be a horror game. Oh no. I went, oh, that's why kids are suggesting it. Hell yeah. Yeah, this doesn't seem like it's about a fucking scary story. Okay. And then you play it.

5:54 And then it's a little silly? It's so jarring. Little Misfortune's production came while the team started to expand from the couple to a total of six employees, which was very exciting for the small studio. Tripled their size. Exactly. And that's all the line item needs to say. They also got help from another studio in Stockholm to help finish out doing the cut scenes and the video animation there. Team Kill Monday was all hands on deck for Little Misfortune. So much so that CEO, Natalia Martinson end up voicing the titular character, Misfortune. Oh, wow. That's really cool. That's a very all hands on deck situation then. Exactly. It's, is it getting a little Sam Lake going, I'll step in, I'll be Max Payne.

6:38 I was actually thinking more Hades. Oh, okay. Where they just had the developers be like, you have a sexy voice. Would you mind just hopping in the booth? Yeah, exactly. Can you imagine being in an all hands there? Just the absolute bisexual nightmare of hearing devs be like, hello, I've got the project ready for you. Right, all those voices are just real people. Yeah, attached to bodies. I don't know, that needs to be attached to a demigod. Oh, Aphrodite is my coworker? No, thank you. Yeah, HR. I mean, yes, please, but also no, thank you. HR on deck. In Little Misfortune, the protagonist Misfortune Ramirez Hernandez is an eight-year-old Hispanic girl living in Sweden. That's a hell of a name.

7:18 Well, Natalia herself is Chilean, so it worked out for her to voice a little girl because it's basically a tiny her. She was able to knock out her lines for the game over two weeks in four-hour segments, which feels very fast. That's super quick. In addition to Natalia, Killmonday hired Swedish actor Henrik Normen to play Mr. Voice. Henrik has 50 actor entries on INDB, so this was a really cool get for the team. Henrik also had met Natalia previously when she asked him to voice a character in an animation school project, which he agreed to do for free. He has since been paid for his work handsomely, so it's okay now.

7:59 Okay, that's good. The studio has actually released several weekly vlogs on YouTube during the production cycle of Little Misfortune, and I'll drop a link to that in our Discord. That's really cool. It's mostly clips of production and putting the game together and kind of what day-to-day life is in the studio, but it's fun and frankly really cool that they track their whole progress. Honestly, to put that kind of effort into a side project while working on a big project is kind of impressive. Across six people, yeah. Yeah. A lot of it is in Swedish though, so I think a lot of the behind-the-scenes kind of went over my monolingual head, but I was like, oh, I like their energy. Fair enough. Little Misfortune was released on Steam on September 18th, 2019, and came out on consoles and mobile over the course of 2020 to mixed reviews.

8:45 Some reviews lauded the game for being off-putting or unsettling, while some found it charming and fun. Overall, reviewers did say they enjoyed the acting and particularly found the protagonist charming, but the game itself was lacking. I'd be remiss to not call out that, in comparison, Fran Bow overall got much stronger reviews. But this is not the title that our Discord wanted to hear about, so we're gonna talk about Little Misfortune. All right, then. I'm here for the listeners, not the fucking critics. To date, Little Misfortune has sold about 368,000 copies worldwide. That's not a crazy number, but for an independent studio, that's pretty good. Yeah, exactly. If it's a handful of people doing this, that's fucking sick.

9:28 If this were a AAA, this would be so embarrassing. But they did a lot on a little. Since the release, the company started working on quite a few games, something called the Benjamin Game. They're also working on a Fran Bow DLC and a Fran Bow sequel entirely. Nice. Unfortunately, games came and went and got canceled, and the team ended up having to let go some of their workforce. Oh, I hate that. I know. It's been happening so much in gaming right now. It can't stop in gaming. At the end of 2023, Kill Monday consisted of Isaac, Natalia, and one more full-time team member. Damn, so they cut their team in half now.

10:09 They laid off half the workforce. Ugh. Terrible poll quote, but that is exactly what happened. Lately, they've been focusing on merch and sales for Fran Bow and Little Misfortune, and have been kind of quiet about which game will actually be their next title. Yeah, because they're all busy fucking working. There's one guy just mopping in the background, you know? That's the third employee. Yeah, the one that's not in the marriage. Right. Anyway, Natalia has said that they have a very long plan for a connected universe and beyond. Fran Bow and Little Misfortune definitively do exist in the same universes, and there will be some overlap with that game. But for now, we're just going to focus on this game. These remedy loving motherfuckers.

10:50 They're European. We start out on the Pacific North. But this is Little Misfortune. The game opens on the underground. We see skeletons and loose bones rotting with worms crawling through their crevices in the dirt. The camera pans up to the surface, and we see a cloaked skeleton speaking to a fox who is standing upright. The cloaked skeleton raises a bony arm out and points forward. The fox follows the direction and seeks a strange gravestone with mysterious symbols on it. The fox nods to the figure as the figure is swept away by the wind. The fox plugs in some headphones and walks over to the strange gravestone, pulling a small wagon behind them.

11:33 Once at the strange gravestone, the fox puts its hand on it. And the strange gravestone glows blue. After a moment, the strange gravestone explodes and reveals a portal. The fox pulls the wagon and enters the portal. As you do. What wouldn't you do? The next thing we see is a small single story home in the fall. They seem to be out in the middle of nowhere, just on the outskirts of the nearby town of Openfield, Sweden. It's October 11th, 1993, and the trees are hanging on to their last leaves. The camera lingers on the home as a warm male voice begins to welcome the player to the game. This is Henrik Norman, Mr.

12:14 Voice, and this is his favorite part of the game. Mr. Voice says, he'll be the host and humble narrator for the game. I'm not gonna do that. I can't. No, that's an offensive accent. It is? A little bit. Really? You're not good at it. Oh, just because it's bad. I'll take that as I don't want to be unkind, but we can talk about the quality of my shit. That's fine. I'll take that on the face. Anyway, he's the humble narrator for the game. The rules of the game are simple. Play it until the end and you'll be rewarded. How fucking everything works, man. Inside the house, we see a little girl, eight years old, with a big pumpkin-shaped head and a pink beret. She's got brown hair and big brown eyes and is playing with paper dolls on the floor.

12:59 Mr. Voice introduces us to Miss Fortune. She's a wonderful child from a not-so-wonderful family. She sprinkles glitter on her paper dolls, and Mr. Voice says that today is the day she will die. Oh, Jesus. Miss Fortune looks up and says, I can hear you, you know. Are you inside my head or something? Mr. Voice says, oh, well, okay, yes. Miss Fortune says, okay, I'll call you Mr. Voice. What did you say about me dying? Mr. Voice says, oh, no, no, no, no one said that. Hey, anyway, I have a game for you. If you can reach the end of the game, I'll give you eternal happiness.

13:42 Deal? Miss Fortune says, well, I guess I could give that to my mommy. It's a deal. As she agrees, we get a flash of her room changed. It goes from bright and sunlight and full of her clothes and toys and things to it being dark and decrepit and rotting and empty. So right out the gate, Miss Fortune knows she's in a video game? No. Oh, okay. You said that Mr. Voice said if you make it to the end of the game. Yeah. I don't think she knows she's in a game. Okay. I don't think she knows she's in a video game. She thinks she's in a game. Okay, but this whole thing is just gonna be one big game. Yeah. Okay. But she doesn't think she's in a video game. Fair enough. It is 93. It's 93. She's not like, oh, I'm Pong.

14:23 From Pong. Once the room comes back to being normal, Mr. Voice says, fantastic. Are you ready to play? Your first mission is to leave the house. Miss Fortune says, okay, I'm gonna do it. Before leaving, she dances a bit to the radio and then goes into a small fort she calls her secret spot and reads her diary to Mr. Voice. Her diary shows that her daddy hits her mommy sometimes, and when they scream at each other, she hides. She has also seen a fox near her window and has named him Benjamin. He has a striking resemblance to the fox we saw in the opening scene, but that probably has nothing to do with this. Probably not foreshadowing. She also has a Japanese friend named Hiro, who she says is a ghost.

15:07 Hiro is a small boy who wears a green alien mask. In her secret spot, Miss Fortune also has a toy bear named Bubsy and a coloring book. Bubsy is a bear who fought a monster for Miss Fortune. He will guard the secret spot. She decides to take her coloring book just in case she gets bored on the adventure. Outside her secret spot, Miss Fortune picks up her glitter to take with her on the adventure. She fucking loves glitter. It's her favorite thing in the entire world. What kid doesn't love glitter? Sad ones. Yeah, well, it makes a damn mess everywhere. But it's pretty. Kids love making messes. Miss Fortune tries to take her toys with her, but Mr. Voice says she can only take one.

15:48 She has two toys, one unicorn and one rock with blood stains on it. That's her toy? I obviously chose the stone. And she says that stone is a stone that her daddy threw at her once. Oh my God. At? At. Not to. And there are blood stains on, so it seems like it made contact. Oh my shit. Under the blood stains, there's a small smiley face that she drew onto the stone. But it's exactly as sad as you think it is. She tells Mr. Voice that she calls him stony, you know, because he's a stone. It's about as creative as Wilson from fucking Castaway. Yeah, but Mr.

16:28 Voice says that she's very clever. Before she leaves, Ms. Fortune sprinkles glitter everywhere in the room, screaming, happiness to everything. And then she leaves. Once the room is empty, Mr. Voice addresses the player. He says, hey you, on the other side of the screen, remember how I said she was gonna die? Let's keep that between us. Oh my God, how do you keep that between you two? Well, like most secrets, this one is not long for this world. Just like little Miss Fortune. That's fair, oh my God. In the hall, Miss Fortune talks a bit about her family. She says her mom wanted to get an abortion when she was pregnant with her, but it was illegal.

17:09 Now she drinks a lot of wine. Miss Fortune stumbles down the hall and shatters a vase. She's embarrassed, but resolves to try to fix the vase. She puts the pieces back together, and it looks terrible, but she tried. Miss Fortune comes up on a pair of moose antlers and says, her daddy's friend was a hunter and shot this moose. His daughter, Erica, thought the gun was a toy and said, bang, bang, to her mommy and daddy. And then her parents died, and she was really sad. Oh, shit. And she says it in just the saddest way that only an eight-year-old child could. Oh, my goodness. That is fucking too true to what happens in the world. We've barely got into this.

17:49 I'm gonna need you to pull it together for me. Oh, wow. This is gonna be a dark one. Miss Fortune goes to the kitchen where Mr. Voice says, Ew, it smells like cigarettes in here. Miss Fortune goes, Yep, that's my mommy. She drinks a lot of juice. It was 93. There was a smoking section at fucking Chuck E. Cheese. Was there really? Oh, yeah. Gross. We see her mom raise a full fucking wine glass to her lips as she drinks her quote unquote juice. Miss Fortune's mother is cooking rabbit soup, which smells absolutely awful. Miss Fortune opens the fridge and sees a bunch of dead rabbits, not just the meat, like bodies of rabbits. What the fuck? She decides to throw glitter on them.

18:33 As Miss Fortune sees her mother, she says, When she grows up, she wants to be just like her mommy. No, you don't. A juice drinker. Oh. Miss Fortune throws some glitter on her mom as she leaves. Whenever Miss Fortune throws glitter at something, her heart swells a little bit and beats really hard. There are 16 instances in the game where she can throw glitter, and every single time, it's fucking adorable. Miss Fortune leaves her house and greets the outside by exclaiming, Good day, morning. She looks around a bit and tells Mr. Voice where she saw the fox named Benjamin. She says he was right outside her window and that he's really cute.

19:14 There is some ongoing undertone that Miss Fortune has a romantic crush on Benjamin the fox. Oh, that kind of cute. Yeah, like, there's stars in her eyes when she talks about the fucking fox. These fucking furries. She doesn't know, she's eight, she's figuring herself out, she's like, what's up, woodland creature? You were bipedal for some reason. Maybe we should kiss. And there's something to say about kids that have gone through trauma or abuse, perhaps growing up faster than some of their peers. Very true. And it's clear that she's had rocks thrown at her by her father. Oh, Jesus. So, you know, there are factors going into what's going on with her. Mr. Voice tells her not to trust the Fox because they're all criminals.

19:55 Ms. Wirtzen says a Fox criminal is very silly. She comes to a car parked on their lawn and says, this is where daddy often sleeps. There are skid marks from the road to the parked car. Oh, there's so many implications. It appears her daddy also likes to hit the juice, just like her mommy does. Yeah. Mr. Voice tells Ms. Fortune the rules of the game. He says there will be choices through the game. There are no right or wrong answers, just consequences. And when you beat the game, the prize of eternal happiness is all yours. The next mission is to cross the road. Ms. Fortune says she can do that.

20:35 So she looks to the left and to the right for cars, but halfway through the road, the world shifts again like it did in her bedroom. Instead of being in the middle of the road, she's in a desolate, dark landscape with rotting trees and bones. She's standing in the middle of a cracked circle in the ground that's glowing red. It only happens for a moment, then she's back in the world she knows. She says she saw a monster. Mr. Voice assures her it was just her imagination. On the other side of the road, Ms. Fortune sees a dead bird and throws glitter on it. I love the glitter. It keeps her going, you know. She keeps moving through the woods, and more and more birds fall dead at her feet. Jesus. In the distance, a thunderbolt hits a nearby farm, and it sets on fire.

21:19 From afar, she throws glitter on it. A satellite falls out of the sky and barely misses her, but she giggles, glitters it, and moves on. A satellite. She almost died from a satellite. Yes. She is just avoiding death barely every step of the way, and she's like glitter. She's not named Little Miss Lucky. Yeah, that's fair. Bummer shit keeps happening around her. Is Miss her first name? Miss Fortune is one word. Miss Fortune is one word? Yeah. Farther down the road, Miss Fortune runs into a puppy with a party hat tied to a tree. He's a goofy little crusty, curly white dog.

21:59 You know the kind. Oh, the crusty dogs. Mr. Voice tells her that she has to make a very difficult choice and be aware of the consequences. Miss Fortune can hear, play with the dog, or set it free. There are some branching narrative things, because I obviously have to play a game with branching narratives. Always. So we're just going to go with my decisions throughout the game for what it's worth, for better or worse, I suppose. I decided to play with the dog so we can share a nice time together. So Miss Fortune takes a ball and throws it at the puppy. She throws and actually misses the puppy and the ball bounces off of the tree and hits Miss Fortune directly in the face, knocking her directly in the dirt.

22:42 Oh my God. Unceremoniously, she gets up and is like, damn, that's crazy. And as she does, a branch from the tree falls and kills the puppy. Oh my God. She's got her father's arm. Oh my God. Jesus Christ. Miss Fortune is beside herself distraught. She cries and she's like, the puppy is broken and I'm broken and there's something wrong with me and life isn't fair. Oh, the puppy's way more than broken. Girl. Mr. Voice says, well, sometimes life isn't fair, but he's gonna be there for her. Sadly, the puppy is gonna miss the party now, so we should tell the puppy's owner, George, about the puppy dying.

23:24 But first, glitter him. Well, Miss Fortune does take a moment. She's like, you're right. That's the right thing to do. And then she throws glitter on the dog. Hell yeah. She takes the dog's party hat as a symbol of their friendship. And then she steps in dog shit, looks down, and throws up on her feet. And throws up on it. I love her so fucking much. She is just a walking mess. Like so many little girls out there. Just constant peril. She is a disaster and I love her. Miss Fortune makes her way down to the end of a pier where she is picked up by a pack of crows and taken into the sky.

24:06 Geez. She screams and decides, I'm gonna get out of this. And she throws glitter in the bird's eyes, which confuses them. They let go and she starts to fall, and fall, and fall, and fall, and fall. How high up do these fucking birds get? I don't know, because Miss Fortune says this is taking a really long time. I've been falling for 30 minutes. We didn't even go that high up. Like she fucking roasts the birds, and was like, this was stupid. A white bird flies by her. It's wearing sunglasses, several stacked gold chains for some fucking reason, and is shaped like a hand flipping the middle finger. Miss Fortune goes, ah, that was a rude bird.

24:47 He flipped her the bird. Somewhat gracefully, Miss Fortune lands back on the dock. She says, why didn't I break my legs and die? Mr. Voice tells her she must be very good at falling. She likes this and says, well, thank you. Mr. Voice and Miss Fortune talk to each other about the puppy and how they'll tell George the owner that the dog died. Miss Fortune resolves to do the brave thing and tell George the truth about his dog dying. Mr. Voice appreciates this decision. Down the pier, Miss Fortune sees a fish that jumped out of the water onto the dock. Miss Fortune names him Rodrigo and wonders aloud if he likes sushi.

25:28 I bet he does not like sushi. Well, she comes to the conclusion that sushi is just kind of tiny pieces of Rodrigo. That's why she's curious. He'd be the sushi. Miss Fortune makes her way to George's house. She knocks, but no one answers. Miss Fortune lets herself in and immediately, there is a dead fish floating in a fish tank, just belly up. Rodrigo. It's not Rodrigo. Rodrigo's just loose in her bag right now. Miss Fortune says that once she saw a man floating like that dead fish in the lake. Oh my God. Which is so horrific. Of course she did though. There's a painting of a man and a young boy on the wall.

26:10 They look like father and son. Miss Fortune looks up and says she wishes she had a picture of her with her parents like this. As she does, a translucent figure of the same boy runs past the window. Miss Fortune saw him, but doesn't look too far into it. She just says, hello? Oh, that was nothing. Further in the house, Miss Fortune enters a room and only sees feet dangling from the ceiling. Mr. Voice tells Miss Fortune, oh dear, George has hung himself. Oh, just straight up says it. Miss Fortune asks, like a pinata? Should I hit him like a pinata? Poke it with a stick. Mr. Voice is immediately uncomfortable and tells Miss Fortune they should leave because the man has died.

26:54 Please don't hit him like a pinata. Right. Miss Fortune tells George, now that you're dead, your puppy is gone. I liked the puppy. She throws glitter at the corpse and says, happiness to George the pinata. The person that's gonna come around investigating all this shit is gonna be so confused. We have an art teacher murderer. You're like a serial killer whose little MO is they spray glitter everywhere. Honestly, slay. It ruins all of the crime scene. No one wants to deal with it. All the cops are like, we're not going to that site. There's glitter everywhere. Send me to the blood and sludge crime. Right. Mr. Voice leads Miss Fortune into the woods where he warns her that all foxes are evil.

27:38 So keep your eyes open. Miss Fortune accepts this and wanders deeper into the forest. She sees a straw doll with a small note that says, everything begins with the song of a jackdaw. She pockets it and Mr. Voice asks her what she has. She chooses to lie to Mr. Voice and says she has nothing. Oh. Miss Fortune keeps going and sees a fox. She says she recognizes him as Benjamin, the fox she has a crush on. Right. Benjamin is painting a red circle in the dirt with rune shapes inside and two lit candles. It looks like a ritual. Mr. Voice tells her to attack Benjamin before he kills her. But Miss Fortune says, no, that's a nice fox.

28:22 As she goes up to him, he runs away. Mr. Voice says, oh, we are safe now. Mr. Voice, who is wildly relieved that the fox has run, tells Miss Fortune that they need to find a magical cave nearby. Miss Fortune says, okay, and then she giggles to herself. As they leave, Miss Fortune stands on the circle the fox was making. She says, it's pretty cool Benjamin likes to paint. Do you think he's an artist? Mr. Voice tells her to keep going, but Miss Fortune goes to finish the circle Benjamin was painting. We get a flash of the world outside the circle in a dark, deserted wasteland. It's dark, decrepit, rotting, and empty. Then it all flashes back to normal. Miss Fortune heads deeper into the woods.

29:04 Miss Fortune finds this cave that they were looking for, and there's police tape at the entrance of the cave. Always a good sign. Right. Mr. Voice encourages her to explore. Miss Fortune likes the echoes of the massive caves, so she's like, all right, let's fucking do this. She starts heading into the dark of the cave, and something small and fast flies by her feet. She didn't get a good look, but we, the audience, did. And I don't think in a million years you'd guess what just ran by her feet. I was thinking a rat or scorpion. It was a hamster in a tiny hamster-sized sports car. What the fuck is this game? Give me 10 seconds, like, no, just look at me.

29:45 10 seconds, okay? Oh, I'm gonna trust you on this one. Misfortune soon runs into an underground hamster strip club. It got weirder? There's a big neon sign that says, live nude hamsters, X, X, X. It's like the little fucking town in Beetlejuice. There's a uniformed bouncer outside checking IDs. Of course, there is. There's a group of hipster hamsters smoking cloves outside. Hipster hamsters drove up in their Kia. It is a soul, sir. Oh, is that what it is? It's a Kia Soul, I think. There's also one super drunk hamster barely keeming it together, just swaying outside the club.

30:29 And right in front of Little Misfortune, who is easily three times the size of one of these hamsters? I was wondering if she was hamster sized or if she was still people sized. Nah, she is who she needs to be. One hamster is robbing another hamster at knife point. Knife point? Mr. Voice asks if Misfortune is going to do anything about it, gives her the opportunity, and she says yes, and she breaks up the fight. She picks up each hamster, one in each hand, and makes them kiss each other by smashing their faces together, and then they both run off. They're so confused. Misfortune sees the robber hamster drop something in the scuffle and investigates.

31:09 His knife. She finds a small plastic sandwich bag with about 20 small white tablets. Oh my god, he's pushing drugs? Misfortune says, are those mints? I should try them so I can keep my breath fresh. Oh god, don't do that. I'm a little lady, you know? She keeps calling herself a little lady, which is the cutest fucking thing. That's adorable. Anyway, she houses a mystery pill. Oh god. And immediately her vision begins to blur. Yep. She says she's starting to feel real nice. And then she wights out. Oh god, don't just pick up loose pills and toss them in your mouth, everybody. Especially when you find them outside the Hamster Strip Club in the Underground.

31:50 Dropped by the one that's robbing the other hamster. Misfortune goes into a dream drug sequence, where friends she's drawn come to life and fly on a big rainbow with her. Holy shit, it's like the fucking, like, elephant scene. And then the crows come. The crows picket her friends in the rainbow and envelop her in a blanket of darkness. Misfortune wakes up sometime later, face down in her own vomit in front of the Hamster Strip Club. She says, that wasn't minty refreshment at all. She hasn't eaten enough to throw up as much as she has. She's thrown up so many times already.

32:30 Mr. Voice checks in on her, and she's like, I'm okay. I'm cool, I'm a little lady. Misfortune loves to party, so she goes back to investigate the Hamster Club. She goes to the Hamster Bouncer and says, excuse me, could a little lady get inside? No? Is it too small for her to fit inside anyway? There is a way to get in the Hamster Club. Really? Yeah. Misfortune talks shit to Mr. Voice before going deeper in the caves. She sees an older hamster lady complete with a pearl necklace, big glasses, and purple hair. It looks like she's been robbed, and she's missing her purse, and she's on the ground. Oh, no.

33:10 Misfortune tries to help her, but she just flies off and runs back to the club. Misfortune's like, well, damn, and goes over to a ladder and escapes the underground. So this playthrough didn't have it, but when I was looking up things, I was like, could you get in the club? Yes, 100,000% you can get into the club. How? There's an alternative sequence where Misfortune can get into a dance battle at the Hamster Strip Club. Not a stripper battle. And the first stripper you see is a presumably male-presenting hamster in like a thong, and it's so fun. Didn't you say she's eight? Yes. This is problematic.

33:52 You look uncomfortable. I told you there's trigger warnings. This was not what I was expecting at all. What were you expecting? I don't know, a little Nightmares clone. Okay, like, oh, a spooky girl runs into birds. Yeah. Which is happening. In addition to the Hamster Strip Club and her accidentally maybe taking some molly. Holy fuck. She needs to team up with Ness and the guys from Earthbound. They like their drugs too. Just do some fucked up kids doing drug shit. Yeah. That's terrible. I love it. Miss Fortune comes out of the cave to the underground tunnels and pipes where she sees more hamsters doing hamster shit. She has to get by them to get out of the underground, but they're blocking all the exits with all their hamster shit.

34:36 And to be clear, hamster shit is crime. I was going to say, you keep saying hamster shit, but these hamsters are unlike any hamsters I've ever seen. Well, one is doing some breaking bad science shit. One is counting money, and one is patrolling with a shotgun, a hamster size shotgun. He's like, I feel the need to clarify. Miss Fortune finds a crate of acorns, inconspicuously marked squirrel speed, and uses a slingshot to distract the hamsters. Squirrel speed. Yeah, so it's like it's the shell of an acorn, but inside there's a little dime bag in there. Of speed. Of speed. Nice little eight ball for acorns.

35:18 Miss Fortune manages to trigger a fire alarm, and as the hamsters leave, they give Miss Fortune the opportunity to escape. As Miss Fortune walks by the setup of the lab of the Breaking Bad Hamster, she tells Mr. Voice, her daddy had a science project like this in their basement. She doesn't know why, but her mommy was really mad about it. I can understand why. Because he was cooking meth? Yeah. Yes, I understand. Outside on the surface, the scene shows a manhole cover. We don't see Miss Fortune yet, so Mr. Voice takes the opportunity to talk to the player. He tells them, I totally get this is difficult to not know what's going on with Miss Fortune, and if she's dying or not dying, if she'll get the prize of eternal happiness, totally get it.

36:02 He says he personally hopes she does get it for what it's worth. And then he clears his throat and tells the player to act normal because she's coming. Miss Fortune busts out of the manhole cover and asks, Where am I? Mr. Voice tells her she's on the way to the prize of eternal happiness. Miss Fortune walks down the sidewalk and sees a poster for a missing child. It makes her uncomfortable and she says, Maybe she should go back home. Mr. Voice assures her he can protect her, and she moves on. Just feet away from the missing child poster, Miss Fortune sees another girl around her age with the same hair as the girl in the poster. Her eyes, though, are whited out and she's almost see-through.

36:42 Oh, shit. Miss Fortune looks at her and says, Hello. And as a car passes, the girl disappears. Fucking ghost kid. Adults pass Miss Fortune and they're all wearing white masks with smiles carved into them. Every adult she sees has this mask, and it's very like We Happy Few. Miss Fortune isn't fazed by this. In this world, the masks are very normal to her. She then sees Benjamin the Fox posting papers to a community cork board. His signs say variations of hide your children with drawings of a forest monster. Hide your kids, hide your wife. I mean, yeah. Miss Fortune is so excited to see Benjamin and tells him, Hey, if he ever wants to hang out, she's available.

37:25 Mr. Voice scolds her saying foxes are dangerous. Stop trying to fuck the fox. Miss Fortune goes up to Benjamin and asks if he's a dangerous fox, which is a little flirty and runs off. Are you a bad boy? She's sad as he runs away. But Mr. Voice says, this is a good thing because he doesn't want anything bad to happen to her. And he fucking hates foxes. Miss Fortune carries on telling a train to slow down, you fuck. Mr. Voice tells her to watch her language, and she just replies. On the walk through town, Miss Fortune asked Mr. Voice if anyone has won the game yet. He says, yeah, of course. And they lived happily ever after.

38:08 Miss Fortune says she wants to win the prize for her mommy. She just wishes she could give her mommy some happiness. Miss Fortune cuts through a park and sees a big drunk seagull sitting in a sandbox. The seagull is holding a bottle and is shaking with hiccups. Miss Fortune says the seagull looks like Kevin's dad. He used to sleep in the sandbox next to the school. He didn't have any clothes on and the police officer beat him with a stick. Oh, my God, this town is fucked. It's pretty trashy, I'm not gonna lie. Oh, my Lord. Mr. Voice tells Miss Fortune to give the seagull Rodrigo, the fish Miss Fortune picked up earlier. Miss Fortune figured that's the fair thing to do, so she throws Rodrigo the fish to the seagull.

38:51 It hits him in the face, and he picks it up and eats the whole fish in one bite, leaving the bones fully intact in a skeleton. Now, the bird, he liked sushi. This breaks Miss Fortune's heart because Rodrigo was her friend. She picks up her friend's bones and says she'll bury him later. Then throws glitter on it. Fucking glitter. In the park, Miss Fortune finds another straw doll with a note, and she pockets it. Once again, she hides this from Mr. Voice. At the park entrance, Miss Fortune sees more notes from Benjamin with the warning, hide your children, and drawings of a forest monster.

39:32 Mr. Voice says it's bad and should be killed with fire. Fucking hate this guy. Miss Fortune says, no, no, she sees some real artistic talent in these. Mr. Voice and Miss Fortune end up at a pet cemetery, and Miss Fortune sees more missing children posters. One shows a girl we'd seen earlier in town, and the other looks just like her Japanese friend, Hiro. Miss Fortune is sad, but Mr. Voice distracts her with a game. He tells her the prize is in the grave for the goldfish, and gets Miss Fortune a shovel. She gets ready to go grave robbing. What the shit? We left the strip club, now we're going grave robbing. Again, eight years old. Miss Fortune goes grave to grave, seeing stones for, like, the first pug to strangle a man, a beloved but departed magpie, other pets that aren't goldfish.

40:22 She even sees one open grave and decides to bury Rodrigo the fish. She delivers a eulogy stating, Rodrigo smelled like a fish. I like that in a fish. He was nice. I hope he liked me. Bye, Rodrigo. After the funeral, Miss Fortune finds the grave we're looking for, and it says, Mr. Bubbles. Classic fish name. There's a small box in the grave, and Mr. Voice congratulates Miss Fortune on finding the prize of eternal happiness. Miss Fortune goes to open the box, and instead of eternal happiness, there's a note saying, I stole your eternal happiness. Signed, Benjamin. What a dick.

41:07 But you know, for her, maybe being with Benjamin would be eternal happiness. Oh. Mr. Voice takes the opportunity to say, he knew the fox was trouble. He stole the prize. Miss Fortune is so sad, because she really wanted to win the prize for her mommy, and now she doesn't know what to do. Mr. Voice says, they must find the fox and get her happiness back. Miss Fortune agrees to the plan, and they head back into town to look for Benjamin. At the gates of the pet cemetery, Miss Fortune sees Benjamin, and she confronts him, saying, did you steal my eternal happiness? Not cool! And Benjamin turns to look at her. In that moment of them together, the world around Miss Fortune and Benjamin breaks away into the gray, deserted wasteland we've been seeing in flashes, where the world is dark and decrepit and rotting and empty.

41:57 Just as the world shifts back into the one we know, Benjamin runs off, leaving a frightened and bewildered Miss Fortune behind. Mr. Voice tells Miss Fortune to run after him, because he stole your prize. Miss Fortune says, she's really disappointed in Benjamin. Benjamin left a small straw doll again, this one with a note saying, when unloved children in darkness search for what they have lost, for why they're in pain. When Mr. Voice asks Miss Fortune if she's found something, she straight up lies to him and says, no, you're imagining things. Again. She stays lying, and I kind of fucking love that for her. Don't trust this fucking voice. Back in the woods, Miss Fortune finds what looks like a strange gravestone.

42:39 It's got red carvings and strange runes on it. She tells Mr. Voice, this isn't a normal stone. She reads a message carved onto it that says, the game of death is what feeds the shadows of the beyond. Then Miss Fortune takes a piece of the strange gravestone out for herself that has like a rune carving on it, and as she does, the message disappears. She's like, damn, that's crazy. She damn that crazy. And she pockets part of the rune. Further down, Miss Fortune finds a hole in the ground with some leaves like poorly laid over it, like a trap. What, like a punji pit? Basically, yeah. Like they have in Tony Hawk Pro Skater and the Vietnam War.

43:21 Right. But anyway, Mr. Fox is like, that's got to be where the fox went. Go down there, it'll be safe and fine. His fortune figures. All right. And she falls down the hole face first. Oh, gosh. She wakes up underground and calls to Mr. Voice, but doesn't hear back from him. Down here, the ground is dirty and there's hay everywhere. She immediately finds a needle in a haystack and exclaims, she found a needle in a haystack. That quickly? She then immediately loses it. I love that she found it so fast, but then immediately lost it. She's brilliant, but she's kind of an idiot, and I love her.

44:01 Oh, that's great. Next, she finds a full display for a perfume bottle called Fox Repellent. She pockets this as well and continues through the underground. Eventually, Misfortune sees Benjamin digging a hole. He walks to her and Misfortune cries out to him. He pushes past her and runs away, leaving Misfortune face down in the dirt again. The screen goes black and we hear Mr. Voice complaining about what he's gotten himself into. Oh, shit. That she's such a mess. Maybe it was a mistake choosing her for this. Oh, what the fuck? I mean, he saw her eating glitter. Who does that? It's not natural. As his rant winds down, Misfortune wakes up face down on the sidewalk in the city.

44:46 She asks what's happening, and Mr. Voice pretends to be relieved he or she's okay. He tells her that Benjamin attacked her, and he told her that the fox was evil, but they still need to find the fox and take back the Eternal Happiness Prize. Misfortune decides they should find out where he lives. Thankfully, Mr. Voice did a quick Google search, and they call it a Google search, and found out that Benjamin's cousin is in the zoo. Misfortune can take the bus, go visit Benjamin's cousin at the zoo, and get Benjamin's address, and get Misfortune's Eternal Happiness back. Solid plan. Assuming that the cousin's gonna cooperate. On the way to the bus stop, Misfortune goads Mr.

45:27 Voice about just being a voice in her head. He tells her, he's not just a voice, and he bends and breaks a lamp post on the street to prove his power. Oh, shit, he's God. Misfortune actually misses this entire thing because she was busy tying her shoe. That kind of annoys Mr. Voice. Back in town, Misfortune sees another missing child poster. She recognizes the girl from her class. Mr. Voice says she's probably just a runaway that will go home soon. Misfortune does find some solace in this. As they pass the liquor store, Misfortune says her mommy takes her here all the time, and it's so boring. She tells Mr. Voice that sometimes her mommy sends her to buy cigarettes while she hugs men behind the dumpster here.

46:11 How does she go buy cigarettes? Are you really gonna gloss over that her mommy needs her to go away while she hugs men by a dumpster? That was just kind of par for the course with mom at this point. Well, it was the 90s, you know. They had smoking sections and Chuck E. Cheese's apparently. Honestly, at this level, mom's depravity does not surprise me. She just loves her juice, okay. Right. Misfortune looks around and sees the arcade next to the liquor store. She tells a story about getting left there overnight by her mommy and scaring the shit out of a security guard who thought she was a raccoon who broke in. Overnight! Isn't that so? Like, I know it's a dream, and I know it's literally like an episode of the OC, but what a nightmare.

46:52 But still, like, this is the most negligent fucking parent I've ever heard of. He calls her a wonderful child from a not-so-wonderful family. Yeah, but still, so was Matilda, and her parents weren't this fucking bad. And she at least got powers. Yeah. This girl just gets puke. And, like, falling face down into shit, this poor girl's nose is destroyed. She gets a fucking voice in her head, visions. She is not having it. She's not okay. She's also coming down from Molly. So she's probably really sad about it, too. Oh, my God. Here in town, there's also a white mask store with the slogan, Let's Face It.

47:33 Sometimes we're just too tired to smile. That's the full name of the store? That's, like, the tagline of the store. I thought Let's Face It. That was good, but then you just kept fucking going. Just a really long title for a business. There's a billboard with even more missing kid posters. Miss Fortune is scared, but Mr. Voice assures her the kids will all turn up. She accepts the assurance, but doesn't seem to genuinely believe him. At the bus stop, Miss Fortune giggles about a street called Dickens Road, which I get. That's funny. Miss Fortune sits down at the bench because her feet are too tired from walking all day, and she's a little lady.

48:13 The bus comes and Miss Fortune finds herself a seat. She tells Mr. Voice that her Japanese friend, Hiro, is keeping her company for the ride. She reminds Mr. Voice that he's a ghost, and he's always saying, Kiri wa doko de suka. I looked this up, and a friend told me it means, Where is the fog? Where's the fog? The fog. Fuck, we haven't had any fog yet in the game. This is just dark. Now you're introducing weather conditions. Oh shit, this fog does not sound like it's going to be a good thing. Misfortune looks out the window and sees one cow take a massive dysentery shit on the face of another baby cow. What the fuck?

48:57 We're in the South Park game now for no reason. Oh my god, this game is way stranger. Yeah, the humor I'm seeing, but like it's not humor that I was expecting. What, fart humor? Yeah, like diarrhea dumping cows on each other. This is fucking bizarre. Well, Misfortune knows that and she says unlucky things seem to happen all the time. Oh, are you OK? You seem bummed. We just have to keep going. Then the bus driver announces the zoo is the next stop. Misfortune is so excited to go inside, but she doesn't have a ticket. Mr. Voice asks if she has any ideas on how to get in for free. Misfortune tells Mr. Voice that sometimes her mommy shows her boobies to the guy at the store for free food.

49:40 Oh, my God. But she doesn't have her boobies yet, so that might not work. She is eight years old. Please don't try it. Misfortune resolves to destroy property and throws Stoney through a window display to distract the ticket taker. Misfortune shatters the display, runs over to retrieve Stoney. Again, her friend, the Bloody Rock. And manages to sneak into the zoo while the ticket taker is distracted by this. Mission accomplished. Stoney was also going to have her DNA all over it. Or at least her daddy's. Oh no, you're right. It hits her. That's her blood. Ugh, what a bummer. Mr. Voice says, isn't this wonderful?

50:22 We'll get to see so many caged animals. Misfortune clocks that he said caged animals, and that's kind of sadistic as fuck to say. But then Mr. Voice diverts to complimenting her sneaky sneaks. Then directs Misfortune to find the wolves. They know where Benjamin lives. That's who we need to see. On the way, Misfortune sees a few caged birds. The first one she sees is a parrot, who is a pirate wearing a bandana. She doesn't like this bird and tells it to give yourself a fuck. Mr. Voice says, oh dear, we need to get your happiness back as soon as possible. You are a dark child. The next caged bird is an owl with glasses, a scarf, and is reading a book.

51:04 It has looked like any asshole in a coffee shop in 2012. The last of the caged birds is an old friend, the rude middle finger bird from the sky. Hell yeah. Misfortune looks at it and says, somehow I feel offended by this bird. She reads the informational sign to see what its name is, and it's called the Fucadillius, the genus Fucadillius Dischidius. Fucadillius Dischidius? Yes, that's its genus. Mr. Voice tells her not to be offended because the bird doesn't know what it's doing. At the wolf cage, Mr. Voice and Misfortune run into an issue. They have to go through an area of the zoo that is closed and under maintenance.

51:47 Misfortune goes to Sneaky Sneak past the maintenance worker and immediately falls on her face. She says she's a little ninja lady. While they're right behind the worker, Mr. Voice tries to like hype her up and give her focus. Mr. Voice tells Misfortune, now wait for her to turn her back to you. And Misfortune finishes the thought by saying, and then I kill her from behind. Bewildered, Mr. Voice says, what? No. Misfortune says, that's what the ninjas do in the movies. She's seen like all of them. Mr. Voice says, no, this isn't a movie. Just when she turns around, move quickly. Right. That's all I was trying to tell you.

52:27 Misfortune goes, I got it. Misfortune runs past the worker and falls flat on her face again, twice, but makes it to the other side. On her way to the wolf cage, there's another strange gravestone. It's big and glows red like the last one when the runestone is placed in the center hole. When the strange gravestone is hole again, the message lights up saying, the path to center CD is twisted by malevolent games from the beyond. Misfortune removes the runestone, and the message disappears, just like the first one. Mr. Voice tells Misfortune not to pay any attention to the silly rocks. They get to the wolf exhibit, and Mr. Voice instructs Misfortune to enter the wolf cage to get Benjamin's address.

53:12 Misfortune solves some puzzles to get into the cage, and along the way finds another straw doll. This one's message says, When broken hearts are chose to receive the gift from beyond. She again hides this from Mr. Voice. In the wolf cage, Misfortune simply walks in. The wolf inspects her. It smells her, and then it simply walks out of the cage. Misfortune is so sad that she's scared off the wolf. She's like, animals fucking hate me. Mr. Voice is surprised the wolf didn't maul her and goes, Oh, that was unexpected. Well, it's not a Harambe situation there. Girl. Then he points out a note for Misfortune to grab. The note says, My evil cousin's address, Fox, with an address in open fields.

53:58 Misfortune now has Benjamin's address, and Mr. Voice says that they can get the prize back for eternal happiness. He says the fastest way to Benjamin's house is to take a boat that's accessible through a local goth festival, Fantasmagoria. Misfortune loves spooky shit. Of course, she's a little goth girl, and she is so excited. She's always wanted to go to Fantasmagoria, and now she gets to go. Mr. Voice and Misfortune catch up a little on the walk to Fantasmagoria. They pass a lot of missing children posters. He asks her some questions like if she's ever lied, and she admits she lies to a friend about something. Her friend thinks Misfortune's dad picks her up after school, but really she just waits until her friend isn't looking and runs into the woods to get home.

54:43 Mr. Voice says, that is so sad. On the event grounds, Misfortune is so excited for all the spooky shit. There's ghosts and clowns and all sorts of like ghouls and things. She runs off into the festival and leaves the player alone with Mr. Voice. Mr. Voice calls out to the player saying, hey you. She deserves to have a good time, so make the right decisions for her. We catch back up with Misfortune as she explores Phantasmagoria. There's a carousel or a haunted house she can ride, and stilt walkers like wandering the streets. It's really cool. That's awesome. Misfortune goes out to a jack-o'-lantern and tells Mr. Voice that the kids at school have called her a pumpkin head.

55:23 He says he can see the resemblance. Honestly, you called her a pumpkin head earlier. Well, that was a literary technique. Misfortune says she doesn't know what resemblance means, but she is suspicious. Misfortune says, hey, there's free candy, but it's really just spilled candy that's on the ground of a festival. Mr. Voice tells her not to eat it, but it's free candy, so of course she does. Right, she's already eaten loose pills. Her stomach is immediately in pain, and then she has a vision. She learns nothing. No, she's eight. She's in the basement alone and is pulled up by a giant fox arm to dinner with her mommy and her daddy. Her daddy is a straw man that looks like the straw dolls she's been finding all over town.

56:07 The straw daddy sets on fire, and she sadly watches her heart beat. The vision ends, and Miss Fortune is pale and swaying and looks visibly nauseous. Mr. Voice tells her he told her not to eat it, but Miss Fortune throws glitter and says, happiness to Miss Fortune, and now all is better. To cheer herself up after this, I had Miss Fortune ride the horror house, which is like a scary haunted house dark ride where aliens and the swamp thing pop out and scare her. She is scared, but she does it, and after she gets out, she says she's feeling dizzy. Mr. Voice talks her through it and tells her they need to go find a boat. Miss Fortune heads through the event and sees her friend, Hero, the Japanese ghost boy.

56:50 She calls to him, but he vanishes into thin air. Miss Fortune moves on to the games area of the event. There's a shooting game that uses real bullets and a minigun for some fucking reason. A minigun? Miss Fortune goes to play, and because it's a fucking minigun, it destroys the entire booth with live ammunition. Holy shit. She breaks the carnival. Then she plays Whack-A-Fox, which unfortunately looks like Benjamin, but that does make Mr. Voice very happy. Miss Fortune goes to the back of the event, where there's a small pier. At the end of the pier is a black swan boat with fairy lights through it. The boat is headed by a cloaked skeleton, the same one we saw at the game's opening.

57:32 They are silent as Miss Fortune hurls a chocolate gold coin at them and boards the boat. Mr. Voice makes a joke about the boat encountering a kraken. Miss Fortune doesn't know what a kraken is, and Mr. Voice doesn't explain what it is, so begins to like seep into her psyche. Later, in the middle of the lake, Miss Fortune is singing a song dedicated to the elusive kraken. And now I will read you the lyrics. Please. Oh, kraken, if you appear in front of me, I will see you. And if I see you, I will know it is you, sweet kraken. Come up in front of me right now. That's the whole song? She stops singing and realizes it's very quiet.

58:15 Then Miss Fortune asks Mr. Voice if she could pet the kraken like a doggy. Miss Fortune shifts her focus to the cloaked skeleton. She starts asking them questions, and she speaks nonstop at them while they remain completely silent. Eventually, in the middle of the lake, the cloaked figure jumps out of the boat and into the water. Oh my god. Mr. Voice says, that's what happens when little ladies ask too many questions. It makes people want to drown themselves. So now we're getting misogynistic about it. I mean, it's that, and it's also like you talk too much, and people want to unlive themselves because of it. It's very rude. Miss Fortune goes, Ah, it'll be fine. Because she might be like a grizzled old man about it.

58:57 Luckily, they arrive on the shore, eager to see Benjamin the Fox. On the shore, Miss Fortune sees a ton of discarded toys. Mr. Voice tells Miss Fortune, there's something very wrong here. Something is coming. Hide! Miss Fortune is weary of this, but moves forward. Just out of reach, over a fallen tree, is Hiro, her Japanese friend. He looks at her, then vanishes. Miss Fortune leaves the shore and heads into the woods. In the woods, she sees a collection of big rocks and pulls out Stoney. She tells him, look, Stoney, this is your family. I love her for that. I was just thinking, she's probably like really comfortable in the woods since that's her way home every day. Yeah, right.

59:38 Miss Fortune heads in deeper and eventually falls and gets her little foot stuck in a tree root. Never mind. As she tries to get free, the world shifts again to the deserted gray landscape. The lush forest around her is dead. She looks over and sees a massive clawed hand reach out at her. She says, it's the monster. Mr. Voice, can you see it? He doesn't respond to her. Miss Fortune gets free and sprints down through the woods away from the monster. Mr. Voice returns, asking if she's running away from the fox, because he's pretty sure it was the fox. Miss Fortune insists that it's the monster and then falls flat on her face. She thankfully though, fell right in front of Benjamin.

1:00:19 Benjamin had binoculars and was investigating something when Miss Fortune fell at his feet. Mr. Voice tells Miss Fortune not to move, but she gets up with Benjamin's help. Mr. Voice tells Benjamin not to touch her, and Miss Fortune scolds Mr. Voice for this. Benjamin looks around and sprints away. Miss Fortune calls after him before chasing him. So was it unclear whether Benjamin could hear the voice or not? I think he could. He's kind of like, oh, shit. What's going on here? As Miss Fortune runs at the night, Mr. Voice begs her to slow down. He doesn't want her to get hurt. She eventually runs into another runestone with a bear trap near it. Mr. Voice gives her an, I told you so, like, you're running around, there's fucking bear traps.

1:01:02 And he warns her not to hurt herself. Also, I'm just gonna throw it out there. I think the fox is behind this. Poor Benjamin is not trusted at all. No, and like, Mr. Voice even puts a cherry on it. He goes, I don't like the fox, by the way. We know. Sir, we know. Miss Fortune looks at the bear trap and thinks about her stuffed bear, Bubsy. He lives in a world of fantasy where there are no bear traps. He's gonna be very sad to know about the bear traps. And if he would go in the woods, he would see this and not know he's dying. Now she sees Bubsy being killed by a bear trap. That's how it is. He's dead. Bubsy died. Mr. Voice asks what she's talking about.

1:01:44 Miss Fortune says, Bubsy, I'm talking about Bubsy. Before leaving, Miss Fortune places the rune stone in the strange gravestone, and as she does, it glows red. There is a message that reads, the illumination of Prumeve will dissolve the filth of the beyond. Miss Fortune is unable to remove this rune stone, and the message doesn't go away. She then finds another straw doll, this one with a message saying, the games you enjoy, you can have them all. Mr. Voice and Miss Fortune continue on their journey through the woods. Mr. Voice asks Miss Fortune if she believes in magic, and she says no. Daddy said the only magic came from acid. What the fuck, from acid? Yeah.

1:02:24 I was like, what, is he Mr. Dursley? Nah, he's a fucking druggy. Yeah, his Breaking Bad set pissed off Mommy. Oh, he gets his drugs from the fucking hamsters. Miss Fortune says the only acid I know is when I lick batteries. What the shit? That's not any safer, really. Don't you just want to save this little girl? Oh my goodness, honestly, with what Mr. Voice told us at the beginning, that outcome might be the best for her. Mr. Voice notices the storm clouds are coming in. Miss Fortune says she doesn't like getting her feet wet. She's a little lady, you know. They come up on a cabin and it's got to be Benjamin's cabin. Mr.

1:03:04 Voice tells her he'll wait out here, but if she sees the fox, she should run. Miss Fortune heads inside, and as she does, she tells herself, be brave, Miss Fortune. The cabin is small and messy. Miss Fortune still has a bit of a crush on the fox and is like, oh, he's cut so much wood. He's probably so masculine and muscular. He's a real fox. She finds a VHS player, because again, it's 1993. Oh, right. And watches the tape that's already in the machine. It's of Benjamin building a tent outside and a monster coming up behind them. Miss Fortune recognizes it as the monster she's seen before. She finds Benjamin's diary, which obviously she snoops in. I don't know why you wouldn't.

1:03:46 Right. In his diary, Benjamin tracked being asked to go to this area for a dangerous mission. He's been hunting a parasite that has had so many victims. He's been leaving dolls for the victims around town as a warning to the children. His code doesn't allow him to directly interfere with children in this reality, so he's just doing his best to do an awareness campaign. He talked about seeing the parasite, and that's the monster Benjamin saw on the tape. She reads on and sees that Benjamin saw the parasite was a demon entity called Morgo, and Morgo likes to play games. Morgo has been hunting children and taking them away, and Benjamin is here to stop it.

1:04:27 Morgo has been going after a girl named Misfortune. Benjamin vows to save her, but Morgo is very scary. The drawing of Morgo that Benjamin made looks just like the monster Misfortune has been afraid of. Oh, shit. Benjamin details watching Misfortune and being weirded out that she was watching him, too. After reading this, Misfortune is like, Oh, my God, he's probably in love with me. Yes, read into it what you want to see. Benjamin also has a partial food journal where he details eating mushrooms that he found in the woods and having really bad farts, but then was like, honestly, fuck yeah, mushrooms make my stomach feel warm. That's why it's farting so much.

1:05:07 Benjamin has watched Morgo start to talk to Misfortune earlier today. Benjamin notes that Morgo was confused by the charms of Misfortune, and after reading that, Misfortune is like, Oh, my God, I do be talking too much. The last entry is Benjamin hyping himself up to be courageous and confident today. He made himself a good breakfast tea with herbs from the woods, and he was getting a funny feeling from them. He was getting ready for something big and may have drugged himself. Jesus, so much drugs in this game. Drug use. Misfortune put his diary back and snoops around more in the cabin. She sees the cooled cup of tea on his table and figured, she'll have a little bit. Oh, God, this girl's going to drug herself again.

1:05:51 This is not the first time today this has happened. Holy shit. She romantically says, this must be Benjamin's blend. She sips it and says, it tastes like his fluffy paws. Yeah, it tastes like dirt. Then the music slows down and Miss Fortune's vision begins to blur. She says, I feel weird before slipping into a catatonic hallucinatory state. You know when the last time we saw this happen? Like, not that long ago. Leisure Suit Larry. Shut the fuck up. I thought you were going to be like, at the hamster ship club, but nah, it's worse and more depraved. Miss Fortune sees herself on a lakeside picnic with Benjamin.

1:06:31 They sit on a blanket and drink juice and eat sandwiches. There are hearts in both of their eyes as they fall in love over PB&Js. They begin to hold hands and fly through the sky, and when they are attacked by crows, the crows pick at their hands and they are separated. Miss Fortune comes to Lucidity in a puddle of her own vomit. Go figure. She's confused and scared, but she shakes it off. Benjamin enters the cabin through a secret staircase on the floorboards. Miss Fortune offers to share the Eternal Happiness Prize if he just gives it back. A thunder clap booms through the cabin, and Benjamin goes to run back and forth in the cabin. Miss Fortune asks if Benjamin is afraid of thunder.

1:07:11 Benjamin grabs his diary and points to the drawing he made of Morggo. Morggo is here, and Benjamin has to be courageous and confident. Mr. Voice calls out, saying, You can't hide the children. Benjamin is worried and runs down the secret stairs. Miss Fortune follows him under the guise of Benjamin rescuing her, as if she was a girl in trouble. She's really over-romanticizing this assault. Oh, the entire time. Miss Fortune tumbles down the staircase and lands directly on her face. The stairs lead into a basement. Behind a painting in the basement is a small secret passage leading into another room. Miss Fortune has no other choice, so she climbs a stool and jumps to throw herself through the passage, but she kind of gets stuck in the middle.

1:07:56 She's limp on the top and the bottom half of her body as she like flops to push through the hole in the wall. As she does, she gets nervous, and she starts farting up a storm. She goes, toot, toot, toot, and then she goes, shh, little butt crack. Be quiet. This is a ninja mission. Little butt crack. The farts come out as small green clouds, and it's the most darling shit. This is Natalia's favorite part of the game. Deeper in Benjamin's secret room, Miss Fortune finds tunnels leading out of the woods. As she leaves, she gives herself some affirmations like, hell yeah, I get up, I keep going, I am little lady Miss Fortune.

1:08:39 Emerging from the tunnel, Miss Fortune finds a baby deer. She pats it on the head and is so excited to see it. On the route she's on, she sees Benjamin's bag and wonders if he's in trouble. Mr. Voice returns and tells her he is very disappointed in her. Miss Fortune tells Mr. Voice to stop playing games, that he was lying to her and that's very sucky, that you're the one taking the children and that the eternal happiness is a lie. Mr. Voice says, No, we're playing the game. Miss Fortune says, you can't make me. Mr. Voice says, oh yes I can. And he sends crows down to trip her, and Miss Fortune lands on her fucking face a fucking gun.

1:09:20 He was sending the crows the entire time, wasn't he? Oh, this morgo motherfucker. She is annoyed and she says she doesn't even want eternal happiness anymore. This angers Mr. Voice and he says he'll see her at home. Miss Fortune calls him a freaky monster, and she starts going through Benjamin's bag. She finds another straw doll. This one says, at the end of the road, you realize you already signed the deal. That's foreboding as shit, just straight up. She finds a study guide made for the students of the University of Saint-Surdiste technology on exterminating parasitic beings from the beyond. Right. She finds pages on morgo, the parasite Benjamin was studying.

1:10:03 The notes call out that morgo seemed friendly, but lures victims to play dangerous games. Large flocks of crows will appear near the parasite and act as the eyes of morgo. The book says the protector must warn the victim about the parasite with dolls, writing, paint, etc. Morgo says, Oh my God, I love to paint. We should paint sometime. Oh my God. There's one final section about defeating morgo, but it's torn. Miss Fortune sprinkles glitter on all of this before she jogs on. Benjamin comes out of hiding, goes to his bag after Miss Fortune is far out of sight. Alone, Miss Fortune heads to the train to go home. On the train station board, there's a drawing of morgo with the message, Beware.

1:10:46 Miss Fortune takes some time in solace, knowing that that is Benjamin trying to warn her. And she fucking loves Benjamin. Oh shit. Miss Fortune waits for the train, and while she does, she decides to talk to herself. She envisions another version of her dressed in a Renfair dress, and she pops up on the bench and asks how Miss Fortune's day was. Miss Fortune recounts her day with Mr. Voice and Benjamin. She concludes saying she doesn't like being alone. Renfair Miss Fortune tells her, You go, girl, as real Miss Fortune gets on the train. Miss Fortune sits alone on the train and works on her coloring book for a bit before getting bored. In a flash, she sees her friend, Hiro, across the seat from her.

1:11:28 She says, It's such a coincidence they're on the same train. She had a fight with The Voice in her head. Although it's probably not a voice. I think it's a monster. She asks Hiro if he's ever heard voices in his head. Lightning flashes, and the windows of the fucking train are fogged with the message. Be aware of the consequences written like in the fog on the window. In English this time? Yeah. Hiro repeats the phrase, Kiri wa doko desu ka to Miss Fortune. She asks him what it means, and then Morgo's arm reaches through the train and picks up Hiro. Oh, shit. He screams, Tatsukete! Which means, help me. Morgo peels Hiro away and leaves Miss Fortune all alone again.

1:12:12 And as Hiro disappears, the fog on the windows disappear too. The train pulls up to Miss Fortune's home station. She says she hopes to get to see Hiro again. She's scared to walk all the way home alone. There's signs from Benjamin that say, hide your children! And it just kind of makes her sadder because it makes her think of him. Miss Fortune walks a little further, and comes up on four young adults, all with white smiley face masks talking. Miss Fortune tries to get their attention, but they ignore her. She gets mad and says, well, if that's the way you treat little ladies, give yourself a fuck! I love when kids don't know how to curse. Yeah, and they just kind of put things in weird positions, and you're like, yeah, man, go for it.

1:12:53 Sure. Miss Fortune finally makes it back to her house, where she notices daddy's car is missing. The house lights are glowing red, which Miss Fortune says she likes. She doesn't think it's scary at all. She opens the door and finds her house deserted and abandoned and decrepit. Her parents are long gone. There are cracks in the wall, and the furniture is gone. Oh shit. Miss Fortune follows the path of her house, finding nothing but windy echoes bouncing through bare walls. Miss Fortune wonders what happened here, and Mr. Voice rejoins us. He congratulates Miss Fortune on winning the game, and tells her there is no more eternal happiness for her. She says she doesn't care, but Mr.

1:13:33 Voice reminds Miss Fortune that she needs to win that eternal happiness for her mother. She rolls her eyes and says, Fine, I do need the happiness. What do you want? Mr. Voice tells Miss Fortune, Oh, she'll love this new game. He moves her back to her bedroom, and it's just like in the morning. It's bright and sunny, and Miss Fortune is on the ground playing with her paper dolls. Mr. Voice introduces us to Miss Fortune. She is a wonderful child from a not-so-wonderful family. Don't be a time loop. Oh no, are we in a fucking time loop? She sprinkles glitter on her paper dolls, as Miss Fortune realizes that she's done this before. She says, You say something about me dying today, right?

1:14:14 That doesn't even happen. Are we playing another game, or like, what's going on? Mr. Voice gets a little panic, but promises her eternal happiness. Miss Fortune says, No deal! She refuses to play, which angers Mr. Voice. Eventually, Miss Fortune gets really sick of his shit and tells him she'll play if it involves Benjamin. And maybe you leaving me the fuck alone. She then eventually does resolve to play the game one more time, as long as he promises to leave her alone. Miss Fortune runs down the hallway, breaking the vase again. Miss Fortune gets annoyed. She says, I'm not playing this game again. The world goes dark. Then Miss Fortune's house goes from full to decrepit and red again.

1:14:55 Mr. Voice tells her, They'll play a different game. The house rumbles with Mr. Voice as he says, Knock, knock, who's there? Miss Fortune runs back into her bedroom. It's nearly empty except for her secret spot. She knows he won't be able to find her in there, a pillow fort and otherwise empty room. So she goes in to hide. In her secret spot, Miss Fortune hugs Stoney. Mr. Voice tells her to open the door because they have a game to play. Miss Fortune tells him she doesn't want to play with him anymore and to leave her alone. Mr. Voice breaks down the door in his morgo form and tells her that his game is the only thing keeping her alive.

1:15:35 Miss Fortune calls bullshit and tells him she will live forever and there's nothing he can do about it. Morgo tells her to stop talking about the fox. The fox has been trying to take Miss Fortune away all fucking night. Miss Fortune is so sick of his shit and tells him to go away and she's fucking over it. She doesn't say fucking, but like basically. Right. Morgo tells her this is only the beginning and rips the blanket off the roof of the fort of the secret spot. Morgo grows from 10 to 20 feet tall. He tells her she is a plaything, a collectible he'll play with for eternity. Her room is suddenly on fire and the walls are all crackling around her. Benjamin comes through the window and Morgo tells Benjamin that Misfortune belongs to him.

1:16:17 Benjamin waves his spear at Morgo and defeats Morgo with a well-timed attack. The world whites out as we hear Misfortune screams for Benjamin. Misfortune is now asleep face down in her bedroom floor, which is kind of nice to know that's just how she is. She's always face down. She wakes up and stands up and says, everything is back to normal, maybe? Benjamin saved me. Everything is back to where it was. It's on collar. It's not on fire. Everything is back. There's a straw doll on the floor with a note that says, Morgo is coming. Open your eyes. He's the voice in your head, driving you mad. Misfortune's like, well, shit, now I know what to call Mr.

1:16:58 Voice. Thanks for the diagnosis, I guess. Misfortune leaves her room calling for Benjamin. She walks by the vase, which had cracked, but has been put back together. Her mommy isn't in the kitchen cooking like usual, though. Misfortune goes outside calling for her mommy. Outside by daddy's car, mommy is talking to a police officer. She's holding her arms for comfort. Misfortune says, hello, mommy? Please don't ignore me. The mommy and the officer start to look see-through, like she can't really see them. Misfortune cries and figures, this has to be a bad dream. Then she walks to the road, where she sees her body under a tarp, right in the pathway of where daddy pulled in to park the car.

1:17:43 Fuck, no, no, fuck, oh. Fuuuck, so many things. Wow, oh, from the beginning, I was getting Six Sense vibes anyway, like seeing dead children, but she, oh my fuck. Are you sad? Yeah, I'm sad. That's fucking devastating. Well, the Discord wanted it, Tom. Oh, wow. Misfortune lays beside herself, crying, literally. Benjamin comes to her and hugs her tight.

1:18:24 She asks, what's happening as she dries her tears? She says, we need to go? All right. As she leaves, she tells her mommy that she's going to go somewhere with Benjamin, and she's a little lady, you know? That's what I am. She tells her mommy as she goes away, I guess I was your little Misfortune for a while, but you need to find your own happiness now. I'll love you forever. Benjamin leads Misfortune to the yard where he opens a portal. The portal is blue and a, like, electric circle to another world, the world she had been seeing flashes of all day. It's a world that's dark and decrepit and rotting and empty. Benjamin and Misfortune enter and walk through the fog.

1:19:05 They see the puppy with the party hat. Misfortune is excited to see him again, but doesn't really understand the implication of seeing him again. She sees small creatures and bugs and spooky things, like cameos from other games, like Fran Bow. Misfortune makes it to a tree with crystals. Each time Misfortune spread happiness with her glitter, one of the crystals will light up. Misfortune releases the happiness from her glitter into the tree and then rings the bell that was hanging off his scythe, which is like that stick thing that the fucking death images use. Right. The ground shakes and a bridge is formed, taking Misfortune from one cliffside to another. At the base of the opposite cliffside, Misfortune finds a straw doll.

1:19:49 The note on this one says, All around disasters seem to disappear. Deep inside the fog, you defeat him. A door opens and Benjamin is inside. Misfortune calls after him, and then Benjamin disappears. The cloaked skeleton comes to the door. The cloaked skeleton asks who Misfortune is. They then invite Misfortune through the doors and disappears. Misfortune follows the cloaked skeleton through the doors. The doors close, sealing Misfortune into the underworld. As we hear her ask, What is this place? Oh my god. Back in open fields, the glow of the glitter happiness from the crystals travel across the sky over Misfortune's family home.

1:20:33 The police officer leaves Misfortune's mommy. She's alone now, and the happiness from the glitter starts to land on her and in her heart. Misfortune's mommy takes off her mask and begins to smile, having finally received the happiness her daughter always wanted from her. Well, fuck me. And that's little Misfortune. So cute. Oh, my God. I was having a great time until the end there. It's not a uplifting game, for sure. Like, I was fully ignoring the bioshots that were going on throughout the story, because I was like, no, this is a story about an eight-year-old, so Mr. Bubbles is about a fucking fish, not about fucking, you know, a big daddy, and the fact that we can't trust the person talking to us.

1:21:16 But like, damn, I should have been saying it, because this shit was dark enough. You really should have lightened it with binge drinking. Yeah, I feel you. No, it's a bummer. Everybody else was binge drinking anyway. Holy hell. Just out here hugging dudes behind the dumpster. Wow. Now, if you don't manage to find all the glitter touch points, you don't get that last scene of the mother taking her vase off. Really? You're just like, damn, that sucks. Holy shit. I got it on my first try, which I was very proud of. Well, very good, then. Yeah. Oh, I played this on the Switch. It was fun. It's very cute. It's very sad. I think I mentioned on some other stuff like, hey, I'm playing something right now. It's a fucking bummer.

1:21:56 And I can't play for long periods of time because it makes me too fucking sad. That's right. You said that while we were like doing other things. You're just like, I want to play this game. And then you played it for like 10 minutes and you put it down like, what's wrong? It's just it's so sad. It's a bummer. No, it for sure is. But it is what it is. And it's fun. I get it. It is very funny. Like her being mad at her own little butt crack for farting is very fucking funny. Objectively, you can go to a dance off in a stripper place, run by hamsters. It's kind of fucking great. What was that shit? All right. Honestly, after a while, I was just like, I'm just on this fucking ride with you. So there's also another split that's kind of funny.

1:22:38 When you go up to the puppy, you can either play with him or set him free and be like, hey, come with me or like, oh, let's just play and have a nice memory. I always opted to play with the puppy because I think that's cool. But if you set the puppy free, the puppy will kind of walk with you. And then by the time you get to the beach, it'll be picked up and eaten by birds. There is no saving the puppy. Not in this world, baby. It's such a bummer, but it's really cool. All right. I'm going to take your word for it. I don't know that I'm going to play that one. I think it works for people who liked Night in the Woods. Oh, you love that game. It has a similar sensibility. I can see that aligning. So if you like Night in the Woods, this could be your jam. Well, that's really great. Well, anyways, Goombas, that was another episode of The Other Castle.

1:23:21 If this is your first time listening to us, please don't forget to like and subscribe and do all the different things you can do. If you want more of me, I just did a guest spot on the What's Your Ness? Podcast. That's right, you did. And that's a video one, so if you want to see my face moving around while I tell these stories, that's available on YouTube under What's Your Ness? Podcast. That's N-E-S-S for Ness, right? Yeah, we can link that in the drop notes too. And you can also go to our website, theothercastlepodcast.com. That's the othercastlepodcast.com. Over there, we have all sorts of links to our Discord, which, like we said, we pulled this episode directly from there. Yep, you made me do this. I love the bullying. Thanks, guys.

1:24:01 As well as a link to our Patreon, where for $2 a month, you can help support the show, as well as get monthly access to episodes of The Other Castle Side Quests, which is our Patreon-exclusive series. That's theothercastlepodcast.com. That's not how that works. I promised I was paying attention. Anyway, so we do want to give a big shout out to our patrons, because they are the people that make this show possible. So we have Ian, Danny, Zyra, Ari, BigCatPDX, Rawr, Chase, Alfredo, Micolaj, Tomas, Amber, BerserkPanda, Quim1993, Damien, That Chonky Boy, AJ, Paul, Omar, Aaron, Cerise, Molly, Krisha, Mollymauk, Jackie, Jacob, and Ellen.

1:24:47 Holy shit, there's a lot of you now. Thank you so much. This is fucking great. We appreciate it. And you will be having a fun patron episode from Tom coming up, but I don't want to spoil it. And if you're just in it for the long haul, we will be back in the summer with a full 10 episode season very soon. Oh my goodness. And I also just want to say that this next season, over half the episodes are Discord requests. Are they really? They are. I fucking love our Discord. I do too. Hell yeah. Although you did make me play something very sad, I love you all very dearly. Hey, you know what? You guys have made me play some games I would have never played otherwise, and I am loving the shit out of them. So I am really happy about it. The listeners of the show have very good taste, in my opinion.

1:25:28 I think so because they listen to us. And they have pretty eyes. All of them. Every single one of you. Well, anyways Goombas, this is Tom and Andrea reminding you. Don't eat candy you found on the ground. It's probably drugs. Also don't eat drugs you found on the ground. It's definitely drugs. And don't skip the cutscenes.