Well hello there, it's been a while, I honestly didn't think I was going to make another post here due to changes in my work I had decided to leave my blog as I couldn't put in the effort I had before. I had just been sporadically updating my Youtube channel and now even less cause of covid. But my partner inspired me to continue writing and posting and I remember other friends and relatives commenting on how they saw and read my posts and how my blog was going and I wanted to thank everyone for that as it was inspiring to me. I must say the posts will not be anywhere near as long as before with in depth reviews and musing etc I just want to make small posts about things I'm doing and playing now. It will still be about games of course with videos and screenshots. I gotta say it's good to be back doing this again as I have missed it.
The year was 1998, I was in high school and it had computers and the internet, so what did we do? we played games of course. Yes back then flash games were the rage of course but also simple small downloadable games ones you could place on a USB drive and play anywhere without having to access the internet. I can remember Elastomania and Blobby Volley and Battle Painters to name a few, and of course there was Liero.
Liero is Finnish for earthworm and was inspired by the earlier game MoleZ, Liero provided inspiration for the later games Soldat and Noita. Liero was described a real-time version of the Worms games where two worms fought to the death using a choice of five weapons from a total of 40 in a two-dimensional map. The worm characters could dig through the dirt or destroy it with explosions to reach their opponent and gain extra mobility by using ninja ropes. So you could imagine there wasn't much in the way of narrative to a game like this.
Prologue
Liero is one of the most violent, chaotic and meaningless computer games I have ever seen. It consists of two worm-like creatures in underground tunnels each in bright colours and using ridiculously destructive weapons to blow each other apart. This may seem like a normal shoot-em-up game to some people with the amount of video game violence today but what makes this stand out is the mindless chaotic destructiveness with no plot or storyline whatsoever. Which does not mean the game is particularly bad, I myself like it a lot, But that’s what brings me to the point of this story, Yes unlike the game this story has a point to it.
I thought it would make an interesting scenario to try to create a detailed storyline to Liero, to create reason out of random violence and an explanation as to why this is happening and why Liero is what it is today.
Justin Durrant
LIERO , The Unwanted Legend
CHAPTER 1 – The Imperfect Creators
When the Creators first came to the planet, it was young and rich in resources and full of oceans and underground tunnels and coated with an atmosphere which allowed lush plant life to grow . But other than this lush layer of grass and trees there was no life, no giant primitive beings, no scaly reptiles, no tiny insects, not even the slightest living microscopic organism. Creators knew that to leave such a perfect planet untouched, this was what they had been waiting for. The chance to create the perfect life-form.
The Creators were exited over the richness and complexity of the planet, the planet had everything needed, air, water, grass, trees and it’s relation to the sun brought interesting dark and light effects. As if it was dark on one side at one time and light on the other side at the other time. The Creators were efficient bringers of life, they quickly calculated the kind of life form that the planet could sustain and created seedlings of the one life form which they thought would be perfect to start off a whole chain of species on the newly discovered planet. The Creators laid these microscopic seedlings all over the planet, on the surface, undersea and in the underground tunnels. Over time the seedlings began to grow and to the delight of the Creators did not freeze or melt in the extreme conditions in some parts of the planet.
When the seedlings finally hatched what came out was an exact opposite to what the Creators expected. Instead of the white larvae of the proposed “perfect” life form, there were tiny colorless worms. The Creators were dismayed at the fact that these were not at all like what they had originally designed. They frantically hoped that if they failed to create the right species, that that species would not be able to survive in that environment and would die out quickly and they could start again. The Creators wanted to make sure that they had not wasted the planet with their embarrassing mistake.
But the Creators were successful in one way not the other, Each one of the tiny worms were perfectly suited to their surrounding environment and multiplied by the thousands, spreading across the planet with the highest population in their teeming underground tunnels. The Creators found that they had succeeded in making their creation be able to live and multiply in perfect harmony with the planet.
The Creators lurked in their colossal space-faring vessels pondering over what they could or should do with the ever-increasing useless mass of teeming worms that had shown no signs of evolution whatsoever. Knowing that if they tried to launch a second life form onto the planet it would instantly overrun by the worms no matter how fast it evolved, there was different opinions and views. Some opted to try to launch a second batch of seedlings that would quickly spawn and ultra-being that would evolve and be strong enough to drive the worms to extinction, but this was almost impossible because of the sheer immensity of the worms population. Others thought that they should find a way to exterminate the worms without destroying the planet. Seeing as there was no way to get rid of the worms and start a new race, nor even save the planet the argument came to two final solutions.
One was to incinerate the
planet and eliminate the race of worms altogether in hope that one day the
planet will become what it once was. The other was insisted by particular
Creators who were sympathetic or intrigued by the race of worms and wished to
leave the planet and in time return in hope that the worms had changed beyond
their original form. The Creators agreed that such a planet and the labor that
went into creating the race should not be thrown away so casually, they agreed
to leave the planet and search for a new untouched haven for another chance.
CHAPTER 2 – Growth, Evolution and Adaptation
Ironically not long after the Creators had left the planet’s solar system, the worms began to evolve dramatically, they grew bigger and fatter and eventually turned into what looked like a giant snake-worm. The most distinctive changes were the fact the worms no longer squirmed across the ground, they grew to an enormous size and reared up in an S-shape. They grew bigger, fatter, stronger and taller (up to 1 and a third metres). The other quite noticeable change was that the worms had developed arms and clumsy, fat but strong hands and fingers.
The worms adapted to the land and to the underground tunnels where most of them lived and even underground the planet was rich in resources as the worms had the ability to make a meal out of almost anything. But as the species evolved they started acquiring certain tastes, some craved large tasty flowerbeds other preferred watery lilies and lush ferns, and some ravenous minorities had even started to get a taste for flesh eating small cave creatures and even other worms . This heightened intellect resulted in the worms quarreling over food, warmth, living space, even personal possessions such as large sticks or uniquely shaped rocks.
Years pass and the worms had virtually dug an underground city of tunnels and holes, and had uncovered water by drilling holes deep into the ground, they worms did quarrel from time to time but this was stemmed to the fact that they were still a primitive species with limited intellect. The worms seldom had anything to anger them they were all roughly the same height same shape and were the same pale white color from the darkness of the underground. But as the worms dug more and more this reasonable peaceful state could not go on forever and the inevitable was about to happen.
CHAPTER 3 – The Surface
In what was to be the most significant event in the life of the worms, the few that were at the highest point of the underground tunnels, felt warmth coming from the surface and small groups of them started digging upwards and upwards, this escalated into millions of worms shoveling out the roofs of the their tunnels toward the surface. After this happened it took barely a week for the first of the worms to reach the surface.
When the first worms broke through the surface of the planet they noticed at once that there was a bright glow coming from the edge of the horizon they reeled back at the harsh light of the sunrise as more and more worms erupted from the ground. Hours passed and the sun had reared up into the sky in the full light of noon the worms had barely adjusted their dark eyes to the sun when their skin made a dramatic change. As the sunlight beams down on the pale white hoards of worms their skin began to change shade into bright colors of the rainbow, some just turned a much brighter white other made a more dramatic change to pale red or yellow or even a dark blue, green or even black.
Weeks passed and the worms entire population had made it to the surface and as they explored the “new world” with new foods, plants, creatures and resources they began to build huts gain and new possessions and weapons, similar to what they had done in the underground but this time there was many distinct differences, on the surface the worms could use their vision to a greater extent and they could even climb tress and hunt other smaller creatures.
The worms explored the
world their population ever expanding and gaining insight and influence and
access to much more resources that they had previously, decades passed and the
worm race evolved into the most populous and technologically advanced species
on the planet making use of modern inventions, and weaponry. To counter their
lack of limbs they used bungee style ropes to gain heigh and move quickly There
was no leadership within the worms, as they all managed to coexist peacefully.
CHAPTER 4 – The War for Resources and the return of the Creators
The Worm kingdom enjoyed years of peace but after the constant farming and desecration of the planets natural habitat, resources started to dwindle, the worms started to divide themselves into separate colonies by colour to safeguard their remaining resources. However this tenuous situation could only go for so long, soon various colonies began to attack each other on resource raids, leading to all out war between the colonies. The war went on for 500 years and terrible weapons were used on a global scale leading to devastated landscapes and millions of worms dead, the planet was eventually turned into a war-torn wasteland.
It was during this time that the creators decided to return to the world and saw with their horror at the consequences of allowing the worms to live, the worms had evolved so much that they had gained enough intelligence to be dangerous and that had led to them destroying their own planet. The creators had no choice but to incinerate the planet destroying the worms before they figured out how to travel the stars and infect other worlds. The entire population of the worms was destroyed as was whatever was left of their civilization. And so the creators left richer with knowledge of their failed creation.
However unbeknownst to the creators some worms had survived and fled underground to escape the scorched surface. But instead of rebuilding their society the remaining worms dig through the earth and hunt each other down with the weapons they have left, so ingrained is their will to survive is that they will fight each other until they are the victor.
Thus we have LIERO
JD
