66 days until the vernal equinox

That’s not a confidence builder.

Warlock is a movie, not to be confused with the 1959 western with that name or Project Warlock or anything else. It’s no masterpiece or anything but it does have some fun gore effects. You know, a perfect choice for the family friendly Nintendo console.

The sun aligns with the moon more than once a millennium. it’s called an eclipse. Yeah, it feels like every millennium in New England only it’s more like every ten thousand to fifty thousand years but they do happen in places like the Sahara, the Arabian Peninsula, and Patagonia.

Massachusetts readers, you’re going to have to wait until 2079.

The game’s based loosely on the sequel Warlock: The Armageddon, which is kind of like the first one, only with even more blood, gore, and explosions. And in 1999 came Warlock III: The End of Innocence, which is direct to video trash. Doesn’t even have Julian Sands.

Note that this game is rated K-A, which was basically E for Everyone. Also note that this game came out in the SNES era, before Nintendo was known for shovelware and borderline pr0nz0rz.

There’s a Genesis version with some differences but I won’t be playing them both. Once is enough, thank you very much.

in the let’s play Astyanax thread on Talking Time, they discuss the ethics of using an invincibility code in a screenshot let’s play and the gist of it is that it’s your playthrough and if you want to cheat, you can cheat if you damn well want to.
I don’t use invincibility for Astyanax but I did use it for this game (except in the first level, where I wanted to show off the health meter). Because this game is a difficult slog.

And to make matters worse, you only get one life. And you don’t get healed after beating a level. please enjoy this gif of Julian Sands’ face illuminated by lightning.

left left right left right right left right right left left right. and now you ca toggle invincibility. And what this game classifies as a level is fucking weird.

A quaint New England town.

Looks to be late September.

You get this orb thing that follows you around and you can direct it to attack enemies or grab out of reach items.

Looks like a Psygnosis game.

It doesn’t last very long because here comes Julian Sands.

This game can be way too dark.

The librarians have been zombified, take a whole bunch of hits to kill, and then come back to life.

Hold on. Library, and a rather nice one at that. Covered bridge. Huh. This game is set in Pepperell, MA.

There’s an elevator in the Genesis version.

And at the end, we have a brief showdown with the Warlock.

It looks like our protagonist lost his head here.

We have the first of six stones.

If you want to skip that level.








The second stone is at the end of the cave excursion.



Some rather nice rain effects.

He’ll make the statues come to life and fight you.

It sort of alternates between archer and gargoyle. The last two fights are against flying gargoyles.

The music reminds me of the more ambient tracks in Terranigma. The instrumentation, anyway. There’s a lack of a discernible melody in these tracks.


Not all the levels will be as short as the first two.

None shall pass!

A scratch!? Your arm’s off!

’Tis just a flesh wound!

Oh, oh, I see. Running away, eh? Come back here and take what's coming to you! I'll bite your legs off!

The castle’s a maze.

You have to knock the blocks down from the ceiling so you can cross.

touching a blue crystal gives you the ability to levitate. Be warned, it’s janky.


These guys throw flaming torches at you.



The spiked balls swing forward and back so time your jumps.

sometimes you have to hit switches more than once.

The Warlock transforms into this demon, or maybe it’s a demon disguised as the Warlock. He’ll fire low bolts and high bolts and it’s obvious what you have to do to avoid them.

Yeah, we got a password that’s in between stones.

The entire arsenal is out to get you.


How long does this fucking take?



Look, you stupid bastard, you've got no arms left.



Fucking… grrr.




We got the third stone, but there’s still more castle to go.


if you die with a portrait spell in your inventory, you get revived at the previous checkpoint. Or you can use it to restore your life.


Okay. Weird that it happens now and not when we get the stone.

GOD DAMN. FUCK.

Maybe you could play some rock and/or roll on the organ and it’d summon the Warlock and you could just fight him.

if you use a sundial, you’ll get taken back to the location where you found it. i don’t really know why you’d ever do this because there’s nowhere I’ve found where the game becomes unwinnable. if you die with a revive spell in your inventory, you’ll be taken back to where you found it. if you move on to a new location, whatever the game interprets that as, you lose the spell.


this place is long.

I think someone fell asleep and woke up after Phantasm came on.

In the Genesis version, it’s boiling red acid (maybe it’s blood) instead and there’s a background.
You can die here, even with invincibility.

For some reason, the wizard fights the Warlock and loses.

As a demon, you can put up a shield and you can fire bolts. And you can punch but it doesn’t matter because you can’t move.
Notice that I’m taking damage.

Finally done with that freaking castle. Ah, well, still better than Ren and Stimpy’s foray into time travel.

And we got a second stone too.



The skeleton knight, like most other enemies, takes a whole bunch of hits.

I don’t know if this is just another part of the ambiguous past or if this is some sort of bad future. Anyway, if the board looks weak, you can assure yourself that the Warlock will show up and destroy it.

Plants come out of the ground to grab you.

Oh.

This skeleton looks like every other skeleton except maybe he’s better at blocking your attacks.
Thankfully this indoor sequence isn’t as long.

The spells in this game are mostly heals and full screen attacks.

Looks like Judge Doom’s zombie.

This game practically oozes ambiance even if the castle stage is too freaking long.

Oh no! It’s boiling acid! You need to use the earthquake spell to make a stone fall down and the stone will float on top of the acid (!) and you ride it to the top.

Super happy fun slide!

The skeleton uses its tongue to attack you.


At some point in this level, we fight a skeleton horse and its rider. Well, the horse doesn’t hurt you.

We’ve got another mausoleum to check out.

With switches.

The stone is in this one.

I don’t know what passwords give you. Probably just take you to the level without anything in your inventory.


The majestic mountains of New England? Nah, probably not.


Hitting that gargoyle changes the direction the lightning shoots out.

Well, at least the Warlock honored that guy from the castle with a statue for his persistence.


I love the color scheme in this and the previous level, it’s just too bad about the game itself.



In these caves, there are items that cause earthquakes when you use them.

Again, it just feels so random when you get a password, since there aren’t really texts or cutscenes or anything.

Not the bees!


It’s kind of sad that our last showdown with Julian Sands takes place on a mountain.


The manual calls it the underworld but it’s Hell.

Turns out the Warlock was Satan all along.

He looks so goofy here.

In the movie, Satan is defeated by truck headlights, which, to be fair, are brighter than the sun nowadays, but here we fight him.







and now you just play with the runestones.

They sure did put a lot of resources into animation and art.
burning question: and in the end, aren’t fun gore effects what count for horror?

That’s not a confidence builder.

Warlock is a movie, not to be confused with the 1959 western with that name or Project Warlock or anything else. It’s no masterpiece or anything but it does have some fun gore effects. You know, a perfect choice for the family friendly Nintendo console.

The sun aligns with the moon more than once a millennium. it’s called an eclipse. Yeah, it feels like every millennium in New England only it’s more like every ten thousand to fifty thousand years but they do happen in places like the Sahara, the Arabian Peninsula, and Patagonia.

Massachusetts readers, you’re going to have to wait until 2079.

The game’s based loosely on the sequel Warlock: The Armageddon, which is kind of like the first one, only with even more blood, gore, and explosions. And in 1999 came Warlock III: The End of Innocence, which is direct to video trash. Doesn’t even have Julian Sands.

Note that this game is rated K-A, which was basically E for Everyone. Also note that this game came out in the SNES era, before Nintendo was known for shovelware and borderline pr0nz0rz.

There’s a Genesis version with some differences but I won’t be playing them both. Once is enough, thank you very much.

in the let’s play Astyanax thread on Talking Time, they discuss the ethics of using an invincibility code in a screenshot let’s play and the gist of it is that it’s your playthrough and if you want to cheat, you can cheat if you damn well want to.
I don’t use invincibility for Astyanax but I did use it for this game (except in the first level, where I wanted to show off the health meter). Because this game is a difficult slog.

And to make matters worse, you only get one life. And you don’t get healed after beating a level. please enjoy this gif of Julian Sands’ face illuminated by lightning.

left left right left right right left right right left left right. and now you ca toggle invincibility. And what this game classifies as a level is fucking weird.

A quaint New England town.

Looks to be late September.

You get this orb thing that follows you around and you can direct it to attack enemies or grab out of reach items.

Looks like a Psygnosis game.

It doesn’t last very long because here comes Julian Sands.

This game can be way too dark.

The librarians have been zombified, take a whole bunch of hits to kill, and then come back to life.

Hold on. Library, and a rather nice one at that. Covered bridge. Huh. This game is set in Pepperell, MA.

There’s an elevator in the Genesis version.

And at the end, we have a brief showdown with the Warlock.

It looks like our protagonist lost his head here.

We have the first of six stones.

If you want to skip that level.








The second stone is at the end of the cave excursion.



Some rather nice rain effects.

He’ll make the statues come to life and fight you.

It sort of alternates between archer and gargoyle. The last two fights are against flying gargoyles.

The music reminds me of the more ambient tracks in Terranigma. The instrumentation, anyway. There’s a lack of a discernible melody in these tracks.


Not all the levels will be as short as the first two.

None shall pass!

A scratch!? Your arm’s off!

’Tis just a flesh wound!

Oh, oh, I see. Running away, eh? Come back here and take what's coming to you! I'll bite your legs off!

The castle’s a maze.

You have to knock the blocks down from the ceiling so you can cross.

touching a blue crystal gives you the ability to levitate. Be warned, it’s janky.


These guys throw flaming torches at you.



The spiked balls swing forward and back so time your jumps.

sometimes you have to hit switches more than once.

The Warlock transforms into this demon, or maybe it’s a demon disguised as the Warlock. He’ll fire low bolts and high bolts and it’s obvious what you have to do to avoid them.

Yeah, we got a password that’s in between stones.

The entire arsenal is out to get you.


How long does this fucking take?



Look, you stupid bastard, you've got no arms left.



Fucking… grrr.




We got the third stone, but there’s still more castle to go.


if you die with a portrait spell in your inventory, you get revived at the previous checkpoint. Or you can use it to restore your life.


Okay. Weird that it happens now and not when we get the stone.

GOD DAMN. FUCK.

Maybe you could play some rock and/or roll on the organ and it’d summon the Warlock and you could just fight him.

if you use a sundial, you’ll get taken back to the location where you found it. i don’t really know why you’d ever do this because there’s nowhere I’ve found where the game becomes unwinnable. if you die with a revive spell in your inventory, you’ll be taken back to where you found it. if you move on to a new location, whatever the game interprets that as, you lose the spell.


this place is long.

I think someone fell asleep and woke up after Phantasm came on.

In the Genesis version, it’s boiling red acid (maybe it’s blood) instead and there’s a background.
You can die here, even with invincibility.

For some reason, the wizard fights the Warlock and loses.

As a demon, you can put up a shield and you can fire bolts. And you can punch but it doesn’t matter because you can’t move.
Notice that I’m taking damage.

Finally done with that freaking castle. Ah, well, still better than Ren and Stimpy’s foray into time travel.

And we got a second stone too.



The skeleton knight, like most other enemies, takes a whole bunch of hits.

I don’t know if this is just another part of the ambiguous past or if this is some sort of bad future. Anyway, if the board looks weak, you can assure yourself that the Warlock will show up and destroy it.

Plants come out of the ground to grab you.

Oh.

This skeleton looks like every other skeleton except maybe he’s better at blocking your attacks.
Thankfully this indoor sequence isn’t as long.

The spells in this game are mostly heals and full screen attacks.

Looks like Judge Doom’s zombie.

This game practically oozes ambiance even if the castle stage is too freaking long.

Oh no! It’s boiling acid! You need to use the earthquake spell to make a stone fall down and the stone will float on top of the acid (!) and you ride it to the top.

Super happy fun slide!

The skeleton uses its tongue to attack you.


At some point in this level, we fight a skeleton horse and its rider. Well, the horse doesn’t hurt you.

We’ve got another mausoleum to check out.

With switches.

The stone is in this one.

I don’t know what passwords give you. Probably just take you to the level without anything in your inventory.


The majestic mountains of New England? Nah, probably not.


Hitting that gargoyle changes the direction the lightning shoots out.

Well, at least the Warlock honored that guy from the castle with a statue for his persistence.


I love the color scheme in this and the previous level, it’s just too bad about the game itself.



In these caves, there are items that cause earthquakes when you use them.

Again, it just feels so random when you get a password, since there aren’t really texts or cutscenes or anything.

Not the bees!


It’s kind of sad that our last showdown with Julian Sands takes place on a mountain.


The manual calls it the underworld but it’s Hell.

Turns out the Warlock was Satan all along.

He looks so goofy here.

In the movie, Satan is defeated by truck headlights, which, to be fair, are brighter than the sun nowadays, but here we fight him.







and now you just play with the runestones.

They sure did put a lot of resources into animation and art.
burning question: and in the end, aren’t fun gore effects what count for horror?
no subject
Date: 2026-01-14 07:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2026-01-14 07:30 pm (UTC)