Episode 3: A Manifestation of Dark Mana

The full-cast acting, narration and sound production is on par with other seminal SBT productions like Kaiju: Battlefield Surgeon, Seance: High Falls, and the Dungeon Crawler Carl Audio Immersion Tunnel. That's really saying something. SBT continues to redefine what's possible for audio as a storytelling medium, in a way that GraphicAudio does not. Bagwell's writing is smoother than Dinniman's. It is not quite as philosophically deep, but without the constant stream of juxtapositional humor and extreme gross-out body horror, the story here flows more elegantly and believably than in any of Dinniman's novels. Josh Cook's music here sets the tone quite well, but it's not as compositionally masterful as Aaron J. Morton's music in DCC, Kaiju, Seance and others. Nevertheless,with Augistin Jacob assisting, Starclad's sound design, editing and mastering on AO is every bit as good as Ahmed Mahmoud's. The woosh of mana, the blips and bleeps of the game UI, and the reverb of each room bring you all the way inside Jason's world. I recommend this as an alternative to Kaiju: Battlefield Surgeon for folks who want more like Dungeon Crawler Carl but without the extreme horror of Kaiju: Battlefield Surgeon.

im enjoying the descent of Jason into darkness. the duality of a good kid who has been bullied aligning with the darkness in game because he thinks it has no consequences in the real world is great! Really hope the story explores the depth of possibilities there. Ryan Reid absolutely kills it of course.