Smashing Neon Pumpkins

Episode 15 of Wrong Way Up starts with everyone giving kudos to Shadow for her cartoon that depicts Capac as an epic Noita; in comparison, Tex' graffiti suit makes him look like someone drew on him with sharpie while asleep. They explore the Mastodon and plan to reverse engineer a Penelope Cruiz missile. DE has identified an outdated blueprint as reason for the recent missile failure and warns against blueprint bloopers. W4sted wants to cohabitate on Texfire's crane trailer to 3D print drones, and they dream of striking a homerun by batting an airdropped bomb with Tex' crane.

While looting the Mastodon, they find a hollowed-out crude magazine with a woman on the title page and, hidden inside, scandalous technical schematics. Splitsie gets lost in the staircase and calls for his Sherpa Capac. Capac dramatically reads the Private's log how the crew was murdered by the Bots. The Bots chant in in-game chat until they realise they lost their rover. Meanwhile, Capac's wheel repair is accompanied by unholy clanging and Splitsie is amused whenever Capac's forklift lifts itself. With all wheels repaired, Splitsie renames the stolen green Mastodon "Kermit the Hulk."

(0:30) A sneaky Kanajashi gets caught deploying a sabotage device in the Jalopy. Splitsie asks Capac to name the forklift "--OW!" right as he collides with DE, and Capac immediately agrees that's a reasonable name. They build and chat about TV shows and superstitions until the Kermit is drivable.

The Bots pass in a surveillance plane and Splitsie jumps into the Neon Pumpkin with Capac as a gunner.

(1:00) DE follows them in his Panther and the chase leads them to a dogfight with an agile Sunderbird. Splitsie clips a hilltop and loses all front guns and realises the plane handles better without them. When the Sunderbird goes down in a crevice, Capac ejects, defeats the pilot on foot, frees the plane, and lifts off with it. Capac and Splitsie fly back for repairs and DE reports a Bot rover (Ferret?) with a rocket launcher. Splitsie lands on the runway at second try and Capac makes an emergency landing on the ground. DE scouts out two anti-aircraft vehicles (Karl Urban Assault vehicles) and an ice lake. Tex' crane sneaks up creepily on Splitsie and helps him weld his plane. Tex teaches Splitsie how to crane like a pro while Capac overshoots the runway. They realise that Capac's captured planes have all run out of power, that's why Capac has been unsuccessful at landing them.

(1:30) Scout DE lands on the runway seconds after Capac picks up his stuff from his hilariously ragdolling body. IRL, Splitsie's dog comes in all wet chewing an antler. The only reason why the protagonists have not split up yet is because of the series rule of driving *one* roadtrain... They decide to attach the Kermit to the end of the roadtrain.

Suddenly, lots of red signals appear and they overhear "operation robot rain" in in-game chat... Bombs drop (without damage) and Bots paradrop outside shooting range. W4sted runs intercept in the Eduard Scissorplane with Splitsie as gunner, DE drives the Jalopy, and Capac the Kermit. Something is audibly clanging and the sim speed drops for a moment. Splitsie solves the mystery behind the red signals inside the Kermit by transferring grid ownership. The Bots try to make W4stedspace execute "order 66" but fail to spell his name. Splitsie and DE disagree on custom turret design regarding dps, cost, etc.

(2:00) Splitsie builds a hitch to attach the Kermit but it must not collide with Capac's foldable umbrella. They will declare an emergency "Miss Piggy" manoeuvre if they ever need to separate the roadtrain ("ditch Kermit"). Texfire and Capac are having a secret rave party in Tex' trailer playing loud Fun Music ("Chat made me do it"); alas, Splitsie is allergic to fun.

Splitsie syphons off the hydrogen from the Kermit to the Kaboom Caboose and seconds later, the Kermit is filled repeatedly with Clang Sparks. Expecting similar issues, W4sted has redesigned his Edward Scissorplane to remove hinges and merge blocks.

(2:30) They get so distracted by subgrids and shared inertia tensors that the Bots wonder whether they'll accidentally turn the Kermit into a Clang Drive and return to space. Capac jokingly recommends auto dampening to the Kermit to feel it jiggling. Texfire wisely unloads ammo and components from the Kermit while Splitsie makes a world backup. IRL, W4sted laughs at his cat running in a paper bag, instead of parking his plane. DE and Capac have built custom turrets, and their rifle shots distract w4sted's landing *less* than the ongoing Clang Sparks coming off the Kermit. After a tip from Chat, Splitsie grinds off the Kermit's wheel-well armour to reduce grid collisions.

The next goal on their way north, an ice lake, is behind a hill that, incidentally, has the next Bot base on it. The roadtrain with its differently sized wheels is driving so sluggishly that w4sted walks faster on foot, backwards... All wheels and wheel settings need to be redone. Splitsie gives up and declares they will unload the Kermit and let Capac drive it. The game sim has reached its limits.

(3:00) DE and Capac install an emergency self-destruct system behind the Kermit's driver seat. Capac paints Kermit "Miss Piggy" pink and starts driving, while Splitsie recovers from a game crash. Capac asks whether it was north or south he's supposed to be going right before getting stuck in a ditch in the foggy night. The Kermit/Piggy is falling apart and DE dares Capac to ignite the self destruct. The explosion lights the night and a rolling detached wheel suspension emits skyhigh Clang Sparks. Capac sings them to sleep with a Swedish Chef song so they can fast-forward to the next morning.

When the Jalopy reaches the wreck of the Kermit/Piggy at dawn, Kanajashi Bot doesn't want his "cursed" rover back anymore. Splitsie is getting "wheely" "tyred" of the others "rolling with" the wheel puns as they grind down the debris to drive by. On their way north, they dream of walking the roadtrain uphill on coordinated piston+maglock legs.

(3:30) Instead of walking, they get snagged and redo all wheel and hitch settings again. When the Bots attack from a Warthog plane and from the ground, Splitsie's evasive manoeuvres almost roll the Jalopy. They wonder if there's a bug with block groups that keeps undoing their settings? In the middle of the shoot-out, Splitsie has to rejoin after his game crashes again. The Jalopy jack-knifes and stalls due to too many wheels off the ground: The runway trailer is damaged, Capac's turret is scrap metal, and Splitsie's dog whines to be let out.

(4:00) While Capac fights off Bots on foot, they are unsuccessful at straightening the half-rolled roadtrain's hitches. The only reason why Capac doesn't singlehandedly fix all problems is that he can't reach his forklift. Using a piston jack and Tex' crane arm, they roll the trailers so their wheels are on the ground again. Then they go through all hitch and wheel settings *again*.

DE states they didn't lose any airplanes today -- right when Splitsie taxis his Neon Pumpkin off the hangar. Tex picks up the Neon Pumpkin with his crane, but Splitsie turns on his thrusters and whips the crane arm hilariously to the other side. Seeing that, Tex coordinates to throw Splitsie like a paper plane. With help of the "most pathetic throw ever", Splitsie lifts off, and returns to the ground after a short scouting circle. Finally, W4sted shows off his new drone printer.

## References

1. ↑ The main character in the Finnish Rogue-like Noita that Capac enjoys playing is a flying alchemist wizard.
2. ↑ Given his laughter and reaction in YouTube chat, this datapad was likely written by Gruzzob.
3. ↑ The Bots are quoting Earth Defense Force (EDF) suggesting that they are protecting this planet from aliens.
4. ↑ The sabotage device is a landing gear with a remote control block.
5. ↑ Spazzmatica Polka by Kevin MacLeod
6. ↑ Clang sparks are an exaggerated visual collision effect often seen in grids with too complex subgrids, such as wheels, pistons, etc.
7. ↑ An exploitable game glitch that lets a grid fly exceedingly fast without any propulsion.