It's too bad I'm not a programmer...

...because The Descent of Alette would make a totally awesome video game.



Fight your way through a series of subway cars full of the blur-faced homeless and menacing suit-clad businessmen until you reach a linked maze of caverns populated by serpents, headless women, owls, bats, and legions of the dead in this action-packed single-player adventure game. As Alette, you must confront and kill the superpowerful Tyrant, without destroying all of creation, which is somehow part of his body. Your guide through this under-underworld is a sadistic owl who may or may not be the spirit of your long-departed father. You'll collect a bit of blue stone, drown in a hellish lake, grow a beak, and be implanted with a talon along the way, and perhaps learn to fly. You'll need to amass a hefty arsenal and rebel against your feminine nature by assuming your animal self for your final showdown with the Tyrant, and to survive the fragile new world that dawns upon his death.

So if you're a programmer, and you want to develop game scripts based on epic poetry, and pitch the idea to the publishers who will quickly come up game tie-in packaging and see skyrocketing sales for these adventuresome tales, my email address is in the top-right corner.