Having had some time to reflect on it in its recent hiatus, I've come to accept that yes, my beloved Grinding Noises thread has somewhat jumped the shark. I had consciously tried to make the second iteration more interesting by making the setting larger and less linear, introducing more overarching quests or goals, and generally making things a bit more grim and dark, but sadly, though it certainly had its moments, the second iteration didn't really come together as I had hoped. Nonetheless, I don't regret trying; I'm reminded of that quote from somewhere or other that it's better to aim high and fail than to aim low and succeed.

Seeing as the thread has recently been bumped, it does rather prompt me to make a decision on whether to continue or not - and, though it's a shame, I'm not sure I really want to carry on in the same direction it was going before. That said, it would be an even greater shame to leave it in its current incomplete state, so if those of you reading this are willing to post in it, I would quite like to bring the story to a finish (before the current thread hits 999) in a rather irreverent over the top silly sort of way. How do the rest of you feel about the idea?