Wow, this is cool but yeah, pretty overwhelming!
Can you pick up the phone booth (and die)?
1 Like
I think at least half of it is at least tangentially related to stuff that’s in the game, but on the more pertinent question of how much of that information is actually useful, I’m saying nothing.
Just in case you’ve not checked this for yourself yet, I don’t think it’s giving much away to confirm that this is correct.
I can’t work out whether the description actually does fit, but I’m not the only one who read the next couple of paragraphs through the lens of “is this describing the opening of Dr Who?”, right?
3 Likes
Unfortunately no. This does not appear to be the sort of game willing to indulge in IF meta-jokes.
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Yeah, the “Phantom Telephone Booth” name is clearly a reference to the Phantom Tollbooth, but the descriptions do seem a lot more similar to the TARDIS to me!
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Given the author’s comments in another thread, it looks like she had almost no contact with the IF “scene” before releasing Finding Martin. As far as I can tell, she pretty much sat down and wrote a sprawling, intricate, 25-hour, narrative-rich puzzlefest that’s essentially bug-free despite not even crediting any beta testers, put it on the IF Archive and then moved on to other things.
3 Likes
Part VI: Screw(drive)ing Around At Work
Last time, what seemed like it would be just a game around Martin’s house got much wider in scope as we explored Martin’s Phantom Phone Booth. In addition to dispensing some helpful items and taking us upstairs, it appears to be able to quickly move us to various other locations, provided we have the correct key object with us. The only option we were able to get to is Martin’s work, linked to the security badge. Let’s explore there now.
PHONE BOOTH, in the Employee Parking Area
You’re in the phone booth.
The phone booth door is open to the east, leading to the Employee Parking Area. A telephone is attached to the opposite wall. Light is coming from the ceiling of the phone booth.
The rectangular drawer is open.
>E
You drop the receiver.
EMPLOYEE PARKING AREA
You’re in the Employee Parking Area, which is inside of a parking structure that is mostly underground.
To the west you see the phone booth, which is parked in one of empty parking spots.
You don’t see any people here.
The entrance to the building complex lies in the distance to the north.
>X BUILDING
The entrance to the building complex lies in the distance to the north.
A simple transitional space, then.
>N
You start to walk northwards, but a small vehicle suddenly drives up to you and blocks your way. It looks something like a golf cart without a driver, sort of an automated robotic machine. You try to walk around the robot cart, but it moves sideways to prevent you from getting past it.Then the cart scans you from head to toe with a bar of white light. An atonal mechanical voice coming from the cart tells you that you must be wearing an SED Limited security badge in order to enter the building premises.
You put on the badge. The cart scans you again, this time pausing as it reaches the security badge.
Then the voice of the robot cart greets you, saying “Welcome, Martin Kessler”.
With a sigh of relief you realize that the cart is either not equipped with face recognition capabilities or else they don’t work properly. You don’t look anything like Martin!
It occurs to you that Martin himself might be involved in the development of visual identification techniques. You seem to remember him mentioning a project that involved optical devices, but you had just assumed that he meant something like military helmets to see in the dark or to look around corners.
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[more]
Was facial recognition tech any good in real-life 2005, anyway?
I appreciate that we automatically wear the badge, especially since we need to have it to get here.
The voice of the robot cart continues, “Please board the security vehicle so that you may be escorted onto the building premises and delivered to your authorized work area.”
You get on the cart and a seatbelt fastens itself automatically across you. The cart begins to move. It takes you through gates, doorways, tunnels, and passages. Then the cart drives down a particularly long hallway heading north.
You drive past a young man in a white lab coat, whose employee badge declares him to be Phouthavong Bochandilay, Department 9-C, Research and Development Technician, Level II. The man looks at your badge and gets a worried, puzzled expression on his face. The cart continues past him, and you can only hope that he won’t report you for being in the building under false pretenses.
The robot cart stops at the end of the hallway. The seatbelt releases, and you get off the cart. Then the cart turns around and heads back down the hallway, disappearing from sight.
NORTH END OF THE LONG HALLWAY
To the north is a closed door marked 15-G. A long hallway leads south.
On one hand, that does feel a bit limiting only getting to Martin’s department. On the other hand, at least we didn’t get a maze of twisty little office hallways, all alike.
If you recognize the name Phouthavong Bochandilay, that’s because it’s from that password-locked email on Martins computer. That mystery will be partly resolved this update.
Anyway, before moving on: can we at least get out?
>S
The security cart appears and prevents you from walking past it. The voice of the cart says, “Please board the security cart if you wish to be escorted to the Employee Parking Area.”>X DOOR
The door marked 15-G is closed.>OPEN IT
The door marked 15-G squeaks as you open it.>N
The security cart goes down the long hallway and disappears from sight.DEPARTMENT RECEPTION AREA
Mellow elevator music is playing here in the reception area.
The receptionist is sitting at the desk. She’s an elderly woman with a friendly face.
The receptionist takes a hearing aid out of her ear. She taps it on the desk a few times and put it back in her ear. But judging from the frown on her face, the hearing aid is still not working. Giving up, she puts the hearing aid away in the handbag that she has stowed under her desk.
On the desk is fishbowl. The fish bowl contains a tiny fish that is no bigger that a guppy, with mouth flaps that look like a mustache. Its coloring is an intricate pattern of white, red, and blue. The fish doesn’t seem to be particularly healthy; it’s not moving around very much.
You see three closed doors here, an east door, a north door, and a west door. The south door is open.
“Hello,” says the receptionist.
>X DESK
On the desk is fishbowl containing a tiny fish.“Would you like some coffee? There’s a fresh pot in the coffee room,” the receptionist tells you, gesturing to the north door. “Just help yourself anytime. There’s a special mug next to the pot just for visitors.”
>X BOWL
The fish bowl contains a tiny fish that is no bigger that a guppy, with mouth flaps that look like a mustache. The coloring of the fish is an intricate pattern of white, red, and blue splotches. The fish doesn’t look particularly healthy. It doesn’t seem to be moving around much.“You really should try the coffee,” the receptionist says. “I always use those special coffee filters made from eggshells, they make them in Sweden or Copenhagen, I think. One of those places where it’s very cold and they need to drink a lot of coffee all the time. Ordinary coffee filters can sometimes make the coffee taste bitter, don’t you think?” the receptionist pratters on.
“Wait, no, I don’t think it’s Sweden. Maybe it’s that city in Iceland that has too many consonants? My late husband always used to say that consonants were the only letters left over in Iceland after most of the vowels got used in Finland. It’s all the fault of the League of Nations, of course. They ought to have saved some vowels for the people who really need them.”
The League of Nations, of course, hasn’t existed since it completely failed to prevent World War II. If she’s in her 70s, and the current year in-game is around when it was published, maybe it existed when she was a child?
Anyway, we’re all set to continue letting her monologue when this happens:
The east door opens, and an unpleasant-looking man comes out. He has narrowed eyes and pursed lips. The effect of his expensive-looking three-piece suit is undermined by a badly considered toupee.
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[more]
“Mrs. McGillicuddy, who is this person?” the unpleasant-looking man snaps at the receptionist. “Why is he wearing somebody else’s security badge?”“I don’t know,” Mrs. McGillicuddy tells him. “But he seems like a very nice young man.”
“This man is an intruder who doesn’t have proper identification and you haven’t lifted a finger to stop him. What the hell were you thinking?” the unpleasant-looking man shouts.
Mrs. McGillicuddy is clearly quite offended. Straightening her shoulders, she attempts to speak in a restrained manner, her voice almost lethally subdued. “Mr. Pendergast, as a lady of advanced years I cannot countenance the use of such language in my presence. I insist that you apologize.”
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[more]
Mr Pendergast’s face is as red as a beet. Apparently he is not used to anyone speaking to him in such a manner, and for a moment he is speechless. But unfortunately that moment doesn’t last very long.
When Mr. Pendergast speaks again, his voice drips with sarcasm. “I certainly am sorry, Mrs. McGillicuddy,” he says through clenched teeth, his anger growing as he speaks. “I’m sorry that I ever hired you in the first place! I’m sorry that I didn’t fire you last week so that I wouldn’t have to go to all the trouble of firing you again today! Now take your things and get out!”
Mrs. McGillicuddy gasps in shock. Then, with quiet dignity, she collects her handbag, hat, and umbrella from under the desk and stands up. She puts on her hat and pushes in a hairpin to keep it in place, using a bit more force than is absolutely necessary. Then Mrs. McGillicuddy takes the fish bowl in her arms and tells Mr. Pendergast, “I shall seek employment elsewhere.”
Before leaving the office she steps north into the coffee room just long enough to spill out the coffee. On her way out she whispers to you, “Tell him to make his own damned coffee.”
Mrs. McGillicuddy leaves the office and a security cart takes her away. You notice that she left the coffee room door open.
While this is all going on, you take off Martin’s badge in the hopes that Mr. Pendergast will forget to confiscate it.
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[more]
Now Mr. Pendergast turns his attention in your direction. “What are you looking at!” he snaps at you.
Mr. Pendergast pushes a button to call a security cart. He takes you into the hallway and forces you onto the cart. “And don’t come back!” Mr. Pendergast barks. He returns into the reception area and slams the door behind him.
A seatbelt fastens itself automatically across you, and the cart takes you back down the long hallway. The security cart takes you through the same passages, tunnels, doorways, and gates that you saw on the way in. It stops in the Employee Parking Area near the phone booth. The seat belt releases and you get off the cart. The cart then drives away and disappears from sight.
EMPLOYEE PARKING AREA
You’re in the Employee Parking Area, which is inside of a parking structure that is mostly underground.
To the west you see the phone booth, which is parked in one of empty parking spots.
You don’t see any people here.
The entrance to the building complex lies in the distance to the north.
Uh oh. That’s not good.
We can, in fact, get back in, as we’ll see. But the receptionist is gone forever. I figured that there’s something we’re able to do while she’s here, and we didn’t figure it out. I undo, and try a few things here.
The boss shows up on a fixed timer, and the receptionist’s monologuing is on one too. After each of these attempts the same scene as above happens; I’ve cut out the repeats.
>SAY “HELLO” TO RECEPTIONIST
You say “HELLO” to the receptionist.>OPEN NORTH DOOR
You open the north door and see the coffee room.“Just help yourself to some coffee,” the receptionist tells you.
>OPEN WEST DOOR
You open the west door and see the research lab.“Feel free to look around in the lab,” the receptionist tells you. “But are you sure you don’t want some coffee first?”
>I
You are carrying:
some khaki trousers (being worn)
a brown sock (being worn)
a black sock (being worn)
a pair of brown shoes (being worn)
a flannel shirt (being worn)
an envelope
a large stack of catalogs
a phone bill
a gold key
an audio cassette with a red label
an audio cassette with a green label
“Go Dog Go”
“The Bedtime Story Book”
“The Boy Who Had No Words”
a optical filter
a yellow feather
a white sock
a red rubber ball
a security badge (being worn)
a small phone book
a large phone book
a report card
a pair of black tap shoes
a battery
a fifty dollar bill
a pocket watch
I spend a bit more time flailing around here, trying to figure out what to do. Upon reading the descriptions again, I notice a detail; the receptionist can’t really hear us because her hearing aid isn’t working. Fortunately, we have possibly just the thing we need to remedy the situation:
>X BATTERY
It’s a tiny round battery of the type that might be used in a wristwatch or a camera.
We got this from one of the phone’s menu options.
>GIVE BATTERY TO RECEPTIONIST
“Oh, thank you so much,” the receptionist gushes. “That’s exactly what I need for my hearing aid.” She fumbles around in her handbag and brings out a very small flathead screwdriver, which she puts into your hand. She looks in the handbag a second time and pulls out her hearing aid, which she also gives to you. “Would you put the battery in for me please?” she asks.But when you try to open the hearing aid with the screwdriver, you discover that the hearing aid needs a Phillips screwdriver, not a flathead. You explain the problem to the receptionist.
“That’s all right, dear,” she says, patting your hand. “I’ll just wait until you find the right kind of screwdriver. And don’t you worry if I’m not here when you get back. If Mr. Pendergast allows me some time off this afternoon I’ll be taking my fish to the veterinarian. But I’m quite certain that we’ll get this battery replaced sooner or later!”
The receptionist takes the hearing aid and the battery and puts them into her handbag, leaving you with the small flathead screwdriver.
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[more]
“You really should try the coffee,” the receptionist says. “I always use those special coffee filters made from eggshells, they make them in Sweden or Copenhagen, I think. One of those places where it’s very cold and they need to drink a lot of coffee all the time. Ordinary coffee filters can sometimes make the coffee taste bitter, don’t you think?” the receptionist pratters on.
“Wait, no, I don’t think it’s Sweden. Maybe it’s that city in Iceland that has too many consonants? My late husband always used to say that consonants were the only letters left over in Iceland after most of the vowels got used in Finland. It’s all the fault of the League of Nations, of course. They ought to have saved some vowels for the people who really need them.”
Etc, etc. Same scene with the boss firing her. I do hope we weren’t supposed to prevent that somehow, but we at least found something to do with her. And she’ll definitely have time off now. 
The vet’s office was also one of the places the Phantom Phone Booth can go to, but we didn’t have the correct object to go there.
I wonder what a key object could be for the veterinarian, since that might be the next destination we should try. Given the key was the badge for work, could it be something similar that we would need if we were visiting the vet? can we get the dog in the booth, maybe?
Anyway, we are now back in:
EMPLOYEE PARKING AREA
You’re in the Employee Parking Area, which is inside of a parking structure that is mostly underground.
To the west you see the phone booth, which is parked in one of empty parking spots.
You don’t see any people here.
The entrance to the building complex lies in the distance to the north.
>N
You start to walk northwards, but a small vehicle suddenly drives up to you and blocks your way.Then the cart scans you from head to toe with a bar of white light. An atonal mechanical voice coming from the cart tells you that you must be wearing an SED Limited security badge in order to enter the building premises.
You put on the badge. The cart scans you again, this time pausing as it reaches the security badge.
Then the voice of the robot cart greets you, saying “Welcome, Martin Kessler”.
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[more]
The voice of the robot cart continues, “Please board the security vehicle so that you may be escorted onto the building premises and delivered to your authorized work area.”You get on the cart and a seatbelt fastens itself automatically across you. The cart begins to move. It takes you through gates, doorways, tunnels, and passages. Then the cart drives down a particularly long hallway heading north. The robot cart stops at the end of the hallway. The seatbelt releases, and you get off the cart. Then the cart turns around and heads back down the hallway, disappearing from sight.
NORTH END OF THE LONG HALLWAY
To the north is a closed door marked 15-G. A long hallway leads south.
> OPEN DOOR
The door marked 15-G squeaks as you open it.>N
DEPARTMENT RECEPTION AREA
Mellow elevator music is playing here in the reception area.
There’s no one sitting at the desk. The fishbowl is gone too.
The east door is closed.
The north door is open.
The west door is closed.
The south door is open.
The receptionist is gone, but she left the coffee room door open.
>N
COFFEE ROOM
There’s a mug on the counter next to the coffee pot. It occurs to you that this must be coffee made by Mr. Pendergast. You wonder how it will taste.
A memo is posted on the wall.
The door to the reception area is open. You look through it nervously, hoping that Mr. Pendergast won’t see that you’re in here.
>X MEMO
The memo reads: “All employees are forbidden to remove tools from the department premises. Violators will be subject to immediate termination.”The east door of the reception area opens, and Mr. Pendergast comes out. He looks through the open door of the coffee room and sees you!
Uh oh! The boss’s timer was still running! We now get a similar scene of getting kicked out:
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[more]
Mr. Pendergast storms into the coffee room and pulls you into the reception area.“Who are you?” Mr. Pendergast snaps at you. “Why are you wearing somebody else’s security badge?”
Mr. Pendergast snatches Martin’s badge away from you and pushes a button to call a security cart. He takes you into the hallway and forces you onto the cart. “Tell Martin he’s fired!” Mr. Pendergast shouts at you.
A seatbelt fastens itself automatically across you, and the cart takes you back down the long hallway. As you pass Department 9-C, Phouthavong Bochandilay steps into the hallway and presses a note into your hand, whispering, “Give this to Martin.”
The security cart takes you through the same passages, tunnels, doorways, and gates that you saw on the way in. It stops in the Employee Parking Area near the phone booth. The seat belt releases and you get off the cart. The cart then drives away and disappears from sight.
EMPLOYEE PARKING AREA
You’re in the Employee Parking Area, which is inside of a parking structure that is mostly underground.
To the west you see the phone booth, which is parked in one of empty parking spots.
You don’t see any people here.
The entrance to the building complex lies in the distance to the north.
Oops. He confiscated our badge this time, which almost certainly means we’re stuck in a no-win state, so I undo. So we need to trick him. Fortunately this is easy; all we have to do is:
>CLOSE DOOR
The door is now closed.You hear a door opening and the sounds of someone moving around in the reception area.
Hopefully he won’t notice.
>GET MUG
Your arms are getting full, but a little rearranging lets you take it anyway. You take the mug off of the counter.You hear a squeaky door closing. Someone is still moving around in the reception area.
>X MUG
It’s a smiley-face mug.You hear another door closing. Then all is quiet.
success!
The squeaking door was the entrance so might continue to alert the boss if we need to come here again. And as you’ll see I have reason to suspect we will before the game is through.
>FILL MUG
(with the pot coffee)
You fill the mug with coffee.>X POT
The coffee pot has coffee in it.>X COFFEE
Which coffee do you mean, the black coffee, or the pot coffee?>POT
The coffee looks dark and hot.>DRINK COFFEE
You drink the black coffee. The black coffee tastes quite bitter.>FILL MUG
(with the pot coffee)
You fill the mug with coffee.
I wish this coffee would tell me which stuff I can probably solve in the current area. Unfortunately that’s another game. Fortunately the pot is large so we can get more if we have a reason to.
>S
The door is closed.>OPEN DOOR
The door is now open.>S
DEPARTMENT RECEPTION AREA
The east door is closed.
The north door is open.
The west door is closed.
The south door is closed.
The east door is the boss’s office, so opening that is probably a bad idea. However we can:
>OPEN WEST DOOR
You open the west door and see the research lab.>W
RESEARCH LAB
Five research technicians are working here. In their white lab coats they all look similarly uninspired. Their names are visible to you on their employee badges, identifying them as Ben, Ken, Glen, Sven, and Jen.
Ben is working with a wire stripper.
Ken is working with a soldering iron.
Glen is working with a small Phillips screwdriver.
Sven is working with some long-nosed pliers.
Jen is working with an allen wrench.No one appears to be using the Bunsen burner, which is currently turned off.
You can’t discern any purpose for the activities being performed by the research technicians. It occurs to you that they may simply be trying to appear busy so that they can continue to keep their jobs.
The door to the reception area is open.
Near the door there is a coat rack with a lab coat hanging on it.
Ah yes, the favorite pastime of office workers everywhere: aimlessly messing around with stuff to make it look like you’re being productive.
Well, one of them has the type of screwdriver the (now former) receptionist needs. We definitely need to get that - but how?
>X BEN
Ben is working with a wire stripper.>X STRIPPER
It looks like your average wire stripper. But you don’t think you’ll need to strip any wires.>X PHILLIPS
It’s a very small Phillips screwdriver.>X FLATHEAD
It’s a very small flathead screwdriver.>X IRON
It looks like your average soldering iron. But you don’t think you’ll need to solder anything.>X PLIERS
The long-nosed pliers look like they could extend your reach a little bit.>X WRENCH
It looks like your average allen wrench. But you don’t think you’ll need to tighten or remove any nuts or bolts.
The game is pretty clear which tools here will likely help us the most. I don’t think we have a need to extend our reach yet but that sounds like a handy thing to have.
>X COAT
It’s a white lab coat without pockets.>X RACK
The coat rack is made of wood. Hanging on it you see a lab coat.>GET COAT
You’re carrying too much. Perhaps you could put something in your pocket.>PUT WATCH IN POCKET
(first closing the watch)
The pocket watch is now in one of the trouser pockets.
I’ll probably drop some stuff off when we get back…
>GET COAT
Your arms are getting full, but a little rearranging lets you take it anyway. You take the lab coat off the coatrack. This reveals some safety goggles hanging on the coatrack. They must have been under the lab coat.>X GOGGLES
The goggles look like a safety shield or visor, rectangular but with rounded edges. There are two layers of clear, flat lenses with a few centimeters of space between them. Small strips of plastic connect these layers at the bottom and the sides, forming a slot that is open at the top. There is nothing inside this space.>GET GOGGLES
You’re carrying too much. Perhaps you could put something in your pocket.>PUT KEY IN POCKET
The gold key is now in one of the trouser pockets.
The house key is probably less likely to be immediately useful. Some of the other stuff (such as the phone book with the hints to the access code) I can also probably get rid of.
>GET GOGGLES
Your arms are getting full, but a little rearranging lets you take them anyway. You take the goggles off of the coat rack.
We found some eyewear, finally. And I think we have an item that goes with it:
>X FILTER
The filter is a flexible piece of plastic, basically rectangular but with rounded edges. It’s mostly transparent with a slight hint of shiny green specks. Around the edges is a braid of plastic that glistens with a pale green tint.>PUT FILTER IN GOGGLES
The optical filter is now in the goggles.>WEAR GOGGLES
You put on the goggles.>WEAR COAT
You put on the lab coat.
There was one more piece of lab equipment here:
>X BURNER
The Bunsen burner is currently off.>TURN ON BURNER
You turn on the Bunsen burner.Ben gives the wire stripper to Ken.
Ken gives the soldering iron to Glen.
Glen gives the small Phillips screwdriver to Sven.
Sven gives the long-nosed pliers to Jen.
Jen gives the allen wrench to you.
Ben takes the small flathead screwdriver from you.
It seems the technicians have decided that we are one of them, and are inviting us to join in on their time-wasting activities! Which is just as well, since we want at least one of their tools. But first let’s:
>TURN OFF BURNER
You turn off the Bunsen burner.Ben gives the small flathead screwdriver to Glen.
Glen gives the soldering iron to Jen.
Jen gives the long-nosed pliers to Ken.
Ken gives the wire stripper to you.
Sven takes the allen wrench from you.
Sven gives the small Phillips screwdriver to Ben.
I spend some time just messing around:
>GIVE STRIPPER TO SVEN
You give the wire stripper to Sven.Sven gives the allen wrench to Jen.
Jen gives the soldering iron to Ben.
Ben gives the small Phillips screwdriver to Ken.
Ken gives the long-nosed pliers to Glen.
Glen gives the small flathead screwdriver to you.>GIVE SCREWDRIVER TO SVEN
You give the small flathead screwdriver to Sven.Sven gives the wire stripper to Jen.
Jen gives the allen wrench to Ben.
Ben gives the soldering iron to Ken.
Ken gives the small Phillips screwdriver to Glen.
Glen gives the long-nosed pliers to you.>GIVE PLIERS TO GLEN
You give the long-nosed pliers to Glen.Glen gives the small Phillips screwdriver to Sven.
Sven gives the small flathead screwdriver to Jen.
Jen gives the wire stripper to Ben.
Ben gives the allen wrench to Ken.
Ken gives the soldering iron to you.>GIVE IRON TO KEN
You give the soldering iron to Ken.Ken gives the allen wrench to Glen.
Glen gives the long-nosed pliers to Sven.
Sven gives the small Phillips screwdriver to Jen.
Jen gives the small flathead screwdriver to Ben.
Ben gives the wire stripper to you.>GIVE STRIPPER TO JEN
You give the wire stripper to Jen.Jen gives the small Phillips screwdriver to Ben.
Ben gives the small flathead screwdriver to Ken.
Ken gives the soldering iron to Glen.
Glen gives the allen wrench to Sven.
Sven gives the long-nosed pliers to you.>GIVE PLIERS TO BEN
You give the long-nosed pliers to Ben.Ben gives the small Phillips screwdriver to Ken.
Ken gives the small flathead screwdriver to Glen.
Glen gives the soldering iron to Sven.
Sven gives the allen wrench to Jen.
Jen gives the wire stripper to you.>GIVE STRIPPER TO KEN
You give the wire stripper to Ken.Ken gives the small Phillips screwdriver to Glen.
Glen gives the small flathead screwdriver to Sven.
Sven gives the soldering iron to Jen.
Jen gives the allen wrench to Ben.
Ben gives the long-nosed pliers to you.>GIVE PLIERS TO JEN
You give the long-nosed pliers to Jen.Jen gives the soldering iron to Ben.
Ben gives the allen wrench to Ken.
Ken gives the wire stripper to Glen.
Glen gives the small Phillips screwdriver to Sven.
Sven gives the small flathead screwdriver to you.>GIVE SCREWDRIVER TO SVEN
You give the small flathead screwdriver to Sven.Sven gives the small Phillips screwdriver to Jen.
Jen gives the long-nosed pliers to Ben.
Ben gives the soldering iron to Ken.
Ken gives the allen wrench to Glen.
Glen gives the wire stripper to you.>GIVE STRIPPER TO GLEN
You give the wire stripper to Glen.Glen gives the allen wrench to Sven.
Sven gives the small flathead screwdriver to Jen.
Jen gives the small Phillips screwdriver to Ben.
Ben gives the long-nosed pliers to Ken.
Ken gives the soldering iron to you.
Well, for now I want the Phillips screwdriver, but just messing about randomly isn’t the best way. It’s probably best if I try to understand the logic of what’s happening. I’ve tried to explain how I think it works below.
There is a cyclic order of the five technicians: Ben, Ken, Glen, Sven, Jen, then wrapping around to Ben. When we give a tool to one of them, each one (starting with who we gave it to) in turn passes the tool they’re carrying to the next person in this order, until whoever is last gives their tool to us.
Right now, Ben has the Phillips screwdriver. Therefore, if we want to ensure Ben is the last person to trade their tool, we should:
>GIVE IRON TO KEN
You give the soldering iron to Ken.Ken gives the long-nosed pliers to Glen.
Glen gives the wire stripper to Sven.
Sven gives the allen wrench to Jen.
Jen gives the small flathead screwdriver to Ben.
Ben gives the small Phillips screwdriver to you.>E
DEPARTMENT RECEPTION AREA
The east door is closed.
The north door is open.
The west door is open.
The south door is closed.>OPEN SOUTH DOOR
The south door squeaks as you open it.>S
NORTH END OF THE LONG HALLWAY
>S
The security cart appears and prevents you from walking past it. The voice of the cart says, “Please board the security cart if you wish to be escorted to the Employee Parking Area.”>BOARD CART
You get on the security cart.A seatbelt fastens itself automatically across you, and the cart takes you back down the long hallway. As you pass Department 9-C, Phouthavong Bochandilay steps into the hallway and presses a note into your hand, whispering, “Give this to Martin.”
The security cart takes you through the same passages, tunnels, doorways, and gates that you saw on the way in. It stops in the Employee Parking Area near the phone booth. The seat belt releases and you get off the cart. The cart then drives away and disappears from sight.
EMPLOYEE PARKING AREA
Now let’s look at that note from Martin’s colleague:
>X NOTE
The note reads:Martin:
I thought that my little riddle would be as easy as cake for someone like you, but then I realized that I forgot to specify how many digits to use. So feel free to use both hands except for those opposable thumbs of yours, which always seem to get you into trouble! And don’t forget the decimal point.
Regards,
BoP.S. May I have a large container of coffee?
Okay, so our guess about the meaning of the email - something to do with the number pi - was right. And the password has eight digits and a decimal point. fortunately, I’m a math nerd who has memorized a good number of digits of pi. I guess the password is likely 3.1415926. We’ll have to remember to try this when we make it back to the computer.
Speaking of going back:
>W
PHONE BOOTH, in the Employee Parking Area
Through the receiver you hear a line ringing, somewhat faintly since the receiver is hanging down on its cord, “br-rr-rrr-p. br-rr-rrr-p. br-rr-rrr-p.”
Finally the phone is answered by a recorded message. You hear, somewhat faintly since the receiver is hanging down on its cord, "We’re sorry, all of our operators are currently busy. Please try again later. Please wait to be returned to the main menu.
>Z
Time passes…You hear the computerized voice tell you (somewhat faintly since the receiver is hanging down on its cord) …
Press “1” to be enlightened.
Press “3” to be cleansed.
Press “9” to be returned.
If you do not have access to a touch tone phone, please remain on the line and an operator will assist you.>PRESS “9”
You pick up the receiver.You press “9”.
You hear the sound of a motor grinding, the door slams closed, and the phone booth suddenly rises upwards very quickly, flying high into the air.
The telephone voice tells you, “Estimated travel time for this ten mile trip is five minutes, using standard travel speed.”
The phone booth flies north. After about five minutes of flying it drops down through an opening Martin’s roof and comes to an abrupt halt in the pantry. The phone booth door opens.
PHONE BOOTH, in the pantry
You see the kitchen to the east.
That makes a good place to stop, I think. Next time, we’ll open the other door in the kitchen (remember that?) and look in the laundry room. Then, we’ll try the password on the computer.
>I
You are carrying:
some khaki trousers (being worn)
trouser pockets
a pocket watch
a gold key
a brown sock (being worn)
a black sock (being worn)
a pair of brown shoes (being worn)
a flannel shirt (being worn)
an envelope
a large stack of catalogs
a phone bill
an audio cassette with a red label
an audio cassette with a green label
“Go Dog Go”
“The Bedtime Story Book”
“The Boy Who Had No Words”
a yellow feather
a white sock
a red rubber ball
a security badge (being worn)
a small phone book
a large phone book
a report card
a pair of black tap shoes
a fifty dollar bill
a mug
some black coffee
a lab coat (being worn)
some goggles (being worn)
a optical filter
a small Phillips screwdriver
a handwritten note>SCORE
Score: 55 out of 360 Turns: 1024 Menu: Whatever
We got quite a few points for making it into work. i think we got some for successfully evading the boss, and more for getting a tool? Not too sure, though.
3 Likes
Part of this is from a classic light bulb joke:
How many surrealists does it take to change a light bulb? Two, one to hold the giraffe and the other to fill the bathtub with brightly colored machine tools.
The “dunking coffee cups into their donuts” is a joke about how, in topology (the branch of mathematics), a mug and a donut are equivalent shapes—they don’t differ in ways that are important to topology.
The only parts that don’t fit a classic joke I’ve heard before are the Klein bottle and the transcendental meditation. But maybe someone else will recognize what jokes those are referencing.
This sums up my general impression of the game so far!
perhaps?
This is completely unrelated to the game, but I think it’s funny that many European languages are just fine with double consonants (“tt”, “bb”, etc) but not with double vowels (“aa”, “uu”) because of a historical accident. Latin had long vowels and long consonants, both pronounced for about twice as long as the short ones, and at first they wrote the long vowels and the long consonants by doubling the letter. Then they stopped doing that for the vowels, and because Latin was so influential, a lot of European languages avoided it too.
English eventually adopted “ee” and “oo” to represent sounds that weren’t quite the same as “ea” and “oa”, but other doubles like “aa” are mostly only found when a consonant got forgotten in between. (In Hebrew, for example, “Aaron” is actually “'Aharon”; but Greek didn’t have a way to write an H between vowels, so the H disappeared and never got put back in.)
Finnish is an exception; the Finns are perfectly happy to write yy or uu or ää or whatever when they need a long vowel. A much more sensible practice than using silent E’s in English or silent H’s in German, if you ask me!
Okay, tangent over.
That’s a much better solution than where my mind first went! I was imagining we had to switch to base eight.
2 Likes
I think it’s just a joke on how Klein bottles don’t have an inside and an outside due to being non-orientable
1 Like
I’m impressed with your progress in this section! I spent ages convinced that you had to do something to oil the squeaky door and didn’t think I could get any further until I found some oil.
(You’ve also dodged one of the less obvious ways to get stuck in the early game: letting Mrs McGillicuddy get fired without obtaining the flathead screwdriver.)
You get 5 for dodging Mr Pendergast and 5 for swapping tools with the lab workers. It’s possible that you didn’t realise the significance of the thing that got you the other 5 points?
1 Like
I mean, I can try that if it doesn’t work, but 8 digits seems more likely than base 8 (and doesn’t tell us how many base 8 digits we’d need). FOrtunately, nowadays all I have to do is type “pi in base 8” into Wolfram Alpha and it’ll quite happily give me all the digits I could need. 
(Doing stuff with numbers in odd bases is hardly unprecedented; there’s another long-form game where, if memory serves, that’s key to one of the first problems.)
This is Not Just An Ordinary Ballerina, right? Although in that one you need to work in two different bases.
1 Like
It did take me a while to figure out that was what I needed to do, and I did go back in to see the receptionist gone. That to me suggested I might have missed something.
I think trying to approach the problem in a structural sense helps. There’s two new sections you can get to in the booth at this stage, and I’m still not sure what’s going on in the upstairs hall with the odd wall. So it seemed likely I was meant to go to work at this stage. And the room outside the squeaky door doesn’t really have anything else to play with. (And for the record, the game doesn’t know the word “oil”.)
Side note: Unlike with the Inform games I’m used to (and like Infocom games) TADS will say “I don’t know the word X” rather than “you don’t see any such thing”. So you can spend some time deducing what objects are in the game. (The recent video playthrough of Zork briefly did this.) If anyone (who hasn’t played!) wants me to try a random noun, just to see if it exists, now’s your chance!
Oh yes, your solution definitely seems like the better one! The mention of “thumbs” in the context of “digits” made me think “eight digits” was about the base, not about, well…the other, more common meaning of “digits”.
1 Like
Yes. Although I’d forgotten that part since I last played it.
Part VII: Search for the Sock
We ended last session just having made it back from Martin’s office. We traded tools with a bunch of lab technicians, and got a note which we think will help us with an email password. Now that we’re back, there was another door in the kitchen we haven’t been to yet.
PHONE BOOTH, in the pantry
You’re in the phone booth.
The phone booth door is open to the east, leading to the kitchen. A telephone is attached to the opposite wall. Light is coming from the ceiling of the phone booth.
The rectangular drawer is open.
>E
You drop the receiver.
KITCHEN
On the east wall is an archway containing a stone door. Next to the stone door is an electrical outlet, and next to the outlet is a large Black Box. You also see a long shelf running along the east wall.
Along the north wall you see two bowls on the floor. A small video screen is in the center of the north wall.
On the west wall is the kitchen sink. When facing the sink, you see a door-sized opening to the left of the sink and a door labeled “LAUNDRY ROOM” to the right of the sink.
On the south wall is a doorway leading to the dining room.
Agador-Spartacus lies down.
Although we haven’t done it yet, given how we opened the pantry/phone booth, figuring out how to open the laundry room isn’t hard.
>GET STOPPER
Your arms are getting full, but a little rearranging lets you take it anyway. You take the sink stopper out of the right drain.You notice some activity in the kitchen sink.
Water from the faucet is pouring into the right basin. The right drain is keeping pace with the new water pouring in from the faucet, so the water level in the right basin is holding steady even as some of the water swirls clockwise down the right drain. The right basin remains completely full.
>PUSH FAUCET LEFT
The faucet is now pushed left.You notice some activity in the kitchen sink.
Water from the faucet is pouring into the left basin. The water is going straight down the left drain without leaving any standing water in the left basin.
The water level in the right basin is two-thirds full and dropping. You find the clockwise swirling of water down the drain to be almost hypnotic.
>PUT STOPPER IN LEFT DRAIN
The sink stopper is now in the left drain.You notice some activity in the kitchen sink.
Water from the faucet is pouring into the left basin. A sink stopper is in the left drain. The level of the standing water in the left basin is almost one-third full and rising.
The water level in the right basin is one-third full and dropping. You find the clockwise swirling of water down the drain to be almost hypnotic.
>Z
Time passes…You notice some activity in the kitchen sink.
Water from the faucet is pouring into the left basin. A sink stopper is in the left drain. The level of the standing water in the left basin is almost two-thirds full and rising.
The water in the right basin is draining away. The right basin is almost empty. You find the clockwise swirling of water down the drain to be almost hypnotic.
The right drain gurgles as the last of the standing water there swirls down the drain. At the instant that you hear the gurgling of the drain the laundry room door slides open, disappearing into the wall. At the same moment the pantry door slides shut.
Success!
>W
The watch beeps as you enter the laundry room…
------------- Press space bar to continue -----------------
[more]
LAUNDRY ROOMA washing machine is on the north wall and a dryer is on the west wall.
On the south wall is a glass shelf that appears to have something etched into the glass. The kitchen is to the east.
That’s a new reaction from the watch
>X WASHER
The washing machine is currently closed.The washing machine doesn’t appear to have any knobs or buttons.
>OPEN IT
The washing machine is now open. You see nothing in the washing machine.>X DRYER
The dryer is currently closed.The dryer doesn’t appear to have any knobs or buttons.
You see Agador-Spartacus in the kitchen. He’s lying down.
>OPEN IT
The dryer regards you with disdain and refuses to open for you. Perhaps you should try again later when you are wearing matching socks.
I knew that we’d need matching socks for something eventually, it was mentioned right since the game intro. We’re still no closer to getting there, though!
>PUSH STEM
(first taking the watch out of the pocket)
You push the watch stem and it springs back up again. The watch cover pops open.On the face of the watch you see an image of Archimedes.
The image on the watch, Archimedes, looks like he has just gotten some brilliant inspiration about where his towel might be. His arms show the time as 12:59.
We couldn’t do anything with Archimedes before, but we’ve at least found the right place. Putting the watch in our pocket does nothing, though. I also tried:
>TURN STEM
You turn the stem clockwise. Archimedes’ arms still show the time as 12:59.Archimedes looks like he has just gotten some brilliant inspiration about where his towel might be.
Still no luck. I guess we need to get matching socks before anything happens here.
>X SHELF
Etched into the glass shelf is a picture of an empty bathtub. Nothing else is currently on the shelf.
THere was a similar shelf with an etching in the hallway upstairs, different to the shelves used by the model train. For whatever that’s worth.
>E
KITCHEN
The dog has been left here, and now that we have a reason to find matching socks, I wanted to test a theory. We found a third sock under the bed, but were told we’d need someone smaller to get under there. Maybe we can get the dog to go there with us? Here’s a reminder of the commands the dog knows.
>X REPORT
The report card is from the Good Doggy Training Academy. It lists the following grades:
SIT B
STAY B-
BEG C
LIE DOWN C-
HEEL B+
TRACK A-
I finally remember that this report was attached with a magnet, so:
>GET MAGNET
Your arms are getting full, but a little rearranging lets you take it anyway. You take the hippo magnet off of the front of the Black Box.>SAY “HEEL” TO AGADOR
You say “HEEL” to Agador-Spartacus. Agador-Spartacus comes to your side.>S
The blue birds suddenly become alive. They fly off of the china cabinet doors and begin to flit about, making you feel as if you should sing “Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah”. Then the blue birds land back on the china cabinet doors and grow still.
I’ll confess, I zoomed right past that message playing this on my way back to the living room and just saw it now compiling this. I’ll just show what that means in a moment, though. And I think I have a theory for why that appears now that I’ll explain later.
DINING ROOM (by the china cabinet)
>SING “ZIP-A-DEE-DOO-DAH”
You sing “Zip-a-dee-doo-dah”:“Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-ay,
My oh my what a wonderful day,
Plenty of sunshine heading my way,
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-ay!
Oh Mr. Bluebird’s on my shoulder,
It’s the truth, it’s actual,
And everything is satisfactual,
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-ay,
Wonderful feeling, Wonderful day!”The blue birds suddenly become alive. They push the china cabinet sideways, covering the opening in the north wall. Then the blue birds land back on the china cabinet doors and grow still.
>G
You sing “Zip-a-dee-doo-dah":“Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-ay,
My oh my what a wonderful day,
Plenty of sunshine heading my way,
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-ay!
Oh Mr. Bluebird’s on my shoulder,
It’s the truth, it’s actual,
And everything is satisfactual,
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-ay,
Wonderful feeling, Wonderful day!”The blue birds suddenly become alive. They push the china cabinet sideways, revealing a door-sized opening in the north wall. Then the blue birds land back on the china cabinet doors and grow still.
Well, at least there is a faster way to do that if we want it closed again for some reason. Not that I can think of why. I should test if that works before you find out about it.
>S
DINING ROOM (by the north end of the table)
>WDINING ROOM (by the west end of the table)
>W
You go through the strands of beads.LIVING ROOM (front half)
>N
LIVING ROOM (back half)
>DROP SMALL PHONEBOOK
The small phone book is now on the floor.
Just clearing up inventory space - this gave us the phone’s access code. I think we’re done using it.
Anyway, time to try our password!
>SIT IN CHAIR
Which chair do you mean, the desk chair, or the armchair?>DESK
You’re now sitting on the desk chair. Agador-Spartacus stops walking at your side. Apparently he has been taught not to go that way, at least not without Martin.Agador-Spartacus stands before you, wagging his tail affably.
I also probably wouldn’t want a dog bothering me when I’m trying to do work.
>USE COMPUTER
You start using the computer.The only thing of interest on the computer is the new incoming e-mail, so you pull these up on the screen.
Unfortunately there’s too much spam here. You suspect that there’s some useful e-mail in here that you’d like to read, but until you turn on the spam filter you won’t be able to find it.
>TURN ON FILTER
The spam filter is now turned on.>READ EMAIL
The e-mail has no subject line, but it appears to have been sent by Phouthavong Bochandilay from his office e-mail account at SED Limited.The body of the e-mail reads “Circular reasoning is irrational.”
There also appears to be an attachment. Unfortunately the attachment has been encrypted by Mr. Bochandilay with a password. You would need to type the password on the computer in order to see what Mr. Bochandilay has to say.
>TYPE “3.1415926” ON COMPUTER
You type “3.1415926” on the computer. The password is accepted!You read the message from Mr. Bochandilay:
Martin, are you ever coming back to work? I finished replacing the neural interface braid on your optical filter. I used the revised specs that you sent me, but it wasn’t easy! I found out that your boss had pulled the plug on your project and voided the Sub-Project Authorization Code. When the investigator from Purchasing called to ask why I was requesting materials for a discontinued sub-project, I told him that I must have transposed some numbers in the Auth Code. They ended up booking it to a visual impairment aid, the one that 17-A is using to try to do an optical nerve bypass.
But Martin, why didn’t you listen to me when I warned you not to show the early prototype to your boss? Old “Spam for Brains” Pendergast never did have any imagination, so of course it wouldn’t work properly for him. Besides, your sub-project had strayed so far from the overall project specs that even a spam-head like Pendergast could figure out that you had just made up the whole thing on your own. Sometimes you are just too straightforward for your own good, my friend.
------------- Press space bar to continue -----------------
[more]
So I did some grapevine investigating and heard that you stopped showing up for work the day after your project was nixxed. I also heard that by the time Pendergast decided to confiscate your materials he couldn’t find anything. Your filter was down in 9-C with me, of course. But where did you put the goggles? And more importantly, where are you?Anyway, I managed to slip the filter to your department receptionist before Pendergast came snooping down to 9-C. I told Mrs. McGillicuddy to hide it in a safe place where Old “Spam for Brains” wouldn’t find it until she could give it to you. I think she understood most of what I told her. But she’s still waiting for you to bring her a new battery for her hearing aid, so I’m not really sure what she thought I said. She was nodding her head and doing something with package delivery labels, and then I had to skip out before the security cart went back online and saw me down in the wrong department. Did you know that the security cart was designed by Mr. Pendergast? No wonder it’s so clueless.
Regards,
Bo
The plot thickens! So, Martin’s project - presumably the goggles - got canceled and so he went off somewhere, never to be seen again.
The cans of spam we were getting were from “K. McGillicuddy”, so that clears up that mystery. And we also were explicitly told here that she needs a battery, in the case that we got into the email without doing that. (Which would mean we’re now locked out of victory, but you still do get the note tossed back on the second trip out even if you’re in that state.)
>STAND
You stand up. You’re no longer on the desk chair.
Anyway, while I was here I played around with something I dismissed earlier.
>X BUST
The bust of Beethoven is made of white marble. His stubborn personality can be seen in the determined set of his forehead, nose, ears, and chin.>X FOREHEAD
A distinctive forehead, very Beethoven.>GET IT
Beethoven’s forehead is part of the bust of Beethoven.>TURN IT
Beethoven’s forehead is part of the bust of Beethoven.>PUSH IT
Beethoven’s forehead makes a sound like an old-fashioned fire engine siren, “Ree-rrr-ree-rrr!”
Okay, we’re on the right track at least.
>PUSH EAR
Beethoven’s ear goes “Honk!”>PUSH CHIN
Beethoven’s lips splutter, giving you a “Br-rr-rrr-p!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to the right.
>PUSH NOSE
Beethoven’s nose goes “Beep!”
This one is rather complicated and I spent quite a lot of play time trying to work it out. Honestly, I’m not sure I fully get it.
>PUSH CHIN
Beethoven’s lips splutter, giving you a “Br-rr-rrr-p!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to face forward.
>PUSH EAR
Beethoven’s ear goes “Honk!”>PUSH NOSE
Beethoven’s nose goes “Beep!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to the left.
Agador-Spartacus stands before you, wagging his tail affably.
>G
Beethoven’s nose goes “Beep!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to face forward.
>PUSH CHIN
Beethoven’s lips splutter, giving you a “Br-rr-rrr-p!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to the right.
>PUSH NOSE
Beethoven’s nose goes “Beep!”>PUSH CHIN
Beethoven’s lips splutter, giving you a “Br-rr-rrr-p!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to face forward.
I think I’m beginning to get the idea here. Each part toggles position between two adjacent positions, and will do nothing if you push it when it’s not in one of the positions it’s tied to.
>PUSH NOSE
Beethoven’s nose goes “Beep!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to the left.
>PUSH EAR
Beethoven’s ear goes “Honk!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to face backward.
>G
Beethoven’s ear goes “Honk!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to the left.
>PUSH EAR
Beethoven’s ear goes “Honk!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to face backward.
>PUSH FOREHEAD
Beethoven’s forehead makes a sound like an old-fashioned fire engine siren, “Ree-rrr-ree-rrr!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to the right.
>G
Beethoven’s forehead makes a sound like an old-fashioned fire engine siren, “Ree-rrr-ree-rrr!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to face backward.
>PUSH EAR
Beethoven’s ear goes “Honk!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to the left.
>PUSH NOSE
Beethoven’s nose goes “Beep!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to face forward.
After much trying and undoing, I finally hit upon an order that causes something to happen:
>PUSH NOSE
Beethoven’s nose goes “Beep!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to the left.
>PUSH EAR
Beethoven’s ear goes “Honk!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to face backward.
>PUSH FOREHEAD
Beethoven’s forehead makes a sound like an old-fashioned fire engine siren, “Ree-rrr-ree-rrr!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to the right.
>PUSH CHIN
Beethoven’s lips splutter, giving you a “Br-rr-rrr-p!”The bust of Beethoven suddenly makes a quarter turn to face forward.
The west wall behind the piano disappears into the ceiling, revealing a dance studio.
Agador-Spartacus is lying down here.
Yes, finally!
I think I get what’s going on here. The four parts are: nose (front and left), ear (back and left), forehead (back and right), and chin (front and right). If you press one, and it’s facing one of the two directions corresponding to that part, it moves to the other one. If you can use all four in a row, the secret passage opens.
>W
DANCE STUDIO
The dance studio is quite large. It occurs to you that Martin’s mother may have used this room to give dance lessons years ago.
The north wall is completely covered by a huge mirror.
The floor is magnificent, with beautifully grained wood squares arranged in a parquet pattern. The wood of the floor has many different shades, both light and dark. Near the west wall you see two indentations in the floor.
A hook is on the west wall, and hanging on the hook you see some ballet slippers.
A long shelf runs along the south wall.
To the east you see the back half of the living room.
You see Agador-Spartacus in the back half of the living room. He’s lying down.
I suppose it was obvious there was going to be a secret area here, especially because…
>X SHELF
Wooden shelving runs along the wall here. Mounted on the shelving is some model railroad track that runs along the entire length of the shelving.The track enters the dance studio from the southwest corner and turns to go east along the wall. At this point the shelving widens to form a platform on the south wall. Then the track goes east, dropping to floor level before exiting the dance studio.
…the tracks into the living room came in through here.
>X MIRROR
It’s a dance studio mirror. It seems to prefer things backwards.Looking in the mirror you see yourself, a man in his mid-thirties with red hair, green eyes, and a dimple in his chin.
>LOOK IN MIRROR
Looking in the mirror you see yourself, a man in his mid-thirties with red hair, green eyes, and a dimple in his chin.
Well, keeping in mind my habit of “let’s try things that worked in Zork”…
>RUB MIRROR
Touching the dance studio mirror has no effect.However, as your fingers make contact with the mirror, you suddenly receive a flash of insight. You have the odd feeling that the mirror understands the workings of the universe a great deal better than a mere human ever could. If it were willing to help, you bet it could show you a thing or two!
Doesn’t seem to have done anything to the room or the mirror, though. Let’s move on.
>X FLOOR
The floor is magnificent, with beautifully grained wood squares arranged in a parquet pattern. The wood of the floor has many different shades, both light and dark. Near the west wall you see two indentations in the floor.
>X INDENTATIONS
The two indentations in the floor are lined with a silver-colored metal. The size, shape, and separation of the indentations looks something like a representation of the pressure of a ballerina’s toes upon the floor if she were standing on pointe with her feet in second position.>X SLIPPERS
The ballet slippers are pink toe shoes with ribbons.>GET SLIPPERS
Your arms are getting full, but a little rearranging lets you take them anyway. You take the ballet slippers off of the hook.>REMOVE SHOES
You take off the brown shoes.>WEAR SLIPPERS
There’s no way that you could ever squeeze your average-sized male feet into a pair of women’s toe shoes.
Okay, fair. Worth a try though.
>WEAR BROWN SHOES
You put on the brown shoes.
I’m not sure what we’re supposed to do here yet, then. Of course with a game this large there’s always the possibility I’m just not ready for the puzzle here.
If I had to guess, we need to get some dancing shoes. The closest we got are some tap shoes we found in the kitchen cabinet, but they’re mangled and thus probably useless.
(Continued in next post)
2 Likes
(Part VII, continued)
>E
LIVING ROOM (back half)
I’m prepared to go west and check out the bed again, but the dog has gone sometime while we were fiddling with Beethoven’s bust and exploring the dance studio. Fortunately he didn’t run that far:
>N
WEST COURTYARD
Agador-Spartacus enters the west part of the courtyard from the east part of the courtyard.
Agador-Spartacus stands before you, wagging his tail affably.
>SAY “HEEL” TO AGADOR
You say “HEEL” to Agador-Spartacus. Agador-Spartacus comes to your side.>S
LIVING ROOM (back half)
>S
LIVING ROOM (front half)
>W
HALLWAY
This short hallway leads south to the bedroom and west to the bathroom. The living room is to the east.
On the north wall you see a cuckoo clock.
The train is stopped at the platform by the sofa.
A cuckoo pops out of the clock and lets out a loud “cuckoo” sound. It then disappears from sight into the clock.
Huh, that’s new.
>X CLOCK
The cuckoo clock hands show the time as 11:11.The cuckoo clock pendulum is swinging back and forth.
Well, we have exactly one other thing dealing with times so far. I don’t know what conditions triggered this, but we’ll look at this at the end of the update.
>W
BATHROOM
You feel as if you are in a lush rain forest, surrounded by green leaves and warm steamy mist.
For some reason the usual bathroom facilities don’t seem out of place here. You notice, however, that the towel rack is empty and the bathtub and the sink do not have any visible means of turning the water on or off.
There is a medicine cabinet with a small mirror over the sink. A long shelf runs along the west wall.
The door on the east wall leads to the hallway.
The bathroom smells soapy. This makes your nose itch.
Hmm, that’s odd. I wonder what happened to cause this change?
It doesn’t take me long to think over things we got to land on:
>REMOVE GOGGLES
You take off the goggles.>L
BATHROOM
The bathroom has all of the usual facilities that you would expect to see in a bathroom. You notice, however, that the towel rack is empty and the bathtub and the sink do not have any visible means of turning the water on or off.
There is a medicine cabinet with a small mirror over the sink. A long shelf runs along the west wall.
The door on the east wall leads to the hallway.
The bathroom smells soapy. This makes your nose itch.
So, it looks like we found out what the goggles do, if the email didn’t give us ideas. they alter how we perceive some areas and items. (The thing with the cabinet in the dining room is, as I found later, also only happens when wearing the goggles.) And I think I remember seeing some message somewhere about needing more imagination…
Anyway. I think I’ll eventually be re-exploring the house with the goggles on in more detail, to see what all changes. For now, however, let’s not worry about it.
>E
HALLWAY
>S
BEDROOM
The bedroom is almost entirely filled by a very large bed, which is oriented with its head on the south wall. A dresser also stands on the south wall just to the right of the bed.
The bottom drawer of the dresser is open.
To the west is a closet door that is currently closed. There is a dart board on the closet door.
A shelf runs along the east, south, and west walls.
The bedroom door is to the north, leading to the hallway.
>X BED
It’s a king-sized bed. The bedding and pillows are strewn on the bed in a careless fashion.>LOOK UNDER BED
There seem to be some other things under the bed, but they are considerably beyond your reach and too far towards the center for you to see anything except shadows. It occurs to you that fetching anything else from under the bed could be done only by someone who is smaller than you are.
Incidentally, rereading this I thought of something to try:
>MAKE BED
No point in doing that. It will just get messy again the next time someone sleeps here.>LIE DOWN
You’re now lying on the bed.Stuck into the ceiling above the bed you see a yellow dart, a red dart, and a green dart. Agador-Spartacus stops walking at your side. Apparently he has been taught not to go that way, at least not without Martin.
>X YELLOW DART
It’s an ordinary game dart with yellow feathers. One of the feathers appears to be missing
Remember how we found a yellow feather in here before? So that’s where it came from.
>GET YELLOW DART
You can’t reach the yellow dart from here.
The good news is that we found an object that could extend our reach not that long ago. The bad news is that one of the SED lab technicians currently has it.
>STAND
You stand up. You’re no longer on the bed.>SAY “BEG” TO AGADOR
You say “BEG” to Agador-Spartacus. Agador-Spartacus sits up on his hind legs and lifts his front paws into the air. After a few seconds he drops his paws back down to the ground.>SAY “LIE DOWN” TO AGADOR
You say “LIE DOWN” to Agador-Spartacus. Agador-Spartacus sits up on his hind legs and lifts his front paws into the air. After a few seconds he drops his paws back down to the ground.>SAY “SIT” TO AGADOR
You say “SIT” to Agador-Spartacus. Agador-Spartacus sits.>SAY “TRACK” TO AGADOR
You say “TRACK” to Agador-Spartacus. Agador-Spartacus stands up. He looks like he’s waiting for you to show him something so that he will know what sort of smell he needs to track.
Well, we found one sock under the bed. So:
>SHOW SOCK TO AGADOR
Which sock do you mean, the brown sock, the black sock, or the white sock?>WHITE
You show the white sock to Agador-Spartacus. Agador-Spartacus approaches the white sock and smells it. Then he puts his nose to the ground and begins to sniff about, trying to pick up a similar scent.Agador-Spartacus sniffs across the floor and then dives under the bed, disappearing from sight. A little while later he emerges with a blue sock in his mouth. He drops it at your feet and sits down.
>GET BLUE SOCK
You’re carrying too much. Perhaps you could put something in your pocket.
Oh, dear.
>X BLUE SOCK
It looks like an ordinary blue sock.>PUT ENVELOPE IN POCKET
The envelope is now in one of the trouser pockets.>PUT FEATHER IN POCKET
The yellow feather is now in one of the trouser pockets.>GET BLUE SOCK
Your arms are getting full, but a little rearranging lets you take it anyway. You take the blue sock.
Well, that’s a fourth on-matching sock, but could there be more?
>SHOW IT TO AGADOR
You show the blue sock to Agador-Spartacus. Agador-Spartacus approaches the blue sock and smells it. Then he puts his nose to the ground and begins to sniff about, trying to pick up a similar scent.Agador-Spartacus sniffs across the floor and then dives under the bed, disappearing from sight. A little while later he emerges with a long black sock in his mouth. He drops it at your feet and sits down.
>X LONG BLACK SOCK
It looks like an ordinary long black sock.>GET IT
You’re carrying too much. Perhaps you could put something in your pocket.>DROP NOTE
The handwritten note is now on the floor.>GET LONG BLACK SOCK
Your arms are getting full, but a little rearranging lets you take it anyway. You take the long black sock.
All the socks we have so far are now “short”, so this still isn’t quite the matching sock we need.
>SHOW IT TO AGADOR
You show the long black sock to Agador-Spartacus. Agador-Spartacus approaches the long black sock and smells it. Then he puts his nose to the ground and begins to sniff about, trying to pick up a similar scent.Agador-Spartacus sniffs his way across the floor and then leaves the bedroom going north, headed for the hallway.
You see Agador-Spartacus in the hallway. He’s sniffing.
>N
HALLWAY
Agador-Spartacus sniffs his way across the floor and then leaves the hallway going east, headed for the front half of the living room.
You see Agador-Spartacus in the front half of the living room. He’s sniffing.
>E
LIVING ROOM (front half)
Agador-Spartacus sniffs his way across the floor and then leaves the front half of the living room going north, headed for the back half of the living room.
>N
LIVING ROOM (back half)
Agador-Spartacus is pointing behind the bookcases.
>LOOK BEHIND BOOKCASE
There seem to be some things behind the bookcases, they are too far away from the edges for you to reach them or to see anything except shadows. You can’t help wondering how anything could have possibly gotten so far back into such a narrow space.>PUSH BOOKCASE
Pushing the bookcases doesn’t have any effect.>GO BEHIND BOOKCASE
You can’t go behind the bookcases.>SHOW LONG BLACK TO AGADOR
You show the long black sock to Agador-Spartacus. Agador-Spartacus approaches the long black sock and smells it. Then he puts his nose to the ground and begins to sniff about, trying to pick up a similar scent.Agador-Spartacus sniffs across the floor and then goes into a tense pointing position, his nose aimed behind the bookcases.
>REACH BEHIND BOOKCASE
There seem to be some things behind the bookcases, they are too far away from the edges for you to reach them or to see anything except shadows. You can’t help wondering how anything could have possibly gotten so far back into such a narrow space.>SAY “HEEL” TO AGADOR
You say “HEEL” to Agador-Spartacus. Agador-Spartacus comes to your side.
I almost give up for now, because I try a few more things and seem to have no way of getting stuff out from behind the bookcase. I decide to lighten my inventory by getting rid of my socks when a new thing happens:
>DROP BLUE SOCK
The short blue sock is now on the floor.Slinky comes out from behind the bookcases.
Slinky grabs the short blue sock. He takes it back behind the bookcases.
Oh, no. Slinky is Martin’s ferret, who presumably got trapped behind there with (probably) the sock we need.
This completely changes the question I think I should be asking from “how do I get back there?” to “can I make the ferret come out with the stuff that’s back there?” Unfortunately, I still cannot think of how I would go about doing that. So I undo and move on.
>S
LIVING ROOM (front half)
>E
You go through the strands of beads.DINING ROOM (by the west end of the table)
>N
DINING ROOM (by the north end of the table)
>N
DINING ROOM (by the china cabinet)
>N
KITCHEN
>DROP BLUE SOCK
The short blue sock is now on the floor.>DROP WHITE SOCK
The short white sock is now on the floor.
Just to clear out inventory space. Once I can get behind the bookcase I’ll just change socks and probably get rid of the ones that aren’t matching. In the meantime I know where my extra socks are if the one behind the bookcase matches one of them.
Now, there’s one more thing I’d like to do this time. In the hallway, we saw a cuckoo pop out of the clock and show us the time of 11:11. That means that something important happens at that time. I think it’s time to mess with our watch again!
>PUSH STEM
You push the watch stem and it springs back up again. The watch cover pops open.On the face of the watch you see an image of Archimedes. Archimedes’ arms show the time as 12:59.
Right, it was on Archimedes. Let’s enact our algorithm. 11 is an odd hour, so we need to start with Newton’s 3:00.
>PULL STEM
You pull the watch stem and it snaps back down again. The watch beeps. The watch image changes to Isaac Newton.>TURN STEM
You turn the stem clockwise. Sir Isaac’s arms now show the time as 3:00.
Next, we need to move to Einstein to get the right hour.
>PUSH STEM
You push the watch stem and it springs back up again. The watch beeps. The watch image changes to Archimedes.>G
You push the watch stem and it springs back up again. The watch beeps. The watch image changes to Alexander Graham Bell.>G
You push the watch stem and it springs back up again. The watch beeps. The watch image changes to Galileo Galilei.>G
You push the watch stem and it springs back up again. The watch beeps. The watch image changes to Benjamin Franklin.>G
You push the watch stem and it springs back up again. The watch beeps. The watch image changes to Albert Einstein.>TURN STEM
You turn the stem clockwise. Albert’s arms now show the time as 5:00.>G.G.G
You turn the stem clockwise. Albert’s arms now show the time as 7:00.You turn the stem clockwise. Albert’s arms now show the time as 9:00.
You turn the stem clockwise. Albert’s arms now show the time as 11:00.
Okay. Next, we need Fibonacci to get us the correct minute mod 4.
>PUSH STEM
You push the watch stem and it springs back up again. The watch beeps. The watch image changes to James Clerk Maxwell.>G
You push the watch stem and it springs back up again. The watch beeps. The watch image changes to Werner Heisenberg.>G
You push the watch stem and it springs back up again. The watch beeps. The watch image changes to Leonardo Pisano Fibonacci.>TURN STEM
You turn the stem clockwise. Fibonacci’s arms now show the time as 11:05.
Aha, it looks like this option keeps track of where in its cycle you were. In my case I had left it on 3 when exploring the 12:00 hour. So I have to turn it all the way around.
>G
You turn the stem clockwise. Fibonacci’s arms now show the time as 11:08.>G
You turn the stem clockwise. Fibonacci’s arms now show the time as 11:13.>G
You turn the stem clockwise. Fibonacci’s arms now show the time as 11:21.>G
You turn the stem clockwise. Fibonacci’s arms now show the time as 11:34.>G
You turn the stem clockwise. Fibonacci’s arms now show the time as 11:55.>G
You turn the stem clockwise. Fibonacci’s arms now show the time as 11:01.>G
You turn the stem clockwise. Fibonacci’s arms still show the time as 11:01.>G
You turn the stem clockwise. Fibonacci’s arms now show the time as 11:02.>G
You turn the stem clockwise. Fibonacci’s arms now show the time as 11:03.
Yes, I know I could’ve gone from 55. Or even from Heisenberg, which after all just randomizes the minute. Ah well, this mostly isn’t a game of down-to-the-move timing so far. Anyway, back to Maxwell now to move the minute to 11.
>PULL STEM
You pull the watch stem and it snaps back down again. The watch beeps. The watch image changes to Werner Heisenberg.>G
You pull the watch stem and it snaps back down again. The watch beeps. The watch image changes to James Clerk Maxwell.>TURN STEM
You turn the stem clockwise. Maxwell’s arms now show the time as 11:07.>G
You turn the stem clockwise. Maxwell’s arms now show the time as 11:11.>PUT WATCH IN POCKET
(first closing the watch)
The pocket watch is now in one of the trouser pockets.The video screen begins to show the movie “Seven Per Cent Solution”. Sigmund Freud hypnotises Holmes by swinging a pocket watch.
Well, seems we should follow suit, then.
I’ve definitely heard of that being a thing. In fact I’m pretty sure I first heard of it because in Curses! you have to pass someone blocking your way by doing that.
>GET WATCH
Your arms are getting full, but a little rearranging lets you take it anyway. You take the pocket watch out of one of the trouser pockets.>SWING WATCH
The watch swings back and forth hypnotically. It’s difficult to see the watch while it’s swinging, but for a moment you think that you see the misty image of a train conductor on the cover of the watch. The conductor seems confused and looks as if he needs you to tell him what time it is.Agador-Spartacus is standing next to you.
>SAY “10:30”
(to the train conductor)
You say “10:30” to the train conductor. The conductor smiles and nods his head briefly before his image fades and disappears.Then the watch stops swinging and pops open.
Maxwell’s arms now show the time as 10:30.
Okay, that’s really nice.
In case it wasn’t clear: we just unlocked a way to instantly set the watch to any time we want without having to manually fiddle with all the watch faces. That’ll make things so much easier. (And I really should start experimenting with the watch again…)
This is incidentally, at least from my point of view as a player, a nice bit of design. We do eventually unlock a shortcut for using the watch, but only after we have thoroughly demonstrated that we know how to control it manually. 11:11 is definitely a fairly complicated time that requires a full plan to get to manually!
Okay, that’s enough for today. Next time: Back to the office!
>I
You are carrying:
some khaki trousers (being worn)
trouser pockets
a gold key
an envelope
a yellow feather
a short brown sock (being worn)
a short black sock (being worn)
a pair of brown shoes (being worn)
a flannel shirt (being worn)
a large stack of catalogs
a phone bill
an audio cassette with a red label
an audio cassette with a green label
“Go Dog Go”
“The Bedtime Story Book”
“The Boy Who Had No Words”
a red rubber ball
a security badge (being worn)
a large phone book
a report card
a pair of black tap shoes
a fifty dollar bill
a mug
some black coffee
a lab coat (being worn)
some goggles
a optical filter
a small Phillips screwdriver
a hippo magnet
some ballet slippers
a long black sock
a pocket watch>SCORE
Score: 60 out of 360 Turns: 1242 Menu: Whatever
5 more points for opening the way to the dance studio. And I think the points I wasn’t sure of last time were from getting the goggles from the work lab.
3 Likes
I will confess, I just solved this by pressing parts of the bust in random orders until something happened.
Yeah, this is a game that often rewards you for exploring dead-end states.
I think lying on the bed is by far the more obvious way to find it, but you can also find out about the darts in the ceiling by showing the feather to Agador-Spartacus and asking him to “track”.
I’m pleased that this happened eventually, because there are loads of small items that Slinky will come out to take it you drop them in the living room, but you kept choosing ones to drop there which were just slightly too big and I was worried you’d never see him! (Although there is a hint later in the game about finding him if you manage to solve a bunch of other puzzles beforehand.)
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I’m impressed—I see the logic now, but none of that was coming across to me at all!
I only made full sense of it writing up the transcript and studying what happened. There was a lot more undoing when I actually played it!
At least (hopefully) I won’t be dealing with it again.
2 Likes
At least this one was explicit about what needed to be done. If you’ve ever played or read about the old mainframe games from Cambridge University, some of those just delighted in putting you in unwinnable states without any hint that they’ve done it.
I’m taking this as a hint that trying to resolve this shouldn’t be my top priority right now.
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