Renga in Blue   Interactive fiction and the All the Adventures project

A poster sent to dealers. Via the Gallery for Undiscovered Entities.

I’ve opened a new area, but it just made things more rather than less puzzling.

First, a revision of something I previously said: I mentioned that when wearing the mask, that the mysterious figure following would eventually pick up the trail anyway. I thought it was a time-based thing, but rather, it is location based:

While in the area marked blue (“City Streets” to “Zoo Midway”) you are safe while wearing the mask. In the red area the figure appears, and you have a random chance of dying to a knife.

Consequently, I made a structural solving decision: I figured that in the “winning run” of the game it was intended for the player to be “safe”, that is, there is no point (unlike Adventure 430) where you can do everything right and still die. This was consistent with the prior games by the author; what this meant is I needed to ignore everything in the red until I had the means to be safe there as well.

(More on structural solving here: roughly, it involves solving puzzles by making deductions about the intended flow of the game.)

There was one bit of hintage at least (although not progress) from the red area. I tested the mysterious box with a button everywhere. It gives a squealing noise twice, and any further button presses there’s just a “click”. That suggests a resource is being used up that only works twice. The special power I discovered at the “monkey house”.

Specifically, pushing the button caused the cage to open. It seems to be a “open the locked door” device. This discovery became important soon after.

Turning back to the initial area, I combed over for things I had missed. One thing I’m sheepish about missing, in that I wrote down the words some things may need to be examined over twice, is that at the body at the start you need to SEARCH twice. The second time you get a telegram.

I wasn’t sure at the time how to interpret this, but I decided — in the spirit of combing over everything very carefully — to hang out at the telephone a little. I didn’t have anyone to call, but ANSWER PHONE gave the message NO ONE IS ON THE LINE. This suggested to me perhaps there would be some moment the line would would be used. The bomb goes off at 6:15, and at 6:09 the phone rings:

Answering the phone has someone ask “what’s the woid”? I figured it had to be one of the telegram words.

ZILCH (“OUT”) gives the password Z3X, and ZORCH (“IN”) gives the password W3E. I think this is meant to be an “are you out or are you in (the gang)” question. Saying Z3X (that is, picking “OUT”) to the popcorn seller gets a NOTE

BEWARE OF THE SQUEALER! IF YOU’RE REALLY SHARP, YOU’LL TAKE A SHORT CUT AROUND THE BLOCK!

and saying W3E gets both the note and a flower, which you are told to wear.

Once you have the flower on you are safe in the red zone on the map, so that’s clearly the better choice. (Incidentally, the popcorn vendor doesn’t respond to either word unless you’ve been through the phone call scene, but it makes sense that he hasn’t been told to expect a code word signal yet.)

I still suspected I wasn’t done with the hotel yet. While you have enough time to leave immediately after the phone call, I wondered what would happen if I waited until the explosion (“SQUEAL BOMB”) from the telegram.

The bomb starts giving the same squeal that my door-opening gizmo gives when I push the button. What if I push it when the bomb is squealing too?

This drops you down a secret trapdoor! Note that this doesn’t work early: You have to hit the button right when the bomb is about to explode.

This is the previously-mentioned brand new area I found.

This is a relatively standard maze, except:

a.) there’s a grate where you land that is unreachable, and a grate in another spot, also unreachable; I don’t know if they’re just for flavor or part of a puzzle, but knowing the author, we need to reach at least one of the grates

b.) there’s a book (LE WIS CAR ROLL) and a bra (MODEL 36EE-2-BBL) just lying around

The Braille has to be a hint, right?

c.) there’s a pair of double doors where the magic button works; however, trying to step inside and you just drop down an elevator shaft

d.) there’s a wood block under a gap in the ceiling; you can move the block to reveal a corkscrew, which you can jam into the block as a sort of stepstool in order to reach the ceiling and get out of the whole complex

This of course could be the “block” referenced in the note the popcorn vendor dropped, but I don’t know how to apply the information.

Climbing up is a one-way trip as far as I can tell, so if there’s a way to safely get in the elevator it needs to be done before this exit.

I’m still very stuck; I guess the model number might be some new key-code and the book might be as well, but I’m making no progress on any of the obstacles I now am blocked by with either. That’d be the movie theater ($5 entry), the electrified fence, the office at the zoo (stopped by security), the snake with rock (can’t pick up the rock without dying), and the gorilla (who as shown earlier, you can free with the magic button, but then he just kills you).

Still, everything is coded very tightly and I don’t feel like I’m stuck because of jank programming, so I’m happy to keep whacking at the puzzles and hoping something falls out.