Renga in Blue   Interactive fiction and the All the Adventures project

(Avon posts in order are here.)

This post is mostly intended to lay out exactly everywhere I’m stuck (for my benefit just as much as yours) although I have made some small progress, including to a new area.

I will officially declare this the threshold if people want to drop full on spoiler hints, but please do so in ROT13 (unless you are “playing along” and have not checked hints, in which case feel free to use plaintext). I’d still like to hit my goal of finishing by the end of February.

But first, that progress I mentioned–

Romeo and Juliet at the balcony, Illustrated London News (1855), wood engraving.

Last time I had leaped off a balcony to my doom, but I hadn’t tried it (as Matt W. suggested in the comments) while holding the bat wool. Seemed logical enough:

You are on the ground floor of Dunsinnin. There is an exit to the north and some steps up.
There is a sceptre here, which shows the force of temporal power!
> get
OK.
> u
You are on the first floor of Dunsinnin. There is a balcony to the south
(Soft! what light through yonder window breaks?) and some steps down.
> s
You are on the balcony of Dunsinnin, which looks out over Birnham wood. The only (apparent) way to go now is back to the north.
> jump
As you leap off the balcony the bat’s wool begins to grow, taking the form of a giant bat, to which you clutch desperately. On the bat’s back you do fly, getting an Ariel view of the wood. After a while you land and the bat’s wool regains its former state.
You are standing on a flat plain. From here it seems that all the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances to the north, south, east and west.

Regarding the scepter (or rather, “sceptre”), it has more attached to its treasure description than normal.

> look
You are in a cell, which clearly belongs to some holy man, as you can tell from the religious decoration of the room. The only way out is by a door to the northeast.
Is this a dagger you see before you? Yes, I believe so.
There is a bat’s wool here.
There is a dog’s tongue here.
There is a diamond necklace here!
There is a large laundry basket here.
There is a miniature portrait of the lady Portia here!
There is a gold ring here!
There is a nourishing meat pie here.
There is a sceptre here, which shows the force of temporal power!
There is a figured goblet here!
There is a shield here.
There is a clerical collar lying discarded here.
There is a piece of paper here bearing the word “TEABAG”.
There is a topaz here!
There is an antique viola here!
There is a signed copy of the Iliad here!
The Boar’s Head Drinking Trophy is here!
There is a furred robe here!
There is a piece of agate here, carved into the likeness of Queen Mab!

(This is not every treasure I’ve found, but a lot of them. The likeness of Queen Mab also feels suspicious but not as much as the force of temporal power.)

Phoenix games have not shied away from having a treasure also be a utility item, but this game (seemingly) hasn’t gone that route. I still have fair certainty the scepter will be used in the future. Perhaps it will be used to go to the future? My maximum score (so far) suggests I really am missing a whole section of game, which might be a fall season for the grand finale section of Avon. (Are there any notable fall scenes in Shakespeare, though?)

Another breakthrough involved the Undiscovered Country, which I’ve finally waded through. I had a “scroll” from the capitol that I always suspected was connected with the mazes…

> read scroll
The scroll bears the following message:
‘By indirections find directions out.’
> read scroll
The scroll bears the following message:
‘What do you read, my lord? Words, words, words.’
> read scroll
The scroll bears the following message:
‘Though this be madness, yet there is method in ‘t.’

…but I hadn’t apparently tested reading the scroll while in the Undiscovered Country itself, as the scroll text changes.

> read scroll
The scroll bears the following message:
‘When the wind is southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw.’

This gives fairly transparent directions for each direction to go.

> read scroll
The scroll bears the following message:
‘Then westward ho! Grace and good disposition attend your ladyship!’

There are two exceptions, one being a text for “BACK”. (“You yourself, sir, should be old as I am, if, like a crab,
you could go backward.”) BACK is an understood verb in the game, but it isn’t a common one, and I’m still unclear what actual action is being undertook here (are we walking backwards, maybe?) Of course, this game has been halfway in wordplay-world where actions aren’t meant to always be literal, but rather perhaps punning.

The other exception you’ll see in a moment. After enough successful moves you find the princess Imogen from Cymbeline, a play I knew nothing about. (Set in very early Roman Britain, ~10-14 AD, involving the vassal king. The 2014 movie changes the premise: “For years Cymbeline, King of the Briton Motorcycle Club, has maintained an uneasy peace with the Roman Police Force.”)

You are in the undiscovered country, from whose bourn no traveller returns. There are paths in various directions.
The princess Imogen is here. Sleep, the ape of death, lies upon her.
On her wrist there is a valuable bracelet!

We can steal the bracelet just like the play and walk away. Alternatively, we can kiss and/or wake Imogen, either before or after taking the bracelet.

> kiss imogen
One kiss! Rubies unparagon’d, how clearly they do’t! You notice, on her left breast, a mole cinque-spotted, like the crimson drops i’ the bottom of a cowslip.
> wake imogen
The princess wakes with a yawn and wanders away with the bracelet.

The kiss description in particular is colorful enough to be suspicious, as is the fact taking the bracelet gives you no points. I think I’m missing some puzzle juncture here (it comes straight from the play, though), but I’ll list it out when I give my full Unsolved Report.

To get out from the princess encounter, you need to follow a special scroll message.

The scroll bears the following message:
‘I am but mad north-northwest.’

It’s not “go north, then go northwest”. It’s as one single command. I have never, ever seen this in a text adventure before.

> nnw
You are on the bank of a river which flows from the north and disappears over a waterfall. There is also a maze of paths to the southeast.

Cymbeline, Act II. Iachimo steals a bracelet from the sleeping Imogen. Art by Samuel Begg from the late 19th century.

Before my Unsolved Report, I need to mention I snuck by one of the other mazes, the one in the fog. This was a matter of order of operations; after you have dealt with the hovel (where you say FATHOM which was obtained from Ariel) you get an encounter there.

From the gloom there comes a voice which you seemingly recognise as that of the poor tormented creature that lived in the hovel, although in the fog you see nothing. He leads you for a while and then stops at (he says) the very brim of a cliff whose high and bending head looks fearfully in the confined deep. You then hear him no more.

You can then jump down to a completely new area! It first asks you for a name, which knowing Phoenix has to be an exact particular name or you softlock.

> jump
You fall forward, with your eyes shut. After a while you open them to see…

You are at the foot of a high cliff, at whose dread summit you can now see a creature above all strangeness. Methinks his eyes are two full moons; he has a thousand noses, horns whelk’d and wav’d like the enridged sea: it is some fiend. Therefore, thou happy father, think that the clearest gods, who make them honours of men’s impossibilities, have preserv’d thee.
The valley you are in leads down to the east towards a Brave New World.
There is a longbow here.
> e
Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them…
Since you are fast achieving greatness, what name would you wish to go under?
Arthur
O Arthur, Arthur! Wherefore art thou Arthur?
What’s in a name? that which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet. Thank you.
You are at the edge of the Brave New World. To the east you see a high house with a small opening in the wall, to the west a steep valley, and to the south a track.

The track goes to a dead end with a “fretful porpentine”, the house is a little more cryptic.

You attempt to enter the house, but a constable seizes on you as a potential trouble-maker and bundles you out again.

I’m very puzzled what the best approach is. Maybe there’s a name we could have picked to avoid trouble-maker status? Or some item from our vast array of treasures would prove our respectability? Or maybe some action way back in a previous season marked us for a softlock right at this moment?

You can also (given the longbow, plus the arrow you can get right before the maze) shoot an arrow, but I’m again mystified, in this case even how to parse what happened.

> shoot arrow
Let your disclaiming from a purposed evil free you so far in our most generous thoughts, for you have shot your arrow o’er the house and hurt a brother.

That’s everything new, so let’s do the updated meta-map.

I can confirm now (or at least be 95% sure) I’m not missing any region to the south. The Rosalind maze may hide a new area, and I suspect the Brave New World section goes farther (maybe a lot farther). I still haven’t broken 200 and the maximum score is 425.

WINTER PROBLEMS UNSOLVED

Just the farmer and the chickens. I don’t have a single iota which direction to go on this puzzle.

Also possible: you can sneak by the drug-sniffing dog with the phial, meaning you can enter the Eastcheap town in a different season (and get back over to the main part of the game via some other method, as the town is usually only accessible in winter).

I am extremely skeptical there’s a way past the bear, but I should list it just in case.

SPRING PROBLEMS UNSOLVED

Nothing really? You need to eat the toe of frog in order to swim (allowing you to survive the knight attack) and the effect seems to only last through spring, meaning it is tempting to suggest it gets used elsewhere; there’s a beach in the town past the capitol, for instance, which has nothing there, suggesting it is a possible embarking point or final destination.

Speaking of the capitol, spring is during the Ides of March so you get stabbed; my suspicion is you simply have to wait until summer, but again I want to mention the event just in case.

SUMMER PROBLEMS UNSOLVED

Surviving getting the third treasure from Lady Portia (I still turn warm and melt upon winning the last contest). There’s a decently long timer suggesting you can get pretty far across the map while affected.

Does the sleeping princess lead to anything useful other than the treasure she wears?

I’m still unclear what the starling does (“Mortimer” which it says does get recognized as a magic word, though) and I also haven’t found a use for the shrew.

The Rosalind maze is still unsolved, and I haven’t been able to do anything once in the Brave New World area past the fog maze.

ANY-SEASON PROBLEMS UNSOLVED

There’s technically some “impenetrable” grass at the graveyard which is present in all seasons.

You are in a walled graveyard. For those making a return journey, the way out is to the west, as the eastern exit is blocked by impenetrable grass. However there is more graveyard to the north.

It has resist my attempts to the extent I think it comes into play as an exit rather than entrance (for instance, maybe the Brave New World area loops back and exits here).

The cloud that might be a whale, camel, or weasel still presents nothing useful. It comes from a scene in Hamlet…

Hamlet: Do you see yonder cloud that’s almost in shape of a camel?

Polonius: By the mass, and ‘tis like a camel, indeed.

Hamlet: Methinks it is like a weasel.

Polonius: It is backed like a weasel.

Hamlet: Or like a whale?

Polonius: Very like a whale.

…and maybe it is just for color … but knowing this author, everything is important.