Renga in Blue   Interactive fiction and the All the Adventures project

(My previous posts are needed for context.)

I’ve beaten the game, and unfortunately both puzzles involved were terrible. I still will give some latitude because the combining-message mechanic was so satisfying, but let’s get to the end first–

Continuing directly from last time, I needed to get a parchment from the native without resorting to violence. I had tried to GIVE every single item I could possibly bring over. (The SKULL I could not bring, because it triggers natives attacking when it passes by the other native.)

Every GIVE gave a variation like the one above: “what?? I don’t think the native wants it”. The text here clearly implies the game is understanding, and simply rejecting this option.

Instead, no: GIVE NECKLACE was right. But it has to be typed as GIVE NECKLACE TO NATIVE in order to be understood.

I’ve never done relative ranking, but this likely would my in top 3 most deceptive parser messages of all time.

Fortunately this was near the end of the game because otherwise my mood would have significantly soured. I did not come across as “solving a puzzle” as much as “making a meta-leap based on my past experiences, given we know the character has the parchment, the verb list is minimal, and GIVE is on it”.

Knowing the GIVE syntax, I went back to the first native and tried giving an item that hadn’t a use before: the FOOD. The results in the native trading a PHRASEBOOK.

With the phrasebook I could go back and read the two messages previously untranslated, at the sign and the altar.

The first simply indicates to follow the path rather than digress, where the second one might be intended as a hint for the endgame but I’m still massively unclear about it (you’ll see in a moment).

when the page is complete look and you’ll find, west of the sun and the ancient temple,amongst the bones of our ancestors

I still hadn’t used the SPADE yet, but now was the time: I dug starting at the three pillars and going west. Just east of where the skull was I found gold.

Once the gold is revealed, natives immediately appear and start to chase. It’s a little more time than what happens with getting spotted with the skull, but not enough to do anything useful.

Trying to hide in the well. You can jump in the cave but you just get killed in the dark.

If it hadn’t been for the GIVE issue I would have spent a bit longer on the puzzle, but I was grouchy and worrying I might be running into another parser issue. It isn’t a parser issue at all, and just as an experiment, I’m going to pause before revealing the answer. Try your best guess at how to pick up the gold and survive all the way back to the boat; maybe you’ll spot something I did not.

Via eBay.

Did you come up with… be holding the skull while picking up the gold?

Despite being attacked earlier because you had the skull, now you are attacked when you don’t have the skull. I assume there is some logic about a taboo going on but I couldn’t come up with any rationale, nor any way to pull the altar’s clue into the puzzle (assuming it is relevant at all).

With the skull providing safety, you can now walk back to the boat. The boat still needs to be light enough to sail, and you’ve got a bunch of gold, so you need to drop the skull before leaving, but there’s ample time after to sail away.

The puzzles overall were essentially straightforward (coat for the cold, foot pump for an inflatable boat, key for a door) and the wide-out exploration and slowly growing parchment made for a satisfying middlegame. Just it failed to stick the landing. I surely am missing some clue on the skull, right?

I’m going to save Urban Upstart for a little bit later (but not too long, I want to have the “feel” of this game fresh in my mind) and my projected third Britgame also needs to be maneuvered a little, so after I finish writing this I’m pulling out some actual dice to see what comes next. Exciting! Then we’ll be off to one of the first Japanese adventures of 1983.