Part 5: We are good infiltrators

Suggested Listening: Wilco - Hell is Chrome

Alright, droogs! Let's Scooby... uh.. do that was incredibly stupid LET'S DO THIS!


The winner of the voting competition last time was FOREST (and not OTHER FOREST).

This is extremely fortunate, because that was the right choice! You could bum around OTHER FOREST for a really long time, finding nothing to do, and clicking every inch before you realized that FOREST was the right choice! Guess what I did my first time!


Anyway, here we are. As advertised, a totally nondescript piece of forest. Why are we here?


Just to prove that littlepants and vlad didn't find the sheriff, here is them finding the battle journal for the first time. You can hear a distant boom if you strain your ears!


Heading east, we find a roadway!


Every thirty seconds(!) a truck will trundle by. Just long enough for it to take FOREVER if you're waiting for it in game time, just short enough to be utterly madcap unbelievable in real time.


But Heeeey! Looks like the AI manufacturing plant is to the east! Score!


My GOODNESS that's a large "high voltage" sign!

Well, no problem, Alex will just mist and fly right th-


Ha ha ha you've got to stop believing that. No, there's no explanation for why misty Alex can't make the trek, he just won't move past the fence. There's still an invisible wall there.

- They have a desk fan hidden in the base!

Whatever, loser. Your stock is going down QUICK.


And heading east one screen, we can see a little more of the base, but that's it.

- Ha ha y' knooow what I should dooo? Shld just SMAAAASH it eh? EH?

- Littlepants, you are drunk. This is what would happen.



- Y'ok maybe not.

(side note: where does this game get off calling Littlepanther a WIMP? If there is ONE thing that she isn't...)


No, the solution to this problem comes by realizing that about ten pixels over from the place where your RV started is a "Clearing in the woods", with no discernible clues that it's there.


And in it? Nothing special but a huge enormous branch.

BUT WAIT, you cry! How am I supposed to believe that a branch would JUST BE LYING ON THE GROUND? I'm more bothered by this than I am by any of the other huge gaping plot holes!


a storm recently blew through here.

WHEW! Glad they cleared up THAT plot hole!


Now to put it in the middle of the road, and stand right next to the truck while the driver moves it away.

B-brother? Is that you? Because I'm pretty sure you're the same face sprite as mine!

You need a little more time to calm down from those soothing herbs, dear. Why don't you take a rest?

Anyway yeah this guy just sort of front-walks this tree limb what must be MILES into the forest, because you just take his truck and use it to get into the base.

And he never checks on it or calls you out, so yeah I guess either the base is 2 miles away or he takes the branch far into the w-


Or the base is 10 feet away and he moves the branch there. You can pick it up from here and move it back into the road, where it'll stall another truck 30 seconds later. This is the only way into the base.


So yeah! Now we're in the base! And now the front gate is open (?) and we can move in and out anytime we want to! Forever! Man the security is AWFUL here.


Uh... does it? In... 1795? You put a tree branch in front of a, carriage I guess, to break into an electric-fence fortified compound? Oh Alex, you CRAZY.


Well, let's get to it. Nothing to do but see what's in this garage area here.


BINGO! Man we are only two minutes into this base, and there are a good dozen crates marked "TOP SECRET". And seeing as this is the suspicious weapons-producing facility, I bet they've got tons of awesome stuff in it! Ok, get to work, boys!







.......
That's... that's it huh. Nothing to do in those crates? No way to open them?

Fine. So turning on the power ALSO activated the um. Power window-cleaning scaffolding? Sure fine. So now we can take it to...


THE THIRD FLOOR!


.....

So... uh.... I guess the other side of this obviously very heavily barricaded steel tube corridor has a lot of removable plate-glass windows? That need cleaning?

Can somebody, ANYBODY, tell me the purpose of a connecting hallway that connects with a level 4 door at one end and a level 6 at the other? Presumably if you have level 6 access you'd have level 4, so why not, you know, MAKE BOTH LEVEL SIX DOORS? All this is going to lead to is some poor level four chump opening this door, staring 10 feet at the level six door, slumping, and slowing walking back to his level 4 world.

So yeah, we can't do anything to level 6 land. I smell a retracing ahead!
Fortunately, we DID get the level four card from the sheriff!

But what about team subtlety???


Yeah.

Things Alex can't mist through: A desk fan, a chain-link fence, the door on an RV.

Things Alex can mist through: The bottom of a side-sliding secured laboratory blast door.




Uh. Uh. Uh.

So.... alright. We've got several hundred open-topped plastic containers of... rainwater? And what looks like a painchamber in the back there. A chamber where they put you for.... pain.


Ah. So those are "electronic parts"? Sure.

Of course, that's not what Isaac sees...


triggers, timers, voltage regulators, and even a few reusable detonator caps. Military contractors have such breath-taking stockrooms!

Yeah, why with all those parts you could... build... hm. Triggers, timers, voltage regulators, and detonator caps? Um. I guess... some bombs? Maybe?


quitting time, intending to finish the job tomorrow

Well anyway, that's an elevator in the back there. That pain-chamber. And it's got a control panel/access code enterer near it.

Actually, before we do that, let me take a second and address the big problem here.

Look, Bureau 13. I KNOW you ran out of budget and time. I KNOW modeling stuff is difficult. But this section just makes it REALLY painfully obvious that you are using stock, pre-created images. At least I HOPE you are, and you didn't really intend for your boxes of electronic components to be this bizarre shade of green plastic boxes with water in them. And the elevator to be a torture chamber. And the room to be a cut and paste from a death star. I can't help but think that making the rooms somewhat simpler, maybe re-using some of the shelves from the electronics store would have been better? It's just... it's just sad-looking is all.

ANYWAY, rant over, we got to get in this elevator.

There's a couple ways we can do this. If we're the hacker...


My goodness what is that icon! That, friends, is the HACK icon, making its first appearance!


LIKE UNTO A BOSS


lock. The diagnostic i/o port was still open.

And that even sound SOMEWHAT legit!

Undermining the coolness of the hack icon somewhat is the fact that this, and every, time the hack icon is usable,


the tinker icon shows up and does the same thing. So the hack icon shows up only sometimes, and is ALWAYS replaceable with tinker. Why include both you ask? Go die in prison! That's customer service, the Bureau 13 way!

So what if we have no hacker? Well, our thief could try to PICK it...




these days!

Yeah, stupid elitist criminals!

Ok, so what now? Well, if we remember back to the AI corporate office...







BOY I hope you noticed and picked up that memo! Because if not, get ready for an entire game's worth of tedious backtracking! At least with THIS puzzle you could guess where a logical place to look for the memo might be. Sometimes, you just flat-out need an item that's in a bizarro place, and you have to search every screen you've ever been in until you find the perfect thing. Like, say for instance....


Here.


- Hey, where are you going Littlepanther? Don' you see that sign says "LETHAL SECURITY"?

- You shut it, batty! I GO WHERE I WBOOOM. Wow. Ok, sobered up now!




Oh, Delilah. I take back anything bad I've ever said. You are AWESOME.

Ok, so what was I saying about solving this puzzle with a backtracking item? Oh right! If you AREN'T a psychopathic walking battlesuit....


- Bad trip! Bad trip!

So what is the problem here, exactly? Some laser beam? Auto-cannon? Yeah, you WISH.


You can't MIST through this of course, unlike the other, identical, door.


No, we have to deal with this trip wire.

Let's reflect on that for a minute. Their security system is a tripwire bomb. In a lab. That blows the door right off its hinges. No security alert, no klaxons sounding. A TRIPWIRE. Not infrared, no human guard. A TRIP. WIRE. THAT SETS OFF A BOMB. SERIOUSLY! Did they get the Viet kong to design their security system? That is going to disrupt the experiment inside, paste any intruders before they could be interrogated, and throw out of alignment every delicate piece of equipment in the building! ARGH.

Ok, so does Littlepants' tactical mind have anything to add?


Darn right!

So: how do we deal with this threat? Sneaking? (no that sets it off) Misting? (no you can't mist under the door)

No, instead we have to remember waaaaay back to the electronics shop.


See those wire cutters? No? Red guys on the bottom-left shelf? Boy you BETTER have seen them, and picked them up! You don't have to have even ENTERED the shop to be here, by the by, but you can't get any further without those clippers.

This is the first "why would you look here for the solution to this puzzle" solution. There will be plenty more, but just imagine having to retrace EVERY. SINGLE. SCREEN. Looking for these. Woo hoo!


Horaaaaay. What's in the room beyond?


Huh. I... can't make much visual sense of this. Is that tinted windows in the back? Just plasma... things? Metal? No idea.

But the rest of the room is simple enough.






would be

Yes friends, this is a place for EXPERIMENTS. DASTARDLY ones! But how to determine WHAT KIND? Do we use the hacker's expertise? Scan the room for clues? Well, no and sort of.


See, they left "ye olde evile planse" right there on the table. Whew!


Oh, so it's a DRONE ledger now? Fine. Whatsit say.

This journal chronicles the process by which chips were implanted in the victims' nervous system. Through this process, the controlling computer system is able to control the individuals' actions, effectively making them 'drones.' Four names appear beside Sheriff Tucker's. They are: Eddie Houston, Dennis Sterling, Sawbuck, and Veronica Cotton.

THE BIG REVEAL! That's what Withers was after! He'd noticed that Tucker had been drone-ified, for some nefarious reason! Doubtlessly, the rest of those names are civic or religious leaders (hahahah) too, and have been turned into drones in an attempt to take over the world!

Now, since this is the big reveal of the game (well, maybe one other reveal is as big, but this one is pretty big), everybody gets a one-liner. LET'S SEE WHAT THEY SAY!

- There. Now the rest of this gig ought to be a piece-o'-cake. (what?)

- How terrible for these people. We must help them. (awww, gramma!)

- So.. some here at AI has been experimenting with cerebral control technology. Mr. Withers must have stumbled onto this somehow and was trying to take out the drones. But why? (Because... it's... obviously evil?)

- This should prove frightfully useful (FRIGHT HA HA PUNS WOOOO)

- For more unfortunate souls. these seem to be gettin' to be a crowd of these mechanical zombies. That must be why Mr. Withers was so intent on stoppin' em. (Mechanical zombies aw yeaaaah)

And, for my personal favorite line of the whole game...




I like to think she's too drunk to realize what's going on, and just literally wants a party.


So anyway, uh, time leave out this open front gate, which is open forever.

I don't feel like I've punished my agents enough yet.....


CARRY THAT BRANCH, ISAAC!

Doo hoo hoo.

Alright! So we have our next task before us: FIND THOSE DRONES!

Where should we look, folks?

We have the familiar


Parking lot

and


Forest

and


Other Forest

open to us, along with the new, mysterious, and ALLURING


SIDEWALK!

Cast yer votes, and remember that there IS a right and wrong answer!

This has been incredibly stupid theater, thanks for joining in.

Keep writing and submitting, ya bums! We can still use prize ideas, pictures, stories, ideas for stories, etc!