Part 9: Bigger than Hitler
Accompanied by a blonde and a gladiator, we approach Gangster's Guillotine.
We easily dispatch the already familiar enemies around here, and enter the town.
The bright new sign reads, "Gangster's Guillotine."
Inside, we are immediately assaulted by three large groups of Hell Soldiers wielding Broad Swords and Hell Sabres.
The problem with this fight is that all firearms except Dark Pistol and Dark Rifle don't function inside Gangster's Guillotine:
To add insult to injury, the ones that still function can't target enemy groups, only single enemies, of which there are just too many. We stand no chance against them, getting exterminated several times in a row. It doesn't help that the enemies outside the town respawn whenever we exit it or reload the game.
Just when I started thinking I'd never be able to make it through here with the current party, a mirracle happened: one of the three Hell Soldier groups defeated, the other two suddenly turned friendly. Phew, talk about luck.
We can even chat the soldiers up, which makes no sense given that we killed their brethren only a moment ago. I wonder just what it is that triggers the guards' hostility or friendliness... Feels completely random, but it probably isn't.
Blonde is level 2 now, her Max HP a little bit more passable.
Interaction with 1 Moaner
Standing right underneath the big letter A is...
"Dude, give it up..."
Hey, we've found Alan! He's been brainwashed, though, and doesn't seem to remember much. Naturally, we'll need to do something about that before we can bring him back to his old self and recruit him into our party.
Speaking of that A letter...
Yep, that stands for "Alan J. Murphy", the one responsible for shamelessly copying the Call of Cthulhu artwork.
The Moaner located under the letter M is Ed the electrician (as in, "state electrician"):
Interaction with 9 Moaners
Ed kindly teaches Richard the Electrical skill:
It's an active skill we can use to recruit Mozart later by disabling the speakers back in Satan's Halo:
Not at the moment, though. For now let's explore the rest of Ganster's Guillotine.
Interaction with 2 Moaners
So let me get this straight. In Hell, Bonnie and Clyde are the ones being daily robbed at the bank. Robbed of their blood, no less.
The bank in question is Bank of Avernus.
Wikipedia posted:
Avernus was an ancient name for a crater near Cumae (Cuma), Italy, in the Region of Campania west of Naples. It is approximately 3.2 kilometres (2.0 mi) in circumference. Within the crater is Lake Avernus.
Avernus was believed to be the entrance to the underworld, and is portrayed as such in the Aeneid of Virgil. The name comes from the Greek word άορνος, meaning "without birds", because according to tradition, all birds flying over the lake were destined to fall dead. This was likely due to the toxic fumes that mouths of the crater gave off into the atmosphere. In later times, the word was simply an alternate name for the underworld. On the shores of the lake is the grotto of the Cumaean Sybil and the entrance to a long tunnel leading toward Cumae, where her sanctuary was located.
Just so you know.
And by the way: BoA also stands for Bank of America.
Interaction with 2 Screamers
They want blood in Los Diablos? Let's get some, then!
We approach Bonnie three times to obtain 3 gallons of blood.
Why three? It's just that I think we could use three of those "free gifts" the fanged guy mentioned.
The way to the treasure chests behind the counter is blocked by 8 Hell Guards, but that's no big deal.
Let's see what we have there...
Richard finds a Crowbar!
Richard finds a Baseball Bat!
Richard finds a Throwing Star!
Gosh, so worthless. Outside we go.
Hmm, what's this?..
You saw that coming, didn't you.
But anyway, they are some temptresses to interact with nearby:
Interaction with 2 Temptresses'
Mind Magnifier, huh? So that must be the device that had Alan brainwashed.
Interaction with 1 Moaner
Helping children? It doesn't get more angelic than that.
Now that sounds just lovely!
Not much of a crowd in here.
We climb the stage and approach the stand-up comedian named Frank.
They even have contracts in Hell!
Another comedian, Larry, is waiting his turn to follow Frank's act:
Yeah, nothing like some swear words to cheer this place up.
Interaction with 3 Moaners
So I guess the Mind Magnifier must be located someplace in Capone's City.
Interaction with 3 Evil Womans
And the Capone's City itself is to the southwest from here.
Interaction with 1 Singer
And the Mind Magnifier must be destroyed. Easy!
Interaction with 5 Moanings
Luckily, our party is immune to Capone's mind control tricks for some reason.
Interaction with 2 Temptress's
"If someone could just destroy Capone's Mind Magnifier!"
Moaning Lisa: vying for this game's most terrible pun.
Laconic.
Eh no, I think we won't.
Blondes are indeed the best.
First we go left, arriving to a large well-furnished bedroom:
And approach the desk.
God: Although you have twisted, tempted, and scared him, he remains loyal and true.
Devil: The facts speak stronger to me than do your words of Faith in your own creation. Your baby has grown up and has chosen to eat from the taboo tree of Apples.
God: He has been forgiven.
Devil: He has sinned and must pay for it!
The bloody knife shows up as a simple knife in the inventory, so there's nothing special in it gameplay-wise.
We discover a Police Special inside the chest; too bad it's useless inside Gangster's Guillotine.
As we approach the chair...
...the game tells us we've discovered a Dark Pistol, but that's just plain wrong:
Instead, the new item added to our inventory is Ice Beam, a relatively powerful long range magical weapon encasing the enemy in a block of ice:
It has unlimited number of uses, to boot!
The room to the right of the main hall contains a chest with a Flame Thrower inside, as well as a TV set. The television is on.
We're big! Bigger than Hitler!
Yeah, I can totally imagine that.
Meanwhile, Sparticus has made level 4.
Blonde is kind of developing, too.
We'll be heading to Los Diablos next time. We could now add Mozart and/or Billy Bob to our party, replacing Blonde and/or Sparticus, but I guess you must be tired of the too-frequent voting. So I'll just make one grand voting in a couple of updates, once we're ready to descend to Hell's level three. I hope that's okay.
Next time: Satan's Sauna