Part 2

PART 2

As some of you have noted, the composer for this game is the same guy who did the music for Beverly Hills Cop, among other things. By the time of this game's release, he already had two Grammy's. The music is pretty good, but it's stored in an unusual format which I can't seem to play or extract. Thankfully, some enterprising soul has put some of it up on Youtube, so I will link the appropriate songs on occasion.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cW-uVzcGyo

Let's rewind a bit. Taking the crank right away is obviously a mistake, and a fatal one. However, the game actually autosaves whenever you enter a new room, so I can just load back to before that happened with no loss of time. This sounds like a great idea, initially, and I was impressed when I first played the game that they would think of a way to include death without making the game frustrating -- after all, death scenes in adventure games can be pretty entertaining, but dying and losing your progress is a huge problem. LucasArts solved this by simply never letting you get yourself in a situation where you die or are unable to win; Sierra games were less kind, of course, and are uniformly shit as a result.

But I digress. I was happy to see that the game has autosaving, and relied on it rather than keeping manual saves of my progress. Then I hit a point where an action several screens ago had doomed me to certain death, and the autosave was, of course, after that happened, meaning my entire save file was completely ruined. So that's pretty bullshit.

Anyway, let's threaten the old woman!



Useless.

Now, as it happens, I forgot to grab something from Alice's place. She has a pair of boxing gloves on the wall, and we need those to solve our Biff problem. Fortunately, she doesn't lock her door or anything like that, and we're free to steal them without having to deal with her. But that's no fun, right?



Jack Orlando, ace detective.

So let's play a little game. We can now visit the crime scene, and there are two things we need to pick up here in order to complete the game. Can you find them both?



Go ahead, point to them on the screen. Let's see if you're detective material.



Did you see the cigar? Did you? Did you?

You can only buy these Davidoff cigars at Charles'.

The newpaper doesn't even get a mention from him, but it's 100% necessary to pick it up or you can't complete the game. You can pick up garbage off the ground all over the place, and most of it is useless, but this specific newspaper is required for victory. Even though you can get more newspapers later.

If you watched the intro, you'll know that the criminal escaped up the ladder there. We can't reach it, though. We have a broom, but he won't use it for that, and he's also incapable of simply reaching up to grab it, so that way is closed to us for now. Time to explore the neighborhood and look for more loot.


Dirty shoes don't go with that nice coat, sir.
I'll slap your face.
Why? What have I done?
Don't be so fresh, or you'll get it.
If you don't want your shoes shined... leave me alone.



The kid is useless. Most characters in this game offer no useful information and do nothing for the plot. They're all animated and voiced, though!

What else is around here?


Watch that horse, it'll kick you!
Up 'till now I always prided myself as bein' good with animals.
But Napoleon is a very special horse. You can't compare him with other animals.
Yeah, I can believe that. But I wanted to talk to you about somethin'. Have you seen or heard anythin' unusual recently?
No, quite honestly I wouldn't want to see or hear anythin' around either. I mind my own business.

Why are all these people so pointless?



They aren't even afraid of being shot! In fact, even characters who you have to punch or physically assault are unfazed by Orlando's trusted revolver, which I do not remember effectively threatening anyone with at any point in the game. But of course we can't kill random people; maybe fisticuffs will be more convincing.



Jack is the most pathetic guy in the goddamn world. Let's just use the broom we stole to take this guy's horse's shoe right in front of him. That's a puzzle, you see.





Now better prepared, Jack goes to confront Biff.


Touch it, and you gonna find out what it like.
Seein' as you know all about it.
Yo' gittin' on ma nerves, asshole. Reck'n ah's gonna teach you some manners.


I had to do that. I don't like gettin' my arms broke.

Jack uses the crank to get up onto the roof.



One again, we need two objects from this scene. Try to find them!





Even knowing exactly what to find here, I had to resort to waving the cursor over the screen until it reacted. This is known in adventure game circles as "pixelbitching," and it is terrible.


Matches from NIGHT'O'GRANIS. Interesting...

NIGHT'O'GRANIS, which is always said in capital letters, is the bar Orlando was drinking in during the opening cutscene. He descends from the roof, to find the police chief waiting for him.


The whisky's eatin' at your brains! You could end up in the can for life, and you're lookin' at some broad.
I just need some kinda inspiration.
OK, do your own thing! But time's runnin' out!
I'm aware of that, Tom.
Oh yeah, my boys found your car keys, here!


No problem, I don't need it no more.
Ah'll show ya, asshole!