Policenauts Part #38 - Jonathan Ingram Against Tony Redwood

Part 38: Jonathan Ingram Against Tony Redwood

Where were we? Oh yeah, Jonathan was on his way up to the Garden but was stopped in the elevator by Redwood piloting a Goddard.

Redwood?
Eat this!

This is a fairly simple fight - Redwood oscillates up and down in place, but he's such a big target that you don't have to adjust your aim too much.

Occasionally, he'll dodge to the side... but to be honest, it's still not too bad.

Redwood, as you can see, does hit a lot harder than the AP did, so it's not entirely a cakewalk, but hit him enough and he leaves, while an alarm goes off on the elevator.

...That a quip? C'mon Jon, it's the final stage of the game. Now's the time to pull out those awesome action movie lines! Anyway, the elevator's out of commission now, so...

Move; Get Off

Guess I'm walking.

A parking garage? They're bound to have guys here somewhere.

Unfortunately, we're in another "look at everything before we can proceed" type of area. So let's get to clickin'.

Look; White Vehicle

It's a van. Doesn't look like anyone's inside. The cars are secured with magnets in the floor.

Look; Red Vehicle

It's a small car. No one's in it.

Look; Floor

The floor contains magnets that keep the cars grounded in microgravity. That's why they stay parked so neatly.

Look; "20"

This is the 20th floor. Twenty more to the Garden.

Look; Monitors

These are security monitors for the garage. They're not showing anything.

I think that's about enough. Listen, I'm a big fan of this scene, so let's watch it

in video

(Really though, it's an awesome video and I recommend highly.)

Jonathan Against Mister Goddard

(If not though...)

The EMPS enters, stage left.

Redwood....
Bingo.
Where's Gates?
The chief's waiting for you in the Garden. Not that you'll see him. I don't think you know what this thing can do.
Then why don't you show me!
That's the spirit.

I want to talk about these last two specific lines, but first...

Redwood flies over to the white van. Who cares? I'm ready for this. You ain't so bad! You ain't-

-so...-

bad?

Wow, okay. Maybe this isn't gonna go as easily as the other mech fights...

So here's the deal. I rarely asked Marc for script changes. But this one, here was the original exchange he came up with. I felt it was visceral and really signalled the final fight between Jonathan and Redwood-

"I don't think you know what this thing can do."
"Then why don't you show me!"
"Good answer!"
*Redwood throws a truck*

I LOVED that. In one of his final drafts, Marc changed Jonathan's line to "Then why don't you shut up and show me?" I asked him to change it back... because... well, it's hard to describe.

I just felt like at this point, Jonathan's just had two big gunfights and Redwood's evaded him at every aspect. He's killed/almost killed most of his friends... well, I won't summarize the whole story, but you get the idea. I felt even the addition of: "shut up and" took a little away. The fact is Jonathan is angry and ready to kill this motherfucker once and for all.

On paper, I love the equally angry response of "Good answer!" maybe implying Redwood's ready to throw down, followed him THROWING A FUCKING TRUCK. How cool is that??!??!

But Redwood's character - and you can hear it in the voice actor - prevents this. He's calm, and this is almost funny to him. He even throws the truck like it's no big deal, and Jonathan can only be astonished and say, "The hell?"

Only a matter of time. Just promise you'll put up a decent fight. Let's go... Policenaut.

This second fight with Redwood's Goddard is a lot harder - he's much faster than he was before and he constantly moves from one side of the screen than the other. Toward the end, he starts machine-gunning his shots, which is really going to drop your health.

In the video, I do the fight pretty terribly (I was a bit distracted when I recorded it) - he moves so fast you want to use lock-on instead of chasing him around with your cursor.

I've never finished this fight with a better than 25% life bar (and I actually have a suspicion it won't end until your health is actually below a certain point, as well as Redwood's, though I've never been able to confirm).

Also the truck throw is just for dramatic effect - Redwood only flies around and shoots. He won't throw that car.

He flies off to the right, followed by a weird crashing sound.

He's abandoned the EMPS?

***End of video***

Well, at least something went right today.

Look; EMPS

It's Redwood's EMPS. He's not inside it. He really has abandoned it. I wouldn't think an EMPS should become inoperable this easily. I guess he's determined to take this all the way. Or maybe he just wants to fight man to man.

Look; Blood Trail

It's Redwood's blood. He's bleeding again.

Look; Blood Trail (again)

His blood leads up the stairs. He's trying to play cat-and-mouse again.

Look; Stairs

These are the emergency stairs. Looks like he's escaped up there.

Go upstairs

Alright. I'll bite.

A spiral staircase. Is he up there?

This is yet another, "do a few things to trigger the next scene" scenes. This time, though we just have to do four of anything. I'll spare you: Jonathan isn't very descriptive when it comes to the stairs anyway.

Oh hey, Redwood! How are you, bud, it's been a-

Jerk.

Redwood pops up a little here and a little bit over. This is a really unintersting fight, sadly. Hit him enough and you'll hear his footsteps running...

(Also the game keeps track of your bullet holes, which is a nice touch.)

Crap, now he's up there! He's a smaller target but because of frozener-genetic-nanomachines-whatever, his aim doesn't get affected. So lock-on, blast away, and...

*footsteps running*

Shit, now he's barely even visible! Keep firing and... same drill.

Lastly here. Win this one and the game gives you back control.

Redwood! He ran upstairs.

Move; Go upstairs

He's on the 30th floor.

Yeah, I'll take that as an accurate summary. Here's another "look at everything to advance" scene, but... frankly, all you get are descriptions of everywhere Jonathan doesn't see Redwood.

Keep looking around and... HEY, WATCH THIS VIDEO INSTEAD!

Jonathan! You hear me alright? How's Ed doing? Can you believe he couldn't shoot me?

(Camera pans right.)

Fucking idiot. I couldn't care less about Ridley.
You were never after revenge, were you?
Revenge? Please. If I do something it's for myself, end of story. I just thought I'd have a little fun with Ed, that's all.
You what?!
If there's anyone I have issues with, it's you. Jonathan.... No one's ever made me feel the way you have.

I think the time for flirting has way, way past, Redwood.

Where are you? Show yourself already!
I'm right here!

*** End of video ***

Well, dag. Redwood pops out from the pillar in the back...

Yeah, you knew where this was going.

Hit him a bunch, and he runs into a pillar closer to the camera.

Hit him some more and:

Jonathan! They gave me one of Dave's kidneys. He was a pretty healthy guy, you know. It's only fair. He did take mine when he shot me. You don't mind, do you?
Motherfucker!

You get to fight him some more around the second pillar. Then...

Tell me.