Part 11: Episode XI: Tedium

Episode XI: Tedium

When last we left our hero, he was likely plummeting to his messy, crunchy death. Fongling now takes the reigns of protagonist from this point forward. Unless Bruce miraculously immerges without a scratch ten minutes later. And what are the odds of that?


Slamming a Dew in a better place.


We are now, believe it or not, in the mysterious underwater base of Umbrella. Sure, we were on an elevator that was going straight down while the undersea kingdom was clearly several hundred yards out from that elevator. But we're there, okay?


There will also be no indication whatsoever we're in anything more than a generic besieged laboratory with no power. The game manages to make things even more dark, dull, and murky by having Fongling lack a flashlight for these portions.


The other end of this corridor is locked with a keycard. This will be important later.


First, we have to plow through a 'woman are tiny and can fit through tiny spaces' plot device to make it to the lower level, as the elevator is out.


Logic would dictate the laundry hamper would be under the waste chute. But, this is Umbrella Inc, after all.


A few doors down, Fongling finds a computer terminal which controls the power.



Since power supply access and garbage disposal should both be sharing the same office space.


The newly restored lights awaken all the zombies in the installation. I guess they function like reverse cockroaches according to Dead Aim undead rules.


Anyway, the elevator, which Fong had to jump through a garbage chute an entire floor to bypass, is now open. Remember when there were still stairs? I miss stairs. These kids these days with their newfangled lifts. Buncha malarkey.


The elevator automatically takes Fongling to the bottom floor. For reasons unknown, the elevator only does this on this particular floor. Or maybe it's a different elevator which only travels between the trash/boiler room and wherever we're going. Who knows with these people.


Regardless, I think we can all agree this game is in love with its hallways.


Fongling ends up in Morpheus' office. Complete with throne and '70s evil supervillain "HDTVs haven't been invented yet" multi-monitors.



Even the automated computer voice sounds like a '50s robot is speaking. Morpheus' style of villainy is all about the old school.


Meanwhile, from the first person perspective of a sneaky monster.


Yes, it is Morpheus. Yes, the only possible place he could have been hiding is behind his big silly throne. Yes, the developers forgot he has fucking built in high heel boots and was making a racket with them earlier in the game and is now suddenly silent as a cat.


Yes, I'm not even going to bother making fun of the facial expressions at this point. It just goes without saying.



Heroes never die, indeed. Oh well, Morpheus manages to launch a few missiles he sprinkled with viruses that would immediately be incinerated by being in a missile. Maybe a Starbucks or Wal-Mart get blown up in the process. The world goes on.











Oh well, could be worse...













Oh, for fuck sake! It's not over?!



So, plummeting to certain doom in an out of control falling elevator, as interpreted by Resident Evil: Dead Aim is being knocked out for ten minutes and waking up somewhat groggy. Not even hang over groggy. We're talking 'woke up to take a leak in the middle of the night and it took a hour to get back to sleep' groggy.


And so Bruce wanders off as if nothing ever happened. His near death encounter will never be talked about or acknowledged again, much like the Chinese space laser.


So, here on out it is all Bruce all the time. It will not get any more interesting, so don't get your hopes up.


Agent (Officer? Chief? Who the hell does this shmuck work for?) McGivern finds himself a few levels lower than where Fongling began, obviously. So exploration of the area proper must now commence. As sub-characters are, as always, utterly useless.


Didn't we have this exact same 'puzzle' in Nemesis? The system administrator's voice is required to activate it. Which, of course, means big gay Morpheus. Unlike in Nemesis, the answer to this mind boggler is going to require running all over the base to record an extremely stupid voice clip. Yes, even the single line voice clip needed to unlock the door is retarded. We entered a no intelligence zone long ago.

There's a few more noteworthy items on this level.


A keycard to unlock a room with the only evidence that we are, indeed, underwater is found in a store closet.

In the same store closet, another file!

Architect's Memo

How little supervision does this company have if a multi-million dollar missile silo was built underwater in one of their installations using their funds and what must have taken dozens of contracted workers. That's not even taking into account the purchase of said missiles, again, with the company's dime.

And what the hell sort of hand did an architect have in constructing a place beyond designing it? Did they give him enough gold, wood, and perhaps Vespene gas and it sprung from the earth?

This fucking game isn't even like taking crazy pills. It's like being hooked to an IV with crazy juice being pumped into my fucking veins!

Bruce takes the elevator to the second floor.


The ultimate goal of this section is to unlock this chain and lock on the door. Really. The voice recognition non-sense is just a means to this goal.


This level is the barracks for scientists. There's two more identical rooms to the south. According to this, this installation staffs a whopping eight people...

Two of the four bedrooms hold a file. Let's get that little bit of business out of the way. I just need to erode my sanity that much more.

Research Report #220120

A crab-roach-bee. Moving right on...

Orders from Morpheus


"RE: Boss, would it be too much trouble to just come fucking down here and let me in! Jesus H. Christ. - Bob."


The final two rooms contain zombies and ammo. The other contains this terminal.



"...verily thy way shall not beith blocked by yonder gateway. So speaketh the tongue of Grand Duke of Beauty - Morpheus D. Duvall the Sixth esquire."

Well, it seems Bruce needs a tape recorder to get past this sensitive lock which requires the administrator be speaking like he's going to the Renaissance fair.


Luckily, that keycard opens the lock on the third floor which Fongling was unable to deal with and jumped into a trash chute as an alternative.


Behold! The only evidence the game presents of this being underwater. A murky window and a poorly rendered water texture. Not even a submarine at the dock could be spared to drive the illusion home. This is it...


There's a tape recorder in here as well. This room will play no further significance, despite the fact the only other way out of here was destroyed and our heroes are quite literally trapped down here. Everything will sort itself out by the end. Don't you worry one bit.

 Yes, it will be unfuckingbelievably stupid. 



"I granteth my access to ye."



In a locker, Bruce just happens upon the same exact Chinese state issued assault rifle with the "100-round burst" which Fongling was equipped with. Quite a coincidence.


There's also this zombie in the hazard suit. This is the only zombie of this type in the entire game. There is nothing special about it, other than it is a poor attempt at a scare found only in this single room and nowhere else. I cannot fathom why they decided to waste time rendering this one special zombie where there has been quite literally all of three zombie models prior to it in this half of the game (naked, female scientist, male scientist).




The next area features flying roach-crab-bees. As there is literally no effective way to combat them, running is the only solution.


I'm uncertain what possible reason there would be for this room to be covered in soil. But, I just don't care anymore. This is a no care zone.


The shutters out of this room magically closes for no reason other than it feels like it.


And the boss falls out of the sky. I'm pretty sure they just went 'Fuck it. Put the boss here. You've got an hour." And so it was.


Boss Fight 3: Bruce McGivern vs. The Boss Which Has an Idle Animation and Only an Idle Animation


So, this is Halberd. Halberd sits there and does its scary monster idle animation. Which involves flapping its wings, moving its feelers, and sort of bug roaring once in a while. It can move in a direction to face you (by sort of gliding in your direction.) That is all it can do. It cannot move. If it has attacks it can perform, it did not perform them. It sat there and it looked at me while an infinite number of kamikaze bees spawned and flew at me.


Conversely, my only available tactic was standing in place and firing my shotgun in it. Then switching to the assault rifle and firing some more. Repeating until dead.


The shutter magically reopens (actually, the screen just fades for a moment and it is back up. Guess they didn't animate an opening sequence) and Bruce trots off to his next destination. As do I...

Tune in next time for handheld laser rifles, and climactic showdowns with backflipping electric monsters.