Part 4: Chapter 2-1

So when we last left intrepid reporter Paloma Hernandez, she had unsuccessfully tried to extort both Vickie and the FBI in general, and then a crazy person in a gas mask broke into her home, knocked her out and dragged her off. Overall, not a good day.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOn3...eature=youtu.be



…and it looks to be getting worse. The odd brightness is the screen doing a fade; rest assured, it goes back to being fucking dark, and there’s no brightness setting in this game.



There are, however, lots of these helpful screens telling you where you are and what day it is.



Well, could you start by turning on a lamp? I can barely see you.



And we’re given dialogue choices. “Let me the hell out” seems about as good a place to start as any.

“Please! I’m begging you! Let me go! I won’t tell anyone what’s happened.”

Paloma has a really awful voice actress. I don’t even mean that in a Deputy Dogg so bad it’s good way, she just sounds bored.



Corroder here isn’t exactly hot stuff either in the voice acting department. I miss Ackerman.





Uh, what?



Look Psycho Mantis, you already aren’t as cool as Ackerman was, so the purple prose isn’t working for you.





Yeah, just what in fuck’s name do you want?

“Listen…I don’t know what you intend to do…maybe we can make a deal!”

Paloma is running through every “This doesn’t work on crazed killers who have you abducted” cliche she can think of.







Uh, if you say so, Paloma.



Oh, right, Paloma had a mysterious source she was going to try and blackmail Vickie with.





You do that.



Our friend leaves, stopping long enough to hit a switch on the wall, which shuts off the TV and turns on those shoplifting alarms. Okay then.



So yeah, meet our new character. She’ll make you miss Vickie in a real damn hurry.



First off, the mattress here is takeable. It says it takes 16 cases…?



What that means is your inventory has 16 little blocks to it and Paloma shoving a mattress down her pants takes up all of them.



Anyway, checking out the TV here…



As noted, the power was rerouted to those shoplifter alarms.



The plug to the TV is over here.





…and so she does. Actually, she rips one end of it right out of the TV and then refuses to touch the now live wire further.



So let’s look at the thingy.



Entryway…?



Well, whatever. It has a plate that’s screwed on. Two guesses what we’ll need.



We can also yoink the antennae right off of the TV.



…well, we could, but the mattress is taking up our entire inventory. There is no option to drop the mattress. You can’t put the mattress back on the bed either. Game design!



Well, with that idea not working, let’s just try to leave. I mean, the door is right here, so…



…and passing those shoplifting alarms fucking electrocutes Paloma.



No kidding. And yeah, she’s wearing a collar around her neck. I immediately tried to shock her five more times to see if she’d die, but nope.



So back over here, there’s a camera.



And by everywhere you mean there’s one camera.



We can check out the mirror over here.



I haven’t seen you try.



A drawer down here…



The makeup isn’t grabbable. The nail file is.



…well, it would be, but we’re still *carrying a mattress*.



So the answer to this little bit of unintuitive gameplay bullshit is the wardrobe over yonder.



We can take items and dump them off in here. So do that, then go back and grab the nail file and the TV antennae.



Creep as close as you can to the shoplifter alarms (this is very annoying, since a step too far sends Paloma a-twitchin), then poke the switch on the wall with the antennae. There aren’t actually two of them, using an item from your inventory drags it out on top of your cursor, and then it doesn’t go away while stuff like this is happening. So it looks like Paloma is fencing with herself.

As soon as this happens, the sound of an engine leaving can be heard. I guess our buddy is off to murder Paloma’s informant.



I go ahead and see if that turned off the juice. Nope.



No, now you need to go back over here and unscrew the panel with the nail file. If you guessed “A screwdriver” for the question posed above, you were wrong.



Well, we’ll just fix that.



Hitting that switch I guess cuts the power to the cord here, as Paloma can now grab it and shove it onto the circuit board. Which fries it. So clearly the power was still…y’know what, I don’t even know.



So the shock panels are off now, but the My Bloody Valentine killer did have the foresight to lock the door. We’ll check out the stove here.






Well, that’s the opposite of fascinating.



More important is the fireplace poker. We’ll yoink that.



I was wrong, there is another camera up there, bringing our total to a mighty two. Whoops.



But we do have a fireplace poker now.



And a helpful new option to Demolish things with it. I forgive you somewhat, game.





Freedom! Out the window we go.



Well, okay. Do that, then.



…





And Paloma just keeps repeating this.



The answer is the mattress. You’ll need to go to the wardrobe and dump all of your items into it so you have enough room to take the mattress again. I take back my forgiveness, game.







Paloma somehow misses the mattress and breaks her neck. No, actually she hits it and rolls off. Boo.



*Now* we’re free. Or at least outside of the house. Will better things await us? (No).