The Let's Play Archive

The Submachine Series

by Carbon dioxide

Part 9: Submachine 4: The Lab

Part 9
Submachine 4: The Lab



The ship, last unvisited place on the list. It's really dark here, but luckily we brought a lighter.

Thumpmonks - Submachine 4 - The Ship

RTL
That's much better. At the bottom of the pipe in the portal room, we pick up the 15th Secret. The disconnected TNT detonator in the left room obviously doesn't do anything. But there's a note, and we can look out of the porthole.


Wherever we are, it's very dark outside.

Note 10 posted:

Crew expendable. Where did I hear that? Did that come from the company, or someone even higher? Nevermind... In the meantime we tried almost every possible way of unlocking that damn ladder. this lock just won't open. the last attempt is to blow this up. We're setting up wires right now, and if we're lucky someone of us will survive and finally see what's on the upper deck of the ship. However, I'm going to write another note just after the explosion, if we'll still be alive that is.
Looking at the blood on that Note, I think they might've failed.


Going to the right, we find the last of the bells-and-blocks. There's also a panel we can simply remove from the wall using our Screwdriver.


There's a free Secret behind the panel, and a pair of wires we need to cut with our Knife.


And that's all that's needed to lower the ladder to the left. The note writers got themselves killed for nothing.


To the right on the second floor, there's another ladder. Not pictured: me lighting the lamps. The 17th Secret is sitting on the ground, to the left of the gas tube for the lamp.


If we place the Turbine in the large pipe and close the lid, it starts running by itself. This lets us open the hatch on the second floor.


Note 14 posted:

If you looked hard enough and you are feeling lucky you can always try this location:

x=7
y=2
z=8
Another set of coordinates. We'll be visiting that place last.


The Chestkey from the Orb we found in the Looping Traps and broke in the Basement Section lets us open this chest, so we can grab the Arm, which seems to be made of solid gold.

laboratory: 001; ancient section: 104; looping traps: 690; basement section: 529; lighthouse digouts: 462; tomb trap: 770; the ship: 800; brick room: 551; second tomb: 043; lucky room: 728.

We've been nearly everywhere now, it's time to gather the remaining Secrets and find our way out of this place.


First, to the Digouts (462), where the bell-and-cube puzzle opened up to give us a Secret. Secondly, I finally return to the Basement to grab the Charged Coil I left behind.


RTL
We return the Coil to the Ancient Section where we first found it, and use it to power the searchlight.


Looking through the telescope, we find some marks: 4-5-2, more coordinates. Luckily, the light doesn't use up the charge, because we need the Coil for one more thing.


All the way back in the Lab, we can use it to power this machine, so the arm moves and we can grab the 19th Secret. Almost there!

At this point I realized that I should have found 20 Secrets by now. It took me quite a while to find the one I missed. Did you spot it?


As LogicalFallacy pointed out, it's in the Second Tomb, in the back left, right next to where the Note was.

laboratory: 001; ancient section: 104; looping traps: 690; basement section: 529; lighthouse digouts: 462; tomb trap: 770; the ship: 800; brick room: 551; second tomb: 043; lucky room: 728; ???: 452.

Let's go to 452, the coordinates we got from looking through the Telescope. We could've found this place as soon as we got the Coil charged up, but we needed to collect some more items to do anything here. It looks like it could be a part of the Ancient Section.


When we attach the Arm and the Sceptre to the statue, it sparks, and...

quote:

Congratulations

You passed all the tests flawlessly

Your application was considered positively

You can start working at the Lab from tomorrow

Wait for further instructions
What? Hey, I didn't apply for anything! I just want to go home!

The end. Except not quite.

In the HD version, the game ends here and returns to the title screen. In the standard version, we end up here:

Now, I think this place, which is sometimes called the Annex, only exists to let you back into the game to collect the remaining Secrets. The HD version doesn't need the area, because there's an option to continue the game on the title screen.

Author's note posted:

Thank You for finishing this game.

Now I'm giving you a choice. You can either go back to main menu to comment this game or even contact the creator (door to the left)
or...
You can go back into the submachine net, because there is a reward for those who find 21/21 secrets. Once You have all the secrets, find a location to use them and enjoy bonus material. (door to the right)
Yours, Mur.
This is one of the old cases where Mateusz refers to himself as Mur, which I suppose led to fans also calling him Mur, and believing Murtaugh is an author insert (Mateusz later said this wasn't the case).

After reading this note, two doors appear. We aren't done yet, so let's go right.

This room has a Secret sitting in the corner on the right. There's also coordinates (596) in the top right, but they just lead back to this room. If you know what you're doing, you can just unlock the first portal device in the Lab, punch in 596, and beat the game in a few minutes. But where's the fun in that?

laboratory: 001; ancient section: 104; looping traps: 690; basement section: 529; lighthouse digouts: 462; tomb trap: 770; the ship: 800; brick room: 551; second tomb: 043; lucky room: 728; statue: 452; annex: 596.


Thumpmonks - Submachine 4 - Bonus Area
This area has a nice upbeat song, quite different from anything we've heard so far.


To the right, we dump all our hard-earned Secrets into the receptacle. Once you put in all 21, the gate opens. But wait a second.


The first room has another, 22nd Secret in it! I guess this is because the Annex area isn't originally part of the game. The extra Secret in the Annex makes it a bit easier to get 21.

If you collect 22 secrets before going to the receptacle, once you put in the 21st, the last one just disappears from your inventory. But if you first put in 21 and then collect the 22nd secret, the counter bugs out a bit.

We can even add it to the receptacle and be left with 0/-1 Secrets.

Anyway, further to the right we find a bunch of rooms with projectors in it, that give us a nice glimpse into Mateusz' life.






Most of these pictures were updated in the HD version. Because I like Einstein, I'm making an exception and putting his HD-version picture here (besides, the HD picture is used on the wiki, too):



I like how these pictures make it quite obvious where Mateusz got some of his inspiration from. It's a good reward for finding the Secrets.


And that's all of them. Let's go back to the exit.


The left room of the Annex has this switch from Submachine 3 in it. Clicking it simply returns us to the title screen.

See you next time for a rather unusual side game: Submachine: Future Loop Foundation.