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Mraagvpeine posted:Man, these last few updates have been wild. Makes me wonder how Botchcop would screw them up. Speaking of, whatever happened to him? A confluence of factors. People seemed more engaged with the normal plot, and also I made a mistake during the recording for the second day of Botchcop stuff and needed to rerecord... which I never ended up doing. At this point it seems liable to kill the momentum of the current run, though. I'll reconsider the role of Botchcop and how much I even wanna show of that run and resume... eventually.
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Aug 6, 2020 05:00
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Arist posted:I'm honestly not a huge fan of a lot of the thought system. Having to spend a skill point to unlock a slot for a thought that may confer no immediate or even long-term benefit (and may actually give me a skill penalty when it resolves, which means I might have to spend another point to remove it) seems like a waste when I could put it into one of the many, many skills I like hearing from. (Gameplay spoilers for thoughts) Like, we're going hardcore Communistcop here but finishing the thought you get for picking communist responses reduces your Visual Calculus and Authority by 1 each and just gives you 4 experience every time you pick another communist response. If you pick another 50 left-wing dialogue options it'll eventually even out, but in the short-term it's garbage, and worse, it dictates what responses I'll pick in a way not dictated by roleplaying or how entertaining they are. ... I also wrote a guide to bonus xp and $$$ from thoughts, and I don't think there even ARE 50 communist dialog options in the entire game.
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Aug 6, 2020 09:12
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I just recorded the next day last night and we're far enough in now that I feel relatively comfortable looking up some of the stuff I find most relevant/interesting or that just has the most potential to be expanded upon, but that's just because, spoiler alert, we're inching closer to the end of the game and I feel like there's less potential for it to just become a railroaded tour of mandatory things to see in a specific order to maximize the experience instead of me forgetting things and remembering them hours later and accidentally locking off dialogue options by choosing other ones and generally riding by the seat of my pants in recording sessions. I will admit that I have been savescumming occasionally to make specific checks. Like, the Composure check with René a couple updates back, partially because we physically couldn't put any more points into that, and as we approach the endgame I just think some of the more major failures will make for a categorically worse experience so I've been avoiding them. Not all, but some. I kind of accidentally stumbled into a really strong build so we haven't even been seeing that many failures, though. Essentially, I'm trying not to be too too controlling, but as we get closer to the end and the stuff we see becomes more important I naturally have to curate what we see more.
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Aug 6, 2020 18:49
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Do you try and succeed with the remaining white checks?
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Aug 6, 2020 21:37
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Arist posted:I just recorded the next day last night and we're far enough in now that I feel relatively comfortable looking up some of the stuff I find most relevant/interesting or that just has the most potential to be expanded upon, but that's just because, spoiler alert, we're inching closer to the end of the game and I feel like there's less potential for it to just become a railroaded tour of mandatory things to see in a specific order to maximize the experience instead of me forgetting things and remembering them hours later and accidentally locking off dialogue options by choosing other ones and generally riding by the seat of my pants in recording sessions. I will admit that I have been savescumming occasionally to make specific checks. Like, the Composure check with René a couple updates back, partially because we physically couldn't put any more points into that, and as we approach the endgame I just think some of the more major failures will make for a categorically worse experience so I've been avoiding them. Not all, but some. I kind of accidentally stumbled into a really strong build so we haven't even been seeing that many failures, though. You're only saying that because you're not Some Kind of Superstar. (It raises the cap on Visicalc, Suggestion, Electrochem, and Composure to 6, at the cost of a point of Logic because you're actually not some kind of superstar, but you apparently have a very generous fake it 'til you make it policy?) Glazius fucked around with this message at 02:24 on Aug 8, 2020 |
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Aug 8, 2020 02:21
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Is it possible, through low starting stats and various thoughts/clothes, to have a negative effective skill value, or does it floor at 1?
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Aug 8, 2020 07:41
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Dareon posted:Is it possible, through low starting stats and various thoughts/clothes, to have a negative effective skill value,
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Aug 8, 2020 08:04
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Chapter 40: 21:39-23:00: The Sound Of Silence We have made the life-altering decision to get sober, a decision that we will have to keep making every day for the rest of our lives, a continuous test of willpower… at least for our next twenty waking hours until this “get sober” thought resolves. It’s just that easy, huh? …Let’s just keep exploring this church.          ARIST: [Heroic: Failure] As you slide the dollar and fifty cents into your pocket, a realization comes over you. RHETORIC: No, no it doesn’t! ARIST: Yes… you can feel the gears turning, turning towards the only possible conclusion… SAVOIR FAIRE: One hundred and sixty-one dollarinos! We’re *rich,* baby! Well, lower-middle class at best, but still! ARIST: Yes, yes… you can feel the urge to lord your status over the serf class rising, crawling across your limbs. This is the power of capital! RHETORIC: Ugh, new money. SAVOIR FAIRE: You should berate welfare recipients! ARIST: If we can get rich by stealing loose change and tricking a billionaire in a container into investing $100 into a bogus youth centre, they have no excuse! SAVOIR FAIRE: You should organize with your neighbors to prevent the development of high-density housing! ARIST: I know they have to live somewhere, but why here? They’re gonna tank the property values and take all the parking! SAVOIR FAIRE: You should move to an area that just so happens to be completely segregated so you can enroll your hypothetical children into a school that is also all-white! ARIST: The neighborhood is just so much better, and the school district is top-notch for Fandaniel and Knattaleigh or whatever I would have named them. Actually, wait, repeat that one? SAVOIR FAIRE: You should start a private equity firm, lend money to a healthy business trying to scale up, start slashing costs and completely loving with the operational structure, then when you don’t see an immediate 1000% ROI begin laying off half the staff and dismantling everything to pay off your debt and satisfy your investors until there’s nothing left in the building but drywall and the entire business is forced to shutter! And then do it over and over again! ARIST: Uhhhhhhh… SAVOIR FAIRE: THE NUMBERS ONLY GO UP. BETRAY THE LEFT. RHETORIC: You see where he’s going here yet? ARIST: Yeah, I’m not down with this. RHETORIC: The tainted paper will destroy you. You must let go of it as soon as possible.  Let’s distract ourselves from whatever that was by examining the computer again.    EAST-INSULINDIAN REPEATER STATION: “Good, I’ve unlocked the filament. After ending the call please press PRINT to access the filament.”  EAST-INSULINDIAN REPEATER STATION: “Sleep well, Fortress Accident,” she says as her voice disappears into a whirl of static.   MAINFRAME: The first entry, made on the 4th February ‘51 by an unknown author, is short and concise: “Arrived at the church. The door was boarded up, so I used a crowbar to get inside. Looks like the place has been deserted. Nothing out of the ordinary, but I’ll ask around. Need to figure out how to get the electricity in.” KIM KITSURAGI: The lieutenant leans closer, scouring the printout over your shoulder. Just as you finish reading he looks up, muttering under his breath:      MAINFRAME: “8th FEB, ‘51: Bought the antenna, had some problems setting it up, called Simo for help. Heard the others are back to *making art* (drinking somewhere out of town). Sulislaw started a rock band again, Lexie has been asking for money from strangers… But at least the artists have their act together—they’re qualified labour, they can get work anywhere: graphic design, ads. The programmers are doing fine, too, I mean they’re programmers. The writers, though… they’re hosed.”  KIM KITSURAGI: “Seems like something to do with radiocomputers—unfortunately I don’t know enough about them to understand what the author is saying.”   MAINFRAME: “12th FEB, ‘51: Brought some food from the grocery store. Apparently there’s a strike going on in the harbour. Definitely not happy to see the Martinaise people again. Everything’s now set up in the church, going to start working tomorrow 8 AM.” KIM KITSURAGI: “The strike…” He strokes his chin. “We’re nearing the date of the murder.”  MAINFRAME: “25th FEB, ‘51: I’ve been sending data up to Lintel for a while now, trying to recreate the data loss, but nothing. Didn’t even feel like logging in the disappointment. But I did discover a curious *audio-spatial* anomaly at the back of the church. I’ve named it *the swallow* (it swallows sound). Need to get some mics.”  MAINFRAME: “28th FEB, ‘51: Yes, the first recordings confirm that the swallow is real and I’m not just losing my mind. It’s a pillar of silence with a diameter of approximately three meters. Seems like the higher I go, the less I record. This might be a coincidence. Or it *could* be connected to the data loss that led me here.”   MAINFRAME: “MARCH, ‘51: Some kind of young *discomen* have appeared next to the church. I’ve been trying to record the silence to find the epicentre, but now it turns out I’ve also been capturing the future of dance music, one neo-disco song over and over again… Fortunately the song is so monotonous I was able to devise an algorithm to factor it out. The other day one of the discomen came in. Before I could even say hello, she got scared and left. Good, I don’t want anyone distracting me from my work.”  COMPOSURE: [Easy: Success] Don’t compare whatever *anodic music* is to the shining light of disco!   KIM KITSURAGI: “I knew it wasn’t a good idea to meddle with that machine…”  MAINFRAME: “MARCH ‘51: A new 2m AUX cable, noodles, crackers, Ping-Ping energy drinks, water, TOOTHPASTE, gum, also some canned air…”    SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Breaking into my radiocomputer, I see.” She glares at you as she holds down the OFF button for several seconds. The machine reboots. INTERFACING: [Medium: Success] Yes, you *are* breaking in. But not into *her* radiocomputer. You’re a master circuit-bender.  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “No one’s hiding here.” She barely looks up from the keyboard. You hear the machine whir back to life. “It’s just me and my computer—and it has been this way for weeks. Now please give me some room. I need two seconds to see that you haven’t destroyed anything.”    While we wait for the computer to reboot, we examine the fine clothing items we pilfered earlier.  We put on the Mesque Banger’s Red Brogues, because they really accentuate our awful sweatpants.  ARIST: [Medium: Success] She should be ready by now, right?   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Yes.” She thinks to herself. “Or no, not anymore. That project is dead.”   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “If you’re not here to hire me, I don’t really know how I can help you.” She turns back to the terminal. LOGIC: [Medium: Success] Did she say *over 16 years of experience*? She must have started programming when she was still a teenager.      SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “What? No. No one suspicious around here.” ARIST: [Challenging: Success] What? You just admitted there was a crab man! That’s at least *a little* suspicious!       SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “On the *front*. The unified front of radiowaves, licensed and controlled by Lintel in the East-Insulindic region.”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: She stops to think. “I guess it is… So far I’ve been quite satisfied with it. Martinaise is an unstable region with bad coverage and the operation has been surprisingly stable. But it’s not the cheapest one on the market, so I wouldn’t recommend it for your regular red tape operations. Fraser 1000 is a foolproof line for civilians. Anyway…” She turns back to her terminal. “You should do some research before you decide to buy anything. Ask around, compare the prices. There are many milieus dedicated to that sort of thing.”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “I’m working.”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Could you…” She closes her eyes. “Could you just… *shh* for a moment? Or get to the point—I really need to focus on something.”    SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: She inhales sharply, before answering in a single breath: “Because I needed something *good* for my investigation and Rehm Civic is widely agreed to be below all standards, so I had to upgrade. Besides, owning a Rehm Prefect isn’t such a big deal anymore.”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “I know a friend of a friend who used to freelance for the Coalition,” she says nochalantly, scratching her ear. “I was actually aiming for the military-grade Rehm Rational series, but couldn’t find one.”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “They are connected to my Rehm Prefect.” She looks up. “Whatever you do, just please don’t move them, okay? Thanks.”   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “You really like those questions, don’t you?” There’s a hint of amusement in her tired eyes.   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “I’m looking for the location of a two-millimetre hole in the world.” LOGIC: [Medium: Success] Wait, what? INTERFACING: [Easy: Success] She’s looking for a disruption in the *radio waves*. That’s what her personal log said.  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Exactly, what *does* it mean?” There’s something frantic about her as she locks her gaze with you, eyes shining like pearls. “Up to now it has been impossible to say what it is, because it’s impossible to measure *nothing*. What do *you* think it is? What qualities does *nothing* have? How do you measure something that does not exist?” She’s suddenly absorbed in the conversation, waiting for your answer.  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Exactly,” she nods, “very true! That’s what I’ve been aiming for, that’s why I have those basins. I’ve tried using hydrotransducers to record the silence—to find out where it *begins*. But honestly, it’s not progressing very well.” She grows silent, staring at her circle of basins—it looks like some ancient ritual.      SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Somewhere underneath those roof beams I assume.” She looks up, eyes trying to pierce the pitch-black heights above, but without much success. PERCEPTION (SIGHT): [Medium: Success] Only a faint criss-cross of rafters can be made out from the dark, most of the tower disappearing into the shade.  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “There’s this place at the back of the church, a place where all audible vibrations seem to decease—I’ve named it the swallow. And the higher you go, the less you record.” KIM KITSURAGI: “The pillar of silence? Are you sure it’s not just an architectural quirk?”   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “No, I don’t.”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Because it’s just trial and error, trying to locate the swallow—the exact point in space.”         ARIST: [Legendary: Failure] Not really sure where this is going, but okay, whatever. Go do that, I guess.       NOID: “No matter,” the paranoid young man mumbles gruffly. “Is he going to be a problem?” ANDRE: “Yeah, Noid is right… let’s get back to the point. What are we going to *do* about him?”   NOID: “I guess it’s not a *massive* problem, now that I think of it.” EGG HEAD: “Everyone is welcome—to dance ‘till the morning light! YEAGH!”   NOID: “What a pity! That’s my favorite thing in the world.” He drops a hammer back into a toolbox. “And she doesn’t like it at all.” ARIST: [Trivial: Success] You know, now that Soona’s brought it up, you almost doubt Noid’s sincerity when he talks like this! ANDRE: “A shame.” He sighs. “What can we do now? Do you see a way out of this jam—and into a laser-lit future of dance and unity?”   NOID: “Look at you, honour-man.” ANDRE: “No, Noid. He’s right… maybe we’ve approached it the wrong way after all. I’m sure there’s a workaround. We can make a deal not to bother her. If that’s okay with her… We only wanna get in the church and spread the joy and ecstasy of music.” EGG HEAD: “The lines in the dark, exist, CO-EXIST!” NOID: “At least crab man seems like an *advanced* being. He’s hard. He’ll understand.”  EGG HEAD: Egg Head can not believe what you just said. It makes him pump the jam a *little* slower for a moment, but then he returns to the full swing of it.   This is good. We’re doing a good thing here.  Now time to bring it all crashing down.    NOID: The young speedfreak puts down a busted capacitor and looks at you. EGG HEAD: The one with the large head seems very enthusiastic about whatever you have planned.     ANDRE: The young speedfreak is silent.  ANDRE: “Hey man, who knows what she’s on about.” He scoffs. “I get it, she doesn’t want us in the church. She’s got something against us.”  EGG HEAD: “We don’t need drugs to be hard core!”   ANDRE: “We know she has a problem, man. We’re working on it. She didn’t exactly have a smooth adolescence.”   ANDRE: “I have no idea how you arrived at that conclusion, but it’s *wrong*! Look, we even have speakers!” He points at the speaker.   ANDRE: “It’s a one speaker system! It’s monodynamic. You wouldn’t know the first thing about sound reproduction in anodic music! Other speaker… Pffft!”    NOID: “He said it was for his nose. What more do you want?”       ANDRE: “What do you mean *do*?” EMPATHY: [Easy: Success] There’s resignation in his voice. He’s almost ready to drop the act. It wouldn’t take a lot of pushing.    ANDRE: He thinks for a moment, then opens his mouth, but closes it again. Then finally raises his hands: “Things are just way too hard for an entrepreneur in this city. It’s not like we’re *not* gonna turn the church into the wickedest club in East Revachol…” EGG HEAD: “Because we are! We totally are!” ANDRE: “We just gotta turn it into a speed lab *first*.”   ANDRE: “No, man! They’re spooky alright. It’s just that they would also probably call the police if we started cooking speed in there.” EGG HEAD: “But the sine was *way* off too. I couldn’t feel the love at all…” ANDRE: “So… what now?”  EGG HEAD: “YEAHH!” The young man’s smile widens to inhuman proportions. His teeth beam in the floodlight. ANDRE: “I knew it…” The would-be leader drops his spiked head between his knees… “It’s impossible now.”  EGG HEAD: “There *needs* to be a club for anodic music in there. NEEDS TO! Everyone hates each other. Everybody hates it here, it’s all just drugs and we’re slaves and I *can’t*… we are running out of time! We need a win, Andre.” He looks at you. “I promise this will be a win! We won’t cook speed in there, we’ll do it clean, we’ll do it true. We’ll do it sober and *real* and beautiful. This will be a victory for the light!” SHIVERS: [Medium: Success] This will be nothing.   ANDRE: “Okay, we’ll try to do it without the drugs.” He raises his head from between his knees. “We’ll do a straight up club in there, spinning the maddest reels and nothing but, I swear to god! Okay, Egg?”  ARIST: [Challenging: Success] You’ve done a good deed for the future of anodic music today. Whatever the hell that is.   ACELE: “I did and I’m sorry.” She doesn’t appear surprised. “For what it’s worth… which isn’t much.” KIM KITSURAGI: “This is why I didn’t go into the tent.” The lieutenant looks at the ocean, squinting his eyes. “Typical delinquency.” ACELE: “You don’t get to choose your posse, they choose you. Mine are idiots, but they’re mine. I tried to talk Andre out of it, I even tried not to lie to you…”  ACELE: “I know. But I knew you’d see through their plan too. I’m not an idiot. I should have been able to control them. I will in the future. I promise.”   ARIST: [Medium: Success] After you finish your conversation with Acele, you realize it’s almost 23:00. Evrart told you to head to the boardwalk after 22:00 to meet with some woman called “the Pigs” and recover your gun. Get a move on.  ARIST: However, you notice something curious on the way…      KIM KITSURAGI: “We might find her down *somewhere*—there’s an old storm drain system beneath Martinaise that’s mostly collapsed. Revachol’s sewage system has been built and rebuilt four or five times now.”    ARIST: [Challenging: Success] You try to avoid thinking about the near-impossibility of the task you face as you approach the boardwalk. As your steps carry you closer, however, you hear something. Something oh-so-familiar, something irreversibly burned into your brain, even if all memory of ever hearing it before has been destroyed. There’s no mistaking it. PERCEPTION (HEARING): [Challenging: Success] It’s a siren. ARIST: You climb the stairs with trepidation, unsure of what scene may lay before you. Are other cops here?   ARIST: [Easy: Success] Oh, what the *gently caress*.
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Aug 18, 2020 17:13
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Oddly, more surprising than the mega-rich light-bending guy.
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Aug 18, 2020 19:59
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Out of one party and into another.
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Aug 19, 2020 20:03
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Goddamn, nicely done, Harrier DuBois. Picture him going through that line of questioning with The Expression plastered on his face, and I wish Kim had been there to see it.
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Aug 21, 2020 07:50
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I believe the correct response in this situation is 'woop woop that's the sound of the police', isn't it?
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Aug 21, 2020 17:36
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quis custodiet custodes
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Aug 21, 2020 17:43
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Chapter 41: 23:00-1:09: Error Undefined ARIST: ...God, really? Do we *have* to? VOLITION: [Challenging: Success] Yes. ARIST: Fine. Let’s… get in there, I guess? This should go well.   THE PIGS: Scavenged battery-powered police lights protrude from her back. The flickering light-show reveals a gun in her shaking hand. INTERFACING: [Medium: Success] Her hand is trembling from some sort of neurodegenerative disease.  AUTHORITY: [Medium: Success] Look at Kim, projecting strength. He had that gun out and ready in an instant. Where’s your gun, huh? Oh, right.[/i] THE PIGS: “Failure to comply. Suspect is displaying aggression! OFFICER UNDER DURESS! OFFICER UNDER DURESS!” REACTION SPEED: [Medium: Success] Her eyes bulge with terror. Veins protrude on her forehead.  THE PIGS: “LATERAL VASCULAR NECK RESTRAINT! CAROTID SLEEPER! CAROTID SLEEPER! Critically reducing blood from passing through the neck of the suspect!” KIM KITSURAGI: “Be careful, detective. Don’t do anything that might set her off.” COMPOSURE: [Medium: Success] The situation looks bad. Calm yourself. Steady your breathing.  THE PIGS: “OFFICER IN NEED OF ASSISTANCE!” Her eyes dart between you and Kim. “SUSPECT AT LARGE, GET ON THE GROUND!”  THE PIGS: “Disturbance reported, authorize deadly fore. SECTOR, TAKE THE SHOT!” Her head snaps at you. “BIG RED KEY, BIG RED KEY!” ENCYCLOPEDIA: [Medium: Success] Big red key? That’s code for the battering ram. Cop talk. You know this. EMPATHY: [Formidable: Success] What happened to make her like this? INLAND EMPIRE: [Challenging: Success] Loneliness.  THE PIGS: The woman looks at you, but through you. Like you don’t exist. Her eyes gleam feverishly and the rotating police-beacon lights reveal deep scratch marks on her cheeks. “THIS IS THE POLICE!” She howls through her megaphone. “UNLAWFUL ENGAGEMENT. HANDS ON THE GROUND, SCUM-BAG!”  KIM KITSURAGI: The lieutenant’s eyes stay fixed on the woman and her gun—he studies them closely, then mumbles: “Fascinating.” COMPOSURE: [Challenging: Success] His shoulders relax and a look of realization appears in his eyes… Did he notice something?  THE PIGS: “IT’S THE GODDAMN POLICE, poo poo-BAG,” she yells into the megaphone. “HUG THE PAVEMENT, YOU’RE UNDER ARREST!”  THE PIGS: “CONFISCATED CONTRABAND!” The megaphone makes her voice almost painfully metallic. “RESTRICTED ACCESS, TWO KILOS MISSING, EYE-WITNESS REPORT COMPROMISED!”   THE PIGS: “No,” the crazed woman mumbles, shaking her head. “No, no, no… I thought Mr. Morrant… Gareth…” Suddenly she raises the megaphone and screams: “AGGRAVATED ASSAULT, MAN DOWN, OFFICERS IN PURSUIT!” LOGIC: [Medium: Success] There’s a scenario unfolding in her head right now. It has nothing to do with what’s happening here. KIM KITSURAGI: “What’s the situation...” the lieutenant hesitates addressing the woman, “…officer?” THE PIGS: “LAW ENFORCEMENT COMPROMISED,” she creams in the megaphone. Red and blue lights illuminate the spit flying everywhere. “IMPERSONATING A POLICE OFFICER!”  THE PIGS: “LICENCE AND REGISTRATION!!!” She repeatedly bashes the megaphone against her head, then screams at the bloody mouthpiece: “LICENCE AND REGISTRATION! COME IN DISPATCH! SECTOR, SECTOR, AZIMUTH!!!”   ARIST: [Challenging: Success] You’re not confident about this prospect, but you see no other choice.     ARIST: [Easy: Success] Oh gently caress. THE PIGS: A click. Nothing happens. She looks at the useless weapon. “This isn’t police issue. Police weapons have bullets. This isn’t real! What is this?”   EMPATHY: [Medium: Success] She looks devastated.      THE PIGS: The woman stands in front of you, motionless, unresponsive. Almost like an inanimate object now. A mountain of police paraphernalia. INLAND EMPIRE: [Challenging: Success] In there she is alone, trapped in a world of blue and red lights.     KIM KITSURAGI: “I don’t think there’s any need for that. In her current state—and without the gun—she isn’t really a threat to anyone.”   KIM KITSURAGI: “But I think we’re done here for now. Let’s head out, this is done.” THE PIGS: As you turn to leave, the faintest of voices comes from the woman. “Please leave the radio on…” she mutters. It seems like a reflex, a half-remembered sentence. LOGIC: [Medium: Success] Reflex to what? Being left alone? EMPATHY: [Legendary: Success] Exactly. With only the voice of Gareth Morrand to accompany her on Channel 8.   We successfully recovered our firearm!   Now, we check the Pigs once more.  PERCEPTION (SIGHT): [Easy: Success] Is one of those things a… police cap?   KIM KITSURAGI: “Oh. Is that yours?”     ARIST: [Legendary: Failure] I see absolutely nothing wrong with this. LOGIC: [Medium: Success] She didn’t consume them. She didn’t look high. She ‘confiscated’ them, a little like you are doing now. KIM KITSURAGI: The lieutenant coughs. “You’re taking those, are you?” ARIST: Oh, right.      We should go talk to Soona now that we’ve made our deal with the speedfreaks.      AUTHORITY: [Medium: Success] You know, just hypothetically. You’re not going to actually *do* it, after all.  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “The Wayfarer Act states that citizens have the right to gather in public spaces unless they’re disrupting the public order.” KIM KITSURAGI: “And she’s not. Disrupting any order, I mean.”   Yeah, that’s a non-starter even if we wanted to.   There we go.   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: She thinks about it, a glassy look in her eyes. A gust of wind brings more snow in from the broken gallery. It touches her hair.  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “No, that’s the production schedule you stole and accessed without authorization.” She’s tapping the table in a badly concealed impatience. “I don’t need it.” KIM KITSURAGI: “In his defence, it was simply lying in the desk drawer of an abandoned cubicle.”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “It’s a back-up of my former employer’s project—the radio game we were working on. It’s stored on a *filament memory* just like the one inside this radiocomputer.” She points to the glowing cube inside the machine. INTERFACING: [Medium: Success] She’s making it *extra simple* for you. SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “The backup itself is destroyed now, but I’m hoping to use what’s left of it to pinpoint the exact location of the anomaly. You just have to go to my old workspace and get the filament.”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Oh god, not *this* again…” She takes a deep breath, before letting it all out: “It is not *on-site*, it is *in the basement*, perfectly safe and not connected to the front *at all*.” RHETORIC: Basement? Sounds like it’s *technically* still on-site… SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “And no, taking it outside the building *wouldn’t* have protected it from the data loss. There’s nothing wrong with keeping the backup in the basement. What happened was a freak accident that has nothing to do with how the backup was stored. We clear?” She stares at you with pleasing, furious eyes.     SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “In the giant ice bear fridge—I just told you. It has red glowing eyes, it’s impossible to miss. You just need to get the off site copy from the ice bear.”   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Zawisza, of course…” She relaxes. “Our project lead Sulislaw Zawisza. God, he was always so hell-bent on keeping the copy somewhere ‘safe’. And feature creep…” she mutters, “And the Valley of the Heads… Like it would have made a difference—the off-site copy was perfectly safe when the data loss happened. That data loss was *anomalous*.” She crosses her arms defiantly.  ARIST: [Heroic: Failure] You’ve said it before you can even think to stop yourself. Nice going. SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Wait, what?” She looks up, alarmed. “*Whose* dead body?” KIM KITSURAGI: “You know, we don’t actually have to tell the entire world about the fridge,” the lieutenant says, looking at you.  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “*And what is it doing in the fridge?!*”   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Okay,” she says, pressing fingers into her eyebrow ridge. “Very cool, thanks for keeping me in the loop.” KIM KITSURAGI: “We would appreciate if you kept this knowledge to yourself, miss.”  ARIST: Well, at least that worked out.    SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “No.” She stares at you with droopy eyes. “She literally started praying for the higher powers when she first saw my Rehm Civic. I’m not making this up.” KIM KITSURAGI: The lieutenant coughs like he’s amused.   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “And here’s my Kvalsund multitool. You might need it to hack loose some ice. It opens everything. If you get me the off-site copy, then you can keep the Kvalsund.”     Let’s talk to the washerwoman. We never did ask her about Ruby.  PERCEPTION (HEARING): [Medium: Success] The buzz of electric lights blends together with the slow rumble of ocean waves at night.  WASHERWOMAN: “Yes. I can’t really sleep any more. Only a few hours a night. It happens when you grow older…” She sloshes the water in the bucket around for a bit.     WASHERWOMAN: “Nay, I haven’t *seen* anyone lately.”  WASHERWOMAN: “He’s a sharp one,” she says to herself and runs her hand across the washboard. RHETORIC: [Easy: Success] She’s being evasive. She knows something. KIM KITSURAGI: “There was a murder in Martinaise.” He points East. “She might be a suspect. We would appreciate your help.”    KIM KITSURAGI: “I see, ma’am.” The lieutenant turns to you. “I hope you don’t mind if we look around anyway.”  We’ll do that—just not right now.   It appears that Titus has, in fact, left for the night. Welp, the Pigs is just gonna have to wait out in the cold tonight! But enough about that, talk to the smoker (not) on the balcony!     SMOKER ON THE BALCONY: “The *homo-sexual underground*?” The smoker sits up immediately, his eyes wide with amused surprise, a honeyed smile lingers on his lips.    SMOKER ON THE BALCONY: “Oh we’re ambitious, we want to destroy the last vestiges of meaning, the last things people in Revachol have to hold on to, the true symbols of security—the meaning of man and woman, mother and father, their marriage.”  ARIST: [Challenging: Success] What are you *talking* about, you have no idea who that even *is*! SMOKER ON THE BALCONY: “But do you also like the *razzle-dazzle* of gold? Do you like parties and discos and having fun under the vibrant lights of Saturday night?”  Really disappointed in myself for not picking “That much fun should be illegal” here.  SMOKER ON THE BALCONY: “Beautiful!” The smoker crawls up to you like an animal preparing to jump. “Beautiful, that’s exactly what we’re looking for! Who knows, maybe you *were* homo-sexual in the past, maybe all of that has been *repressed*… He circles his hands around you.     This “twenty-hour mind project” really only takes eight, weird.  Let’s say hey to Garte while we’re in the area.  Aww, he liked the bird.   Now, we enter the dreaded basement to recover the filament memory.   ICE CREAM MAKER: Turning the crank feels oddly satisfying, like stirring your childhood dreams… In the distance you hear water dripping.  ICE CREAM MAKER: You slip your fingers under the frozen lid, but the ice is too cold for you to get a good grip. A prybar would come in handy here… or something stronger, like the Kvalsund KR+2 Multi-Tool. KIM KITSURAGI: “Didn’t Soona give you a perfect tool for this kind of job—the Kvalsund? You should take it out.”  Good idea, Kim.    Oh hey, and we unplugged the machine two days ago, making this slightly easier! It’s almost like I already knew we’d need to do that! Unfortunately, due to the -2 to Physical Instrument we currently have while internalizing Waste Land of Reality, our chances look grim. But never fear, because we have another secret weapon…  ...taking our loving shirt off. Thank you, Coach Physical Instrument.  That’s worth a shot at least.  Hell yeah!        ARIST: [Easy: Success] Instead of heading right for Soona, you decide to go back up to the radiocomputer in the decayed wreck of Fortress Accident. You don’t just want to see what’s in the off-site copy, but also the original filament memory which might be accessible as well with the password Tiago gave you.     EAST-INSULINDIAN REPEATER STATION: “Good, I’ve unlocked the production schedule. After ending the call please press PRINT to access the filament.” KIM KITSURAGI: “Really? She just used the same password?” The lieutenant seems almost disappointed to discover that, as he murmurs: “Maybe those radiocomputer guys aren’t that paranoid after all…”  EAST-INSULINDIAN REPEATER STATION: “Thank you and good bye,” the old lady’s voice disappears along with the static.   MAINFRAME: It’s a project report written by the lead producer Andrew ‘Andy’ Schott about “Wirrâl Untethered,” a radio game developed by studio Fortress Accident.  MAINFRAME: Fortress Accident employed 18 people, the bulk of the team composed of writers and concept artists. There were also radio programmers, sound engineers, a CEO, two marketing experts… and a single overburdened producer who developed a habit of popping Pyrholidon in the basement to escape his obligations.   MAINFRAME: No, definitely not. A few more producers could have come handy though—especially when dealing with writers, some of whom routinely skipped work because of “mental health issues” and extremely unprofessional sleep schedules…  MAINFRAME: In its short time of existence Fortress Accident SCA managed to burn through truly *insane* amounts of money. The first tranche of seed financing brought in 150,000 reál, but then came the *delays*.    RADIOCOMPUTER: No, not the concept artists. It wasn’t even the writers, with their panic attacks and three-hour lunches… MAINFRAME: It was impossible not to fail. The project was too large and no amount of money could satiate the ever-expanding ambitions of the development team. They tried to make a 4,000,000 reál game with 400,000 in their bank account. They thought they could bridge the gap with pure willpower and imagination.  MAINFRAME: No. Even then success remained within an ever-narrowing margin of possibility that, despite everything, never entirely disappeared…  MAINFRAME: No, it was good. Too good. At the eleventh hour, the lead designer, Ziemsk-born Sulislaw Zawisza decided that what Wirrâl Untethered needed was a secret mystical location at the extreme edge of the map…                   MAINFRAME: On the nature of the data loss there’s ominously little information in the production log. It comes at the very end, where things get fuzzy and dark, where tables and numbers seem to vanish into an eerie nothingness, before their Igaunijan investor pulled the plug…  MAINFRAME: When the project returned it was completely blank.  MAINFRAME: Miraculously enough, it seems that the off-site copy happened to be *on-site* when the catastrophic data loss occurred…  MAINFRAME: S. Luukanen-Kilde, the lead programmer of Fortress Accident: “The off-site copy was on-site because there was no *off-site* anymore, not for me, not after eight months of crunch.”    MAINFRAME: Four months later by an unknown author: “I am the only one left and it’s gotten rather damp here. A few other businesses have gone under, too. Slipstream switched to making skis and the hairdressers just left, cursing Martinaise. They’re right, though, something’s seriously wrong with this place. Martinaise, all of it.” RADIOCOMPUTER: “Still haven’t gotten an answer from Lintel about what happened. All I could get were the physical coordinates of the error on the East-Insulindian front on that day. Since the computation happened on-air, I reckoned it had to coincide with an actually existing location… I have compared the coordinates to a map of Revachol West. Turns out it’s only 800 metres from here. The address is Saint-Brune 1147. I am going there to look this thing in the eye…”    Let’s try the off-site copy now.      gently caress. EAST-INSULINDIAN REPEATER STATION: “Received. I will *register* this log-in attempt.” LOGIC: [Easy: Success] Don’t worry. Passwords have a way of *turning up* sooner or later. ARIST: [Challenging: Success] You sincerely doubt you will ever find a *different* filament memory password in your time in Martinaise, but you also do not much care, because the off-site copy is blank and you only put it in the radiocomputer out of curiosity.      While we’re in the area, let’s talk to Neha.   NOVELTY DICEMAKER: “Fortress Accident, the radio game studio…” She closes her eyes as some remnant of a memory lights up her face. EMPATHY: [Medium: Success] She liked them. NOVELTY DICEMAKER: “They were an interesting bunch. We talked about role-playing systems every now and then. Once I even saw two of them get into fisticuffs over Wirrâl…   NOVELTY DICEMAKER: “Well, I did hear them talking at times…” She looks at the hallway, as if she can still hear them chit-chat behind her curtains on a cigarette break. “They seemed to believe they were historical individuals on some *grand* quest.”  NOVELTY DICEMAKER: “Yes, but when the money started to run out they just began to complain a lot about capitalism. You know, how the markets are *rigged* to keep out new businesses, and so on. In the end they just didn’t get it done. They didn’t have enough willpower to produce something *truly historic*—and to show up to work on time.”  NOVELTY DICEMAKER: “And so is producing something extraordinary.” Her eyes wander to the shelves full of die prototypes and discarded models. EMPATHY: [Medium: Success] Something strains her face, before she looks up again:   NOVELTY DICEMAKER: “Yes. I guess so. The arcade is an *ancient* failure—before my time. I’m not surprised, however.”  NOVELTY DICEMAKER: “Why would Slipstream SCA have a hundred-years-old recording as their doorbell message? It doesn’t make any sense. I’m still convinced it was nothing more than some elaborate prank.”     NOVELTY DICEMAKER: “Ah, yes, Fortress Accident.” She shakes her head lightly. “It’s too bad they never finished their game… The Wirrâl Untethered die is a variation of a standard role-playing die, only instead of plants it uses motifs of ice and death. And loss, of course.”  NOVELTY DICEMAKER: “It’s an *icositetrahedron*—a 24-sided die that can produced results for 2-sided, 3-sided, 4-sided, 6-sided and 12-sided dice with a single roll. Technically you can also use it for many other sizes, but you may need to re-roll results.”     ARIST: [Easy: Success] Is this the tree across from Roy’s pawn shop that Shivers kept bringing up?     ARIST: [Medium: Success] Let’s try that again. Don’t pat the tree this time.     INTERFACING: It curls up into a mess inside your pocket. If only you could find a way to re-spool it, so that you could hear what’s on the tape… LOGIC: [Medium: Success] Maybe Roy from the pawnshop can help you with this?   KIM KITSURAGI: “You could also get it fixed at the pawnshop across the street—we shouldn’t waste our time.” He looks at his wristwatch a little impatiently.    To the pawnshop we go, then.    BIRD’S NEST ROY: He slowly finishes his thought: “…but I’m not some Mr. Fixit, I’m a pawnbroker. If you want to pawn the tape, sure. Although it looks pretty… worthless.”     BIRD’S NEST ROY: “Man, you’re really invested in this.” He looks at the bundle of tape in front of him. It shimmers under the shop’s dazzling light show.   BIRD’S NEST ROY: “Yeah.” He nods. “It was. Re-spooling isn’t that difficult, although I had to mend the tape in a few places.”          ARIST: [Formidable: Success] You will never wear this shirt, you already know this. But at least you got rid of some of your disgusting blood money. LOGIC: [Challenging: Success] It’s not actually blood money. RHETORIC: [Challenging: Success] All money is blood money.  We return to the humble shack, ready to turn in for the night.    ARIST: [Challenging: Success] As your eyes flit across the room searching for any clues Ruby might have left behind, you notice something off about one of the floorboards…    LOOSE FLOORBOARD: Nothing particular catches your eye. Looks like more reeds. There might be something hidden inside the sand, though.      HAND/EYE COORDINATION: [Medium: Success] It’s extra ammunition. She’s locked and loaded, ready to fight some cops.  ARIST: [Medium: Success] You found Ruby’s hope—her escape. The clue she left behind is ominous, no doubt about that, but you can feel yourself getting closer to *something* even if it’s unclear what that is. Tomorrow’s going to be a long day. Better rest up.   
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Aug 27, 2020 02:02
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I really like the idea of radiocomputing. It's like what if the Internet, but an undertaker's wife was never hired as a telephone operator?
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Aug 27, 2020 03:29
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G'night, Kim.
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Aug 27, 2020 07:24
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Great update. Bits like this really cement the heart of Disco Elysium, even if I'm very upset that you left The Pigs to rot in the cold because you wanted to prioritize the dice and tape. I also love everything about Fortress Accident.
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Aug 27, 2020 08:07
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I'm secretly hoping that all this dicking around with dice does have some sort of effect on the filament, but timed things don't seem like they'd really fit in this game. Can't wait to see how it goes. Also very sad you left pigs to rot in the cold all alone.
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Aug 27, 2020 17:25
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I didn't prioritize the dice and tape. By the time I had dealt with the Pigs, Titus had already left the Whirling, just to be clear. There's nothing I could have done for her without Titus there.
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Aug 27, 2020 17:31
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I didn't even realize you could miss on getting the other password. Isn't that a trivial Logic check or something?
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Aug 28, 2020 00:20
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Xander77 posted:I didn't even realize you could miss on getting the other password. Isn't that a trivial Logic check or something? Looking it up, I probably needed to check the stained glass window in the church after talking to Tiago?
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Aug 28, 2020 00:28
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Well, I finally got a computer that can actually play this, and an amazing thing happened as I started. I passed both checks about The Expression. Double 6 on the Electrochemical, and 11+3 on Encyclopedia. Now Harry looks sad.  e: And apparently used all my luck on those two. Failed the Savoir Faire check in the Whirling, failed the Empathy check with Sylvie, failed the check to bluff that I hadn't lost my gun... Dareon fucked around with this message at 13:22 on Aug 29, 2020 |
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Aug 29, 2020 12:46
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Feel free to shave too, for maximum oof.
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Aug 29, 2020 12:57
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Art Cop is best cop. Talking to Cuno, I was able to pull out "I liked your pig's head. I've got one of my own. *point to your own head* It's poo poo." Cuno wasn't expecting that. Kim wasn't expecting that. Hell, Cunoesse wasn't expecting that. Conceptualization gave me a nice pat on the back for just completely derailing all three of them.
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Aug 30, 2020 15:25
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 ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN: How’ve things been going for you out there? Helped anyone lately? Saved anyone lately? *Murdered* anyone lately? RHETORIC: [Medium: Success] This bastard isn’t even listening to you!  LIMBIC SYSTEM: Hear that? He doesn’t even flinch. Ice-man doesn’t care about killing people. That’s *nothing* to him. Black water under the bridge. The thing he’s *really* scared of…  ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN: Don’t tell him, sister. It’s too bad.     ANCIENT REPTILIAN BRAIN: …in hell and ancient sadness, brother. Ten thousand years later—in front of the video rental. There is a warm breath on your face again. Everything is *okay* again.  LIMBIC SYSTEM: Your eyelids flutter open for a moment. When you close them again, you sense the light of the room around you—you’re back. In two seconds the alarm will ring.   Chapter 42: 7:30-8:23: Long Lonesome Road Home    You may notice that there is now a small tab barely visible in the top-left corner of the screen whenever I leave a shot uncropped. In the many months in between me recording Day 4 and Day 5, ZA/UM added a few handy features that allow you to play the entire game using only your mouse without any loss of functionality. It’s neat, but you also can’t turn off that weird tab thing that shows you where the menu will pop out, so… welp! ARIST: [Medium: Success] You walk past Kim, who offers his customary morning greeting. You walk past the washerwoman as well, despite the critical evidence you need to confront her about. No, you have something important to get to first…  ARIST: Siileng!? No! In case it wasn’t clear, the important thing you had to do was not window shop over at Siileng’s. Go loving talk to Titus and get that old woman out of the cold, good grief.    ENDURANCE: [Medium: Success] This jakcet is the apex of human evolution—the moment at which man became weatherproof. SHIVERS: [Medium: Success] Practical, and yet it may deaden your senses to the world around you. Possibly because of the awful typeface.   ARIST: [Medium: Success] Man, Siileng’s offerings are pretty… loving awful, honestly.  ARIST: [Easy: Success] As you get closer to the Whirling, you notice Gaston sitting on a bench alone. He seems despondent.   GASTON MARTIN: “The prick is gone,” he replies, trying to smile. “I… I can barely believe it, but he’s really gone.”   GASTON MARTIN: His angry little heart finally gave out.” He sighs. “The dockworkers found him in the guard booth this morning. Wasn’t even supposed to be working for another week, but he just had to prove how tough he is…” REACTION SPEED: [Medium: Success] Wait… did he push himself to prove he could pull his weight and doesn’t need hand-outs? GASTON MARTIN: “Guess he was about to head home, ‘cause when the dockworkers found him he was wearing civilian clothes and not the cockatoo uniform I saw him in all the time. Sometimes I thought he was wearing it just to piss me off.” Gaston smiles a sad smile. “Now the joke’s on him, ‘cause he’s gonna be buried without it.”  GASTON MARTIN: “No,” he replies quickly. “René was the most stubborn man in Revachol. Nothing you or I could say would ever *push* him to do anything. The man was completely immovable.”  GASTON MARTIN: “I repeat—an *absolute* oval office.” He turns to look at the crater. “Even his old army buddies didn’t want him around. He was like an old viper. The only people who could stand to be around him were Jeannie and me…” He pauses. “She saw something in him when we were just kids, and…”  GASTON MARTIN: “We’ve hated each other our entire lives. So much in fact that…” He falls silent and looks at you, eyes filling up with tears.   GASTON MARTIN: He looks at you for a moment and then speaks quietly. “I took them for myself. Took them to remember that old oval office. Nobody knew him better than I did, and I want to remember that old oval office by something.”  KIM KITSURAGI: “Yes.” The lieutenant nods. “We are both very sorry for your loss.” GASTON MARTIN: “It is what it is, part of life really,” he mumbles, only half-listening to you. “But to know someone for 79 years, then one day they’re just *gone*…” EMPATHY: [Legendary: Success] Despite their differences these men played such a significant part in each other’s lives that now that one of them is gone, the other feels… just lost.    GASTON MARTIN: “There were many reasons, but mostly it was the communards. They called them ‘The Bells of Revolution’.” A sad smile passes his face. “I guess in the end the Insulindian Lillies were just another piece of the Old Insulinde the royalists had to surrender to the Mazovian insurgents. It doesn’t really matter anymore.”  ARIST: [Challenging: Success] What a depressing start to the day. Just… just go to Titus. What else do you want from me?   TITUS HARDIE: The big man laughs, nearly spitting out his beer. “What’s that, copper? You want us to help little old ladies now?” KIM KITSURAGI: “You’re *local law enforcement* aren’t you?” The lieutenant looks Titus in the eye. “Helping troubled civilians should fall under your jurisdiction.”  TITUS HARDIE: He pushes up his cap. “God, poor lady. Don’t worry. We’ll handle this. I think she’s got some family in Couron or something… Bastards left her alone when she got sick, we’ve been getting complaints.” EUGENE: “Hey,” Eugene interjects. “Wasn’t Evrart’s B Team looking for her the other day? They said something about her… I dunno, finding something?” TITUS HARDIE: “Yeah, I think you’re right, Gene.” Titus gives him a beer salute and turns to you. “She have something of yours, pig?”  ARIST: [Medium: Success] Oh, *now* you stop telling people this poo poo. A little late, don’t you think? TITUS HARDIE: “No? Well, whatever then, copper.” Titus chugs his beer down and wipes his mouth. EUGENE: “No, they totally said what it was… What was it…” He’s still thinking it over in the corner. “Anyone remember?” ALAIN: The tattooed man scratches his head with his knuckles. “I don’t remember, I was fuckin’ drunk.”  TITUS HARDIE: He takes off his cap and scratches his head. “Auntie LePlante, we always called her. Something LePlante?”   TITUS HARDIE: “Was? Like before? Just an old lady. Her kids moved away years ago. Never come to visit, never took her calls. She gets… out every now and then.” He swirls his beer. “She did right by lots of us when we were kids. Always was a little off, but still.” RHETORIC: [Medium: Success] Us kids? That must have been ages ago. She was better then.  TITUS HARDIE: “Get wanting to be a cop, you mean? Well, she…” He furrows his brow in thought. “poo poo, I don’t actually know. Anyone know why she started acting like a pig?”  ALAIN: The tattooed Mesque sinks into his seat, unsure how to respond. “Yeah… you should be.”  TITUS HARDIE: “Dunno,” Titus says, shrugging. “She lives by the water. poo poo washes up all the time on the beach.” KIM KITSURAGI: “Police paraphernalia doesn’t just wash up on the coast, people. It’s not like we dump it at night. She bought it, collected it.”  TITUS HARDIE: “No problemo, cop-man. We take care of our mentally ill in Martinaise. Ain’t that right, boys?”  ARIST: [Challenging: Success] And while you’re here, you should probably warn them that they’re turbofucked. TITUS HARDIE: “Yeah?” He doesn’t seem worried. “By friends you mean his squadmates from Krenel?” EUGENE: “Wouldn’t wanna beat up his grandma.” There’s snickering in the room. Some of the men put their beers down.  KIM KITSURAGI: “This is what happens if you take the law into your own hands. Other people start doing it too.” GLEN: Let them come!” Blondie yells across the cafeteria. “The Hardie boys are right loving here!” TITUS HARDIE: “You heard the man—right here.” He points to the ground. “We’re armed, we got the whole district behind us and Glen… Glen is loving *crazy*.”   EUGENE: “We’re not bees, we’re men. We’re socialists!”  TITUS HARDIE: “Pft!” A spray of beer. “So were the local gangs. The fuckin’ *Barmy Army* and the Madre scum. You’ve been out there. Seen any around?” ALAIN: “Yeah? Where are they now, huh?” He points South. “Sent back to Madre in an airtight cargo crate.” KIM KITSURAGI: “These people are trained military professionals. Special forces, as you said. They’re not a gang, or a *Barmy Army*.”   TITUS HARDIE: “I guess we’re gonna see, aren’t we?”  TITUS HARDIE: “Yeah, like you’ve been up against ceramic armour…” He takes a sip of beer to bide his time, then tries to get the last word in.    TITUS HARDIE: “No, they won’t.” He shakes his beer at you. “Get out of here with your negative energy.” AUTHORITY: [Medium: Success] He really doesn’t like you ruffling their feathers like that—on what might be the eve of battle. KIM KITSURAGI: “All he means is that the situation is serious.”  ARIST: [Medium: Success] You probably didn’t accomplish much by telling the Hardies about the mercenaries other than one-upping them—but it still felt kinda good. Maybe they’ll be on the defensive now if those mercs come calling, but you kind of doubt it. They’re still day-drinking, after all.  ARIST: [Medium: Success] Go talk to the “scab leader”. LOGIC: [Challenging: Success] What, are you gonna ask him “what’s it like actually being a war criminal for hire?” This is a terrible idea and you know it.  SCAB LEADER: “Hell no. I’m just an honest scab. I won’t have talk like that around here, you understand?”  SCAB LEADER: “loving loincloth…” He stares you down mutely for a second.   SCAB LEADER: “Don’t think so,” he grunts, barely glancing at it.  KIM KITSURAGI: “Actually…” The lieutenant turns to you. “I think we should maybe even *get going* now?”   ARIST: [Challenging: Success] Well, that was a bust. But at least you still have a face to pout about it with. Why don’t you make up for it by talking with the Paledriver now that you know what the pale is?   KIM KITSURAGI: “Great.” The lieutenant concedes with a head shake. “He asked the Pines rep about the pale—and now he’s talking to everyone about it…”  KIM KITSURAGI: “*Exactly* what I didn’t want you to do…” He sighs and turns to the woman. “Ma’am, my partner wanted to know if you work in pale transport.” PALEDRIVER: “No offence, but *your partner*…” She lights the cigarette, and a white and silver cloud of smoke disappears into her mouth. “…seems like a bit of an idiot.” She breathes out. The air tastes sweet.    PALEDRIVER: “The smell of liquor on Gabriel’s lips after the shoot. In the motor park. The roses on the day of Franconegro’s coronation. On the grand stairs of Raehl. The smoke from the fowling piece, when Dolores Dei was shot.”   PALEDRIVER: “Thought insertion? *Dithering*? The Graad-Katla Magistral?” She savours the lungful. “It’s more than dangerous—it’s *sad*. But… at first I had to make a living. Now… When you’ve it all go *away* like that, rolling off like the sea, and then come back to this…” She gestures at the square. The broken horse monument, the clanging of machines in the distance.    PALEDRIVER: “Nothing. Until it starts. When you’re deep enough—then, for me… it’s like autumn. Dark grey and orange, the orange of streetlights and the colour of trees in the electric light. It smells like autumn too. It smells terrible.”   PALEDRIVER: “No—the same one. A *roller*. They all are nowadays. Special wheels for connecting to the floor of the hold.” She points to the machines, clumped up like toys.  PALEDRIVER: “Yes.”  PALEDRIVER: “They say there is a point—one that *I* have not crossed—in the pale superdeep. If you stray too far off course on the U41-A, or in Lomonossov’s Land… where every step you take is one step further drom home, no matter the direction. It’s a point you cannot come back from. Your mind becomes so radiant with the past—there is a flip.” She flicks the ash from her cigarette. “Instead of writing, it erases memory. Nearing some kind of…” She shakes her head. “Indescribable *finale*.”  PALEDRIVER: “It’s a story us longhaulsmen tell—longhaulsmen, *xerife*, not *paledrivers*—way beyond the established pale that’s lit by radio frequencies. Where it goes silent.”  PALEDRIVER: “No one knows what’s at the *end…*” She takes the cigarette out of the cigarette holder and extinguishes it. “I’ve only glimpsed the beginning.”  PALEDRIVER: “*Hosiannna…* A sigh escapes her lips, then silence, as she stares within herself. EMPATHY: [Easy: Success] There is nothing more to do now. She’s far away. KIM KITSURAGI: “You’ve fried both your brains enough for today, detective.” He inspects her. No response.    ARIST: [Medium: Success] You figure you should stop by René’s booth to pay respects, if nothing else.  SAVOIR FAIRE: [Medium: Success] Take it. It’s just there. Who cares? It’s not like anyone’s gonna need it.  We’re not taking that goddamn uniform.  What we *are* going to do is finally report that we found our missing cop poo poo!       ARIST: [Formidable: Success] You’ve just set down the microphone when a thought pops into your mind. Something you never tried.      ARIST: [Easy: Success] loving hell…
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Sep 1, 2020 19:48
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I have trouble letting go of old chairs. I can't imagine how Gaston feels after finding out someone he's known for almost eight decades finally kicked the bucket, oval office or no.
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Sep 1, 2020 22:34
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I couldn't get further information about the pale from the paledriver in my playthrough, glad to see it
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Sep 1, 2020 22:36
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(extremely Limbic System voice) The Apricot-Chewing-Gum-Scented One will not reveal Her secrets so easily~ It's fascinating what changes based on early checks. Like, I didn't even try the check to come up with Ambrosius Cousteau, but because I succeeded at the Logic check to figure out the casefile designation conventions from the ledger, during the field autopsy I was able to put down "HDB" in the Assistant field. On the topic of the ledger, you need to show off some of the case files. THE UNSOLVABLE CASE especially. I actually read all of them on night 2 because my game had bugged out and wouldn't let me sleep (Wound up needing to reload an old save). Also there's a real neat conversation with Cuno (Honestly not a phrase I thought I'd ever say) after the autopsy, but that requires you to actually succeed at the find-the-bullet check before moving the body.
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Sep 2, 2020 05:05
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I'm guessing from that latest dream that he blames himself for his ex-wife's death, then? From the earliest dreams I was just assuming he had a breakup and was taking it in the most ridiculously self-pitying overly-dramatic way you could possibly take it, but if it's more of a Silent Hill 2 situation that justifies things a bit more.
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Sep 2, 2020 10:40
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CountryMatters posted:I'm guessing from that latest dream that he blames himself for his ex-wife's death, then? From the earliest dreams I was just assuming he had a breakup and was taking it in the most ridiculously self-pitying overly-dramatic way you could possibly take it, but if it's more of a Silent Hill 2 situation that justifies things a bit more. I'm assuming, just based on previous media experiences, that Ruby is his ex-wife. However, the game has been very, very good at subverting my expectations so far, so I'm not assigning the theory a large probability. I did have kind of an amusing moment in my game. Between that, Actual Art Degree (Art Cop is best cop), and a thought we haven't seen yet (I realize it's probably for dramatic effect, but why have we not seen the Feld building and the Wompty-Dompty-Dom Center conversation yet?), I am swimming in skill points and money. Dareon fucked around with this message at 08:30 on Sep 3, 2020 |
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Sep 3, 2020 01:14
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Chapter 43: 8:23-9:09: Lieutenant Bumblefuck ARIST: [Medium: Success] You decide to talk to Joyce once more. Not for any real reason, just to share some information and see if maybe she’ll tell you that story about Insulinde.  JOYCE MESSIER: “Hmh,” she nods with well-contained curiosity.  ARIST: [Challenging: Success] God*dammit*, shut the gently caress up about this!   Well, let’s get down to real business, then.  JOYCE MESSIER: “*Taking* it…” She looks toward the colourful mountain of crates, like toy blocks rising above Martinaise. PERCEPTION (SIGHT): [Medium: Success] Green livery changing into red, blot by blot.  JOYCE MESSIER: “They most certainly are not.” Her eyes return to you. Krenel has a thousand men on their payroll. The next batch will be a platoon of twenty men and a gunship.” KIM KITSURAGI: “I’ve seen the Union’s forces. They’re better organized than these mercenaries. They also have the support of the people of Revachol West. It will take more than Krenel to wipe them out. Wild Pines will need to send more and better-equipped men. Make no mistake, ma’am… I am sure you have the money. The question is how many years and how many lives you are willing to sacrifice.”  JOYCE MESSIER: “Everything affects the decision making process, detective.” KIM KITSURAGI: “Officer…” The look on Kim’s face conveys uncertainty. He doesn’t even sound angry.   JOYCE MESSIER: “What will I do…” she says slowly looking around. COMPOSURE: [Medium: Success] Her arms fall to her sides, her spine relaxes.   JOYCE MESSIER: “The nations who colonized this isola called theirs *Mundi*. The World. It was all they knew, all they thought would be. That there would be something more was a gamble. Akin to another world—or life after death. The pale was thought to be impenetrable, perpetual.” She points north-west. “Irene La Navigateur, the Queen or Suresne, sent *eight* expeditions, one after the other, into the mass at the edge of the world. Five of the crews did not return. Two did, but had lost their minds.”  JOYCE MESSIER: She nods. “There was no precedent for such an undertaking. People thought she was punishing the admirals, or had gone mad, or both… Until after *years* of trial and error—and the development of a *strict* psychological regime imitating the creation process of poetry… The eight expedition returned, sane and intact. They told of a new continent of matter. They told the queen and her councillor, Dolores Dei, that the pale had begun to condense, day after day, hour after hour, minute after minute. Slowly raining down until it formed a vast ocean.” PERCEPTION (SMELL): [Medium: Success] The air is cold and scented with petrichor.  KIM KITSURAGI: So does the lieutenant. His mouth is slightly open as he looks to the sky.  JOYCE MESSIER: She nods. “The phenomenon has never again been encountered. For a time the crew thought they were experiencing a hallucination. The mast-hand proclaimed ‘L’Insulinde! L’Insulinde!’—the signal to wake up. But they could not. They were sane and conscious, as islands began to appear on the horizon… There are 78,000 uninhabited islands in the Insulindian archipelago, officer. The freckled face of god,” she smiles. *“Après la vie, la mort,”* they summarized it for the queen and Dolores Dei; “Après la mort, la vie encore! Après la monde, le gris. Après le gris, le monde encore!” INLAND EMPIRE: [Medium: Success] After life, death. After death, life again. After the isola, the pale. After the pale, isola again. JOYCE MESSIER: “On the second day a Great Skua was shot down above the flagship Lysergique. The bird was preserved and brought back. Along with pollen.” She looks to the sky, then back at you.     JOYCE MESSIER: “In your defense—it is a nasty creature, who plucks food from the throats of lesser birds. Yet much like Revachol, it is also magnificent. And rare. Imagine the suzerain of seagulls.”  JOYCE MESSIER: “The nations of Mundi proceeded to discover five more isolae—or they discovered us—all in the rush of the great interisolary reconnection… But these others weren’t uninhabited. We had to kill people there, wipe out indigenous populations, gunboat economies. Or they came to do the same for us. Or had done to each other. But here…” she spreads her arms.   JOYCE MESSIER: “It is.” She pulls the hood over her head. “Soon it will be spring and everything will blossom.”   ARIST: [Medium: Success] You didn’t actually suggest she do that… but you didn’t leave her much of a choice, did you? JOYCE MESSIER: She puts her hand in the rain. She’s silent for a second. “We will see.” KIM KITSURAGI: “Ma’am… This may well unravel property law this side of the river. If that occurs, we may never see the end of this kind of confrontation. The next time there will be two strikes…” he looks toward the harbour. “Then four, then a hundred.” RHETORIC: Workers of the world unite! ARIST: [Challenging: Success] The idea of more strikes doesn’t sound so bad until you realize the people who benefit are just going to be more Evrart Claires… JOYCE MESSIER: “What happens will happen.” She takes the end of the rope in her rain-slick hand and starts untying the knot.       KIM KITSURAGI: “That’s right detective. And next time you should confer with them before you go setting events in motion.” ARIST: [Medium: Success] Oops. Sorry, Kim. EMPATHY: [Medium: Success] Despite his words he’s not really sure whether to be annoyed with you or not.   JOYCE MESSIER: “Keep the peace—and I will keep my end of the bargain.” KIM KITSURAGI: “How far along is Krenel’s *investigation*?” JOYCE MESSIER: “A confrontation is imminent. They have followed in your footsteps… As your investigation reaches a climax, so does theirs. They are your shadow. Arm yourselves. Armour yourselves…”  JOYCE MESSIER: “Soon. I do not know precisely. They have cut off all communication, you see. They know I’ve been feeding you information. One last thing, Lieutenant Du Bois.” She starts the engine. “I’ve given the matter much thought and come to this conclusion: You’re not an amnesiac. You’re *insane*.”  JOYCE MESSIER: “No, detective—no one’s as insane as you.”  JOYCE MESSIER: “I’m over-exposed, baby. My travels take me through the pale dozens of times a year. I’ve got the longing—and I’ve got it *bad*.” She points to her heart.  JOYCE MESSIER: “The same strict psychological regimen the eighth admiral developed when he crossed the pale and discovered this isola—the *Volta do Mar*. It’s used by interisolary travellers and other troubled souls even to this day.”  INLAND EMPIRE: [Challenging: Success] Remember the truth of her.    ESPRIT DE CORPS: [Medium: Success] With worry in his eyes. He does not know if it was the right thing to do. But he doesn’t say anything.       We actually decide to internalize this thought. Why not? Something to remember Rejoyce Leyton by, the filthy liberal that she is.  ARIST: [Easy: Success] And now you’re just a bit curious: what *does* Evrart have to say about this?   PERCEPTION (SIGHT): [Challenging: Success] There’s a mean little glint in his eyes. EVRART CLAIRE: “…did it look like a germ? Did it look like a piece of *bacteria*?” COMPOSURE: [Medium: Success] His tone is totally different now. The jolly man of the people is gone and so is the smile. INLAND EMPIRE: [Medium: Success] You get a sinking feeling…  ARIST: [Challenging: Success] Oh, you loving *idiot*. KIM KITSURAGI: “You wanted us to relay all this information to her…” the lieutenant cuts in. EVRART CLAIRE: “That this is a takeover, that I want a war?” He nods, forcefully. “God, I hope you also told her about the drug trade… They absolutely hate getting their hands dirty with that.”     EVRART CLAIRE: “Harry, I bugged her cabin. I bugged her whole boat. I had camera surveying her boat. Hell, I even wanted to bug that thermal cup, but my boys advised against it.”   EVRART CLAIRE: “Hell no!” he exclaims. “They’d gently caress it up. They can’t do anything right. I mean my *real* boys. My special task force boys.” KIM KITSURAGI: “Where are these boys?”    EVRART CLAIRE: “Of course she did. Rich people have the best stories. About all the interesting things they’ve done and seen, all the beautiful places they’ve been to. It’s just sentimentalism. She can afford to be sentimental—and she can afford to lose as well.”    ARIST: [Formidable: Success] What, you want a medal? It’s been less than twelve hours since you made that decision.  EVRART CLAIRE: “What was always going to happen. We take the harbour and she fucks off to Ozonne, uncorks a bottle of wine, calls her partners and says they need to distance themselves from this nasty business before the big poo poo spinner splashes everyone.”  EVRART CLAIRE: “That it will, Harry. That it will.” A sincere smile crosses his face. “As to the *bad taste*—please. You’re not a sommelier, you’re a cop. You knew something. Something *big*. And you wanted to see what happens when you tell someone. So you told her. Anyone who’s ever been close to power will tell you: inside information is the sweetest thing in the world.”  EVRART CLAIRE: “Don’t beat yourself up, Harry. What you did was participate in history. When history calls, you *have* to pick up. You had no choice. A hard disco cop like you—I knew you weren’t one to resist temptation.” KIM KITSURAGI: “You know what, detective? I am going to leave this out of my report and I suggest you leave it out of yours too.” ARIST: [Challenging: Success] ...Good idea, Kim.   ARIST: [Medium: Success] You just *have* to keep telling people about the gun instead of taking the perfect opportunity to gently caress off out of here. EVRART CLAIRE: “My, my…” He lets out an appreciative whistle. “She’s quite the looker, Harry. You can’t imagine how pleased I am the two of you are reunited.”   ARIST: [Formidable: Success] And as you leave Evrart Claire’s office, sure you will not return, you curse your own idiocy. It wasn’t the capitalists you had to watch out for, but the mini-capitalist in the guise of a socialist, the one with everything to gain by exploiting the people he was supposed to be representing. gently caress. RHETORIC: [Heroic: Failure] Another win for communism! Eat poo poo, corporate lackeys! Arist fucked around with this message at 17:53 on Sep 3, 2020 |
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Sep 3, 2020 16:04
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Yes, all cops
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Sep 3, 2020 16:05
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"Bring an army, go in, gun them all down" also results in her telling you she'll let them have the harbor, as you suggested. I agonized over that choice before eventually letting Harry's ideologies decide, and capitalist pigdog with high Motorics won there. Also if you haven't finished her reality lowdown, you get a passive informing you that this is a big fat point of no return as you start to tell her it's a takeover. e: Finishing off the dance club? I savescummed the hell out of that (botchcop no  ). The mercenary tribunal? That result I'm keeping, one and done.
Dareon fucked around with this message at 14:08 on Sep 4, 2020 |
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Sep 4, 2020 01:47
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Chapter 44: 9:09-15:09: The Grand History Of The Fuckatoo ARIST: [Challenging: Success] Still reeling from your latest “success”, you manage to shamble out of the container yard. Mañana sits on the rail beside you, same as ever. You catch his attention in a delirious haze.    CALL ME MAÑANA: “Los Ardies?” He smiles. “They’re an independent militant group. A bit too high-strung, but it comes with the responsibility. They’re sort of like you. Preserve the rule of law and all that. Except it’s Evrart’s law.” He takes a swig from his flask. “But, really, they’re just like you.” AUTHORITY: [Medium: Success] Is he actually comparing you—an officer of the law—to some neighborhood vigilantes?!    ARIST: [Medium: Success] You’re a little more lucid at this point, but you still have no idea what you actually want to do next, so you continue hiding your shame from the world by going to Crime, Romance, and Biographies of Famous People.            ARIST: [Easy: Success] Oh, right, pick up your die from Neha while you’re here.        ARIST: [Godly: Failure] And now you head back to the bookstore to keep browsing for some goddamn reason. What? Some of the vagaries of your decision-making lost on even myself.       Ooh, pale! We’re gonna learn homeopathic medicine and die of pneumonia! Yaaaaaay!  ARIST: [Medium: Success] You head back to the fishing village to talk to the drunks there. You have a *purpose* there, you can feel it.  IDIOT DOOM SPIRAL: “Can’t really remember seeing any women after losing my keys.”  ARIST: No, not asking about Ruby… Talk to the other one. The other *coherent* one, obviously.      ARIST: [Impossible: Failure] The spirits… VOLITION: [Challenging: Success] No! You were getting sober! ARIST: And we still are! Think about it: how better to know you’ve really committed to the path of sobriety than to cart around *this* much alcohol without drinking it! It’ll speed up your recovery by *years!* Probably! And if, by chance, you do give in and drink it, well, this concoction is so potent it’ll probably just loving kill you on the spot. ENDURANCE: [Medium: Success] That’s what we in the business call “incentive.” VOLITION: That’s not how it works! That’s not how any of this works!     VOLITION: [Medium: Success] I loving hate you guys.  We’ve never been over by this area of the boardwalk during the day. When we pass by it this time, we notice a man and his young son.  TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “You, officers! Come to investigate the historic subtext of West Martinaise? I’m Trant Heidelstam,” he turns to the lieutenant. “You must be Kim Kitsuragi, right? I was just telling my son about this building. Not a lot of people realize the historic significance here. Very rich in *hypertext*.”    TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “No, I can’t say that we’ve met before. But I’ve *heard* of Kim, of course. Mikael, say hi to the officers.” He rests his hand on the boy’s shoulder. The child stays hidden behind the hem of his father’s coat, clutching to his würm-themed colouring book. “Mikael’s a little tired today. We spent all night trying to run Orbis on his radiocomputer. Have you heard of it? It’s a programming language used in Graad. Quite tricky, but he wanted to play this Graad-made adventure programme. We’ve been getting *really* into würms lately…” DRAMA: [Easy: Success] The man speaks in the artificial cadence of a professor—or someone who’s been on too many radio shows. TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “But I assume you’re not here for giant würms when there are so many real things to see. Just as I was telling Mikael before—this is where the Coalition landed in ‘08. We could be standing on what is the most interesting landmark in Revachol West.” He points to the building again. ESPRIT DE CORPS: [Medium: Success] This man is your half brother. You feel it. But *why*?  TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “No, I’m afraid I can’t help you with this one, officer. It’s just a regular day off for me and Mikael here.” He pats his son’s head. KIM KITSURAGI: “So you haven’t seen anyone around?” TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “No, I’m sorry. As I said—this is just a day off. We just arrived anyway.” EMPATHY: [Medium: Success] There’s something friendly and familiar in how he says that. A day off.  TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “A-ha, but it’s not just *any* empty old building!” He raises his hand to his eyes, springtime sun warming his handsome face. All four of you turn to admire the mural before you. “What not a lot of people know is—this used to be the R&D department of *Feld Electrical*. And Feld, which now sells ink cartridges, mostly, was once a top dog in the turn-of-the-century cybernetics boom.”   TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “Apologies, it’s an acronym for research and development, they don’t use it anymore.” He smiles brightly, laugh lines around his eyes. “You’re probably more familiar with *RTD*, research and *technological* development.”  TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “That’s not surprising. Only a vestigial ink cartridge and ferrotape manufacturer remains.” He adjusts his suit jacket. “They started out as a midway electronics outfit in Köningstein two centuries ago. After an aggressive move to Revachol, Feld became a global player in the emerging personal electronics market of the pre-Revolutionary era.”   TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “Mhm. An elegant folding mechanism of rollers and ferrotape ribbons, portable enough to be a take-it-home solution, revolutionizing business machine possibly even bringing them to the average consumer. Which is a feat of engineering even today’s giants Ream, ICN, and ZAMM haven’t achieved yet.” He grins, admiring the sentence he just produced.  TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “Indeed, what?”  TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “Unfortunately their moonshot project never made it to market. Feld’s move to Revachol backfired. The Revolutionary government liquefied their assets and expropriated those very advanced prototypes. Possibly from this very building… or one of the adjacent ruins.”  TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “Yes, they even built a pleasure wheel, but that got destroyed in the war.” KIM KITSURAGI: “A pleasure wheel?” The lieutenant looks wistfully at the horizon, as if picturing gondolas rising to the sky. EMPATHY: Perhaps reminded of a childhood memory? It’s clear he would prefer there were a big wheel lighting up the coast.  TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “Oh, I’m afraid it didn’t end well for the boys.” He smiles again, as if he’s somehow personally responsible for this bleak turn of events. “But this story is a bit too *dark* for little Mikael here. Now if you were to ask about *tape computers*…”    TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “What’s the March decree? I mean the radio transmission sent out to news agencies and world governments by the newly-created Commune of Revachol on the 7th of March in the year ‘02.” ENCYCLOPEDIA: [Medium: Success] A short-lived legislative foundation for a short-lived utopia. TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “It’s a beautiful piece of text, actually. A singer-songwriter I know—Charette—called it a love poem to Revachol on her political concept album ‘Bons baisers d’Insulinde’. You should read it. Every local library in Revachol stocks a copy of the decree. I tried to get Mikael to memorize it.” He looks at his son, who starts giggling, his face hidden behind the book. “*Tried to*. Someone was much too interested in würms to be paying any attention.”  TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “Actually, no one knows. No one even knows what a computer made entirely of tape would look like! But word has it they were *very elegant*—exquisite, alien-looking turn of the century hardware…” He raises his finger, remembering something. ENCYCLOPEDIA: [Medium: Success] Buckle up! TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “Ten years ago I did a little… freelancing, I guess you could say. I was a special consultant for an exhibition at the Wompty-Dompty-Dom Centre in Vredefort, Oranje. It raised the same questions, and we had lengthy discussions with Paul Ockermann, who was head curator at the time (this was before the twins Keith and Guy Joost joined the team), trying to…” REACTION SPEED: [Easy: Success] Wait. Did he just say *Wompty-Dompty-Dom Centre*? SUGGESTION: [Easy: Success] He did it! He said *Wompty-Dompty-Dom Centre* like it’s the most natural thing in the world.         TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “I do have some money, yes, but that’s not what’s really important here.” He brushes it off like it’s not a thing at all. AUTHORITY: [Medium: Success] He’s not gonna give you money, what are you doing? Clearly you were just profiling.  TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “Of course, detective, I wouldn’t have assumed anything else. Matter of fact,” he looks up again, a playful hint shining in his eyes… “I don’t know if you’re familiar with this, but the Vespertine Department of Justice has published a rather interesting paper on the criminal profiling in former socialist states. Have you read it? If not, then you definitely should—if not for tips and tricks, then just for theoretical curiosity. Anyway, that’s just a little something that sprang to my mind.” He squeezes his son’s shoulder lightly. “You were saying?”  TRANT HEIDELSTAM: “No, thanks to *you* for having me and little Mikael here to pick your brain… A very interesting conversation indeed.”   Man, what the gently caress am I even looking at here?  ARIST: [Medium: Success] Next stop today is delivering the tape you found in that tree to Egg Head.    EGG HEAD: “Yeagh, re-mix time!” His voice booms through the      ANDRE: “Intriguing. The way I see it… van Eyck based his remix on some famous original piece. Like, a folk song? Something local. Seems you found an initial part with the main melody.” NOID: “I think it’s just happenstance. Chaos in action. Contingencies of our limited existence. That an Egg Head’s fantastic talent.” He nods to his friend behind the turntables. INTERFACING: [Medium: Success] Noid’s right, Egg Head’s technical talent is the key. LOGIC: [Medium: Success] No, this is definitely part of the same song. Something cut from it. It fits too well.   ANDRE: “What about the bass? Do you have any ideas for that?” Andre looks back at you.   ANDRE: “Don’t be too hard on yourself if you don’t figure it out. I think the jam’s already pretty ultra.”  Here’s a fun game, children: try to find all the hidden clues that I accidentally broke the scripting for that scene in a way the developers didn’t intend by not having that conversation after the ravers had moved into the church!   Wow, thanks for the insight there.  Let’s just head inside and give Soona the off-site copy.   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Now I’m going to print it out to see what’s left of it.” She’s already inserted the filament into the radiocomputer’s core, ready to close the door.   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “I have a theory,” she says, as the filament clicks into place, “Lintel was able to divine the anomaly’s location from this broken copy. I want to repeat their calculation, only this time with better equipment. “Watch,” she says and presses PRINT on the machine’s keyboard, “what an intricate display of failure.” The paper starts filling out with ink, soaking it in a gleaming darkness. Not a single line of data stands out.  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: Soona doesn’t reply, her hands running over the printout. She’s looking for something—for her morning star—eyes scouring the millimetres.   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Shh… just give me a second, I’m almost…” She clocks up her typing speed. KIM KITSURAGI: The lieutenant leans closer to whisper: “I’ve never witness a programmer work before…”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “I found the coordinates!” She lets out a celebratory laugh. EMPATHY: [Medium: Success] She’s beaming—you can feel it in your heart.   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “There.” She points at the other end of the church where a group of water bowls forms a ritualistic arch. “In the swallow.”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “I need you to go move those water bowls for me, I need to double-check my calculations.”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Figure it out?” She shakes her head, grinning. “No, I don’t need you to figure anything out, I’ve got a computer for that.” She pats the mainframe. “Just walk over to the circle and follow my instructions: Move the third bowl 2 cm to the left and the fourth bowl 5 cm to the right. This should do the trick.” LOGIC: What? She only wants you to follow instructions, nothing *intellectually stimulating* in this task… A child could do it!  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Eh?” She frowns. “Come on, it’s not about your brain—even I couldn’t figure it out on my own.”   Moving the water bowls, okay.  PERCEPTION (SIGHT) [Easy: Success] Measurements have been marked down around the bowls, each chalk-drawn line representing a centimetre on the floor.  WATER BOWLS: It moves like a ghost without creating a single trace of sound.  WATER BOWLS: Some water spills out of the bowl, wetting the floor.  Done and done.  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Great, everything should be aligned now…” She stops, biting into her chapped lip.  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Yeah,” she snaps out of the lull, “nothing. Now the only thing left to do is unmute the headphones.”   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “I don’t know.” She stares at the heart of her computer. “That’s what I’m scared of: I don’t know. It could be *anything*.” I mean, what sound does the nothing make? How can you even listen to something that doesn’t exist?” She turns to face you, the mainframe throwing shadows on her chin.   SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Maybe.” She rubs her face. “Maybe I’m just tired.”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Because it reminds us of death. And we humans tend to think that death is pretty scary.”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “Yeah…” She breathes in. “You’re right, let’s do it.” She puts on her oversized headphones, ready to press UNMUTE on the keyboard… KIM KITSURAGI: The lieutenant takes a step back… SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: And then nothing. Nothing happens as Soona Luukanen-Kilde presses unmute on her keyboard. Nothing but silence.    SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “No, of course not,” she says, clearly disappointed,” nothing happened, let’s move on.”  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “No.” She rests her face on her hands, massaging her forehead. “No, my hypothesis was wrong. According to this I should have *heard* something if I got the coordinates right. Like I said: silence is only what surrounds it.” But this…”She raises her head, staring at all the machines that litter the church, cables coiling up on the floor like pests. “This is just another failure. Silence sounds like silence. That’s all it is.”  INLAND EMPIRE: Silence is silence? You’re sure there’s more to it…     PERCEPTION (HEARING): It feels like flying on an aerostatic, or when your ears pop, or like a subtle difference in the atmosphere, a weather change happening in the air…  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “A better sound system?” she repeats. “Alright… But where would we get one?” PERCEPTION (HEARING): Suddenly a rhythmic beat permeates the walls, causing a small patch of decorative stucco to crumble onto the wooden floor. KIM KITSURAGI: “They should really allocate some renovation funds to this place…” murmurs the lieutenant, inspecting the damage done to the arabesques.  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “You mean the *speedfreaks*?” She closes her eyes, as more dance music invades the holy silence of the sanctuary.  SOONA, THE PROGRAMMER: “I guess I could live through a week or two of peaceful coexistence.”   ARIST: [Medium: Success] Everybody wins! Go get those speedfreaks, they’ll be so excited!     ANDRE: “That’s fine, we can manage.” He grins, excited.    ARIST: [Easy: Success] The ice somehow feels a little lonelier without the constant thrum of anodic dance music…   ARIST: [Medium: Success] The speedfreaks said it would take a bit for them to move in, so… how about some reading? If I haven’t mentioned it before, reading is the only way to quickly pass time (unless Kim isn’t present, in which case you can use a bench).      FROM A TO ZRIEEK! A GUIDE TO A WELL-BEHAVED COCKATOO: You’re right, cockatoos are magnificent creatures. They love to perform, cuddle, and show off, and will even scream for *fun*—often as loud as up to *135* decibels! PERCEPTION (HEARING): [Medium: Success] Ouch. That must hurt. LOGIC: [Medium: Success] Not great for the neighbors.  FROM A TO ZRIEEK! A GUIDE TO A WELL-BEHAVED COCKATOO: This is a yellow-tailed black cockatoo. Its specific name *Psittacus funereus* relates to its dark and sombre plumage. This bird looks as if it is dressed for a funeral, 24/7. There is something indisputably ominous about it.  FROM A TO ZRIEEK! A GUIDE TO A WELL-BEHAVED COCKATOO: Perhaps the most *impressive* of all the species, the endangered Major Majestic cockatoo is often described as the most flamboyant bird in the jungle, its pink-coloured winds and flowing crest embellishing its proud and *bumptious* nature. In the words of poet-explorer Sir James Fournier: “Few birds more enliven the monotonous hues of the verdant forest than this big, bold and beautiful species.”     How much time did that kill? ...About 45 minutes.  Let’s go for some harder reading then, shall we?     LOGIC: Every last alphanumeric in the files begins with it—and these are *your* case files. It’s safe to case H.D.B. are your initials.   DAMAGED LEDGER: This one is relatively easy to reconstruct. Overnight on 12.02, a graffito—nay, a mural!—appears on an eight story tenement overlooking Central Jamrock. The building is a sparsely inhabited ghost tower, part of a failed real estate development called Grand Couron. RHETORIC: [Medium: Success] (Cause of failure: rent too high.) DAMAGED LEDGER: The mural is enormous. Two silhouettes—a man and a woman—are kissing. The text cut into their forms reads: TRUE LOVE IS POSSIBLE ONLY IN THE NEXT WORLD—FOR NEW PEOPLE IT IS TOO LATE FOR US WREAK HAVOC ON THE MIDDLE CLASS DAMAGED LEDGER: People call it *that thing* and *that loving thing*. It’s visible for miles. In two days the Station’s complaints desk gets clogged with requests to remove *The Bummer*. You and your partner are assigned to the case.   DAMAGED LEDGER: The crew agrees to clean up after themselves. However, your partner JV is against the removal, citing public support for conservation. This leads to a debate in Precinct 41, which then spreads to the streets of Jamrock. Ending in a rare plebiscite—organized by you and the rest of Row III.    DAMAGED LEDGER: A.k.a. LESLIE & BURKE, a.k.a THE PUBLIC INDECENCY DRUNK & THE PROPERTY DAMAGE DRUNK is a *cursed* case. It has been passed from unsuspecting officer to unsuspecting officer for ten years. On January 29 THE UNSOLVABLE CASE made its way to you. Why you accepted it is unclear. Every officer and indeed most civilians in Jamrock know it’s UNSOLVABLE. Leslie will always take his pants off when drunk. Burke will always trash everything. It’s just what they do. It is their nature—you cannot change the nature of a man. And you can’t lock them away, because public indecency and small scale property damage are not punishable by incarceration.  DAMAGED LEDGER: You would think that, but you’re wrong. Where’s the fun in exposing your genitals or breaking stuff in your own home? No, Leslie and Burke are on the corner of Main Street and Perdition, because that’s where the *action* is.  DAMAGED LEDGER: Threatening, fines, dragging them to the station, locking them up in the hell holes they live in, locking them up in the station, hypnotherapy—even trying to get a local gang of *zemlyakis* to take them out (the zemlyakis gave them ethanol so Burke and Leslie would expose and rampage even harder)—you tried it all. And the complaints still wouldn’t stop. As they hadn’t stopped for *ten years*.  DAMAGED LEDGER: Good, you’re learning. If the files are to be trusted—that’s all there is to it. That and Burke breaking things. And the fact that they’re both drunk. But then again, so are you. The case becomes *considerably* less comic one day, when Burke takes a swing at your ledger. He must have it confused with the *property* he likes to damage. But the joke’s on him—the officer is also drunk. Way more drunk than Burke there, and let’s be fair, you also have *party eyes*. You slam the hardened plastic board in his face, then proceed to beat him unconscious with it. Uhhhhhhh DAMAGED LEDGER: In the process the ledger sustains damage. The compartment within—reserved for permeable documents—is jammed shut. You stop your assault on the now-unconscious Burke to open it, but are unable to do so. *The officer began to cry*, reports Leslie, who at this point is tending to Burke. *He came at us*—*And at us*—*I think he was trying to kill Burke-o*. While trying to kill Burke-o, you slowly come around. The permeables’ compartment is open. You’ve smashed it open on poor Burke-o’s kneecaps. The good news is, Burke can’t walk anymore.  DAMAGED LEDGER: Can’t get out of his apartment. An invalid. With Burke to tend to, Leslie cuts back on the indecent exposure. Maybe he flashes his genitals to Burke, who knows, but both drunks are off the street. The complaints stop, the unsolvable case is solved.  ARIST: [Challenging: Success] Holy loving *poo poo*, it’s probably a good thing you aren’t whoever the gently caress that was anymore.   DAMAGED LEDGER: Who knows. Those pages are missing. What next?   DAMAGED LEDGER: Yes. As you’ve said here: insufferable rock and roll assholes. Young people are the worst. So anyway—you got a complaint about the drat sofa. Or couch. Or whatever it was. They were leaving it out in all these *unexpected and whimsical locations* they took it to. Where they also took photos of themsevles—on it. And smoked cigarettes. And drank coffee, because they felt it’s *intellectual*.     DAMAGED LEDGER: Joseph Mills was on this case that he just couldn’t solve. Was doing it solo. Said it was a real nutcracker. A real braintwister. Was on it for, like, a month—the captain got impatient. poo poo or get off the pot, Mills.     SAVOIR FAIRE: [Medium: Success] Man, we gotta talk about what you think is cool these days… DAMAGED LEDGER: Yeah, really lame. So anyway—young man, in his twenties, found with his skull busted open. Right on the floor of the hookah parlour. Only client that day. In perfect health too, some kind of movie producer. No one enters—no one exits. He’s just sucking on his watermelon hookah all morning, all noon, like he usually does (he’s a regular). No calls, nothing. Just sucking on the hookah, until 15.45. Then bam—he’s dead on the floor with his skull busted open, blood everywhere. What happened? How can it be?       We spent an additional 3.5 hours or so reading those case files, so let’s check out the church now that the speedfreaks have moved in. I know I’m typing the word “speedfreaks” a lot, but it’s really fun to say. Speedfreaks.  Man, these idiots rule. Arist fucked around with this message at 12:56 on Sep 10, 2020 |
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Sep 10, 2020 02:39
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Oh neat, there's a lot of little side comments in those case files based on previous events or non-events. Like talking about how Leslie and Burke wouldn't be able to stop drinking any more than you could stop The Expression. I didn't have that, because I immediately criticalled the check as soon as I looked in the mirror. Also, it's interesting that the UI is Feld-branded. "Feld Playback Device", it looks like.  That particular tidbit never went anywhere in my game, it's possible I didn't have the right skill for it. But I was expecting more cool story/gameplay integration like we've been getting.e: And the Wompty-Dompty-Dom Center is the place to be for intelligentsia and poseurs alike. You go there, buy overpriced drinks, and listen to smart people talk. Or you can save your money, stay home, and know this stuff yourself because you're a Smart Cop. Dareon fucked around with this message at 09:30 on Sep 10, 2020 |
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Sep 10, 2020 09:27
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Arist posted:
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Sep 10, 2020 10:38
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Dareon posted:Also, it's interesting that the UI is Feld-branded. "Feld Playback Device", it looks like. It's on film too
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Sep 10, 2020 19:46
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Dareon posted:e: And the Wompty-Dompty-Dom Center is the place to be for intelligentsia and poseurs alike. You go there, buy overpriced drinks, and listen to smart people talk. Or you can save your money, stay home, and know this stuff yourself because you're a Smart Cop. I'm getting a real "either think-tank or CIA" vibe from Wompty dude.
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Sep 10, 2020 22:14
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Notahippie posted:I'm getting a real "either think-tank or CIA" vibe from Wompty dude. That note from Drama about how he speaks is accurate, his voiced lines are all very carefully enunciated, and he places, a, significant, pause, between, every, word. The voice work in this game is great.
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Sep 11, 2020 03:39
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So we were OK cops?
Golden Bee fucked around with this message at 21:36 on Sep 11, 2020 |
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Sep 11, 2020 19:42
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