Part 9: The Decision
The elevator brings you up to a nice room and you learn that the mastermind behind everything is...
Who? The rector of the academy, a random character you only saw for 10 seconds earlier in the game, how stupid. I like to rewrite it in my mind that Adam is really the bad guy, or at least that Adam is a secret pervert or something. He's just too creepy for me to allow him the title of hero.
It's just a small piece of background decor, but guess what we find in Alex's bachelor pad?
A hookah! That's right, this game crams in as many pro-smoking messages as possible. A great game for those trying to fail quitting: the constant references and frustrating crappy puzzles will have you screaming for a smoke before long. But that's OK because cancer is cool.
So now that you know who's responsible, you've got a choice: leave for the surface or go warn everybody. If you leave, the game is over. If you warn everyone, you do more poorly-contrived puzzles.
Let's leave first.
If you choose to leave, Ariane becomes a cold-hearted bitch. She happily narrates to you while innocent creatures are being shot.
Then she says she met her husband on subsequent expeditions, and instantly you see this fellow (who appears to be scratching himself in the screenshot).
Actually, that's not her husband, it's a local. Her next sentence is about how the locals were rude at first, but it came right at the end of her husband sentence. You never see her hubby. He probably doesn't exist.
Check out this picture from the cut-sequence:
Looks like the designers put their picture in the lower right side. If I had worked on this project, I wouldn't have wanted my picture anywhere in the game. I'd die of shame just having my name printed on the credits.
Ariane also recognizes that the bad guy who spread conspiracies has now become filthy rich and owns a television corporation. Great. Just the guy I'd want in charge of delivering news, way to go Ariane. I really don't get that, why didn't she turn him in to the surface police? She had enough evidence. It's because you chose for her to be apathetic, I guess.
Here's the picture they use in the ending credits, a picture of Ariane stupidly gawking and holding a lighter instead of a flashlight... which I guess basically sums up the game for me.
Alright, now let's go back and make the "right" decision.
You go back down and do nothing, but Ariane tells the guard this:
"I found a way out, but I blocked it so no-one can use it now." I guess she's just bluffing, because we really didn't do anything to prevent people from using it.
We go back and find that stalker Adam who gives us more info on how to open the safe: you have to make sure the 3 glass bulbs attached to the safe contain a neutral solution. So pour base into the acid and acid into the base, whoopee. Open it, and look at all these diamonds!
But Ariane is such a prick; she won't take the diamonds. Perhaps she supports cubic zirconium (if she does, props to her). But still, come on take em! It's not as though the good guys need or want diamonds. Once you've saved everybody, diamonds will be useless to the underground people. Although maybe she's right not to take them, they look more like glass knobs than diamonds, maybe they're fake.
You tell the giant about the plot and you are given this very forward invitation.
Whoa, there! Look, Ariane is slightly ashamed, she is bowing her head. (She is also intimidated; he's probably huge.)
Ariane can't leave the mine because the sub commander is being lame again. Go find dynamite in a truck and dynamite attached to the machine to convince him something is up.
When I first did the convince-the-sub-guy-again puzzle, the directions and comments were so vague, I thought you were trying to scare the guy into thinking he was under attack.
After all, Ariane decides to push a cart of dynamite (dynamite being a logical thing to be in a mine, actually) past the mine's harbor and into the ocean.
"This dynamite is attached to the truck. The only alternative is to push the whole thing into the sea." I thought it was to scare the captain, but really it was to dispose of the dynamite safely.
When the dynamite hits the water it explodes with the most awesome explosion I've ever seen in a video game. Here is a capture of the explosion in full swing:
See that mist? That's explosion mist, duh. What I've always wondered is why the dynamite exploded in the water. Wouldn't it just have slowly sunk to the bottom? Was it made of nitroglycerine? Or perhaps pure potassium? The world may never know.
But I guess a mine cart full of explosives wasn't enough to really tear up the place, as there's an extra explosive strapped to the mining machine.
"Seems things are getting complicated..." Yes, because an underground civilization, untold number of new species and huge scandals weren't complex enough. So go grab that as evidence and the sub guy will let you travel. Personally, if I was the sub Captain I would have made Ariane leave the dynamite before embarking, seeing as how an explosion onboard a submarine would be pretty much instant death, but whatever.
Now you're back at the giants. You find this menacing note:
We are up against some serious thugs.