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	Message: : TOUR OF DUTY : 23 - Ain't Got Time Pfhor This... : Last time on Tour of Duty, we used lots of transporters, killed the : Controller, found a massive hole in the floor, and learned a little bit : about BoBs in stasis. : When this level starts, you'll be in a small alcove with a 2x Shield Charger : (thank god) and several streams of ubiquitous Pfhor slime separating you : from numerous small ledges. Each time you jump across a stream, you'll : take damage (this slime, if you hadn't noticed, will hurt you if you just : pass through the same polygon as it), but the first jump is especially : dangerous, as it will also activate a bunch of Wasps. It's advisable to : jump back to the alcove you started in the moment you hear them squawk and : then shoot them with the Fusion Pistol (or if you're scratch-starting, the : Magnum). On the other hand, you could run across all the streams as fast : as possible to draw them towards the first room, where there are some : Troopers and a bunch of inactive S'pht, along with a Pattern Buffer : (finally). : The S'pht will not activate unless they are shot, so you may want to shoot : the whole lot just once to get them all going. If you kill all the enemies : without the S'pht getting hurt, however, you'll just be left with this: : Not very helpful, are they? So much for a "S'pht Rebellion". : After saving the game, you'll open the door to this room, only to be greeted : by a group of Pfhor Troopers. Yikes! At least if you already activated the : S'pht you should have some left to back you up. Once you've dealt with : these Pfhor, save your game and head back to the charger. Unless of course : you've taken so much damage in the process of fighting the Troopers that : you can't make it across the slime. ;) : Before continuing, let's take a glance at the map: : After passing through the door and the corridor it's attached to, you'll have : to make a bunch more jumps across slime streams. If you fall in, you can : always grenade hop out - in the original, you could use the Flamethrower : to get out without taking too much damage, but in the recent betas, the : Flamethrower doesn't have the force to get you off the ground, and can : only propel you through the air when your feet have already left the : floor: this means that not only do you have to fire a grenade at your feet : to escape the streams if you fall in - you also cannot return to the first : part of the level after making the big drop, preventing you from : recharging. : After the many leaps over slime, you'll pass through a really dark corridor : until you reach this: : There's always the question of how this Assault Rifle got here, but if you're : a casual gamer, you probably won't be thinking about how it got there. : You'll just be praising the Lord ( aka Reginald Dujour) for putting it : there. As for the split in the corridor, always go right. If you don't, : there's potential for getting yourself stuck in a suicide trap later on - : there's two switches here that open doors that will allow you to return to : the main part of the level if you fail to complete your mission. Past : these doors are some Troopers and Wasps, along with... what the heck? : : In addition to the deactivated Hunters (or is it their shells?) and the : column of Pfhor slime, there's eleven eggs on a ledge around this room. : Before we start puzzling over them, it may be worth while to try and hop : your way up to the ledge (which you can do with a Flamethrower by firing : it up, jumping off the raised section of the floor, and turning around so : you're propelled up to the ledge) - there's a huge battle here that you : may want to deal with early so that you're not caught out with minimal : health: a bunch of Troopers engage a group of S'pht Compilers in a large, : windowed room. This is the room you'll have to exit from later, so it's : better to finish the Troopers off early, while you still have some : shields. : Interestingly, sometimes the Compilers will fail to activate (they love doing : that), and just sit in their perches while you kill all the Troopers: : Some rebellion, eh? : By this stage of the level, you may start wondering, "Why am I : here?" It's one of life's great mysteries, isn't it? It's certainly : one of Marathon's great mysteries, at any rate: we killed the Controller, : but Durandal seems to want us to stay here. The S'pht are rebelling : (albeit poorly), yet we are still on the Pfhor ship. Why? What are we : doing here? As the level's title says, "I Ain't Got Time Pfhor : This!" : We'll have to come back to that question in a minute. In the meantime, we'll : head back down the side of the corridor we never explored. After taking : out a group of Wasps lying in wait for us, we find a door. When we open : it, we find we are in a gigantic room. A bunch of Wasps will try to attack : us, but the Fusion Pistol (assuming you have it) can deal with them : easily. Afterwards, you may finally start to realize what you're looking : at: : Another egg? And why does that pillar keep going up and down? And why do I : hear Pfhor chattering constantly-- oh wait, there's a Trooper that : constantly gets stuck in one spot on the other side of the pillar, : chattering continuously and running in place. Let's put him out of his : misery, shall we? : Now let's take a look around. The first thing you may notice is a dozen Wasps : all hovering patiently in one place: : There's also another group of Wasps on the other side of the room, all : colored brown. Interestingly, none of them will attack, though in the : recent betas they will squawk a bunch (this is not canon, however - in the : original, they were completely silent aside from perhaps wings : fluttering). No need to kill them. You'll also find a raised switch in the : wall between the two groups (point A1 on the map above). Shooting it will : cause another switch to appear on the other side of the room (point A2 on : the map above), which will stop the pillar moving and turn out the lights : when shot: : Interestingly, you'll see here that a Compiler decided to start 'talking' to : the egg (in reality he's just stuck on it, but it sure looks like he's : trying to do something with it) - he starts off in front of the first : switch, but I'm not sure what activates him exactly. In any case, he : usually ends up stuck on the egg, as in this screenshot. : On the far side of the room is a transporter, which will take you to the : ledge with the eleven eggs from earlier. If you activated the Compilers : when you were last here, you may see something like this: : Two S'pht seem to be chatting, while another one seems to trying (and perhaps : failing) to communicate with the egg. This, along with not doing anything, : seems to be a favorite pastime for the S'pht on this level. You could : justify this by saying "They've finally gotten their freedom - they : don't know what to do yet," and you might be right. In any case, they : sure aren't the most helpful fellas. : So what about our earlier question: why are we here? It has been theorized : that these eggs all around the level are in fact baby Controllers, and : that the one on the pillar is being incubated, a process we stop by : shooting those switches. However, in 1995, in a usenet post that you can : read here , Jason said the following (underlining added by me): "As : soon as you killed the Pfhor cyborg which was telepathically controlling : the S'pht and deactivated the Pfhor reactor, " : Pfhor reactor? Is that what we were doing here? Shutting off the Pfhor : reactor? That would make sense - after all, Durandal's ultimate goal is to : capture the Pfhor ship, so he wouldn't want it escaping, right? But then : why is there an egg in the reactor? Furthermore, Reg did say that they : were "incubation bubbles", and that we were supposed to be able : to break them. So what are we really doing here - shutting down a reactor, : or killing embryos? I guess we'll have to wait for later levels to provide : us with the Tru 7 h. : Interesting fact about the end: if you die and your corpse lands in the exit : room after you've completed the objective, you'll still teleport onto the : next level, albeit as a puddle rather than a still-living Security : Officer. You can also witness the same kind of thing on the M2 level ' The : Big House ' - if you get killed and wait for the Pfhor to get killed off, : you'll still be teleported onto ' This Side Toward Enemy '. All very : strange. : Provided you're still alive, you can exit this level successfully by standing : in the room with all the windows after completing the objective of : deactivating the pillar. Of course, if you didn't hit any of the switches : on this level and still took the transporter... ;) : Vale, : Perseus
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