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	Message: : TOUR OF DUTY : 05 - Come and Take your Medicine : Last time on Tour of Duty, Martin encountered the Cyborgs, found that pink : BoBs will drop their Magnums on death (a process which I usually speed up : manually), immersed himself in lava just to find a secret room, and : uncovered the tru 7 h about Tycho and Leela. : Having just thrown the Pfhor into a fair bit of chaos, we teleport into a : room with windows looking to an outside area with water, along with a : Terminal and a 1x Shield Charger. Our presence will activate several : Drones who will attack from outside. Nothing too much to worry about, : though, even for the scratch-starter. Shall we read the terminal? Of : course we shall: : : This is a very interesting terminal. First off, it's a strangely... revealing : look at Durandal's attitude towards humans. Second, there's the text : " gjk//H-v58 -w12pcgbk ". Somehow that first part, " gjk : ", looks like Greg John Kirkpatrick's initials. Sure enough, gjk : did make this level, according to the Level Credits section of FAPTA... : Thirdly, Durandal tells us to follow a strict path, even though there's a : massive level to explore beyond just that path: : The path durandal tells us to follow is shown here in a dotted red line (my : apologies for how weird it looks at parts - I made all the annotations in : Keynote, so what can you expect?), and the panels we have to break are : shown with purple circles. We'll start by following the allotted path and : then exploring a little bit. : First, we head down a staircase, and pop out to meet not one, but two new : enemies: the S'pht Compiler, and the Pfhor Trooper. Granted, we've met : them before, but their looks have changed quite a bit by this stage. Now : the Compilers' heads are less pronounced, and the Troopers' weapons are : now hand-held rather than seemingly 'worn' on one arm. In any case, they : are just as dangerous as before. But we have an Assault Rifle, Fusion : Pistol, and two Magnums, right? No? Well then get to punching! In fact, : even if you have those weapons, start punching - that's an order! : In the north-west corner of this room is a set of breakable panels that open : the door to proceed. Continue south, and you'll find a room somewhat : similar to the first one, this time with two breakable panels - these are : the panels we were sent to destroy, and most people probably just return : straight to the beginning after breaking them. However, we're gonna : explore a bit before we leave. If you head north a ways from the main : panels, you'll find a Pattern Buffer at point B. : Scattered around this level are plenty of Drones, Compilers, and Troopers, so : keep alert wherever you go. Eventually you'll probably make your way to : point A on the map, where there is an Alien Weapon just laying in the : corner of the room. This new-found Alien Weapon, sometimes referred to as : the "N-Cannon" outside of the game (don't ask me why), is much : different from the original: rather than firing off a row of little : pellets, it fires big, burning, slow-moving disks that will roast monsters : alive. The secondary trigger fires them diagonally, alternating between : left and right. Personally, I rather dislike the N-Cannon; its only value : is that it becomes more useful with each difficulty level. This is very : different from the old Scatter Rifle, which proved its value when handling : large clusters of aliens. The N-Cannon, however, is more like a : poorly-designed sniper weapon that only becomes at all valuable as you : ramp up the difficulty. : Just past the Alien Weapon are three doors that all activate together. Be : careful with these, as they can crush you to death if you happen to pass : through at the wrong moment. So at this stage there isn't much to find, : except for the " Sixth Panel " and the Aliens-only door. I don't : recall ever finding either, but the Marathon Story Page provides a nice : explanation of how to find the "Sixth Panel" and what it once : did. First and foremost, a map of the level with some special annotations : (provided by the Marathon Story Page, not me): : Point A is the location of the Sixth Panel, located behind a blue part of the : wall. Breaking doesn't do anything, but the Story Page has this to say: : " If you do [break it] what happens? No hoards of aliens come : pouring in, no distant platform sound can be heard, no previously locked : door can now be found open, nothing happens... nadda... zero. But it : wasn't always like that. At one stage The Sixth Panel had a purpose. It : opened three doors (see B, C, and D on above map). In an early version of : this level these doors were locked thus preventing you from accessing : parts of the level. But for some reason or another this was never : implimented in the final release. It does however reveal that "Come : and Take your Medicine" was intended to be explored more fully at one : stage. " : What I'd like to know is how the Story Page got the information in the first : place. Explain yourself, Hamish Sinclair - the People are righteous in : asking for your reasons! ;) : The Story Page also shows a picture of the Aliens-only door, which I think is : found a short ways to the east of the Sixth Panel (at least that's the : only area that looks very similar to the screenshot): : This door can only be opened by Aliens. However, the design of the game means : that any monster can open an Aliens-only door, so had there been a BoB : nearby, he could pass through and we couldn't! Very strange. Now, as I : said, I personally don't remember finding either of these, but I probably : wasn't looking hard enough. : Be careful when swimming on this map: there's no oxygen rechargers, and : you'll need some oxygen left for the next level, which opens with a bit of : swimming. Basically, don't spend too much time in the water or you'll find : yourself incapable of proceeding through the game without repeatedly : suffocating - a suicide trap of the weirdest kind. A bit like not having : enough health to get back to the Shield Charger on Ain't Got Time Pfhor : This and still saving your game. : Somewhere on this level (though I'm afraid I failed to put it on my map : guide) there's another terminal with some Pfhor Troopers nearby. It's : another S'pht terminal: : : If I remember correctly, there's a S'pht Compiler waiting idly in front of : the terminal. Considering that he's probably the one who 'wrote' the : terminal, it would seem he's the only character we truly meet in person in : the entire series, though that's up for debate (see the comments of : Jean-Francois Lemay). : After exploring enough, we'll probably start getting bored, so naturally we : return to the start to finish the level. Once again, the start is the end : (don't even mention " starting back ", Martin-- oh wait): : Once again, " gjk " makes a blatant appearance. Looks like Greg : sure has an ego... : GK RULES! : GK IS THE #1 VID At BUNGIE : JAy rokz greg : Oh well. : Vale, : Perseus
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