In the final terminal of From Now We Go On, S'bhuth's parting words are:
I alter your path -- my old teachers come.
I think you shall meet them after I am gone.
With these words, he sets the stage for a bizarre change in direction that is open to debate. It was a Dark and Stormy Night is a simple interlude level that is designed to set the stage for the following two levels. No longer are we romping around on 16th century earth. We find ourselves in some sort of a USEC base on a planet that most likely is in the Alpha Centauri system. We can see we are on a planet from the view out the window, but we cannot go outside of a very limited area - just enough to get our briefing. The curious thing is the texture sets used - an amalgam of earth and space textures. We will be seeing this again in a couple levels. Why a modern UESC facility would make use of primitive stone architecture is beyond me - but most likely a reflection of the available textures in TI.
In our briefing, we are informed that a Pfhor Dreadnought has entered orbit and that the planet's defenses are minimal. This places the time period definitely after the Pfhor attack on Tau Ceti, but it's not clear that it is after the events of M2/Moo, or how long after. What is particularly intriguing to me is the question of whether S'bhuth has returned us to our own time period and that these events are occurring in sequence after the rest of the TI scenario, or perhaps has done exactly as he suggested - altered our path so that what happens next is independent of the rest of TI. We'll see in the next level that this is probably the case. If he has truly altered our path, it's possible that the events of the rest of TI never even happened in this timeline. Who knows.
Mysteriously, an "S'bhuth entity" contacted the UESC concomitantly with the Pfhor's arrival. He has told us that there is an old manuscript planetside that was brought here by an eccentric religious order. This manuscript contains an encoded virus that may be capable of disabling the Pfhor vessel. This idea seems preposterous, but the UESC has no viable other options and so they are going to send you to retrieve the manuscript. Why a religious order, and why would they keep it in a church? Could this be the manuscript we encountered in Big Man with a Gun? No, we'll learn otherwise later, as will be discussed in (hopefully) tomorrow's post. Unfortunately, the Pfhor will get to the church first and take the manuscript first, but we won't find that out until we battle a slew of their most formidable warriors on Epicus Doomicus Metallicus, which takes place in the church. Incidentally, this and the next level, as well as the end level are the only ones that are not rebellion levels. You can take your ammo with you, and the ammo is to a limited degree regenerating. At the end of the level, S'bhuth introduces himself - that's right - he introduces himself. Why would he do that if he had been communicating with you in the previous level? I think this makes it likely that you are now in a different timeline. However, S'bhuth also refers to Leonardo, but in an analogy. Is this a plot inconsistency, or am I reading too much into this?
The final level of this trio is Lather, Rinse, Repeat. This level was originally intended for the first TI scenario, but replaced with Hang to Dry due to difficulties with the level that made it too difficult to play. Although still a very difficult level, it has been cleaned up for TI2-TLL and is very much a blast to play. It is clear why the Nardo group used the ruse of a religious order bringing the manuscript to Alpha Centauri - they wanted to use the earth texture set and needed a viable reason to use stone building materials on Alpha Centauri. This is a compact level, which is a good thing since the player needs to go back to some areas again and again as they defeat security locks and open new areas, eventually granting access to the "nexus" that the Pfhor have built where they are analyzing the manuscript. Sometimes it can be confusing where the player needs to go next, but there are a limited number of blocked doors and passages so that there is seldom far to go to find out. Lots of enemies teleport into open courtyards in particular, and into some rooms, but there is usually sufficient reward for the player's exploration - the one possible exception being the room with the 3X power-up. As the player reads various terminals, we learn that S'bhuth is with the Pfhor and has infiltrated their network. In effect, he has become an intelligence without a body - an AI in every respect except that his origin is not quite artificial. How he managed to leave his physical form and infiltrate the Pfhor network is a very good question. In any case, the Pfhor are coming closer and closer to S'bhuth, so we need to hurry. More to come tomorrow.
