Leather Goddesses of Phobos (Part 1) - Infocom Solution supplied by John R. Barnsley NB This solution was written before the demise of Infocom. Hey! Them fellers at Infocom ain't dummies, ya know. No, siree, Bob! They were right up there at the head of the line when the "smahts" got doled out. (That, I'm told, is how it's properly pronounced in New England where, for totally obscure reasons, Infocom fellers are said to live!) Heck, they know all sorts of important stuff, like, well, girls use the ladies' loo and boys use the gents'. They also know that both boys and girls play their games, and in this one (hereafter to be referred to as LGOP) it's important to get the sexes straightened out right quick. That's because LGOP is a sci-fi sex comedy adventure. This means there's a fair amount of ravishing going on, at least there is if you play it in either the "Lewd" or the "Suggestive" mode. (Not sure about "Tame" mode; never tried it.) Anyway, if you want the full impact as you play, it's important to determine which you are: ravisher or ravishee. ('Course, if you're kinky, you can be both. But you'll have to play the game twice, once as a man, once as a woman, to do that). All of which gets us to the start of the game. You find yourself in Upper Sandusky, Ohio, in Joe's Bar, to be precise. You've quaffed a fair amount of no-name beer (at five cents a glass, who cares about names?), and you feel an urge. You trace the urge to the region of your bladder. You are told that the ladies' facility is northeast and the gents' is northwest. Okay, go in the direction of whichever one you normally use. Yes, I said NORMALLY! Clever, huh? This is how those subtle smahties at Infocom get you to determine what sex you will be in LGOP. In any case, you will find either bathroom to be filthy and fly-specked. Moreover, each contains a stool. Get the stool if you think it will come in handy (and no cracks about which stool, either! It's the three-legged one). Under certain circumstances, the stool may prove useful, but it isn't vital. Also, while you're in there, you might want to follow instructions and use the Scratch 'n' Sniff card which comes with the game. (Honest, the scents on the card really do smell pretty close to what they're supposed to. Well, some of them do, anyway.) On the other hand, if card-sniffing isn't your bag, simply type, "Smell the odor," hit RETURN and each time you'll be told what you're supposed to be smelling. In the case of the bathroom, it's an old pizza slice, dubiously discarded in the corner. Finally, before leaving the bathroom, use it. I mean the bathroom, silly, not the pizza slice! And no prurient entries, please. Just type, "Use the bathroom." After you have done so, exit back into the bar and order a drink. Usually, the bartender will tell you you've had enough. If he does,try ordering again. You won't get another one, of course, but Infocom has to have a little delay in the game before you get zapped by tentacled aliens (?) from your cozy bar into a cell. That's right, a cell. You are suddenly, and with no logic whatsoever, a prisoner of the dreaded LEATHER GODDESSES OF PHOBOS, whose dastardly plan it is to invade and take over Earth for their own sinister purposes. This bodes ill, I fear for God, country, the old ball game, mom's apple pie, and all those other values we hold so dear. Oh, at this point I should interject that you start LGOP in what is called "Suggestive Mode." In movie lingo, this roughly corresponds to "PG." At any point in the game, including the beginning, you can change modes by typing in either "Tame" (ho hum), which gets a "G," or "Lewd," which is "R." This, of course, permits you to play the game all the way through in any of three modes, not to mention as a male and/or a female. If this is confusing, well, don't fret on it. One other thing, you have to be eighteen or over to play in "Lewd" mode. No cheating! (Remember those tentacled aliens?). Okay, you're in your cell and you find some things to take: a flashlight, a painting of a pussy cat and a blanket. Take all. Also, someone thrusts a tray containing a hunk of brown food into your cell. Get the food (it's chocolate candy) but forget the tray. Evidently, one of those aliens was asleep at the tentacle because he/she/it forgot to lock your cell door. Open the door and go south. Across the hallway, you find another cell door. You also see a sign at the head of some stairs which go up and down. The sign says, "Observation Room." Don't go up yet. Instead, open the other cell door. (Some jail!) Inside the other cell you find (a) a man named Trent, if you're playing the game as a male; (b) a girl named Tiffany, if you're playing as a female. Trent or Tiffany will be your faithful, albeit not too bright, companion from now on. On the floor of this cell you spy a crumpled piece of paper. Get it and read it. It turns out there's a seemingly meaningless matrix of letters on the paper. The operative word here, folks, is MATRIX. If you scan the letters very carefully you will make out words, for the matrix is one of those "scramble-grams." Some of the words run backward from left-to-right, others are forward, right-to-left. Some run vertically, others diagonally and several intersect. In any case, encircle the words as you find them. You should wind up with eight circled items: blender, rubber hose, phonebook, angle, cotton balls, photo, mouse and headlight. For the present, you are not told the significance of these objects. Eventually (rather soon, as a matter of fact), you will learn what they're for. However, as with many Infocom puzzles, all is not as obvious as it seems with this matrix. If you are paying very, very close attention, you will discover that its real significance is with the letters you DON'T circle. If you put these together, you will read the phrase, "Hissing frightens flytraps." You are encouraged to stash this information in your memory banks. It comes in handy later on. Okay, leave the cell and go upstairs to the Observatory Room. (Note: there's a basement downstairs, and one flight up from the Observatory is the Roof of the Observatory. The basement isn't important; the roof is.) Once you're upstairs, go north into the tiny closet where it's too dark to see anything. Turn on your flashlight. Now you can see, and you notice a black circle on the floor and a wicker basket up on a shelf; but the basket is too high to reach. Here, you can either drop your stool (if you took it) and stand on it, or you can stand on the shoulders of your newly acquired companion. Either way, take the basket. It's a good idea to put your possessions into the basket, too, since this will permit you to carry more stuff, at least until you find a roomier receptacle. No? You don't want to do that? Well, at least put the blanket in the basket. You'll be sorry if you don't put your other stuff in, too. When you get the dropsies, don't come crawling to me for sympathy. Finally, stand on the circle. Whoosh! You're zapped away to the Jungle. Slithering up to you through the excessive heat and humidity is a gigantic Venus Flytrap. It looks (and is) hungry! I've got some explaining to do so I'll pause here. First, I should tell you that the sequence of events in LGOP does not necessarily have to follow my solution scenario. For instance, if you had gone upstairs one more flight to the Roof of the Observatory, you would have seen another black circle. If you had stood on this one instead of the circle in the closet, you would have been teleported to the Martian Desert instead of the Jungle. The sequence isn't especially important. What matters is that there are black circles (teleporters) located at key locations throughout the game. You should make a note of where each circle is situated and where each one takes you. Otherwise, you will quickly get lost and doubtless die and be forgotten, never to taste mom's apple pie again. One other thing: whenever you stand on a black circle, your faithful companion will emerge right behind you when you reach your destination. Well, most of the time he/she will. Back to the action. There's this flytrap, see? Well, we know what to do, don't we? Hiss at the flytrap. (Oh, and it might be a good idea to turn off your flashlight, too!) Your hissing promptly causes the flytrap to cooperatively expire. (He mistakes the hiss for a spray can of weed killer.) With the flytrap out of the way, you can now proceed west to the Spawning Ground for Venusian slime beasts. Only one spot is free of slime and it contains a black circle. Next to the circle is a jar of ointment. Get the jar, but do not stand on the circle. Examine the jar. It turns out to contain untangling cream, whatever that is. At this point, Trent/Tiffany will toss you a matchbook. You notice it is empty, but there are notations scrawled all over the cover. Your companion tells you this is a list of things he needs to whip up a Super-Duper Anti-LEATHER GODDESSES OF PHOBOS Attack Machine! As it turns out, the list is a duplication of the objects you so laboriously decoded from that meaningless matrix you found back in your cell. Anyway, now you know what you must obtain in order to win the game. You also note that, so far, you're batting zero. On with the quest! Having read the matchbook cover, go east from the Spawning Ground back into the Jungle. Go east again. At this point, a mighty tree rises before you! Suddenly, the tree dies and is consumed by Venusian hypertermites, leaving a gigantic hole in the ground. What to do about the hole? Well, you can go down into it if you wish. But that's pretty boring. Besides, you won't be able to get out again unless you have your stool. (That's really the only use I found for the thing, by the way.) On the other hand, Infocom doesn't just allow things like unexplained tree-dyings to occur, do they? I never tried this, but I gather the purpose of the hole is to permit another solution to the flytrap puzzle. I suspect this is included in case you didn't/couldn't decipher the meaningless matrix of letters. (Those Infocom guys know that not everyone is as smaht as they are!) Anyway, one of the places you will teleport to at some point in the game is Cleveland. There, you will find a trellis and a sack. If you are following a sequence of events which gets you to Cleveland before you get to the Jungle and the Venus Flytrap, here's what you can do. Presumably, you will be astute enough to take the sack and the trellis when you find them. The sack is full of leaves (69,105 to be exact). Now, when you get to the Jungle put the trellis over the hole left by the tree, and dump the leaves on the trellis. The flytrap will sidle up to you across the trellis and fall into the hole. End of problem. Since you have just hissed the flytrap into oblivion, you may completely disregard the foregoing, ignore the hole and proceed east yet again. This takes you to a Clearing. In the Clearing is a can of black stain. Get the can and go northeast. You come to the front door of a plasticoid house. It is closed and locked. What's more, you don't have a key. Go east to the Rocky Clifftop. There isn't much here except, oh, a black circle and a neat view. Off to the northwest you can see a Vizicomm Booth. Go northwest. (The black circle can keep.) Enter the Vizicomm Booth, which is out of order. Turn or pull the coin return knob and you'll hear a clank. Open the return box, and a coin drops to the ground. Get the coin and examine it. The coin reads "Ten Marsmids." Fine. Now go back to the Rocky Clifftop (just type "Exit"). From the clifftop, go north. You find yourself at the back door of the plasticoid house. And you are NOT alone! An extraordinary number of door-to-door salesmen are camped out here. One of them approaches you and offers to barter one of his machines for something of equal value you might be carrying. Offer the flashlight to the salesman. In exchange, you receive what is described as a TEE-Remover Machine. Before the salesman can explain, he turns on your flashlight and a giant Venusian Megamoth swoops down and carries him off. The other salesmen scatter to the four winds. Hm -- a Tee-Remover? Open the machine. Put the jar (of untangling cream) into the machine. Close the door and turn on the machine. The machine whirs and grinds. When it stops, open the door and get the jar. It now contains unAngling cream. (Oh, brother!) Now knock on the back door. You are welcomed by a Mad Scientist (mit a Cherman accent, uff courze). He welcomes you because you look like a grand candidate for his next mad experiment! Go downstairs. Oops! You're in the Mad Scientist's laboratory. It contains a cage. The cage contains two gorillas. The cage also contains a rubber hose. Quick! Throw the candy (the hunk of brown food, remember?) into the cage. Just in time! The mad scientist straps you and Trent/Tiffany down to a couple of slabs. Then he throws an ominous looking switch. Suddenly, you find yourself inside the cage. You also find yourself inside a gorilla skin! Odd, you can also see your own body still strapped to the first slab. Gee! The female/male gorilla in here with you looks better and better all the time. Kiss the gorilla. This seems to satisfy the Mad Scientist that his experiment is working chust fein, zo he bounds up the stairs, leaving you locked in the cage with the gorilla. Your companion, who has been transported to the "body" of a Venus Flytrap, is of no help. He remains strapped to the second slab. Let's see, wasn't there a rubber hose on that list? Yep. Get the hose. Now eat the candy. You feel a sugar rush. (For those of you not quite so smaht as those Infocom fellers, a sugar rush means you feel super strong.) Good. Open the cage. Wow! You really are super strong! You part the bars easily and can exit the cage. Do so. Drop the hose outside the cage. Then, go to the second slab and unstrap Trent/Tiffany (watch out for those "tentacles!"). Next, unstrap your body. While your sugar rush is ebbing, pull the switch. Good! You're back in your own body again. Get off the slab and retrieve the rubber hose and put it in your basket. If you were paying attention when you entered the laboratory (it's always a good idea to read the descriptions, no?), you noticed there was a black circle at the foot of the stairs. This might be a good time to stand on it. Zap! You're back inside the Vizicomm Booth. Exit the booth and you're back on the clifftop. Now you can stand on the black circle you saw the first time you came here. Doing so takes you to the Royal Docks..... @~To be continued in Issue 15.