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Text Adventure Playthrough #9: Slouching Towards Bedlam

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Karlok - 12 April 2021 09:38 AM

Not to me, no. It’s a scary poem. Humanity failed, no second coming of Christ.

I agree. The second coming is of the Beast, not Christ. We’re getting Rosemary’s Baby, imo.

     

The truth can’t hurt you, it’s just like the dark: it scares you witless but in time you see things clear and stark. - Elvis Costello
Maybe this time I can be strong, but since I know who I am, I’m probably wrong. Maybe this time I can go far, but thinking about where I’ve been ain’t helping me start. - Michael Kiwanuka

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Luhr28 - 12 April 2021 09:43 AM
Karlok - 12 April 2021 09:38 AM

Not to me, no. It’s a scary poem. Humanity failed, no second coming of Christ.

“That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle”

If a rocking cradle was a nightmare which produced the First Coming, then the beast Yeats describes could produce the Second. We just never understand it at the time. Maybe that’s what the game is suggesting.

The first coming was twenty centuries ago.

     

See you around, wolf. Nerissa

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Vegetable Party - 12 April 2021 09:28 AM

edit: I’ve been meaning to ask, did you manage to get Ceremony of Innocence working on your win98 computer?

Haven’t tried yet, have to set up the computer first because I hardly use it anymore. I do remember that Ceremony of Innocence gave me some problems and I may have ended up playing it on my even older win95 machine.

     

See you around, wolf. Nerissa

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Still, he says the rocking cradle vexes us to nightmare. What do you make of that?

If a form of madness could unite the world, make it One, then is it something to be feared?

     
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Luhr28 - 12 April 2021 09:59 AM

Still, he says the rocking cradle vexes us to nightmare. What do you make of that?

If a form of madness could unite the world, make it One, then is it something to be feared?

Is this a serious question? We created the Nightmare! I am no poet either but I am one hundred percent certain Yeats didn’t want a rough Beast to take over the world with its blank and pitiless gaze.

     

See you around, wolf. Nerissa

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You’re probably right. It’s not a poem I like very much to be honest, and I suppose I’m trying to change its meaning to like it more, and relate it to the game.

As for the game, I hadn’t like it very much either up until this latest ending.

     
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It was written after WW1. That may have something to do with his pessimism.

I’m not a Christian, but I was born and raised in a Christian family, so I’m familiar with the Biblical prophesy of the Second Coming of Christ. I don’t know if you are. My interpretation of his poem is that mankind had become so evil that the Second Coming was urgently needed, but twenty centuries of war, bloodshed and harming others could only create a Beast.

PS: I don’t know about the meaning of the game endings. That’s for the devs to say. It’s not my type of game.

     

See you around, wolf. Nerissa

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Can we try the killing spree?

> go to Du Monde
> kill girl
> s
> driver, bedlam
> kill driver
> out
> n
> kill james
> n
> jump out window

Or for dramatic effect: kill girl, go to Bedlam, kill James, go to flat, kill driver, go to noose, hang ourself like we deserve as a multi-murderer… Smile

     

The truth can’t hurt you, it’s just like the dark: it scares you witless but in time you see things clear and stark. - Elvis Costello
Maybe this time I can be strong, but since I know who I am, I’m probably wrong. Maybe this time I can go far, but thinking about where I’ve been ain’t helping me start. - Michael Kiwanuka

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Karlok - 12 April 2021 10:33 AM

I’m not a Christian, but I was born and raised in a Christian family, so I’m familiar with the Biblical prophesy of the Second Coming of Christ. I don’t know if you are. My interpretation of his poem is that mankind had become so evil that the Second Coming was urgently needed, but twenty centuries of war, bloodshed and harming others could only create a Beast.

My skeptic mind then wonders: were the twenty centuries before Christ any better?

     

The truth can’t hurt you, it’s just like the dark: it scares you witless but in time you see things clear and stark. - Elvis Costello
Maybe this time I can be strong, but since I know who I am, I’m probably wrong. Maybe this time I can go far, but thinking about where I’ve been ain’t helping me start. - Michael Kiwanuka

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Joined 2013-08-26

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TimovieMan - 12 April 2021 10:35 AM
Karlok - 12 April 2021 10:33 AM

I’m not a Christian, but I was born and raised in a Christian family, so I’m familiar with the Biblical prophesy of the Second Coming of Christ. I don’t know if you are. My interpretation of his poem is that mankind had become so evil that the Second Coming was urgently needed, but twenty centuries of war, bloodshed and harming others could only create a Beast.

My skeptic mind then wonders: were the twenty centuries before Christ any better?

Well, then obviously the First Coming was very much needed.

     

See you around, wolf. Nerissa

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Karlok - 12 April 2021 10:33 AM

It was written after WW1. That may have something to do with his pessimism.

I’m not a Christian, but I was born and raised in a Christian family, so I’m familiar with the Biblical prophesy of the Second Coming of Christ. I don’t know if you are. My interpretation of his poem is that mankind had become so evil that the Second Coming was urgently needed, but twenty centuries of war, bloodshed and harming others could only create a Beast.

I’m too harsh on the poem, and in the context of a first world war, I can see its place and worth.

     
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Onto Timovieman’s killing spree:

(Du Monde’s)
>kill woman
Alexandra leans intently over her device, so focused that she does not feel the hand wind itself into her pony tail until it is almost flat against her head. She looks up and gasps as fingers tangle themselves tightly in her hair.

She tries to simultaneously strike out with her tool and pull herself free, but there is not enough time to do either before her head is slammed into the countertop again and again and again.

She stops struggling, and falls heavily against the countertop when she is released, her head oozing with blood. She spits defiantly, a trail of blood and spittle dripping from her lips.

“Monster,” she accuses with her last, raspy breath. “Monster.”

/(!NO!)\

(Lobby)
>kill james
James collapses to the floor, staring with shock and surprise. But it is when he sees the ivory paper knife lifted from under a stack of papers on his desk that true panic sets in.

He scrambles backwards, desperate to get to his feet. Unable to find purchase on the tile floor, he only manages to flounder about like a drunken crab.  He tries to scream for help but his voice fails him, squeaking out in only a whisper.

Assistance does not come.

He has scrambled himself into a corner. The look of resigned fear in his eyes in terrible. “May God forgive you,” he whispers as he closes them.

Blood, deep and red, bubbles from him and spoils the hygienic floor.

With another death, the cold begins to spread even faster…

/(ceaseexistancenonullgonehowwhy)\

The cold has teeth now. It stretches, unfolding like a flower.

>

(Bedlam)
>kill driver
A false destination. It is as easy as that.

The cab turns down a vacant alley that ends in a wall. It goes fast at first. Reggie yelps in surprise as the gloved fingers close around his throat. He thrashes, but he is old and can not overtake the grip that holds him fast.

The most he manages is to turn around and stare with surprised, horrified eyes, his fingers clutching his throat, desperate to make room for air.

It does not take long for the life to slide from behind his eyes turning them to glass. Even still the fingers keep gripping, one, two minutes more to be sure. When they let go, Reggie’s body slumps and falls to the ground.

There is a sickening thud as bones break on impact and the carriage rolls to a stop…

Alley
A narrow space between walls, barely enough for the cab to navigate.

A hansom cab sits here with a tired old horse hitched to the front.

Reggie’s corpse is here.

Triage rests obediently nearby.

With another death, the cold begins to spread even faster…

/(YESYEShavetakeallnowtakeforceSTOPnowYESYES)\

Cleve’s words somehow echo across the world.

“Too late. Too late.”

If there are words for this…

/(reference|point|metaphor)\

...they have not yet been written.

/(:timeline/date/1919:wbyeates/secondcoming)\

Twenty-four hours later Dr. Thomas Xavier was found in his flat unconscious and bleeding, apparently from self-inflicted wounds.

/(the darkness drops again; but now I know)\

Just as they had on Fleet Street on the evening of March the 3rd, the Bobbies knocked down the apartment’s door after complaints of hideous noises coming from the place.

/(that twenty centuries of stony sleep)\

Several of those involved in the arrest refused to speak of it afterwards. The papers gleaned their horrific descriptions of the state of the flat from eyewitness accounts given during Xavier’s infamous trial.

/(were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,)\

During the trial, Xavier also admitted to the murder of Reginald Maundy, the hansom cab driver who had been assigned to him. Maundy’s death had previously been attributed to a botched robbery.

/(and what rough beast)\

Xavier was also implicated in the death of Alexandra Du Monde - a mechanist viciously murdered in her shop in Smithfield.

/(its hour come round at last)\

Things come full circle: Thomas Xavier is brought home to Bedlam, sentenced to live out the rest of his days interred as a patient.

/(slouches towards)\

In the end, no matter what the public may debate, the reasons

/(bethlehem)\

or his actions

/(?behtlehem?)\


can only

/(BEDLAM)\


ever be known

/(to be born?)\

to him.



  ***/(finishendcompleteconclude|periodmomentpointspacetime))\***


/(reachedfoundendfinishcomplete|possibleprobablyonlyoneinofmany))\

/(nowfurtheryetaheadrelease-APPENDIX-E-availableaccessableopen))\.

/(?? RESTARTperiodfirstrevisit ?? RESTOREbackrecallrelease ?? UNDObackreverseunmake ?? APPENDIXfurtherjumpyet ?? QUITleaveenddone ??))\

     
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> appendix
APPENDIX E
EXCERPTS FROM FILE F6A143: THOMAS XAVIER

Patient Name: Thomas Xavier, Dr.
Age: 37
Physical Description: 6” 14 stone, hazel eyes, brown hair
Distinguishing Marks: badly bruised about face and chest (may indicate struggle?). Tongue missing.
Residence: Old Bailey Area, Newgate
Attending Alienist: Sir John Charles Bucknill

Patient arrested for gruesome murder of Bedlam attendant James Houlihan; possibly responsible for the murder of several others. Patient was found in his flat, bloody and unconscious. His tongue has been removed, although it is unclear whether he has bitten off or cut it out on his own, or if this was done to him. The tongue has not been located. Patient refuses to answer any questions concerning it.

Observations: The patient’s psyche has created a complex inner world, delusions to define his actions as a sacrifice, something noble. These illusions, in part, seem to have grown out of his interactions with Patient #F6A142 (reference patient file), the last that he treated before his evident breakdown.

It is the stuff of penny dreadfuls; a scheming, omnipotent secret society, an unwitting victim, and a paranormal force whose will is stronger than his own (thereby alleviating the patient of any actual responsibility for his despicable actions).

“Do you know where you are?”
[BEDLAM]
“Do you know why?”
[MAKE SAFE]
“Safe from what, Thomas? Why do you feel as though you are in danger?”
[NO. SAFE FROM ME]
(Patient hastily crossed out what he had written, then…)
[NOT ME. NEW ME. WE. IT. STOPPED IT SAVED ALL.]
“What is this ‘it’, Thomas?”
[IN ME. ANGRY. HURTING, TRYING TO REACH. WON’T LET IT. WANTS TO TAKE OVER. I TOOK MY]
(Patient crossed out “my”, more agitated this time.)
[ITS VOICE. WITHOUT WORDS IT CANNOT]
(Patient’s eye grew wide at this point, staring at pen and the hand that held it as though it were an enemy. Then…)
[BURN THESE PAPERS, BURN ALL MY RECORDS. DESTROY TRIAGE. EVERYTHING I TOUCHED, THEY TOUCHED, MUST BE DESTROYED. THE WORDS. WE CAN’T GIVE IT THE WORDS.]

Told patient I didn’t understand why the records should be destroyed. The response was immediate - a low, guttural groan came from his throat, and then he stood up quickly, throwing his chair back. He began tearing the pages in his hand, went after all the pages in the table.

It took two orderlies and a sizeable injection to placate him.

The patient his been restrained since the interview, for his safety and the safety of the staff. Although apparently alert and aware, he refuses to respond (in word or deed) to any inquiry put to him.

He simply watches, silent and frightened.


/(?? RESTARTperiodfirstrevisit ?? RESTOREbackrecallrelease ?? UNDObackreverseunmake ?? APPENDIXfurtherjumpyet ?? QUITleaveenddone ??))\

     
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That’s a valid point, Luhr.

Still, I think all Yeats wanted was an end to the nightmare.

EDIT: You’ve removed your valid point.

     

See you around, wolf. Nerissa

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TimovieMan - 12 April 2021 10:34 AM

Can we try the killing spree?

> go to Du Monde
> kill girl
> s
> driver, bedlam
> kill driver
> out
> n
> kill james
> n
> jump out window

Or for dramatic effect: kill girl, go to Bedlam, kill James, go to flat, kill driver, go to noose, hang ourself like we deserve as a multi-murderer… Smile


I don’t think it’s possible to jump out of the window or hang self after killing everyone. Unless there’s a way to get out of the alley, which I haven’t found.

     

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