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Messages - heltenjon

#2121
I can see the word BETWEEN in there, diagonally upwards.
EDIT: And ALDRIN to the right upwards.

Between Aldrin and Armstrong?
#2122
Quote from: Laura Hunt on Wed 01/07/2020 09:31:49
Quote from: heltenjon on Wed 01/07/2020 09:26:37
At this point, I'd like to check with Stephen King's secretary if he has any public appearances in this area coming up. It looks like our killer has a King obsession, and while
that may make it unlikely that King is the target (no more books if he kills him), it would be nice to rule out the possibility.

The killer may have chosen this district because of the names of the police officers. While Pangborn stands out as the unusual name, every officer has a name shared by a
Stephen King character. Alan Pangborn is the main character in The Dark Half and Needful Things and a supporting character in many other stories. Carrie White is the main character in Carrie. Cynthia Collins is a character from Under the Dome. Leland Gaunt is the other lead from Needful Things. Stuart Ullman is the General Manager of the Overlook Hotel in The Shining, and the one to give Jack Torrance his caretaker job.

With the Stephen King characters in the hundreds, and most of the names being common names, this may not be so unplausible as it seems. However, I don't think we ought to send out officers to every location that reminds us of Stephen King. Then we will be sure to walk into traps. Let's see what the next lead may be.

Honestly, I think that the Stephen King lead is simply a meta-wink from Jack, not from the killer, i.e., it has no in-game relevance and Jack simply used Stephen King references to populate it. He clearly said that we would need no outside knowledge to find the solutions to the puzzles, and basing a whole case on Stephen King references would definitely go against that, as we shouldn't all be expected to be fans of Mr. King to solve this. I believe that we should focus strictly on the clues we're given.


I agree. We should focus on the clues and send units accordingly. However, I think that KS must mean King Slayer. It fits the clues, if it's about Stephen King or not.
#2123
At this point, I'd like to check with Stephen King's secretary if he has any public appearances in this area coming up. It looks like our killer has a King obsession, and while
that may make it unlikely that King is the target (no more books if he kills him), it would be nice to rule out the possibility.

The killer may have chosen this district because of the names of the police officers. While Pangborn stands out as the unusual name, every officer has a name shared by a
Stephen King character. Alan Pangborn is the main character in The Dark Half and Needful Things and a supporting character in many other stories. Carrie White is the main character in Carrie. Cynthia Collins is a character from Under the Dome. Leland Gaunt is the other lead from Needful Things. Stuart Ullman is the General Manager of the Overlook Hotel in The Shining, and the one to give Jack Torrance his caretaker job.

With the Stephen King characters in the hundreds, and most of the names being common names, this may not be so unplausible as it seems. However, I don't think we ought to send out officers to every location that reminds us of Stephen King. Then we will be sure to walk into traps. Let's see what the next lead may be.
#2124
Aha!
"..." "35 - 11 14 10 18" "1315 - 21 1114 1110 1118" "11131115 - 1211 3114 3110 3118"
35 = one 3 one 5, 11=two 1, 14= one 1 one 4, 10= one 1 one 0, 18= one 1 one 8...and so on.

Going backwards, that's three 5 - one 1 one 4 one 0 one 8.

Potential solution
Let's dial 555-1408!

And room 1408 is a Stephen King story, too. Jack's doing it on purpose!
#2125
Quote from: Laura Hunt on Tue 30/06/2020 20:03:47
Quote from: heltenjon on Tue 30/06/2020 19:53:07
I guess these are coincidences or Easter eggs, as it's not the common knowledge Jack Putter talks about in the rules.

And Shudder Lake looks like a place out of sadtopographies :-D

And Shudder produces Creepshow, which is based on SK's work...

What's the term for an unintentional Easter egg? A Pentecostal egg?  (laugh)
#2126
Ok...bear with me while I not write about the code. This may just be Easter Eggs, because I doubt most people know Stephen King is born in 1947. The killer signs KS - King Stephen? The sargeant of the police force is named Pangborn, just like the police chief in Castle Rock in many stories. Now I don't know if the place names on the map are genuine or made up, but there are plenty of similarities to King's fiction, like Kerry (SK writes about Derry) and tweeners (SK writes about twinners). And Joe's Hill? SK's son is writing under the pen name Joe Hill.

I was going to crack a joke about how sargeant Pangborn had relatives in Castle Rock and would be the man to send to Joe's Hill if we needed to.

I guess these are coincidences or Easter eggs, as it's not the common knowledge Jack Putter talks about in the rules.
#2127
A sad song accompanying an unstoppable train hurling through a bleak winter landscape. What a great and sadly beautiful way to make a contract with the player before the game has even started!  (nod)
#2128
Congratulations on the release in English.

I've played a few of these games in German a long time ago, but can't remember the plotlines. From what I understand, this game is a chapter in a larger story. This makes it a bit difficult regarding motivation, as we're playing a villainous character, but don't know what his goal is. It's not too difficult to find out, but if the game rubs people the wrong way, I think this is one of the main reasons.

IIRC, these games use the same graphics set for the Mansion and the characters, making them look pretty good. Some of the rooms in the Mansion are locked, making way for a smaller game where it's easy for the player to find out what to do.

For the most part the English translation works out. When you try to use the toilet, the character ought to say "I'd prefer to be alone when I do that". There is also a note on the kitchen door that is still in German. No problem for me, but non-German speaking players may wonder if this is some important clue.

The problematic stuff fits best under a spoiler tag:
Spoiler
Because I had no clue what to do, I too thought in the direction of sexual assault. Britney kept kicking me out of her room, and when I tried to talk to her, my character kissed her instead, triggering the transformation. I'm relieved that he "did that on his own". After knocking Britney out, I was wondering what was supposed to happen. When trying to use her bed, the message read "not now" or "not yet" (Don't recall, sorry.). I think this should rather have some sarcastic reply in tone with the others: "I don't want to lie down in that" something. There is no use for the bed later, so the generic response doesn't fit, in addition to giving the wrong impression. It's also true that there are sarcastic remarks about Britney earlier, but there are far more about Bernard, so those really reveal more about the player character. It would be in-character to refuse to use Britney's bed.

I think this game would be more comfortable to play if we know up front what the mission is. Perhaps we would if we had played episode #3? As it is, there are no sexually motivated actions in the game, but I got the impression that they were while playing.
[close]
#2129
Need a title, Vampire Wombat? And you got a playground with a slide, a tube and a swing?

Youtube - the slide into swinging!  (laugh)
#2130
Jack Putter, donuts are on me.
#2131
As the three locations i a row remind me of Orion's belt, I'd like to send squad cars to a couple of sites just to make sure the killer is not drawing Orion on the map. This doesn't quite add up, as there are more stars in Orion than sites. If the chief doesn't think it's too far fetched, may we send squad cars to (potential solution) Long Island City Astoria and to the 9/11 Museum? (Marking Bellatrix and Betelgeuse.)
#2132
The G in the east was Glendale, and A was the original spot (Bushwick). No idea if the ws meant anything, though.

What now then? Does the sites marked make a pattern? A star constallation, perhaps? Or maybe someone can do some more magic connecting of dots?
#2133
Working from the assumption that it was the killer witnesses observed at Bushwick, I suspect he has travelled northeast and/or southwest from there, like the alphabetic directions in the code. I suggest (potential solution) that we search locations in those directions, starting with those close by. If we send squads to Ridgewood and Bedford-Stuyvesant, we may either find the killer or perhaps breadcrumbs showing us that he went that way.
#2134
The updated map didn't give me any new insights, but then I'm more of a Pun Department Detective. I'll request (potential solution) sending squad cars to MUSEUM OF THE MOVING IMAGE (so many memories ?) and ROCKAWAY COMMUNITY PARK to check out detective Ian Aloser's theory.

The fact that we got the map in the first place suggests that this was something we were supposed to do.
#2135
The Rumpus Room / Re: The 4 word story thread
Sun 28/06/2020 02:10:56
My uncle's face is
#2136
RL=real life  ;)
#2137
mkennedy - Using anagram solvers and the likes of it would be cheating, but if someone wants to check for letter replacement codes, like A=B, B=C and so on, I don't
think it could be considered cheating to do so digitally.  The point being that the player would do the thinking and the app only would speed the process up. Like using a tile counter in Scrabble/Wordfeud or a calculator in Yahtzee.

Nice maps, Ian Aloser! I've already sent my two squads this turn, but it looks promising. Have you tried with the normal compass directions? EDIT: Is it me, or would Kings County Hospital Center and Queens Hospital Center be placed exactly on a normal NW-SE-line? Coincidence?

Stupot, good spotting on the road! I've entertained similar thoughts, but only managed to see possibilities on the grid of Manhattan (Alphabet city).
#2138
The last victim was cut in half, and the killer mocked us:
QuoteHello,

Took you a while to find my latest site.

Or, rather, both of them. LOL!
Then, the reaction to your map:
QuoteThe police chief looks at the map Officer Ian Aloser put together on his own and says:

"This looks promising, but the guys down in Logistics could probably do a better job if asked the right way."
I may be reading too much into it, but I think there is a hint there. And the only thing I can think of, is the site where the other half of the last victim's body was found. We cannot easily place it on the map ourselves without a place name, but logically, we (the PD) ought to know it. And maybe we can see another pattern then, with four points.
#2139
I'm sending the guys in Logistics a large amount of their favourite donuts and asking them to make a map of all the relevant sites. Please make sure to include the double site from last time, if that is what we've missed.

I have a feeling that the sites will make some kind of pattern in the end.
#2140
The Rumpus Room / Re: The 4 word story thread
Fri 26/06/2020 17:10:55
you are only as
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