Missed Classic 4: The Scoop - Need More Coffee

Written by Kenny McCormick

Kenny’s filthy notebook (with several html addresses to alt.sex newsgroups) legible page #3: TRAINS! Choo chooooo~~~!!!

Now, to go through what I’ve gathered so far.

Since the dagger has been retrieved and any description of the weapon being “destroyed”, it would seem that the killer is afraid that it would be exposed to the public. If that were true, then my earlier deductions would have its scope drastically reduced.

Meaning that this is not:

1. Opportunistic serial killing – Because serial killers love having a theme. The dagger would have been a great theme. But since its significance has been more or less marred by the killer trying to mask the fact that it was the murder weapon, this is no longer applicable.
2. Warning message – Since the person who should be warned can no longer know who is the person responsible, the message would be lost. The kill that was meant to warn someone will lose its original purpose. Thus, this possibility is also moot.
3. Accidental manslaughter – The first killing of Geraldine Tracey might have been one. But not this one. This is a premeditated silencing attempt.
4. Ritual killing – Because Bloody Johnson there is also stabbed with the same knife, albeit no signs of any esoteric stuff can be found. Ha! In your face for trying to throw me off into the occult line of thought, game!

Thus, we are now left with the possibility that this is an assassination. It must be done by someone close to both Tracey and Johnson because there were no signs of struggle at either location. Strengthening my belief that this is so, is that, unless the killer has 100 points in Pickpocketing, Johnson had willingly handed the dagger to the killer on the pretense that the killer wished to help by “inspecting” the murder weapon when they met “by chance” outside the phone booth.

Looking at the victims, one male and the other a supposedly rather attractive female, it is very possible that we are looking a crime of passion. Someone might have killed both out of jealousy. Or, it is also quite palpable that, since it’s his very close friend who got killed, Johnson’s fervor in finding the killer could have forced his/her hand to silence him before his anger-driven zeal managed to unravel his/her identity.

Okay, now that we know that this is a simple series of assassinations which would have stopped at the first killing had everybody just forgotten about Tracey and got on with their lives, finding the killer would be as simple as knowing more about the death of, and who is, Geraldine Tracey. Frickin’ game just threw me in at the time of the SECOND killing to make my life difficult.

So, I’m in a train station. Why frickin’ not, know what I mean? On top of that, it seems that the trains work 24/7 in London. I wish the ones in my city did that.

Here I am. Thinking… of non-sexual thoughts. Ha ha ha! This is the funniest caption I’ve ever written! ZING!

To the shop on B. Street! What the… it’s 3am already!? It should take less than an hour, lying pre-Internet game!

As an aspiring journalist/amateur detective/novice sleuth/greenhorn vigilante, I took the train to where the shop might be, presumably, in Brighton Street. At this time of the day, I’m sure it’s closed and I can find some way to break into the shop for some evidence gathering and exact some crediting into my crime-fighting funds.

Antique store? Aha! Found it! Fancy that. Selling my shit that I threw out for 50 quid. Who said this game is all up in your face with serious?

And what do we have here? Arnold’s Antiques? The shop on B. Street that sells stuff which might have included an ancient jade dagger named Medusa? Could it be that simple? Let’s open the door and- wait. Where’s the… Where. Is. The. Fricking. Door. There’s a window. Break the window and Climb through it! Argh! No such commands! There isn’t even a Use command! For a thinking man’s game, it sure is brutal. FINE! I’ll just find my clues elsewhere.

So, making my way to the next screen, I found the courthouse in which the inquest will begin in a few hours. Since every shop and building is closed at this unearthly hour, I’ll just wait till it begins.

Mmm… chocolate… Unlike Trickster, who hates cocoa-goodness which means that he’s not human, I love chocolates.

But something inexplicably funny happened that made me restart the game because…

I didn’t know I was a narcoleptic.

I guess I’m not a freaking Night Reporter as I had initially thought I was. I hope readers can feel the teeth-gnashing anger I'd felt when I was still a starry-eyed teen playing his first Detective Adventure game. Why, oh why, didn't the stupid manual or the goddamn boss clue me in about this? Why is the boss even in the office at 11pm, which further misled me into thinking that it’s perfectly normal for us to go all Batman-like in the middle of the night?

Good thing that adventure games are simple enough to get back to where you came from if you know what you’re doing. Unless there’s a stupid maze or revolting mini-games built in to sap your playing time.

My next article will start where I left off after speaking with Smart and going home to sleep instead of falling into a slumber-deprived coma outside like some kinda yuppie/hobo hybrid.