Lost in Time - So Long, Astoria

Written by Michael

So far, this game hasn’t reached the level of childish and stupid, like school is.

My apologies for a long absence. Since my last post, I was rather sick for a week, and then had trouble regrouping and building momentum to keep going with this. Add to that the comment on the last post from SpanishCoktelVisionFanClub, “If I (and MorpheusKitami) recall correctly, you're now set for the last puzzle on the house, which is a bit hard, so buckle up! I'm curious about how you will describe the thing.”

Hard isn’t the right word for it, perhaps. At least one of the puzzles is pure moon logic, which makes sense because we gain a crescent-shaped item from it. But we’ll get there eventually.When we last journeyed together, I had just scaled the cliff and made my way back to my inherited manor. First things first -- I dropped some items next to the ocean before my journey, and need to reclaim them.

Some things you can never get back.

It turns out that I only dropped the barrel and the fire extinguisher, and I suspect the real reason for that was just to force puzzles again. After all, if I had the barrel with me, I could have just stood on it to reach the stranded buoy rather than enlist the help of a bird with a finicky palate.

So now that I’m back from my three-hour tour, it’s time to tackle some of the puzzles that eluded me before I left. One of those is the fireplace. See, I set up the rod and inserted a log into the hearth, and I suspect that the fire will have something to do with activating those contacts on either side of the fireplace. But I’m not able to light it, yet.

No hints provided here.

I try the box of matches on it, but no luck. But that makes sense -- you never start a fire by lighting a log, you need some kindling or something. Since I can’t stick my diary there, the only possible thing in my inventory seems to be the handkerchief. Still no luck. Desperation sets in, and I think, maybe she’s dumb enough to use undiluted kerosene as lighter fluid? I add that to the pile, and the game tells me that, “Yes, that could help start it...” so I am hopeful. But again, I strike out. (Actually, that sentence is a hint to the solution, which is something the game never gives you.)

See, what the game never tells you is that the match box is EMPTY. No matches. I restored my game to make sure I didn’t miss anything, but no, you never get a chance to examine the matchbox, so you just have to figure it out for yourself.

I already know what the solution is, I just don’t know how to get to it. The ship-in-a-bottle was built from matchsticks. How do we get them out? None of my inventory items will work in breaking open the bottle, or otherwise opening the cap or something.

I return to each location, room by room, pixel hunting for any items I might have missed. Nothing. There’s almost nothing left for me to interact with, anywhere, and I try using everything on everything. At one point, I make my way back to the well, and notice that the hose is still there, and I can interact with it.

A homemade billy club, just like my gangbanger momma used to make.

Trying all my items on the hose, I’m able to cut it, and supposedly, the repaired section is rock-hard now and makes a superior weapon.

Yes, I’m holding back some choice words. And my reaction to the game at this point.

But I hold a club, which can be used to smash the jar open. Going back to the fireplace, the game makes me go through the motions. I can’t just use the match on the hearth, I have to first use it on the match box, and while I hold the burning match, then apply it to the fire. Burn, baby, burn.

The heat expands the metal rod, causing it to press upon the contacts on either side of the fireplace. “But what do they do?”

Finally, a useful hint.

It revealed a flagstone (a type of paving stone) set in the floor, just in front of the fireplace. Clicking on it hints that weight might trigger it to do something. The heaviest thing I have is probably the barrel. I place that upon the flagstone, but it’s not heavy enough.

I try to add more weight to it, by placing the fire extinguisher on it, and other items. No good. I then remember there's a box full of sand nearby, and although it won’t let me move the box, I’m thinking some sand on the barrel will do the trick. It’s not open, it’s closed up tight. Well, yeah, except for the hole in the side. But that almost never counts.

Would you believe that I can pop the top off of the barrel by using the club again?

Circle in the sand

I can use the wooden shoe to shovel sand from the box to the barrel, but that’s no good, because the barrel, previously described as being closed up tight, isn’t really, because there’s a big ol’ hole in the side from when I milked it for aged rum a couple of gameplay posts ago. And before you ask, no, you cannot clog the drain hole of the barrel with the wooden clog. That would have been a shoo-in for a good wordplay puzzle, but instead, it was given its walking papers. It was given the boot. Because, instead, another solution was shoehorned in.

Again, solved by brute force. Somehow, the appropriate item to plug the hole is the... candle?!?!?

August is already a noteworthy month for moon events, so it might as well be known also for repeated moon logic.

Should I stay, or should I go now?

There’s nothing else for me to do in the manor, so far, and Dora so confidently believes that this portal will lead to the sea, so let’s see what’s to be seen.

“I descended a long and damp tunnel that went under the sea and into the shipwreck.”

It’s like déjà vu all over again.

This looks vaguely familiar, although we haven’t been here yet. The background “music” is the same from our earlier excursion on the high seas.

There’s water leaking in from a hole in the side, but at the same time, Doralice notes, “Funny that the floor is still solid. This ship must be at least 150 years old.”

I’m running out of captions to put on pictures of locked boxes we need to open.

In a complete surprise to absolutely nobody playing along with this game... a locked box we will need to open to continue. This one warns of being filled with lethal gas, and is secured with an exposed electrical wire, like the fences used to contain horses.

Trying to manipulate the wire gets you nowhere, and no inventory items are useful on the lock. So let’s look around the room.

Who ya gonna call?

The doorway to the back is dark, and you can’t grab any of the lanterns in the room, so we can’t go that way without maybe a proton pack.

There’s the leaking water, which can be collected in the pipe again, as we did with the battery acid earlier. It’s salt water, although being told that didn’t give me the hint for its future use that I think the game thought it was. No worries, I got there in the end all the same.

Pixel hunting the back wall shows something labeled (arguably incorrectly) as “the mast” and is a narrow cabinet/cubby with a spring-loaded door. Removing the pair of pliers holding the door open locks us out for good, but gains us a pair of pliers. I’d say that’s a net gain.

Pliers in hand, I’m obviously going to try to manhandle the wire blocking the lock, and I’m electrocuted and sent across the room on my bottom for my trouble. But using the floats on the wire tells me they insulate me from harm, so that will be part of the solution. I try to use the pipe of salt water on the lock, but the tight electric wire is blocking my way.

Using the floats to protect me, I am able to use the strand of wire in my inventory to bypass a section of the electric wire, and then snip it open, exposing the lock to me.

I’m trying to un-fence stolen goods

I use the salt water on the lock, and I get the cryptic (because of poor translation, most likely) message of: “It’s not acid but there is a hint.” I try to click on the lock, maybe I can pull it open, and I’m told that “If I must wait for it to rust, I’ll be here for some time!”

Has anyone ever used the word “Hurrah” in real life, spoken out loud?

The pliers do the job, however, and I’m able to open the box of treasure.

Definitely gotta be cursed.

And when we finally find the treasure, out walks Jarlath! As we get to our fifth gameplay post, we are now in the mortal danger advertised on the game box. Well, maybe.

I won’t post ALL the images for this conversation, as I have in the past, because 99% of them are the same two images repeated back and forth, with the camera zooming in and out on Jarlath making him look crazy, and just the eyes and nose of Doralice showing fear, concern, and maybe even hunger or desire from the same image, who knows.

“It’s our time, our time down here!”

Jarlath isn’t happy to see anyone here, even though we have the papers showing we have inherited the manor. We apparently remind him of someone from the distant past, and apparently our presence here disturbs him and could disrupt his plans.

Wait, so that means no mortal danger?

Um, I thought he plotted to kill me before I was born, but now he’s not going to kill me? Color me confused.

A sane person would have run AWAY from the maniac.

Too bad I somehow lost his notebook between the fisherman’s shanty and here, or else I could be a good samaritan and return it

And now we are back on the ship, apparently fully recovered from our earlier amnesia. A lot more screens of dialogue follow. It seems that it is possible to go back in time, but not forwards. Doralice doesn’t comment on that, which is shocking, because my first thought is, “How the &@#%$ am I going to get back home to 1985... er, I mean 1992?

Talking with Melkior some more, I learn that he joined the Space Time Patrol because of the adventure, and was chasing that fine gentleman I encountered 20,000 leagues underneath my inherited manor, Jarlath. He’s being chased through time because he stole a superconductor from the Defense Department that’s quite valuable and also rather radioactive. Doralice thinks that’s what made the Egyptian treasure all glowy, it must be hidden inside.

Pause for a second: how come there’s no death scene for Doralice, after she’s been exposed to what is almost certainly more radiation than a dental x-ray?

Yeah, I’m getting too lazy to type all this stuff out.

After this, Dora finally starts worrying about her safety. “He said that I looked like someone he knew ‘in the past’.” Is he going to kill her? Kill her relative? Melkior is understandably concerned, but also asks... “And now, what about untying me?”

Much like with Yoruba, Doralice says, “Don’t move! I’ll come back with something I can use to cut you free!”

Melkior, I wouldn’t hold your breath.

A check of my inventory, and sadly, no more shaving razor that I could use to free Melkior. But now I have a towel again, which I suspect would have been nice to visit the beach with, perhaps get a tan. Alas, I need to keep on adventuring.

If only because some dried frog pills would enhance this gaming experience

Looking around, with no purpose, I decide to use the pliers on one of the pins in the wall. I’m now bowled over to find that I have a pin.

I also have a hook, remember? And there’s that chest from earlier, you know, the locked chest? Wait, I suspect that doesn’t narrow it down much in this game. Using the hook on the treasure chest, the one we suspected was holding Yoruba’s treasure he was protecting... was some ladies’ clothing. So I can cosplay as an 1840s maiden. Digging further in the chest, because that’s the modus operandi for this game, is a ribbon. Below that is a spring in the bottom of the chest, but I can’t seem to get anything to interact with it.

Checking around some more, I look at the cannonballs again in the wall, and this time, I find an oar hidden there. I am almost 110% sure I clicked there earlier in the game, with no reward, and if we subtract out the dream sequence to the manor, it was only a few minutes earlier that I checked there. Grrr.

This seems like a good place to pause the game, at the halfway point. Seriously. According to the in-game IndyQuotient™, I am 50% done.

Session Time: 1 hour
Total Time: 3 hours 30 minutes

Inventory: Wet sponge, twisted nail, corkscrew, acid, ribbon, pliers, wooden pin, oar, towel, pipe filled with water
Game Completed: 50%

Note Regarding Spoilers and Companion Assist Points: There’s a set of rules regarding spoilers and companion assist points. Please read it here before making any comments that could be considered a spoiler in any way. The short of it is that no points will be given for hints or spoilers given in advance of me requiring one. Please...try not to spoil any part of the game for me...unless I really obviously need the help...or I specifically request assistance. In this instance, I've not made any requests for assistance. Thanks!