Pepper's Adventures in Time – The Dude Abides In Philly

Welcome back to the first exploration phase of Pepper’s Adventures in Time! A short recap: Our pet was dognapped by the spoiled daughter of an evil British colonist and we are looking for clues on how to infiltrate their mansion and bring Lockjaw back. Also, Pepper is looking for Ben Franklin who has succeeded in turning Philadelphia into a veritable Hippie town. Parts of it, at least. Our objectives for this act are simply to meet the colonists and Ben Franklin. To pass the obligatory test we’ll need to be all ears whenever somebody starts talking about British taxation acts, millinery shops, Ben Franklin’s influence on the colonial post office, the Penn family, and potholes. 

It may just be my pot-luck. 

It’s right on the first screen that we meet some laid-back fella called Marty Hardy tossing a frisbee off the screen, calling me “little dude”, going on about “big bad Ben” and whatnot. He’s not exactly helpful with any of my inquiries; we only learn that the Guvner is big on taxes and curfews. Marty also tells me that the “flying disk” (aka, the frisbee) is Ben Franklin’s greatest invention which would not be too shabby for anybody but people like Ben Franklin, I guess. 

Who will win? Historical inaccuracy or the last-minute addition of self-referentiality?

I leave the screen to the left and arrive at the Governor’s Mansion. Unfortunately, there are several guards blocking my passage, and I am unable to sweet-talk them into letting me pass. Maybe Pepper’s story is just not good enough – she’s claiming to make a delivery of nice, fresh air. Try selling fine leather jackets next time, kid! There is some kite string stuck in a tree but Pepper can’t reach it. The two guards mock me when I try to grab it but they still take it down and give it to me. When I talk to them one of them hints that he may be corruptible if I bring him food. Other than that they are quite rude, insulting me when I try to approach the bridge or even the little river.

It's my lost cousin Throckmorton!

I go back to Marty Hardy and one screen to the right I find his brother Throckmorton Hardy who is catching Marty’s “flying disk” and throwing it back to him. He tells me about Ben Franklin’s “Doctrine of Personal Mellowness”, once again underlining the game’s anti-hippie stance. “Don’t fool about, don’t slack off, don’t be on the gad, little ones”, Sierra responsibly teaches us which is kind of ironic regarding the company’s early history of weed’n’whirlpools but maybe that's all part of the self-irony. Throckmorton at least agrees with us that the Pughs have some seriously muddy karma but people being all brothers and sisters and stuff he doesn’t plan on doing anything about it. Like Marty, Throckmorton tells me that he once wanted to do something worthwhile with his life but eh, not anymore.

And it went wherever I did go!

Using my “truth” button I can click on one of the potholes and learn some potentially vital information for the next quiz. I’ll spare you the details but the gist is that Ben Franklin once wrote some funny letter in which he ironically praised the potholes for being lovely wallowing pools for certain animals, shaming the city council into fixing them. I leave Throckmorton alone and check out the surroundings. There is a tax notice nailed to a tree informing the citizens of Philadelphia that the British Crown has passed the Stamp Act which includes a twenty percent toll on salt, sugar, molasses, rutabagas, chocolate, toys, clothing, and more. Nothing to do with stamps, then, unlike the real Stamp Act that forced the colonists to buy stamps if they wanted to purchase any kind of paper goods. This will probably come up in the quiz later. 

I try to talk to the bickering couple sitting next to the tree. They continue their constant quarreling for much of our conversation and I don’t learn anything new from them. At least they confirm the others’ opinions of both Benjamin Franklin and the Pughs. Also, their dialogue is quite entertaining which is probably their main purpose in the game.

901 Market Street but in the 1770's

Moving on, I enter the centre of town boasting shops like “Ye Olde Sewn Sew”, “The Millinery Shop”, and “Ye Olde Sprouts & Rice”. Let’s start from the beginning: the proprietor of “Ye Olde Sewn Sew” calls me an urchin and only talks to me from her 1st floor window (not unlike the French baker in Zak McKracken). Well, talks at me would be more appropriate since she only tells me to get off the street and stop pestering her. Maybe later. The “Millinery Shop” is potentially important for the next quiz and when I use my “truth” button on it I get some information, e.g. that the colonists liked to imitate the fashions of France by wearing wigs. The Millinery Shop is owned by a gossip aptly named Tattle Taleteller who “know(s) everything about everyone”. She, too, tells me that Ben Franklin is just fine but alleges that his marriage is not all that it should be because his wife Deborah is “always leaving the house to go somewhere”. Spoken like a true gossip. When I ask her about Lockjaw she tells me that dogs who go into Penn Mansion never come out the same way. The funniest part of the dialogue is when Pepper asks Tattle about herself and almost right away she tells us that some people misguidedly take her for a gossip but that, of course, would be completely untrue. She then goes on to tell us who’s calling her a gossip and why their opinions don’t matter, spreading a lot of actual gossip about them in the process. It’s quite the performance. 

Don't you just love 1990's pixel art done right?

I can actually enter the third shop, and Goody Gumdrops, the owner, is by far the sanest person I’ve met so far. She also has a fetch quest for me: if I bring her a recipe for chocolate bonbons she will give me a jar. Goody’s bakery is catering to vegetarians if not vegans. She has soy flour, tofu, and cabbage cookies on offer, causing Pepper to lose her good manners and reply with a hearty “BLEH!” Goody goes on to reveal that she cannot stand her own products but due to the mass lunacy of her colony she needs to remain competitive. She even renamed her store to fit in, going from “Goody’s Delectable Delights” to “Ye Olde Sprouts & Rice”. This is another jab at non-conservative tastes: hippie ideology is bad for you, the game tells us, and so is the attempt to eat healthy and plant-based food. Were those low-hanging fruit in 1993? Was there an actual urge to protect the kids from this kind of thinking? I’m probably overthinking it and they just wanted to be cool for the kids, and everybody knows that kids love candy. Be that as it may, Goody is quite the opposite of her peers, condemning their embracing the “Doctrine of Personal Mellowness” and especially taking offence at their sudden lack of industriosity. Goody agrees with the other inhabitants of Philadelphia when it comes to the Pughs and Lockjaw’s probable fate, though, and apart from the fetch quest I don’t really learn anything new here, either. The game apparently relies on driving home its points by letting several characters repeat them which may be par for the course in a game directed at children. For this adult it’s starting to become a bit tedious albeit for the first time because it’s still mostly a delight to play this game. 

There’s one final detail I really enjoyed in Goody’s store: when you click on the rocking chair with the “truth” button the game informs you that Benjamin Franklin actually invented the rocking chair and draws a (possible) connection between his current transformed doctrine of mellowness and his original feats as an inventor which is kind of clever, I think. (Although a little research reveals that rocking chairs actually existed in North America when Ben Franklin was still a child.) 

Gatekeeping 101

The next location is over the hills to the far north where a cutscene shows us how the Pughs attempt to explain to some guards how road tolls work. They actually put up a stile right in front of Benjamin Franklin’s home to exemplify that he doesn’t oppose the stamp tax because he won’t lift a finger to get rid of it. Because the people are still infatuated with their erstwhile innovator and current, er.., softener, they will still look to him for guidance as is their custom. Pepper arrives after the Pughs have left, immediately questioning the tax and challenging the guards to deliver a good explanation. They don’t feel the need (or have the brains) to even try. The dimmer one even goes so far as to blankly state that the money will most probably go to the General’s wig collection. When his (slightly) smarter colleague questions Pepper’s right to be so nosy she replies: “I am what I am, dude, which is more than you can say.” Pepper goes on to insult the guard but he stays on guard (sorry) and asks for a shilling if Pepper wants to pass. I don’t have a shilling. I really don’t have much of anything in my inventory. Time to explore some more, I guess. 

Nothing but the world’s smallest ball of twine.

When I backtrack to the screen with Throckmorton and the quarreling couple suddenly there’s a bag  full of marbles lying underneath the tree. This is kind of apt considering almost everybody appears to have lost theirs but still I don’t know what to do with them. But when I mean to backtrack to the Penn Mansion to see if something else has changed I accidentally find that I’ve missed an exit previously. The new screen contains a whole other part of town with lots of places to explore. Guess I went to Ben’s too early.

Sitting on a fence is a man who sees no sense at all

The first location is “Ye Olde Pub & Eats”. When I try to enter, the owner comes to the door, chewing, belching, inviting me to “groove on a nice leg of lamb”. He’s clearly obsessed with food in a way only Governor Phatt would understand, scolding Pepper for not currently being hungry. His name is General Lee Stuffed and he calls himself a friend of Ben’s although they’ve been out of touch lately because Ben never gets out of his hot tub anymore. That could be another jab at Ken Williams and the common practice during Sierra’s early years to conduct their business from a hot tub. Once again, though, General Lee is not terribly helpful, answering more or less the same things as anybody else. 

Talk about anticipating bad wordplay.

I say goodbye to “the Colonist that ate New York” (in Pepper’s words) and talk to a beatnik gamer who is sitting on a bench in front of the pub. He tells me that games are his life but the Pughs took all of his cards, darts, and everything else, so maybe he’ll be interested in some nice, round marbles? Yeah, he lost those, too. The funniest things about this bit of wordplay is Pepper’s wry retort: “You can say THAT again.” Pepper offers to sell her newly found marbles to the gamer and he offers to teach her “to gamble with the best of them” instead. She insists, though, and after another humourous bit of dialogue he gives her a shilling, telling her to “go fly a kite.” If I try to talk to him again he tells me he doesn’t want to get involved where the Pughs are.

By the way, did you know Scrooge McDuck was actually from Glasgow?

The next shop is owned by one Penny Pyncher who, accordingly, is very much in love with her beautiful coins and doesn’t really have time for “a short person”. When I tell her that my dog was stolen she reveals that she is pro-guns and that everybody should protect their property. Also, like many people before her, she tells me that the Pughs have bad karma. The word “karma”, like the word “tofu” when I talked to Goody Gumdrops, is set in red. Does that mean anything? Are those anachronisms caused by Uncle Fred’s interference? Or am I losing my marbles, too?

That’s why they call it “snail mail”.

My next stop is the post office. Two bored office clerks are slacking off here without the slightest inclination to actually deliver the mail. Naturally, the clerks have funny names, too. Ladies and gentlemen, let me present to you Billy and Hidel Idle. I find out that Ben Franklin was the first postmaster of Philadelphia which will probably be useful in the next quiz. Also, I manage to talk the clerks into letting me deliver a package to Ben. They make me answer some questions about Ben Franklin first to make me prove that I’m an actual friend of his. It’s a bit cumbersome to research them from the manual (as you should) so I channel the spirit of Billy and Hidel and just google the answers. I did read the manual at one point but to be honest it’s been a while and don’t remember details about at what age Benjamin Franklin ran away to Philadelphia (nor do I intend to). 

Tell him to go fly a kite!

When I return to the two redcoats guarding Benjamin Franklin’s house (well, waiting for people they can tax, rather) they have amassed quite the pile of valuable stuff. Pepper won’t touch any of it but she can now pay the guards and proceed to the front of the house. A short cutscene shows me her thoughts and that she’s really in awe because she’s standing in front of Benjamin Franklin’s actual home. As she wonders how Lockjaw is doing the scene cuts to Penn Mansion. But that’s a story for another post...

When the dog bites / When the bee stings / When I'm feeling sad /

I simply remember my favorite things

Session time: 1 hour
Total time: 1 hour 50 minutes