Re-reading my previous posts about this game, it might seem like I loathe it. You could see me bitching about it from the introduction until the end of my second playthrough. But the truth is not so one-sided. I can say that I have actually enjoyed my trip even in spite of the multiple problems this game has. The game possesses some charm, although it kicks in later in the game, with the first two opening acts being too slow in my opinion. Even on my second playthrough I was delighted when discovering new things. Speaking of which, although my first and longer playthrough was on ScummVM, it is only fair to judge the DosBox version. Let’s begin.
Knowing what you are in for, I wouldn’t be so optimistic
If you have kept up to date with this playthrough, I have played The Dagger of Amon Ra to completion but failed miserably to answer the coroner’s questions. As I played the version of the game sold by GoG which uses ScummVM, I thought it a good time to replay the game using DosBox to try and beat the game and see the differences between the two versions. In that regard, there are not that many.
The first and most obvious one is, as Laukku pointed out, that there is no option to have both sound and text during the game. You have to choose one of them. Given that the quality of the recordings is not that great, that is more of a feature than something you can really miss but it is an odd option to leave out of the game. In fact, this time I played with only text to shorten the experience and because I don’t really think you are missing that much without the voices. I didn’t notice any other major differences but for a myriad of bugs, but I am not even sure this affects only the DosBox version. But I will get to them while recounting the game.
My plan for this second playthrough was to try and discover what I had missed by being a bit more thoughtful and persistent and not simply accepting time jumps as they come. Also, I just went ahead and read Illmari’s clues and a walkthrough after considering being “done” with every time slot so I don’t have to replay the whole game if I miss something crucial. Let’s see.
Like I missed commenting on this awesome piece of music
Laura Journal Entry #4 "Ok, ok. I have to get out of this museum. People are dropping like flies. First Dr. Carter, and then everyone else. I am starting to believe I am the murderer as I seem to be the only living soul around here. But I will soldier on and see the end of these murderers or I am not called Laura Bow!”
Who would have thought? It really seems like Yvette cared for Ernie. We start this chapter at her office trying to comfort her. She repeats the bit about Ernie being chased by Icepick, a loan shark, but that’s something we already knew. What surprised me in that conversation is that Laura reprimands Yvette for spending too much time with her Steve. I mean, we have seen her with Ernie, O’Riley, Tut, Najeer… basically the entire male cast but for Steve. I really must have missed something along the way…
And immediately after leaving her to her woes, we find the thought but sensitive stevedore-by-day artist-by-night Steve at The Thinker, talking with Dr. Myklos. He comments that the paintings in the gallery are all fake, but Laura doesn’t want to have any of it and presses on about all the women he has been with tonight. And just when Laura is about to get really mad at him, Yvette comes rushing to cry on his shoulder, taking him inside. That’s a short mourning period. Obviously, I couldn’t let the french blonde to get away with our Steve, so I used the old glass on the door trick™ to listen to them. Well…
Mon dieu! Let’s shout some more easily misinterpreted things so we can provoke a hilarious situation!
Curiously, that IS the same face she used when looking at a dead corpse. Maybe we will find Steve’s soon and we will be pretty sure of who did that
Yes, I will leave you alone so you can keep grasping her neck with your hands. It is not as if there have been several murders this night and Steve hasn’t been seen in a while...
Laura Journal Entry #3" What a day. After just arriving and getting a job I have managed to see the lows and highs of this city in a single day. I have even managed to get into a high class fundraiser party in a fancy museum. Sadly, the party ended when I discovered the corpse of the main guest inside a sarcophagus. Well, sadly and lucky for me, as I have a feeling this story will sell a lot of newspapers and there doesn’t seem to be another reporter here. The only caveat to that plan is that somehow I am now trapped with the other guests in the museum and I think I am starting to smell blood in the air”
I didn’t remember it when changing from chapter 1 to chapter 2, but when starting chapter 3 I got a message telling me “Excellent work. Your father would be proud of you”. That is an encouraging message, as I have previously doubted having gathered all the necessary information. I might not be going that bad (although Ilmari has pointed out some things I missed in chapter I). My only question is if that message is always the same or depends upon a hidden score.
Doing the interrogation with everyone listening surely produces wonderful results
Laura’s Journal Entry #2:"So my boss has asked me to investigate the burglary of the dagger of Amon Ra from the Leyendecker museum by attending to a fundraising party there tonight, masquerading as a social events reporter. To be honest, I think I would have gotten a really good article about the upper class shenanigans with plenty of shady deals, femme fatales, impersonators and more. However, this whole thing about a murder has focused me again in the problem at hand, discovering where is the dagger of Amon Ra.”
Act 2 begins with Laura at night in front of the museum, which is now open and guarded by a German who is one svastika away of ending this walkthrough by means of Godwin’s law. He is apparently the chief of security but right now there is not much that can be extracted from him. We just have to give him our press pass (which he keeps for some strange reason) and he lets us in. This makes a clock appear in the upper left corner of the screen signaling that it is 7PM. Oh my god, I just got shivers from thinking about Colonel’s Bequest. I really hope I won’t miss key information due to simply walking into a room and making the clock advance.
I am going to be very sad if after so many stereotypes there is not a bullfighter somewhere in the game...
The real party starts inside the museum. As we enter we can see a big bust of Rameses II and several tables with refreshments. There is a group of men surrounding a blonde woman which seem interesting. Specially because our friend Ziggy is there. What is a crook doing in an upper class party? And who is all these people? Time to socialize!! The woman introduces herself as Yvette Delacroix.
Laura’s Journal Entry #1:"I just haven’t started off on my right foot in the Big Apple. I have been mugged, robbed and almost killed by a car. But I am not going to let that stop the daughter of John Bow. No, sir. This New Orleans girl is going to crack an important case, the theft of the dagger of Amon Ra from the Leyendecker museum, and impress Mr. Augustini, my new boss at the New York Tribune."
The introduction video shows us a murder taking place in a ship. An unknown man is sleeping in his room when a shadowy figure emerges, strangles him and proceeds to store his corpse in a trunk. Next we are presented with the arrival of a ship, presumably the same, to the docks of New York and see some of the passengers get off the ship.
Sweet dreams, my beautiful prince
First, we attend to a discussion between a fez-wearing Egyptian-looking guy and another fellow. If I had to tell from the voice acting I would say it is a conversation between Apu, the Quickie-Mart owner in The Simpsons and Snooby McSnob, the most pompous Englishman this side of the Atlantic. Really, you should play this game just to hear these two discuss about the dagger of Amon Ra. Because you see, the English prick (honorary title) just came back from discovering the dagger and taking it from its home land to his pocket. That doesn’t suit the Egyptian guy who insists the dagger should be in Egypt. The conversation gets heated to the point where the Englishman threatens the life of the Egyptian so he drops the subject.
Deimar, there is a game that falls right up your alley, they said. And so I have come back to you, ready with my insatiable love for death animations and low budget unipersonal projects. And what is this game that will suit my tastes? A murder mystery that promises to mix the intense thriller ofHugo II: Whodunit with the gruesome deaths of any Elvira game: The Dagger of Amon Ra.
Where Laura needs to investigate her own murder!! Who saw that coming?
