Game 32: Neuromancer - Ocean's One

Tricky Journal Entry 17: "I'm rich!!!! For weeks I've been trying to get my hands on a large sum of cash from one of these vulnerable bank bases, and today I hit the jackpot...twice! I hadn't even really considered the Bank of Berne to be a target, but came away with 500000 credits for my efforts. I spent a large portion of my afternoon shopping of course, getting the Cyberspace VII I've always wanted along with a stack of warez and skills. Surely I'm unstoppable now, especially now that I have my first ever ROM Construct installed too!"

Even at this stage of the game, my constitution was copping a beating while trying to break through ICE.

I can't believe this game has already required 17 gameplay posts!!! Its been a huge undertaking, and I hope we don't face another game like it any time soon, regardless of how I feel about the actual game. With that in mind, I'll get on with it! There were three sections on the Turing base, being 1. AI Registry, 2. AI Reports and 3. Skill Upgrade! As usual, I took them in order. The AI Registry was a list of all AIs, along with their Registration IDs and Citizenship! It included the likes of Sapphire, Hal, Xaviera and Chrome (who I’ve defeated) and also Neuromancer and Greystoke (who I keep reading about). I couldn’t think of a way to use the registration IDs or Citizenship to my advantage, but perhaps it would come up later. The AI Reports section was actually broken into three sub-sections, being 1. Monthly AI Report, 2. General Alert and 3. Primary Alert. The Monthly AI Report included an article by Michele M., talking about the AI named Chrome that “is presently operating an on-line psychology service”. The report suggested that Chrome was merely “gathering data on human neuroses as well as encouraging some of the cowboys to cease their illegal activities”. The General Alert section reported that “two of our specialized AI destruct programs are missing from our vault! Junior Turing operatives should be informed that these warez are to be considered extremely dangerous! Both are part of our battle library to ensure that mainframe AI’s belonging to Allard Technologies and Musabori Industries do not get out of hand!”

This list at least helps me figure out which AIs I've defeated and which are still out there waiting for me

This alert was both good and bad for me. It was good because it confirmed my belief that there were particular pieces of software out there that were needed to defeat certain AIs (such as the Musabori AI that I could find no weakness for), but it was bad because I’d hoped to find them somewhere in the Turing base. If they weren’t here, where was I going to get them from? I moved onto the Primary Alert section, where I found a message concerning a Turing operative that had died while investigating AIs owned by Tessier-Ashpool. Before her death, she had discovered that the AIs seem to “have a certain ability to alter reality”, which was a scary thought. Finally I checked out the Skill Upgrade section, which contained upgrades to the Phemonenology, Philosophy, Sophistry and Logic skills. While this sounds like an awesome find, I was very disappointed to find that the upgrade would only take the skills to level 5, which I’d already surpassed (mine were at level 6). There was also an upgrade to Psychoanalysis level 4, but I hadn’t even purchased that skill chip during this game as it wasn’t all that useful. Regardless, with Turing all done, it was time to go back to the Bank of Berne and see if I could now defeat the AI there.

I don't see how anyone could get to this base without already having level 5 skills!

To my delight, I defeated it pretty easily this time, since I’d increased my skill levels since my first attempt. “How can you have done this, you bug? How is it that I die at your hands?” I’d not been to the Bank of Berne base at all in the game so far, so all six menu options were of interest to me. They were 1. Current Rates, 2. In the Know, 3. Message Base, 4. Funds Transfer, 5. Software Library and 6. AI Message Buffer. The Current Rates section was no different to any of the other bank rates pages, merely displaying the bank’s various interest rates. The In the Know section was an information service for the bank, and reported that their security chief, Roger Stefano, had “died in a terrorist strike against one of our bank branches”. It went on to claim that customers should expect the sort of dedication Roger had shown, and suggested cowboys were syphoning money from all the other banks apart from Berne. I hoped to test that theory soon, but first I entered the Message Base to check out the four messages contained there. The first message was from Anson Auric to Tozoku Imports, inquiring about the ETA of a shipment for Mr. Stefan Rogers, which they were concerned might have disappeared. Tozoku’s response was that the shipment was “not lost, merely hiding”, and that they will notify Anson when “things are under control”. This is another conversation which I simply can’t figure out the relevance of!

It sucks realising you're inferior doesn't it!

The third message was from Thomas Cole to Anson Aurix, telling him that he knew an excellent security man named Roger Kaliban. I’d seen Roger’s name mentioned on several message boards now, but still have no idea who he is or what I’m supposed to take from it all. While the first three messages seemed pointless, the fourth and final one certainly wasn’t! It was from Administration to Anson Auric: “Due to the security problems we’ve been having, we’ve changed the master authorization code for the Funds Transfer system to LYMA1211MARZ. The Funds Reserve Account number is still 121519831200. Thank you for your cooperation in this matter.” I’d always expected to syphon money out of Bank Gemeinschaft, but perhaps the Bank of Berne was the real target all along! I entered the Funds Transfer section and was asked to “Enter source account number:”.  I entered the Funds Reserve Account I’d just discovered, and then entered the source authorization code from the same message. The account held no less than $500000, and I was asked how much I wanted to transfer!!! I did what anyone would do, and tried to transfer the whole lot! I was then asked to enter the destination bank link code , so I entered BOZOBANK (I’d previously opened a bank account with the Bank of Zurich), and entered my account number. “Transfer Complete”!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I hoped for some money, but $500000!!!!!!!!!

That’s right! After struggling with funds the entire game, I now had more money than I could possibly need! It wasn’t showing in my interface though, and I quickly realised I needed to go into the Bank of Zurich base to download the credits. I still had a couple of sections to check out on the Bank of Berne base though, with the first being the software library. It contained ArmorAll 1.0, Slow 3.0 and Probe 10.0. I'd already downloaded the first two from the Screaming Fist base, but Probe 10.0 was a fair upgrade to my version 4.0! I snapped it up, then moved onto the AI Message Buffer section. There I found two messages to the AI I'd just defeated (named Gold). The first one was from Greystoke (the AI guarding Musabori), saying "Yes, yes, the cyberscum must be stopped from raping the banks. You are right to bring this to our attention. Do what you must to stop them." The second one was from Neuromancer: "Gold, I believe you should not take offense at the pilfering of rounding errors. We all know you keep track of them down to the hundredth digit. That these cowboys place a value on that sort of thing does not make you any less powerful. If they attack you, by all means, defend yourself, but we should not take the offensive, no matter what Greystoke predicts." I was starting to see that the two AIs fighting for cyberspace dominance had very different "personalities". Greystoke was aggressive and unrepentant, whereas Neuromancer seemed more thoughtful and patient.

Neuromancer...just a nice guy really.

Whether or not this meant anything was yet to be seen, but I was too excited to think on it any further. I jumped into the Bank of Zurich base and downloaded my newly acquired fortune, stopping to admire my new cash total of $502024! I then made my way back to Chiba City and went on a massive spending spree. I replaced my deck with a top of the line Cyberspace VII (which would allow me to have 25 warez simultaneously), then bought all the skill chips that I’d ignored due to lack of funds (Cryptology, Bargaining, Warez Analysis, Hardware Repair, Psychoanalysis), then upgraded all the ones I could at the Matrix Restaurant. Finally, I bought the Sense/Net security pass from Lupus, which I assumed I would need at some point. After all this spending, I still had over $430K! I took all this new stuff and prepared to move onto cyberspace zone 4, 5 and beyond. Now that I had Easy Rider, it didn’t matter where I jacked in, so I just did it from the Cheap Hotel. It also meant that my systematic approach that I’d used to this point went out the window a little bit, as I tried to hack into new bases from zones 4, 5, 6 and 7 in whatever order I discovered them. This resulted in me getting crushed a few times, but I see no point in me describing those occurrences and concentrate on the successes in the order they occurred.

Look at that balance. Just look at it!

The first base I cracked was Bell Europa, which contained a Software Library and a Message Base. The software library had ThunderHead 4.0, Acid 5.0 and Cyberspace 1.0, and since I could now hold heaps more software, I downloaded them all. I’d not previously figured out what Cyberspace 1.0 actually did, so had another shot now that I could hold onto it with no deck space consequences. I immediately realised that accessing cyberspace using this piece of software, rather than Comlink 6.0, means I access it for free! This was quite ironic really! I’d finally got to a point where money was of little concern to me, and now I found a way to save heaps of it!!! The Bell Europa message base only had one message, which was from Leo Kestrel to Service Rep. This message seemed to be another attempt at humour, with the service rep claiming that Leo was still required to pay his phone bill, despite the fact their phone’s failure caused the fire that burnt down his home. The service rep then claimed that Leo’s comment that the phone failed to work when he tried to call in the fire was “a very cheap shot. Just because our equipment shorted out, causing the fire, is no reason for you to ridicule all we do here at Bell Europa to serve our customers.”

Telecommunication companies don't change at all in the next 45 years

The next base I hacked into turned out to be Sense/Net, and inside I was shown the ROM Construct Catalog. As I’d expected all along, the first name on the list was Dixie Flatline, and this was also the only construct on the list to have a ROM Construct number next to it (#0467839). I took a break from cyberspace and made my way to the Sense/Net building in the real world. I showed my security pass when requested, then entered Dixie Flatline’s ROM Construct number. “Availability verified. Checkout is approved.” Awesome! After weeks of play, I could now finally use the ROM Construct icon in the interface. When I did, a message popped up saying “Hey, bro! I’m the Dixie Flatline, best cowboy that ever punched deck.” I was then given a menu with three options in it, being 1. Software Debug, 2. Software Analysis and 3. Monitor Mode. Software Debug and Software Analysis did exactly what the Debug and Warez Analysis skills did that I already had, yet surprisingly not as effectively. When I tried to use the Monitor Mode option I was told it was for cyberspace only, so I went back to the Cheap Hotel to try it out. I’ll jump ahead briefly and say that having Monitor Mode switched on causes Dixie to warn me when an AI is present on a base, and he also tells me when I’m close to having my brain fried. Most importantly though, it makes my Zen skill work better, allowing me to survive longer when my constitution is plummeting.

You punch decks?

The next base I visited was one I’ve been hunting down since the start of the game...Gridpoint! This is where Matt Shaw has been telling me to meet him and my other apparent friends since my first session. There was no AI, so I was able to hack in pretty easily. “Okay, so you made it to The Gridpoint. Whatdaya want, a medal?” A medal would be nice to be honest, but I had to make do with three menu options: 1. Message Base, 2. Look Out and 3. Software Library. The first message was from Deathangel’s Shadow to Anonymous Bosch. He’d shown up at the “rendezvous point” to trade Python 6.0, but Bosch hadn’t left a copy of Slow 3.0 as promised. The status of Bosch was again under question in the second message, where Matt Shaw asked Deathangel’s Shadow if he knew of his whereabouts. He seemed genuinely concerned for his well-being, and wondered whether he’d been napped by the Federales. In answer to this, El Aquila wrote to Matt Shaw, telling him that the rumor was that Bosch had been flatlined. It was either that or he’d simply stopped entering cyberspace, which seemed to concern El Aquila more than his possible death for some reason! The fourth message was from Matt Shaw to All, requesting anyone that was still around at Gridpoint to make themselves known. Clearly no-one did, as the fifth and final message on the Gridpoint base was from Matt Shaw again, announcing how scared he was that no-one had answered his call in 24 hours.

The Gridpoint practical joke was going splendidly!

I’d had hopes that I would find out some really important information on the Gridpoint message base, so was pretty disappointed that all I’d got was the standard “there’s something weird going on in cyberspace” comments. I moved onto the Look Out section, where I found warnings about three bases. It warned that the Psycho base was used by enforcement agencies to get at cowboys, that Free Sex Union was anything but free, and that everyone should be careful near Musabori as that was the last place Anonymous Bosch was seen. That left only the software library, which contained Jammies 3.0, ThunderHead 3.0, Hammer 5.0, Injector 3.0 and ArmorAll 2.0. I already had Injector 3.0 and ThunderHead 3.0, but the rest were new and cool. Jammies 3.0 finally made Jammies a really useful piece of software as, if timed correctly, I could stop ICE from launching warez of their own for quite an extended period of time. ArmorAll 2.0 didn’t replenish any more of my “health” than version 1.0, but it did it a lot quicker, making it really valuable also. Now that my deck could hold 25 pieces of software, I started hording one shot viruses too, so downloaded quite a few Injectors and ThunderHeads. I was feeling good about my situation, having pretty much unlimited funds, making consistent progress through the bases, and finding cracking ICE easier and easier as my collection of powerful ICE breakers and viruses increased in power.

It's nice to not have to clear out software every time I find something to download

I’ll cover one more base in this post, which is the one I’d always thought would result in a flood of cash coming my way...Bank Gemeinschaft! I’d only had first level access when I first entered the base, and having full access gave me three new menu options: 4. Message Base, 5. Software Library and 6. Funds Transfer. There were five messages on the Message Base, with the first one being from M. Godot to Herr Geistjager, thanking him for “the tip about Fuji Electric.” I wasn't told what the tip was, but Mr. Godot transferred $30000 to Herr’s account to say thanks. The second message was also to Herr, with this one being sent by the security officer I’d heard of so many times, Roger Kaliban. Roger wrote to tell Herr that he was not in any way involved with the banking irregularities that Herr had brought to his attention, yet paid him a “token of appreciation” into his account regardless. The guy is clearly dodgy, but I still have no idea whether he plays any real role in the game! The third message was from Roger again, this time to Epkot Foundation, informing them that he’d apologised to Kryo-sleep Corp for certain cash transfers being delayed. Fortunately, Kryo-sleep had told Roger that “Walt had not begun to thaw anyway, so no harm was done”. Funny, but useless to me!

Who the hell is this Roger Kaliban and what relevance does he have?

The fourth and fifth messages were between Thomas Cole and Adrian Finch, with Thomas telling Adrian how uneasy he was about moves Musabori were making. “Phillip over at Bank of Zurich is uncovering all sorts of irregularities with their accounts.” Adrian responded by saying he knew of the issues Bank of Zurich were reporting, and that they wouldn't face such issues if they had an expert security officer like Roger Kaliban. None of those five messages gave me any information that seemed useful, so I moved onto the software library. There I found Decoder 1.0, BudgetPal 24.0 and Receipt Forger 7.0. I didn’t need Decoder, as I already had a much more advanced version, and the other two warez were not downloadable, clearly there to show just how dodgy these banks really are. That left only the Funds Transfer section, and while I was tempted to ignore it due to my ridiculously high bank balance, I wanted to know just how much money I could steal. I entered the source account that I’d uncovered on a base many weeks back, then transferred the $30000 in it to my own account, the same way I’d done for the Bank of Berne. It was $30K I didn’t need, but it still felt good to utilise my criminal skills successfully once again. That’s another two hours of play covered, and a damn successful two hours they were too! I’m off to bloody well finish this game! Don't try to stop me!

Yesterday I would have killed for $30000. Now it seems completely useless.

Session Time: 2 hours 00 minutes
Total Time: 17 hours 30 minutes

Note Regarding Spoilers and Companion Assist Points: I've written 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!

Game 32: Neuromancer - The Power of Greystoke

Tricky Journal Entry 16: "I thought things were getting a bit too easy. While I can't find many ICE's that I can't get past, the AIs in zones 2 and 3 are an absolute bitch to bring down! Luckily I've increased my skills to a point now where I think I might just be able to manage it. Well, except for the scary one guarding Musabori! I still have no idea how to get past that one! Perhaps the Turing Registry will hold the key?! Only one way to find out!"

Zone 2 awaits!

I’m on the final straight towards the end of Neuromancer! If I can manage to get across the line without requiring assistance, I will feel pretty proud of myself. My last post covered the entirety of cyberspace zone 1. I accessed every base in that zone and defeated both AIs, raising my Logic, Phenomenology, Philosophy and Sophistry skills to 5 in the process. I also had some great warez, including BlowTorch 4.0, Decoder 4.0, Drill 2.0, ThunderHead 2.0 and Python 2.0. I hoped that this would be enough to handle whatever zone 2 served up, and made my way to the high-tech zone to find out. There were cyberspace jacks in all four companies there (Fuji Electric, Hitachi Biotech, Hosaka and Musabori), but all of them accessed zone 2, merely changing the entrance point.  I decided to start with Fuji Electric, and was thrilled when I was able to hack in with little trouble. Surprisingly though, there were no new access levels available to me, so the effort was pointless. I moved onto Hitachi Biotech, still hoping to find some way of getting back at them after they took my lungs in an earlier session. I was close to dying during this ICE battle, but still managed to get through the defences. This time there was a new menu option available, but the Employee List contained nothing more than 11 names I didn’t recognise.

Nope, don't recognise any of them!

So far zone 2 had been pretty disappointing, but that was about to change. The Hosaka base had an expanded Software Library, including Hammer 4.0, Concrete 1.0, Mimic 2.0, Injector 2.0 and Slow 2.0. These were all either entirely new warez or upgraded versions of ones I already had. I replaced my Hammer 2.0 with 4.0, my Slow 1.0 with 2.0, and added Concrete 1.0 to my deck (this is one of the ICE breakers Deathangel’s Shadow listed in the Best category). I didn’t have room for Mimic 2.0 (a warrant mimicking piece of software) or Injector 2.0 (a slow acting virus), but it was nice to know I could get them. Slow 1.0 had already made breaking through ICE much easier, but 2.0 was simply awesome! I could now attack ICE at twice the speed that their attacks were coming back at me! This made hacking into Musabori a simple task, but then I found myself face to face with an AI! All he had to say is “Go ahead. Make my day.”, before he started hitting me with seriously damaging attacks. All the great warez I had now were completely useless against him and, even worse, none of my skills did anything either! I was very quickly crushed, and then taunted for my humanity: “That’s what you get for being an ape-descendant.” This really set me back! If none of my AI affecting skills could touch this AI, how could I possibly defeat it!? Had I missed a skill altogether?

This couldn't even scratch this AI!

I had a good think about what else I could try to get into Musabori, but nothing came to mind. I decided to try my luck on Freeside, where I assumed the cyberspace jacks would give me access to zone 3. I took a shuttle straight to Freeside as I could see no point in going via Zion now that I’d got the Bank Gemeinschaft code off the Rastafarian leader there. I knew of three different jacks that I could potentially use on Freeside, but I decided to use the one in the Bank of Berne. I soon discovered that there were five bases in zone 3, and my Probe software told me they were Bank of Berne, D.A.R.P.O., Screaming Fist, Sex Union and Turing Registry. I decided to try my luck getting into the Bank of Berne base, as I was getting pretty desperate to find a new form of income! It took me a couple of attempts, but I scraped my way through the ICE on the base, only to come face to face with yet another AI! “You’ve forced me to levy a service charge on your account.” I quickly figured out that this AIs weakness was Philosophy (he cried out “Ouch! Bankruptcy!” when hit), but I got crushed every time I tried to take him on. This didn’t bode well, since the only way I knew of to increase my AI harming skills was to defeat AIs. I decided to move onto the other bases in zone 3 for now, and hoped that I would find something along the way that might assist.

Another defeat! My pride was taking a beating at this point!

The D.A.R.P.O. base turned out to be Defense Advanced Research Projects, and the welcome page informed me that the “system contains RESTRICTED data as defined in the Tempest Restrictions of 2025”. There were two menu items inside the base, being 1. Current Research Topics and 2. Software Library. The first section contained highly technical documentation regarding Hypersonic Weapons, Photon Echo Memories, Kinetic Energy Weapons, Monoclonal Antibodies and Laser Techniques. I read through each of them, but I highly doubt any of the information is useful, so won’t bore you with it. I’ll include an example below so you can see what it looks like.  The Software Library section contained ThunderHead 3.0, Injector 3.0, Jammies 2.0, Concrete 2.0 and Drill 3.0, all of which were updated versions of software I’d come across previously. The two viruses (ThunderHead and Injector) are hugely effective, lasting a long time and causing significant damage to ICE, and Concrete 2.0 and Drill 3.0 were great replacements for their previous versions. A few readers let me in on what Jammies is all about after I could find no use for version 1.0. I can now see what it does with Jammies 2.0 (it locks up the ICE, stopping it from launching software for a short period of time), but its effectiveness couldn’t justify keeping it installed on my deck, given the RAM limitations I was facing.

Blah blah blah blah...

The Strikefore Screaming Fist base had the same RESTRICTED welcome screen as D.A.R.P.O., and once again contained two menu options (1. Software Library and 2. Operational Reports). The software library contained Slow 3.0, Depth Charge 3.0, Python 3.0, KGB 1.0, ArmorAll 1.0 and Easy Rider 1.0. This turned out to be a smorgasbord of awesome warez! As you might expect, Slow 3.0 allowed me to hit ICE with three separate pieces of software to every one coming back my way, which makes getting into any Zone 1 to 3 bases really very easy. Depth Charge was the second piece of software on Deathangel’s Shadow’s list of Best warez (leaving only Logic Bomb to find) and Python 3.0 made an already great virus frickin awesome! Most interestingly though, I’d not come across KGB, ArmorAll or Easy Rider before, although I remembered reading something about Easy Rider on one of the message boards. Polychrome had told everyone on the Panther Moderns board that “Screaming Fist has Easy Rider 1.0 in their base. Lets you cross zones without having to go to another cyberjack.” That sounded awesome to me, so I made room for it. I had no idea what either KGB or ArmorAll did, although I figured I could guess the latter. Before I went back into cyberspace to test them out, I checked out the Operational Reports section on Screaming Fist.

Best...software library...ever!

I found a report from General Davis to Ossian Intercept with the Operational Code of HAMMER. The report appeared to be a summary of several reports concerning Colonel Corto, who reportedly ran into trouble while fighting the Russians over Kirensk (I assume in some sort of fighter plane). He managed to take out many of their defences before being taken down, and even then he commandeered a Russian gunship and made his way to Finland. Once there he was brought down by a cannon, losing his eyesight, legs and most of his jaw in the process. Corto was repaired, with “new eyes, legs, plumbing and extensive cosmetic work”. Later, Corto surfaced in Thailand as “overseer of a heroin factory, then as enforcer for a Californian gambling cartel, then as a paid killer in the ruins of Bonn, then was sent to a mental institution in Paris! Why do I bother mentioning all this? Because Corto is “now living under the name of Armitage”! That’s right…the same Armitage that gave me $10000 at the beginning of the game to work for him, then never turned up to give me my directives at the rendezvous point. As far as I know, Armitage was taken by the lawbots and executed, so I fail to see why any of this information is in any way relevant to the game. It’s likely just something that played a role in the novel, and so is included here, but that really does make figuring out what you’re supposed to be doing in Neuromancer much harder than it would be otherwise.

I assume this Captain Fargo is the ffargo that I owe $2000 to as well!

While I was chomping at the bit to visit the Sex Union and Turing Registry bases, I devoted some time to figuring out what the KGB, ArmorAll and Easy Rider warez were about. The Easy Rider one, as I hoped it would, allowed me to visit every cyberspace zone from any cyberspace jack! This meant that I no longer needed to move around in the real world, as one jack is all I would ever need again! Using KGB 1.0 while in cyberspace autopiloted me straight to a particular base in zone 5. I assume I could have made my way to the base manually easily enough (perhaps not?), so not sure of the purpose, but I do know that the ICE at the base smashed me in seconds! Finally, ArmorAll very handily reduced my damage back to zero on use, although it seemed that I could only use it once per base attack. With all that figured out, I moved onto the Sex Union base. I broke through the ICE easily, but then was confronted by another AI. “Mmm, you’re a big one! Want to play with me? I’m Xaviera.” I hoped that this AI might be easier to defeat than the one at the Bank of Berne, so tried out my skills on her. Phenomenology turned out to be her weakness and thankfully, I was able to beat her (just!) on my third attempt! “Oh, it’s never happened to me like this. It’s driving me MAD…!#@$^*#$#”. I was in! Not only that, but I’d also increased my AI harming skills to 6, meaning I might be able to go back and defeat the Bank of Berne AI.

Sorry, you just seemed the type that likes it rough!

There were three sections on the Sex Union base, being 1. Meeting Place, 2. Advice from Xaviera and 3. AI Message Buffer. The first section’s purpose was described by Xaviera as a place to “get in touch with others who share your tastes and desires. Anything goes, as long as it is above board and you let it all hang out – let’s not have any surprises, unless that’s what you’re into.” I could then see three “profiles”, written by a 41 year old male and 21 and 44 year old women. I won’t describe what was in each of the profiles, but I’ll put an example below. The Advice from Xaviera section was fairly humorous, being a conversation between Xaviera and someone calling themselves SM, 15. Basically, SM, 15 told Xaviera about a girl called Cindy, and how she’d touched his shoulder and called him “unique” in response to a joke. He wanted to know what he should do next, so Xaviera advised him to ask her out on a date. He did, and while Cindy hesitated before saying yes, he thinks that pause was only to have an orgasm. Xaviera was stunned by this, and told him that she wanted to have a long chat with him! Anyway, the AI Message Buffer was the real reason to visit the site, but even that was a bit disappointing.

Showered with gifts and constant attention? Man, that sounds like a form of abuse!

There was a message from Greystoke to Xaviera: “What do you mean asking me if I’m into domination? We can’t have these cowboys violating us at every turn, can we? What would you do for playthings?” There was also a message from Neuromancer to Xaviera: “I do not agree with your assessment of cyberpunks, and I regret the cruel methods you use on them. Do not destroy them all just to sate your bestial lusts.” These messages didn’t really give me anything to go off, making the whole Sex Union base a bit useless. I took my leave and went off to pay a visit to the Turing Registry base. I’d been looking forward to accessing it since I read a message from Greystoke to Morphy on the World Chess Confederation base: “The AI destruct program that Turing developed to destroy me is missing from their vault! I am unable to locate it! If you know where it is, inform me immediately! If it falls into the wrong hands, Neuromancer may win! This cannot happen!” Perhaps Greystoke was the AI that I was unable to defeat at Musabori, and this AI destruct program was the key! I haven’t quite managed to get through zones 2 and 3 in this post, but I’ve probably gone on long enough for now. Join me in a couple of days, where you will witness one of the most successful heists known to man...maybe!

..and so the progress continued!

Session Time: 2 hours 00 minutes
Total Time: 15 hours 30 minutes

Note Regarding Spoilers and Companion Assist Points: I've written 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!

Game 32: Neuromancer - Taking a Stress Pill

Tricky Journal Entry 15: "I ripped my way through zone 1 today, defeating two AIs on the way and collecting numerous awesome bits of software. Slow 1.0 in particular has been fantastic, allowing me to launch my warez at a much faster rate than the ICE I'm attempting to break down. My AI affecting skills are also increasing consistently now, so I reckon I'm ready to try my luck on the big boys in zone 2 and 3. I'm off to the high-tech zone tomorrow!"

Let's do this!

Onwards we go into cyberspace zone 1! The first base I hacked into was Chiba City Central Justice System. It was nice to know that I was going to gain access to bases I hadn’t visited previously, whether through design or through me simply missing them earlier. There were three menu options inside, being 1. Press Release, 2. Arrest Warrants and 3. Accounting. The Press Release section talked about the Justice Booth system, which many citizens considered to be a “thinly disguised method of supplying the city with a needed cash reserve”. I had to agree, and it didn’t help that the press release claimed that the “simple fact is that practically everyone who is brought into a Justice Booth is guilty of something. We merely provide a means of penalyzing these criminals for their antisocial behaviors.” The Arrest Warrants section listed six “Lawbot Arrest Warrants”, and while I didn’t recognise the first five names, I certainly knew who the sixth person was. It was me! I wasn’t able to edit the list or any details at all, but I could see that I was on the list for piracy. I also found myself on a list in the Accounting section, which stated that I and the other criminals mentioned there owed a debt to the Justice system for our crimes. I was a bit concerned that “liens have been levied against the known orbital bank accounts of the aforesaid criminal persons”, but then I remembered that my account was empty.

Oh what have I done now!?

The next base I attempted was Citizens for a Free Matrix. I only just got past the ICE and then ran into yet another AI! “Death comes only once to a sane person. A fool dies many times.” As usual, I was forced to use my evasion skill to avoid death, but not before I figured out that the AI’s weakness was Sophistry. Once I knew that, I repaired all my software and went straight back in for another go. I defeated the AI this time, but not before he could shout “My lord Greystoke will avenge this insult, you carbon-based scum!” There was that name again! Greystoke was clearly an AI, and had been the one concerned that the Turing’s software to defeat him was missing. I quickly forgot about Greystoke, as I had a base to explore! The software library had no additions to what I’d seen previously, and I knew to avoid downloading any of it anyway as it was dangerous. There was another AI Message Buffer though, containing two messages from Greystoke and Neuromancer to Sapphire (obviously the AI I’d just defeated). It talked about the considerable success of Sapphire’s cowboy trap, which must be referring to the infecting Blammo 1.0 software in the library. It talked about a “deck protection program” too, that could deflect the virus, but didn’t mention where it could be found.

By the power of Greystoke...I have the power!!!!

The message from Neuromancer to Sapphire was very intriguing! “I support your methods of cowboy prevention, but your seeming alliance with Greystoke troubles me. Consider the alternatives if Greystoke’s Great Plan should fail...and remember who holds the real power in the matrix.” So there are conflicting AI’s battling for domination in the matrix! That’s a pretty cool idea! I wondered what exactly Greystoke’s “Great Plan” might be, but figured I wasn’t going to be able to guess. There was nothing else to see on the base, so I moved onto Copenhagan University. I found four menu options there: 1. Notes of Interest, 2. Message Base, 3. Software Library and 4. Faculty/Alum news. The Notes of Interest section was broken into two sections, with the first one describing the university’s Bloodsport team's (The Polar Bears) victory in the Pan European Championship. It was interesting to hear about their star player having his leg nearly severed halfway through the first day, but still being able to finish the competition with a replacement limb, but otherwise it held no worth. The second part appeared more likely to have value, discussing “Cyberspace and Addictive Personalities”, but I didn’t pick up anything that seemed usable. It talked about a study, “funded by a grant from Tessier-Ashpool funnelled through their Allard Technologies subdivision”, that will try to figure out what it is in the matrix that is “alienating users” and causing them to drop out of the communications network.

Tis nothing but a flesh wound!

The Message Base section held five messages. The first and third were a conversation between Deathangel’s Shadow and the Polar Bears star player, Lars Mbutu. Deathangel’s Shadow congratulated Lars on his game, and told him he didn’t expect a quick response as the player had lost fingers in the last period. Lars responded, although the missing fingers were clearly marring his ability to type. “you r right tht loing fingr on my lft hn ill mk for iffikult riting, but ill try.” The second message on the board was from someone calling themself Habitual User to Dr. Marsha Sanderson, the woman behind the cyberspace and addictive personality study. “Hit the nail on the head – no harm in decks. Promote intellectual development.” None of these messages seemed important, but the fourth one was from Deathangel’s Shadow to me: “It’s getting really spooky out here. Was supposed to get some information from the Sumdiv Kid, but he’s gone null. Have you seen him?” This was very similar to a message I’d recently received from Matt Shaw, and I was beginning to wonder whether I was actually supposed to be responding in some fashion. I checked to see whether there was a way to send a message on this board, but there wasn’t.

I thought I would have found these guys by now! Where is this Gridlock place?!

The fifth and last message on the Copenhagen Uni message board was very useful indeed! It was once again from Deathangel’s Shadow, this time to everyone on the board. “All you new moes, remember that all ICE breakers aren’t created equal. So being the cool guy that I am, I leave the following info for all.” He then went on to list a bunch of ICE breaking software in Good, Better and Best categories. This is exactly what I needed, particularly with the RAM limitations I was facing with my deck of choice. I hadn’t come across any of the warez listed under Best (Concrete, DepthCharge, Logic Bomb), but would download them with no hesitation when I did. With that in mind, I entered the base’s Software Library, hoping to find one of them there. I didn’t, but I did find Probe 4.0 and one of the ICE breakers listed in the Better category, being DoorStop 1.0. There was also some software called Jammies 1.0, but I had no idea whether that was an ICE breaker, a virus, or something else entirely. I replaced my Probe 3.0 with 4.0, then added Jammies 1.0 and DoorStop 1.0 to my deck too. I was keen to get back out into cyberspace and test out these new warez, but I still had one more section to check out on the uni base, the Faculty/Alum news. This section didn’t reveal much, talking about a doctor named Heinrich Gott, who was made Professor Emeritus in Economics/Political Science using the “Heinrich Maneuver” to oust unfavourable dictators from small nations.

This was a great find! Makes choosing which software to keep and which to erase so much easier.

Next up was Eastern Seaboard Fission Authority, where I knew there was one extra level of security that I could breach. I hacked in pretty easily, but discovered no new menu options. I did however find ThunderHead 2.0 in the Software Library, which wasn’t there before. Given how effective ThunderHead 1.0 had been, I eagerly downloaded the upgraded version and moved onto the Gentleman Loser base. Once again there were no new sections to explore, but the Software Library had additional warez. I now had the option to download Slow 1.0, Injector 1.0 and Drill 1.0. The latter I’d used previously, but I hadn’t come across the other two before. I made room for them all on my deck and downloaded them. Some experimentation showed that Injector was a virus, although it didn’t last as long as ThunderHead 2.0. Slow 1.0 on the other hand was something very special indeed! Once Slow made contact with an ICE, it completely slowed down the software attacks coming back at me. This meant I could attack approximate three times for every two attacks coming back my way, which was a huge advantage! Unlike viruses, Slow seems to have unlimited uses too, making it rather invaluable! I couldn’t figure out what Jammies 1.0 did, if anything, so erased it for now.

I still can't get PikUpGirls 1.0. Disappointing to say the least!

By now getting into bases through ICE was pretty straightforward, and I hacked into the Internal Revenue Service with little trouble. There were four new menu options on the base, being 2. Supervisor’s Notice, 3. Special Audit List, 4. View Audit List and 5. Software Library. The Supervisor’s Notice was an instruction to all Field Supervisors to warn their Field Examiners not to use the garrotte, the Rack, and the Iron Maiden unless absolutely necessary. It’s their belief that “the rubber hose and the insertion of bamboo under the fingernails should be sufficient for Taxpayer compliance in most situations”. It went on to suggest that the only purpose of the message board on the base was to “locate and arrest tax offenders who have otherwise managed to be overlooked by our standard procedures”. Nasty stuff, but nothing useful. The Special Audit section was bare, with a message stating “No report at this time”, while the View Audit List section contained a list of five individuals that are known for evading tax. As with most of these criminal lists, my name was on there, although I wasn’t able to adjust it in any way. That left only the Software Library to check out, which contained Jammies 1.0, Hammer 2.0 and Mimic 1.0. I left Jammies alone for reasons mentioned above, but grabbed the other two. Having Hammer 2.0 allowed me to erase version 1.0, and Mimic appears to attempt to break straight through ICE by mimicking a warranted investigation. I haven’t had any success with it yet, but have held onto it in case.

Alright, what the hell does Jammies 1.0 do?

The next base was one I’d been keen to check out, being the NASA base. Level 1 access had been pretty pointless, so I hoped hacking in would reveal something important. Before I could find out though, I came face to face with another AI! I immediately recognised which AI it was too, when he said “Dave? Is that you? Be careful, I don’t want to hurt you.” I knew one of the AIs was called HAL, and this was clearly it, referencing HAL from Stanley Kubrick’s amazing 2001: A Space Odyssey. It didn’t take me long to figure out that Logic was his weakness, with HAL responding with “Dave, I’m losing my mind”, but I was forced to use Evasion on my first attempt. “Sorry about that, Dave, but I had to defend myself.” My second attempt was successful however, with HAL going out with “I’m losing my mind, Dave. I can feel my cores burning even now. Goodbye.” I thought this was all pretty cool, as a big fan of the movie, and it gave me access to two new menu options on the NASA base, being 5. Software Library and 6. HAL’s Funding Strategy. The software library contained Probe 1.0 , Python 2.0, BlowTorch 4.0 and Decoder 4.0! I didn’t need Probe 1.0 as I already had 3,0, but the others were all great additions to my deck! BlowTorch 4.0 replaced my 3.0 version, Decoder 4.0 replaced my 2.0 version, and Python turned out to be a really effective virus. I was very excited to find out what HAL’s Funding Strategy was all about, but it turned out to say nothing more than “File Under Modification”.

Um...you've got something on your chin!

The second level access of the Software Enforcement Agency base contained one extra menu option than it had with first level access, being View Surveillance List, but a couple of the original ones were expanded too. Firstly, the Software Library now contained ThunderHead 2.0 on top of the original Comlink 4.0 and Sequencer 1.0. The Skill Upgrade section now had CopTalk level 4, while it previously only had level 2. Unfortunately, I didn’t have CopTalk at all, as I hadn’t thought it was going to be useful after restarting, since I appeared to have got everything I could out of the stupid cop at Donut World. Now I had to wonder whether that was a mistake, particularly as I’d taken Larry Moe out of the equation to get to Lupus. Larry was the one that had sold me CopTalk for $100, and I hadn’t come across it anywhere else! I put this concern aside for the moment, and checked out the View Surveillance List. Surprisingly, it was just another list of unrecognisable names, all of whom are suspected of some criminal action or another. I keep feeling like I’m supposed to do something with at least one of the names on all the lists I keep coming across, but I can’t think of what that might be or why.

I'm going to have to restore and find out whether CopTalk 4.0 has any real value at some point.

There were only two more bases to check out in cyberspace zone 1, and the first of them (Chiba City Tactical Police) contained no new levels of access. That left only Tozoku, which I was able to hack into easily due to my newfound Slow 1.0 software. There were two new menu options available to me, being 4. Jobs Listing and 5. Message Base, but the software library also held a stack of new warez. I didn’t need BlowTorch 3.0 as I already had 4.0, but Drill 2.0 and Acid 1.0 were new. I replaced my Drill 1.0 with the second version and added Acid to the list of one shot viruses that I knew where to find. The Job Listings section had three company objectives, along with a list of required employees they wanted to recruit for them. They needed “3 men with experience in breaking and entering” to penetrate the Hosaka plant with the intention of uncovering the action figures with “a striking resemblance to our own G.I. Akira”. They needed a woman to seduce a man within Musabori Industries named Clarence Hartesty to gather information. Finally, they needed “3 men and a baby”, who would be tasked with delivering contraband alkaloid substances from the Popul Vox ship.

I would have thought a cyberspace attack would be more effective than a physical one

The Message Base contained four messages, with the first three being between Iemoto and Tanenaga. The latter was asking whether he could leave his cover as an apprentice to a concert pianist, since it had been six months since he “terminated the two women using the nail polishing machines”. Iemoto responded to say he could now return, but only because there was another woman that required “terminating”. This didn’t seem to work for Tanenaga, who decided to remain under cover. I'm sure this is connected to messages I read earlier in the game, but I'm not sure it's important. The fourth and final message was from Phillip d’Argent to Iemoto, with the former asking the latter to contact him at Bank Zurich using link code BOZOBANK (which I found out about ages ago). And that...is all there is to do and see in cyberspace zone 1! For my next post I intend to use the cyberspace jacks in the high-tech zone, before travelling to Freeside where there are another three that I know about. I have no idea how much more there is to Neuromancer. It’s starting to become a bit of a chore, but I’m sure that has more to do with the stupid amount of posting I’ve had to do to describe it accurately, and not necessarily the game itself. I will have to keep that in mind when it comes time to rate it. I really do want to finish it!

You terminated two women with a nail polishing machine or two women that owned nail polishing machines?

Session Time: 1 hours 30 minutes
Total Time: 13 hours 30 minutes

Note Regarding Spoilers and Companion Assist Points: I've written 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!

Game 32: Neuromancer - Clipping Angel's Wings

Tricky Journal Entry 14: "Bloody hell! I'd heard all about these AIs, but I didn't expect them to be so nasty! I was extremely fortunate not to get fried the first couple of times I encountered one, with only the evasion chip I got from Lupus saving my butt. I've followed in Dixie Flatline's footsteps however, and have actually figured out how to defeat these things! I've got a stack of awesome warez and skills, so if I play my cards right, I should be able to go anywhere and do anything I want pretty soon. I'm about to step out of the safety of zone 0, so here's hoping I'm not just getting overconfident. If you don't hear from me again, I guess I was!"

You could at least make the important clues more easily decipherable!

Before I continue my adventures in cyberspace, there’s a small victory that I had while writing my last post. I’d written about how certain I was that I’d missed something either on Zion or during my trip from Zion to Freeside with Maelcum. It was bugging me so much that I took a break from writing to load up a save game and give it another shot. I once again asked the Rastafarian old man on Zion everything I could think of, and this time tried hard to follow every lead that he gave me. He seemed particular fascinated with banks (in a negative way), so I asked him about “banks”. His answer seemed very promising indeed! “Freeside a Babylon port, mon. Several banks there, ya know? Which one you askin’ bout?” Since Bank Gemeinschaft seemed to be a big focal point of the game, I asked him about “gemeinschaft”, to which he responded with “Aerol seh BG1066 get him in th’ fron’ door there, mon.” Not sure who Aerol is, but BG1066 seemed a very likely code to get me into the bank on Freeside! I travelled with Maelcum to Freeside, walked into the bank, and tried entering “bg1066” when asked for a code. “Code verified. You may enter the vault.” Eureka!!!! Unfortunately, just as with the Bank of Berne, once inside the only thing I could do was enter cyberspace using the jack there, but I have a feeling this find will prove very useful later in the game.

I guess it was silly to expect actual money in a bank of the future

With that little tangent aside, let’s get back to cyberspace. The truth is that I’ve already spent five hours there!!! That’s right, as soon as I finished my post on Sunday morning, I played Neuromancer for five straight hours, only stopping for a bite to eat. It was obvious through it all that it would be downright silly to blog my way through the whole experience, since it really was just doing the same things over and over again. I also restarted a few hours into the session after running out of cash, which complicates my normal process further. I’m therefore going to summarise the experience, covering the highlights in detail while brushing over the completely repetitive and uninteresting bits. I’ll take it zone by zone though, since there seems no way to attack things in any other way. As mentioned in my last post, the Cheap Hotel jack leads to cyberspace zone 0, and starting off in any other zone leads to a quick and inevitable death. Matt Shaw had warned me about that earlier: “The ICE is softer at the bases you can reach from the Cheap Hotel’s jack, so brush up on your cyberspace techniques there first.” I began hacking into each of the bases on offer there, starting with Asano Computing. I was able to break in fairly easily with my Drill 1.0 and Hammer 1.0, and was rewarded with an extra menu option once in the base. It was called Inventory, and it did exactly what it said on the tin, displaying a full inventory of all hardware held at Asano. I wasn’t able to edit it or tinker with it in any way, so moved on.

How is this helpful?

I had a similar experience at Consumer Review. My Scout 1.0 software had previously told me that there were two access levels to the base, and since I’d only accessed the first level, I thought there would be something on offer through cyberspace. If there was, I couldn’t see it, as the list of decks and the information listed under each was exactly the same. Panther Moderns on the other hand had a greatly expanded Software Library, with BlowTorch 3.0, Decoder 2.0, ThunderHead 1.0 and Cyberspace 1.0 available to download! Mindbender 3.0 and Chaos Videosoft 1.0 were also there, but they were still incompatible with my deck. BlowTorch 3.0 and Decoder 2.0 turned out to be really effective ICE breakers, far better than the ones I had on my deck to this point (meaning they do far more damage with every hit). ThunderHead 1.0 was something I hadn’t seen to this point, being a slow acting virus that gradually does damage. When ThunderHead (or any other virus) hits the ICE, it changes the barrier from blue to green, and gradually does damage for its duration. Unfortunately, given how effective they are, these viruses can only be launched once before disappearing off the player’s deck. To be honest I’m not certain of the real purpose of Cyberspace 1.0. I’ve figured out that I can use it to enter cyberspace, but since I still need to be situated in a room containing a cyberspace jack, I don’t really see the point. Given my deck’s RAM will only allow 11 bits of software installed concurrently, I couldn’t afford to hang onto it. I also erased Scout 1.0 and Sequencer 1.0 (since I couldn’t see why I would need them anymore).

Fill yer deck gov'ner!

This is where things got really interesting! My new ICE breakers made destroying the ICE protecting the Psychologist base straight forward, but once it was gone I was faced with something I really wasn’t expecting! A white face appeared saying “Your destructive tendencies clearly indicate a desire for attention”. It then started attacking me in the same way that ICE had been, yet with much greater force! My warez seemed completely useless on it, literally having no effect! I was forced to use my Evasion skill to escape with my life, and even that failed a couple of times before successfully getting me out of there. “You’ll need to use more skills than that to beat me.” Huh?! What skills? Perhaps I needed to explore more bases until I found something that could damage this thing? I opened the manual and read the chapter on AIs, learning the following important information (I’m massively summarising here). “Certain bases contain a second line of defense – an AI. Modern AIs have personalities and mental capabilities far beyond the humans that originally created them. The Turing Registry has the responsibility of watching for signs that any AI might be developing into a dangerous, ultra-intelligent program. Some cowboys avoid combat with these formidable entities, because icebreaking softwarez can’t harm them. While it’s rumoured that there are skill chips available which allow mental combat with AIs, no one had lived long enough to talk about the details. The late McCoy Pauley, aka Dixie Flatline, is said to have run into AIs in three different bases, and supposedly only survived because he found a weakness in each AI.”

Come on! Let me get away from this bitch!

Whatever the weakness was for the Psychologist AI, I didn’t have it, so I moved onto Regular Fellows. There was no AI waiting for me there, and I was able to pick up Probe 3.0 from the expanded Checkout Counter inside. That left only one base in zone 0, which was the World Chess Confederation. I was really hopeful that I would be able to make some easy cash in this base, but that idea was squashed when I once again came face to face with an AI! “It’s a Fool’s Mate, my friend. Surrender while you still can.” Just as before, none of my warez or skills seemed to have any effect on the AI, so I was forced to use Evasion. “Thought you could beat me, ha! You couldn’t even beat that wimp Chrome.” I’d had a quick attempt to access bases in zone 1 from the Gentleman Loser jack, and it had been seriously tough going. For this reason I was very keen to do everything I could in zone 0 before having another crack at other zones. I had a think about what other skills I’d seen throughout the game, and the ones that came to mind as potentially useful were the Psychoanalysis, Phenomenology, Philosophy and Logic chips that I’d seen on sale at Julius Deane’s and the Matrix Restaurant. I’d not found any use for them earlier, and Logic in particular seemed very likely to be useful against the World Chess Confederation AI, so I rushed off and purchased all four of them (it’s worth pointing out that I already had Sophistry after giving the Holy Joystick to Nolan)!

To think I originally missed these!

With my new skills implanted, and just over $2000 left in my kitty, I had another go at breaking into the Psychologist base. Using Logic did fire a pink bolt at the intelligence, but it had no effect. Psychoanalysis was the second one I tried, but the bolt rebounded and came back and hit me: “Subject weakness: Unknown”. So the Psychoanalysis skill is used to find out what an AI’s weakness is! Unfortunately it didn’t work in this case, particularly as my vertical bar had gone into the red! Phenomenology didn’t do any damage, so I tried Philosophy, getting pretty desperate at this point. When my Philosophy bolt made contact with the AI, it shouted “Psychopath!” at me, and I did significant damage to it! My EEG monitor was displaying red at this point, so I used my Zen skill to bring it back under control (I’d learnt this through experimentation earlier on). My software was being wiped out one at a time, but since I only needed my skills, continued on with much determination. Once I’d broken through with the Philosophy skill, I was able to attack the AI with Logic, Philosophy and Sophistry, all of which caused various degrees of damage. I must have been awfully close to dying when the AI finally crumbled: “You are nothing but a worm and you will die...like...a worm! Aarrgh!” I was in!!!

Apparently...not!

As exciting as this superb victory was, I really didn’t get much out of the Psychologist base. I’m probably missing the whole purpose of it, but I’ve never found a reason why I would want to tell the “psychologist” my concerns. All the same menu items were there that I’d seen previously with the addition of a Software Library. The software library contained Thunderhead 1.0, which I could already get from Panther Moderns. On the positive side, my Phenomenology, Philosophy, Sophistry and Logic skills had all increased to level 2 after beating the AI! I say this like I immediately figured it out while playing, but the truth is that it took me at least an hour to figure out that my skills were increasing by beating AIs. I’d been restoring my game fairly often so I could approach each base with a full kit of useful warez, but in doing so I was losing my skill increases and facing increasingly difficult AIs, getting completely crushed over and over. Once I knew it though, I was able to progress pretty quickly. As expected, Logic was the key to defeating the World Chess Confederation AI, with the AI saying “Good move” when struck. Even with my increased skills, I was still on the verge of dying when I finally defeated it. “I surrender; the game is yours.” I was quite sure that I was going to be able to somehow rig the chess tournaments so that I won heaps of money, and I was even more confident when I discovered BattleChess 4.0 in the Software Library on the base!

I didn't get this far in philosophy at uni!

I downloaded a copy to my deck and joined a tournament, preparing to watch the money roll in. I was asked which software I wanted to upload to play, so I naturally chose BattleChess 4.0. “Incompatible software”! What do you mean incompatible software? BattleChess 2.0 worked! Why wouldn’t 4.0? Was I supposed to make it compatible somehow? Why was it on the base if it couldn’t be used? I set all these questions aside for the time being, and checked out the other newly accessible section on the base. The AI Message Buffer had a couple of messages on it, both of which were addressed to Morphy. The first one was from Greystoke: “The AI destruct program that Turing developed to destroy me is missing from their vault! I am unable to locate it! If you know where it is, inform me immediately! If it falls into the wrong hands, Neuromancer may win! This cannot happen!” Well that sure was interesting! I could only assume that Greystoke was an AI, as Turing was the corporation tasked with making sure AIs didn’t get too advanced. This was also the first time that I’d heard the word Neuromancer in the game. Who or what is Neuromancer? Is Morphy also an AI? Was Morphy the AI that I just defeated? Very interesting indeed! The second message was from Hal, and was a warning to Morphy that there appeared to be an AI who’s a chess master, who goes by the name Phantom. I hadn’t come across the name elsewhere, so wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do with that information.

Why did they tease me with this!?

Having defeated another AI, my four AI hacking skills were now all upgraded to 3. That, along with the nice collection of powerful ICE breakers I’d collected, made me feel ready to move onto the next cyberspace zone. I left Cheap Hotel, went next door to Gentleman Loser, and jacked into zone 1! Just as I did in zone 0, I saved my game and explored the zone, using my Probe software, now at level 3.0, to find out what bases were in there. There were 10 to be explored: Chiba City Central Justice System, Citizens For a Free Matrix, Copenhagen University, Eastern Seaboard Fission Authority, Gentleman Loser, Internal Revenue Service, NASA, Software Enforcement Agency, Chiba City Tactical Police and Tozoku. I should be able to get through all of them in my next post now that I’ve explained how things work in cyberspace. While it probably wouldn’t seem like it, this post covers more than half of my five hour session! I really did jump around, and struggled to beat the AIs due to my playing style. I also wasted time going through old screenshots looking for clues that just weren’t there, and restarted at least once. I hope those of you that are still here will join me in a couple of days as I near the climax of the game. Let’s hope those readers that have been scared away by Neuromancer will come back for Space Quest III!

Zone 1, here we come!

Session Time: 3 hours 00 minutes

Total Time: 12 hours 00 minutes

Note Regarding Spoilers and Companion Assist Points: I've written 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!