Les dossiers d'Abandonware France
Créé le 28/12/2003
LONG ENGLISH WALKTHROUGH
This is the English translation of the excellent walkthrough the magazine Tilt published in its issue 100, as a fictitious interview with Jérôme Lange. It reveals all the deductions the player had to make to fully understand the plot, as well as the explanation of the riddles.
Tilt: During your research, who was the first character whose revelations sent you on an interesting trail ?
Jérôme Lange: Maguy, of course... As soon as I asked her what she had noticed on the evening of the drama, she talked about that cup of tea Maguy took every night before going to sleep. That evening, while preparing the tea, Maguy left for a moment. When she returned, the cup of tea had changed place. In the victim's room, I also noticed a suspect smell of camphorized ammonia water. There was a bottle of this narcotic in the kitchen closet. So someone had drugged Marie... But some clues did not fit this eventuality.
Tilt: What clues, for example?
J.L.: As I searched Marie's room from top to bottom, I quickly discovered that the signs of forced entry, the broken window pane for example, were only a staging. Indeed, there was broken glass in the aquarium and under the chest of drawers. Given the layout of the premises, it became obvious that the window pane had been broken from the inside, on the open window! Another strange detail was that there were no cigarette butts in the victim's ashtray and the bed was not unmade. How can we imagine that Mary drank her tea that evening without smoking a cigarette (a fact contrary to her habits) and without first going to bed? None of these discoveries corroborated anyone's statements...
Tilt: You visited every room in the house. To find out which other significant clues?
J.L.: This was really the biggest challenge of this mission. The clues were numerous and few of them actually had any real meaning. As for Anita and Anton, I didn't find anything interesting. These two characters very quickly appeared to me as strangers to the drama being played out there. On the other hand, the visit to Lucie's room was more instructive...
Tilt: A locked room, it seems...
J.L.: Yes, but whose key was in Maguy's room, hidden behind a secret hatch, behind a painting hung on the wall. In Lucie's room, the clue that struck me the most was a dark hair I found on the bed. Strange fact, since Anton had described this Lucie to me as a blonde with advantageous shapes. This Lucie became for me one of the key characters of the adventure.
Tilt: Lucie had left the island before you arrived, aboard Roy's boat, I heard...
J.L.: That's what I've been told. But very quickly, I sniffed out the drama. It's Juste who put me on the track. He discovered a blond wig on the northern beach. Then, probably frightened, he tried to destroy this evidence. It was in the stove of his house that I discovered the half-burned wig. Why did Juste want to make it disappear? I found the answer to that question later.
Tilt: It has been said in the press that Maupiti was an island of legends, that many caches had helped you to discover the truth...
J.L.: It's entirely true. To solve this puzzle, I had to decipher several messages, some of which were insignificant, some others related to the ancient presence of pirates in Maupiti. My first discovery in this sense was made in Maguy's room. It was by chance that I found a trap door there. It took me longer to open it. Actually, I finally found the corresponding key in Maguy's bedside lamp. The base unscrewed to open a subtle hiding place... The trap door then gave access to a very old cave, the lair of two famous pirates, the Vargas brothers. A fresco engraved on the wall depicted these two pirates. They were standing back to back. Between them, a skull. The signs engraved under the fresco and on either side of the two men were at first sight unreadable. However, I quickly understood the meaning of their disposition. The symmetry of the inscriptions and the fact that each side of the fret was a reflection of the other, "as seen in a mirror", gave me an idea. It was to "cut" each sign by the middle to obtain numbers arranged in a special way. I was none the wiser, but later on, this first message would take on its full meaning.
Tilt: You also discovered a list of music pieces.
J.L.: In Lucie's room, there was a hiding place too. All you had to do was move the aquarium to see it. There I discovered a list of twelve musical scores and a case. For this latter clue, two things struck me right away. First of all, the case was closed, and it aroused my professional curiosity. Then and above all, the top of the case was engraved with the motto "Jemelos y Indivisibles", or "twins and indivisibles"...
Tilt: A motto without much meaning...
J.L.: Don't be mistaken! I had just read this motto in the cave of the Vargas brothers, on the fresco representing them. Twins and indivisible, they were the two Vargas brothers, but it was also what made me think of the mirror effect to translate the signs of the cave. In any case, the discovery of the fresco took on a new dimension. It was no longer just a forgotten message from a bygone era. This fresco was now linked to the drama, of that I was convinced!
Tilt: What about the list of music pieces?
J.L.: There, I was in the most complete haze. Why was this trivial list, written in Mary's hand (Maguy confirmed it to me), hidden in such a secret place? I admit I didn't understand the meaning of this new clue right away. Then, while visiting the island of Maupiti, I made another discovery. Remember the statue of this great ape in the middle of the pool. It was one of the scariest moment of my life. There were inscriptions on this statue, inscriptions that were discovered when the water in the basin dropped with the tide. But when I approached to read them, I almost died in the quicksand! I needed binoculars and I didn't bring my own... Fortunately, I found a pair in Bruce's cabin. Back in front of the statue, I finally deciphered the engraved text. Surprise, the inscriptions looked like those found in the cave. I was not long to note this new message and understand that it was enough to superimpose it on the first one to obtain a coherent, or at least readable text.
Tilt: This message, that you communicated to the press, said "3 deads weigh 2 deads and 5 deads 2 deads. The first is the second and the second the first. The iron turns under the sign of the pirates." A strange text to say the least?!
J.L.: It's true, and I thought at that moment that I was on the wrong track, that Mary's abduction had nothing to do with this series of old messages. But yet, only one thing gave me courage, the same motto in the cave and on Mary's case.
Tilt: At this point in the story, can we take stock of all the evidence you found? And what about Mary, about her abduction?
J.L.: To summarize the situation, I had now two types of clues in my hands. On the one hand, all the messages related to the Vargas brothers and the list of musical pieces, and on the other hand some indications about Mary's abduction, such as the letters issued by the sinister Lady in Black, who signed all the committed crimes. Finally, the disappearance of Lucie, because I already knew then that we would never see her again!
Tilt: What did the Lady in Black say in these letters?
J.L.: Actually, she was the one who directed me towards further investigation. As I read her messages, discovered in Bob's room, I understood the role played by many of these characters in the drama. This is what I learned from my deductions. The Lady in Black revealed in a letter to Bob that one of her friends had to provide transport for her, but that the cyclone that hit the island had delayed the project. Since Bruce's boat, the Bamboo, was still being repaired in the harbour, I deduced that the transport this mysterious woman was talking about was actually directly related to this ship. The Lady in Black was pressuring Bob - he is deeply in love with Mary - to make sure that the transport would still take place.
Tilt: An investigation on the boat was necessary!
J.L.: Of course, and the visit to the Bamboo gave me more details than I expected. First of all, I found the captain's logbook. I immediately understood what Bruce and Roy were doing. Bruce was an opium addict and remained locked in his cabin for very long periods of time. Chris told me that. The drugs were provided by the Lady in Black. The exchange took place in the hollow tree of the southern beach. At the same time, Roy the first mate was making good progress in his career as a trafficker.
Tilt: What kind of traffic?
J.L.: Reading the newspaper provided the information. It was definitely arms trafficking!
Tilt: What about Chris in all this? Was he also involved in the traffic?
J.L.: No, Chris had only recently joined the Bamboo. And this commitment, decided by Bruce, worried Roy. There was a parallel adventure to Mary's abduction. As I was going through a file found in Chris' cabin, I understood that this sailor was in fact a British secret service agent. His task in Maupiti: to find another agent, named n° 12, missing in action.
Tilt: And did he find out?
J.L.: Yes! That missing agent was none other than Lucie. I made this discovery by comparing two photos, one of a soldier into firing position in Chris' file, the other one of Lucie and Juste. In both photos, the soldier and the woman wore the same bracelet, a bracelet I discovered later in Roy's cabin. Everything fitted together perfectly. A brunette by nature, Lucie wore a blonde wig so that she would not be recognized. Was she here to expose the arms trade? Probably.
Tilt: But how do you explain Juste's death? It also seems that he had become taciturn very suddenly.
J.L.: Juste certainly understood that Lucie was dead when he picked up the wig in his nets. Sue confirmed to me that "Juste caught a funny pack of yellow algae" and that "Roy was watching him". Juste got scared. He preferred to keep quiet and started running away from everyone, even Anita who loved him though...
Tilt: Do you know how this crime unfolded?
J.L.: I was able to piece the facts together, based on simple inferences. Juste's body was found at 7 a.m. at the pier. But his medallion was caught in a net at the northern beach. So the assassin killed Juste at his home, about 1:30 a.m. He then dragged the body to the beach and threw it into the water. The corpse drifted to the pier. As for the culprit, it is Roy, of course. First clue, Roy was unaccounted for on the island throughout this period. But above all, I discovered a diamond at Juste's house, next to the window. Everybody told me it belonged to Roy. He denied this fact, but I could see that the other diamond Roy had in his cabin was no longer there. So...
Tilt: But why didn't the murderer recover, once his crime had been committed, the only evidence that could incriminate him?
J.L.: Roy had locked the door of Juste's house, probably to stop my investigation. Unfortunately for him, he lost the key to the pier. Rather than embarrassing me, it brought even more strength to my forebodings: the fact that the key is on the pier proved that the assassin was a sailor!
Tilt: And Lucie, what happened to her?
J.L.: A body was found washed up on the southern beach. As everyone identified it as poor Mary's corpse, I soon realized that it was Lucie, disfigured. Like Juste, she had drifted from the northern to the southern beach. She couldn't have drowned, as she was an excellent swimmer. The reality was much more sinister. Roy was responsible once again for the crime, he who had unmasked this secret agent and became afraid that she would reveal his trafficking.
Tilt: The inhabitants of the island said that gunshots were heard... Yet Juste got his throat cut!
J.L.: The gunshots were aimed at Chris. Why? Sue said recently: "Chris asked me a lot of questions about Maupiti..." Chris was getting too embarrassing and he was the target of a failed attack. It was Roy who lured the victim to the southern beach. It was the Lady in Black who was holding the gun. From then on, I confess that I was afraid that something would happen to me. Two murders and one attempt, the climate was getting unwholesome. We had to be extra careful and find Mary as soon as possible.
Tilt: You probably had to go back to the study of the documents discovered previously?
J.L.: Exactly. And more than anything, it was the old mechanical piano that intrigued me the most. Maguy told me that "the piano belonged to Mary and that it had been delivered by an Egyptian ship two years earlier." As for Anita, she confessed that Mary never wanted anyone to touch this instrument. Mary's distrust and the discovery of the scores in her hiding place proved to me its importance in solving the enigma. The mechanical piano offered a choice of fifteen pieces. Among them were the twelve titles on the list discovered at Mary's room. But two more important discoveries were going to put me on the trail. First, I discovered an ashtray, innocuous at first, which also belonged to Mary, as Maguy confirmed to me. This ashtray, the decorative element of the piano, took its place at the top left of the instrument. Second discovery, the foot of the piano rotated and sounded like a trigger in the device. All I had to do was operate the ashtray to open a secret compartment. In this cache, white sheets, and a sheet covered with characters. I suddenly understood: the piano was used to print secret messages, messages undoubtedly related to the drama i was trying to elucidate! Satisfied with this discovery, I replaced all the elements as I had found them.
Tilt: You then understood the mechanism of the piano, but without using it?
J.L.: No, but I was right to wait... The next day, while I was searching Roy's cabin, I was most surprised to find the coded sheet discovered the day before in the piano! So it was Roy who used the rigged instrument. Back in Mary's room, I found out that the bookcase had just been broken. A visit to Roy confirmed my suspicions: I discovered the stolen book, a chess manual titled "52 Chess Games".
Tilt: I don't see the relationship between chess and the piano?
J.L.: It only appeared to me after a few minutes of deep reflection. You see, the coded sheet in the piano had some bold letters. I counted these characters: they were 64, the exact number of squares on a chessboard! It couldn't be a coincidence... I reproduced a chessboard on a blank sheet, and then copied the 64 letters. Unfortunately, it was still unreadable. It took me one more element to understand how this complex code was handled. I noticed this element on the kitchen calendar. The numbers of all weeks of the year were hand-drawn, a total of 52. 52, like the 52 chess games detailed in the book. Add to that the 12 pieces of music on the list, such as the 12 months of the year. This time, I was getting to the point! I went to the living room as fast as I could. Strange, the piano pedal was now lowered. I put a coin in the instrument and chose the second piece from the list, since it was February, the second month of the year. I turned the foot of the piano to discover a printed sheet in the secret compartment!
Tilt: That you've decoded...
J.L.: Thanks to the chess book! I copied the bold characters on a blank chessboard. Then, since we were in the fifth week of the year, I opened the book to the fifth chess game. With each piece played, I copied the letter occupying the corresponding square on my chessboard. Finally, I got the following message: "Tribes need guns. The Lion." Remember the information collected in Anita's newspaper or in Chris' cabin folder. It was about the revolution in Ethiopia and the rebels of Menelik, aka the Lion. Everything became clear to me. The message was about a shipment of weapons bound for Asmera!
Tilt: This deduction was certainly famous, but did it allow you to unravel the secret of Mary's disappearance?
J.L.: No, but it was from this research that I started to direct my investigation. I had two clues in hand: Juste's medallion discovered at the northern beach after his death and, above all, a book found in the library and entitled "The Pirates". First of all, the medallion interested me for the simple reason that Mary had a similar one. The triangular jewel showed a skull surrounded by precious stones. It included the letter "V", probably the initial of Vargas. As for the book, it contained a message of the utmost importance. The text said "From the septentrion to the meridian, by the mooring, the monkey and the brothers of the coast, on the skull. Never go backwards. Then you will follow the way of the Zodiac as it is written." It was obvious, all the elements of this message related to Maupiti island. The monkey indicated the basin, the brothers of the coast the two Vargas brothers, the mooring the pier ... As for the septentrion and meridian, they referred to the north and south, the two beaches of the island. That's when I remembered the first message in Maguy's cave. The numbers on the wall offered a geometric design. I tried to make the two pieces of the puzzle coincide. As a result, each figure corresponded to one location: 4 and 2 for the northern and southern beaches, 1 for the pier, 3 for the basin, and 5 for the buildings. For the number 7, which corresponded to the skull, I later discovered that it was the well. By rereading the message of the Pirates, the ranking of the various places finally gave me the following code: 413572.
Tilt: Was it a combination?
J.L.: Exactly, and I soon discovered that it corresponded to the opening of Mary's case, the only object I had not yet been able to use. By pressing the stones of the case in turn, without ever changing the way (the text said "never go backwards"), the case finally revealed its secret to me... Inside, there was room for two medallions. On its lid, the signs of the zodiac. Everything worked perfectly, and I read the last words of the text: "After that, you will follow the way of the zodiac as it is written." I pressed the stones on the medallion, composing the code 54236. A click, a small rod just came out of the jewel! During my investigations in Mary's room, I had noticed in the aquarium a strange stone, marked with a skull. I had not paid attention to this object, which I thought was purely decorative. But later, as so many skulls appeared during this adventure, I returned to seize the stone. It turned out that this stone was set in a cavity at the top of the well. When I read the book of the Pirates, I made the connection.
Tilt: So the rest of the adventure took place in the well?
J.L.: Exactly, and I must admit that it took me a little while to discover the rope that allowed me to go down. It was simply hanging near the piano in the living room. I had passed in front of it many times, without seeing it! Finally, when I got to the bottom of the well at 4 p.m., during low tide, I knew that I was approaching the goal. There was still a little skull drawn. I pressed it and a gate opened on a narrow passage. At the end of the passage, a cave. The fountain I saw was flanked by two small stone shelves, marked with an I and a II respectively. In front of me, six fonts, three of whom were engraved with skulls. I remembered the message I had found previously: "3 deads weigh 2 deads and 5 deads 2 deads. The first is the second and the second the first. The iron turns under the sign of the pirates." Since three fonts were engraved with 3, 5 and 8 skulls respectively, I finally saw a way to apply the curious message. I had to make sure that the fonts 3 and 5 contained only two volumes of water. For this, the maneuver was simple. Thanks to the third font, I emptied two volumes in each of the first two fonts. Then I put the font n° 3 to the right of the fountain, the font n° 5 to the left. The medallion, which had taken the shape of a key, entered the ring, which I turned gently, as indicated at the end of the message "The iron turns under the sign of the pirates". A second cave, a message, the end of the riddle...
Tilt: Was Mary saved?
J.L.: Saved, no, but rather unmasked! All the suspicions I had about her were realized here. She was the Lady in Black. The one who shot Chris was none other than Mary... Mary, an unscrupulous woman, a woman who relied on Bob's love for her to carry out the trafficking that brought her fortune. As I had foreshadowed in her room, when I found some glass in the aquarium, she was the one who had staged her own abduction, she who now bears responsibility for two heinous crimes...
SOLUTION COURTE EN FRANÇAIS
En 1954, vous accostez sur l'île de Maupiti ou une jeune autochtone a mystérieusement disparue. Vous avez trente-six heures pour rencontrer tous les habitants de l'île, les interroger, trouver des indices, faire vos déductions et conclure votre enquête.Avant de vous révéler la solution de cette enquête, et étant donné que celle-ci est très courte, il sera bon d'écouter tous les témoignages des personnages, ainsi que de fouiller leurs chambres afin d'y trouver les indices qui vous permettrons de répondre aux questions posées à la fin de l'histoire.
LE COFFRET
Devant chez Maguy/ Choix sur écran. 1er étage, 2ème porte à droite. Tourner l'aquarium. Fouiller le trou. Toucher le 4ème bouton. Toucher le 5ème bouton. Toucher le 3ème bouton. Toucher le 3ème bouton. Toucher le 5ème bouton. Toucher le 2ème bouton. Prendre le coffret. Stop. Fouiller l'aquarium. Suite. Suite. Prendre la pierre. Stop. Dehors. Choix sur écran. Au salon. Prendre la corde à gauche du piano. A l'embarcadère. Choix sur écran. Sur la cabine du bateau de droite. Choix sur écran. 1ère porte à gauche. Vous avez quartier libre jusqu'à 3 heures du matin.
LE MÉDAILLON
A l'embarcadère. Devant chez Juste. La plage Nord. Fouiller la nasse près du rocher au milieu. Suite. Suite. Suite. De gauche à droite, toucher le bouton 1, toucher le bouton 5, toucher le bouton 4, toucher le bouton 2, toucher le bouton 3, toucher le bouton 6. Prendre le médaillon. Au puits. Prendre la pierre dans l'inventaire. Mettre la pierre sur le trou en bas du puits. Prendre la corde dans l'inventaire. Mettre la corde sur l'arbre derrière le puits. A l'embarcadère. Choix sur écran. Sur la cabine du bateau de droite. Choix sur écran. Vous avez quartier libre jusqu'à 4 heures 45.
LES BÉNITIERS
A l'embarcadère. Au puits. A 4 heures précise, entrer dans le puits. Pousser la pierre à droite de la porte. Entrer par le passage. Examiner les 3 bénitiers (celui à 3 têtes = B3, celui à 5 têtes = B5, celui à 8 têtes = B8). Tourner B3. Prendre B5. Mettre B5 dans B3. Mettre B5 dans le bénitier de gauche surmonté d'un "I". Tourner B3. Prendre B8. Mettre B8 dans B3. Mettre B3 dans le bénitier de droite surmontée d'un "II". Prendre le médaillon dans l'inventaire. Mettre le médaillon dans le trou. Tourner le médaillon.
LES QUESTIONS
1 - Qui est Anna : Une révolutionnaire
2 - Avec qui était Anton dans la nuit du 31 au 1er : Sue
3 - Mis à part son assassin qui est la dernière personne à avoir vue Juste vivant : Anita
4 - Qui a enlevé Marie : Personne
5 - Qui est la dame en noir : Marie
6 - Quelle est son activité : Trafic d'armes
7 - Où sont livrés les armes : A basméra
8 - Qui a tué Juste : Roy
9 - Le mobile : La perruque
10 - A qui était la perruque : Lucie
11 - Qu'est devenue Lucie : Morte
12 - Qui était Lucie : Autre
13 - La cible des coups de feu : Chris
14 - De quel endroit de la plage sud Aston a-t-il tiré : Les arbres
15 - Qui à forcé la bibliothèque : Roy
16 - Que cherchait-il : Le livre
17 - Pour quoi faire : Décoder le message
18 - Reçu par qui : Le piano
19 - Qui est Ménélic : Le vent