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This week, we arrive at the twenty-first and last of the Roger M. Wilcox adventure games, a science fiction story fittingly titled The Last City.  It was written in 1983 for the TRS-80 and ported to the IBM PC several years later, which is why it remains the authors best-known game -- the PC port was well-circulated and even spawned some additional conversions.  In 2001, Wilcox brought The Last City to Windows, and for the sake of consistency with the rest of his rediscovered library, well be playing that version here.


If you consider yourself an old-school adventure gamer, you really owe it to yourself to go check out the Wilcox archives.  These nearly-lost games are completely in the tradition of the Scott Adams adventures by which they were inspired -- all of them are interesting and a few of them are really, really good.  As always, though, its at your discretion -- Im happy to document the experience for historys sake, and to that end, there shall be myriad...

***** SPOILERS AHEAD! *****


We begin in a suitably post-apocalyptic setting -- the rubble-strewn remains of an east/west freeway, with nothing at all in inventory.  We are informed by a brief introduction that human technology was eventually surpassed by magic, and it proved our downfall.  We are now on a quest to rescue the last of human technology.

We cant even GET RUBBLE here, so lets explore the area a bit.  A seemingly endless desert borders the freeway on the north side, but we have nothing available to help us map the area, so well come back later.  South lies instant death in a magically-contaminated wasteland (though when this happened, I was actually able to continue playing after death -- the What now? prompt is visibly disabled, but we can still type blind and our commands will be processed.  This was in the 09/11/2013 build, and past experience suggests that Mr. Wilcox will fix the bug soon after he reads this!)

Sticking to the freeway route, we find the remains of an ancient boulevard to the east, leading to the edge of a gigantic domed city we cant enter via this path.  More interesting is a pawn shop on the north side of the street, where we can acquire a Small advanced device (with five button), Fulcrum, Plank, Sand shovel, and a Pick and pitons (for climbing, most likely.)

We have enough stuff now to facilitate mapping the desert, and... well, as it turns out, theres only the one room after all!  But we can DIG here with the sand shovel to find a Dirt shovel (such specialized hardware!) and a Key if we dig some more.

The freeway loops back on itself to the west, so theres nothing to explore out there.  Can we use the device to protect against the magic contamination?  PUSH ONE doesnt do much, nor does PUSH FIVE or anything in between.

I couldnt resist cheating a bit here, using my unexpected life-after-death powers to cross through the fatal wasteland and reach the foot of an ancient-looking castle, complete with a moat and a Raised drawbridge, with a picture of a half-donut on it.  Hmmmm.  Im probably here too early.  And slightly hungry now.  At any rate, Ive been exploring and experimenting quite a bit, and I begin getting these time-out warnings: "Magical premonition: city will cease to exist in 39 turns."  So there is some time pressure to deal with here.


So what can we do?  The concrete rubble on the freeway is in chunks too big to lift -- with the fulcrum and plank, though, we can MAKE LEVER, and USE LEVER to turn one chunk into a Levered-up concrete block.  EXAMINE BLOCK reveals that Underneath its only dirt, so the dirt shovel comes in handy as we DIG to find a Parchment.  It reads: "As our world crumbles down, the future I see: To go in is five-four, to go out is five-three!"  This sounds very useful indeed, but now the timer has gone to zero, and even though Im not-quite-dead, the game is truly over; I can still make moves, but the screen keeps flashing and none of my moves register, probably because The last city of humankind has been destroyed!  The human race is forever lost to the cosmos.  So its time to start over, reset the end-of-game timer, and see if I can play honestly this time.

On the second go, I confirm that the parchment speaks truth -- we PUSH FIVE and PUSH FOUR at the edge of the city, and we are transported inside the dome among Light human traffic.  (The layout inside the dome is a little awkward to visualize, as the dome curves around but we can only navigate in cardinal directions, so mapping is very valuable here.)  East of our entry point is City Hall, where a Perpetual lamp is available.

To the southwest, at the south edge of the city, is a cover we can open, revealing a passage downward.  We travel down a metal ladder to an area with horizontal pipes and a Half-donut, which suggests it has something to do with the castle... that, um, I havent visited yet.

Near the north edge is the citys central tower, a monolith of sandstone that rises all the way up to the dome.  We can CLIMB the TOWER (using the pick and pitons, one presumes) to approach a Circular ceiling hatch, which is sealed and resists attempts to open it or break it for the moment.

Toward the east edge of the dome is an unused part of the city where various magic items are available -- examination establishes that one of the wands could be made operational, so we should GET WAND; It looks like it needs to be recharged.  (We have a seven-item inventory limit, so some discarding becomes necessary along the way, but most items have obvious and limited uses so its not necessary to juggle too much.)

We can also PUSH FIVE, PUSH THREE at the east edge of the city to teleport through the eastern wall of the dome, where we find ourselves in a secluded rock formation.  Theres nothing else of note here, but LOOK ROCKS reveals a Magic stone, which radiates a strong aura of protection. 

Finishing our urban exploration, we learn that using the device to teleport through the north and south walls of the dome sends us straight into solid granite or off the edge of a cliff, fatally so in both cases.  Theres also a botanical section near the center of town, where hydroponics and potted flowers abound.  We cant seem to do anything with them, though, unless theres some subtle joke about the magic stone afoot here.

The stone allows us to pass through the magical wasteland safely, as expected.  At the castle, legitimately this time, we can THROW DONUT -- the two symbols combine and vanish, and the drawbridge opens.  Inside the foyer, a sign reads, "GO NO FURTHER."  But wed be poor adventurers if we didnt go yes further anyway, to reach the castles main audience chamber, where a Steel door and some Royal paraphernalia reside (to use with our magic stone hydroponics, no doubt.).  We can visit the royal quarters and try to GO BED -- No time for that now! Youve got to save the city! -- and GO TOILET -- Thanks. I needed that.  Giving in to the temptation to LOOK TOILET reveals that There seems to be a passage behind it!  And we can go D to find an underground storage chamber, containing a Small plastic explosive (and, in a nice touch from the author, revealing that the castle is mostly illusion, as the reality distortion fades out a bit here, revealing the chamber to be conventional plastic of a decidedly non-royal character.)

Trying to USE EXPLOSIVE suggests that we need something at least as hot as a spark.  We can CHARGE WAND in the magical wasteland, where the contamination provides a power source, and discover that USE WAND creates a small lightning bolt, but it only holds one charge, so well have to save it for setting off the explosive.  Dropping the explosive near the sealed hatch and setting it off -- the most likely thing to try, it seemed to me -- opens up a passage into the dome.

On top of the dome, we find a Laser cutter -- surely the last piece of human technology we have been seeking?  But the plot has drifted slightly from its original stated premise, and the game isnt over yet -- we have to return to the castle and USE LASER to cut a hole in the steel door.

We now find ourselves in an unconceiled [sic] missile control room in front of a Humongous control console.  Aha!  This syncs up with the magical premonition -- theres a "Countdown at T minus 26 turns, and counting" displayed as I arrive here, while the premonition is also reporting in, saying that the city will cease to exist in 26 turns.  Can we stop the missile?  Theres a black "SPEED LAUNCH" button, and an unlabelled red button.  Launching it didnt seem like the best option, so I decided to PUSH RED, causing the missile to detonate in its silo without launching, but still taking the city... and the player... with it.  So thats not the solution.

On the third try, we try what seems to be left to try, and aha!  We have to PUSH BLACK to launch the missile ahead of schedule, at which point we have one move available to PUSH RED and blow it up in mid-air.  Victory is ours, and a cheering crowd arrives to celebrate the brush with annihilation so cleverly instigated and then narrowly averted by the player!





Roger M. Wilcox considers The Last City to be the best of his twenty-one games, and its a good one -- well-designed and not too cryptic, with sensible puzzles and a plot that develops quite nicely without being overtly spelled out.  Its been a pleasure working my way through this series during the past year, and Im really glad these vintage adventures have been unearthed and re-released so long after they were created.  Theres one more game that owes its existence to the Wilcox family, however, and Im sure well be taking a look at it soon.

It took me a while to track down Greg Hassetts The House of Seven Gables adventure for the TRS-80 -- some online archives have what appears to be a machine-language version, but that game is actually Bill Millers House of Thirty Gables, in a very different style from Hassetts games.  Like Millers game, this one bears remarkably little resemblance to the classic Nathaniel Hawthorne novel, House of the Seven Gables, aside from the fact that the house that serves as the games setting does indeed feature a number of gables.  I knew this was the right code as soon as I saw the title screen: 




Like most of Hassetts early adventure games, this one is written in BASIC and has a rather limited vocabulary.  It still performs pretty well, and its fun to play, if a little obtuse when it comes to scoring.  The game seems to be introductory in nature, given the copious hints available within the game itself; the source code was published in the Captain 80 Book of BASIC Adventures.  A version also exists for the Commodore 64.

As always, I encourage interested readers to try The House of Seven Gables before proceeding below.  Its a treasure hunt set in a mysterious house, and its not a hard game to finish, really, though earning all of the points can be a challenge.  Beyond this point, in the interest of documenting my experience with this game, for those who have already played it or may never get to do so, be advised that there are comprehensive...

***** SPOILERS AHEAD! *****



The story begins outside of a house with, naturally, seven gables.  Theres a doorbell and a compass we can take with us.  We cant TAKE COMPASS, but we can GET COMPASS, and we cant look at it, examine it, or read it.  So it may not be very useful, except that -- aha! -- we cant maneuver anywhere without it -- no exits are displayed, so we do need to keep it in hand.  Most adventure games take directional navigation for granted, so young Mr. Hassett deserves credit for turning this into a minor puzzle.

The game is very player-friendly -- if we try to go S, we are told THE DOOR IS LOCKED. I THINK I CAN GET BY IT, THOUGH.  And if we try and fail to OPEN DOOR, then we learn that MAYBE THESE PEOPLE (?) ARE FRIENDLY, SO TRY RINGING THE BELL.

Upon RINGing the BELL, we are swept inside and the entrance vanishes.  We are in a living room, with no objects visible, and can explore to the south, east and west.  The Dining Room contains an empty bucket and some silver candlesticks.  We dont seem to gain any SCORE points after we get the candlesticks, so maybe they are not a treasure.

The kitchen contains SOME FRESH GARLIC, a BANANA, and a SINK WITH A WORKING SPICKET [sic].  Mr. Hassetts spelling was often... inventive.  The spelling is the same in the listing in the Captain 80 book, although there the text is in mixed-case unlike this version; it may have been typed in by a TRS-80 owner without an uppercase kit installed, like many of us back in the day.

A door east of the dining room has no doorknob or keyhole, but again it is suggested that we can get by it.  KNOCK DOOR doesnt do the trick, though.  And HIT DOOR returns I DONT WANT TO HIT THE DOO.  Neither do I, sorry for suggesting it!

The Guest Room right off of the living room leads to the first and second gables.  Theres a BLACK CAT at the second -- if we try to GET him, he vanishes, SAYING "I WILL RETURN..."

South of the living room, in a dark closet, A HOLLOW VOICE SAYS: MIX THEM.  This is yet another early adventure game influenced by Scott Adams approach.

Downstairs is a long east/west hallway.  At the east end is DRACULAS CHAMBER.  We can try to OPEN COFFIN, but THE VAMPIRE WONT LET ME!  Hes listed as a MEAN LOOKING VAMPIRE, to boot.  Why arent there ever any friendly vampires in these games?

The Barren Library contains a BOOK TITLED PRIMEVAL WITCHCRAFT; I dont think that word means what Mr. Hassett thinks it means.  The book is very short, reading NOTTUB SSERP, or PRESS BUTTON backwards.  But theres no button in the library.

This sort of thing occurs at random:



Ahem.  After self-consciously checking my attire, theres only one turn before THE GHOUL KILLS ME!  This was the first death I ran into; restoring, I made it past that room with no ghoul appearing, and found my way to a DUNGION [sic] where A CRUDE NOTE ON THE WALL READS: YOU CANT GET OUT WITHOUT KILLING ME FIRST! -- WITCHY-POO.  No wonder the Bay City Rollers couldnt get out of their Saturday morning contract with the Krofft brothers!  This isnt actually true, at least if we take it at face value, as while most paths return to this same location, we can just go S to exit the dungeon.  The dungeon entrance doesnt really lead to a maze, it seems, but theres a real maze nearby, also at the west end of the hallway, containing an AXE.

Randomly during our explorations, we may see that A GHOST POPS OUT AND SAYS: THROW ME SOME TREASURE!  Hell accept our gift if we THROW CANDLESTICKS, so apparently scoring is just deferred; clearly, we should avoid this situation if possible so we can earn all the available points.

The hallway maze leads to a MAD SCIENTISTS LABORATORY where we can pick up some chemicals.  Presumably these are what we want to mix.  If we MIX CHEMICALS they turn into AN ORANGE BUBBLING LIQUID.  We can FILL BUCKET with water using the kitchens spicket [sic], though this doesnt seem to be necessary for working with the chemicals.  And when we run into the GHOUL we can THROW CHEMICALS so that THE GHOUL MELTS TO NOTHING.  But eventually it comes back.  Fortunately, the chemicals also remain intact, we can just pick them up each time and reuse them later.

I did run into a small bug -- at a couple of points I tried to GET AXE after finding or dropping it, and was told I couldnt carry any more; but after an INV check, I was able to; some counter must get cleaned up when we take a look at our inventory.

Returning to the interior locked door with the axe, we cant SMASH DOOR but we can CHOP DOOR so that THE DOOR IS CHOPPED TO PEICES [sic].  This leads to a staircase, with A BEAUTIFUL ROSE at the top.  Theres also a BROOM CLOSET, with some VALUABLE RECIPIES [sic] written IN WITCHISH.

The sixth gable contains a PAPER AIRPLANE; the third, a TEST TUBE OF FLUID (which is neither a TEST TUBE nor a TUBE, but FLUID per the games dictionary.)

Another hallway south of a DILAPIDATED BEDROOM leads to a MAMOTH [sic] ART GALLERY where we can pick up a PRICELESS REMBRANT [sic].

At the eastern end of the hallway is A ROOM WITH A PEDESTAL IN THE MIDDLE, and we can see a button atop the pedestal.  Even if we havent read the book in the library, its tempting to PRESS BUTTON here (actually, PUSH BUTTON doesnt work so the books clue is actually kind of helpful). 

This leads to the WITCHS CHAMBER, where an UGLY WITCH has a POT OF WITCHES BREW, in case there was any question; where the other witches are who are apparently responsible for the brew remains an open question.  The Books of Oz tell us what to do - THROW WATER and THE WITCH HAS VANISHED! HER HAT REMAINS.

With the witchs hat in hand, we can return to the LIVING ROOM.  And the entrance door has been reopened, so we can just go N.  And suddenly, weve won!  (So thats what the witchs note meant.  Odd of her to invite her own death that way.)



Except... I havent done very well scorewise -- yes, that is actually a negative 70 points -- and theres no opportunity to continue.  It looks like we need to ignore the red herrings, and carry as many treasures as possible out the door as we take our one shot at exiting.  Basically, it appears we need to grab the compass, fill the bucket, mix the chemicals, kill the witch, collect all the valuable treasures and leave the house.

So what puzzles remain to be solved?  There are a number of objects we havent experimented with yet.

We can EAT BANANA to be left with a BANANA PEEL.  It looks like a slip-and-fall may be in someones future. But whose?  Random ghoul appearances continue to be a pain, as the creature can arrive long before we have an opportunity to acquire the chemicals.


We can SHOW GARLIC to send the vampire scurrying off, and claim a SULTONS [sic] DAGGER from his coffin.  He shows up again at the top of the stairs, at which point we need to STAB VAMPIRE so that he dies and vanishes; why he was keeping this dangerous dagger in his own bed is another unanswerable question.

I also notice that my once-SHINY COMPASS has become A TARNISHED OLD COMPASS while playing, though this seems to have no bearing on our score at the end of the game.

The ghost will eventually kill us if we dont throw him a treasure when he demands it; I didnt find any solution to this, we just have to be quick about our business and hope the random number generator looks kindly upon us.

We can UNFOLD AIRPLANE to turn the paper airplane into A PIECE OF PAPER WITH WRITING ON IT.  It reads: "REMEMBER THE WIZARD OF OZ."  So weve already figured that out.

Down from the pedestal room is the Seventh Gable, with a DIAMOND in it; I had just missed exploring that direction, after seeing the button on the pedestal.  The WITCHY-POO note room is still not a maze, just a room whose exits all lead back to itself; it does not change state after the witch is dead, so the note refers only to our ability to leave the house itself.

It seems that if we are not efficient, our score drops dramatically.  I was down to -595 points at one point, and dropping by 25 points per turn!  I wish I knew what the object of the game was, or had some way to determine which items were the critical treasures!

Fortunately, Dorothys walkthrough at CASA indicates that the AXE, HAT, REMBRANDT, ROSE, RECIPES and DIAMOND are the treasures, and that we dont need to carry them with us -- just drop them in the living room before we escape the house.  So playing quickly, we can pick up all the valuables and escape to a proper victory:




The House of Seven Gables is not a particularly difficult game; the biggest complications stem from all the red herrings (I never did find anything useful to do with the black cat) and a few random unsolvable situations that can present themselves at inopportune times.  Im slowly working my way through the Greg Hassett oeuvre, and I enjoyed this one.

Raven Journal Entry 2: “I’ve found three of these blasted Vort Skulls, and feel like it’s only a matter of time before the last two are in my possession. There are some strange creatures in this temple, with unknown motives, including a Spider Mistress that appeared to want to copulate with me and a massive beast living submerged in acid! At least the other aspirants’ motives are clear, and I made the most of one by trading items, giving myself the opportunity to proceed. I can write no longer, as I have very little time to complete the ordeals. Sci Fi’s life depends on my success!”


At the end of my first gameplay post for Chamber of the Sci-Mutant Priestess, I’d just managed to unlock the door labelled Who Will Be Saved? by giving the serpents in The Twins some drink and “food”. On entering the newly accessible room, I found myself staring at seven hands reaching out of the ground, with a sliding panel and yet another serpent head on the wall. On inspecting the serpent’s head, I was informed that it appeared to be mobile, and that there was some sort of inscription. It read “the passerby saves some, then makes his choice known to the sliding one’s head.” I tried pulling up one of the hands and found that this did pull it out of the ground by some distance, although nothing seemed to happen when I did so. I assumed there must be some order or pattern to which hands I should pull, but which ones?


I reread the inscription. Did I need to choose whichever ones I wanted and then “make the choice known to the sliding one’s head”? Was the sliding one’s head the sliding panel on the wall? I tried interacting with the sliding panel, but I didn’t really get anywhere. I did however find I could push the serpent’s head, and was told that I could “hear a noise coming from the fountain room”. Would I find a hint to the hands puzzle in the fountain room now? I was prepared to go and find out, but I thought I would see what Gauss had to say before I did so. I clicked the Tune In icon and Gauss told me that “the die nose witch wunz to pullup” (the die knows which ones to pullup). The die? You mean the die I just put in the serpent’s mouth to open the door to Who Will Be Saved?


How could the die tell me anything? I recalled that when I rolled the die, it always came up with the number two, but pulling the second hand up didn’t do anything. I had no idea how to inform the sliding panel of my choice either, so I left the room and headed back over to The Source (where the fountain was). Nothing looked different in The Source, but pressing the serpent’s head must have shifted something. When I moved the cursor over the plaque at the front of the room, I now found that there were six cubes, marked Cube 1 through to Cube 6. I have to say that it’s pretty odd for a game like this, even one made in 1989, to not show any visual representation of items on screen. Why would I think to recheck the plaque when it looks exactly the same as it did before?


Interestingly, when I inspected each of the cubes, I was informed of different shapes atop each one. A circle, a triangle, a star, a cross, a square and wavy lines respectively! I hadn’t really noticed anything that might hint as to which one to open, but thankfully I saved my game before making any attempts. I chose to lift the first cube, and was poisoned, ending my game before I had any chance to try any of the others. I reloaded and tried the second cube instead. “You find a skull inside.” Winner! Was it possible that the number 2 that kept coming up when I threw the dice was the hint? At first I assumed so, but on subsequent play throughs (I’ve had to play through numerous times due to running out of time), I’ve now found that the cube with the skull in it is random.


I have to be honest and say that I have no idea what Who Will Be Saved? is all about, and have no idea how to logically figure out which cube holds the skull, but since finding the skull makes The Twins and Who Will Be Saved? inaccessible, I can only assume that the skull was the only thing I needed in this section. Either that or I’m dead-ended already! Regardless, I had the first of five skulls, and was able to make my way back out to the starting area by clicking the arrow at the bottom of the screen. I’d kind of hoped that I would receive one of the other three items (dagger, rope, fly) while I was getting the first skull, as I’d assumed I would need one particular item to pass each ordeal, and that by doing so would reveal another. Was I supposed to get an item by solving the Who Will Be Saved? puzzle? All I could do was push onto the other rooms and see what would happen!




By the time I’d figured out how to get the Vort Skull from The Twins part of the temple, I’d well and truly used up my hour. I therefore had no choice but to restart, get a new item, and go wherever it led me. The next item I got was the rope, which would apparently be useful in the room titled De Profundis. As usual, I was immediately transported to that room, where I was met by a rather horrific beast in a pool of acid. I had to click the left mouse button to continue and as soon as I did, the beast sank beneath the deadly liquid, leaving me to ponder how I was going to reach the doorway on the other side of it. Gauss’ hint was “hole don” (hold on), but I could see nothing to hold onto. I sensibly saved my game, which was just as well, as even clicking on the door made the platform I was standing on sink a little bit into the acid. A vertical column did come down from the ceiling though, which looked like a perfect thing to hold onto!


My first thought was that the rope would likely help in this instance, but since I’d begun to doubt whether I would be able to discover all the required items in one play through (I’m only going to be given one each time I play), I thought I’d try to get across without using it. Any incorrect move and I sank into the acid, forcing me to reload, but I quickly found the solution was to use the Sticky Fingers sci power, which allowed me to climb up to the ceiling and hang onto the column. As usual though, I was merely informed that I was hanging on, and nothing actually changed onscreen. I then used the Wait icon until the beast re-emerged, before selecting to “jump onto it”. He took me across the acid to the door on the other side, where I was informed that a skull was just waiting for me. Well that was a heck of a lot easier than the first one!




On exiting De Profundis, I found myself back in The Ring, and was pleasantly surprised to discover a fellow Five Ordeals aspirant asking me whether I wanted to trade items. I happily traded in my rope for his fly, and since I’d wasted very little time collecting the second skull, didn’t have to start over this time before venturing on. I was really happy to learn of this trading option, and felt much more confident in being able to solve the five ordeals within the same play through if this feature was available multiple times. I knew from a previous beginning that the fly would be useful in the room called The Scorpion’s Presence, so that’s where I went next.


The scorpion turned out to be a statue, or at least that’s how it initially appeared. Talking to it caused it to respond with “I am mastel of scolpions. How hungly I am!” Clearly this master or scorpions had a bit of trouble with the English language, but it wasn’t difficult to translate. Further conversation resulted in “I desile my dinnel. Go see hel, and folget not hel plesent!” Who was this “her” and what “present” would she want? What dinner could I offer the master of scorpions? I immediately thought of the fly, and after saving my game, put it into the mouth that was situated towards its base. Nothing at all happened, causing me to believe that wasn’t the right thing to do, so I restored.


The only other things of interest in the room were two engravings, the first of which was a spider that offered nothing more than “very webbish” when inspected. The other engraving on the wall increased in size when I inspected it, but even at a larger size, it didn’t really show me anything that meant anything to me just yet. It had what appeared to be a man beneath a sun, moon and star, pointing out a Saturn-like planet to an infant (well that’s my take on it anyway). With nothing else to do, I went through the door beneath the spider, assuming whoever this female character was would be found within. I was right!


The Web seemed like a pretty nasty place to be. Cobwebs all over the floor, spiders everywhere, and the Spider Mistress beckoning me closer! But as soon as I figured out how to get past the cobwebs without getting caught (I had to crawl before moving forward), I realised she didn’t necessarily want me for food. This hideous monster wanted me for sex, firstly requesting a kiss after I gave her the fly, before demanding we make “passionate love” once I agreed. As you might expect, none of these creepy exchanges of bodily fluid led to anything positive, and I eventually figured out I could simply refuse her advances without lowering my chances of survival. The Spider Mistress offered me one of two spiders, with one being red and the other blue.


Clearly, choosing the correct spider was a test, and interestingly it was the spiders themselves that gave me a hint of its solution. The red one said “you think of evelything, as Khele would say”, to which the blue one responded with “Dear Khele! He loves what he can’t pronounce!” It didn’t take me long to figure out which spider I was supposed to choose. Khele was obviously the Scorpion Master, since he was the only character that always replaced R’s with L’s. Out of the two spider colours, the one that he wouldn’t be able to pronounce was “red”, which he would have pronounced “led”. I therefore surmised that the spider he would want to eat would be the red one. However, since I had to choose the one to feed the fly, and the other one would be mine, I needed to select the blue spider.


Blue was the correct answer, and I took the spider to Khele and placed it into the mouth towards the bottom of the statue. Rather oddly, the little door at the base opened up revealing an “upside down character”, which was Khele. I couldn’t do anything apart from entering the statue alongside him, within which I found the third skull and then suddenly found myself back in The Ring, apparently having gone through another door on the inside of the statue. That’s three skulls down, with two to go before I can become a Divo! I assume the two remaining skulls can be found in the rooms called The Noose and The Wall, but I haven’t yet explored them apart from a quick peek. I still have no idea whether retrieving the skulls is all I need to do in each section, and there are a few puzzles I failed to solve (the hands, the engraving etc.). I guess Ill ignore them unless I get stuck down the track!

Total Time: 2 hours 00 minutes