Waxworks – Won!

Bernard Rinaldi’s Journal: So my recent career success has come to a stop. My supervisor is sending me to this remote mine in the middle of nowhere so I can make a safety report. Yeah, sure. A safety report about an abandoned mine that no one cares about. And don’t get me started with those supposed reports we have been receiving saying it is operative again. That makes no sense. But I will endure. I will go there, write my report, maybe kill my evil twin and go back to show him that I can carry any job he sends my way. Wait, what twin?

Attack of the killer lettuces!

So… real life got in the way. I don’t know if this happens in other countries but in Spain we usually have lots and lots of Christmas dinners with friends and coworkers before the actual Christmas and it also usually coincides with deadlines to finish that year’s projects. So I had to let the game wait for a while. And it was a pity, because The Mines, the last waxwork left, is not very long, and not very difficult once you notice a few things and find the most important location in the map. Without that, it is pretty frustrating and infuriating and I can only hope I can convey my pain and desire to kill the designers through my writing.

Try to find the screwdriver in the image

The only way ahead is going east, following some rails to find our first enemy, a mutant with a very long tongue with teeth. Here, allow me to fuel your nightmares.

You are welcome!

I have to say I really like the graphical design of this level. The monsters are quite nightmarish and frightening, the walls of the mine don’t get too confusing or boring and there is some variety in the traps that is quite nice. I must stress that I am talking about the graphics only, because mechanically, it is not that different from other levels. In any case, I managed to quickly kill the mutant with the screwdriver without even getting a hit. Exploration of the tunnel soon made me find some suspicious moving vines from the ceiling in a side tunnel to the north. Those are the traps in this level. Clicking on them showed me the option of looking at them or to try to cut them, but that option simply says that whenever I try to approach them they simply move away and then retaliate by trying to grab my arm. Extremely friendly for my tastes.

It is at this point that I started to notice some plants growing in the walls, like tentacles extending towards the elevator. I tried to keep moving east until I got to a crossroad. The north path ended just a few steps away, so I decided to explore the south path until I reached a corner with a strange looking plant the game called a pod. This is another of the traps of this level, as crossing a square with a pod makes it release poisonous gas and kill us.

And that’s why I think Apple tried to end humanity with their iPod…

I think this is definitely the goriest level, even worse than the graveyard, and you can see why at the end in the death round section. I will only say however, that these traps are quite more fair than the freaking wires in the pyramid, or the teleporting policemen/mobs in London. Seeing as the game didn’t want me to continue there I kept going east along the rails only to find another path blocked by a pod, and it I could see some vines behind. Another no, no. I kept going east and suddenly I saw a rail truck heading full speed towards me. Or what this game understands for full speed which means I could probably have ran to the beginning of the level and back before it had moved a single square.

When I was doing some reading for the introduction, one thing in common in some of them was mentioning how this was one of the few dead ends in the game, as you have to stop the rail truck with a pit drop before it reaches the elevator or otherwise you get stuck and unable to finish the level. Knowing that, I had nowhere to go at the moment. I was missing something and that something is a chemical sprayer located in the elevator but that you can only see if you step out of the elevator and look back.

I hate you, game. I hate you

The chemical sprayer contains some fungicide that can kill spores, pods and mutants instantaneously and is basically the best/only weapon worth that name in the level. Why? Because mutants are really hard. Seriously, I don’t know if I was lucky with the first one or what, but when I unblocked the first path north and met some more mutants it was very hard to kill them without losing too much hp. You see, you keep missing all the time while trying to hit them. Thrusting does next to nothing in terms of damage and the only other option is swinging over and over. I was killed by the mutants in that north section several times, as I didn’t want to waste my precious fungicide.

In the end, I spent quite some time fighting the tongue mutant at XX until I got him in a few swings and I found a rusty pickaxe just behind which I started to use as a weapon. And I think it is even worse than the screwdriver and it misses a lot more and is very slow. And I had plenty of opportunity, as the mutant marked as M2 is an even tougher enemy than the tongue mutant. This one is faceless and shoots some white liquid from his fingertips. Luckily, these enemies don’t seem able to make corners if you don’t give them time to move so I simply skipped him to find a pod, and behind it yet another mutant. This one had one gigantic eye and claws instead of fingertips and was the toughest of the three to kill as he was quite fast dealing blows.

Kind of reminds me of Darkseed, only more greenish than brownish

Seeing that was getting me nowhere, I restored and decided to go south at the crossroads, kill the pod and meet yet another mutant guarding the famous pit prop that would allow me to block the rail truck. So after dying quite a few times I decided to start spraying like there is no tomorrow and see how far I could go. That allowed me to find some kind of storage behind a metal grill, closed with a lock which I could do nothing about at the moment.

I restored to just after getting the pit prop to save a charge and went to stop the rail truck just before blocking passage to another path leading south. Once the rail truck stopped I was able to look inside to find a metal bar, which I think is better than either the pickaxe or the screwdriver. The path itself presented a new kind of pod that shoots spines. Another fancy way of presenting the same trap disguised as a new one. This path leads to some very interesting locations. The first one is a passage where the mine starts to go dark. There is a pod hidden there and afterwards the corpse of a miner with a drill. Then we have a plant holding a welding torch and the corpse of an electrician, with a toolbox and a handkerchief.

It’s tool time!!

Going back to the first path to the north, I discovered the corpse of a welder, with a welder mask and a gas bottle. I continued exploring that way and found a burnt pit drop, which I was able to scrape to get some charcoal, next to an alcove with a shovel, which is as bad a weapon as the pickaxe. At this point, I was quite worried as I started to get a message saying I was close to empty in my sprayer and close to no HP from trying to avoid that situation by fighting the enemies on close combat. By the way, if you are wondering why I was not consulting old uncle Boris for help is because he offers no help at all. Apparently, the mine is far from a ley line and he can’t help. How fortuitous!

I kept going ahead but only found an old generator next to another mutant that I was starting to fear I could not kill for fear of not having a substitute for the sprayer. Going back to a path leading south, I met another mutant that I chose to avoid. Without having found any effective weapon to replace the extinguishing sprayer I then decided to go back to the grilled storage room and see what was inside, now having a full welding equipment ready to cut the lock. Inside I found two protective suits, three gas masks, and four bottles, two empty and two with gasoline and and cloth, so basically a Molotov cocktail. While taking these last bottles something curious happened, as I accidentally dragged one of them over the sprayer and it got filled with gasoline, effectively transforming it into a flamethrower.

I put on one of the protective suits and one mask, but closer examination of the mask warned me that it didn’t have a filter. I tried to put the handkerchief inside, but the game told me it was not enough and then I had the idea of rubbing the charcoal against the handkerchief to finally get a working gas mask, which allowed me to bypass the remaining pod in the map without wasting ammo. I was tempted of reloading to start the level again and save some ammo by getting the gas earlier but looking at the map, you pretty much have to kill most of the pods to get all the needed items.

Not sure a safety inspector would recommend the gas masks to be so far from the entrance…

In any case, now I had some more ammo for my sprayer, so it was time to go back to the north section and see if I could complete the level. Killing the mutant next to the generator allowed me to take a closer look at it. I couldn’t do much but to remove a screw and make gasoline pour out of the generator. I was able to fill up the sprayer, the drill and two of the bottles before the gasoline ran out.

So, fully confident now I could probably kill anything in my way, I kept going ahead until I found another grilled storage alcove full of dynamite and a detonator. Then I reached another alcove with four prisoners, with varying degrees of mutation. The one most human is a female medic which was kidnapped from a nearby village and that agreed to help me with the man in the elevator as long as I provide her with some medical equipment I had yet to find. She also explained that the mutants force them to drink the potion everyday, gradually transforming them into the monstrosities I found in the mine.

Aren’t you worried about the mutant sitting over the left?

Next to her, I found a soldier that was keen on destroying the whole mine if I could provide him with some equipment. That is a protective suit, a gas mask, eight barrels of dynamite, a detonator, some electric wiring, a drill and a drill point. I tried to offer him the mask but he didn’t feel confident without a working filter, which either meant I had to give him mine or make another filter for another mask. The third guy is an electrician, almost converted to a mutant who simply asks me to find the professor to get the antidote for the potion, meaning that the guy at the elevator is the professor. The last one is completely mutated and although the conversation starts with him thinking I am his master, he soon realises his error and calls for guards, summoning two mutants just outside the alcove. Not a problem for the sprayer.

Following the path south led me to the rails again. And it was at this time that looking at the map and my inventory I suddenly realized I had dead ended myself with the rail truck even in spite of knowing that it could be a dead end. Yes, I had blocked myself from the rest of the level by stopping the rail track just before the last path going south. I almost considered quitting right there at that moment. In fact, I did stop that session to grab something to eat, watch an episode of Flash and rest for a while before returning.

Lucky for me, now knowing the layout of the map, where the enemies are and reappear and that the sprayer I was much more efficient with my exploring. Especially because I discovered that you can put the screw back on the generator to avoid it from leaking all the fuel. So I redid everything almost exactly the same except for three things. The first one is that I stopped the rail truck just before the third path going north, so I could use the northern branch to go forth and back. The second one is that knowing I would need two filters, I tried scraping twice the burnt pit prop and it worked, so I was only missing another handkerchief. The third one is that I found the drill point next to the driller corpse inside a hole in the south wall, which I would have probably dismissed if I hadn’t known I was missing that part.

Because who doesn’t want to search for things in the dark?

The new path behind the rail truck led me to find the corpse of a medic with medical supplies, a handkerchief and a key to the elevator grates. Also, to the evil twin monstrosity hiding at the heart of the mine which instantly killed me. I went back to the prisoners and gave the medic the medical supplies and she joined me and we went together to tend the professor. She abandoned me to treat him but demanded me to give her a weapon. And the only weapon she accepts is the sprayer.

Definitely take the pickaxe, much better

So I obliged and readied myself for some pain if any mutant was to reappear. I went back to the jail, gave the soldier everything he needed but for the electrical cables. After some exploration I found some ceiling lights in a dead end I had previously discarded in my explorations. The lights were linked by some electrical wiring and there is a section were the wire is broken into two, which you can take. Back to the soldier, he joined me and together we went to face the beast. Aaaaaand I found a new mutant in the way which kicked my ass. One restore later and with the way ahead free of enemies, the soldier and I entered the chamber of the beast, which hypnotized us with its gaze to get us next to it and unable to move. The gas mask prevented us from also being unable to act and so I tried to combat the thing but not even the sprayer makes a dent on it. The only weapon that does something is the metal bar from the rail truck, which instead of normal attacks, makes every one poke an eye from the beast.

Why are you hitting me with your eye in my metal bar?

Once the beast is completely blinded, we are allowed to move freely again, allowing us to drill a hole and insert some dynamite in each of the walls in the chamber. Going back to the elevator, the soldier decides to stay there and the professor is conscious again. He explains how he noticed the strange behaviour of the mining people and decided to work on an antidote and kill the mutants but he got captured and injured. He managed to escape thanks to having drunk the antidote but his only option was to block the exit of the mine when we arrived in the elevator.

He refuses to give us the antidote for the electrician so we could escape until I assure him that the dynamite has been placed and it is ready to go. One quick trip to the cell and back, the elevator is now working and we can detonate the explosives and escape through the elevator, ending the mutant threat.

Try if you can find out how to close the grate in time. Have fun!

Back to the waxwork, now a new room opens, giving access to the time when the witch cast the curse. Boris contacts us to give us a relic from each of the four twins we defeated: the amulet of the priest of Anubis for protection against the witch, the poison from the mutants to confuse her, Jack’s knife to kill her and the ring of the necromancer to cure our brother. Enjoy:

And with that we end Waxworks. Apparently our brother thinks we are the evil twin which doesn’t make too much sense to me but it could explain why some of the characters have confused us with the evil one. Not that it matters much, it is an inconsequential twist.

DEATH BONUS ROUND (SESSION DEATHS: 9, TOTAL DEATHS: 27)

Well, this surprised me but once we get the gas mask, the deaths are modified to account for us wearing it. I am not going to count them double however, but it is a really nice touch.

Session Time: 2h 57m
Total Time: 13h 48m

Note Regarding Spoilers and Companion Assist Points: There’s 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!