We Died At Sea, and Now We're Dead On Land. Let's Play Why Am I Dead at Sea and Why Am I Dead: Rebirth [Complete]

[Timrod]

Well, this update sure was a feel-good read! I kind of like Quella’s chill-at-all-costs attitude, actually; she’s a nice contrast to Darryl.

Does the softlocking happen because the game assumes you’re in a person and not a cat, or is it just one of life’s little mysteries?

I’m not entirely sure, but I do have a theory about why the game softlocks. The game actually expects that you leave Paulo’s room as the ghost and go straight upstairs without possessing anyone (since at that point, all of the human characters are on the floor above).

The game is known to have some weird code for how it determines where a character is at any given time - it actually saves the position of each NPC in this big unorganized text file along with their “home location” (where they’ll return to if you suddenly stop possessing them) and patrol path in the same file that is used for savegames. It’s actually possible to edit each character’s “home location” provided you know where the coordinates are mapped to.

My theory is that when the cutscene starts, the game sets the positions of all of the NPCs (since in the save file, they’re each essentially a variable) but doesn’t know where to put the cat, so it puts the cat at its home location, which is right outside Garv’s room.

The cutscene happens, and then at the end of the cutscene there’s probably another trigger to send all of the NPCs except for Quella back to their home locations - the camera follows Quella up to the staircase to the top deck. This is most likely so none of the NPCs get stuck. The NPCs getting stuck is a thing that can happen in this game, by the way, and it’s effectively game-ending unless you edit the save file to change their position.

What I think happens is that if you’re possessing the cat at that point, the game sends the cat back to its home location in the lower deck, and sends the ghost to the same spot. This causes the game to get really confused and softlock.

[Timrod]

This is going to be kind of a short update, mostly because the next one is going to be a bombshell in terms of plot and to fit all of that in one update might mean losing the images again. There are two things we can do right now, assuming we’re aiming for the good ending. We could go get more puppets… or we could use Quella to our advantage first. We actually need to do this in order to take total control of two people, so let’s do this thing.

Unlike Alton, who has all the personality of a brick, Quella is capable of asking far more in-depth questions and getting answers with actual information in them. Actually, Alton can ask these same questions now rather than the two he could before, when we took total control of him the first time. The first three answers are basically the same from everyone, and the fourth option has a lot of restatements of stuff we already know. What I’m going to do is give the unique parts of each character’s answer to the final question.

Xu

: "I didn’t really know her all that well. She was a strange person.

: “Strange in what way?”

: "Don’t take it the wrong way. I really liked her. She was just… very honest. In good ways, and in harsh ways. She didn’t seem to know what tact was. She got into arguments with Marc a lot. And I remember one time she almost made Alton cry.

: “How did she get along with you?”

: "We got along very smoothly. I was her young little sidekick. She was actually a very nice person, granted you told her what she wanted to hear.

I hope to god Xu secretly recorded Alton crying in the corner of the Observation deck.

Marcurio

: “Not much. She’s worryingly absent recently.”

: “Is that all you can say?”

: “I dunno, what do you want me to tell you? I work in the kitchen all day. She drives the ship. Didn’t see her a lot.”

: “But you haven’t gotten along with her very well.”

: “Ugh. Everyone’s a gossip around here, huh? Well, it’s not my fault she was a nazi about everything. I mean, look around you. Do you think this is a four-star cruise line headed to Bermuda? And she couldn’t accept other people’s word on things. She had to micromanage everything.”

: “What kind of things did she micromanage?”

: “You know she always wanted to come back here and check on the stock? And the appliances? I’ve been running this kitchen immaculately for a very long time. I know what I’m doing. You know, we’ve got our own way of doing things here, and there are reasons for them. Very good reasons.”

Still an asshole, as always. Anyway, once we talk to Marcurio…

Now that we’ve recovered enough of the captain’s identity, the ghost goes from a tiny wisp to a vaguely humanoid figure. There’s not a whole lot of difference between the ghost’s first form and the second form - apart from one thing.

Now, we can interact with people as the ghost without possessing them. Right now, this doesn’t do a whole lot… but it’ll be useful later. You might be wondering why we’d continue talking to people if we’ve already levelled up, and let me explain why, briefly.

The game uses a point system to track which form the ghost should be in. Using certain dialog options and looking at some specific objects (namely the captain’s diary) add points to the total. The second form requires roughly half the possible points in the game. The ghost has one more form… which requires ALL of the points to be gathered. By the end of this update, we’ll have all but about five or six points, which we’ll be getting quite soon afterward. Anyway, on with the questioning!

Ferdinand

: "I do hope we can find her soon. She is indispensable to the management of this shipp and its crew!’

: “What kind of person is she?”

: “Diligent, to say the least! She’s devoted to making this ship the best it can be! There is resignation and stagnation all around us. But no matter our situation, we can strive for better. The captain understands this.”

: “I hear her relationship with the crew has been rocky.”

: “Hmm. Yes, I suppose you could say that, but it’s nothing to worry over. These things are to be expected when old ideas and new ones come together. Some clash is inevitable.”

Alton

: “The captain? She doesn’t get along with everyone, but I like her. She’s just trying to do her best.”

: “I mean sure, she can be kind of… abrasive. But I think that’s because she’s so new. She’s just trying to give a strong first impression.”

: “What do you mean, abrasive?”

: “Well, she’s really friendly most of the time. She’s just strict sometimes. When she found out how much electricity I use in the observation room, she said she was going to take a hammer and smash all my speakers.”

: “But hey, she didn’t!”

I kind of wish she had. I also kind of wished she’d thrown your laptop overboard.

Garv

: “She was a straight arrow, that’s for sure. Hard working. Honest. I like that in people. But also young, idealistic, and sentimental. Well, life has a way of beating that outta you.”

: “What do you mean, sentimental?”

: “Look around you. Look at the people. You know where you are? You’re in purgatory. We all are, and we all know it. Somewhere, things went wrong and that’s why we’re in this dump. The only thing any of us want is to get out of here and move on with our lives.”

: “The captain really thought she was doing something important. She wanted to turn this place around. Isn’t that a little sad?”

: “How did you get along with her?”

: “Well enough, at first. Then she found out about my pets. Apparently, this ship has a strict no-pets policy, but it’s the first time I’d ever heard of it. The old staff never cared. But she had to do everything by the book, right? That was the captain for you.”

Gwen and Darryl don’t have too much to say - Gwen because she’s been in her room almost the entire time she’s been on the ship, and Darryl because the captain reminds him of his wife. Now we have to use Alton to talk to Quella.

Quella

: “I hope everyone is wrong about the captain. I mean, I hope she’s alright. She’s an amazing person.”

: “How did you get along with her?”

: “She stopped by my room sometimes when I was writing. She even read through some of my drafts and gave feedback. She sincerely wanted to help me within moments of finding out who I am. A lot of empathy in her.”

: “I’d like to see her again and return the favor. She had clearly been through a lot.”

: “She had been through a lot?”

: “Sometimes the people who seem the warmest and the liveliest are the ones truly struggling. She was very friendly, but she never talked about herself. Where she was from, what she did before this. I think she came here to get away from her past. There was something she needed to forget.”

: “How did she get along with everyone else?”

: “She’d stop by the lower decks when she could to check up on people. It was a nice gesture. She meshes better with some people than with others, but I think everyone generally likes her.”

And with that, we’ve obtained all of the identity points we can up to this spot in the game. There’s one more thing I want to do this update, and that’s to get Xu as a puppet. I was actually wrong when I said that Alton is the only person who has to be fully controllable to finish the game - you need Xu as well. To do this, we need to go back to using Darryl, then confront Xu.

: “I…stole…? No, I would never do anything like that.”

: “I’m sorry, there must be some kind of misunderstanding, I…”

: “You can drop the act. I’ll take Quella’s word over yours any day.”

: “No, I mean, you don’t understand, it’s…”

: “Give me a good reason not to tell everyone else what you’re doing.”

: “W-what?!”

: “Jeez… look, I just… need any extra money I can get.”

: "I get paid peanuts here, and I’m really desperate. Every bit counts.

: “That’s not a good reason. You get room and board, so you don’t need the money.”

Darryl, going from suicidal and kind of empathetic to being an asshole in a single bound.

: “…”

: “I’m not legal, alright?”

: “I came over on a student visa for university and well… I flunked.”

: “My family threw away everything to send me over here. I couldn’t go back like a total failure.”

: “So, I disappeared. Stupid, I know. With no money or papers, I couldn’t get very far.”

: “This job didn’t need any ID or qualifications, but I’m pretty much broke and stuck here.”

: “For me to have any chance of getting out, I have to scrape together something.”

: “…If I lose this job, I have no idea what’ll happen to me.”

: “This is no way to live, Sue. Once we land, we’re going to sort this out.”

: “…You may not have to do anything. It seems like almost everyone knows by this point.”

: “I’m mostly worried about Donovan. I don’t know what he’s planning…”

With that, we’ve made Xu our puppet, bringing us to a total of three. With Xu under our control, we could theoretically move on and end the game - but there are still people on the ship we don’t have control over. Next time, we’ll unlock everyone on the ship and start moving this story to its conclusion.

[Timrod]

Since we’re already controlling Darryl, we might as well use him to unlock someone new.

Despite Quella being the one with the conversation skills, Darryl is the only one who can really get Garv to talk. I’m guessing it’s because there’s some kind of secret language that only old people know.

: “I just kind of float around depending on where I’m needed for work. Beyond that, who can say anymore?”

: “That’s how I’ve felt for a while now.”

: “It just comes with age. After a while, you just realize there’s no right or wrong way.”

: “No matter how good or bad things get, life keeps moving forward. The only thing that matters is if you keep moving with it or not.”

: “Sounds like you’ve seen your fair share of ups and downs.”

: “Yeah, I’ve hit rock bottom more than once. I’ve even lied down and slept on it. But overall, I’ve been able to live a very comfortable life.”

: “Point is, I always thought I had some idea where I was going, like things were all going according to plan. In truth, I had no idea.”

: “Maybe that sounds crazy. People are obsessed with self-improvement. Generally, I think you’ll wind up in the same place no matter what.”

: “We all get the life we secretly deserve.”

: “Oh sure, sure. Though I spend more time with my pets than with my own kids. Funny how that works out.”

: “What about you? You got a wife? Kids?”

: “An ex-wife.”

: “Same here. Let me tell you, divorce is one hell of a thing.”

: “No matter how close you get to someone, you can never really know them completely. There will always be some wall, something deep inside them you don’t know about.”

: “And sometimes, that thing can just rip you to shreds.”

: “I think I know what you mean.”

: “Well, I’m truly sorry to hear that. Sometimes it feels like the only things I can trust are my pets.”

: “Sure, they’re dumb as bricks, but that’s how you know you can trust 'em. I guess that’s why I like animals.”

: “…in any case, thank you for listening to the ramblings of a jaded old man.”

Now we have control of Garv. Like Darryl, he has an ability that is never used for anything: calling Sunshine to his side. This is actually kind of a risky maneuver because the cat can get stuck on the way to him, requiring that you go into the game’s files and manually reset its position.

Garv’s real ability is to complain at Marcurio until he relents and allows us to take control of him. I’m not going to post Marcurio’s dialogue here mostly because it covers stuff we already know: he hates his job and thought the captain was kind of a dick.

Also, Marcurio has the second-best theme in the game.

Marcurio’s special ability is actually more useful than you’d first think - it’s not strictly necessary for anything, but it answers one of the biggest questions we have left.

His special ability can detect trace liquid spills. Essentially, he’s a walking spray bottle of luminol. There’s a trail of liquid right outside the kitchen that looks like it was recently cleaned up. Let’s take a look at where that leads, shall we?

If we follow it outside, it leads to a massive freaking puddle just outside the door to the dining area. Sure, there’s nothing too suspicious about that - it IS outside, after all.

It leads to the storage closet next to Alton’s room!

… Wait, why is Garv here? He’s standing… right next to a storage locker… with a strange fluid spill leading right to it. This isn’t a glitch, by the way. If you watch Garv, his patrol path will occasionally take him into this room, which contains only that locker and a garbage can. The locker is locked, by the way.

There’s one other thing Marcurio has access to that no one else does - that being the fridge and the nearby cabinet. Both of these are kept permanently locked, and if anyone else (including Ferdinand) tries to access them, Marcurio will call them out and force them away.

There’s actually nothing in the fridge - just food. Well, Marcurio IS just a chef… maybe he doesn’t have anything crazy to hide! Let’s just check the cabinet too. I bet he’s got some spices in there or something, maybe something that can bring out that totally-not-a-bloodstain from what definitely was not the captain being killed

Let’s pick the top shelves. Gotta be something useful up there.

What a relief!

Oh, crap.

: “They all have vague instructions regarding dropping off items or supplies. One note has instructions for leaving the boat’s docking ramp out overnight before the ship had disembarked. In each case, few specifics are given, but a payment for each of these services is referenced.”

: “Keeping these around hasn’t done me much good. If I can’t figure out who sent the notes, I have no leverage. Period.”

: “That was the captain for you. Always so diligent.”

: “What did she care if a little food went missing here and there?”

If you’ve been following the LP closely up to this point, you may have noticed that we’ve now unlocked every character on the ship except one - Donovan. This is why we need to be able to take full control over Xu. Surely we’ll just enter him and have him turn himself in. He’s got to be the killer, right?

So, remember that strange golden object in Donovan’s room? That’s the master key to the ship. Gwen didn’t recognize it because she’d never seen it before… but the captain’s ghost inside of her sure did.

: “And I know you stole the master key first.”

: “You’re in no position to make any demands of me.”

: “There’s no reason I should tell you that. I don’t owe you any answers. Got that?”

Donovan’s theme is by far my favorite out of all the music in this game.

: “That’s too bad, because I don’t want to tell you.”

: “If you don’t tell me, I’ll let everyone know you broke into my room and stole the master key.”

: “Do that, and I guarantee you lose your job here.”

: “You’re pretty tight on money, aren’t you? You couldn’t afford to let that happen.”

: “I don’t care. The captain is missing, and we have to work together. I need to know why you wanted the master key so badly.”

: “Jesus. You’re… you’re serious, aren’t you?”

: “What’s gotten into you all of a sudden?”

: “Fine. But not out here. Come into my room and I’ll tell you.”

: “Stealing the master key from the pilothouse, blackmailing me… what do you hope to accomplish?”

: “You mean the master key you stole from the pilothouse?”

: “I need unrestricted access to the rooms on this ship. For that, I needed the key.”

: “It was never yours to take, and I had greater need for it.”

: “There is no ‘we’. But fine.”

: “The first secret is that the captain isn’t dead.”

: “She’s still somewhere on this ship, though I don’t know in what state.”

So, I’m going to stop here a second and say that obviously, Donovan is wrong. This part honestly really confused me the first time I played it, because I figured that Donovan would be right… but he’s not. I’m not sure if this is a plot thread that the writers changed and just kind of forgot to fix all of the related dialog or what, but Donovan actually has quite a bit to say about this.

: “Only from your perspective. I have solid reason to believe it’s more likely that she’s been abducted.”

: “If she was abducted, she’s probably seriously injured. She should be alive, but she’ll need medical attention.”

: “I haven’t checked every room of the ship yet. The master key will solve that problem. On top of that, this is an old ship. It’s clearly seen renovations over the years. That could mean there are secret areas to it that we don’t know about.”

: “What I’m about to tell you cannot leave this room… for the sake of the captain, and all of the other people on this ship.”

: “I’m in pursuit of a known serial killer. His trail has led me to this ship.”

: “He’s a sadist. He tortures his victims, maims them… and worse. But he keeps them alive for days.”

:“I believe he has chosen the captain as his latest victim.”

: “If I’m right, there’s still time to reach her before she dies.”

: “FBI.”

: “Can I see your badge?”

: “No.”

: “Then how can I trust what you say?”

: “I’m laying innocent lives on the line by sharing this information with you. If I’m going to put that much trust in you, I expect some in return.”

So yeah, Donovan is an undercover FBI agent. I’m surprised he hasn’t just arrested Alton for crimes against fashion and called it a day.

: “Why don’t you call for help?”

: “I don’t need any help. It would only get in my way.”

: “In order to apprehend the right person, I need evidence. That means stealth and surveillance. One person is more effective for that.”

: “If I knew that, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

: “All I have is a basic profile - it’s an adult white male. So you’re ruled out, which is the only reason we’re having this conversation right now.”

If the profile’s right, that means the following people are out: Xu, Quella, Gwen, Paulo and Marcurio. Donovan is also out assuming that he’s actually an FBI agent. That leaves Alton, Darryl, Ferdinand, and Garv.

: “That’s confidential.”

: "This search has been going on for a long time, and has involved multiple people.

: “To him, there would be no point in immediately killing his target.”

: “And if anything, the risk of being discovered here… it might just make it more exciting for him.”

: “When I realized he was on this ship, I knew there was a chance that this could happen.”

: “You can help by being quiet and staying out of my way.”

: “I’ll need to make a full sweep of this boat. That’s where the master key comes in.”

: “When I do find the captain, I’ll be able to track down my killer.”

: “…Let me tell you something.”

: “There is such a thing as evil. It’s on this ship with us. And I’m here to exterminate it.”

And now Donovan is ours to control.

Donovan’s special ability is straight-up Batman vision, and highlights anything he can interact with or search. You might think that the first thing we should do is go check the locations of those mysterious totally-not-blood spills and the locked locker in the storage closet - and you’re right… sort of. Next time, we’ll track down a serial killer and unlock the ghost’s final form.

[Timrod]

Donovan has a lot of stuff to investigate - starting with his laptop. There’s kind of a massive text dump ahead (most of this update is going to be very text-heavy) but a lot of it is important to the plot.

Email #1

Hey, Donovan. It’s been a long time since we’ve spoken. I hope you’ve been doing better since you left the force. I know it’s been rough. Truth is, I’m contacting you because I need your help. Something has come up which requires a… special touch. It’s him, Donovan. Let me know if you can help.

                                                                              -L

I think this this the first time I’ve ever heard the FBI referred to as “the force”. As far as I know, Donovan is actually a rogue former FBI agent, though the character in the first game is only part of some kind of vague, nameless law enforcement agency. The writer/dev stated the game went through multiple rewrites so it’s entirely possible Donovan was originally meant to be a regular police officer.

Email #2

I’ve tracked him down to a small cruise ship. Of sorts. However, it’s across the border, so it’s out of our jurisdiction. By the time we can coordinate an effort, he’ll be gone. I’d throw away my badge and go after him myself, but I got close to him. My identity was compromised. I need someone from the outside that he doesn’t know. You’re the only one who can do this, Donovan. It’s been a long time since he last struck, and it’s possible he’ll regard this isolated ship as a prime opportunity. Attached, you’ll find everything you need to know in order to get there. The rest is on you.

                                                                             -L

Email #3

Oh, and… one last thing, Donovan. I know you blame me for your dismissal. But you weren’t okay, Donovan. You needed the break. Maybe you’re still bitter… but keep this in mind: I’m breaking a lot of regulations, and personal standards, enlisting your help like this. I’m putting a lot of trust in you. So please, be professional about this. Don’t do anything reckless. Get the job done, and come home. For me.

                                                                        -Lucille

Well, that would explain why Donovan didn’t want to show Xu his badge that he no longer has. You might be wondering what the flag we need to set here is - it’s actually reading the third email. You’ll understand why later. We can also check the recordings from Donovan’s cameras.

There’s a lot of text here, and a lot of it tells us things we already know, so I’m just going to bullet-point the most important highlights for the first choice:

• Donovan was only able to put cameras on the lowest deck and the middle deck, due to there being nowhere to hide them on the upper deck or outside.

• Marcurio and Garv are constantly going in and out of the broom closet for cleaning supplies. They’ve been doing it every day since the ship disembarked an unknown number of days ago.

• The camera on the lowest deck (where the passengers stay) has been mostly uneventful save for Garv’s cat, which sometimes carries small objects in its mouth.

Now let’s look at the second set of choices:

: “The day before last… that was the day the captain was last seen. There aren’t any peculiar movements that morning or afternoon. That night, after a break, the captain left her room and went up to the first floor. She never came back down.”

: “Unfortunately, I couldn’t install cameras on the first floor, so I don’t have any eyes on her after that point. Between the time when she left and the next morning, every single person went up to the first floor and came back down. So really, anything could have happened in that time period.”

: “The last thing to note is when Sue came back to her room that night, she had the spare master key with her. She must have picked it from the pilothouse when the captain wasn’t there.”

The footage for yesterday is all stuff we’ve already seen: Donovan comments about Alton and Xu talking to people, and will also add in a comment about Quella talking to a lot of people if you’ve unlocked the ghost’s second form before taking control of him. He’ll also mention having seen Gwen in his room, but not the cat.

: “Today isn’t over yet, but there’s still plenty of footage to cover. At the crack of dawn, Ferdinand paid a visit to Garv’s room. Odd.”

: “Not long afterward, he had a meeting with most of the ship. After the meeting, most people headed up to the first floor.”

With Donovan’s laptop thoroughly checked, we can now get into the meat and potatoes of his section, namely:

Both of those sound like great leads… but there’s a bunch of other stuff we can use Donovan to look at - and in fact, we need to have him do this to get the final “point” to unlocking the ghost’s third and final form.

The first place we’re going to check is Garv’s room, specifically his dresser.

The first three shelves have nothing of interest, but the bottom right shelf…

Well, I think we’ve got our serial killer… or at least someone who fits the bill for what Donovan is looking for.

Our next stop is the locker in the storage room.

: “It’s a giant stack of receipts and expenses. It all looks really uninteresting. Wait. In the middle of the stack, there’s a smaller paper with handwriting on it.”

: “I hope this note has been found by the right person. I have reason to believe someone has been breaking into my room while I’m away. I think it has something to do with that strange chest.”

: “If I’m right, it means something is terribly wrong here. Only the master key unlocks my door, and I have the only master key… right? I have a plan, but it could fail. If it does, someone else needs to know.”

: “I’m looking for a door that shouldn’t exist. It could be in a corner, or on a side where you don’t normally look. It must have something to do with that chest, but I couldn’t get it open.”

: “Be careful. This ship has eyes and ears. People know things they shouldn’t. There are alliances being forged.”

We can also investigate the boring receipts.

As soon as we leave the storage room, assuming we’ve gotten all the other ghost form points (which we have), this happens:

That last sentence is the most important one. In her final form, Captain Smilla has one ability she did not have before - namely, the ability to directly speak with living people. We’ll look at that in a short update that will follow this one, just before we complete Donovan’s investigation. I had to go get Donovan back since that cutscene exits his body, so let’s see what happens if we talk to him now.

Lucille seems very important to Donovan. If you haven’t guessed already, this is extremely important to getting the best ending.

This is Marcurio’s room. Two things will set off Donovan’s batman senses - the chipped plaster on the wall, and the bookshelf. Let’s look at the wall first.

You might remember that there’s a similar spot in the dining area… which is just above Marcurio’s room. We’ll get there.

Marcurio’s bookshelf is a bit of a puzzle, but it’s not necessarily a hard one to solve - either by brute force, or by knowing a little about Marcurio.

The bookshelf has three shelves. On the bottom shelf is a book about creating a successful restaurant. We know that Marcurio’s dream is to get off the ship by any means necessary, and opening a restaurant would certainly do that. Let’s take a look inside.

Why is it that I keep LPing games that have items necessary to complete them hidden in books? We’re now down to just four things left to investigate on the ship. Let’s head to the Captain’s room now.

The captain’s room has two objects of interest - the dresser and the chest. The dresser is actually not useful to us, due to the fact that we’ve already unlocked the ghost’s final form. Had we not gone and done that right away, one of the points to unlocking the ghost’s final form disappears. The dresser is an alternate way of getting that point.

Finally, let’s take a look at the chest. Some of you may have already figured out where the hidden door is, based on where we’ve already been and the evidence we’ve seen. The chest basically solidifies that.

: “Inside are buckets of paint and a paint roller, along with a hand-written note:”

Wait a second. We’re on a boat… out at sea… and the captain had a chest with a paint roller in it?

Did anyone actually check to verify the captain wasn’t a squid? Has anyone done a thorough search of the nearest respawn point? Can we also toss Alton into the water to make sure he’s not a squid?

: “Do NOT get the cheap shit. The sun, rain, and salt water will make quick work of shoddy paint. I’m sure you understand how disastrous it would be if the paint started chipping before it’s due. Don’t be stupid. Make sure it’s paint for exteriors and is high quality.”

: “It’s all a bit dusty. It hasn’t seen recent use. Still, it’s clear that someone has had to do frequent painting on an exterior wall of the ship. I’d be interested to know why.”

Finally, we can check the plaster in the dining area. No surprise, the wall behind it is hollow. If you haven’t guessed yet, the hidden door is where we found the liquid spill on the outer deck as Marcurio… but there’s a few other things we’re going to want to do first. Next time, we’re going to use the ghost’s new abilities and get the final additions to our growing horde of puppets.

So… there is one other thing we could examine as Donovan. It’s not at all necessary for getting the best ending… but it does get you an achievement.

If you’ll remember back to last update, Donovan said that the profile of the serial killer is that they’re an adult white male, meaning that Alton is a possible suspect.

Donovan can’t search his laptop, but he can search Alton’s dresser.

Haha oh wow, Alton is actually… probably depressed just like everyone else on this boat. I still say the ghost should cure him by tossing his laptop into the ocean.

[Timrod]

Before we finish Donovan’s investigation, there are three other things we can do in this “chapter” of the game. All of them require that we have the ghost’s final form. This mini-update will cover two of them, and allow me to explain exactly why here: the next update will directly imply that a certain character is a victim of what may or may not be rape. This way, you can skip that portion and go right along to the next one should you need to do that.

First, let’s use the ghost’s new ability on Darryl. What could possibly go wrong from having a chat with a suicidal guy?

: “I’m so sorry… it’s all my fault. I should have seen what was happening. How could I not have seen…”

: “It should have been me. It should have been me.”

We wind up in something very similar to the place we started the game in, with Darryl standing in the middle of it. This is essentially a “quest” to unlock Darryl for use as a puppet. This is one of the plot points that I feel the writer could’ve done better with - even though we’re ultimately trying to help Darryl, we’re essentially going to be using his wife’s diary against him.

Both Darryl and the character we’re going to unlock in the next mini-update (who has a mind-world very similar to Darryl’s) start out with a blank text box. I’m not sure if this is a bug or not.

What follows is a small dialogue puzzle with only one correct line of answers. The text is typed exactly as it appears.

: “Darryl, it’s me.”

: “Mari”

: “is that you”

: “Yes, I’m Mari.”

: “I’m sorry”

: “I’m sorry”

: “I’m sorry”

: “I love you”

: “Why are you sorry?”

: “I should have done more”

: “should have noticed”

: “it’s my fault”

: “I should have been there”

: “it’s my fault”

: “it’s my fault”

: “It’s not your fault.”

: “then why”

: “I don’t understand”

: “Why did you go”

Note that once the ghost identifies herself as Darryl’s wife, her dialog boxes change from “Smilla” to “Mari”. It’s kind of a nice touch.

: “sick”

: “what do you mean”

Now we’re back to being Smilla again.

: “I was having terrible thoughts… incredibly painful thoughts. And I couldn’t escape them.”

: “My thoughts and feelings were distorted. I wasn’t myself.”

: “there had to be another way”

: “I want to help you”

: 'but I can’t"

: “I couldn’t”

: “I know. I’m sorry… I can’t change what I’ve done. It’s too late for me.”

: “But it’s not too late for you, Darryl. You can still be happy.”

: “Maybe right now, you don’t even want to be happy. But some day, you will. And you can. Please… don’t give up hope.”

: “I just had the strangest feeling wash over me. Like I just woke up from a living nightmare.”

: “Mari… was that the nightmare you were in at the time?”

We’ve now got the ability to turn Darryl into our puppet. I think it’s a fair deal - healing his suicidal thoughts in exchange for his body.

Darryl can now talk to Garv again… this time, with a little more effort put into his questions.

: “I could say the same of you. People are going missing. Aren’t you worried about what’s going to happen?”

: “Cold. Some would be shocked to hear such a cold thought.”

: “Is that so? I can imagine. Always being exposed to the worst side of people…”

: “It can take a toll on you. Seeing what people really are, underneath everything.”

: “That’s exactly right. Everyone has a price. They’ll stab you in the back if there’s a half-good reason. When I was younger, I thought the opposite. I was naive. But I learned the truth.”

: “It started with my marriage. She had been lying to me for years.”

: “And when she lied to the court, they gave her the kids and the house.”

: “Next was my career. I wasn’t much of a politician back then, and company politics was everything.”

: “When I had everything, people were great to me. But when I had nothing, they were all gone.”

: “People… we’re all just animals. Carnivores. You may as well be on the top of the food chain.”

So, if you read my Dagger of Amon Ra LP, you’ll remember how there were certain things we had to do and see to prove the identity of the killer in that game. Dead at Sea works in a largely similar way. Most of the things we looked at as Donovan counted toward that, as does this conversation with Garv. It’s looking more and more like we’ve found our serial killer.

Wait… what? So… remember when I said the writing in this game wasn’t always where it needs to be? I want you to consider something. At this point, we’ve got puppet-level control over three out of the four people Donovan suspects to be the serial killer he’s after. In fact, we’ve got total control over all but three people on the ship: Gwen, Donovan, and Ferdinand.

The question that will naturally pop up is “Well, why wouldn’t the ghost just take control of whoever it thinks killed it and make them commit suicide?” The answer is probably the same reason that Umbrella owns like… six different boats throughout the Resident Evil series. Everything makes sense when you’re at sea. Everything.

Next up will be another mini-update where we’re going to give some ghost-assisted therapy… to Gwen.

One thing I thought of after the fact: there is kind of a neat little thing that the game wouldn’t normally expect you to find (since the developer pretty much assumes you’re not going to leave Donovan until you’ve completed his investigation) but we can now ask a new question when controlling someone as a puppet.

Naturally, no one admits to knowing anything about any secret areas - and we really have no reason to ask, given that it should be pretty obvious at this point where it is.

[Timrod]

We’ve unlocked nearly everyone on the ship at this point - as I mentioned last update, the only three people we haven’t been able to puppet are Donovan, Gwen, and Ferdinand. That number is about to shrink by one.

Gwen’s nightmare realm is a lot like Darryl’s, only red instead of black.

So, one thing I didn’t notice the first time I played this game is that there’s actually a shadow figure in the doorway. It’s kind of hard to see if you’re not looking for it.

As with Darryl, the first text box for Gwen here is totally blank. I’m not sure if this is intentional or not.

This time, I’ll branch out into the second option - it doesn’t actually end the dialog puzzle.

: “in my bedroom”

: “it’s almost time for sleep”

: “it’s not normal”

: “no”

: “please no”

: “it’s just a dream”

: “it’s not real”

: “Gwen, it’s me.”

: “who is that”

: “please stay away”

: “It’s your sister.”

: “elisa”

: “you shouldn’t be here”

: “if they see you outside your room at this hour”

: “please go”

Just like with Darryl, the captain’s dialog boxes change to a new name.

: “They aren’t here. It’s just the two of us.”

: “you’re lying”

: “he can tell”

: “he’s watching me right now”

: “No, he isn’t watching you. He’s far away.”

: “what”

: “but why do I sense him watching”

:“always”

: “Pay close attention, Gwen. You’re in a dream. This isn’t real.”

: “just like when we were kids”

: “I would wake up and there you are letting me know it was a nightmare”

: “but why”

: “why does it always feel so real”

: “Because, Gwen, part of it is real. The part that still exists in your mind. What your mind recreates for you. But it’s only a part. And it’s not all true.”

: “then how do I tell the difference”

: “the nightmare when I’m asleep is the same as when I’m awake”

: “does it even matter which is which”

: “Yes. The nightmare you’re awake for is the one you can change. There are people that can help, Gwen. You don’t have to carry this by yourself.”

: “But you have to take a leap of faith first.”

And with that, we’ve unlocked Gwen as a puppet. Gwen is the last character we’ll be able to fully unlock. Next time, we’ll complete Donovan’s investigation… and then start collecting evidence.

[Timrod]

Okay. We’ve done literally everything else we can do at this point in the game. Let’s take control of Donovan again and finally finish his investigation. In case you somehow haven’t figured out where the hidden door is, let me point a few things out:

• Donovan does not have cameras on the outer deck or outside the bridge.

• There was a giant spill of totally-not-blood on the upper deck leading to the cleaning supply closet downstairs.

• Donovan found a bucket of high-quality outdoor paint and a note insinuating it would be used where it is exposed to the elements.

• There is a space behind Marcurio’s room and the kitchen, which are directly underneath where that spill on the outer deck was.

Anyway, the answer is that the hidden door is right here, indicated by the yellow line.

: “But investigating the dining room wall showed that there is a hollow space somewhere here.”

: “Hmmm… like I thought, there’s a layer of fresh paint here. I wonder if…”

: “Yes, there’s a seam in the wall that’s been painted over. There’s a waist-high door here.”

: “And now that I’ve cleared a bit more paint, I can see a lock on the door.”

: “Picking a lock like this is still possible, but I don’t have the tools. It could take several days…”

click

: “…Except that the boat’s antiquated skeleton key is somehow able to open it.”

: “The waist high door slides open to reveal a ladder down into darkness.”

Uh-oh… last time I saw a shadowy figure approach someone on a boat, it was at the start of Dagger of Amon Ra when Dr. Carrington got murdered. Donovan? Now might be a good time to turn around… and take out a gun.

This part is just a little ridiculous. I get that it’s dark outside, but Donovan is maybe 5 feet from this person, who would have had to walk all the way up the ship with that disguise on.

A gunshot. Then another. Then another. Five in total. The animation for this really sucks and I’m not even going to try and defend it.

Donovan is thrown off the side of the boat, in probably the same way the captain was. And now everyone else is boned, given that this person has a gun and no one else (barring Gwen) has any kind of weapon on them. Though, you know, there is one thing very strange about all this. Donovan said the serial killer liked to torture their victims… yet whoever this is shot Donovan five times and disposed of his body immediately.

Well, fuck. Is this what happens when the person you’re in dies? Must be.

We’re back in Paulo’s dream realm. Surely we can notify him, have Quella and Gwen go into his room and barricade it until the trip is over, then hope whoever’s left can somehow take out the killer.

That’s not good.

There’s music that plays here that doesn’t play anywhere else in the game… only I have no idea what it’s called. It’s not on Youtube and it’s not on the composer’s Bandcamp page.

: “I’m afraid I have more dreadful news. I don’t want to cause any panic, but these things must be said.”

: “It would appear two more people on the ship have gone missing.”

: “This morning, the ship staff and I did a comprehensive search of the ship. Donovan, the passenger from room 201, was missing.”

: “So was the boy from room 205. A boy named Paulo, if I remember correctly.”

: “Oh my god…”

: “…just like the captain. Why is this happening?”

: “This changes everything. Who will be next? How can we be sure we are safe?”

: “Where’s Gwen? I don’t see her anywhere. Shouldn’t she hear about all this?”

: “She… she knows…”

: “That’s right. When we searched the ship, we found something very troubling. Very troubling indeed.”

: “In Gwen’s room, we found a key. A very particular key.”

: “The ship’s master key. It can open any door in the entire ship. It had gone missing from the pilothouse not long ago.”

: “So? What does that have to do with these recent disappearances?”

: “You can tell them, Xu.”

: “…right. Okay. Before he went missing, I talked to Donovan. He was searching for the captain, who he believed was still on the ship.”

: “In order to find her, he had gotten hold of the master key. I saw it in his room.”

: “When he disappeared, so did the key. And then we found it… in Gwen’s room.”

: “Well, we didn’t have to believe it. We saw it ourselves.”

: “It’s hard to come to any other conclusion. And honestly, I’m not too surprised. She was kind of crazy.”

: “What happened to her? Where is she?”

: “You can be at ease, Quella. We have only restrained Gwen in the observation room. I think everything is simpler that way.”

: “After we land, we can ensure that she stays on board while the proper authorities take a look at this case.”

: “But I want everyone to know that they have no reason to feel they are in danger. The situation has been controlled.”

: “We will reach land in a few days. This awful affair will be behind us before you know it.”

: “And maybe you shouldn’t.”

: “What do you mean? You don’t think it was her?”

: “At first glance, it seems like Gwen having the key implicates her, maybe.”

: “But think. What doors does the master key open? All of them, of course. Including… the door to Gwen’s room.”

: “What if someone took the key from Donovan, used it to get into Gwen’s room, and planted it there?”

: “…You’re right. They could have done it overnight while she was asleep. Anyone could have done it.”

: “So, in reality, it tells us nothing. I think the truth is still out there… and we have to find it.”

: “Getting to that truth might involve clearing Gwen’s name.”

: “I have a lot to think about. I’m sure you do as well. Take care of yourselves, and be safe.”

: “Thank you, Garv. I’m glad I’m not the only one around here who has a little faith.”

: “Take care of yourself, too. The real criminal must still be free.”

: “…”

: “Three people have been killed or abducted. No witnesses. No crime scene. No evidence. I think the truth died along with the captain.”

Everyone disperses, leaving the ghost alone.

Quella will actually head up to the observation room by herself, where Alton is forcing her to listen to his mixtape.

While we’re here, Alton’s ability can now play a much wider range of tracks. These are all ones we’ve heard before.

To make progress, we have to grab Quella and go talk to Garv.

Garv has a bunch of dialog that is mostly just repeating what he’s already said about the real killer being on the loose still. We can ask him where to look for clues, and he suggests looking through Paulo’s room.

Paulo’s door is still locked, but if you’ll remember, we have another way in there that Garv outright reminds us about. This kind of makes no sense.

So somehow, whoever killed Paulo took him from his room… and then locked the door. From the inside. The dialog boxes here are identical to when we did the same trick to get into Donovan’s room, so I think it might’ve just been an oversight from the dev copy-pasting code.

And there’s the obligatory Earthbound reference. If you haven’t played that game, Overcoming Shyness is a book Ness has to give to a tribe of extremely shy underground dwellers.

: “The pages are bent and crumpled by the way it’s been thrown to the ground.”

: “The book is open to page 105. There doesn’t seem to be anything out of the ordinary with it…”

: “Wait a second. The next page is missing. It looks like it got torn out somehow. There’s only a jagged scrap left.”

: “I don’t know why, but this seems like a really important detail. I should remember this. It might come up again later…”

We’ve just found another piece of evidence necessary to getting the good ending. There’s one more in this room, however.

: “The drawer hanging open on the top, however, has a bracelet resting on some socks. The bracelet and socks have been stained red with blood.”

Well, we know who that has to belong to! Only one person on the ship has a name beginning with M - Marcurio.

: “Oh, let me guess… did that little shit give it to you? That’s just great.”

: “I was looking for it all… wait, what’s wrong?”

: “I found a bracelet with the letter “M” on it in Paulo’s room. Covered in blood.”

: “…”

: “No way, uh…”’

: “Just a second ago… I was talking about a different bracelet.”

: “Alright, alright, yeah. It’s mine. It was a gift.”

: “…Shouldn’t have even kept the damn thing.”

: “I never went in there, I swear! I mean, not by myself.”

: “Sure, I went with Alton, Sue, and Ferdinand. For the search. That’s when we found the kid was missing.”

: “That was the only time. I never went into that room before or after, swear to god.”

: “No, I didn’t leave the bracelet in there during the search. I barely entered the room.”

: “But I never went in at any other time, either. Look… it was that stupid cat.”

: “I ran into it last night, and it attacked me! It went completely nuts!”

: “I was caught off guard, and when I reacted, the bracelet just kinda flew off.”

: “The cat must’ve nabbed it and carried it around for a while. I just assumed it gave it to you, like a gift or something.”

: “I had no idea it would put it in Paulo’s room, of all places.”

: “What would other people think if they heard about this?”

: “Hey, hold up. You have to… wait a sec.”

: “How did you get into that room anyway? Wasn’t it supposed to be sealed off from all of the passengers?”

: “Well… the door was unlocked.”

: “So you’re saying you broke in. And no one can back you up. Look, I never set foot in there besides the search, and I never left anything of mine in there.”

: “…I wonder if anyone saw the cat moving around with my bracelet. That would validate my story.”

: “Maybe it would try to give it to its owner as a gift.”

Wait a second. Didn’t Donovan catch the cat on camera taking stuff?

Unfortunately, Donovan’s room is locked again. This time, not even Sunshine can get us back in. The only person who can get inside is Ferdinand.

So, this is one of the ways in which you can screw yourself out of the good ending. Looking at Donovan’s laptop as Ferdinand counts as a piece of evidence. The only way to know his password is to have read all of his emails before Donovan dies. Most of what’s there is stuff we’ve already seen, but…

This is the “footage from today” option Donovan had, which covers some stuff that Donovan didn’t get to see.

: “Then that morning, there I am having a meeting with everyone and explaining the situation.”

: “Later on, there’s footage of Donovan walking around all over the place.”

: “It looks like he used the master key to enter the captain’s room, and even my room! So naughty!”

: “But then in the evening, he goes up to the first floor… never to return.”

: “Then the footage cuts out. Looks like someone found his little toys and turned them off.”

Interesting. So, even though Quella has no proof she didn’t tamper with anything in Paulo’s room, Marcurio also has no alibi for how the bracelet got there. There’s no footage of the cat holding it.

There are a few other things we need to do - and next update, we’ll find the rest of the evidence before moving straight along to the ending!

[Timrod]

What’s coming up is a rather long, dialog-heavy sequence that gets us the second-to-last evidence item we’ll need to get the good ending. A lot of it covers stuff we already know or loops back on itself, so I’m going to skip right to the pertinent parts.

So one thing I forgot to do last time was talk to Garv again after talking to Marcurio. He mostly confirms stuff we already know.

We know now that he saw the cat running around with the bracelet, and that Marcurio probably did something to provoke it.

Our next stop is to take total control over Quella and have her talk to Xu about the missing key.

Xu confirms Donovan’s theory that there are two master keys - the one that Xu stole from the bridge and that Donovan took from her, and a second one belonging to someone else.

Once we finish that, we have to do something a little tricky. First, we have to grab Marcurio and bring him to Gwen, then quickly switch into Gwen before he can walk away.

: “Fine, I’m listening.”

: “Well, when we find 'em, I’ll be the first to let you go. Until then, you’re our best suspect.”

: “Why should anyone believe you? You’ve been sneakin’ around and acting suspicious since the day you got here. It’s no surprise you’re the one under suspicion.”

: “I thought someone was following me. That’s all…”

: “You should listen to yourself. That explanation only makes you look worse.”

: “You thought someone was following you? What’s that all about?”

: “I…I thought someone was coming to take me back home.”

: “Listen. I don’t know exactly what you’ve been through. But I can probably relate. A little.”

: “My family was kind of a mess. My dad had some…issues. And he had, well, his own way of dealing with it.”

: “He’d beat me until I was bloody, using anything within arm’s reach.”

: “There were times when I really thought he’d kill me. Maybe he thought he would too.”

: “Who could I tell? And how would it help?”

: “They would see me the day after, all beaten to a pulp.
They could hear it happening. No one cared.”

: “You wouldn’t say that if you had met me five, ten years ago.”

: “I was messed up. Real messed up, and desperate. I did some dumb things.”

: “Which is why I’m stuck here in the first place.”

: “…You shouldn’t thank me. I still can’t help you.”

: “Yeah. I do. But there’s still a lot you don’t know about me.”

: “You know what, here, I’ll let you in on a secret.”

: “I know it wasn’t you.”

: “…Because I was the one who planted the key in your room.”

: “That’s the last thing I’m going to do.”

: “Look, Gwen. We had a moment just now. We’ve both been through some shit, and that’s great.”

: “There are forces larger than both of us at work here. My advice to you is just to go along with it.”

: “You’re not going to come to harm. If you’re innocent, which I know you are, you’ll be let go by the police after their investigation… probably.”

: “But until then, this little play has to keep on going.”

: “Well, I thought you should know. You deserve the truth. It’s nothing personal - I’m really just following instructions.”

: “But I’m mainly telling you because there’s literally nothing you can do about it.”

: “You just try and tell people I planted the key. Go on! They won’t believe you. It’s your word against mine.”

: “Just keep calm, and this whole thing will be over before you know it. Okay? Okay.”

There’s not much we can do, either. We can’t take total control over Marcurio, so making him kill himself is out. Instead, we need to do something that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. I hate to say it, but… we need Alton.

The ghost points out (through Alton) that they know Xu stole the master key, which we all already know. In response…

: “Telling me I’d find the key in the pilothouse. Ordering me to take it for myself, and hide it.”

: “Why did you follow the orders?”

: “It’s not the first set of instructions I’ve gotten. I have an… arrangement.”

: “I did small errands. Moved things around. And I got paid.”

: “I never understood it, but I didn’t have to. Of course I was suspicious, but it was all harmless stuff.”

: “Well now three people are missing - and it’s all your fault!”

: “N-no, what I did had nothing to do with that…”

: “… You’re right, aren’t you? I could have told Donovan everything I knew. And I didn’t.”

: “And now he’s gone. I really am a horrible person, aren’t I?”

I’m fairly certain that last line got added in with the final patch to the game, because even the writer admitted that Xu had some serious issues with being an unlikeable character. I haven’t said much about it, but this is honestly my least favorite part of this game for several reasons.

Xu then walks away and psychically transmits things we already know to Alton. The main problem with this part is that it’s possible to do it out of order and have things not make a whole lot of sense.

We then need to talk to Marcurio with Xu. Because we already looked in his cabinet and his fridge, we know that he’s on the same payroll Xu is.

The second half of this sentence refers to a single line in a big chunk of dialog about the stuff in the fridge being some kind of medicine.

: “The evidence doesn’t tell the whole story, but it must be connected to the captain and Donovan. The way he’s talking, he’d need a gun pointed at his head before he’d open up.”

There’s another big long sequence confirming again that both Marcurio and Xu are on the payroll of this shady individual.

Two seconds later, on the bridge…

: “The key I saw in Donovan’s room isn’t the same as the one found in Gwen’s room. And Marcurio admitted to planting that key to incriminate Gwen.”

: “That is quite the revelation, Sue. Marcurio, is she correct?”

: “Yeah, she’s right. I recieved the key in a package, along with anonymous instructions to plant it in Gwen’s room.”

: “What?! You cannot be serious! My very own staff, working behind my back to throw off my investigation!”

: “Actually, I’ve been following anonymous instructions as well. We both have, for quite some time.”

: “I…I don’t understand. What instructions? Why would you do something like this?”

: “For money. Whoever was sending the instructions would also send handsome payments at the end.”

: “And honestly, it’s been going on for a long time. Since before the captain even worked on this ship.”

: “As for Gwen… perhaps it is not her, but the two of you who should be restrained in the observation room.”

: “What kind of employees keep such secrets from their superiors?! And at such a crucial time!”

: “Sure, sure. The real issue is, what are you going to do with this information now?”

: “…Well, there is no longer a point to keeping Gwen tied up.”

: “Our main priority should now be to find out who this strange figure is issuing out commands and bribing our staff!”

: “You have to admit, there’s nothing directly linking the two.”

: “Like I said, these orders have been coming in for a long time. It’s not a new occurrence.”

: “Sure, but if this person wanted Gwen incriminated… it sounds like an attempt to throw suspicion off of themselves.”

: “That’s a pretty strong connection, in my opinion.”

: “Well, we can cross one person off the list - me.”

: “I have access to every room on the ship with or without a master key.”

: “I’d have no need to bribe someone to plant a key in Gwen’s room. I could do it myself!”

: “Also, I got my orders while the ship was at sea, so obviously it has to be someone who is on the ship now.”

: “That implies it must be one of the ship’s residents… but which one?”

: “We know now that Gwen is innocent, but not a whole lot else. So how much has really changed?”

: “If we can’t be certain who the culprit is, we don’t have much choice but to wait until we’ve landed.”

: “We can lock down the ship until the police have carried out an investigation and questioned everybody.”

: “Not the ideal course of action. I’d like to revisit the evidence with this new information.”

: “But I have to admit, if we can’t prove one person is guilty, I’m not sure what there is to do. Bind everyone in their rooms? That’s not a real solution.”

: “None of these are solutions. We need to find the killer and apprehend them before they get away.”

: “Uh huh. And just how do you propose we do that?”

: “Donovan was looking for a hidden area on the ship before he was killed. I know for a fact it exists… and where to find it. But only the master key can open it.”

: "W-what?! You never mentioned this to me before, Sue!’

: “You know where to find it? That’s incredible news. And if Donovan perished in his search for this area, that implies there’s something to be found there. Perhaps something that your anonymous donor wants to remain hidden, no?”

: “If Donovan went missing looking for it, then that’s all the more reason we should steer clear of it! Let the guys with the guns and badges investigate it.”

: “That’s not a bad point. We need to think of our own safety, as well as that of the passengers.”

: “… I’ve got it! What if everyone went into the hidden area together? Safety in numbers, and all that.”

Translation: We’re still missing one piece of evidence that we couldn’t possibly have until after we get Gwen untied. Next time, we’ll go right into the bad ending… before going back and getting that final piece of evidence.

[Timrod]

So, here we are. We’ve gotten all of the evidence minus one conversation we’re going to totally ignore for right now. Let’s go ahead and get the first of the game’s two endings.

Now, if you’ve played this game before, or if you’ve read the Steam achievement list for it, you might be a bit confused when I say “two endings”. While the game has five different achievements corresponding to different endings, there are only really two. Technically, there are two bad endings - “A Living Nightmare” and “False Awakening”. Both of these are almost identical… though I didn’t know that going in because the ending sequence to this game is honestly something you’re going to want to use a guide for. Dagger of Amon Ra, this isn’t.

The difference is that “A Living Nightmare” can be obtained at any time, even after getting the final piece of evidence we’re missing. “False Awakening” is basically what happens if you try to get the good ending without having the missing piece. Because “False Awakening” is missable, we’ll be going for that one.

Both the good and bad endings start exactly the same way:

Ferdinand then explains the plan… again… and makes a show of finding the secret door we already know is there. For sanity’s sake, I’ll cut that part out. The ghost is forcibly expelled from Xu when the cutscene starts, so there’s no way to softlock it.

The cast winds up here, in the secret room behind the kitchen. I think this is the dev kind of poking fun at himself - there’s really not enough room on the boat (at least, from how it looks on the outside) for this room to exist. I suppose you could write it off as there being a secret deck underneath all of the other ones.

: “Oh my god…”

: “…People. There are people down here.”

Well, looks like Marcurio was right about something living being smuggled on the boat.

: “I think they’re alive, but they aren’t responsive.”

: “Why are they even here? What’s going on?”

: “Guys, I don’t feel so good…”

: “Not to interrupt, but you all might want to check this out.”

So yeah, that kid in the corner that looks nothing like Paulo is, in fact, Paulo. It’s strange, though… why is he down here if the person who killed the captain and Donovan just threw them over the side?

: “What!? What is he doing here? But… I don’t see Donovan or the captain…”

: “He looks really injured. Is he…”

This line was added in an update, because I’ve seen videos where it’s not there and it wasn’t there the first time I played through this game. Originally, it wasn’t clear that Paulo actually survived in the Good Ending route, where he appears in the secret room but does not appear in the actual ending. This is why I think Gwen was originally written to be psychic - my theory is that she was supposed to be the one who supports the ghost once Paulo dies.

Holy shit, what?! Yeah, this part is kind of really contrived. If you watch Donovan’s “death” scene, he’s definitely thrown over the side after being shot five times. I suppose it’s possible that the shooter was using a really small caliber handgun (like a .22) and Donovan was wearing a bulletproof vest, but if you were going to waste five bullets why wouldn’t you just waste a sixth and pop him in the head?

: “But maybe it’s better this way.”

: “Donovan?! What happened to you? We were sure you were dead!”

: “I’m not so easy to get rid of.”

: “There’s still something I need to do before I die…”

So the story’s official explanation is that Donovan was shot five times without a vest, somehow survived that and got back onto a moving boat, then waited in a dark corner down here for probably 16-24 hours without dying from blood loss or going into shock. I say it’s still less stupid than Zero Time Dilemma.

: “Have you been here the whole time? What were you doing down here?”

: “Waiting… just waiting…”

: “Donovan, what is all of this? Who are these people? What about Paulo?”

: “And the captain. You didn’t find her, did you? I thought, since you’re here… maybe she…”

: “Why didn’t you show up earlier? Why wait until now to show up? What the hell’s your plan with that?”

: “But that’s okay… because there’s still a solution.”

: “One last resort… yes… this is what I came here to do.”

So yeah, Donovan apparently had a gun the entire time, and never even thought to draw it when the killer approached him.

: “I have a profile. He’s in this room, I know it.”

: “Whoever you are, you’re going to die here. There’s no hiding…”

At this point, we regain control and are able to start possessing people. The endings to this game are absolutely dickish - the game does guide you by giving you options marked with a ! that will make progress… but doing them in the wrong order gets you the first bad ending. This bad ending is essentially doing the same options that lead to the good ending… minus one we convieniently forgot. I should also mention that not all of the evidence is actually relevant. Remember that conversation where we got puppet-level control of Garv? Yeah, not ever brought up.

I think the dickish part of this whole thing is that there doesn’t necessarily need to be an “order” for some of these things. Really, you should be able to just bring up the evidence in any order as long as everything makes sense. So without further ado, let’s get to this. If you’re doing this on your own, by the way, there is (thankfully) a user-made Steam guide that tells you what you need to do to get all five of the endings.

By the way, for these following sections, assume I’m always picking the option marked by a !, or whichever option I have highlighted in the picture. The other options (as far as I know) lead to the other bad ending.

The Bracelet

The first thing we have to do is possess Quella. Not puppet - you’d think that we could just puppet her and get the same results, but no.

: “You did? But that room was off-limits! How did you get in there?”

: “Shut up. What did you find?”

Here, we have to mention the bracelet. The book is irrelevant, and mentioning it at all locks you into the other bad ending. This is pretty much the only difference between that ending and this one.

: “Wait, we talked about that! It wasn’t what it looked like!”

: “You’d better have a really good story. What were you doing there, Marcurio?”

: “I wasn’t there. Not then, at least.”

: “My bracelet was taken by that stupid cat. It must’ve carried it around and dropped it in that kid’s room.”

: “That sounds absurd. How does a cat steal a bracelet off a grown man’s arm? And why?”

: “Does it matter why? There’s testimony backing me up.”

: “The bracelet was a gift. I’ve had it for years. Why would I give it to some rodent?”

: “Okay… say that were true. I still don’t see how it’s relevant to anything else.”

: “That guy’s pointing a gun at us, and we’re arguing about why a cat took my bracelet?!”

: “It’s relevant because you were in Gwen’s room, weren’t you?”

: “You were there planting the master key to incriminate her, as you had been instructed.”

Wait…how does Garv know about that? There’s only one way he could - he’s Marcurio’s secret paymaster!

: “The cat was there, since it snuck in through the vents… and it was in your way. It wanted to play with you.”

: “You needed it to move and leave you alone, but if you antagonized it, Gwen would wake up.”

: “So you gave it something to keep it distracted, and you planted the key in silence.”

: “… Yeah. You’re right. So I was planting the key in Gwen’s room when it happened. So what?”

: “Shut up.”

: “Again, we’re just going in circles…”

: “Shut up!”

The game’s a little ambiguous about this, but Ferdinand does in fact have the ability to enter any room without the master key. So… he’s got to be the one who took Paulo! And since Paulo is still alive, fitting the serial killer’s MO, we know that he’s the serial killer!

The game is not at all good about explaining this, but there are actually TWO criminals on board. The first is Garv, who is the person that was sending the messages to Xu and Marcurio. He’s actually a human trafficker, not the serial killer. The second is Ferdinand, who is the serial killer Donovan is looking for!

I should mention that the summary of this ending is “You proved that there are two things going on, but don’t have enough evidence to prove either one.” Really, Donovan should be able to intuit who the two criminals are… but he’s kind of an idiot.

The Kitchen Stock

Anyone can bring this up as long as they’re able to be puppeted. This is why we looked in the fridge and in the cabinet in the kitchen as Marcurio.

: “That would answer the question of how these people have stayed down here for so long. How do you know he was doing this?”

: “So the captain was on to what you were doing. And then soon after, she was gone.”

: “Even if you are as ignorant as you say, you undeniably had motive to silence her.”

: “No way! You’re not really thinking that I…”

: “There’s almost no evidence anyone else was involved.”

: “That’s ridiculous! Look, there’s no way it could’ve been me.”

: “Then who was it?”

: “One of the passengers. I know that much.”

: “So you were holding out earlier. You’d better talk, and fast.”

: “When the captain arrived, things changed. The way I received messages, what they told me to do…”

: “The person that was giving me orders changed, and it gave me some hints as to who they were.”

: “The notes I recieved were usually slid under the door while I was on shift. That way, I could never see who it was. It was discreet enough.”

: “Recently though, the orders have been placed in the broom closet.”

: "It’s strange, because it’s an un-necessary risk. What if someone else found those notes?’

: “Before the ship departed, before everyone even boarded, I was instructed to leave the boarding ramp out overnight.”

: “This would’ve allowed anyone to get on or off the ship without anyone noticing.”

: “And they could smuggle anything… or anyone… on board.”

: “Here’s the thing. At the time, all the staff were already on board. So the only reason I’d need to leave the ramp out…”

: “Is if the smuggler wasn’t staff. They were a passenger.”

Donovan’s Camera Footage

Like the last point, this one can be done using anyone that can be puppeted.

: “How did you find that? My computer was password protected.”

: “Well… what are you talking about? I never caught anything incriminating. I wasn’t able to hide cameras on the first floor, which was the most important thing.”

: “… Hold on. Marcurio said that before this boat trip, he got orders slid under his door. Why did that change? Why now?”

: “I wonder if the smuggler realized I had bugged the ship.”

: “If they were seen sliding notes under the door of a staff member, it would alert me. I would investigate.”

: “So they disguised their correspondence with something inocuous. Something like… cleaning up after their cat.”

: “Marcurio was going in and out per his usual need to clean the kitchen… but so were you, Garv.”

: “…Hm. As it happens, I was.”

: “Anything to add on that?”

: “Not really. I have a litter box I need to regularly clean out.”

: “You were the only person besides Marcurio who was going in and out of there! You orchestrated this!”

: “That’s a lot of conclusions to draw from such a small detail.”

: “Well, how do you explain how the notes got there?”

: “I’d say Marcurio is making this up to cover how suspicious he is. Maybe if he can tie a detail to someone else, he’ll be okay.”

: “You have to admit, there’s nothing concrete tying me to anything he’s talking about.”

Except the part where you kinda admitted you knew about him taking orders.

: “That doesn’t mean there isn’t anything. It just means I haven’t found it yet. But I will.”

: “No you won’t. Not if I’m innocent.”

Garv’s Confession

So yeah, the final piece of evidence in this path is forcing Garv to outright confess that he did it.

: “When considering the camera footage, that’s the only real possibility.”

: “So you knew about all of this? You were bribing the staff to cover this up?”

: “It’s clear that there were at least two people working together. But I don’t have enough evidence for both of them.”

Actually, yes you do, but whatever.

: “I’m not going to take a chance on letting one of them go.”

: “I can’t trust my profile anymore, but I’ll do what I can.”

: “This nightmare ends now.”

Oh, I get it. This is gonna be one of those things where he’s faking out Garv and Ferdinand so he can kill them without them pulling a gun.

Alton is summarily shot in the chest, dying instantly.

Well, Garv’s dead.

In case you don’t know what he’s saying (I sure as hell didn’t), the phrase is Latin for “The drama is over! Applaud!”. These were supposedly the last words of Caesar Augustus. Basically, Ferdinand is a smug fucker even in death.

’

Quella, assuming that Donovan is out of bullets, takes the bullet for Darryl.

Unfortunately, Donovan still has at least two bullets in his gun.

Donovan offs himself. It’s kind of a mystery to me why he doesn’t shoot Marcurio in this ending. The only thing I can think of is that Donovan’s gun is a six-shot revolver and he hadn’t planned on killing Quella.

: “…”

: “…”

: “Yeah… same here.”

: “We were the ones that were guilty! It’s… it’s our fault that they’re gone…”

: “He isn’t responding to anything. He just keeps staring straight ahead.”

: “What happened down there? What did he see? I can’t understand any of it.”

: “I know it’s hard, but we have to try and stay focused for now. We can try and figure out the rest later.”

: “And… maybe it’s best if we let someone else put the pieces together.”

: “I don’t know if I can do that.”

: “Something else happened there, on the ship. There was more going on.”

: “I need to understand what happened. I need for it to make sense.”

: “Just leaving it behind like that… it’s not right.”

And that’s it. Next time, we’ll go back and do one final sequence with Gwen before we move on to the good ending!

[Timrod]

So, let’s pretend that we didn’t just get the bad ending and instead went for that final piece of evidence. It’s honestly kind of dumb, but…

First, we need to get Xu and have her talk to Gwen now that Gwen is untied.

: “Wait…it wasn’t? Then whose key is it? And why do people think I took it from Donovan?”

: “How do you know it was a different key?”

: “An angry skull design? That sounds familiar.”

: “I think I saw that key… though I didn’t realize what it was at the time. I may have reacted differently had I known.”

: “I don’t have any idea. If I knew anything about it, I would tell you.”

: “Like I said, I didn’t even find out they were missing until this morning. And then I was brought here.”

: “When I heard Donovan was gone… I was more shocked than anyone. I really thought he was…”

: “Thought he was the killer?”

: “Not even that… I thought he was after me.”

: “I could just sense his anger. He seemed just incredibly angry, all the time…”

: “And it was as if he was looking for something. Or someone. I guess he reminded me of someone I know.”

: “Wait… really? He was looking for the captain? But I thought she was dead.”

: “W-what? I never heard anything about this before…”

: “So he was after a serial killer… was that why he had all those cameras?”

Once we exit the conversation…

So yes, that entire conversation basically boiled down to:

Yes, Gwen got defeated by the old “fake emerald on the space colony” gambit. Oldest trick in the book, that one.

So, we now need to have a largely pointless conversation with Ferdinand confirming what we already know.

Once we finish it off…

With that, we’re now clear to go right to the ending.

Everything up to this point is exactly the same - we’ve told Donovan about the bracelet, the food supplies, the camera footage, and had Garv outright confess that he was the one giving Marcurio and Xu orders. The difference is that Donovan (for some unknown reason) decides not to go shooting everyone and let Gwen say one last thing.

Gwen’s Testimony

: “Wait. You told him what you saw in my room? And just what did you see in my room?”

: “I saw the master key. And I told him. I’m sorry.”

: “I suspect the person who ambushed me knew I had the master key. That’s how they anticipated me.”

: “At that time, Sue knew because I got the key from her. And you knew because you broke into my room.”

: “And neither of you fit the profile. But Ferdinand… he fits the profile. And he knew.”

: “Why did you tell him?”

: “T-that’s not what happened! I merely confided in her that the captain was missing!”

: “I personally disapproved of her actions! I never told her to do anything!”

: “Even so, you set her against me. And you knew I had the master key. You were the only suspect with that information.”

: “Well, perhaps. But what if she told someone else? Or what if… what if I told someone else?”

: “I’ve heard enough. I think I finally understand.”

: “But the evidence doesn’t cancel itself out. It was both of you, wasn’t it?”

: “This theory is a bad detour! You said yourself you were after one person. You had a profile.”

: “What are the odds this killer you’re looking for would run into someone they could collaborate with?”

: “It sounds unlikely, doesn’t it?”

: “But I got my info from someone who had been tracking my killer. Maybe the killer expected they’d be tailed.”

: “When Gwen told Ferdinand about what she found in my room, he realized I was following him.”

: “Then he told Garv, who was able to get the jump on me.”

: “With me out of the picture, Ferdinand thought it was safe to target Paulo. At the same time, Garv worked to frame Gwen.”

: “I can understand why you’d suspect me, but what you don’t know is that I helped prove Gwen’s innocence!”

: “I also helped uncover evidence from Paulo’s room! Why would I do all of that?”

: “The evidence in Paulo’s room incriminates him, not you. And the evidence here does the same.”

: “You counted on everyone uncovering the pieces of truth you left behind, and accepting the story I had given them of a serial killer.”

: “I thought the idea of using Gwen as a patsy was kinda flimsy, but Garv insisted. I guess it makes sense now!”

: “What the fuck are you talking about? I had nothing to do with any of that!”

: “Sure you did! You told me that Donovan had been taken care of, and that you’d incriminate Gwen with your copy of the master key.”

: “Ha! I bet you knew the whole time they would figure out it was a plant. You sneaky old bastard!”

: “You know exactly what he’s talking about.”

: “You were gonna sell me out from the start, after how much I had helped you! How rude.”

: “Fuck you, you lunatic! You ruined everything!”

: “You brought feds onto my ship, and you tipped off the captain… that was blackmail, not help!”

: “Well, okay, but I also helped you get rid of the captain and the fed, so isn’t that like a wash?”

: “Look, he’s the one you’ve been after this whole time. He’s the one you want!”

Just like the last ending, Donovan shoots himself afterward.

: “Once they do, I’m out of here. This ship can sink into the ocean for all I care.”

: “I can’t believe it. Both Ferdinand and Garv, the things they did… and they didn’t even pretend to feel guilt.”

: “Darryl, Gwen… if you hadn’t come forward, who knows what would have happened to us?”

: “The information you gave brought us the truth. Thank you.”

: “I remember having help more than once along the way. Thanks, Quella.”

: “I just wish Donovan was still here. He didn’t deserve to die like that. The captain didn’t, either.”

: “Yeah. If it wasn’t for them, we never would have found out what was really happening.”

: “It can’t all be fixed, and a lot of it will take time. But… we can start to make things right.”

: “There won’t be any more victims now. The nightmare is over.”

: “I guess that depends on the police.”

: “Well, yeah… what I meant was, what are we going to do?”

Holy shit, can someone just toss Alton into the ocean already?

: “Oh. Right. I’ve been thinking about that…”

: “Oh. That’s… that’s really far away, isn’t it?”

Nothing could ever be far enough away from your horrible stack of mixtapes.

: “Yeah. Very far.”

: “I guess that means I won’t see you again. This is it.”

: “Pretty much. I mean, this was always going to happen. I never really planned to stay here forever.”

: “Right. Yeah, of course. I guess I kinda knew that.”

: “Well, good luck, Sue.”

: “You too, Alton. Oh, and I never corrected you, but I might as well now. It’s ‘Xu’.”

: “A little rattled, but I’m fine, thanks.”

: “Well, I guess this is goodbye.”

: “…Say, I have an idea. Mind if I tag along with you for a while?”

: “I don’t know if that’s such a good idea. I don’t know when I’m going.”

: “That’s alright! You can figure it out on the way!”

: “I don’t think I’ll be pleasant company.”

: “You don’t have to be.”

: “…Fine. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

: “I wouldn’t think of it.”

: “…What? Why?”

: “You figured out what that bastard was up to. Ferdinand.”

: “As much as I tried to keep my ear to the pavement, I had no idea about him.”

: “What are you talking about? You tried to frame me.”

: “You never wanted to find out what was going on.”

: “You’re right. I did a lot of shitty things. I probably bear some responsibility for what happened.”

Understatement of the century right there.

: “I’m not a good person, am I?”

: “What do you want me to say? That I forgive you? That you can change your ways?”

: “You’re like everyone else. You’ll keep doing what you’re doing as long as it’s convienient for you.”

: “Maybe you’re right. Look, I just wanted to say… thanks.”

And… that’s it! We’re done with Why Am I Dead at Sea! I’m not sure whether I’m actually going to go through the prototype Flash game for this, mostly because of how crude it is. I’ll think about it. Thanks for reading!

After going through the game for this LP, I figured “Why the hell not go for all the achievements?” and did all five endings. As I mentioned in the bad ending update, there are really only two endings - you either get the lifeboat scene with the handful of survivors or you get the docks scene with everyone. Let me summarize the other three endings for you:

• A Living Nightmare

This ending plays out exactly like False Awakening, except without Donovan realizing he’s actually dealing with two people working together instead of just the serial killer. You can get this by doing any combination that doesn’t lead to one of the other endings.

• Retribution

This ending is the first “neutral” ending. Here, you basically use Paulo’s book to prove that Ferdinand is the serial killer - the page he ripped out of his book matches Ferdinand’s room number. The only difference is that Gwen does not appear in the docks scene and instead, Garv offers Marcurio a job as the new Ferdinand.

• Justice

This is the second “neutral” ending. Instead of mentioning the bracelet with Quella, you instead mention the key deal with Xu and Marcurio, with Marcurio positing that Paulo was taken before he planted the key. Ferdinand survives and has a scene with Marcurio instead of Garv or Gwen.

[Zena]

Alton is summarily shot in the chest, dying instantly.

Holy shit, can someone just toss Alton into the ocean already?

Seems like the bad ending has some redeeming qualities.

In seriousness I enjoyed the LP and your commentary! As well as your ongoing contempt for Alton.

Would have been interesting if the ending was a bit more straightforward where you could’ve taken control of Donovan and picked out who the baddies were, right or wrong.

[Timrod]

So, I kind of found a way to get my screenshot tool working with the original game…kinda. As it turns out, the developer made a second version of it known as “Why Am I Dead: Rebirth”. Unlike Dead At Sea, the original game… kinda has a lot of shortcomings, namely that it doesn’t tell you which dialog options are important. Unfortunately, this involves a lot of manual editing on my end, so I definitely won’t be going nearly as in-depth as I did with the sequel. There will be unmarked spoilers for Dead At Sea here, so don’t read this until after you’ve finished the main LP.

I also haven’t played through all of the endings to this game: I got the first one (which is basically the equivalent to False Awakening and is clearly not canon to Dead At Sea) but did not get the other two that were added in the Rebirth remake.

I’ll be using this page as a sort of index page for Dead: Rebirth so that it doesn’t get mixed up with the first LP.

The characters in the original game are nowhere near as well-written as Dead At Sea’s are, mostly because I think this was supposed to be a “tech demo” of sorts for Dead At Sea. From the top, going clockwise, we have:

Cricket: Cricket has no real backstory, and is just kind of a person staying in a hotel where the owner has just been murdered. He’s basically the main character.

Orval: Orval is a flasher who is also probably a stalker. Seems to know where everyone in the hotel is at all times, though he doesn’t secretly have the hotel bugged. He’s pretty much unimportant to the plot.

Lucille: A shy, meek woman who is also an FBI agent chasing a serial killer. She’s the same Lucille that sent Donovan onto the ship in the sequel. She’s more of the “Smash Alton’s stack of Nickelback CDs that we all know he has” type rather than the “Shoot Alton just because” type.

Morgan: Morgan is an heiress who is also basically a non-French Yvette from Dagger of Amon Ra. She has a single daughter from her previous marriage.

Iblis: I think the writer named Morgan’s daughter this to bring back painful memories of Sonic 2006. Iblis is a little girl who may or may not be psychic - she’s essentially Paulo without having anywhere near as big a role.

Ted: Ted is Orval’s best friend, and a travelling salesman. He has information on where everyone was at the time of the murder. Also, his dialog noises are exactly the same as Ferdinand’s… but surprisingly, he’s not Ferdinand in disguise as far as I know.

Rose: Rose is an old woman who kind of hates everyone and everything.

Randy: Randy is the hotel manager, and also a drunken slob.

[Timrod]

Unlike Dead at Sea, Why Am I Dead: Rebirth starts with you as a ghost standing over its dead body. There’s no need to unlock people in this game - everyone is available from the start and there’s no total control vs. partial control mechanic.

The only thing we actually need to do here is take control of Cricket. No one in Dead: Rebirth has a special ability, and we actually kind of have to use Cricket for the vast majority of the game (minus a couple of the new endings). We could simply walk (or float) out of this room as well - there’s no rule about the ghost not being able to enter rooms straight away like there is in the sequel.

I apologize for the shifting screenshot sizes here, by the way. Unfortunately, I took most of the shots for the introduction to the game while running the flash in its own window, forgetting that the game has black borders on an all-black screen. The bald guy is Randy - he’s the hotel manager.

: “Didn’t think so. Not sure what you were trying to do coming in here.”

: “Don’t you think we should try and find out who did this?”

: “No.”

Quella, this guy isn’t. Actually, can we just bring Quella back? That’d probably be better.

: “That’s what cops do. And I’m not a cop.”

: “We already called 911. Leave it at that.”

: “But with the storm that’s going on, nobody will make it here for weeks.”

There are vague thunderstorm noises that play throughout the hotel (which is one of the reasons I didn’t just do a stream of this and call it a day) for pretty much the entire playthrough. There’s also this kind of annoying transition sound that I think the dev took from 24 or CSI or something that plays every time you enter a room.

: “So we wait 'til they do make it. He’s not going anywhere.”

I’m not going to bother going through every dialog option in this game like I did for Dead At Sea, mostly because it would make each update take probably five times longer. You can assume that I’m going with whichever dialog option is highlighted.

]

: “Beats the hell outta me. The boss had a way of pissing people off.”

: “Can’t imagine anyone pissed off enough to kill him, though.”

: “Now if you’re done playing detective, I’m gonna booze up.”

You know you have a drinking problem when you’ve resorted to the phrase “I’m gonna booze up.”

Now we’re in the entryway to the hotel. That bottom doorway leads outside, but it remains blocked for the entire game. What we need to do here is talk to Ted, the guy that looks like he’s trying really hard not to be Ferdinand.

Ted doesn’t have much of an answer to the first two questions: he just gives his name and says he didn’t know the hotel owner. The third question is what we need to ask him to make progress.

: “Well… sorta.”

: “Sorta?”

: “I may know the whereabouts of… some of the people here last night.”

: “But, well, it’s not stuff I could tell to just anybody… you know?”

: “Nothing against you, I just don’t know anything about you.”

: “Is there anything I could do to prove my good will?”

: “I mean, I’m sure you’re trying to do the right thing… just, given the circumstances and all, I’d need to really trust you.”

: “So here’s what you’d have to do. Give me your alibi.”

“Your honor, I could not have killed that man, as I was busy taking a dump. Believe me, you did not want to be there.”

: “Can anyone back that up? If not, it’s not really an alibi…”

: “Actually, there was somebody there. He could vouch for me.”

“Your honor, I can verify that man was taking a dump. I can also verify that it stank to high hell. I think he may have committed a war crime in that bathroom and I demand he be taken to the Hague to face prosecution.”

: “Any idea where I could find him?”

: “I don’t know. I guess I’d start with the bathroom.”

This is the game’s way of telling us to switch to Ted and go check out the bathroom.

This is the main hallway. The doors are completely unmarked - which is I think a big reason that every room in Dead at Sea had the name of the person occupying it just outside. The center door across from where we entered is the bathroom.

Meet “Pooper”. His name was changed from the first release of this game, where he bore the creative name of “Shitter”. I like to think he’s a copyright-friendly clone of Oscar the Grouch who lives in a toilet rather than a garbage can.

: “No worries. So, uh, how long have you been in there?”

: “…”

: “Okay, maybe that was the wrong kind of question. That came out pretty weird.”

: “Yeah, it did.”

: “I ask because there’s a guy who says he was here during the murder, and that you can back up his story.”

: “Oh, guy with the red hair? He was here.”

: “I was having a bit of a night-time emergency and he was using the bathroom at the time.”

: “Not sure what he was doing, but he was taking a long time and refusing to get out.”

: “Sort of like you, right now?”

: “Maybe we ate the same thing. When we were in the middle of switching ‘shifts’, as it were, there was a gunshot.”

: “I wasn’t in any position to go check it out at the time. Don’t know what the redhead did.”

Now that we’ve confirmed Cricket’s alibi for Ted, we can get him to narrow down our list of suspects.

Ted heard most of his information from Orval, and he was in Orval’s room when the murder happened.

Rose is also cleared, as she was in her room the entire night. Iblis (the little girl) was asleep the entire night. How Orval knew this… I don’t think any of us want to know.

The only people without an alibi are Randy (because his room is the one behind the counter), Morgan, and Lucille. Next time, we’ll investigate them and find out what their alibis are.

[Timrod]

So, one thing I’ll say about the flash game: it has a lot of points at which it expects you to do things that make no real sense to do and that you’re not even really given any hints about. I should also mention that there are (as far as I know) no comprehensive walkthroughs of this game anywhere.

The logical thing to do would be to possess Cricket and have him talk to the three people who don’t have alibis. Makes sense, right? Except… that won’t actually get us anywhere with Randy or Morgan. Instead, we need to possess Morgan’s daughter, Iblis, and have her talk to Randy. At no point are there any hints leading the player to do this: you’re basically just expected to brute-force it.

: “H-hi there! How’re you, little girl?”

: “Me? Oh yeah, I’m okay. Don’t worry about me.”

: “Just… you look exactly like my daughter did.”

: “She must look a lot older by now, I guess.”

So in case you haven’t played Hotel Dusk: Room 215, Randy is basically Dunning Smith from that game, right down to his motivations being exactly the same. In fact, there’s a LOT of stuff in this game outright lifted from Hotel Dusk.

: “No. Not for… three years now?”

: “Why not?”

: “Well… I did some bad things. Things I’m not proud of. And now I’m not allowed to see her.”

: “What if you apologized? Won’t she forgive you?”

: “Ha… it’s… it’s not like that. I can’t get back into the country. I’d be arrested.”

: “I made some big mistakes in my life, and ended up under the thumb of a complete scumbag.”

: “We had a deal, me and him. We had a deal. I could go back. I could see my daughter.”

: “But now he’s dead, and that deal is history.”

So yeah. For no reason whatsoever, Randy just told a little girl that he has incriminating evidence under his mattress. Makes total sense.

While we could look at the stuff under Randy’s mattress as Iblis (for some reason, Randy does not give a single fuck about people looking under there), we actually need to do it as Cricket to progress.

: “Underneath the mattress is an envelope. Inside are several letters. All of them are addressed from the owner of the hotel to Randy.”

: “While they talk about different things, they all mention some kind of deal between the two. There are also several veiled threats aimed at Randy.”

So yeah, now you know more or less where Marcurio came from. Next, we need to confront Randy as Cricket.

: “The owner was blackmailing you, wasn’t he?”

: “…I guess there’s no point lying about if you’ve already seen the letters.”

: “Yeah, we had some screwed-up arrangement.”

: “I worked at the hotel and did errands for him. It felt like being a house servant…”

: “In return, he promised I’d be able to see my daughter again.”

: “Moving things around. Transporting people. That kind of stuff.”

: “Nothing illegal, but it still left me feeling uneasy. I was never told why I was doing these things. He was hiding stuff from me, but I never cared to figure it out.”

As we leave, Randy gives us the hint to go talk to Morgan. However, it’s not quite that simple.

What we actually need to do is possess Rose, the evil old woman who literally exists solely to get Morgan to talk to Cricket. The entire exchange between them doesn’t make a whole lot of sense - Rose just knows somehow that Morgan was sleeping with the hotel owner.

So yeah, in another fit of complete nonsense, Morgan just kind of tells this evil old lady who walked into her room and starts talking about her sex life right in front of her daughter that she’s hidden incriminating paperwork in her dresser. Dead At Sea, this game is not.

Now we can bring Cricket in and have him just search Morgan’s dresser while she’s in the room. Makes about as much sense as anything else in the flash game. Just as an aside, the dev himself has admitted that this game was basically a trial run for Dead at Sea, so there wasn’t a ton of effort put into it.

: “Inside are assorted clothes, makeup, and cigarettes. Also, some very risque lingerie!”

: “…Underneath the lingerie is a giant brown envelope with the word “CONFIDENTIAL” written on it.”

: “Inside the envelope are a bunch of files belonging to the owner of the hotel. They have to do with the hotel’s finances.”

We then have to confront Morgan about the file. The conversation is mostly stuff we already know - she suspects the hotel of being a front for something but doesn’t have any idea what. At this point, the game’s four endings start to branch off. Next time, we’ll talk to Lucille and achieve the first ending.

[Ferrovore]

This game looks kind of frustrating, especially compared to the flawed-but-much-better Dead at Sea, but for being more or less a proof of concept/tech demo it’s got a surprising amount of work put into it! Has the creator done any other games?

[Timrod]

The only games the dev has made are Dead: Rebirth, Dead at Sea, and some game called “Mandate” that looks like a Nobunaga’s Ambition clone. You can see all of the dev’s games on his website, which is linked in the first post. It looks like his most recent work is a game called “About-Face” that he finished last summer. You can find it here: https://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/676121?id=676121 though it’s kind of a shitty VVVVVV/Eversion clone.

[Timrod]

Now that we’ve uncovered all of the evidence, it’s time to get the original bad ending. Dead: Rebirth has a total of four unique endings: two that were in the original version and two more that were added in the remake.

To get this ending, all we have to do is talk to Lucille as Cricket after finding the evidence in Randy and Morgan’s rooms. As soon as we do that, we’re locked into the bad ending.

: “I…I see…”

: “It must have been somebody else…”

: “And Morgan was in the middle of investigating the owner’s finances. His death only disrupted her search, so she didn’t have a motive either.”

: “…”

: “That leaves one person as the killer. You.”

: “Meet me in the owner’s room. The scene of the crime.”

At this point, Lucille just kind of teleports away into the murder room. I forgot to mention it earlier, but Dead: Rebirth doesn’t have the feature Dead at Sea does where NPCs will wander around when not possessed.

Interestingly, while you can’t possess Lucille anymore, you can still possess anyone else in the hotel and bring them in here. Lucille won’t react to them.

: “Then you’re in luck. Tell me, what do you know about this hotel?”

: “…Wrong.”

: “The owner was a criminal, yes. But the hotel was not a front. The hotel was the stage of the crime.”

: “What do you mean?”

: “It suffices to say that the remote location of this hotel was by design, not by accident.”

: “Away from society, Away from the law.”

: “And that was why you killed him?”

: “No, not exactly. Sadly, Morgan was not the only person whose investigation was ended prematurely.”

: “I had been careless, and he discovered me in my search for evidence against him.”

: “In that moment, it was me or him. I chose myself.”

: “And a badge and a license to kill to go along with it.”

What isn’t explicitly clear here until about a minute from now is that Lucille does not have her gun with her. She was apparently trained by the same people who taught Donovan not to carry a gun when investigating secret rooms in a crime scene.

: “You’re a cop? You were sent here to investigate this hotel?”

: “No, I came here on the trail of a known serial killer.”

So one thing I want to mention here. There’s a popular fan theory that Ted and Ferdinand are the same person. The game never actually addresses the whole serial killer thing, but in my opinion, Ted and Ferdinand are two different people.

: “However, when I grew suspicious of the owner, I realized he was more… deserving of my attention.”

: “I’m… not sure how to react.”

: “Act as if nothing has changed. If my cover is blown, all of my work could be reversed.”

So yeah, Cricket is actually evil and there were zero clues to it. I think what the dev was going for is the part in Heavy Rain where you learn you’ve actually been playing as the origami killer the entire time, only Heavy Rain didn’t have the writing to make that work either.

: “What are you doing?!”

The real question I have about Dead: Rebirth as a game is why the ghost even needed to be a thing. The ghost has no real agency, and really the plot is the same whether or not the ghost is present as a character. This is one thing I’m really glad they fixed in Dead at Sea.

And with that, we’ve achieved the first ending to Dead: Rebirth. The original game (as far as I know) had one more ending, which is the one that is canon to Dead at Sea. Next time, we’ll make sure Lucille has her gun before she talks to Cricket.

[Timrod]

So, welcome to the canon ending route. You would think that making Lucille grab her gun would be an easy task… and you’d actually be wrong. First, we need to have done everything up to the point where we’d get the bad ending - finding the hidden stuff in Randy and Morgan’s room and then confronting them with Cricket. The good ending requires even more nonsense that isn’t even really hinted at.

First, we have to talk to Cricket as Lucille - not the other way around, as that would give us the bad ending. This results in a conversation tree that is remarkably identical to the one Cricket had with Ted in the beginning of the game. He won’t confirm anyone’s alibi… but he will confirm where he got them from. Which, again, is something we already know.

The only new bit of information to come from this is that Ted got all of his information from Orval. We haven’t actually talked to Orval for any reason and this is the only time we’ll be doing so.

Orval is basically the equivalent to the clown from that one case in Phoenix Wright 2 - he’s very elusive about giving Lucille any actual answers to her questions. Fortunately his dialogue trees are relatively short, but it’s still annoying if you’re trying to pick the right answer.

: “Sorry! Doesn’t ring any bells!”

Only the last one will get us anywhere. Picking the third option will get Orval to deny he even knows what a lounge is.

: “No way!! He really said that?! Best friends?!”

: “And by that I mean… who’s Ted? Sorry. Doesn’t ring any bells!”

: “So you do know Ted. You just said so. Stop wasting my time!”

: “Woah! Woah! Woah! Let’s just calm down. Okay, so, I talked to Ted. A little bit. We’re sorta buddies.”

Now I see why Donovan likes her so much. Orval kind of stumbles around for a bit, and then…

: “I mean, Ted kinda told me to do some research for him. Keep an eye out on the other guests. And report back to him.”

: “Y’know, nothing weird.”

So now, we’ve confirmed that Orval is Ted’s source. There’s also this little tidbit he gives us:

Basically, Orval and Ted are Ferdinand split into two characters. I think the dev was going for the exact same thing he wound up doing with Dead at Sea, where Cricket and the hotel owner have their own thing going on until the serial killer shows up and demands to work with them.

Anyway, this next part is… probably the dumbest thing we’re going to wind up doing on this route. Remember how when we set things up for the bad ending, we found the documents in Morgan’s dresser that outright stated she was investigating the hotel owner and then interrogated her with Cricket?

Now, we have to do the opposite and interrogate Cricket with Morgan. The reason for this is that the final two endings are heavily based around Morgan and Randy, and this is also a requirement for those endings.

: “Well, actually, I was supposed to meet with someone at the hotel. He wasn’t here, though, and anyway this mystery takes precedent.”

That’s all we actually needed to hear. Now we get to interrogate Morgan with Lucille again, giving us largely the same information she just told Cricket. This is one of those things that I’m really glad the dev/writer fixed with Dead at Sea.

Similarly, we then need to interrogate Randy, who gives us the same information for the… fourth time now? I’m starting to think that… maybe… just maybe… Cricket was planning on meeting someone at the hotel! But who? It’s not like most people who’ve played this far wouldn’t already know the answer!

Once we do, Lucille has a moment very much like the one Gwen has after her final conversation with Ferdinand in the sequel.

: “It’s most likely that they were, in fact, going to meet each other.”

: “They must have had some prior relationship. Maybe even partnership.”

: “It seems like Ted is feeding information to the owner’s partner.”

You know, I bet if Lucille was in Dead at Sea, she would have popped Garv multiple times before he could even reach for his gun. Hell, I bet Lucille could’ve saved the captain.

That last item is something that was added to this version of the game. It’s used for the final ending. Instead, we’re now going to progress just like we did for the first ending: having Cricket talk to Lucille and meet her at the crime scene.

This time, Cricket pulls his gun… and is promptly shot in the hand by Lucille.

: “You… you knew?!”

: “That you and the owner were working together? Yeah.”

: “I thought it was suspicious that Ted, of all people, was giving you information.”

She’s even got a sick burn just for this situation.

: “What are you talking about?”

: “Once I realized the owner still had a business partner kicking around the hotel, I knew I wasn’t finshed.”

: “But when I knew Ted was working with him, I figured it was only a matter of time until they made their move.”

: “All I had to do was be ready and wait. And I was right, because you delivered yourself right to me.”

: “But arresting you will have to do.”

: “Oh, you will definitely tell me everything you know. But I’m still arresting you.”

Somewhere, in whatever wastebasket Activision tossed him in once they acquired Sierra in the early 2000s, Sonny Bonds looks up with a smile knowing proper police procedure is being observed.

: “This is the end for you.”

And that’s the second ending. Next time, we’ll finish the final ending of Dead: Rebirth!

[Timrod]

This is it. The final update for Dead: Rebirth… and a second giant ripoff of Hotel Dusk. This ending, along with a second bad one that I’m not going to cover for reasons you’ll understand shortly, was added in the Rebirth re-release.

The requirements for getting it are convoluted to say the least. First, we have to go through the game up to the point where Ending 2 happens - Lucille has to have her briefcase opened.

What we actually have to do is talk to Randy as Rose, and confirm that Morgan is investigating the hotel’s owner. From here until we reach the actual ending, I’m going to be abbreviating a lot. There are two reasons for this: one is that a lot of this is stuff we already know from one of the other endings. The second is that the dialogue related to the new endings is REALLY poorly programmed, particularly in one spot coming up.

This is the first real hint on how to get this ending: we need to make Randy and Morgan team up. This is among the most convoluted and poorly designed things in this entire flash game. If we were to talk to Morgan while controlling Randy, we’d get nowhere. Instead, we have to talk to Randy while controlling Morgan.

So here’s where the coding starts falling apart. The option we actually need to make Morgan work with Randy is exactly none of the ones you see here. It’s actually a fourth branch that comes after you ask the other two questions. We already know the answer to question one: it’s because the owner was blackmailing Randy with his daughter in a blatant Hotel Dusk ripoff.

: “Apart from his general nature and the fact that he was extorting me?”

: “Well, he would give me strange odd jobs all the time. Nothing illegal… but suspicious.”

If you’re thinking “Hey this sounds exactly like Marcurio when he was telling Quella his theory about there being an animal hidden somewhere on the ship” you’re EXACTLY RIGHT. Keep in mind that the Rebirth version came out after Dead at Sea did. I’m actually pretty sure this entire dialog tree is just Marcurio’s with the names changed.

: “The weird thing was they seemed to have no connection to the hotel. Maybe I’d fix something he gave me, or maybe I’d go out and buy something and bring it to the hotel.”

: “But then… I’d never see it again. Like. I’d buy blankets, but never see them used for the tenant’s beds.”

If you’re thinking “Gee, this sure sounds exactly like Marcurio’s testimony at the end of Dead at Sea when he reveals how Garv is a human trafficker” YOU’RE EXACTLY RIGHT! This ending is exactly as ham-fisted as you’re thinking it is. Actually, even more so.

I would point out the obvious parallels to Dead at Sea here, but you’ve probably already got the idea. The dickish part here is that this third question has two nearly identical branches. Both of these need to be explored AFTER asking the other two questions to proceed. If you asked both of them beforehand, you’ll need to do it again.

Anyway, we do all that, and then Randy re-caps everything we just read not even seconds ago… before going into a twist I’m sure absolutely none of you will see coming. Ready?

Yes, they just went there. From this point on, Randy and Morgan function as one person when possessed.

… However, there’s one more person we need to get to join them - Lucille. This is what differentiates the final “golden ending” from the second bad ending. Now, you might ask me: “Well, couldn’t we just have Lucille come over and ask Morgan what she’s doing, since Lucille already knows that Morgan is investigating the hotel?”

Oh no, my friend. The answer is something FAR more stupid. One thing you might have noticed in Dead at Sea is that little “…” icon near people’s heads. This is an indicator that they have a dialogue option we haven’t explored yet. If, for some reason, you possess Iblis while in Morgan’s room, you’ll notice that the doll in the corner has a speech bubble above it.

While Randy and Morgan stand in the middle of the room posing for a family photo, we’re going to possess the doll and use it to talk to Iblis.

Now we need to have a five year old girl convince an FBI agent to go along with a plan to find a hidden room in the hotel that may or may not even exist.

That was surprisingly easy.

A few minutes of repeat conversation later, Lucille joins Randy and Morgan on their quest to find the hidden room. Now, you might ask how we’re supposed to find this hidden room that we’ve been given absolutely no clues to other than that it might possibly exist.

The answer is that the other mirror in the owner’s room has the switch behind it. There is zero indication that this is the case if you examine this mirror at any point before right now.

Welcome to the hidden basement. There’s one thing about this basement that will be extremely familiar if you’ve played through Hotel Dusk - namely that it has an airtight seal to the outside that has never been mentioned before now and will make absolutely no sense in a minute.

: “Look at that thing… talk about ominous.”

: “I can’t believe a place like this was under the hotel the whole damn time.”

: “…it won’t open. It looks like there’s a giant lock on the door that needs a key. Do you know anything about that, Randy?”

: “I don’t know. I have a few hotel keys with me I could try out…”

: “…”

:"…"

So, if we hadn’t gotten Lucille to come along, the game ends right here with Randy realizing that the door going back into the hotel is sealed… and airtight. This is a blatant ripoff of Hotel Dusk, which had the exact same gimmick only with a stupid substitution cypher that had no reason to exist.

Yes. You read that right. Lucille is so hyper-competent that she actually has the key to a door she didn’t even know existed until mere seconds ago.

And there you have it. The final ending to Dead: Rebirth is copy-pasted straight from Dead at Sea, right down to the assets. Now, I want you to think about something. This room is completely sealed off from the rest of the hotel. How are these people still alive if Randy and Morgan run out of air about two seconds after the outer door gets closed?

: “I was thinkin’ we’d find a drug stockpile. What is this?”

: “Randy, don’t you get it? These people are… are…”

So now you would think that it would make a lot of sense for, say, Garv to show up. Or for there to be any kind of connection to Dead at Sea other than the copy-pasted ending.

Nope! Instead, Cricket shows up and gives a monologue about evil hiding in plain sight.

Lucille pulls her gun and demands that Cricket talk, since the rest of this is basically the second ending just in a different location.

Cricket gives his usual A Few Good Men speech, and then pulls his gun.

: “The people that were found in that horrible black room were moved to shelters where they could slowly come back to good health.”

: “it seemed like things had been resolved.”

: “But I still had questions. How many more places were out there like this one? How many people like Cricket were out there?”

: “How did a place like this escape our attention for so long? Am I the first to discover it?”

: “And was my mission that led me here a coincedence? Or was there a deeper meaning to it all?”

And there we have it. All four endings of Dead: Rebirth completed. I honestly did not like this game anywhere near as much as I like Dead at Sea, but I still think it’s worth looking at to see how the dev actually learned lessons from this and applied them to the sequel. Thanks for sticking with me for these past four months.

[Timrod]

@moderators I’m finally done… at sea. Put this one in completed.