========================================================== (80 characters) ===== Whale's Voyage Walkthrough v1.0 By 8-bit Warrior e-mail: eightbitwarrior@rocketmail.com -TABLE OF CONTENTS- I. Intro II. Stupid Things III. Character Creation IV. Trade V. Walkthrough VI. Weapon Stats VII. Loose Ends VIII. Conclusion IX. Appendix X. Credits I. Intro There I was, knee-deep in a foreign country 8000 miles from home, surrounded by mosquitos and palm trees. I was traveling where no man had ever gone before... Well, maybe a few men. But not many of my ilk. This was, after all, a unqiue mission.... After three months of continuous travel, I found myself in town not unlike American suburbia. Lulled into complacency by this unexpectedly familiar environment, I began to live an American lifestyle, hanging out with friends, hitting up the diner and eating giant poori with chutney and tea...Even playing old computer games at night. Soon I found myself trolling Underdogs, looking for some sort of space-based adventure to satisfy my seemingly unquenchable thirst. I had to play them all, every last damn sci-fi game ever made before 1995. What can I say? I guess I let my guard down... And that's how I found myself playing this stupid game smack dab in the midddle of Tamil Nadu, India. II. Stupid Things There's a couple of stupid things about this game you'd best understand before you start playing. 1. If you load a character with too much stuff, they'll quickly start dying. Really quickly. The amount you can carry seems to be based on strength, but there's no way to tell max carrying capacity. Instead, after picking up any particularly heavy item, you'd better click the character portrait to see if you overloaded them. If so, jettison some stuff ASAP! 2. The controls are ridiculous. There is no mouse support, and no keyboard shortcuts. Everything is accessed by holding down Spacebar and pressing the down key. Then you highlight the various options on the lower part of the screen. Escape backs up a menu. For further foolishness, the [Target] command and [Attack] command are located in different menus. This immediately puts the game into the "labor of love" category. 3. Similarly, if a character dies, the game dumps you back to the main menu, so you have to click through again to continue fighting. Genious. 4. Other stupid things: this game. III. Character Creation When you start the game, you'll be taken to a character creation screen. First you'll be asked to choose the father, then the mother. This determines not only the character portrait, but the min/max values for each of the six attributes. Note that neither the character class nor race has any effect on game choices or plot. Neither do you ever encounter the aliens you can choose from in this screen in the game. Three attributes increase as the character levels up: health, mental energy, and strength. 1. Attributes Strength: Determines max weight that can be carried. Unsure if it affects melee weapon damage. Intelligence: May influence rehetoric level. Speed: Unsure. Mental Energy: Starting mental energy points. A character with zero mental energy will always remain at zero. Skillfulness: Seems to determine weapon accuracy. Health: Amount of damage that can be incurred before death. 2. Skills As far as I can tell, character classes only influence the set of skills the character can use. (They may influence rhetoric, honesty, and general education stats as well, but I'm not sure. Also, only one of these seem to even matter.) So knowing what the skills are will allow you to make the best choice for classes. *Auto Reload: Automatic reloads the character's gun instead of you having to go into the menu to do it manually. Check Honesty: Tells you the honesty of a character in numeric value. Since we don't know what that value signifies, this has abosolutely no use. *Heal Wounds: Heals all wounds of a party member, the mental energy cost equivalent to the damage incurred. Since higher health levels = greater cost, the amount you can heal at once will be more or less the same throughout the game. Brainblast: Might be a one-hit kill. But by the time you can use it, you'll have better guns which can be used for far longer. Create Fireball: Hurts bad guys. Never used it, but the high casting cost ensures only 3 or 4 uses anyway. Detoxicate: Not used. Seems related to the never-used poison stat. Disarm: Never worked. As a result, no chance to do anything but kill bad guys. Heal Unconciousness: Not used. Seems related to the never-used oxygene stat. Hypnotize Opponent: Never worked. Too bad, it seemed to have great potential for NPC as well as enemy interactions. Identify Essence: Never used. Seems like it may have been linked to an incomplete quest on the alien ship, though obviously was intended for more as well. Identify Opponent: Gives the same stats for other characters as you can get on yours. Since most characters in this game are simply shot at, pretty useless. Identify Weapon: Gives detailed stats on weapons, though all but one (technical level) can be figured out through other menus. Useful if playing on your own, but since you've got this guide, it's pointless. :) Intimidate: Never worked. Paralyze: Never worked. Again, too bad as it seemed to offer non-violent solutions. *Resurrect: Brings dead character back to life. At later levels, it may cost more than your character's max mental points, but in the beginning of the game, it is essential--at that stage, resurrecting at an aid station will cost more than your party has. Search for Trap: Not used. Set Trap: Not used. Take up Trail: Not used. *Use Computers: There are several moments where you can use this skill. The alternative is lugging around a 4000 g toolbox, so it's a pretty good skill. Use Essence: Not used. *Use Scanner with Extended Knowledge: Allows you to scroll the map around while activated. Very useful. Value Item: Tells you how much you could sell an item for on the present planet. Pretty useless. 3. Character Classes Soldier [Psi-Neg] Starting Skill: [Identify Weapon] Other Skills: Auto Reload, Use Scanner with Extended Knowledge, Identify Opponent, Take Up Trail, Set Trap, Search for Traps, Value Item Bounty Hunter [Psi-Neg] Starting Skill: [Take Up Trail] Other Skills: Check Honesty, Identify Weapon, Identify Opponent, Use Computers, Value Item, Set Trap, Auto Reload Aranian [Psi-Pos] Starting Skill: [Hypnotize Opponentnent] Other Skills: Heal Wounds, Resurrect, Paralyze, Disarm, Check Honesty, Take up Trail, Identify Weapon, Auto Reload Biochemist [Psi-Neg] Starting Skill: [Identify Essence] Other Skills: Use Essence, Identify Weapon, Auto Reload, Use Scanner with Extended Knowledge, Search for Traps, Value Item, Set Trap, Use Computer Psionian [Psi-Pos] Starting Skill: [Check Honesty] Other Skills: Create Fireball, Brainblast, Hypnotize, Heal Wounds, Identify Opponent, Detoxicate, Paralyze, Intimidate Doctor [Psi-Pos] Starting Skill: [Heal Wound] Other Skills: Resurrect, Hypnotize, Detoxicate, Heal Unconciousness, Paralyze, Use Essence, Identify Essence, Disarm Note that all healing is related to mental powers. There are no healing items you to take with you--only other option is health stations. Based on usefulness of abilities, I would reccomend a soldier, aranian, doctor, and psionian--if you want variety. Truthfully, the most useful party would be the one that dies the least & can heal the most. i.e., one soldier, and three of either aranians or doctors-- picking the parents that yield both high health and mental. The choice is yours. 4. Generation The previous three sections should give you enough info to decide what classes you want. Now you must pick the parents which yield the best combination of attributes. I ran all 25 combinations and logged the most notable ones: 1 + * average. 1 + 4 good intel, health, decent mental 2 + 1 bad stats 2 + 2 good 2 + 3 good stats 2 + 5 good (inc. mental), - str sped 3 + 1 some good, - health, 0 mental 3 + 2 crazy intelligence & mental; other stats garbage 3 + 4 decent, no mental 4 + 1 crazy mental, other stats good 4 + 2 good stats, - mental 4 + 4 crazy str & spd, - others 4 + 5 crazy intl, spd, skl 5 + 1 great speed str skil 5 + 2 good, - speed mental 5 + 4 decent, - mental The stats will determine what skill your character can be admitted to. The school will increase one or two stats dramatically. The second skill will do the same, and also determine the character class. Presto. Because characters will basically get attacked all at once, there's no character that can afford to have low health. So try not to take on any lame ducks in that area. IV. Trade The trading aspect of this game seems pretty cool at first, but due to the authors' apparent total unfamiliarity with even rudimentary principles of supply & demand, it quickly becomes quite stale. Once you get enough money to buy anything (around $100k), each planet will have a "best deal" to purchase. Buy all you can and take it to the next planet in a row. If you stop by and trade every chance you get, you'll never have to worry about money again. Lupis = Bauxite[/6686] > Auboris[/10884] = $4198 Auboris = Drugs[/9376] > Lapis[/13671] = $4295 Castra = Medicine [/70000] > Lupis[/108944] = $38944 Sky Boulevard = HeavyWeapons [/168753] > Lapis[/256485] = $87732 [lightweapons also good] ? ? ? The second planet is where you can get the greatest profit, but technically you can sell it anywhere and make green, since each item is at the lowest price in the system. V. Walkthrough 1. Part I Welcome to Whale's Voyage. This is the main screen, where you'll do all sorts of fun stuff, like buy & sell wares, set your destination, and equip the Whale. For now, though, there's nothing much to do but beam down, so you might as well do that. And this is your introduction to the "field" mode. It seems cool at first, but quickly becomes quite mazelike. Personally, it reminds of this bizarre "virtual reality" machine I paid $20 bucks for at the shore once as a kid. But I digress. To the left of each character's name is an icon which indicates their role. These are pretty much useless. However, whoever is going to be doing the killing (probably your soldier) should be set to "T", for "Tarzan." (Or Targeter.) You may also find it useful to set someone to M so you can tell how many credits you have. Finally, C ("Closer") is sometimes useful when being chased. Anyway, Castra is a somewhat snazzy-looking location with a pretty decent BGM. You'll also quickly discover that it is one of the most maddening useless areas you'll ever encounter. Seriously, what were they thinking when they designed this piece of ass? And yet there's so much more ass to come. Head to the West, through a covered passage. There's a strange shaped computer room with lots of alcoves. In one of these, you find Greg Morgan, who complains about being persecuted and asks for a shrinking machine. Sure. Go South, and you'll find old man Geroge McNil getting beat up by some holligans. Target them and beat them with your bare fists. They go away soon enough. Approach George and click the icon that appeared under the beam up icon. (Pay attention, usually it's partially off-screen.) Geroge gives you $1500 cash. Talk to him again and write down his number: 781658819. Head a little East to the U-shaped room with two doors. There the merchant Walter will tell you that he lost track of his daughter Winnie. Head back North and West through that covered passage where you were introduced to the mysteries of Greg Morgan, and you'll find Winnie shortly thereafter. Again, you have to highlight a secondary icon to interact with her. Bring her back to papa and he'll happily give you two guns and a grenade in response. The natural reaction for any father, of course! Give the Shotgun to your attacker and the pistol to your secondary. (Not that it will matter, ever.) Immediately use the clip to reload the gun. As soon as you step outside, a mugger will demand your money. Mercilessly dispatch him (the only way you can deal with anyone in this game). I would beam back to the ship and save my game at this point. Head West and slightly North to find the second merchant, Max Flesh. He's in the L-shaped passage. Talk to him and he'll tell you of a job involving a heart that needs to get to Jack Nock on Lapis. As soon as you grab it, a hit squad beams in to kill you. Beam up as fast as you can. Be quick, as it's easy for one of your guys to get killed here. Save the game, then call old man George. He'll "fax" you the shrink machine. Beam back down. (The hit squad is gone.) Go back to Greg Morgan and you'll see an event icon pop up. You may notice that Greg Morgan is dressed exactly like the squad of hitmen that beamed in to kill you. This may make you suspicious. You would not be incorrect to harbor this feeling. However, you have no choice but to help him out. Greg leaves behind a CD; don't forget to grab it. Mosey on over to Lapis (hopefully you won't get killed by space pirates along the way). There's a gang of mercs wandering around to the east. Try not to get pwned and take them out. Grab their guns as you can hawk them for over $10k apiece(!).You'll find Jack Knock in the staircase-shaped building to the east. (Unless you didn't grab the CD, in another example of how this game doesn't respect your freedom. In which case you may very well spend the next several hours of your life wandering around Lapis wondering where the heck Jack Knock is.) Talk to him and he mutters some nonsense about freedom fighters. Give him the heart and he gives you $100,000 bucks. Give him the CD and the game spawns an enemy directly behind you. Turns out Greg Morgan is really an assassain after the heart. Surprise. At this range he'll be killing your characters in pretty much one hit. Refuse to play ball and immediately beam out of there, leaving poor Jack Knock to fend for himself. Hopefully no one got killed. If they did, resurrect them. Save and beam back down. Now just park yourself outside the building and wait for that traitor Greg Morgan to wander into your sights. One blast from the s-gun should enough to finish him. The person who offs him gets a bucket of experience and will probably level up, though the other members will be very close. Turns out Jack is fine, Greg was just a plot device for the game for the game to sucker punch you. Jack basically tells you to go away, which is strange considering that a bunch of people are trying to kill him. Well, now you have enough money to essentially become rich beyond your wildest imagination. (Even if you didn't give the heart to Jack, by selling the Small Bore guns you picked up from the four thugs, you will still have enough cash to achieve total market domination.) It's pretty simple. Beam up and buy all the Bauxite and Iron you can. Fly to Aboris. Sell. Fly to Catera. You should have enough to buy Perfume. Fly back to Lapis, continue the route. Work your way up to Cybernetic Parts and Reactor Parts. Upgrade your ship (spe. fuel related upgrades). Fly to Sky Boulevard once you have $100k+. Buy Heavy Weaponry, fly to Lapis. This time, still fly to Arboris, but skip to Sky Boulevard and work back. Repeat until you are satisfied with your wealth. 2. Part II After you're done robbing the solar system blind, find yourself at Lapis. Visit Jack Knock to find, suprise! He's dead. [Examine] his corpse to find a note. [Examine] the note to find a number: 042545120. (The game probably won't let you dial it until you pick up the note.) Alrighty. While you're here, you can buy the Room Scanner, which automatically fills up the map. No more nudging up to every wall to fill it in. You might also want to buy a toolkit if no one can learn {Use Computers}. There's also an Infrared Scanner and a Sound Suppresser which will be very helpful later in the game. Before you beam up, find a dude with green hair wandering around the north part of the map. Ask about news and he'll tell you that Hypo-Coca disease is going around. Oh no. Beam up and call the number. He'll tell you that "the only place the heart could be is Inoid." Really? The only place it could be is the farthest planet in the solar system? The ONLY place? Okay. Make sure you grab the extra fuel tank and the fuel optimizer before you set sail. Once on Inoid, go to the north side of the map to find the hospital. Tell the guy at the front desk that you have Hypo-Coca disease. The person who says this will get another bucket of experience and probably level up. Doc will show up and leave you alone in a locked room. Use [Manipulate Computers] skill or a {Toolkit} to open the door. Grab the heart and everyone will get experience. Suprisingly, no one materializes to kill you. After that, not much to do but beam up. Make sure you buy an {Automatic Gun} before you go. Call the number again to get some coordinates on Lapis to meet the guy. You need a {Glider} and a {Glider Locator} to get there. If you weren't reading this FAQ, and you were a chump like me and clicked through the message without paying attention, you'd get to spend the next several hours checking every coordinate on Lapis. But fortunately, I'm here to spare you such life-wasting moments, and so, head to [33,18]. Simply flying over the location is enough to activate it on the beam bar. Find Jenns Nipple in the southwest part of the mine. If you ask what the heart is for, he'll tell you to read Suffix A in your manual. You might be curious as to what happens if you don't give him the heart. I honestly have no idea. Everyone gets a bucket of experience if you give it to him, so that's good enough for me. If you want to do something besides wander around aimlessly for the rest of the game, accept the mission to escort a ship to Nadax. If your ship is fully upgraded (and I see no reason why it wouldn't be) you will crush the fleet that intercepts you. Captain gives you loot and tells you to meet their man on Nadax. Kevin Grove is wandering around north of you. He tells you to meet a pirate at [45,17]. While you're in Aqua, you might just want to invest in a Plasmagun. That's Necht. Around the West-Center part of town are some bubble helmet-wearing soldiers who will try to kill you and might be quite effective at it. These are tougher before, both offensively and defensively. Hopefully you got a Plasmagun as the buckshot doesn't really cut it. They also employ a beam blocker, so you're in for the fight. After you snuff them, you'll realize why they were so tough: all had plasmaguns! In the bar to the north, a bartender will tell you that the cops just chased out someone. On the table behind you, you'll find an ashtray. If you pick it up and examine it, you'll find that there is a number written on it: 075384251. Just like before, no one will pick up if you didn't examine the ashtray. Sigh. If you think this is silly, yes, it is. South, you'll also find a guy who casually mentions that there's an alien ship orbitting past Idion. If you bought a translator on Auboris, you could go there and hear aliens talk about boring, irrelevant topics. Or you could not go at all. Finally, make sure you grab the damaged gun and armor that appear when you kill the final soldier. The armor is heavy, so it will probably require some inventory shuffling. If you call, the pirate tells you to meet Nipple on Lapis. Well, what are you waiting for? When you show up, Nipple is dead. The pirate "accidentally" killed him. Well, okay, plant the damaged stuff on Nippel's body, everyone gets experience, a guy shows up, then you beam up. A call tells you to wipe a central computer on Sky Boulevard then call 093493330 when you're done. You'll find a goofy looking guy wandering around the southeast part of the map. He'll tell you the computer room is behind Mr. Wellscoff, but only after you give him an Automatic Gun. (Buy on Inoid.) He's in the west part of the map, but he wants a blue filled form. The guy who will give you the blue form is in the northwest part, but he wants the yellow form first. That guy is in the southeast, but he wants a green form. At this point, you may feel like you're playing a low-grade version of Doom. But unlike the novel, you don't have the option of just blowing the darn door up. The same guy in the north will give you a green form, but only after a red form. The guy in the southeast will give you not just one, but as many red forms as you desire. Hurray. Grab all those forms and get into the comp room. I can say for sure this next part you would never figure out on your own. Set a CP4 trap at south T junction. (Buy on Castra.) All the way North, a door opened, allowing you to the power station. Use the computer [skill or toolbox] to turn out the lights. You can use an infrared device to see now if you want, or not. (Buy on Lapis.) Go to the room the guard was in front of, use the computer to the right. Beam up and call. You'll hear a voice tell you to come to Inoid just before it gets killed, apparently. Fly to Iniod and you'll intercept a distress call on the way. Dust the donuts. He'll give you a new map location to visit. Head to the asteroid. In the center there is a bartender who will mutter something about a meeting. West of him in a tiny room is a shopkeeper with some serious ordinance. (Which the asteroid also has for your ship, btw.) Max is in a room to the southwest. I'm pretty sure he doesn't appear till you talk to the barkeep. He'll give you the coordinates of another place on the 'stroid: [10,11]. Then you have to give Max something, anything, and he'll tell you that his friend will only talk to you if you bring him a red sardine. Right. If you're broke at this point like me, it might be time to raise some funds. $2 million should do. Go back to Lapis and ask Krueger for a red sardine. Naturally, because nothing in this game makes sense, he happens to have one on him. While you're on the asteroid, buy an advanced room scanner in the first town. This shows where people are and makes the game much, much easier. You should probably pick up a plasma thrower while you're at it. Go to shame and find Max's friend. You'll recognize him by his red hair and wrap-around sunglasses which make him look r i d i c u l o u s. Give him the sardine and he'll yak up a storm. He tells you to go Dymy on Auboris. After searching the internet for a half-hour or so, I found the coordinates thanks to a Youtube video: [16,31]. Dymy doesn't have much to do. You can purchase an Automatic Lasergun in the store, which you might find useful. Otherwise, go to the jail in the south. The door is closed, but wait a few seconds and it will open up. If you use the Sonic Absorber & the Advanced Scanner, you'll only have to face three guys with Shotguns, who you can shoot through the walls with the Plasmathrower. Otherwise you'll face about 20 guys with Plasmaguns. It's still easy since you can also shoot them through the walls. This reuslts in a lot of experience for whoever is doing the shooting. The problem is that when I did this, the contact also shot at me. Problem. When you talk to him alive, he'll inform you that the hidden base on Lapis is at [20,0]. It's sort of tough, so, you know, bring your A game. Kill everyone, wreck the computer. When you try to travel after that, you face a pretty tough space battle, so make sure you are top-outfitted. Then go to Sky Boulevard, back to the computer room. Set the {Bomb} and run back to the exact starting point. Beam up. (You can only beam up in that exact spot, so don't mess up.) And believe it or not, that's the end of the game. VI. Weapon Stats Small Bore Gun Weight: 3500 Weapon Class: 70 Number of Shots: 16 Range: 3 Group Damage: No Technical Level: 9 Automatic Gun Weight 10200 Weapon Class: 100. Number of Shots: 60. Range: 3. Group Damage: Yes. Technical Level: 11. Flamethrower Weight: 13500. Weapon Class: 110. Number of Shots: 8. Range: 2. Group Damage: Yes. Technical Level: 12. Shotgun Weight: 8000 Weapon Class: 120 Number of Shots: 12 Range : 2 Group Damage: No Technical Level: 9. Automatic Lasergun Weight: 16000 Weapon Class: 160 Number of Shots: 40 Range : 3 Group Damage: Yes Technical Level: 16. Plasmagun Weight: 14000. Weapon Class: 200. Number of Shots: 8. Range: 3. Group Damage: No. Technical Level: 15. Plasmathrower Weight: 15000. Weapon Class: 235. Number of Shots: 20. Range: 2. Group Damage: Yes. Technical Level: 17. Apollo Grenade Weight: 200. Weapon Class: 20. Number of Shots: 1. Range: 1. Group Damage: No. Technical Level: 7. CM3 Battle Gas Weight: 500. Weapon Class: 30. Number of Shots: 1. Range: 1. Group Damage: Yes. Technical Level: 9. Acid Tube Weight: 500. Weapon Class: 40. Number of Shots: 1. Range: 3. Group Damage: No. Technical Level: 8. Knuckleduster Weight: 200. Weapon Class: 13. Number of Shots: unl. Range: 1. Group Damage: No. Technical Level: 3. Battle Knife Weight: 750. Weapon Class: 23. Number of Shots: unl. Range: 1. Group Damage: No. Technical Level: 2. Electric Staff Mk1 Weight: 2500. Weapon Class: 25. Number of Shots: 255. Range: 1. Group Damage: No. Technical Level: 12. Electric Staff Mk3 Weight: 2500. Weapon Class: 120. Number of Shots: 255. Range: 1. Group Damage: No. Technical Level: 14. VII. Loose Ends -Is it possible to find the old lady's key on Auboris? -What's the point of the alien ship? If you buy the translator in the first ship on Auboris, you can talk to them. They all say the same thing. They're looking for essence X-109-E. What's up with that man? -Why all the unused skills? -Why are there five beam slots for each planet when some only use one, and none use more than three? -Why even bother playing this game? VIII. Conclusion This game is absolutely horrible. I can't believe I wasted a week's worth of nights in Tamil Nad playing this garbage. It's stupid, it's violent, it's vaguely irreverent. I've rarely felt more violated. I only wrote this FAQ so you can avoid the pain of this nonsense game. Blegh! IX. Appendix 1. Best Profit Chart ComputerParts = Casta [/5500] > Lupis[/10282] = $4782 Food Infusions = Castra[/12500] > Lupis[/18813] = $6313 Perfume = Castra[/15876] > ? Lupis[/25211] = $9335 MachineParts = Castra[/3976] > ? Lupis[/5954] = $1978 CyberneticParts = Castra[/25750] > Lupis[/39485] = $13735 ReactorParts = Castra[/36500] > Lupis[/69069] = $32569 OxyCarbo = Sky[/8372] > ? BrainImplants = Castra[/21875] > Lapis[/47305] = $25430 Textiles = Auboris[/155] > Lapis[/232] = $77 Opticals = Castra[/6350] > Lapis[/10063] = $3713 Water = Sky[/29] > Lapis[/79] = $50 PowerSupplies = Castra[/9594] > Lupis[/14161] = $4567 Drugs = Auboris[/9376] > Lapis[/13671] = $4295 SoundReceivers = Castra[/4487] > ? Iron = Lupis[/5000] > Auboris[/8750] = $3750 Bauxite = Lupis[/6686] > Auboris[/10884] = $4198 Medicine = Castra[/70000] > Lupis[/108944] = $38944 WineSurro = Auboris[/1350] > Lupis[/2319] =$969 LightWeapons = Sky[/73126] > Lapis[/119687] = $46561 HeavyWeapons = Sky[/168753] > Lapis[/256485] = $87732 2. Ship Equipment Prices Castra Glider 200455 " Engine 375004 " Bottom Gun 321570 " Econo Scan 35675 3. Other Prices Ammo: Sea--2062 X. Credits Thanks to this walkthrough (now offline) for some help: http://home.flash.net/~rayearle/Wfiles/Whale's_Voyage.html Underdogs for hosting this stupid game, I guess. Do whatever you want with this FAQ. (c) 2012, 8-bit Warrior.