35 The End

Tips and Secrets

Insert the final manuscript into its holding place. A subtle, unseen change takes place in the room... an inactive switch hidden in the east side of the central red pillar becomes active. All you need to do is punch it.

The previously inoperable doors sealing off the repository room now open. You will see the same hallway you ran down at the end of "Ain't My Bitch", ending in the same drop shaft lined with three moving "goo" windows. Except now there is a subtle difference.. there is a clue in the grenades left in front of one particular goo window, inviting the player to explore further. Either by running down the hall and swinging around the corner to the left really fast, or by using the grenade to hop up through the goo window, you will pop through into a room with several transporter bays in the walls. Each of these will send the player to the same spot... back to the repository room. The real trick here is to notice that one of the transporter walls is flickering. Stand in front of that transporter, and hit the tab key... the back wall of the transporter bay will open, revealing an elevator. Run through, and the elevator will rise.

Run off the elevator, down the hall, and turn to the left. You will enter a room with two large closed doors framing a terminal. This terminal will give you an odd clue about the next level you will visit, and then teleport you away to the last secret Tempus level, Your Eyes Only.

Map Making Notes

The original plan for this was to have two "challenges" the player had to beat in order to reach the final secret level. The doors flanking the terminal lead to each of these challenges. The door to the left brought the player into a room with a deep goo pool, guarded by a very large, very pissed off Juggernaut. The trick was to make it around the room to the other side, open a door there, and flip a hidden switch which would crush the Juggernaut. A teleporter there delivered the player safely back to the terminal area. The door to the right brought the player into the single most annoying moving platform puzzle ever invented for a Marathon game - each platform moved up and down at a different rate, and the room slowly filled with goo. The player had to time each jump perfectly to make it up and across the room to reach the teleporter on the other side.

After crafting these challenges, Borzz alone play tested the map, since Your Eyes Only was a very secret level, known only to the two of us... the rest of Nardo team was in the dark until the very end of the scenario "build". He thought the challenges were unnecessary to "protect" the final secret level. So I removed the challenges altogether, the only remaining memory being the doors that lead to them.

(editors note: probably the most irritating room I've ever entered...had we not removed that platform puzzle, I'd still be trying to beat it - or warding off the mailbombs we'd be getting)