Confusingly, after that determined speech about dealing with Elijah, the game insists we backtrack down to the lobby to piece together the fragments of Vera's voice and figure out the password to the Vault.
The hologram of Vera on the stairs comes to life, blasting the Ghost People away - protecting the entrance to her casino. And we learn the password. Obviously, really - the simple, optimal philosophy for a dead man reborn, for a civilisation attempting resurrection.
'Begin again - but know when to let go.'
Back to Christine, who's still having difficulty coming to terms with her throaty new voice.
This place...I'm not sure. It doesn't feel like a casino, not entirely.
I know. The sealed doors, the security...it's almost a fortress. Think that's why we're being ordered to come here and crack it open?
Guess it's the object of someone's affection...or obsession.
Love makes some people do strange things. Won't argue that. It can drive you crazy sometimes if you...can't connect.
Here follows some surprisingly insipid commentary on the line between love and obsession. Let's skip that shit.
When you go down there, that may be it for us - we won't be needed any more. The one who made these collars, he'll follow you down there. And he won't let you leave. He's not one for sharing, never was.
That's what I'm counting on.
'Begin again, but know when to let go'. Let's see what happens.
And the Vault doors slide open.
There's our target. The vault itself. Who's betting getting there won't be easy?
Aside from holograms, there aren't any enemies on this level. But there are forcefields, speakers, most of which can't be turned off - so it becomes a case of dashing quickly back and forth, trying to find the one safe area. If you stumble off the walkways, you'll quickly find yourself in the toxic Cloud-filled lower zones, fumbling to find a way out before your health runs out. Character stats matter less here than agility, co-ordination, good timing and quick thinking.
Shit.
Well, I guess we have to-
Actually, there's only one part of this level which really annoys the piss out of me - a walkway with only one tiny 'safe' area, and some distance away, both a destructible speaker and a terminal which turns off a non-destructible speaker. You can just about get one before your collar blows.
So, after a pathetically high number of failed attempts, we (Agility 9, mind you) holster our gun, run up the walkway, shoot the destructible speaker, dash back the way we came before the collar goes off, dive off the walkway all the way down into the Cloud below, taking damage, then work our way back up again to deal with the terminal, just in time.
And then you see some little ten-year-old git on Youtube doing it all in one fluid, easy attempt. Goddamn vidya games.
Holograms patrol this irritatingly small area; if they see us, they'll take us down in a couple of hits. We have to get to the terminal on the far right-hand-side of the room to turn off the forcefield and proceed further into the level. We can do this with a combination of sneaking, using terminals to change their patrol routes, and just legging it past them and hoping our health bar holds out. And if we fall, of course, it's curtains.
We can also, according to the wiki, turn off the holograms via the following simple method.
There are 3 hologram emitters in this room, although they require a Repair skill of 100 to disable, you can shoot them. The first is on top of the enclosed structure to the left (when entering the room). You can push a barrel onto the catwalk to the left, jumping on it and jumping in the air while on the barrel will allow you to shoot the emitter on the roof of the first structure (oddly enough, after you move said barrel, it will disappear and become visible again after you touch it and will repeat in this way), alternatively this can be achieved by exiting the room towards the gap in the walkway you came from, hopping onto the rail and attempting a jump shot into the emitter, this will make the holograms hostile so run. The second is on top of the metal beam almost directly on top of the door with the force field. You will need to run along a beam and jump up onto the roof of the structure in the southeast corner of the map to reach these. The third is on the ceiling (not the roof like the 1st, but inside) of the control structure in the northeast corner of the map. You can also use 2 or 3 carefully tossed hand grenades to blow up the emitters without having to get close to the holograms or the speakers (you can get up to 9 frag grenades from the grenade bouquets that Dean set up around him from where you met him, so long as you can pass the Explosives check (30) to disarm them). After dispatching the three hologram emitters, you can turn off the security system at the last terminal.
Yeah. Let's not do that.
And so the Courier finally finds himself standing in front of the Sierra Madre vault.
*creams self, lets out high-pitched girlish ululation of delight*
So...much...gold!
And I can take all of it, I can get out of here with all of it, with a bit of clever sneaking and good timing, and I'll trap Elijah inside the vault! Oh, fuck me, just think what I could do with all of this gold...
I could...I could develop my own computer game! My very own CRPG! Fuck, I could hire the very best talents there are to work on it! I could save the genre!
...I mean, we'd want to turn a profit on it. All the better to gain enough standing in the industry, enough of a long-term foundation that we could make truly great RPGs in the future. Nobody would thank us if we made a challenging turn-based game that bombed, bankrupting us. It might even do harm to the notion of RPGs!
So we'd make it friendlier. Not dumbed-down, never that, something that would satisfy the old-school crowd and appeal to more modern gamers. Exciting combat! No...no, that's not the word I'm looking for...er...visceral. Yes. Visceral combat.
Which couldn't be turn-based, obviously, turn-based just doesn't have that heart-stopping quality to it, but we'd have a pause button which basically equates to the same thing. Probably. And we wouldn't be able to have too many stats. Stats are frightening. Nerdy. No-one cool likes maths. So instead of a boring old 'Strength' stat, you'd probably have a Power Meter, which rises with every achievement...and we'd want some cool-looking cinematics for the trailers, of course...
Yes! YES! It's all coming together now! Romances for the Bioware crowd! Furry and scaly romances for the Bethesda modding scene! Linear levels! Majestic action! Cutscene after cutscene after cutscene! It'll make even more money than Sinclair could ever have dreamed of! The shareholders will cum buckets! And, sure, those hardcore old-school gamers at the Codex will whine - they always whine, you can't please them! - because they don't understand that times have changed and while we'd love to make Arcanum 2, we're a business and we need to think of our profits, the massive, massive, juicy profits that our next game will surely make! AHAHAHAHAHA-
...*cough*...*wheeze*...
...what...what happened to me? A madness overtook me, but it's passed. What was I thinking? Do I want to end up like all the RPG developers out there, scrabbling like lemmings to make the next big blockbuster game, to rake in millions and lose my soul in the process?
Joshua Graham was right when he said that a great fall is made up of countless tiny steps. And the love of money...the love of money is, as the old books once said, the root of all evil.
I cannot take the gold of the Sierra Madre for myself. I don't know if I have it in me to fight my own greed, my own weakness, day after day. And I do not wish to test it.
I...need a moment. Let's take a look at Sinclair's terminal.
Vera told Sinclair that she was Dean's stooge in an attempt to rob him blind? But Sinclair already knew?
Damn.
Dayum.
DAYUM.
At this point, we get an option to access Sinclair's personal accounts. If we do, the Vault door will slam shut and we'll fade out to a slideshow detailing our agonising starvation, trapped inside, in a fate intended for Dean Domino.
The Courier, lured by the promise of the Sierra Madre, could not escape. Once inside the vault, the casino did not let go. When the Courier finally passed away, the casino created a new Hologram to walk with the other ghosts that filled its casino. It was a pre-programmed homage intended for another. It assumed a new meaning in the likeness of the Courier. A means of allowing even the dead to begin again.
I'm pretty sure this is MCA's way of thumbing his nose at players who skip through important information without bothering to read any of it, and it appears to have worked - I've found at least one Youtube video entitled 'Help!! Trapped in vault and cannot complete Dead Money!'
Instead, we shut the terminal down; as we do so, the wall opens up, revealing Elijah.
Don't move, don't go into the vault. And don't touch anything else...there may be more traps down there...another security system.
Still hiding behind images and screens, I see.
Hiding? Hardly. Trapped. You think you were the first one to open the casino door? No, I did it...with other hands, other bodies. After that, the casino wouldn't let go.
Once I was locked in, no way out...until your Pip-Boy signal came to life in the Villa. Then...then things, uh, changed. And here you are.
What do you want from the Sierra Madre?
What do I want. Weapons. Security. A citadel of my own.
The Madre's all these things. It's a fortress and a weapon. A chance to 'begin again'. Once I unlock its archives, I can carve the Mojave into any shape I choose.
The Cloud is unique in my travels. Right now it protects this casino, preserves it. It can be used to preserve other Old World relics...and cleanse them, at the same time.
And as much as I've researched hologram technology, the Big Empty facility was quite clear - only the Sierra Madre got holograms working...properly.
Dump one of those emitters in the middle of a battle, there's no defence. It's like holding light in your hands. Can't fight it...only watch it burn. Just one is a portable army. Arm it - anyone standing against you, dies.
And the machines that fill its streets, its corridors. They provide almost anything. Perhaps in the Pre-War era they were commonplace, easy to dismiss. Now, they are far more valuable. You know it. They helped keep you alive.
Sources of food, supplies, medical assistance, ammo...make more collars, even print currency. Make a nation. The Cloud allows me to wipe the slate clean. Collars assure cooperation. Holograms - defence. The Vending Machines provide...everything else.
Should we have a 'vilified' reputation with the NCR, we'll be able to pin Elijah down to the specific source of his discontent - the Brotherhood of Steel's defeat at Helios One. He'll acknowledge that part of his desire is to 'wipe the slate clean' of the NCR's ever-growing, ever-expanding nation, and we'd be able to join him in his grand endeavour, leading to another premature game ending.
In the years that followed, the legend of the Sierra Madre faded, and there were no... new visitors to the city. Years later, when a mysterious blood red cloud began to roll across the Mojave, then West toward the Republic, no one knew where it had come from. Only that it brought death in its wake. Attempts to find the source of the toxic cloud failed. The Mojave was cut off. Through the Cloud, lights were seen from HELIOS One. There were stories of ghosts immune to gunfire, who struck down anyone they saw with rays of light. The last chapter of the Mojave came when a modified REPCONN rocket struck Hoover Dam, releasing a blood-red cloud, killing all stationed there. All attempts to penetrate the Cloud and re-take the Dam failed, and both the NCR and Legion finally turned away from it, citing the place as cursed. In the years that followed, communities across the West began to die as traces of the Cloud began to drift over lands held by the NCR. Only two remained alive in the depths of the Cloud, at the Sierra Madre, waiting for their new world to begin again.
It was such a good antagonist's motivation, MCA decided to use it twice in the course of the DLC.
Anyway, we don't have a 'vilified' rep, so we decide to taunt the man holding our life in his hands instead.
You're nothing more than a killer that aspires to mass murder.
...not the catchiest putdown, Courier.
You think I'm a murderer. If I was, I'd have set off your collar long ago. The collar ensures compliance...encourages cooperation. Think about it. Would you truly have gotten into the casino without those collars? No, human nature is against us, always.
Every time, even with collars clutched at their necks, they would betray each other, kill each other, to get inside the Sierra Madre. It was...insanity. They could have had it all, it was so close. And they kept...turning on each other, again and again.
Cracking the Sierra Madre was difficult...but cracking greed, that was more difficult. So the dead man's switches went in.
Now that I'm here, are you coming down?
No. I am not going to take the chance, while I'm so close...not this close, no. Not again. I can wait...afford to be careful. You...you're locked down there. This is the only entrance, and I have free rein of the Sierra Madre. I have time...more time than you.
Besides, there might be more traps. I'll send more scouts in...yes, more. You're...resourceful, don't want to leave anything more to chance.
Unless you come down here, I'll destroy the Vault, everything in it.
No...I don't think so. It'd most likely trigger other security measures...if you hurt the Vault at all.
Besides, you wouldn't have followed the signal if you didn't want this place's secrets for your own. You're curious...past the threats.
(Repair) Forget the Vault. The elevator's only a single control box.
The elevator. Then you'd be trapped down here, with no hope of escape.
Throwing a wrench into the works is what I do best.
Even...even if you damaged the mechanism...there's a chance of repairing it. It might take years...but it's possible.
Persist in threatening me...or the Sierra Madre's secrets, you're of no use to me. I'll set off your collar now.
(Science) There's noticeable lag of several seconds for the collar to go off - and a warning.
Huh...clever. Whoever designed the Sierra Madre, their obsession with messing with frequencies and signals...
I'm coming down - I'll meet you face to face at the Vault entrance. If you resist, I'll use the collar, even if it puts the Vault at risk.
Not much time. Elijah wants to see the power of this casino's technology...and I'm going to give it to him.
Using a copy of Programmer's Digest, the Courier hacks into the vault's turrets.
After a few seconds, we hear Elijah, outside the vault. Alarms begin to sound.
Alarms...what...
you. Think you can run, think you can trick me?
Is...is this thing on? You hear me down there? Trying to help you out here...disable the speakers, play a little music...
Dean! You loveable old evil life-ruining scoundrel, you!
Elijah is momentarily distracted. And the Courier turns on the turrets.
We dash out of the vault just in time to see Elijah collapse in, for some reason, a bright blue explosion.
Please...please...you can...can take the gold...you can leave here...I'll let you go...
Oh, the gold? Actually, Elijah, I've thought long and hard and...I don't want the gold. I'd only end up making the action blockbuster Planescape: Torment 2: Back In Action or some shit like that. It wouldn't end well.
What...what are you talking about...I don't...
I'm saying I want you to have the gold, Elijah. All of it.
Please...you don't have to...
Take your gold, you greedy old son-of-a-bitch. Take all of it, no need to say thank you. Because this is for every developer's decision based on market research. This is for every unasked-for innovation. This is for every piece of marketing bullshit that claims human beings are all too stupid to understand basic maths and that removing core elements isn't dumbing down. This is for every excuse, every lie, every justification for making bad games, bad RPGs, and getting rich off the profits from them.
I...please, wait...
And this...this is for me. One big fall.
The Courier kicks Elijah, laden down with the heavy gold bars, off the edge of the walkway; he falls, with one final, agonising shriek, into the seething Cloud, and is lost forever.
Courier? It's Christine here. What happened to Elijah?
I let him go.
...what? You
let him go? You bastard, what gives you the right to-
(Sigh) No, I mean I stuffed his pockets full of gold and threw him off the walkway.
Wow, that's so cool! And thematically fitting! And you've still got time to get off the level before your bomb collar goes off, don't you?
Bomb collar? What are you talking about, bomb collar? Elijah's...oh,
yeah.
...shiiiiiii-
....iiiiiiiiiii-
Just seconds before the collar goes off, we leap into the lift.
...it.
Emerging into the coarse, foul air of the Villa, the Courier tears away his collar. His companions are nowhere to be seen; he can only assume they, too, all escaped unharmed.
Taking one last glance at the casino - fortress, trap, prison and refuge - he pushes the gates aside and stumbles out into the night. Free, once again.
The survivors of the Sierra Madre thought about gathering at the Fountain and waiting for the Courier. In the end, the collars' silence made them uneasy, and the fear of turning on each other made them hesitate, and leave the goodbyes - unspoken. The radio message at the fountain was enough for them, and there was no need to add another farewell on top of all they had suffered.
Dog forgot himself, as did the voice that raged within him. After their passing, a new voice spoke within the mutant's shell. It was difficult for the voice to remember the two it once was... there was the beast, Dog consumed by hunger... ...and the other in reverse... the one consumed by control. Both were driven by need for the other. The Courier brought them together, somehow, joined the two into one. All that happened at the Sierra Madre, was a faint memory to the new personality... like a flickering light in the clouds of the mind. The new voice did not think of the Courier again until the battle at the Divide reached his ears. The battle between the two couriers, beneath the torn skies and the Old World flag... each bearing a message for the other. And the mutant prayed the Courier that had saved him... had been saved in return.
If Dog/God died, we'd get a nice little moral to their story - 'hunger and control are twin greeds'. If God took over, he'd head into the Wasteland to tell his story. If Dog took over, he'd roam the wilds, eating Brahmin and humans, an unstoppable beast.
Dean Domino, entertainer, singer... thief... explored the Sierra Madre not long after he was rescued by the Courier. Once he left the theater, the Sierra Madre recognized him as a guest, and many doors opened to him. He had to admit, it had been built to last. During his search, he came across the final records of Vera and Sinclair, and realized what happened the night the bombs fell. He felt strangely sad for a moment, and he had no idea why. Shrugging it off, his mind turned instead to where the Courier had come from. Vegas still survived, out there in the Mojave. Its sights, sounds... and casinos, ripe for the taking. So giving the Sierra Madre one last nod and a wink, he set off beyond the Cloud to begin again.
Christine, her mission complete, found new purpose as the Sierra Madre's warden. She watched over it silently - by choice. Over time, the Ghost People came to see her as one of the Holograms. They would watch, silently, as she walked among them. At times, Christine thought of the Courier, who had kept Elijah's hand from her throat. The Courier reminded her of the other courier she had met in the Big Empty, and wondered if the two had found each other at last. She did not think of them again until she heard the legends of the Divide. The Divide, where the two messengers, the two couriers, fought beneath an ancient flag, at the edge of the world.
You've heard about the Sierra Madre. We all have, the legend, the curses. Some foolishness about it lying in the middle of a City of Dead. A city of ghosts. Buried beneath a blood-red cloud... a bright, shining monument luring treasure hunters to their doom. An illusion that you can begin again, change your fortunes. Finding it, though, that's not the hard part.
It's letting go.
It's letting go.
It's letting go.
...well, here we are. At the end of a heist, we're no richer other than for a security guard's suit and a few dozen stimpaks.
Still, Courier...I'm proud of you. You faced up to your greed - the greed of every RPG character, the drive for loot, still more loot, no matter that it would break the game's economy and you'd never be able to spend it all anyway - and you weren't found wanting. You did the right thing. Maybe all the game developers out there will follow your example and not worry so much about maximum profits.
Ha...yeah, er, yeah, fat chance of that.
Funny thing, though. You planted 34 gold bars on Elijah, right? Because I thought there were 37 gold bars in the vault.
Hm? Oh, no. Definitely not. 34. Counted 'em myself.
...no, look, I'm on the wiki right now and it definitely says 37-
SO ANYWAY, I was thinking we head to the Big Empty next. Elijah and Christine gave us some interesting leads. Might be some Old World tech up there - and maybe some clues about this other Courier. Come on - no time to lose.
...why are you walking so slowly? Are you
clunking?
...no.
THE END.
And so ends Dead Money. The best of the DLC? Yeah, I'd say so, though quite a number of reviewers seemed to get alienated by the implementation of the various survival mechanics.
Next stop - multi-headed dicks and Roboscorpions...in Old World Blues.