Jailbreak Bob by David Whyld




Prison life didn't agree with Clueless Bob Newbie - for a start he didn't have access to a computer 24 hours a day so his usual output of new games was cut down to a measly half a dozen or so a week. On top of that he had to put up with the indignity of sharing a cell with a man who thought farting should be considered a national pastime and, worse still, the prison warden didn't like his games! Sure, the guy was also a despicable thug who delighted in pounding prisoners into mush for any supposed insult but CBN expected that kind of treatment and would have felt there was something wrong if he didn't get it.

[more]



The final straw? An article in The Prison Herald denouncing text adventures as a thing of the past. It was all Clueless Bob Newbie could do not to throw himself on the prison authorities in a mad rage and cause them to implode (such a thing had happened in one of his games so there was every reason to assume it would happen in real life).

He had to escape. He had to get out. The world was crying out for his freedom. Well, maybe not out loud but he was sure that someone, somewhere was missing his colossal output of two dozen high quality games per week.

He had to escape. It shouldn't be that difficult. After all, he had written no less than fifteen separate games about escaping from jail, one involving a banana and another with an emphasis on short French monks with a penchant for swearing (the details escaped him right now but it had been a classic game for its time).

It should be a doddle to escape.

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You're in the cell you share with Hoggins, an obnoxious fellow who would fart for the Olympics if they had such an event. Fortunately he's not here right now. You see his bed, the dusty patch in the corner where you spend your nights, a shelf containing nothing, and a door to the north.

> x bed
Hoggins' bed: the mere stench is enough to drive you away.

> hold nose
You cover your nose as best you can.

> x bed
Hoggins' bed: even with your nose covered, it's still a strain to study the thing without being violently ill. But you persevere and come across, among other things, a comb. After picking away a few bits of Hoggins' scalp from between the tines, you slip it into your pocket (the comb, that is, not the bits of Hoggins' scalp).

> look under bed
Just a few motes of dust and… hold on! What's this? You ferret under the bed and come up with… a ferret!
Quite what Hoggins has got a ferret under his bed for you don't know but from writing several games about ferrets - Ferret PC: The Trials of Birdie, Alesian Ferret and Dark Ferret - you're well acquainted with such creatures.

> n
You move north. Executive dining hall is the official title of this room but the inmates more usually refer to it as "the craphole". It's one long room with a table running down the middle at which are crouched several dozen inmates. Your cell lies to the south while the prison warden's office is northeast and the exercise yard to the west.
"Hey!" mutters an inmate. "That one's got a ferret!"
Save me! pleads the ferret silently.
Or maybe he doesn't and you've just started imagining things.

> drop ferret
The inmates throw themselves on the ferret in an orgy of despicable ferret-murdering. The ferret catches your eyes as it is forced down the throat of a particularly large-throated inmate - and then it is gone.
Every inmate in the room looks at the large-throated fellow who gives a dismayed cry as they barrel into him in a desperate attempt to have the ferret for themselves.
"Typical!" mutters a guard as he hurries from the warden's office. "Feed 'em bread 'n' water for sixteen years and then show 'em a ferret and they all go crazy."

> ne
You move northeast.
This pokey little room holds a desk and a filing cabinet (reputedly containing confidential details of everyone in the prison - guards included). It is the proverbial treasure trove as far as prisons are concerned. To the southwest is the executive dining hall.

> x desk
The desk's surface is empty aside from a mug and a few sheets of paper. A closed drawer in the side of the desk holds unknown secrets.

> smash drawer
Drawing on your rage, you unleash it in a whirling tidal wave of retribution (a phrase featured in many of your best games) on the drawer. Normally nothing happens but here it seems you are in luck as the drawer's front shatters
Picking through the fragments of the drawer you come across an exercise yard pass which you swipe before anyone comes along to stop you.

> sw
You move southwest.
Executive dining hall is the official title of this room but the inmates more usually refer to it as "the craphole". It's one long room with a table running down the middle. A fight is raging around the table as several dozens attempt to kill each over a ferret. A guard is ineffectually trying to stop the fight. Your cell lies to the south while the prison warden's office is northeast and the exercise yard to the west.

> w
You move west. Twenty feet of hard concrete surrounded by a high wall: that's the exercise yard for you. Several inmates are here, exercising or arguing with each other. A guard with a gun watches over the proceedings. This is Trigger Happy Terry, the most dangerous man in the prison. A door leading into the prison is to the east while the gates are to the north and a meeting room to the southwest.
THTerry has got his gun raised and his finger is squeezing on the trigger almost before you have time to show him the exercise yard pass.
"Damn!" he mutters, lowering the gun with obvious reluctance. "But I guess there'll be a day when you forget the pass." He chuckles. "Oh yeah, that'll be a good day."

> e
You move east.
Executive dining hall is the official title of this room but the inmates more usually refer to it as "the craphole". It's one long room with a table running down the middle. A fight is raging around the table as several dozens attempt to kill each over a ferret. A guard is ineffectually trying to stop the fight. Your cell lies to the south while the prison warden's office is northeast and the exercise yard to the west.

> s
You move south. You're in the cell you share with Hoggins, an obnoxious fellow who would fart for the Olympics if they had such an event. Fortunately he's not here right now. You see his bed, the dusty patch in the corner where you spend your nights, a shelf containing nothing, and a door to the north. Your cellmate, Hoggins, is here.
"Wotcha, Bob," grunts Hoggins, letting off an enormously foul fart. "Cor! That wuz a stinker and no mistake! Whew!"

> z
Time passes...

> z
Time passes...

Hoggins burps.

> z
Time passes...

> z
Time passes...

Hoggins farts.

> z
Time passes...

"Strewth!" says Hoggins, momentarily distracted from his scratching, farting, belching and burping by his hair. "Me hair ain't half a-" He pauses to burp "-mess. You seen me comb, Bob?"

> give comb to hoggins
"Ta, mate," says Hoggins. He runs the comb through his hair, dislodging a few centipedes, a cockroach and a small rat. "That feels better. You know, I could swear I felt something scuttling around in me hair a minute ago but it ain't there now." He belches. "Ah, better still."
"Don't I get something for finding your comb?" you say.
"Like what?"
"Like something. It's traditional to get a reward for giving something to someone. I've wrote 28 adventures in which-"
Hoggins scratches his backside. You guess that's the best answer you're going to get.
Hoggins scratches himself. You avert your eyes so as not to see exactly where.

> talk to hoggins
"Ah, sod it," mutters Hoggins. "You're gonna keep on botherin' me till I give you something, ain't you? Here." He tosses a coin on the floor. "Don't spend it all at once. Huh huh."

> get coin
You take the coin.
Hoggins grunts and then farts so loudly the cell is filled with the noise of it.
Not to mention the smell.

> n
You move north.
Executive dining hall is the official title of this room but the inmates more usually refer to it as "the craphole". It's one long room with a table running down the middle. A fight is raging around the table as several dozens attempt to kill each over a ferret. A guard is ineffectually trying to stop the fight. Your cell lies to the south while the prison warden's office is northeast and the exercise yard to the west.

> w
You move west.
Twenty feet of hard concrete surrounded by a high wall: that's the exercise yard for you. Several inmates are here, exercising or arguing with each other. A guard with a gun watches over the proceedings. This is Trigger Happy Terry, the most dangerous man in the prison. A door leading into the prison is to the east while the gates are to the north and a meeting room to the southwest.

> sw
You move southwest.
This grimy little room is where prisoners get their once-a-decade five minute meeting with their nearest and dearest. The room is sectioned off into two halves by a pane of unbreakable glass. On the far side, a door leads out of here and into the free world. A telephone hanging on the wall allows those prisoners who can afford the charges to make calls. A door at your back, in a general northeasterly direction, leads back out to the exercise yard.

> use telephone
You will need to insert a coin first.

> insert coin
You insert the coin and then dial...
Who?

1) Games Review Magazine
2) Your friends and family
3) The police
4) Trigger Happy Terry's wife

> 4
Acting on a hunch you call THTerry's wife (ignoring for a moment the fact that there's no way you could possibly have her number) and, putting on your best authority voice, say, "Madam, it is with great regret that I must inform you that your husband, Terry, has been sleeping with his secretary."
"What!" screeches the hellcat on the other end of the line. "But his secretary's a dog!"
"I'm sure she's not very pretty, madam-"
"No! An actual dog! Why, that lousy no good useless trigger happy stinking son of a gun! I'll rip his b-"
You hang up, satisfied you have done what you intended.

> ne
You move northeast.

EXERCISE YARD
Twenty feet of hard concrete surrounded by a high wall: that's the exercise yard for you. Several inmates are here, exercising or arguing with each other. A guard with a gun watches over the proceedings. This is Trigger Happy Terry, the most dangerous man in the prison. A door leading into the prison is to the east while the gates are to the north and a meeting room to the southwest.
"Terry!" is called across the exercise yard.
THTerry goes pale as his wife, four foot six and with a personality that makes his gun look friendly, comes running across the yard and slaps him across the face.
"You goddamn loser!" she screams, slapping him again. "Sleeping with your secretary! How could you?"
"But I didn't!" says THTerry, frantically trying to defend himself. But a trigger happy man with a gun is no match for an angry woman. "I swear, I've had sex with nothing but whores and the occasional inmate! I never touched the dog!"
"LIAR!!!" yells his wife.
She grabs the gun off him and belts him around the head with it before kicking him in a certain place that pretty much guarantees he won't be having sex again. Whether with whores, prostitutes or dogs.
As THTerry collapses facedown on the ground, his wife storms off. The other inmates clear a path for her.

> l
Twenty feet of hard concrete surrounded by a high wall: that's the exercise yard for you. Several inmates are here, exercising or arguing with each other. THTerry lies unconscious on the ground. A door leading into the prison is to the east while the gates are to the north and a meeting room to the southwest. Lying on the ground is THTerry's gun.

> get gun
You take the gun.

> n
As you approach the gate with the gun, you experience a moment's worry that the guards might not respond to a gun being waved at them and might just shoot you down where you stand. But...
"Hey there, Terry," calls one guard.
"That ain't Terry," says another, peering at you suspiciously.
"He's got Terry's gun."
"Oh, so he has. Must be Terry then."
You watch in amazement as the guards swing open the gate and let you through, not even noticing the unconscious form of THTerry lying in the middle of the exercise yard.
You're halfway home, and several ideas for new games already forming in your mind, before you give a cry of "woo-hoo!"

[Press any key to end]