The Deaths of Laura Bow

The museum's already deserted with the clock struck past midnight a little while back. There's a sudden chill in the air and I can't help but recall the headless body pierced through the back by a pterodacytyl. A vicious killer's loose in the corridors of the Leyendecker Museum - so it's all I can do not to scream hysterically even as I keep uncovering more corpses in each subsequent chamber. Always one step behind.

Who else will die tonight?
Oh yes, somehow I've managed to get this ancient DOS-based game running on the computer. If I remember correctly, this game used to come in a stack of disks or so to be inserted after each act. And now it fits into such an amazingly tiny file! Seriously I have work presentations that are larger in size.

Such a classic. Ah, Laura Bow intrepid girl detective, I remember her well. Just out of college, this hotshot cub reporter gets quickly entangled in an intriguing Egyptian mystery-murder in the Roaring Twenties. The games that my ISO and I played back in school. How can I possibly forget the number of times we replayed the various scenes in Laura Bow's Dagger of Amon-ra! Seemed almost impossible to surmount the preposterous obstacles without a simple walkthrough ready - though I sternly kept reminding my frustrated ISO not to succumb to that ignoble temptation.


Even an act as simple as crossing the road seemed an impossible task.

My ISO : Muthafucka. We got hit by a cab again.
Paul : Maybe we should make a run for it.
My ISO : The bloody cab's too damned fast. And this is the twenties!
Paul : I blame those heels!
Evidently you're supposed to hail a taxi instead. You can imagine how many times Laura turned into roadkill on her first day before we accidentally stumbled on the required solution.

And the number of insignificant items you have to pick up along the way ( e.g. dinosaur bone, cheese ) to place inside what I've termed Laura's otherdimensional purse. That only makes sense way down the line as you face a bunch of carnivorous rats.


What's a murder-mystery without a love interest?

Oh yes I had such an early crush over dreamy redhead Steve Dorian! Certainly would have pushed Laura into a steaming vat of industrial chemicals to get him. Or perhaps a more elegant death in keeping with the other grisly murders in the game.


Our reimagined Steve Dorian! Buffer than I recall!
Had such a great time reminiscing with Laura that I had to keep my ISO abreast with my replay. Surprisingly his mental faculties still in working order, he immediately recalled the game and picked up the game as well. The internet really has made the world that much smaller!

My ISO : Have you gotten to the museum yet?
Paul : I have! OMG. That man's fallen over a stuffed porcupine.
My ISO : Eeew. Have you reached that French skank yet?
Paul : The slutty Yvette who's after my Steve?
My ISO : I think Steve Dorian spoiled us for other men.
Paul : Oh so true. Feel like stabbing Yvette with a pterodactyl.
My ISO : Think you gotta pry it off Ziggy first.
Paul : Maybe I'll plaster her into a statue.
My ISO : I think someone thought of that already.
Oh yes, did I mention the murders get progressively more gruesome as the game continues? And we used to play the game pitch-dark at midnight :)