Complete Evil

Yeesssss!  I’ve finally done it.

Long term readers will know what a fan the the James Bond death simulator, Evil Genius, I am.  It easily makes my top ten (whatever the others may be) and yet I’d never completed…until last Friday.  It has been a little over nine months since I started Evil Genius Week, I had never gotten very far through the game, just a little way through the second island, but during that week I made remarkable progress.  Whether the project gave me the push I needed, or I was a little older and a little wiser I do not know, but by the end of that week I’d gotten further than I ever had before.   At the end of Evil Genius Week I needed a break, but I was certain that I’d get back to the game at some point and finally complete it.

Sometime in the future I’ll post the results of this hard toil.

So here we are.

Oh, and as you may have already guess, spoilers ahead.

At the end of Evil Genius Week, my “lair”, deep inside a volcanic island had been viciously attacked yet again.  All of my research equipment had been destroyed, as had a lot of other expensive items, I had lost practically all of my high level minions and my finances were looking very thin.  My first job was simply to get back on my feet.  Fortunately my heat rating, which represents the overall interest in my activities of the worlds security agencies, was nice and low and I wanted it to stay that way, but at the same time I was lacking funds for the reconstruction.  I decided to only send out small teams of fund reallocation teams, backed up by a good amount of social minions.  Minions of the social persuasion are not at all good at stealing money (their arms are too weak) but they are great at covering up the works of your more capable workers such as guards.

I had already dealt with two of the worlds powerful Super Agents, Samantha Mumba and Jet Chan, but another two were already a thorn in my side.  Dirk Masters, of P.A.T.R.I.O.T., was in my custody having just finished twirling around in my mess halls mixing bowl and Ms. Frostonova of H.A.M.M.E.R. had returned to the world stage.  All of the Super Agents can cause a lot of havoc, but Masters with his dual machine guns causes a lot more destruction.  Each Super Agent has a vital weakness, discovering this allows you to get rid of them permanently, but until then you have to keep them busy.  If you’re lucky, you’ll be able to keep them in a daze with your social minions but once the action starts they don’t give up without a prolonged and deadly fight.  The only solution is to keep them in a state of perpetual torture, interrogating them constantly with the wide variety of toys at your disposal.  You have to keep a constant eye on them, leave them in their cell for too long and they could escape, and it would cost a lot of  minions to put them back.

As the funds started trickling in I began making my first purchases, the first priority was my research department.  My science minions had mostly survived the previous spate of attacks and in the interim had spent their time wandering around my “lair” doing nothing in particular.  I had already researched many new and interesting items but there were still a few more to uncover.  Unfortunately the required equipment is very expensive and it will take me quite a long time to get things back to the way they were.

My plans for world domination were going well, but there was still a lot more to do, the next step in my master plan was to insert some agents into high up positions within all of the worlds security organisations.  I had already inserted two but before I could insert anymore I’d have to “recruit” some more diplomats.  These jolly looking fellows are very useful to have around, they’re speciality is offering bribes to the various agents that are sent to inspect your place of residence.  Before them though I would need some of the mid-level social minions, the Spin Doctors.  Not only are they required for some of the diplomat kidnapping jobs, if I am to be training any more having them around would speed up the process.

Meanwhile my “lair” was under close scrutiny by the worlds security forces, luckily I had enough Valets to keep them suitably confused and for the few that slipped through my nice collection of henchmen were there to clean up.  Not only do they add some great colour to your operations, they are also the only direct action you can take in Evil Genius.  When it comes to removing minor annoyances no-one does the job better, and they are of great help in more difficult situations.

It wasn’t long before I had re-established my position as future ruler of the world, I had a reasonable group of spin doctors and my first diplomat was already training them up to his level.  I also had a relatively secure income, carefully selecting targets based on which super agents I knew the location of.  A minor annoyance had turned up in the form of new employment laws, the total amount of minions you can legally maintain is capped at 100, unfortunately due to my previous losses the paperwork of deceased minions was tied up in red tape.  So although their slots were free I couldn’t rebalance the numbers and was limited to a little over 80.  Whether I liked it or not, I’d have to do some more recruiting.

We had been on constant alert for a very long time now, there are three settings available; green is peace time, yellow is alert and instructs all the minions who are able, to pick-up a weapon, then finally red means kill all outsiders on sight.  Dirk Masters had broken free several times, in each instance causing lots of death and destruction.  Without weapons things would be much worse, henchmen are generally invincible, they can take damage and even be rendered unconscious but they will always come back.  Super agents however are not your usual opponent, should a henchman be knocked out three times by a super agent, it’s all over.  So you need other minions around to back them up.

Thanks to some ingenious planning and basic geography skills I soon had a diplomat in each security agency, not only would they provide me with the information I need to complete my plan, but they also started stirring up trouble between the different agencies.  Telling them how the others called their mother names and such.  Soon I have what I need to finalise the plans of my rocket launch, I have a choice of stealing technology from various agencies or interrogating a cosmonaut until he spills the beans.  I have a lot of nice equipment going spare so I choose the latter.  A quick search of the island reveals his location and I send out my henchmen to capture him.

Dirk Masters has been a constant botheration (new word of the day), he’s mostly been limited to the armoury and one of the barracks but it’s becoming costly.  I initiate a world search for his weakness, I know he has one I have only to find it.  His isn’t the first one that turns up though, she hasn’t made as large an impact on my plans but it would still be nice to get rid of Ms. Frostonova, if I dispatch some of my men posing as researchers we might find out something useful.

I had thought I was on the last stage of setting my plans in motion, but there was something I missed.  I had been so focused on the payload and organisation that I had forgotten about the engines, it would require some further “recruitment” but had to be done. In the meantime “lair” life had been going well, the difficulties of earlier had all but disappeared, whether this was because things were getting better or possibly I had settled into the more attrition style of play I don’t know.  But despite a few incursions my plans continued unharassed.  I felt the power of the Super Agents waning too as I discovered Ms. Frostonova’s weakness, and I finally had a lead on Masters’.

It took quite a while for Ms. Frostonova to turn up, but as the cosmonaut was cracking she was finally carried to a cell.  Things were busy at the time so she had the opportunity to escape, which she took full advantage of, as I would expect from her.  But once again she was deposited in cell and the final curtain could be called.  Ms. Frostonova is known the world over for her cold, calculating manner, but deep inside she’s a big softy.  The focus of her affections is her childhood companion Mr. Snuggles, so taking a meat cleaver to him would obviously distress her.  Three down…

Soon too Masters was to fall, after obtaining a sample of his sweat analysis in the lab turned up something interesting.  His bulky exterior didn’t have so much to do with intensive training as it did steroids.  The scientists come up with a complex potion of chemicals that will react with all the muscle enhancing steroids running throughout his body, all it takes is a quick dip in the Bio-Tanks and he, like his predecessors, is dealt with permanently.  Out of the tanks emerges this. Unlike the others who quickly made an escape from the island, Dirk Masters remains, continuously strolling through the corridors.

The rocket was almost complete, all that was required was a little test of the engines.  This “little test” however soon turned into a rather big issue, by operating the panel personally the rockets would fire up correctly, however they needed to keep running continuously for a whole minute.  This requires minions on hand to make sure everything is working as it should, and as you can imagine standing in the room when a rocket powerful enough to break orbit is being fired is rather dangerous.

Multiple successive tests weren’t working and soon my complement of science minions was falling.  I put into action all the ideas my world conquering brain could manage but to no avail.  Eventually though, through time, patience, and great sacrifice on the part of my minions a test was completed successfully.  The rocket was ready for firing.

I had completely forgotten about one of the great mysteries during Evil Genius Week, Freaks.  Having uncovered the so titled research fairly quickly, I had failed to discover what they actually were.  But I was on a roll, for some reason I ended up looking at the informational videos screen.  I’m sure I had checked here before but must have missed it because there it was, Freaks, suddenly the clouds parted and everything was clear.  From the associated picture I knew it had something to do with the Bio-Tanks in the research lab, but despite extensive testing on both, enemy agents, random tourists, and even my own minions nothing happened, what I hadn’t tried were body bags.  Whenever someone is killed they form a little body bag on the floor, you need to deal with these promptly because they obviously attract the attention of inquisitive agents.  Normally this means a trip to the freezer, however if instead you send them to the Bio-Tanks a worker will carry the bag there and chuck it into the foul smelling liquid.

A hand grips the edge of the tank, and out of the fumes leaps this monstrosity.  Now I had the chance to read up on them, their roles seems completely obvious, not to mention clever.  These knuckle dragging hulks wander aimlessly around the island, should they run into an enemy agent they will attack no matter what they may be tagged.  They’re great fighters and add a nice cushion to your security.  However their grasp on life is tenuous, their stats cannot be restored, now for health and endurance this doesn’t matter much, but should their delicate psychology be affected they will soon die, for final this time.  There is a limit to how many you can keep on your island, no more than three may run around at a time.

We now come to the close of the game, a suitable reward for the complicated mid-section.  With everything in place all that remains is that vital video conference with the world leaders, hand over control or fell my wrath!  After knocking up a few television transmitters and building a mini-television studio in the Inner Sanctum, Maximilian climbs into the chair and starts his tirade.  He doesn’t ask for a million dollars, he doesn’t even ask for 100 billion dollars, he wants the world.  Now the art of terrorist negotiation is of course to ask for as much as you can, but that which your victims can afford to do without, otherwise you get involved in that we’ll ‘never surrender’, ‘fighting to the death’, ‘it’s a matter of honour’ stuff.  That doesn’t me you should ask for less of course, you wouldn’t be taken serious at the next Evil Genius convention if you did, it does make the resulting action inevitable however…

For failing to comply with your demands you must launch the missile.  Fingers crossed that it works.  At nice big countdown appears in the top corner, and at the heart of the island the rocket starts moving into position.  Just because they weren’t willing to capitulate to your demands does not mean that the security agencies will stand idly by whilst you enact your plan, the gloves are off and soon the island is flooded with soldiers.

I order the alert, all unarmed minions head for the nearest armoury with orders to shoot to kill, and I start positioning my henchmen.  All the while sitting comfortably at my desk.  The fighting is brutal with high casualties on either side, body bags are soon strewn across the island.

Even some of the science minions join in with the action.

Soon the rocket is set, the systems all come online and then it appears, the most exciting part of the game.  A giant red launch button.  Who wouldn’t press it?  For successfully taking over the world you are rewarded with a small video of whichever plan you chose being put into action.

Relief.  I can finally say I’ve completed Evil Genius, I feel slightly deflated but it was definitely worth it.  I shall be going back soon for another go, this time trying out the unofficial patch.  I don’t like using these until I’ve beaten the game through vanilla, Vampires:  The Masquerade – Bloodlines being the other big one, but now that I have it will hopefully make the game even more fun.  Evil Genius does have it’s flaws, the difficulty curve is erratic, it went too high around the time I stopped playing but then dropped off towards the end.  The hotels sound like a great idea, but are completely pointless in the game, they’re too expensive and do almost exactly the same job as leaving the social minions in your base.  The unofficial patch allows you to build hotel rooms inside your base, so it may make them useful.  The patch also makes various tweaks to minion and henchmen stats to supposedly make them work correctly.

Evil Genius remains one of my favourite games, even now.  The potential alone excites me, and although there are a few issues it mostly pulls it off.  Great humour, great ideas, simple but fun base planning.  Can’t wait to have another go, trying to get all the objects and build the perfect base.  Now I’m afraid I must ask you to follow this guard, you’ve seen too much…

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