Let's Make a Deal!
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This content has been retired and is no longer available in game. |
The blazing sun beats down upon you as you crawl through the desert, gasping for water like a fish out of... metaphors.
"Strewth, you look pretty rough, mate." You turn your head to look, blearily, for the voice. It appears to be a gnome dressed in black leather. "Gneed some water?" he says. Too parched to talk, you nod, panting. He crouches down next to you, holding up a waterskin.
"Right. Well, I'll give you this water, see, but only if you'll do something for me in return." He points at a beaten-up black meatcar parked nearby, which you somehow failed to notice before. For some reason, it's got big metal spikes meatpasted all over it. "She's a bonzer little gnumber, yeah? Only she's a bit clapped out presently. I give you the water, and you fetch me back a new carbie. Deal?"
You nod again, and he tosses you the waterskin, which lands near your head with a lovely 'bloop!' sound. The gnome leans on his front bumper, cleaning his fingernails with a penknife while he watches you drink. After a minute, you stand, refreshed, and toss the waterskin back to him.
He directs you to a gnome encampment nearby, and after an hour's walk or so, you find, amongst some rough-looking shacks wielded together from bits of rusty metal, what passes for a merchant, sitting on the ground behind a blanket piled with various meatcar parts. "What a tortuously-constructed sentence," you think.
You poke through the gnome's wares, eventually turning up a carburetor in reasonable condition, and inquire about the price. "Five dense," he grunts.
| Buy the carburetor (5,000 Meat) |
(If you have 5,000 meat or more)
You reluctantly hand over 5,000 meat, and the merchant drops the carburetor into a plastic shopping bag for you. You haul it back to the gnome's car, and hand it over. "Ta, mate," he says cheerfully, and after a quick installation he tosses you the old one, waves, and zooms off in a cloud of dust and sand.
 | You acquire an item: broken carburetor |
(If you don't have the meat)
Since you haven't got 5,000 meat, you attempt to bargain with the merchant. (continue at "Haggle for a better price")
| Haggle for a better price |
The merchant looks insulted at your attempt to haggle. He gathers up his blanket full of car parts, slings it over one shoulder (or, well, over the top of his head, I guess), and stomps off, muttering.
You return to the car to find the gnome and a couple of his friends, smoking roll-ups and passing around a bottle. When you admit that you couldn't get the carburetor, their friendly expressions turn hard. The gnome growls, "Bust a deal, spin the wheel," and his friends nod in agreement. They grab you by the arms and drag you back to the gnome camp -- weak from dehydration, you can only offer token resistance. They push you into the center of the camp, and the growing crowd begins to chant: "Bust a deal, spin the wheel! Bust a deal, spin the wheel!"
A gnome with a mohawk haircut drags a large carnival wheel out of a nearby hut, and shouts "Come ogn down!" The other gnomes push you to the ground under the wheel, and he growls "Spin it, drongo. I double dare you." You reach up, hesitantly, and give the wheel a spin. "No whammies, no whammies, no whammies," you pray.
tictictictictictic.. tic... tic... tac. "D'oh!" you mutter, as the wheel lands on GULAG. "Can I buy a vowel?" you ask. "Look, let's make a deal."
"Don't make me laugh!" snorts the mohawked gnome. "You're the weakest link, drongo." You scrabble to get away, but the gnomes grab you, and you find yourself in serious jeopardy.
Soon, you're stumbling blindly through the desert, wearing a giant papier-mache Mardi Gras head for some reason. When you finally manage to get it off, you find yourself near an oasis. You collapse under the shade of a palm tree and try to recover your concentration for the task ahead. Win, lose, or draw, you've got a job to do.
Notes
- Used to occur in The Arid, Extra-Dry Desert while not Ultrahydrated.
- A superlikely adventure, with a chance of 33%.
- Trying to haggle results in An Oasis being found and the adventure becomes a one-time adventure.
- Attempting to buy the carburetor with less than 5,000 meat on hand results in trying to haggle, with the words "Since you haven't got 5,000 meat, you attempt to bargain with the merchant." prefacing the rest of the message.
References
- This adventure references numerous game shows, including Jeopardy!, The Weakest Link, Wheel of Fortune, Let's Make a Deal, The Price Is Right, Double Dare, Win, Lose or Draw, Tic-Tac-Dough, Scrabble, Concentration, Make Me Laugh , and Press Your Luck.
- The bit about "Bust a deal, spin the wheel" refers to the movie Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, where the entire bit with losing a deal, the Gulag and the horse with the Mardi Gras hat originates.
- Finding a carburetor (and haggling for a better price on it) for the car refers to a quest in the game Fallout 2.
History
- Removed on the 29th October, 2013.
