Key & Compass presents:
Beat Witch
by Robert Patten

• Map
• Walkthrough
• Extras
  • Characters, Credits, Endings, Inventory
• Thank You to my Patreon supporters
• Support me on Ko-Fi
• External links:
  • This game at IFDB, and IFWiki.
  • Post about this walkthrough on X.

Map

Note: Although this game does have a geography, it's also very plot-driven and linear, making a map rather unnecessary.

Walkthrough

Note that the status line shows music status on the left, the current location in the middle, and an adjective describing your current health on the right.

Staging Area

You are forced to walk with others past the smoldering dead into an enclosed area. Dr. Steve takes off his hazmat helmet and motions for everyone else to do the same. Dr. Steve is between you and the magnetically sealed door.

> i. remove helmet. (not yet)

> x Steve.

Everyone is waiting for you to remove your helmet.

> remove helmet.

Dave draws a pistol. You're not Alisha. Dr. Steve demands you talk to him.

> talk to Steve.

>> 1

Dr Steve realizes you're a beat witch, pulls out an iPhone, and now its loud music is killing you!

> wear helmet. (This muffles the music.)

> drain Steve. (You are now strong.)

> open door.

Deeper in City

Someone shoots you in the leg. You're now wounded and leaving a trail of blood.

> x corpse. (You can't GIVE LIFE to a corpse.)

> n. (Or any other direction.)

South Side of Skyscraper

You black out and lose the helmet. You wake, still wounded.

Oh, and you don't have the option of exploring just yet. You must face the beat witch first.

> n.

Main Lobby

As the doors slam shut, outside, the mob and their music arrive.

> x logo. x desk. x Ted.

> talk to Ted.

>> 1 (He just nods.)

> x elevator. (broken)

> w.

Bottom of Stairs

> x album. x camera.

> drain Ted. (no effect)

> u. (no: Ted blocks you.)

> give life to girl.

You black out and wake healthy somewhere new.

Upper Lobby

Your Walkman and notepad are gone. A man hugs you. He says he's Hal, the chief exec. He points out a note from the witch: "BENNY ABANDONED YOU", which means she listened to the B side of your tape!

> x Hal. (soft music is now torturing you)

> e.

First, Hal wants to know if you're here to kill the other beat witch?

>> no

Was it a lie? Hal follows you.

Corridor

> x memo. (It's from Hal Tau re: testing of the Semper battery.)

> open door.

The office is filled with corpses, burnt ones on the bottom.

> close door.

> e.

End of Corridor

Margo Harris is wearing earplugs and she can talk. She invites you and Hal to enter the breakroom.

> e.

Breakroom

Margo confirms that Ted is dead.

> x Margo.

She learned about the battery and electronics through Ted. She turns off the music and turns on the TV. Ted crunches the remote into bits. Margo shoves you into a chair.

The news on the TV identifies you as Polly Miller, shows you and Benny with a harp and tuba respectively, footage of you fleeing, and finally dragging "noted epidemiologist Alisha Brown" and taking her hazmat suit.

When a jingle-filled ad comes on, Margo rips the TV off the wall and out the window.

Margo then gives you your notepad, but the Walkman to Hal, putting the earphones into your ears.

> show notepad to Hal. (Ugh, Margo edited it.)

>> 5 (closed)

> give life to Hal.

Hal breaks free of Ted, throws Ted at Margo, pulls the earplugs out of your ears, puts them in Margo's, and plays the tape. She's now near the broken window.

> push Margo.

Margo, Hal, and your Walkman fall out the window.

> x sandwich. x Ted. open fridge. (nope)

> w.

End of Corridor

You somehow have your strength back, and Ted speaks as if he was Margo.

> w.

Corridor

Something's happening behind the south door. Ted/Margo begins telling a story.

> w.

Upper Lobby

Ted/Margo says she almost died when... "BOOM!"

> w. (The stairwell door is jammed.)

After the EMP, she was able to drain many people at once and she got strong enough to drain from a distance.

> e.

Corridor

> open office door.

The corpses push you all the way to...

Roof

> x machine. x dial. (two unlabeled settings)

> x displays. (You don't understand them.)

> turn dial.

The corpses stop you. Ted arrives with the girl from the stairs. She's the true beat witch, Denise, who speaks through the dead. She explains how draining so many people at once made her so powerful.

You now have one last chance to use your altered notepad.

>> 5 (close notepad)

Denise says they'll soon send music-playing drones. Ted eats your notepad. The corpses grab you.

> drain Denise. (You can't do that to her any more than she can drain you.)

> z.

After Denise takes your photo, the corpses throw you off the roof.

Falling

> drain crow. (The attempt fails.)

You remember Benny telling you to find him at the abandoned lighthouse when you can prove you're not a monster.

> give life to crow. (This also fails.)

> x crow.

You're now near people. You remember Denise saying you can drain more than one person at once. You remember Benny saying you may need to do something magnificent.

> drain people. (This works but...)

*** You die ***

But the next thing you type is...

> LIVE

South Side of Skyscraper

Your body heals and the crow scrams. You are now deaf and divine.

> x dent. (Your hearing returns, and Dr. Steve's phone is playing loud nearby.)

> look. wear helmet.

> take phone.

> turn off phone. (You don't know how.)

> n.

Music from hidden speakers assault you and you're forced back outside. You can't get back upstairs that way.

> search people. x dent.

> climb building.

The undead try to grab you, but the phone repels them. You reach...

Fleshy Bridge

The bodies are recoiling from the phone's music. You briefly see how the bridge links the skyscraper roof to another building to the south, and how other bridges are forming between buildings.

> s.

You lose the phone and helmet as the bridge grabs for you. The bodies crush you; you heal, but you lose strength.

Denise, Ted, and the battery are nearby. Denise is about to kill you, but the musical drones arrive!

Everyone's in agony, and Denise's aura fades.

> turn on battery.

The bridge falls apart. Battery and Denise fall. Then you. You fall into...

Sales Floor

There's no music, but you're now weak. You no longer sense Denise; she's dead.

> look. w.

South Side of Skyscraper

> x bodies. x drones.

> ne. (You spot Denise's gray photo album.)

> take album. (Ugh. You drop it.)

> ne.

Park

> x dumpster. x grass.

> x swing. sit on it. (You remember happier times.)

> nw.

Alley

> x ribbon. take it.

> x Hal. x Margo. x TV. x Walkman.

> x grate. open it.

Dr. Steve attacks you with a scalpel. You could drain him (which would kill him) or just escape into the sewers.

> d. (He tries to follow you, but he's weaker than you are.)

Beach

By this time, you're healthy again.

> x windows. n. (You run. It's him.)

*** The End ***

Polly Miller will return.

Extras

Characters

• Polly Miller is the player-character and a beat witch. She doesn't know this city.
• Dr. Steve is in charge of the first responders and uses loud music from his iPhone to subdue you.
• Dave points a gun at you in the staging area.
• Jessica delivers a report in the staging area.
• Other first responders make up the rest of the group in the staging area.
• Denise first presents herself as an unconscious girl at the bottom of the stairs, but she's actually a very powerful, sadistic, and insane beat witch.
• Hal Tau meets you in the upper lobby. He was the CEO of Tau Labs. He's been chewing his badge for lack of food.
• A crow follows you as you fall towards the pavement far below.
• Benny Miller is your brother. He's waiting for you at the lighthouse.

Found dead:

• A young man in his 20s wearing rollerblades is the first corpse you see when you first run from the staging area.
• Ted Tau meets you in the main lobby. He's Hal's brother. It's not immediately obvious that he's a walking corpse.
• Margo Harris was an intern and initially presents herself as the beat witch you're looking for. But she's really a corpse that Denise is using as a meat puppet.
• Corpses are littered over the city. Several offices in the skyscraper are stuffed full with corpses. Two-thirds of the way through the game, Denise starts using the corpses to make skybridges between the city's taller buildings.

Mentioned:

• Dr, Alisha Brown is an epidemiologist whom you drained but didn't kill. You also took her hazmat suit.
• Ruby, Faith, and Ivy were Dr. Steve's wife and daughters. He wants to avenge their deaths.
• Your parents: You accidentally killed your mother, Anne Miller. Your father, Devin, called the police.
• Denise's family: Her photo album shows her parents and three brothers both before she became a beat witch and after she killed them all.
• A fiddler was one of Denise's earliest victims.

Credits

This is the response to CREDITS:

Beat Witch
An interactive loneliness by Robert Patten
Release 1 / Serial number 230928 / Inform 7 build 6M62 (I6/v6.33 lib 6/12N)

Identification number: //5EDB3173-2DC0-4D98-87D5-CDDBC66265CD//
Interpreter version 0.6.0 / VM 3.1.3 / Library serial number 080126
Standard Rules version 3/120430 by Graham Nelson
Simple Chat version 4 by Mark Tilford
Room Description Control version 13/160517 by Emily Short
Numbered Disambiguation Choices version 7/140501 by Aaron Reed
Epistemology version 9 by Eric Eve
Room Description Headings version 1/090620 by Erwin Genstein
Basic Help Menu version 4 by Wade Clarke
Music by Daniel Stelzer (based on code by Massimo Stella and Wade Clarke (Glulx sound), Erik Temple (Glulx timing), and Eliuk Blau (DAMUSIX for I6))
Menus version 5 by Wade Clarke

Music and cover art by Robert Patten. Sounds by albertomarun, foad, inchadney, and robni7 from freesound.org.

The author would like to thank the testers: Christopher Merriner, Matthew Goh, and Mel Jason.
Any errors in this story are the author's responsibility and not the testers', who were all wonderful!

Type HELP if you are stuck or to learn more about this story.

Endings

• You die
• if you listen to deadly music too long.
• if you're falling from the roof and don't drain the people before impact.
• if you climb the outside of the building without the iPhone to protect you from the zombies.
• if Dr. Steve cuts your neck with his scalpel.
• You despair
• if you drain Dr. Steve, killing him, before entering the sewers.
• The End
• if you reunite with Benny at the lighthouse.

Inventory

• a conversational notepad. You're carrying it.
• Since you're mute, you use a notepad with pre-made statements on them to communicate with. Choose the number corresponding to the statement you want to say.
• Unfortunately, in this game, no one is really interested in hearing anything you have to say, except for Dr. Steve when you first remove your helmet. But whatever you say, he figures out you're a beat witch.
• You temporarily lose the notepad after you try to either drain or give life to the girl at the bottom of the stairs.
• Margo returns the notepad to you when you're in the breakroom, but it's altered to say childish or self-destructive statements.
• On the roof, Margo gives you one last chance to use the altered notepad before Ted eats it.
• a Walkman. You're carrying it.
• You won't use the Walkman, but the story behind its cassette tape is interesting. One side has a recording of music you played with your brother before you became a beat witch. The other side is a personal message from him in his voice.
• You lose the Walkman after you try to either drain or give life to the girl at the bottom of the stairs.
• In the breakroom, Margo threatens to use the deadly musical side of the tape on you. Assuming you survive this threat, the Walkman falls out the window.
• In the alley behind the skyscraper, you find the broken Walkman and the tape ribbon. Take the ribbon.
• a yellow hazmat suit. You're wearing it.
• Ignore the suit and leave it on. They become bloody rags after your fall from the roof.
• a bulky helmet. You're wearing it.
• In the staging area, remove the helmet when everyone is waiting for you to remove it. When Dr. Steve starts playing music on his iPhone, put the helmet back on to muffle it.
• When you first arrive at south of the skyscraper, you lose the helmet and you're too weak to go look for it.
• After you survive the fall from the skyscraper roof and you start hearing music, the helmet will be nearby. Wear it!
• When you try to go south on the fleshy bridge, you lose the helmet forever.
• Dr. Steve's iPhone. After you survive the fall from the skyscraper roof, one turn later, your ears heal and you hear the phone, held by one of the drained people.
• First, wear the helmet to muffle the music, then take the phone. You don't know how to turn the phone off.
• You must have the phone when climbing the skyscraper to repel the corpses trying to grab you from the windows.
• When you try to go south on the fleshy bridge, you lose the phone forever.
• Denise's gray photo album. You first see the album held by the girl at the bottom of the stairs.
• After Denise is dead, you find the album when you try to go northeast from the south side of the skyscraper.
• Examine the album to learn more of Denise's story, but you discard the album in disgust.
• a cassette tape ribbon. It's in the alley behind the skyscraper.
• Take the ribbon. You won't be willing to enter the grate until you have it.

Thank You to my Patreon supporters

This walkthrough was funded via Patreon with

• the support of Robin Johnson, Ville Lavonius, Andrew Schultz, Kenneth Hon, Carl Muckenhoupt, Mark Musante, Phil Tatro, and Mitch;
• the generous support of Janice M Eisen, Matthew Foxley, and Thomas Insel;
• the very generous support of Karl Ove Hufthammer, Lance Campbell, and DrkStarr;
• the extremely generous support of Emily Short, Allen Garvin, Jesse McGrew, Jacqueline Ashwell, Jennifer Rexrode, and Durafen;
• and the invisible support of several anonymous patrons.

Ko-Fi is a way to send me small one-time donations. Every little bit helps, and thank you!