The FFC Nonarcade DogDay Walkthrough

Walkthrough by MrLipid
September 2003

A Modest History ...

DogDay, a 1997 title from Australian developer Eyst, required players to grapple with at least two and sometimes three arcade games. Fortunately, SnowMoon has played (and won!) all three arcade games and provided a saved game that will enable players to completely skip the twitch portion of an otherwise engaging adventure. Thanks again, SnowMoon!

Usual Disclaimer

Walkthroughs tend to let the air out of a game. And in the case of DogDay, there is a lot of air to let out. DogDay is not smart enough to know whether or not a player has actually solved puzzles that reveal vital information. As a consequence, it is possible to skip entire sequences by simply entering the correct information, be it a security code, a combination to a safe or a phone number. While sequences that can be skipped will be noted in this walkthrough, the assumption is that players want to see most of the game rather than just getting to the end as soon as possible.

The Story

A brutal dictator named Chegga has taken over your part of the world. Your goal is to acquire enough money ($14,000) to leave your part of the world. You will do this by selling incriminating evidence of Chegga's wrongdoing to a group called CATS (Coalition Against Totalitarian Society). Once you've collected your payment, you can buy your ticket out and the game is over.

Game Mechanics

DogDay uses a paw for its cursor. In addition to the usual right, left, up and use inventory item functions, the paw also points downward when it possible back out of a closer view, usually of a bit of animation.

While DogDay presents the appearance of being fully three-dimensional, it is actually a series of seamlessly stitched-together prerendered animations. This means that the player is only in charge of triggering the animation. It can be unnerving to click once to move forward and have no control whatsoever over how fast or how far one goes. Just follow the walkthrough and everything will be fine.

The World of DogDay

This map should make getting around in the world of DogDay a bit easier. With a few exceptions, such as the sewer maze, you are on your own to find your way to specific locations.

The Walkthrough

If you choose to start playing with SnowMoon's saved game, the following comments will give you some idea what occurred before the saved game.

Our Story So Far ...

You find yourself in the arcade, looking at the clerk, safe in his booth. In your inventory along the left side of the game screen, you'll find the following: a personal alarm, fifty dollars, a bundle of keys, a lamp, an empty ladle and a VIP pass to Pluto's Nite Spot.

You won the personal alarm and VIP pass in the arcade. You earned the fifty dollars (and picked up the ladle) working in the soup kitchen. The bundle of keys comes from your room. You used the keys to open the cabinet containing the lamp.

Your next stop is Pluto's Nite Spot.

Note: Take care not to leave the sidewalk. Any attempts to cross the street are punished by a trip to the Dog Pound.

Go to Pluto's Nite Spot

Leave the arcade and head toward Pluto's Nite Spot.

Note: If you want to see why you are on this adventure, continue past the alley that leads to Pluto's Nite Spot and go to the end of Lovemeat street. Look in the garbage can. You will find a piece of paper that contains virtually the entire plot of DogDay.

Or you can just read it:

BLAB
Newspaper of the Coalition Against Totalitarian Society
Loose Lips Sink Chips

The latest attempt to silence ex-Sectionary Daily investigative reporter Hugo "Chips" Chompsky by Chegga heavies has been unsuccessful. Mr. Chompsky was lucky enough to escape torture at the Pound early yesterday morning and flee the section via the underground rail system, leaving behind him a substantial amount of information of the inner workings of Chegga's empire. Chompsky was under close surveillance whilst working at the Daily after he was discovered to be also working for this publication.

Your mission is, then, to find Chompsky's files and sell them to CATS.

Back to Pluto's Nite Spot. The entry is a set of double doors on the right wall as you enter the alley. Once you are at the doors, ring the bell on the far edge of the right door. A bouncer will look at you through a slot. Show him the VIP pass and he will let you in. Enter the nightclub, sit down at the bar and ring twice for the bartender. Buy a drink. The bartender will give you change and a cork will wind up on the bar. Take the cork. Drink your drink.

Get up from the bar and move to the dark table in the far corner of the club. There is a lamp on the table. Turn it on. You'll see that a free voucher for a strip club has been torn to pieces.

Put the voucher back together, being careful not to cover any of the smallest pieces.

Once the tiny sliver on the top is moved into place, the voucher is ready to be taken.

Leave Pluto's.

Go to Your Room (Optional)

You can skip a substantial chunk of DogDay if you go to your room and make a phone call at this time. Dial 677-3897. This is the number for the headquarters of CATS (Coalition Against Totalitarian Society). The phone will ring several times, you'll hear a low grumble and whoever answered will hang up. This call can be made any time before you offer the evidence against Chegga to the folks at CATS. If this call is not made, the door at CATS HQ will not be opened when you come calling.

The only other way to acquire this critical phone number is to be picked up by the Dog Squad and tossed in the Dog Pound ... which is what we'll do next.

Go to Subway One

If you would like to try your ... what? paw? at breaking out of the Dog Pound, go to the bottom of the stairs, turn left and walk toward the guard. He will oblige you by taking you to the Pound.

Escaping from the Dog Pound

Your inventory will be taken from you and you will be tossed in a cell with another unfortunate. Find the radio and turn it on. There are nine stations to choose from. Station one is on the far left and station nine is on the far right. Set the radio to station eight. Your cellmate's foot will start to move. Click on your cellmate's face and he will give you the phone number of CATS

Look on the lower bunk for a dumbbell. Remove the pin from the left side of the dumbbell. Turn off the radio. It is time to pick the cell's lock.

The pin can be moved in eight directions: North, Northeast, East, Southeast, South, Southwest, West and Northwest. Move the pin until you hear a click. Note the direction of the pin at the time it clicked. (This puzzle is different with each game, which means finding a solution is a matter of trial and error.) Move the pin in the direction that produced the click, get the click and then try another move. If you don't get a click, go back to the first move that produced a click and try another move. Repeat until you have a pattern that produces four clicks. The lock will now open.

Note: A successful pattern can include repetition, such as N, NE, S, S.

Leave the cell and turn right. You are going to the laundry room. You'll go through a set of iron bars, turn right, through another set of iron bars and then through a normal wooden door. You are in the laundry room, facing three dryers.

Save your game.

Turn left and you should see a pair of double doors. Time to upset the Dog Squad. Rattle the double doors and an alarm will sound. Get back to your cell as quickly as possible. Watch the Dog Squad run toward the laundry room.

Once they have passed, leave your cell and retrieve your stuff from behind the counter in the front room of the Pound. Return to your cell. Watch the Dog Squad members return to their posts in the front room.

Leave your cell and head for the laundry room. The middle dryer is your escape route.

The dryer sports a large white button, two toggle switches and three small light bulbs. Flip the top toggle switch until the first light bulb turns a light purple. Flip the lower toggle switch once and then flip the top toggle until the second light turns green. Flip the bottom toggle switch once and then flip the top toggle until the third light turns light blue. Click on the large white button and climb into the dryer. (This must be one of those "real world" "common sense" puzzles the folks who developed DogDay were so proud of.) Click on the square at the back of the dryer to reveal the escape tunnel. Move into the tunnel. You'll find yourself back in the alley next to Pluto's Night Spot.

Using the Strip Club Voucher

Whether or not you choose to escape from the Dog Pound, you still need to get past the guard in Subway One. That's what the Strip Club Voucher is for.

Before you enter Subway One again, save your game. Turn left, approach the guard and drag the Strip Club Voucher onto the screen and give it to him. If you are successful in offering the voucher (it can take more than one try, which is why you should save your game), you'll never see the guard again.

Go to the Toy Store

Once you've climbed up the Subway Two stairs, you'll find yourself on a new street. Move past the stairway on the left side of the sidewalk and proceed to the end of the street. Turn left and enter the Toy Store. Move toward the wire cages on the left of the store and find Toy Rocket #2. Turn toward the back of the store and go behind the counter. You'll find Toy Rocket #1 under the cash register. Leave the Toy Store and go back to the stairs you passed earlier.

The Workbench, the Glue Gun, the Bomb, the Ear Muffs and the Crane

Climb the stairs and look in the wastebasket for the broken ear muffs. Move to the far end of the room (the end with the metal gate) and turn around. Find the glue gun on the shelves to your right. Sit down at the table, place the broken ear muffs on the table and use the glue gun to repair them. Put the newly repaired ear muffs in your inventory. Place Toy Rocket #2 on the table, use the glue gun on it and then put the cork in the rocket's tail. You've just made a bomb.

Get up from the table and turn toward the metal gate. Probably a good idea to save your game at this point.

Move the gate by alternately clicking on its top and its bottom. That is, click on the top, click on the bottom, click on the top, etc. It takes a total of ten clicks (five on the top, five on the bottom) to move the gate aside. If you click and the gate doesn't move, keep trying until it does. Click too far to the right, however, and you find yourself looking at a bit of doggy cheesecake and you'll have to start over with the gate.

Once the gate is open, climb onto the seat of the crane. There are three controls: a red and white knob (the choke), a yellow button (the starter) and a large orange knob (the winch release). Click on the choke, hit the starter and then release the winch. The truck, once lowered, provides safe passage to the far side of the street.

Leave the crane, go downstairs and, once you stop moving, turn left and click on the truck's cab. You'll jump and run across the truck just before it is again lifted into the air.

(While turning left when you stop moving at the end of the stairs may not seem quite right, it's the only way to do it. Move any farther forward and the truck will be lifted in the air and you'll have to open the metal gate and lower the truck all over again.)

Breaking into the Newspaper Office

Once across the street, you've got a number of tasks to complete involving the Newspaper Office (it's the one with the gold double doors):

• Breaking into the basement
• Getting out of the basement
• Breaking into Chompsky's office
• Finding the key to the Newspaper Office
• Finding the access code to Chompsky's computer
• Breaking the access code to Chompsky's computer
• Copying Chompsky's files

Breaking into the Basement

Find the blue newspaper box to the left of the gold double doors. Use the change you got from buying the drink to open the newspaper box. Then, I kid you not, climb into the box. Fall into the basement.

Getting out of the Basement

Turn right and move toward the back of the basement. Look closely at the red air conditioner and you'll see that icicles are forming on the bottom of it. The icicles come in three sizes: small, medium and large. Once past large, they break off. You need a medium and a large icicle.

Once you've got your icicles, turn right and move forward. Time to get out of the basement by, and again I kid you not, firing icicles at a stairway hooked to the ceiling. The idea is that the icicle knocks the hook loose and allows the stairs to descend.

Find the scale on the floor. Place the medium icicle in the scale's right bowl. Back up and observe the odd golden gizmo on your left. Move toward it. Click on the black rectangle on the front of the gizmo. The rectangle opens to reveal a gauge set to 632. To the right of the gauge are two buttons in the shape of a plus and a minus. These buttons allow you to reset the number on the gauge. The number you want is 730.

Once the gauge is set to 730, place the large icicle on top of the gizmo and step back. The device will launch the large icicle toward the scale's left bowl, sending the medium icicle toward the hook holding the stairway. The icicle moves the hook and the stairway descends into the basement.

Climb the stairs to the lobby of the Newspaper Office.

Breaking into Chompsky's Office

Clicking on the stool will move you past it. Turn around and click on the stool twice more. The stool's seat will tip to reveal a purple key. This is the key to Chompsky's office. Turn left and move forward—the counter opens to let you through. The animation may carry you all the way to the gold double doors. Turn around and look for the hallway that the gold double doors face. Go to the hallway and use the purple key to unlock to door to the right of the elevator doors.

Finding the Key to the Newspaper Office

Welcome to Chompsky's office. Turn on the light and look around. Time to find the key to the Newspaper Office. And what better place to start than the bookshelves?

Simply click on the books in the order indicated to find the key. The code is CHEGGA. Pretty ironic, eh?

Now that you've spelled out the name of the villain of the piece, the last book you clicked on will float toward you. Click on this book again to open it and then take the gold key that's inside.

Finding the Access Code to Chompsky's Computer

Put the book back and move toward the desk. Open the upper left drawer and take the floppy disk. Move closer to the computer. Click on the pad of paper to reveal the number 612. 612 is the combination to Chompsky's safe upstairs.

Fire up Chompsky's Computer (Optional)

As mentioned earlier, DogDay is not smart enough to know if you have actually cracked the access code to the Newspaper Office's elevator, found and opened the safe and then cracked the access code to Chompsky's computer. It is possible to simply enter the computer's access code at this point and skip the elevator ride, the safecracking and the decoding. If you want to sidestep all that, just skip to Copying Chompsky's Files.

Finding the Access Code to Chompsky's Computer—Part II

Leave Chompsky's office and enter the elevator. There are five keys in a paw shape on the wall. And an endlessly looping tune in the air. You can either try to mimic the tune by pressing the five keys in the right order or you can simply press the keys in this order: 5, 3, 2, 4, 1.

The elevator will take you upstairs, where you'll find a safe that can be opened by clicking through the combination found on Chompsky's desk: 612. Open the safe and remove the PC access code.

Breaking the Access Code to Chompsky's Computer

Examine the PC access code by dragging it onscreen. It appears to be a series of neatly nested Ls. And within the Ls are dots.

Here's how to read it.

The number, once decoded, should be 1, 3, 5, 4, 2, 5, 1, 1. Time to go back to Chompsky's office.

Copying Chompsky's Files

Turn on Chompsky's computer and, using the same paw key pattern as the elevator, enter the PC access code: 1, 3, 5, 4, 2, 5, 1, 1.

Insert the floppy disk and start copying all the files on Chompsky's system. Click on the In folder, click on Backup, click on Exit. Click on the Out folder, click on Backup, click on Exit. Click on the Trash folder, click on Backup, click on Exit.

You now have half of the evidence you are going to sell to CATS Remove your floppy disk from the system and head for the gold double doors in the lobby. Use the gold key to unlock them and move down to the sidewalk.

Heading Toward the Sewer Control Building

Move to the end of the block so that you are across the street from the Toy Store. You are now near a canopy. Click on either of the gold poles supporting the canopy to climb on top of it. Click on the Toy Store and you will jump up and down on the canopy like a trampoline, eventually sailing across the street to land next to the Toy Store.

Go down the Subway Two stairs, up the Subway One stairs, turn around in front of the arcade and then head for the Sewer Control Building.

When you click on the red cross over the door at the end of the dead end street that runs in front of the Sewer Control Building, you will be stopped by a guard. Time for the ear muffs and the personal alarm.

Drag the fixed ear muffs onscreen to put them on. Drag the personal alarm onscreen and press its button. So long, guard!

Enter the Sewer Control Building. A locked door can only mean one thing: time for a rocket bomb!

Place the rocket bomb on the bars at the right side of the door. Click on the red wire in the upper right of the screen to connect it to the bomb's fuse. Turn around and look for a small white button the wall. Press the button. The door is now somewhat grudgingly unlocked. Go through the door into the Sewer Control Building.

Move around the corner toward the right. Find the two diagrams on the wall in the far corner. There is a hot spot near the bottom of the diagram on the right. (It's the off-color patch to the lower left in what looks like a door.) A rumble lets you know you've found it.

Go back toward the door to the Sewer Control Building and you will find a panel to the right of the door has opened to reveal a series of levers. These are the levers that control gates within the sewers.

Click only on the yellow, green, and red levers.

Go to Pluto's Nite Spot. Ring the bell. When the bouncer appears, do nothing. He'll toss a cigarette butt through the slot. Back up and then look down. Pick up the cigarette butt.

Turn left, move forward, turn left again. Click on Manhole One to look more closely at it. Bring the lamp onscreen and use the cigarette butt to light it. Open Manhole One and enter the sewer.

Exploring the Sewer

Once you are in the sewer, turn right, go forward and turn around. Click on the switch in the lower right (it's on the railing) to turn on the sewer's lights. Turn around again.

Save your game.

Note: For those with no taste for mazes, a saved game (Hideout.pup) will move you immediately to Chompsky's hideout. It also, as an added bonus, takes care of the pesky robot guard dog that defends the CATS HQ. There is another saved game (Endgame.pup) which brings you out of the sewer after you have completed your invasion of Chompsky's hideout.

Second Note: The directions that follow only refer to actual junctions in the sewer, that is, places where one actually has a choice of going right or left. Simple bends in the sewer don't count.

Bend

Junction

Third Note: If I am going to be turning one way or the other more than a few times, I find it easier just to say "left six" or "right four" and then count as I reach each junction.

Time to start walking. Here are the directions.

Right
Left
Right
Left
Right
Left
Right
Left
Right Two
Left
Right Eight
Left Four
Right Two
Left Two
Right
Left Five
Right Two

When you reach this point, move forward, turn left and climb out of the sewer. You are at Manhole Two, right in front of the Sewer Control Building.

Go back into the Sewer Control Building and click only on the purple, yellow and green levers.

Leave the Sewer Control Building, turn right toward the main street and then left toward the Manhole Two. Click on Manhole Two and reenter the sewer.

Once you are back underground, turn right. Time for more maze.

Right Two
Left
Right
Left

Keep going until you arrive at a circular metal gate. Turn left and you'll see a small door in the wall. A click opens the door and you see a pair of wires. Click on the wires to connect them. You have just disabled the CATS HQ robot guard dog.

Turn left and follow the bends in the sewer back to a true junction. Then follow these directions.

Right Two
Left
Right
Left Two
Right
Left
Right Two
Left
Right
Left
Right
Left Two
Right
Left
Right Two
Left Two
Right
Left Five
Right
Left Seven
Right
Left Two

Move forward, turn right, climb up into Chompsky's secret hideout.

Welcome to Chompsky's Secret Hideout

Open the door to the left of the TV to reach a hallway. Once in the hallway, turn right and then go through the door on the right. A left turn will take you into the bathroom. Open the medicine cabinet and remove the stethoscope. Leave the bathroom, turn left and click on the picture near the center of the screen. Imagine that! A safe!

Use your stethoscope on the safe. If you want to, you can figure out the combination the same way you figured out how to break out of your cell in the Dog Pound. You are looking for a pattern that will produce a series of eight clicks.

If you'd rather just get on with it, here is the combination: 5, 1, 9, 8, 3, 1, 6, 4. Click on the safe's handle to open it. Swipe Chompsky's green disk. You now have the rest of the evidence you are going to peddle to CATS

Leave the room and follow the hallway to the room where you entered Chompsky's hideout. Click on the middle cushion of the couch to reenter the sewers.

Back to the Sewer

Once in the sewer, turn right. Here are your marching orders for the junctions:

Right Two
Left
Right Seven
Left
Right Five
Left
Right
Left
Right
Left
Right Two
Left
Right Eight
Left Two

Go forward, turn left and climb out of the sewer through Manhole Three, right in front of the Toy Store.

Endgame

How you decide to finish DogDay will depend on your level of curiosity.

Really Curious

You've already used the crane to lower the truck once. You can do it again, enter the Newspaper Office and use Chompsky's computer to read the green disk you lifted from his hideout. Once you've read the disk's contents, head over to CATS HQ.

Slightly Less Curious

If the crane approach doesn't appeal, you can use Subway Two to reach Subway One and then follow the street past the Sewer Control Building and around the corner toward CATS HQ. The robot guard dog will short out and let you pass. Keep walking to the Newspaper Office and use Chompsky's computer to read the disk. Then head back to CATS HQ.

Not So Curious

Use Subway Two to reach Subway One and then make your way past the Sewer Control Building to CATS HQ. The robotic dog will short out and you can knock on the door. Offer the floppy disk and you'll be handed $7,000. Offer the green disk and you'll be handed another $7,000. You now have enough to buy your ticket out.

Walk back to Subway One and present your cash to the ticket agent. Take your ticket and climb on the train. Brace yourself for a tremendously underwhelming finale.