CUT CONTENT IN COLDRIDGE: Teague Martin, a foiled execution and more!
There is quite a bit of cut material for the first mission in Dishonored, and it is all so intermeshed that I had to write one huge post about it all. Come along with me for this ride, there will be Martin, there will be heads getting chopped off (or maybe not), there will be an explosion, you'll love it.
This post is not comprehensive. There are quite a few cut tutorial messages, for example, which I did not include because I found them too boring. If you want to really go insano style and write a full list of all the cut content on this map be my guest. The following seven thousand words are just the stuff I found interesting.
It was originally planned for there to be an execution taking place on the day you, ahem, leave Coldridge. I have to say something really disappointing up front: I couldn't tell for 100% sure who it is that was going to be executed. It might have been you - Corvo is set to be executed on the day after he escapes from prison in the final game after all. It might have just been some other prisoner. I do very heavily lean towards it being Corvo's execution, for reasons that will hopefully become clear.
What I do know for certain are some of its other details. It would have taken place in the execution yard that we see from Corvo's cell and that we later get to explore in Daud's second DLC. Unlike the execution in The Brigmore Witches, which is done by gun by a guard, this would have been a beheading executed (heh) by the Royal Torturer and Executioner himself. Also unlike the one in TBW, this execution would have at some point had guests attending it.
There's a small bank of four sound effects in the files of the base game called "Special_Scene_Prison". These four files include a slicing or blade sound effect (first track below) and three versions of multiple people clapping (the second track below is the longest of these three). This bank of sound effects is not called in the final Prison level at all, and so there is no context for it.
There is a package called L_Prison_Scene, which may have been where other files associated with this "special scene" would have been kept in, but unfortunately in the shipped game this package is basically empty. (It has enough data in it that it is recognized as a valid package but that's it. Basically all the data it has is just what is needed to tell the game that "I am a package".)
The shipped game contains a dialogue that confirms that Corvo's execution would have been attended by a crowd, and that this is extraordinary. We never get to see this crowd in the final game, of course, as by the time the execution date rolls around we've already been whisked off to the Hound Pits' Pub, have met the Outsider, and gone off to cause havock among the Overseers, but as you can see by the applauding sound effect the aristocratic audience was at some point very much intended to be present on the map. ("How come so many people are coming to the execution tomorrow? " - "It's on account of Corvo, the one who killed the Empress, and abducted her daughter, Emily." - "So it's an Occasion." - "Right, a social event for the high and mighty. Come see the noble Lord Protector get his head chopped off.")
And indeed the entire execution was supposed to be an on-screen affair, one we would have very much witnessed first hand. Obviously now would be the time to reconstruct how this execution would have gone down. Who exactly was it that was supposed to get executed? What foiled it - if it was us who were supposed to be executed, how did we survive? Here is where things get a bit... complicated.
The files for this level are quite messy, with what I believe are multiple iterations of this level still visible in the architecture of the files. This makes it hard to conclusively reconstruct anything as it's not possible to tell one "layer" of development from the other. Due to these different "layers" representing different moments in development, where an idea could be included in the game at one point but had been discarded by another point, it's pretty difficult to reconstruct one linear narrative, especially when there might not even have been a linear narrative even when scenes were already being implemented. So I will try my best to guesstimate things here, but of course feel free to rearrange these puzzle pieces into whatever pictures you think might look better.
Some objects are grouped together by all being children of the same parent object, and I think it's safe to consider most objects parented to one object all part of the same "layer". Let's start with one of these groups.
There is a directory of soirees called "=Soirees=.Soiree_Directory" - a soiree is the Dishonored 1 version of an Unreal Engine Matinee (source), which is basically a set of actions for an NPC to perform, like a scene (not necessarily a cutscene, but any scripted interaction between NPCs). This directory contains a list of children objects. Here is that list in full in order of SeqEvent_RemoteEvent counting up, i.e. SeqEvent_RemoteEvent -> SeqEvent_RemoteEvent_1 -> ... -> SeqEvent_RemoteEvent_15: Soiree_Jumpto_Prisoner_Helper, Soiree_Martin_Tossed_in_Cell, Soiree_Guard_Booth_Start, Soiree_Stealth_Hallway_Guards, Soiree_Martin_Intro, Soiree_Yard_Guard_Slacks, Soiree_Yard_Guards, Soiree_Guard_at_Cell, Soiree_Shut_Gate, Soiree_Execution, Soiree_Execution_explosions, Soiree_Execution_Head_Chop, Soiree_Wake_Up_for_Execution, Soiree_ [sic]Player_Wakes , Soiree_YardGuardOpensGate, Soiree_Dragged_To_Execution.
I consider all of these to be one "layer". Here are the specific members of this directory that I want to talk about in this section, roughly grouped by what they're about:
Waking up: Soiree_ [sic]Player_Wakes , Soiree_Wake_Up_for_Execution
Execution: Soiree_Dragged_To_Execution, Soiree_Execution, Soiree_Execution_Head_Chop, Soiree_Execution_explosions
We are woken up for the execution - this is different from the normal waking up. Somebody is dragged to the execution - this person is most likely escorted by two guards, as there are guards carrying the nicknames "Guard Escort1" and "Guard Escort2". Somebody gets their head chopped off. There are explosions.
I'd say it's pretty safe to assume that the explosion(s) would have interrupted the execution. Was this, then, the explosion of the bomb we planted? But that would necessitate us having escaped our cell previously, doesn't it, which doesn't really fit in with us then still being dragged to the execution - why would we return back to the cell after we'd gotten out? Would we have found the outer door shut, planted the bomb somewhere else (hint hint, this is foreshadowing for a later section), and then gone back to our cell while the bomb ticked down... for an entire day?
I do find it likely that we would've woken up in Coldridge two times, to account for the different "Player_Wakes" and "Wake_Up_For_Execution" soirees. The execution date for Corvo is also canonically set for the day after we end up escaping from Coldridge - so if we failed to escape on that first day, the next time we woke up it would've been for the execution. I also find it very likely that we would have escaped directly from the execution yard, as it is right beside the outer door that leads to freedom (see the next section for details on the yard).
I also believe that at some point the plan was for it to be possible for the execution to not be interrupted by an explosion. If it really was our execution that was happening here then obviously this would've led to our death, which would in turn have led to a game over screen. As evidence for this there is a SeqEvent_RemoteEvent called "NewGame_HeadChop_Finished" which sends you back to the Tower - you know, it starts a "NewGame" after the "HeadChop" is "Finished". This is why I believe it would indeed have been Corvo's execution that we would have attended, and not just some other person's execution that we could've witnessed. We fail to escape, our head gets chopped off, game over, try again.
I don't think that they stuck with this idea forever, though. There is a SeqEvent_RemoteEvent called "PrisonExecutionSceneFinished" which, once activated, would trigger the display of the sprint tutorial message - which sounds to me like at that stage of development, the only possible outcome for the execution scene would've been for us to hightail it out of the prison (and not for us to die and be sent back to start a new game).
To tie the sounds from above back into these events, I think the slicing or chopping sound effect is most likely for the actual chopping of the head. The clapping sounds would have been for the high society crowd attending Corvo's execution - I assume this would've played over or right before the game over screen, or maybe when we were first presented to the crowd. The strange phrasing of the names of these files - "special scene" is just weird - sort of gives me feeling they're from very early in development of this level, which is why the applauding crowd of people isn't actively part of any of the other layers anymore (they probably discovered pretty quickly that it was too complicated, too many NPCs to deal with in such a small space, etc.).
Apart from the sound effects listed, to round this strange but eventful section off we have three (partially) cut pieces of music that we know are associated with the execution. They are all called "LVL_Prison_Music_Execution_[number]". My interpretation of how these were intended to be used is of course guesswork, as these tracks don't get used for their intended purpose in the game, but either way - track number 1 sounds to me like it would have played as you (or whoever) were being dragged to the execution, ominous military drums heralding your doom...
...track two sounds to me like it is the buildup and climax of the axe dropping...
...and track three might have been an alternate version of that buildup and climax - maybe towards the explosion that saves your life? This piece of music is used in the final game as the stinger when the bomb is planted, according to TheWorld.PersistentLevel.Main_Sequence.~~4_Control_Rooms_Sequence~~.SeqAct_AkPostEvent_23.
The execution yard itself could be called cut content, although we do get to catch a glimpse of it through Corvo's cell window.
Despite this little glimpse being our only view of the yard in the base game, the developers clearly intended for us to be able to visit the yard and see it up close right there during the very first mission of the game. It is fully decorated, including chairs that you cannot see at all in the final game. The chopping block, called "prison_decapitation_log_01", is an asset that's completely unique to this instance of the map and is not reused anywhere else.
(Compare this decoration to the yard as we see it in TBW: the chairs are the same - despite there being no audience for this particular execution - but the chopping block and bucket have been removed to facilitate an execution by firing squad guard instead of by axe. It has also been decorated more detailedly than in the base game, gaining several new structures, including some pipework to facilitate sneakier access.)
There is a unique graffiti on the wall by the door that isn't visible at all in the shipped base game unless you noclip into the yard.
The door to the yard looks fully usable from the yard side...
...but once you walk through it and turn around you see what it is in the final game: a blank wall that papers over the otherwise perfectly usable door.
Collision was never finished for the base game version of the yard - while the ground is solid enough, you can simply walk through most of the objects, including into the walls and stairs. In the third image I have turned collision display on so you can see that there's really no collision to speak of. The bucket on the execution platform does have collision - it's movable so you can even kick it around if you want to - but I assume that this is just a part of the object, which itself is not unique and was simply dropped into this scene, presumably with collision data included.
There is a CameraActor positioned in the middle of the four chairs (enlarge the images if necessary, it's the little orange dot). This means it's likely a cutscene would have taken place here, although what this camera would have done and how it would've been animated I can't say.
There is also an AudioPortal right outside the door, which is a way to play localized sounds. I believe that this particular Portal is playing seagull noises as even in the finished game if you walk up to the wall where the door should be, without clipping into the yard or anything, you can hear seagulls sqwaking more loudly than you do when you step away from the wall.
Coldridge Prison is home to a boiler that has been known to have issues. This is true even for the final game. After you pick up the bomb and walk into the yard, you can overhear a guard say that the reason why he hasn't patrolled the yard yet is that he was "gonna report that boiler leak from yesterday". This line is where the mentions of this boiler end in the final game.
Originally however, it played a much greater role: we could've blown it up in order to kickstart Corvo's escape. Whereas in the released game we can only plant the bomb on the big outer door of Coldridge, as alluded to in the previous section we were originally supposed to be able to plant it on this malfunctioning boiler.
This was still the case when the earlier execution idea had already been dropped. We know this because the mentions of the boiler bombing are all part of a list of sequences that match what we see in the final game. In order, these sequences are called (yes, the squiggly lines are part of the name):
~~1_CorvosCell_Sequence~~
~~2_Firsts_Guards_Sequence~~
~~2_Footbridge_Sequence~~
~~4_Control_Rooms_Sequence~~
aka exactly the sequence of events you are taken through in the released game, no execution to be found.
The boiler bombing is considered part of the "Yard_Sequence". This sequence contains, among other things, the following SequenceFrames:
"Interrogation Room", "Bomb Picked Up", "Safe Closed" - your brief stint in the interrogation room, during which you pick up the bomb, is considered part of this sequence
"Enable / Disable Boiler Interaction", "Show / Hide Bomb", "Bomb Planted" - also part of this sequence is you placing the bomb on the boiler, where it visibly sticks in place much like it does on the outer door of Coldridge in the finished game
What I find really cool about this is that suddenly the location of the interrogation room is no longer random but actually has a reason behind it: it is almost directly attached to the yard! The yard where you would use the bomb that you pick up in the interrogation room!
Moving on from the yard for a moment, the next sequence, Control_Rooms_Sequence, has the SequenceFrames "Soiree: Boiler Eploded" and "Start Boiler Explosion Dialog". It does also contain the SequenceFrame "Destroy Door", and part of the "Yard_Sequence" is also a SequenceFrame called "Outer Door Sabotage", which makes me think that either at some point we were supposed to be able to choose between sabotaging the boiler or the door. It's also possible that these are two layers of development overlapping, with the door comments coming from the version where we destroy the door and the others from when it would've been the boiler, who knows.
The guards would have reacted to the explosion, be it of the boiler or the door, which I believe is cut content as I could not get these lines to trigger. The soirees "Bomb Planted" and "Bomb Eploded 2" featured two guards, both of whom would move to different spots during it. "Bomb Exploded 1" and "Bomb Exploded 3" would have featured just one guard who would've moved. These text of these reactions are contained in OneShot_2, nicknamed "Bomb Reactions":
DisConversation_2 (Description: "Player has just dropped the bomb on the boiler. It's ticking.", Label=Bomb Planted):
"Hey, what's that sound ?"
"Looks like something is wrong with the outer door."
DisConversation_1 (Description: "The boiler just exploded.", Label: Explosion):
"What was that?! What just happened? "
...as well as in DisDialogOneShot_23, nicknamed "Bomb Reaction":
DisConversation_3 (Description: "The boiler just exploded", Label: Explosion):
...and also in DisDialogOneShot_24, which is also nicknamed "Bomb Reaction":
DisConversation_4 (Label: Bomb Explosion, Description: "After the explosion, 2 guards run in the yard and stop in front of it."):
"This had to happen the day before the biggest execution in the last hundred years? Dammit! Everyone stay ready." (I love the line reading of this one, the voice actor did a great job!)
The boiler is referenced in descriptions for several conversations that are still in the game, such as the dialogue between the guards discussing Corvo's execution date that plays right after Corvo leaves his cell, which carries the description "When the boiler is intact, a random dialog takes place in the escape corridor". The announcements that play over the speakers after Corvo blows up the outer door are similarly described as being "Speaker announcements when the boiler has been destroyed".
Now you're probably all asking yourself where this boiler would have been. This is actually more complicated a question to answer than you might think. The first option that sprang to my mind - and which to me has always looked like it should be interactable somehow - literally has the word "boiler" on it. That's a very strong contender right there. It is located right beside the room in which you learn how to pull yourself up onto ledges. In the released game, it does nothing except sit there conspicuously. But it is also rather far away from everything else relevant to this story, and you'd have to backtrack quite a way from the Interrogation Room to attach the bomb to it - but that could tie in with you maybe going back to your cell after you've planted the bomb, which would be a straight shot from this location.
Then there's this beauty in the yard, which looks about a half second away from exploding by itself. This ties in with all the dialogue about the boiler malfunctioning. Its location also fits, as the boiler is part of the "Yard_Sequence" after all, the dialogue of the slacker guard complaining about the boiler takes place just a few steps away from it, along with the guards being supposed to run into the yard after the explosion. It is also the only one of its kind in the Prison. And it literally glows. You physically cannot miss it.
Unfortunately, the above object is called the "Prison_YardTank" in the files. This naming goes to the point where even the objects connecting it to the larger sections of pipe are specifically called "tank_01_plug"s. So it's probably not a boiler.
Don't worry though, the boiler options thankfully(?) do not end there.
There is a texture called "prison_ground_boiler_room_01" and "_02". It is applied to exactly one group of floors in the prison, which are... not in the Yard nor where those first two boilers are. It is here, in the section where you learn how to vault up onto ledges. (I have disabled all other materials here to easier show the two objects with this material.)
and indeed, there are two boilers in this "boiler_room", outlined orange below.
But this room already has a purpose, and the way the boilers are placed doesn't look particularly... appealing to me? They do not immediately scream "boiler" to me, and I did not know they were boilers until I ctrl+f'd for all boiler objects on the map. That makes it seem less likely to me that we were ever intended to recognize this as The Boiler Room, The Room In Which The Boiler Is Located. Elsewhere, this room is simply referred to as the generic "machine room".
And yes there's still more. The room where we get the bomb... is filled with boilers.
(This room is also called the "bomb room" in the files but since this is where we get the bomb it's not really all that surprising either way.)
So we have one set of boilers that literally visibly say "BOILER" on them, one boiler-like object that's visibly malfunctioning and is located in the yard, one so-called boiler room, and a room full of boilers where we get the bomb. All equally likely contenders in my opinion. We have a bit of a JonBenét situation here don't we
Of course it is incredibly possible that whatever form the boiler and its environment would have originally taken has been scrubbed so vigorously from the game that it simply does not exist anymore. Its floor material may have been repurposed, and so could have some of its effects for the tank in the yard. It's a great big boiling mystery.
Lastly, while there are no sound effects nor models remaining of this explosion I could find in the files of the base game, there is interestingly enough a sound file called "Bank_DLC06_Amb_Boil_Expl" in The Knife of Dunwall. I don't remember there being any exploding boilers in that DLC. It's just an explosion sound effect, nothing special, so I have decided against including it here in order to stay under tumblr's 10 audio files per post limit, but I did want to at least mention it for completion's sake.
After the explosion, a guard would have noticed that Corvo's cell was unlocked and empty. These lines are contained in DisDialogOneShot_25, nicknamed "Corvo Is Missing".
DisConversation_5 (Description: "After the boiler's explosion, a guard goes check corvo's cell and see that nobody is in it.", Label: CorvoIsMissing)
"Hey! Corvo's cell is empty! We have to find that bastard!"
DisConversation_6 (Description: "Variation of \"CorvoIsMissing\" if the player has killed some guards during the stealth tutorial.", Label: CorvoIsMissingDeads)
"Dammit, Corvo's cell is empty and it looks like he went on a slaughtering spree. Let's find that bastard!"
The above two lines were recorded by their respective voiceactors and remain in the files. In order to stay under tumblr's 10 audio files per post limit, I tacked these audio files onto some other cut ones, see the end of the next section for copies of these files.
While there's no real reason why these lines shouldn't be in the released game, as even with the bomb exclusively placed on the outer door these would have fit in perfectly, I believe that these were also cut as I could not get them to trigger. I even lead an entire squadron of guards to Corvo's empty cell with no results.
When the guard comes to give us the tray containing bread, a note, and the key to our cell, in the final game he only says one line: "You should eat, Corvo. This meal comes from a friend". However, it was originally planned for this conversation to be able to play out in several different ways.
At one point instead of the elite guard that gives you the tray, it would have been a lower guard - that's the guards with the simple, open blue uniform tops and the blue slouchy hats - who could've had one of several different dispositions towards you. How exactly he'd treat you would depend on... what exactly? I don't know. It's not like you have done much in the game up until this point. Could you maybe have saved a guard from being killed by Daud et al. in the opening Tower sequence, and that would've made these guys more favorable towards you? Was it going to be completely random? Were these just here because the writers hadn't yet decided what tone they wanted this scene to take, and it was always their intention to cut all the variations and only leave one variant in the final game? Who knows.
Either way, this OneShot was nicknamed "Dinner Is Served", came with the description "After the interogation, a guards come to give a tray with bread to the player.", and was labelled "Dinner". Its speaker nickname - which is usually just a short random name or a description of the character that speaks these lines, like "BridgeElite" for the elite on the bridge, "KeyGuard" for the guard holding a key - is rather bizarrely "Weak". He's also labelled as "Escort Weak" in a different place, meaning that it's it's possible he was one of the two guards escorting us (or someone else) to/from the execution at some point. This bank features the following lines:
"Dinner is served, traitor." (Localization note: "Bitter, crude")
"Dinner is served. The prison cook is wretched, but he's better at making bread than you are at protecting Empresses."
"Dinner is served, Lord Protector." (Localization note: "This one is actually a sympathizer, passing a note under a plate")
Only the last of these three refers to the note, including in the note to the localization teams. Does that mean that in the other ones, there would not have been a note - and we would have been dragged to the execution, where we then would have escaped? Or maybe in those cases the guard would not have known about the note and key at all.
Similarly, the elite guard that hands us the tray has three alternate lines he could have said. These, along with the line that made it into the final game, all come from the OneShot nicknamed "Elite_Friend", which carries the label "Eat", and were all recorded and can be found in the game files. It's possible they had these as backup hints for the guard to say if the player didn't pick up the key fast enough, however in the final game the guard leaves immediately after he gives us the tray.
"Enjoy your last meal, Lord Protector. It's from a friend you don't know yet."
"Eat your food, Corvo. It's from a friend. Some of us still believe in you, Lord Protector. "
These lines too were recorded and their audio files are still included in the released game, here is what they sound like. The first two lines in this file come from the section on Corvo's empty cell being discovered above, due to tumblr's 10 audio files per post limit.
HELPING SCARING YOUR FELLOW MAN
The reactions of the three prisoners in the cell next to Corvo's to your escape all belong to a sequence called "Prisoner Helper" - presumably because you're able to "help" them by bringing dead bodies to them after they ask you to kill some guards for them, but also because they help you, the player, by functioning as a low-key in-universe tutorial in telling you to stay out of sight or to try killing the guards in your way.
The fellas in cells B1 and B2 are delighted if you show them a corpse or two. The man in the cell right next to yours - him being the anxious one who is in there due to having been accused of stealing from the Boyles - in the final game doesn't have any comments on any dead guards you show him. At some point however he was actually supposed to have a negative reaction if you brought the bodies of any guards to him. These lines all come from DisDialogOneShot_12.DisDialogTree_OneShot.DisConversation_2, which has the description "If corvo bring corpse in front of this prisoner's cell, he will react." and is labelled "Dead Corpse".
"If I was you, I'd get out of here, fast."
"Hey, don't leave his body here. They'll think I did it. "
"No way I'll cover your killing spree. If they ask me, I'll tell us you did it !" [sic]
The spoken versions of these lines I've put in a file at the end of the next section, as usual due to tumblr's 10 audio files per post limit.
On the topic of this Prisoner Helper thing - I do wonder if maybe we were supposed to be able to break any number of the prisoners out along with us. There's a SequenceFrameWrapped object that carries the description "Prisoner hides at corner and motions with hand for player to stay low. Looping animation peeking around corner.", which doesn't really make sense to me unless there was supposed to be a prisoners outside of a cell at some point. That's just pure speculation on my part though.
To cap off this section on cut dialogue, here's some just some assorted cut dialogue. First up is some generic dialogue for the guards to say during Corvo's escape. This generic dialogue was recorded by all four actors for CityGuard_A, CityGuard_B, EliteGuard_A and EliteGuard_B. I haven't included all of these cut versions here, just randomly picked one actor for each cut line. As long as one actor gets to say a line in game at one point I don't consider that line cut anymore, but if you are compiling this information somewhere else and want to be truly comprehensive about it you should go back and figure out which actors' lines got included and which ones did not. Anyway here is the text that for sure did not make it into this scene in the final game: (Prison_GenericDialog.Escape_DialogTree.DisConversation)
"I hope we'll find who did that or we're all dead."
"We'll all have our ass kicked for sure."
"The regent is going to be pissed if the execution needs to be postponed."
"I hope we can fix this situation before Campbell and the Regent come back tomorrow."
And then there's also DisDialogOneShot_9.DisDialogTree_OneShot.DisConversation, nicknamed "Stealth Hallway Convos" and spoken by "Guard Escort2", - interestingly enough a name that should be familiar to you if you read the part about the botched execution. Only part of this conversation was cut - you can hear the remaining part of it being spoken by the guards in the hallway right as you leave your cell for the first time, it's the one that starts with "How come so many people are coming to the execution tomorrow?".
"It's a shame they haven't found the girl. "
"Are you kidding, Corvo, or whoever he was working with, probably dumped her into the river the day after it happened. "
"Yeah, it's just too bad. She'd have been the new Empress."
Hey, remember when Teague Martin goes "The nursemaid Callista is quite fetching, eh? Or maybe I've been in prison too long"? Turns out the prison he was talking about was originally going to be the very same one we escape from. The info I could gather about him is incredibly fragmentary but it quickly became clear to me that this really was him being in this level at some point during development and not just a case of re-used assets.
You might have already spied the RemoteEvents Martin_Intro and Martin_Tossed_in_Cell in the "Soiree_Directory" above. The name of the second one is pretty clear - it's a scene where Martin gets tossed in a cell. The first one is less clear, and unfortunately there's really no way to get more details out of it. An intro to Martin (i.e. the first time we see him)? Him introducing himself? Maybe him featuring in the intro to the level? Who knows. I do wonder if him being tossed in a cell had something to do with the empty cell two doors down from Corvo's, cell B3. It's suspiciously the only cell not in an inaccessible area that's empty in the released game.
We do know that he would've had specific tweaked settings that only applied to him on this map, in the form of a package called "Twk_Pawn_Martin_Prison". The name of this package appears as leftover in the NamesTable for all the DLC upks, however unfortunately there is no instance of the Tweak file itself making it into the game. These tweak files contain anything from what headmeshes a character uses to how fast they swim to what weapons they carry to what soundbanks they use when knocked unconscious, so just the fact that it exists sadly tells us absolutely nothing about its contents.
There is one single fact we know about this tweaks package though: according to the localization file for this tweaked copy of Martin, upon highlighting this version of him we would've seen the name "Overseer Martin". This is unlike the simple "Martin" we see if we highlight him during the High Overseer mission, but the same as what we get if we highlight him in the Pub. Other than that this file just tells us that he had the generic busy text of "This character is busy" and the generic message you get upon trying to steal from someone you fail to steal anything from, which is "You can't carry more ammo of this type". (Side note: while none of the lines Martin says to Corvo mention them having met before, he does introduce himself with the words "Psst! Corvo! It's me, Overseer Martin" [emphasis mine]. You know, like we would have seen him be labelled as in the Coldridge map but not like what we see in the High Overseer map. Is this a remnant from the version of the game where we met him all the way back in Coldridge? Idk maybe)
There are several animations that were created for him to use in this level. All of these are children of Tall_Gestures_RightArm_Prison - I'm not 100% sure on this as as of now there is no way to export the DH1 animations because they use a propietary format that has not yet been cracked, but I believe this naming can be taken literally to mean that these animations would have only applied to the right arm.
Here is a list of these animations:
Animations "MartinReturn_Main_Explain" (41 frames, 1.36 seconds)
"MartinReturn_Main_Slice" (46 frames, 1.53 seconds),
"MartinReturn_Main_ComeHere" (51 frames, 1.7 seconds).
There are also the two animations "Gesture_Tossed_SpeakingGrid_PointRightFinger" (101 frames, 3.36 frames) and "Gesture_Tossed_SpeakingGrid_RightHandOpen" (41 frames, 1.36 seconds) which I would guess are probably part of the "Martin_Tossed_in_Cell" scene mentioned above.
All five of the mentioned animations are exclusive to this map and are not reused anywhere else (or if they are, they carry a different name).
The naming "MartinReturn" is of course notable but there's really nothing I can say about it. Who is returning? Us? From our trip to plant the bomb on the boiler? Is it Martin that's returning? From where? I don't know.
I do not believe that he - unlike Lizzy Stride - would have at this point been locked in the pillory that we later see him in, as the animations for the pillory are all named Pillory_(etc) and Martin_Pillory_(etc), and none of those can be found in the Prison level files. Some of the pillory sound effects get used in this map but those are just generic clinking noises, nothing major.
One of the guards that you could have found slacking off in the yard is inexplicably called "Prison_OverseerOfficeGuard2" in the files. No, before you ask, there is no OverseerOfficeGuard1. I wonder if this guard might be connected to Martin's presence in the prison - maybe this guard would've been the one who tossed him in his cell after he'd taken him from the High Overseer's Office. It's also entirely possible that this guard would've just talked about the High Overseer's Office in some form, but I thought it bared mention here nevertheless since the Office doesn't get mentioned at all in the final game either way.
Funnily enough the released version of the game can't quite decide if Martin has been to prison at all - there is that line of his about his having been in prison that I quoted above, but then there's also the line of him saying that "If you think prison food's bad, you should see what the Abbey serves its captives", which kind of implies he has not been to prison but to a secret different place. Either way I wonder if the line about being in prison for too long is a remnant from the version of the story where he went to Coldridge - and I also wonder if we would've broken him out of there at some point, or if it was always planned for us to meet him in Coldridge, leave him to stew in there while we walked out, then rescue him from Holger Square.
There is an SeqAct_Gate in Coldridge Prison's script file called HavelockThreats_StartCondition. So did Havelock also visit Martin and Corvo in prison? Let's investigate. This event name does not appear anywhere else in the game and so this isn't just the case of something being copied over to this map (for example, Campbell's dramatic assassination animation also exists in the Coldridge Prison files, but that's just because it's part of what gets loaded for all maps he's on). It's part of the PrisonerHelper sequence, specifically PrisonerHelper_BoolCheck. While I can't figure out what boolean it actually is that's being checked here I do think that this is not actually a case of Havelock himself appearing in the prison, and rather one of the other prisoners in the cells next to Corvo's mentioning him. Were they threatening Havelock, or were they threatening someone else with the wrath of the admiral? I'd hazard to guess the second is more likely - and to veer off completely into speculation here, I do wonder if this had to do with Martin and that empty cell I mentioned. Of all people there it would make most sense for Martin to be throwing around Havelock's name after all.
There is also a SeqAct_Gate called Russel_Jump_Start4Conditions in Coldridge Prison's script file. This event name too is unique to Coldridge. This Gate is part of a cut tutorial message that would have been displayed to teach you how to pickpocket. Specifically this would happen when you got the opportunity to pickpocket the Yard or Yard Walkway Key from a guard. As you may recall, Russel is a cut member of the Loyalists whose role was ultimately mainly absorbed by Havelock. I have absolutely no idea what this name might be referring to - a jump usually means a time or logic jump, so could we have skipped something here, a scene involving Russel, or skipped to a scene involving Russel, after you've pickpocketed a key? What the hell is the "4" in the "Jump4Conditions"? I have no clue.
Both of these objects, along with Martin, could be taken to imply that some additional Loyalist presence was planned for Coldridge. I personally lean towards Havelock just being referred to by another NPC and not actually being present in the prison. With Russel I can't even guess honestly, we know too little about him to know whether his presence in the prison could have made sense at any point and the object name referring to him is so vague it doesn't help either. Neither Havelock nor Russel have seperate pawns for the Prison level nor do they appear in any other way in the Coldridge files (Russel's head texture does, but that is because those files were re-purposed to function as a generic elite guard head after Russel himself was cut from the game).
There is an earlier draft complete with finished voice lines of the intro sequence to this mission, the one in which Campbell and Burrows speak with Corvo while the Torturer-and-Executioner tortures him, remaining in the files.
There were supposed to be at least two guards in the room, as there are stage marks for both of them (Prison_Torture InterpGroup Guard1 and Guard2). One of the two was going to move to a different spot twice, then both would have exited the room. Presumably these lines, attributed to "Voice_CityGuard_B", would have been spoken by one of them: (from bank Bk_56DE25CF47C6E7E5BA7CF2BCD624AD12)
Burrows had the following additional lines (the first half of the second line made it into the final version of this conversation): (from bank Bk_37BDBF33467BED554D419EA9C23E2F2C)
"Corvo, the Empress is dead, her daughter Emily is hidden away, and no one will ever know the truth. No one will ever know how many nights Campbell and I sat in secrecy with the others. Plotting her assassination. Planning our moves."
"And it came together better than I could have imagined. For all of history, it will be told that you, the rejected lover, committed a terrible murder just as the city was falling apart. And that I, taking the role of Lord Regent, stepped in to restore order. Elegant."
And Campbell had this to say:
Campbell: "You might have had her favor, Corvo, but now you'll die a traitor and dishonor will mark your name for generations. When your head hits the ground, I want you to know that we'll be smiling."
I had to put all of these into one big file because like I mentioned before tumblr only allows a limited number of audio files per post, sorry. (Note: if anyone wants to compile any of this info anywhere else then for completion's sake please do also note that Burrows' and Campbell's banks also include alternate line readings for four lines of final dialogue.)
Notable to me in these lines: 1) they explicitly speak of Corvo's relationship with Jess. Feels like they really decided to make that whole story more of a "blink and you miss it" type deal instead of just laying it all out right at the start of the game - especially since they also cut these lines from Jess to Corvo. 2) they are so much more heavy-handed even when compared to the not exactly subtle nature of the lines we got in the final game. 3) >dishonor OH I GET IT THATS THE NAME OF THE GAME
In the final game we only get to potentially enact our revenge on the Torturer when we return to the Tower many months after having escaped Coldridge. It looks like in previous drafts, however, they wanted us to be able to meet him in battle right there in the prison.
There is a storyflag - which is basically a small bit of data where the game stores the state of part of the world, like if we've triggered certain events yet, have entered certain areas, completed certain objectives and so on - called "Prison_Executioner_Dead". Aggroing or killing any essential NPC that you're not supposed to kill just yet - like killing any of the Loyalists in the Pub - makes the game throw up a "game over" screen. It does not set any storyflags because it doesn't need to, because the game is over right afterwards. It basically breaks the game. The existence of this storyflag then tells us that this would not have been the case here. Killing the Torturer was intended to be a legal action that would not have instantly ended your game.
The Executioner as he appears in the Prison in the base game does not carry any weapons. When we potentially meet and fight him during Return to the Tower his weapon, which looks like the branding tool he uses on Corvo during the torture cutscene that starts off the Prison mission, is called "Twk_Inv_TorturerSword" and has the debug name "Torturer's Sword". It's also called a "poker" in some of the other files. In the files for Coldridge however there are sound files that are labelled "Prison_Executioner_Axe". Therefore I think it's safe to say he would have carried an axe during some version of this level, which then makes it pretty likely to me that he would've used it during our fight - quite possibly the very same axe he tried to cut Corvo's own head off with earlier in the day. The following files are what remains of this axe, in order: "take", "whoosh", "hit", "clean", "putdown"
While we don't know a lot about the details of how this fight would've gone down, it seems to me most likely that it would've taken place in the Interrogation Room, which also recieved some other cuts in the final game: for one, there were supposed to be ragdolled bodies in the hallway leading up to it, making the approach to the Torturer more ominous and the revenge we could have taken on him even more justified (SequenceFrame named "b_RagdollsInTortureHallway / i_RagdollsInTortureHallway").
Another cut to the Interrogation Room is more obscure. You see this rat in the cutscene where Burrows et al. are torturing you? It doesn't actually have any particular purpose in the final game, it just hangs out and spectates your torture.
I get the feeling this guy might have had a bit part to play in your torture. There's at least one soiree in the files called "Torture Rat" and while there's not really much you can gleam from it, it is strange that there's that whole rat there that does not really get adressed in the final game, isn't it?
While the rat does not appear in the explorable interrogation room in the finished game...
...it was at one point possible for you (or someone else) to kill it, as there is a soiree called "Kill Torture Rat". If the rat really was involved in your torture somehow then it would make sense to let us get our revenge on it here, too, right alongside its master.
WHATEVER THE HELL THIS STUFF IS
One last thing. The version of the Interrogation Room you see during the intro torture cutscene is a different copy than the one you actually explore in game. There are no important differences between them and nothing cut so that is not what this section is about. This section is about... this.
What exactly is this? I don't know. I found it by taking my freecam around the level while the opening torture cutscene was being played. There were no differences to be found, everything was right where it should be. Except for... this. These are objects emitted by an emitter that's located right inside the lever-controlled sliding gate at the end of the control room. They aren't part of the door explosion, I went and checked that out in ultra-slowmo - while there are bits and bobs that get scattered from the explosion, none of them are... this. Are these leftover bits from the door explosion? From the boiler explosion? Given how red some of them are, prehaps even from the execution? Hell, why not from the torture cutscene itself? I don't know. I don't know what the hell these things are.
I hope you enjoyed this section about unidentifiable gunk that is normally invisible to the naked eye. That's where I'm gonna end this post! Thank you so much for coming along with me on this wild ride, writing this post took multiple months and I sincerely hope you enjoyed it. I will now go think terrible thoughts about Martin in prison
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