Total Overdose Diaries Part Four

This is my ongoing exploration of Total Overdose, where I will chronicle my playthrough like a text-based Let’s Play.

With Morales dead, Tommy was pointing me in the direction of Papa Muerte - the one who killed our father…

My first port of call was Elvez’s house, since I had found plans for coffins with hollow compartments at his car dealership. I say “port of call” because I had to arrive via speedboat!

Of course, the first thing I had to do was a menial task for some random guy. Thankfully once that was done, Marko said that he had made it clear that I wouldn't be doing any more odd jobs, and gave me a somewhat clapped out old speedboat. It was fit for purpose, as I set course for Elvez’s place to infiltrate quietly. By jumping the speedboat into his pool right in front of everyone - except for Elvez. As I murdered sunbathers and swimmers (who were trying to kill me) alike, Tommy explained that Elvez was actually on the other side of the property.

Traditional "Cannonball!" rules do not apply when using a speedboat...

The route to Elvez's was pretty simple, involving a switch in the little island in the middle of his pool, an atrium, a maze and a winding series of supported decking which took me into an alcove beneath the house. There was plenty of murder to be had as I went, that was for sure!

I used the elevator in the alcove to head back up into the house where I confronted Elvez in his hot tub, who wasn't too happy about the state I had left his car lot in. He told me what I wanted to know - that he was told what to do and paid by a General Montanez - but not all of it was useful information.

As I turned to leave, he told his bikini-clad bodyguards to show me their bazookas - unfortunately he meant their automatic rifles, and neither their boobs nor actual rocket launchers. I used a couple of power ups and some rewinds, but the hordes of guards and Elvez fell. However, my mission wasn't quite over as I still had to escape the place which was being swarmed by the Mexican police.

In fairness, I had committed a lot of murder

It was actually surprisingly easy, as I just had to jump over a wall, race through the maze and kill about a dozen men in the driveway before I was free. Well, free may be too strong a word, as I still had to escape back to Los Toros and the police were trying to stop me. With a song in my heart and a bullet in my gun, I headed for the bridge I had to cross - so they raised it.

Guys, help me help you not get murdered!

I must have killed two dozen men before I reached the control room to lower the bridge, but an officer shot the controls before it could finish. I went back down the stairs and had to go to a couple of cars before I’d managed to kill all of the men who had grenades or rocket launchers… Hopping into a police car, I punched the pedal to the metal and raced over the bridge to safety.

The lead on General Montanez that Tommy managed to find, sent me to a military jungle camp, where I could hopefully access their computers and find out more about the whole operation. Luckily there was a satellite dish which would allow me to transmit said information to Tommy. Unluckily, it was in the middle of the whole thing, and not configured to do so.

Parachuting in, I headed for the pyramid which held the dish aloft. I was met with major resistance and fired so much ammo that I ran out of everything but grenades - and that’s only because I didn’t like throwing them. Eventually I was inside, but had to go down into the bowels of the Aztec structure to activate the controls which would allow me to reposition the dish.

Nice, big hallways in these ancient Mayan temples

This involved killing lots of men, and going down two levels, but I got the switch thrown and headed back up. Whilst wading through the enemies trying to end me, I encountered General Montanez. Thankfully, with the help of a luchador, I took him out with relative ease before heading up and activating the dish. It began transmitting data to the DEA, and soldiers came after me. I had to protect the computer from their attack, as well as myself. Thankfully, it was pretty easy, and Tommy told me to get out of there.

A ladder led to the roof and a zipline, which I grabbed onto and slid to freedom. Of course, it wasn't freedom it was actually just more enemies. I jumped into a vehicle and drove for it, though soon had to ditch it in the jungle when the soldiers pulled out the rocket launchers. It was touch and go, but using a lot of ammo I made my way to the airfield that Marco was going to pick me up at.

They couldn't defend it with blow darts, could they?

Of course, I had to destroy some AA guns first, because life is hard. Three AA guns and a dozen soldiers later, Marco landed and I jumped in. Away we flew, headed back to Los Toros, where I would meet up with Angel and the DEA would extract us both, and bring Marco along as thanks for his help. At this point Tommy had finished explaining things to his boss, and showed that Papa Muerte wanted to steal the cocaine that was locked up in evidence right in the DEA headquarters.

Before I could go and see Angel, however, I had to do a couple of odd jobs. Collect cocaine from hot dog trucks, kill 25 men on my way down a tower - standard stuff. Finally, I was allowed to go and see Angel - who had been kidnapped by the DEA traitor who had killed our father: Agent Johnson. Thanks for letting me go right over, random side quests…

At that same moment, Agent Johnson was incapacitating Tommy and his boss, and had already smuggled a bomb into the building. He was planning on escaping with the cocaine aboard a train, using the secret rail tunnel in the basement. Luckily, Tommy managed to activate the comm and I heard everything, so set off for the US border via taxi.

I mean, there's not a single part of him that looks trustworthy...

As you might expect, the border patrol were very unhappy that I was trying to get across in a hurry without my paperwork, so I had to shoot my way through. I had to stop by the office to open a gate, but after more than a few explosions and tons of bullets exchanged, I was in the United States and on my way to the DEA headquarters.

Somewhat predictably, as soon as I was within a couple of miles there were armed DEA agents trying to stop me violently. Sure, come after me instead of what I would discover to be tons of Johnson’s men actually inside the HQ… I had to get upstairs to Tommy, as both he and his boss had been given an overdose of some drug and needed an adrenaline shot to the heart. I couldn’t take the elevator, so I had to go up three stories by the ramps they had instead of stairs.

Dozens of murders later, I found the two ODing on the floor of an office, but the adrenaline was several rooms away. I stopped to look at two luchadors through a telescope, before heading for the adrenaline which saw me spreading more murder mayhem as I went.

Seriously, what's the story here?!

Once those two had been injected, they told me to head for the basement vault where the bomb would be. Inevitably there were a couple of dozen men trying to stop me, but I eventually reached the bomb. It couldn’t be disarmed since there were no wires to cut, so I had to get a forklift to load it onto a train. Using that, I could chase the one that Johnson and Angel were on, loaded with cocaine.

The train sped away from the DEA and was soon catching up to Johnson’s. I leapt from the front of it, landing safely on Johnson’s train as the bomb took my train out of the running. What followed was a lot of bullets, tons of dead bodies and a couple of slips off of the train requiring a time rewind. Eventually I caught up to Johnson - so he pulled the pins leaving my carriage - and those behind me - to stop gently.

So I jumped on a bike that was in the only nearby crate and sped off after them. He activated the AA gun that was on the rear carriage, and I had to blow it up using only an uzi, which wasn’t best suited for the task. Once it was destroyed, I raced to the front of the train, shot Angel free and zoomed to safety just as the train flew off of the newly-destroyed bridge (courtesy of the DEA).

Could there have been a more inconvenient place for her to be?

And with that, the credits rolled. Was Johnson dead? Was Papa Muerte real? Who knows? Head back into the city and do crazy things!

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Final Thoughts

I certainly had a lot of fun with Total Overdose. There are plot holes you can fit landfills in, but at least it kept you interested. The fight mechanics are really amusing, and a step up from the “Bullet Time” dives of Max Payne. Also, allowing you to use vehicles as projectiles by leaping out at the last minute was brilliant.

Just generally diving around the place was fun

Sure, you can jump out of cars in motion in other open world games, but Total Overdose explicitly has you open the door and wait to leap to safety. The Just Cause series is probably the closest similar thing, but even that doesn’t feel exactly the same.

I’m kinda bummed that the game never got a proper sequel. Especially with so many questions dangling at the end. Still, it was worth a play. Thanks for reading, and make sure to check out whatever diary I keep next!