If there's anything Christmas specials have told us, it's that the big man at the North Pole is notoriously bad at managing his assets. In Tesshi-e's holiday escape this year, Santa has lost ten of the Happy Coins he's supposed to give the children, and in The Happy Escape it's up to you to find them and save Christmas once again.
There's nothing particularly unusual about the setup. Just point and click around the room to navigate, pick things up, and interact with other things. When you have something in your inventory, and there'll be a lot of somethings to have, click it to highlight it, then use it on the environment or click "About Item" to view a close-up. Solve puzzles, look everywhere, collect all ten Happy Coins, and get out the door! (There's no special Happy Coin ending this time, but since the whole game is about collecting them, well...)
Once again, Tesshi-e has come through with a spectacular escape; the puzzles flow perfectly and logically, the sounds and graphics are charming, and although there's still no changing cursor, you never really have to do any pixel-hunting. There's also a save feature for when you get stuck. It's a few days late in the year to be playing a Christmas-themed game, but the holiday season always ends too soon anyways.
Walkthrough Guide
(Please allow page to fully load for spoiler tags to be functional.)
THE HAPPY ESCAPE
PRE-GAME NOTES
You won't be looking for a single Happy Coin in this game..instead, Santa's tasked you with finding TEN of them! Best. Christmas. Ever.
There are a total of THREE endings to this game.
There is one color-dependent puzzle in this game, but the directions I gave for it will allow anyone who is colorblind to solve it.
WALKTHROUGH
NORTH WALL
The door (locked, of course) has a keycard slot by it. Nothing we can do about that yet. Nothing in the flower pot either.
Check the picture in the center of the wall. It's a puzzle with 3 wreaths that can be rotated. The bells on top can be positioned to the same spots as the numbers on a clock. Hmm...gonna have to come back to this one later.
Check the table under the picture. Mr. Hippo's sitting on it; may as well check his mouth for anyth--
SCORE!! Happy Coin (1/10).
Hm. The cabinet under Mr. Hippo is locked. Nothing else around the table...we'll come back later.
Whoa, hold up. What's that in the rafters over the picture?
Some sort of gold ball, but...Bah, can't reach it. Guess we'll need a ladder, a slingshot, or some stuff to build a plane out of to get that.
That's about all we can do here. Let's check the east wall next. To the right!
EAST WALL
Nothing on the windows, but below them there's a table with 3 bells. Nothing we can do with those yet, though.
Let's check that big cabinet out for now.
Let's start with the upper-left cabinets.
The cups in the middle are rather pretty. Wonder if there's anything in them?
AHA! Happy Coin (2/10) is ours!
Nothing else in here.
Now, let's check those presents on the upper-right shelf.
Can't open 'em since they aren't ours, but we can move them to check behind them.
And sure enough, the Round Key is behind the last one!
Below the presents is a device to put the Happy Coins into...let's hold off on that for now, shall we? I kinda like having more than 1 Happy Coin on me. ^_^
Now to check the drawers in the middle.
The far left one is locked. Will the Round Key open it?
Yep! Happy Coin (3/10) is retrieved!
The middle-left cabinet has a push-button box inside. Let's come back when we have a hint to open it.
The middle-right one has a little bronze hammer. How cute! Let's take it.
And in the far-right drawer...a Tetris block? O_o? Well, may as well take it too.
Right, now for the bottom cabinets.
The left one's locked, and the Round Key won't open it. Drat.
The right one's unlocked....and empty. Double drat!
Well, that seems to be everything of importance here for now. Rightward, to the south wall!
SOUTH WALL
The little rack in the left corner has nothing on it, and neither does the picture. Let's check the cabinet below the picture for now.
The little purple block atop it has some shaped cut-outs in it...looks like our Tetris piece will fit in one of them.
Oh! Letters appeared inside it! Hmm, gonna have to find those other two pieces to make any sense of this.
In the cabinet below, there's some firewood. Let's take a few pieces, shall we?
That rocking chair looks inviting. I could sit in it and rock back and forth all day. Back and forth...back and forth...back and forth...
Huh. Apparently all my rocking dislodged something underneath...OH! Another Happy Coin (4/10)! Sweet!
Let's check the mantle over the fireplace next. There's some kind of stand here we can set something on...oh, and what's that to the left? Another Tetris piece! Let's go attach it to the device on the firewood cabinet.
Yep, more letters. Guess we'll need that last one to make any sense of this thing...
Well, nothing under or around the table. Time to check the bed for clues and Happy Coins.
There's a panel on the left of the headboard that's screwed shut. Just our luck, no screwdriver yet.
I can't see anything behind the headboard, but the lamp looks adjustable. If we tilt it down maybe--OH!! Another Happy Coin! ...But I can't reach it. D: ...Well, guess we'll have to come back for it later.
Looks like we're done with the south wall for now. Time to check the west wall.
WEST WALL
That's a very lovely painting there. I don't see anything resembling a hint on it, but...what's that sitting on the easel?
Ah, a pencil. Could be handy later, let's take it.
Next, let's check the top of that blue cabinet.
Atop it is a chest with a green heart and a green spade on a latch. We can pull that down to reveal a combo lock...no clue what the combination is, though.
Doesn't seem to be anything below or beside the cabinet, so let's have a look in those blue doors. For simplicity's sake, let's number the 1-5 from left to right.
Door #1: A glowing green 6.
Door #2: ...Looks empty.
Door #3: A glowing yellow 9.
Door #4: A Santa figurine! I bet I know where this goes.
Door #5: A glowing red 2.
Well, that seems to be all we can do here for now. Let's go back to the south wall for a sec.
SOUTH WALL
Remember that stand atop the fireplace mantle? I bet our new Santa figurine goes on it.
Yep! The blank letter blocks light up with a familiar heart and spade glow. But that's not how you spell "Santa!" Hmm...I bet those buttons below it change them.
Ha, I was right. And once we get it to spell Santa...AHA! A screwdriver!
Well, since we've got a screwdriver, let's open that panel on the bed, shall we?
Ahh, and there's our last Tetris piece....and another Happy Coin (5/10)! Awesome!
Before we get too carried away, let's check that panel sitting on the bedspread real quick. Could be another Happy Coin taped to it...well, there isn't, but let's take the screws anyway.
Right then! Let's put that last Tetris piece in place in that purple box.
"TAE PWL INK?" That doesn't make any sense, but hey, the box is open now. And look, a Triangle Key!
Right, let's try something back on the east wall real quick.
EAST WALL
Let's see if our new Triangle Key opens that locked door on the bottom of the cabinet, shall we?
Yep, it sure does!
Hm, another puzzle box. The button below the weird alien words change the shapes above them. Maybe this gibberish is a clue?
Wait. I've seen these letters somewhere.
The letter display on the purple box! Remember?
TAE
PWL
INK
The letters on this puzzle box are all there. Maybe they're a clue to the shapes.
SOLUTION:
Up triangle, Plus sign, Down triangle ^+v
We put the right shapes in, hit the button...BINGO! Another Happy Coin (6/10) is ours!
Well, that takes care of that, but...now what?
Say...that little hammer we got matches the color of those bells. Maybe we can use it to make them ring!
Well, they don't make any sound, but they let off a nice glow when they're hit. The left one glows red, the middle glows green, and the right glows yellow.
We saw some numbers in that cabinet earlier that glowed those same colors, right? Maybe that's a hint...
The green 6 was on the left, the yellow 9 in the middle, and the red 2 on the right. Let's try hitting them in the order of those colors, and hit each one that many times.
Nope, nothing...doesn't look like there's any ind of panel here to pop open anyway....
Wait, I think I know what these are a hint to! Let's go back to the north wall for a second.
NORTH WALL
Check that wreath puzzle out again. There's 3 of them, and they can be positioned to have the bells point to where the numbers on a clock would be, right?
Well, the numbers in that cabinet can be found on a clock! Maybe if we rotate them to match those numbers in the order the bells indicated...
SOLUTION:
Click the left wreath twice, the middle wreath six times, and the right wreath nine.
...and then hit that button on the bottom right--AH! It opened! Another Happy Coin (7/10) and...a metal bracket of some kind? Well, this could be useful.
I think I just realized something. Let's go back to the south wall.
SOUTH WALL
Remember how the S and T in that Santa figurine were originally lit up as the same heart and spade on the cover of that treasure chest? Let's have a look at them again.
Look at the letters each one cycles through. They seem to spell something out...a pair of numbers. I bet that's a hint for the treasure chest on the west wall!
WEST WALL
Let's check the chest again. Still has the same green heart/spade as the Santa figurine does. Let's try putting those numbers in to open it. What were they again?
SOLUTION:
7015
Put them in, press the button...open sesame seeds! And inside we find...WOOHOO! Yet another Happy Coin (8/10)!
Well, I'm feeling limbered up now, let's try getting that Happy Coin behind the bed again!
SOUTH WALL
Looking behind the bed again, tilt the light, REEEEAAAAACH.....gugh, no good. I could grab it if I had a long enough stick, but we've only got these two dinky pieces of firewood...
...and a bracket that we could connect them with...and screws to secure it...*facepalm*
SOLUTION:
Open the "About Item" view for the firewood. Use the bracket on them, then the screws, then the screwdriver to make a long stick. ...Huh. A sensible construct for once.
Okay, let's grab that Happy Coin with our New And Improved Longer (or NAIL for short!) Stick!
YES! Got it! (9/10)
Y'know, I can think of something else we could use this thing for. Back to the north wall!
NORTH WALL
Remember that gold ball in the rafters? I bet our NAIL Stick could reach it!
Sure did! ...Oh, and it's not a ball at all. It's a golden egg. Sounds like there's something inside it...definitely not yolk. But how to open it?
Well, we've still got that hammer!
Alright, now we've got a Clover Key. Probably goes to the cabinet below Mr. Hippo.
Sure does. Now we've got a piece of paper with a blotch of pencil lead over a diagram.
Good thing that pencil we found has an eraser on it!
The diagram shows 6 squares with an arrow in a corner of each one...I bet I know what this goes to.
EAST WALL
I bet it's a clue to that puzzle box in the middle-left drawer. Just hit the buttons as indicated by the arrows...
It's open! And there's the last Happy Coin (10/10)!!
... ... ...*sigh* Well, as much as I enjoy having 10 Happy Coins in my possession, we did promise to get these back to Santa, didn't we...let's go ahead and drop them off in the red box on the right side of the shelf.
A key card fell out...oh, and the Happy Coins came back out as well! Guess we can hold onto them after all! JOY!!
I bet I know just what that's a reference to. Right then, time to get out of here!
NORTH WALL
Put the card in the keypad and a red light'll come on. Now we just need to punch in the combo. Remember the letters on the purple box we used the Tetris pieces on? There were 9 of them in a 3x3 grid just like this, and the letters on the card were on there as well.
SOLUTION:
Press 4, 1, 2, 3, and Enter on the keypad.
Alright, I think we can get out now!
SAVE AT THIS POINT
ENDGAME (All 3 endings)
Well, what are we waiting for! Open the front door and let's go!
Oh, Santa's here! And he's got a present for us for helping him get the Happy Coins back! ...But I can't decide which one to get. You pick first.
Don't like what you get? Reload and pick a different box for a different ending!
LEFT BOX
Wow, that's a beautiful key necklace. Looks very nice on you!
CENTER BOX
Oooo, a Mr. Birdy figure! Lucky you! I want one next year, Santa, okay?
RIGHT BOX
Oh wow...a brand new kind of Happy Coin! I'm so jealous of you now!
HAPPY HOLIDAYS!
Posted by: An Onyx Mouse | December 28, 2011 1:41 AM
The Happy Escape Happy Coin Walkthrough
Coin #1 (hidden in room)
Walk forwards to the hippo and open it!
Coin #2 (hidden in room)
turn until you see a big set of shelves with glass doors on the left. Open the glass doors, and the happy coin is in a blue coffee mug.
Coin #3 (hidden in room)
Rock the rocking chair 3 times)
Coin #4 (leftmost drawer)
Go to the big set of shelves with the red box in it. Zoom in on the boxes on the top right. Move them to the left, and find a key. This unlocks the leftmost drawer in the big shelves, which has a coin.
Coin #5 (Santa)
Open the fourth cupboard in the low cabinet... the one with the chest on top. Take the Santa figure. Turn to the fireplace, put the Santa on the white box.
Scroll through the letters, you'll see the heart spells "Seventy" and the spade spells "Fifteen". Go to the low cabinet, open the front of the chest, and enter 7015. Press the button, and take the coin.
Coin #6 (bed)
Go back to the santa. Make the stand actually spell "SANTA", and take the screwdriver. Go to the bed, zoom in on the headboard, unscrew the plate, and the coin is behind the green panel.
Coin #7 (panels)
The first panel is behind the plate on the bed. The second is in the right-hand drawer in the big shelf with the red box. The third is on the fireplace. Place all of them in the purple box on the wood cabinet, and get the triangle key. The triangle key opens the bottom left cupboard on the big shelves, and shows a strange device.
Those letters are a clue... find what shapes they make on the purple box, and enter those shapes above. (regular triangle, plus sign, upside down triangle). Push the button, and take your coin.
Coin #8 (bells & wreaths)
Opening all the low cabinet cupboards reveals a green six, yellow nine, and red two. Go to the big shelves, and open the 3rd drawer to find a hammer.
Take this to the bells, and see that using it to hit them reveals red, green, yellow.
So the code is 269, but where do we use this?
Go to the wreaths, and click them in that order, then push the button, and take your coin.
Coin #9 (behind the bed)
See coin #6 for taking the plate off the bed. Assuming it's off, go to the bed. See the plate lying on the bed? Zoom back in and get those screws. Go to the open cabinet by the fireplace and get two boards. Lastly, go to the wreaths and get a connector. (See coin #7).
Connect the wood with the connector, use the screws on it, then use the screwdriver to secure them. Zoom behind the bed, it might take a few clicks. Move the light so you can see, then get the coin.
Coin #10 (four corner device)
Use the stick from coin #8 to get the ornament on the ceiling beam, then use the hammer from coin #7 to break it and get the clover key.
Use the clover key on the hippo table, and get a smudged drawing. Go to the painting and get the pencil, use the pencil on the paper.
Go to the second drawer in the big shelves. Click the corners shown (UR, UL, LL, UL, LR, UL) to get the coin.
Ending
Put all your coins into the red box on the big shelf, and you get your coins back, and a card to escape. But you need a code! There's a hint, though... "PINK".
Use the letter position of the letters PINK on the purple box above the firewood to get your escape code.
(4123).
You're out! No spoilers on your present, though. *Grin*
Posted by: Werebear | December 28, 2011 2:08 AM