Aztec: The Curse in the Heart of the City of Gold Walkthrough by Dan Kennedy

Skullduggery

Continue through the open
area by the Great Temple, and proceed to the location of the wooden
ladder, which is marked on the map with the green star. Pick up the
ladder and place it in your inventory. Now make your way over to the
right side of the Tzompanti (Wall of Skulls). Place the ladder up
against the wall, and climb up.

A series of nine (9) poles
with skulls impaled on them line the top of the wall. Note the parchment
partially concealed beneath the bottom skull on the nine (far right)
pole. You’ve got to move the skulls around in order to access the
parchment.

The trick here is to move
the skulls around so that the pattern that is present on the three
"completed" poles to the left is repeated on each of the
poles numbered 4 through 8. The ninth should be empty so that you
can grab the parchment. Follow the set of moves below to free the
parchment:

Now grab the parchment,
and climb down to the ground. Proceed back to the House of Song, enter
via the left door, and go down the hallway to the right to speak with
Flower of Stone. Show her the second parchment – she can’t make heads
or tails of it, and gives both pieces back to you.

Time to take matters into
our own hands. Grab the fist (left side) parchment, and click on the
eye icon on the inventory bar to get a close up. With the first parchment
still in view, now grab the second from your inventory to examine
them together. They look quite similar, but are out of alignment.
Click and hold the left mouse button down to move the pieces around.
You want to align the two yellow rectangles with the small red circles
inside (this puts the right parchment at a higher position than its
left counterpart).

With the pieces connected,
click on the "flat" hand cursor icon which you get at the
bottom of the page to back away from the now-connected parchment.
Then, grab the parchment from your inventory, and give it to Flower
of Stone. She suggests going over to the Tlatchtli pitch (which is
pictured in the center of the parchment) for another clue.

High Stakes Hoops

Leave the House of Song,
and make your way over to the Tlatchtli pitch, located near the Wall
of Skulls. Walk onto the playing field, and approach the Lord practising
his game. He’s naturally cheesed that you would interrupt his pitch-booking,
but agrees to test us with our game ability. We have 6 shots to attempt
to get the ball through the sideways hoop – do it, and we walk free;
miss it and we become his slave forever. What a great guy.

Turn around, pick up the
ball lying on the ground behind you, and take a step towards the hoop.
Holding the ball, position it where you think it will go in, and click
the mouse. You watch Little Serpent either make or miss the shot.
I found the best place to position the ball is directly even with
the sides of the hole, and a little below center You do have six shots,
so play around with it if you don’t get immediate success. The guards
will come for you after missing six shots, but a resumed game provides
the opportunity to try another set of six shots.

After a successful attempt,
you will see the shining Great Star of Quetzalcoatl through the hoop
– your important clue. Exit the pitch, and return once more to the
House of Song. Return to Flower of Stone, and discuss the finding
with her. She asks you to enter the calendar room, and check the entries
for "3 House" and "5 Serpent". Proceed over to
the Calendar room via the short hallway.

The calendar entries are
located along the walls in numerical order starting from the back-left
corner from you position upon entering the room. Find the entries
for "3 House" and "5 Serpent" – simply approach
the illustration on the wall, and your voice intones the name of the
god associated with that entry. 3 House yields "Tepeyolloltli
– Heart of the Mountain", while 5 Serpent gives "Chalchiuhtlicue
– Goddess of Water".

Return to Flower of Stone
in the other room, and relay the information you collected. She puts
it all together: the names of the gods indicate a spring in the mountains,
and the star from the Tlachtli pitch indicate a westerly direction.
This identifies the location of the poisoning – the spring Chapultepec.
You will have to make another journey, but first spend the night in
the House of Song (keep your hands to yourself, this is a family game).

They Shoot Birds, Don’t
They?

Welcome to the mountains!
Proceed to the right of the bushy tree before you, turn to the right
once more, and move forward towards the rock cliff. Now turn to the
left, and walk toward the guards in order to bluff your way in. Don’t
mention anything about the Lord Three Rabbit’s plot – simply explain
you are one of his hunters. The guard demand you show your hunting
prowess by shooting two birds in the trees behind you.

Turn around and walk forward
a step, then turn to your right and walk forward. You should see a
bushy tree to your right, and you will probably spot a fluttery black
bird on the right hand side of the tree, about half-way up. [Another
bird can be found on the left side of the bushy tree to your left,
but you must walk forward a step and turn around to spot it.] Take
out your blow-pipe, position the target (like the hoop at the pitch,
I found the best strategy was to place the target a little below center),
and shoot. Now move forward, and look on the ground for the bird’s
body.

Keep checking out these
two trees for the birds – they should keep re-appearing in the same
spots if you keep missing them. Make sure you check carefully for
the bird’s bodies on the ground after each shot (it may look like
the bird flew away, but the body may be lying on the ground on the
other side of the tree). After you have two dead birds in your inventory,
return to the guard and show them to him. He will allow you to proceed
to the spring itself.

Don’t Drink the Water

Pan a little bit to the
left and move forward, and then turn a bit to the right and take another
step. Watch the workers carry large stone jugs into a guarded shed.
Afterward, turn a bit to your left and walk to the spring itself.
Not much to see here, so turn around and walk towards the guarded
shed. Speak to the guard – he indicates that you need to be lugging
a big jar of poison to get inside.

Proceed to the right of
the shed door and look around – you should see a bunch of empty jars,
and a parrot in a cage hanging from the shed’s overhang. Pick up the
jar on the far right, and place it into your inventory. Now pick up
the bag of Amaranth, and give it to the parrot – it will blurt out
the password needed to get past the guard: "Topco Petlacalco".
Give the parrot anything else, and it calls for the guards.

Walk back to the front
of the shed, and speak to the guard again. Give him the proper password,
and enter the storage shed. The shed leads into a cave in the rock.
Walk forward, and turn to the right when you reach the stored jars.
Walk forward one step, and then turn to your left – you should spot
a stick lying up against two logs. Grab the stick, turn back towards
the right, and move forward once more. Using the stick, click on the
jars to smash a few open – the dark poison oozes out of the cracked
pots.

You now have all the proof
you need to bust this ring of treachery wide open. Turn around and
walk back towards the bend in the tunnel. Turn to the left once you
hit the wall, and take several steps forward to reach the tunnel entrance.

Okay, Now You Can Drink
the Water!

The evil Mountain Head
warrior is waiting for you just outside the entrance to the shed.
All of a sudden, our friend Chimalli bops him on the head, and shouts
at you to run. Your only move is forward (off to the right a bit),
and then directly towards the spring itself (the guards have you penned
in). Turn to the right for a face-to-face with the Lord Black Flower.

He admits to you that his
only beef is with the Emperor, and offers you a deal – poison the
spring for him and he’ll let you join the dark side, or drink the
poison and die now. Your morality should tell you to sacrifice yourself
(plus your common sense should tell you that they’ll kill you anyhow).
Choose to drink the poison.

Everything starts to go
blurry, but you still have a few seconds to turn around and click
on the spring’s pool. If you wait too long, you expire from the poison.
Click on the pool, and Little Serpent makes a last ditch effort to
jump into the pool and ride the river to safety. What follows is a
hazy dream sequence – our hero is obviously delirious with the poison
flowing through his system.

Finding Herb

You wake up with Quilaztli,
the scrunched-up doctor from your village standing over you. Apparently
Chimalli found you unconscious somewhere downstream of the spring,
and carried you back to your village. The doctor has nursed you back
to life. Get up, walk over to the doorway of the doctor’s house, and
speak to Quilaztli. He needs you to find some herbs in the swamps
outside the village (near the shack) for his antidote for the poison.

Leave the doctor’s house,
turn to your right, and follow the path down to the shoreline. Get
into the canoe on your right, and move ahead two steps. Turn to your
right, and move ahead another two steps. You should be able to get
out of the canoe to your left. Back on shore, turn to your left, and
move forward one step. The herbs are to your right – click on the
green leaves of the plant with the orange flower to collect them.

Now head back to the canoe,
get in, turn to your right, go ahead two steps, turn to your left,
and go forward three steps. Once you are back in the village, follow
the path back to the doctor’s home (the house with the blue and yellow
door frame). Give the herbs to Quilaztli, who is standing in the back
corner of his backyard.

The doctor tells you to
take the antidote to Woman Serpent, who has become ill with the sickness.
If Woman Serpent dies, all is lost for you, your family, and the empire.
Walk back into the old guy’s front room, and find the gourd of antidote
on the floor (it’s near the door). Leave the doctor’s house and walk
straight ahead, and then to the left. Using the story map, travel
to the main Square.

Damsel in Distress

Forget about getting past
the guards at the front door, or the Eagle Knight since you’ve lost
the rattle. Approach the stairwell leading down to the canal just
to the right of your starting point. Our friend with the canoe is
there again, ready to take us to the tax dock for a couple of beans.
Back on the docks, approach the figure standing straight ahead – it
is Woman Serpent’s scribe, who fears it is almost too late.

Move off to the left, and
enter the palace through the left entrance. Walk straight ahead through
the empty rooms until you are almost out into the palace courtyard.
But a guard blocks our path – we’ll have to find another way. Return
to the empty room you just came through, and turn to your right. Find
the part of the wall that looks like a separate dark brown coloured
panel, and cut it open using the knife in your inventory.

Walk through the hole you
have created, turn to your right, and walk into the interior garden
of the palace. You won’t get past the Jaguar Knight (no rattle), and
the doctor is the only one getting through to see Woman Serpent now,
so you will need some help if you want to administer the antidote
to Woman Serpent.

Turn to your right, and
walk around the corner to speak to the poet Ayocuan. Be sure to mention
that the Lord Black Flower is involved with the plot – the poet does
not like him, and will do anything to prevent him returning to the
palace. He agrees to distract the guard at Woman Serpent’s door, while
you slip into the room. Turn to your left, and walk into the palace
courtyard. Approach Woman Serpent’s door (off to the right), and walk
in (you will see the poet engaging the guard in a conversation to
your right as you enter).

A Final Sacrifice

Walk into Woman’s Serpent’s
room, turn to your right and walk forward. Now turn to your left and
walk to his prone figure lying at the back of the room. Take the antidote
out and click on him to offer the life-saving medicine. Just as he
takes a sip, the Lord Three Rabbit busts in and grabs you.

The final movie shows us
lying on the sacrificial altar with the treacherous cohorts standing
around. At the last second, the Emperor sees the gold bracelet that
we wear on our arm – the bracelet that we got from a beggar just outside
the palace walls near the beginning of the game. The Emperor explains
that he like to occasionally walk among his people as a beggar, and
gives this bracelet to people who unselfishly help him.

Just then Woman Serpent
pipes in and identifies us as his saviour, and the plotters as the
real baddies. As a reward, we are made a Lord, and the evil-doers
are captured.

Screenshots