Bugs:Normality
This page details bugs of Normality.
Contents
Music Getting Stuck
Sometimes the music does not properly change when moving to another location or loading a save file. This happens when the target location has already been loaded once previously, resulting in the file for that location being decompressed (which is then cached on the hard disk as a .DAS file). Apparently when cache for the level exists, the game loads that up instead and doesn't switch the music.
As a workaround, the game devs included NORMAL.BAT in the game's files, which simply deletes all the cached .DAS files before starting the game.
An easy way to test this is by starting a new game, escaping the apartment to Dai's cradle, then saving, restarting (by running NORM.EXE), and loading the save. You should continue to hear the music from Kent's apartment, and this should hold true even when you move back and forth between your apartment and the cradle.
Escaping the Mood Filter
For some reason, the Mood Filter location where Kent gets brainwashed has the flag set that lets you use the map, so you can escape it by just pressing 'M'. Apparently Kent believes he's at the M.I.N.T. Mall when you click on it, but any other location will let you escape.
Doing this softlocks the game: the only way to progress is by going through the prison, and you can never re-enter it because the necessary door at the Processing Floor can only be opened once.
...Actually, there is a very obscure way to avoid softlocking the game. When you first enter the Processing Floor, you don't have to press the big red button that opens the door—you can just wait for about 4 minutes, and the door will open automatically. This only happens once, so by doing this you can leave and re-enter the prison as the second time you can still press that red button to open the door again. You have to get rid of the guard first for the timer to begin. Things will be a little glitched depending on various factors, but if you don't take any of the items inside the cell the first time you can finish the section just fine. Unfortunately it's never possible to activate both the Corridor and Prisoner sections in one playthrough.
Clipping Out of Bounds
Although the Normality engine is quite good about not letting you clip, there are a few small exploits none the less. They all involve opening and closing the menu, which resets the player's view angle and pushes you to the top of whatever platform you're standing on. In some cases this lets you move to places where you're not supposed to stand.
The TV Shop and the exploded M.I.N.T. Mall have the most easily usable clipping locations.
Door Clipping
You can clip inside of a door by standing in the doorway when it's open, and then opening and closing the menu. Closing the menu causes all doors to be reset into the closed position when the map reloads, so if you're standing in the doorway at that moment you'll be inside of it. In a few rare cases this can be used to clip out of the map entirely, although it's very tricky to do so since the game will try to clip you back into bounds while moving. Actually going out of bounds seems to only work with the doors that move up and down, like the ones in the Ordinary Outpost. It's possible to crash the game by trying this.
TV Shop
In the TV Shop, stand right in front of the shelf of TVs by the door, open and close the menu, and then just walk forward to climb on top of it:
In fact, you can even climb on top of the TVs (and the shelf by the cashier) without opening and closing the menu, but doing so makes it easier. From there, walking over the TVs to where you're looking directly at the poster then puts you in a spot where the game will sometimes push you out of bounds if you open and close the menu, depending on your exact position and angle.
With some precise wriggling, this allows you to see the storage area right behind the cash register, which is inaccessible but still partially skinned:
Another place you can end up is the fake version of the power station visible from outside:
M.I.N.T. Mall
The exploded M.I.N.T. Mall, unsurprisingly, has a glitchy location in the broken piece of wall near the fireworks. To exploit it, stand inside the broken wall at the part closest to the Mall entrance, and then open and close the menu. Depending on the angle, you might even be immediately thrust down into the fireworks pit.
This small area is also configured to block you from using the map, which is still active even in the exploded mall. Ending up here is a softlock unless you use the map change cheat.
Minor Bugs
Norm 2782 Continuity Error
Once you bring the fire extinguisher filled up with yellow paint to the M.I.N.T. Mall, Norm 2782 will take it from you and sit it next to the Waffle Statue. He then initiates a conversation about it.
The game assumes that you do this before you cause the disturbance at the toy shop which lures him away. If you do it out of order, he'll spontaneously materialize at the statue to take your fire extinguisher, talk to you about fire safety and then vanish again immediately when the conversation ends.
Ray's Frozen *FOOD* Lines
A very minor oversight: looking at the Frozen *FOOD* aisles at the M.I.N.T. Mall causes Ray's voice lines to be heard even after he's gone. He's the heavily depressed cashier at the shop, and after the Mall explodes he's gone along with all the other NPCs. (You can see an example of this in the video above.)
Similarly, Kent will refuse to take money from the cash till because "that guy might spot me!"
Prisoner Evacuation FMV
In the guard version of the cells section of the game, you eventually rescue Saul by initiating a prisoner evacuation. Doing this triggers an FMV to play showing the prisoners being sucked into the tubes and sent to the roof, after which you have to go help them. You can, however, choose repeat this scene as many times as you want by pressing the prisoner evacuation trigger again after it finishes playing.
Roof Brace in the Sewers
When in the sewers, you need to find the roof brace to get access to the lab. There are two ways to use it: either you use it to press down the "access" sign, or you use it on the loose slab. However, it's somewhat buggy: once you use it, the door to the lab will always stay open even if you remove the brace. What's more, whenever you use the brace on either location, it will show back up there after you go through a screen transition (such as by crawling into the hole leading to Saul's brain or by triggering an FMV), even after removing the brace.
Two braces?
...THREE braces?
Ordinary Outpost Corridor Music
For some reason, in the Corridor section of the Ordinary Outpost only, the music always restarts from the beginning whenever you go in and out of regular gameplay, such as by opening and closing the menu or reading one of the many notes you find there. In all other locations in the game the music continues from where it left off, including in other locations inside the Ordinary Outpost.
This might be because the Corridor section shares the same map as the Prisoner section of the Ordinary Outpost—the map just has a different set of items and triggers depending on which branch you've taken. When you're inside the cells as prisoner, the same music plays that's also heard in Kent's apartment. The map might therefore use a special script to change the music. If the Ordinary Outpost music track is removed from the game's files altogether, the apartment music plays instead, and still resets each time gameplay resumes.
