oh god
Personality: He's chilled out a little since the events of Hotel Dusk, but he's still that same old Kyle Hyde everyone knows and loves (or, more likely, hates). He's still a jerk with an economy-sized chip on his shoulder who always looks like he's got something better to do, yes. He still sticks his nose where it doesn't belong and he takes anything that isn't nailed down. You know, like a good adventure game hero. He still creeps around in places he shouldn't and asks questions people don't necessarily want to answer. Kyle's blunt and brutally honest to a fault, unless he's in a spot of trouble (during which a little white lie like "no I didn't open this door that sets off the fire alarm because I wanted to snoop around it was a test" or "what yes of course I wasn't lurking around in staff-only places I was just. looking for the bathroom" never hurts).
He somehow still manages not to be completely intolerable -- he's got a genuine heart of gold somewhere under all that gruff. It's stuffed in a corner of his closet. No matter how much he denies it he really does care about people, and has absolutely no shortage on sage advice for folks and lectures for unsavory types. If he's giving you the "turn your life around before it's too late" speech he means it from the bottom of his heart, for real. He doesn't sugarcoat and there's some earnest quality around him that makes people listen. There's some kind of charm around him that makes people open up, no matter what walk of life he or she's from. Men, women, children, whatever; they all dump their problems on him and Kyle's a dumb enough guy that he'll try and help solve them.
He's so stubborn it's funny. Kyle doesn't let go of things easily and once he sets his mind on something there's no shaking it out of him. "Hey I heard you can win a prize from that soda machine if you find a winning bottle cap--" "GONNA WIN IT" He makes a lot of split-second decisions when it comes to competition, and as a result he kind of has this lengthy history of pulling stupid stunts. One time he swam around Manhattan just to prove he could do it. That kind of stupid.
When it comes to his job or anything like it his personality does a complete 180 -- he's calm, cool, collected, and determined to rip everything apart with a fine-toothed comb. He's a meticulous jerk and if something's out of place he's gonna find it. He's a cool guy as long as you're on his good side. He's friendly enough to the people he knows but he always seems to dodge the subject of his past. He also does a lot of brooding as characters like him are wont to do.
Backstory: The only stuff changing is his history prior to arriving at Smash Academy. Last Window goes pretty deep into his backstory in a way Hotel Dusk never did. And by "never did" I mean there's suddenly a ton of it. I am not kidding when I say they wrote a novel about him. tl;dr here I come
Kyle Hyde was born in Los Angeles in the late 40s. His mother Jeanie was a nurse, and his father Chris had a job Kyle never knew about as a child. He grew up a latch-key kid because they both worked late, but they were pretty good parents when they were around. They didn't fight or anything they were just gone all the time. SPEAKING OF BEING GONE ALL THE TIME, when Kyle was 9 his dad left for work and never came back. A family friend on the police force came and broke the news to Kyle's mother three days later, and soon enough she packed their bags and left for Manhattan.
For his first few years there he was absolutely miserable, but thanks to one of his elementary school teachers he eventually came out of his shell (because of science) and grew up to be a pretty normal kid. Kind of. Well normal for Kyle. When he turned 16 his mother finally let him in on Chris Hyde's Terrible Secret. It turns out that dad was a bigwig safecracker, and he was involved in some pretty heavy criminal stuff before his murder. With the case still unsolved, Kyle was determined to uncover the truth, and that was one of the reasons he became a policeman. He made some friends, did some stupid stuff, and all in all he led a pretty decent life for a kid like him. He became an NYPD detective in his early 20s and he was one of those detectives people respected and admired-- at least, not to his face.
As a detective he came across a lot of cases similar to his father's unsolved murder. There were always a bunch of unsavory secrets found in those sorts of investigations, and he was hesitant to look into his dad's for just that reason. MAN WHAT IF HE WAS LIKE... A MOB BOSS OR SOMETHING. Kyle just didn't think he'd be able to cope with anything like that.
He had some friends on the force but none were more important than his partner, Brian Bradley. They practically worked better together than any other team in the department, probably because they were such polar opposites. They were bros, life was cool for a while. When Bradley decided he was going to go undercover to investigate a ring of art thefts by this crazy moblike group called Nile, nobody was more against it than Kyle. So, of course, when the police finally found out Bradley was feeding Nile information about his investigation, Kyle was the first one out of the station. Basically he tore up Manhattan to find this guy.
He finally cornered Bradley on a dock near the Hudson River, knowing full well his partner must have had a reason for stabbing the entire police force in the back. Unlucky for him, he was already furious and on edge and Bradley wasn't talking. Why'd he do it? He wouldn't say. Kyle's gun was drawn and it only took one sudden move for him to pull the trigger. He thought Bradley was going to make a run for it, shot at him, and Bradley toppled over right into the river. Uh... Oops. The police searched for days, never found a body, and Kyle turned in his badge to go look for his partner. He just. Really needed to ask him why he would do something so stupid. He had to have a reason and damn it Kyle was going to figure it out.
...Oh that left him without a job didn't it. Huh. Whoops. He moved back to Los Angeles to get in touch with Ed Vincent, that old family friend who used to be a policeman. He was retired now, running a door-to-door sales business named Red Crown (and his... less advertised, probably less legal service of finding objects that didn't always want to be found). Kyle laid it all down on the line: He told him everything he hadn't already heard about Bradley and quitting his job, he thought Ed's connections would be useful, and he was only going to be around until he got back on his feet. With much deliberation Kyle was hired. Hahahaha Officer Hyde's a door-to-door salesman that's hilarious. YEAH WHATEVER HE COULD SELL ALL KINDS OF CRAP-- No. No he couldn't. He wasn't really a people person to begin with so it was a miracle he even sold anything at all. He really excelled at that other part of Red Crown, and his expertise at finding things was what kept him employed for so long.
Three years later he was still searching for Bradley. He was so burnt-out smoke alarms wept around him. He had also been bailed out of jail a couple of times for interrogating some people about Bradley's location. Is it illegal to interrogate people... uh... Probably when you kick their asses. Red Crown sent him all the way out to a BIG FAT DUMP IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE. It was Hotel Dusk. As he went about his business he came across MYSTERY and INTRIGUE and girlie magazines STRANGE COINCIDENCES. Like WHAT IN THE that mute girl was wearing the same bracelet BRADLEY WAS WEARING WHEN HE DISAPPEARED??? and HOW COULD KYLE HYDE STAY HERE SIX MONTHS AGO I DIDN'T STAY HERE SIX MONTHS AGO??? As a man of justice he decided it was his duty to clear out all these secrets. Mostly because he was pretty certain it would lead to Bradley.
It did not really lead to Bradley. It did lead to him uncovering the secret secrets surrounding Nile and one of their biggest heists, though. It also lead to Christmas trees and bowling but that is a different story. One time there was this painter named Osterzone. When he was living, he was a nobody, but some art dealer called Robert Evans found some of his works and A HIT WAS BORN. Paintings were just like... Flying all over the place and selling for tons. There was this one painting called Angel Opening a Door -- man, that thing was great. It had bookmarks and jigsaw puzzles and t-shirts and coffee mugs and all kind of kitschy souvenirs made out of it. One day Nile stole it and it was ~never heard from again.~
Except because this is a mysterious mystery, there's waaayyyy more to it than that and Kyle found out everything.
#1: Osterzone was not a really old painter. IN FACT in the 70s/80s he was still living. His name is Dunning Smith and he's another big fat jerk, but at least he has a reason to be. He met Robert Evans through a STRANGE COINCIDENCE: both of their wives died in the same plane crash. They were both left with daughters the same age and they both had interest in art. Evans wasn't an artist by any means, but he saw real talent in Dunning. He was like a genius, but as it stood he decided he probably wouldn't get much attention for all his work. At some point Evans came up with a BRILLIANT SCHEME. He wrote a book chronicling the life and times of a painter named Osterzone and published it under the pretense that Dunning's paintings were actually this painter's. They were rolling in cash, and life was good. Evans eventually crossed paths with Nile and got involved. Insurance fraud, oh boy. Nile wanted more paintings and Evans bought a hotel to hand them over. Hotel Dusk! Evans' daughter Mila and Dunning's daughter Jenny got along pretty well until Dunning decided he really really hated being this Osterzone guy, so he quit painting. Evans rose up in Nile's ranks and uh. Nile wasn't happy about one of their big cash flow sources quitting. One day some Nile folks just busted into the hotel, marched right into a room Mila and Jenny were playing in, and straight-up kidnapped Jenny. Mila was traumatized and went comatose. Rumors spread and people stayed away from the hotel, convinced there was a ghost floating around. GOD DAMN... Evans left the hotel in Dunning's hands and told him to just. Wait. It wasn't like Dunning had much of a choice -- as of Hotel Dusk he's spent 10 years in that nasty hotel. He cleaned it up some and made up a couple of interesting stories to get people to stop focusing on the ghost stories and, well, a struggling business was born.
#2: Bradley swiped Angel Opening a Door. This pickpocketing doofus Kyle used to arrest a lot, Louie? His best friend was in cahoots with Nile, and he hatched up this scheme to run off with a ton of money and the painting. OH TOO BAD... Nile caught wind of it and sent Bradley off to collect everything. Oops he shot Louie's best pal dead. FOR SOME REASON HE JUST RAN OFF WITH THE CASH AND PAINTING (it was a lot of cash).
#3: SOMEONE FOUND OUT OSTERZONE WAS DUNNING. It was Melissa's mom and she was most definitely blackmailing somebody involved with Nile. She disappeared and left a tape with her sister to "give to the man who made the angel painting." Also a book of matches from Hotel Dusk. Kevin Woodward be creepin'.
#4: BRADLEY FOUND OUT TOO. He made his way to Hotel Dusk 6 months before the events of the game, and stayed under Kyle's name. What a dick. He lurked around and left some ~presents~ for Kyle (a boobie magazine, his lighter, and a box with a letter in it. uh. ok. are you trying to tell him something or...), and then proceeded to get way too creepy with Dunning. That I KNOW WHAT YOU ATE LAST TUESDAY creepy. Dunning was rightfully weirded out and defensive. Before he checked out Bradley hung up Angel Opening a Door in the room he was staying at and POOF he was gone. Dunning was kind of pissed when he found it so he took it and doused the whole thing in a coat of white paint. Six months later Bradley called up Red Crown and Kyle was sent out to find that crap he left sitting around.
#5: THAT MUTE KID WAS MILA EVANS. WHOAAAAA. Yeah she was in a coma for 10 years and then just SNAPPED OUT OF IT with no family to claim her. You know uh Bradley's sister was named Mila, too. One time Kyle resuscitates her and SUDDENLY SHE CAN TALK AGAIN. Good job, Kyle.
#6: BRADLEY'S NOTE. It said he double-crossed the police because Nile kidnapped his sister. Dicks. In a STAGGERING COINCIDENCE Robert Evans was the guy there when Bradley went to rescue his sister and found her dead. AND SO he did dumb things like steal that painting and probably kill Robert Evans.
#7: KULE CAN HOLD HIS BREATH FOR A VERY LONG TIME. lock him in an airtight room and listen to him wheeze and complain for 20 minutes. It's pretty funny until he dies.
#8: Kyle met some jerkwad named Martin Summer. He talks a lot and smells funny. apparently he is a writer THIS WILL BECOME IMPORTANT.
Kyle left the hotel with Mila and she started going to a nice art school up in Seattle. And now Kyle still had no idea where Bradley was and he was sitting on all this fresh new information that would have him wearing cement shoes at the bottom of a river. UHH... Yeah he wasn't about to press on Nile too much. He kept his mouth shut, kept working for Red Crown, and put Bradley behind him. A year passed before Ed finally got so sick of Kyle's slacking off that he fired him. MAN...
So he grumbled and stomped off to his apartment building: Cape West. Look at that lighthouse it's so neat. When Kyle first moved back to L.A. he saw that lighthouse and HE WAS SOLD. I dunno, guy likes roofs and metaphors about being ~lost at sea.~ Oh and then his neighbor and landlady both come up to him and tell him about how the building's going to be demolished in about a week. And then he gets a letter in his mailbox telling him the same thing. MAN...
And lo, when he trudged all the way up to his room, he was met with a strange envelope! IT WAS... an order sheet? HA HA WHAT A JOKE OK HE GOT IT HE WAS FIRED... Wait no this looked like a legit order. And he could SMELL THE MYSTERY. Except it was just his garbage. It said something about finding a Scarlet Star to uncover the truth about something that happened 25 years ago. In response to this mysterious mystery, Kyle returns to what he does best and creeps all over the hotel like a creep a whole lot. He talks to all his neighbors way more in the week than he has in the past 4 years, and in between chugging Cool Pop and solving crossword puzzles and playing pool he uncovers some pretty interesting stuff.
SPOILERS, the Scarlet Star's a goddamn giant diamond! DOUBLE SPOILERS, Kyle gets his job back! TRIPLE SPOILERS, KYLE'S DAD WAS MURDERED IN THAT VERY BUILDING! BECAUSE OF THE DIAMOND! HOLY BALLS!! Somehow a jewelry theft ring called Condor ties into all of this AND THEY'RE TAKING ORDERS FROM NILE!!! OH MY GOD...... After a series of convoluted clues and more uncovering of mysterious mysteries, he found the Scarlet Star and tried to give it back to one of the only remaining people who knew of its existence, but she refused it.
AND SO, before he packed up all his stuff and left the apartments he wrapped it up, addressed it to the L.A. Museum of Natural History, and shoved it into a mailbox. Totally anonymous and that was a-ok with him. At this point all the loose ends are pretty tied up and this game is still kind of new so I'm trying to avoid spoilers :*|. Except uh you know Kyle doesn't have a place to live. SOMEHOW, SOME WAY, he gets sent to Final Destination City for a job and there was something funny about it that intrigued him enough to stick around and-- OH NO EVERYTHING IS REALLY EXPENSIVE IN THE FUTURE... A wizard thought it would be funny to send him to the future let's go with that or something ok. Basically free room and board got him to move in.
More stuff happened. SBG stuff.
SOMEWHERE ALONG THE LINE Martin Summer decided he was gonna write a book about the Adventures of Kyle Hyde, so he creeps on everyone who knew him and rakes up enough information on him to write a biography. Except he did not write a biography, he wrote a novel. Its name is Last Window and it was probably a Big Deal in the late 80s/early 90s. It sold pretty well and contained a lot of Very Interesting Information: Kyle is six feet tall... Kyle wears suits... Kyle... likes apples...... wait no.
Anyway, the book basically contains his life story, for better or for worse. Everything in it is true and if he ever saw a copy of it he would want to beat up Martin Summer with it.
Also somewhere floating around the publishing industry is Summer's big case file on Kyle. It's all his notes and anecdotes he collected to write that dumb book, and like it everything written in there is true. Yes even that part about him being a gigantic nerd in elementary school and his brief stint as a saxophone player after high school. KYLE IS A DOOFUS. How did Summer even lose it... what a wiener...
He somehow still manages not to be completely intolerable -- he's got a genuine heart of gold somewhere under all that gruff. It's stuffed in a corner of his closet. No matter how much he denies it he really does care about people, and has absolutely no shortage on sage advice for folks and lectures for unsavory types. If he's giving you the "turn your life around before it's too late" speech he means it from the bottom of his heart, for real. He doesn't sugarcoat and there's some earnest quality around him that makes people listen. There's some kind of charm around him that makes people open up, no matter what walk of life he or she's from. Men, women, children, whatever; they all dump their problems on him and Kyle's a dumb enough guy that he'll try and help solve them.
He's so stubborn it's funny. Kyle doesn't let go of things easily and once he sets his mind on something there's no shaking it out of him. "Hey I heard you can win a prize from that soda machine if you find a winning bottle cap--" "GONNA WIN IT" He makes a lot of split-second decisions when it comes to competition, and as a result he kind of has this lengthy history of pulling stupid stunts. One time he swam around Manhattan just to prove he could do it. That kind of stupid.
When it comes to his job or anything like it his personality does a complete 180 -- he's calm, cool, collected, and determined to rip everything apart with a fine-toothed comb. He's a meticulous jerk and if something's out of place he's gonna find it. He's a cool guy as long as you're on his good side. He's friendly enough to the people he knows but he always seems to dodge the subject of his past. He also does a lot of brooding as characters like him are wont to do.
Backstory: The only stuff changing is his history prior to arriving at Smash Academy. Last Window goes pretty deep into his backstory in a way Hotel Dusk never did. And by "never did" I mean there's suddenly a ton of it. I am not kidding when I say they wrote a novel about him. tl;dr here I come
Kyle Hyde was born in Los Angeles in the late 40s. His mother Jeanie was a nurse, and his father Chris had a job Kyle never knew about as a child. He grew up a latch-key kid because they both worked late, but they were pretty good parents when they were around. They didn't fight or anything they were just gone all the time. SPEAKING OF BEING GONE ALL THE TIME, when Kyle was 9 his dad left for work and never came back. A family friend on the police force came and broke the news to Kyle's mother three days later, and soon enough she packed their bags and left for Manhattan.
For his first few years there he was absolutely miserable, but thanks to one of his elementary school teachers he eventually came out of his shell (because of science) and grew up to be a pretty normal kid. Kind of. Well normal for Kyle. When he turned 16 his mother finally let him in on Chris Hyde's Terrible Secret. It turns out that dad was a bigwig safecracker, and he was involved in some pretty heavy criminal stuff before his murder. With the case still unsolved, Kyle was determined to uncover the truth, and that was one of the reasons he became a policeman. He made some friends, did some stupid stuff, and all in all he led a pretty decent life for a kid like him. He became an NYPD detective in his early 20s and he was one of those detectives people respected and admired-- at least, not to his face.
As a detective he came across a lot of cases similar to his father's unsolved murder. There were always a bunch of unsavory secrets found in those sorts of investigations, and he was hesitant to look into his dad's for just that reason. MAN WHAT IF HE WAS LIKE... A MOB BOSS OR SOMETHING. Kyle just didn't think he'd be able to cope with anything like that.
He had some friends on the force but none were more important than his partner, Brian Bradley. They practically worked better together than any other team in the department, probably because they were such polar opposites. They were bros, life was cool for a while. When Bradley decided he was going to go undercover to investigate a ring of art thefts by this crazy moblike group called Nile, nobody was more against it than Kyle. So, of course, when the police finally found out Bradley was feeding Nile information about his investigation, Kyle was the first one out of the station. Basically he tore up Manhattan to find this guy.
He finally cornered Bradley on a dock near the Hudson River, knowing full well his partner must have had a reason for stabbing the entire police force in the back. Unlucky for him, he was already furious and on edge and Bradley wasn't talking. Why'd he do it? He wouldn't say. Kyle's gun was drawn and it only took one sudden move for him to pull the trigger. He thought Bradley was going to make a run for it, shot at him, and Bradley toppled over right into the river. Uh... Oops. The police searched for days, never found a body, and Kyle turned in his badge to go look for his partner. He just. Really needed to ask him why he would do something so stupid. He had to have a reason and damn it Kyle was going to figure it out.
...Oh that left him without a job didn't it. Huh. Whoops. He moved back to Los Angeles to get in touch with Ed Vincent, that old family friend who used to be a policeman. He was retired now, running a door-to-door sales business named Red Crown (and his... less advertised, probably less legal service of finding objects that didn't always want to be found). Kyle laid it all down on the line: He told him everything he hadn't already heard about Bradley and quitting his job, he thought Ed's connections would be useful, and he was only going to be around until he got back on his feet. With much deliberation Kyle was hired. Hahahaha Officer Hyde's a door-to-door salesman that's hilarious. YEAH WHATEVER HE COULD SELL ALL KINDS OF CRAP-- No. No he couldn't. He wasn't really a people person to begin with so it was a miracle he even sold anything at all. He really excelled at that other part of Red Crown, and his expertise at finding things was what kept him employed for so long.
Three years later he was still searching for Bradley. He was so burnt-out smoke alarms wept around him. He had also been bailed out of jail a couple of times for interrogating some people about Bradley's location. Is it illegal to interrogate people... uh... Probably when you kick their asses. Red Crown sent him all the way out to a BIG FAT DUMP IN THE MIDDLE OF NOWHERE. It was Hotel Dusk. As he went about his business he came across MYSTERY and INTRIGUE and girlie magazines STRANGE COINCIDENCES. Like WHAT IN THE that mute girl was wearing the same bracelet BRADLEY WAS WEARING WHEN HE DISAPPEARED??? and HOW COULD KYLE HYDE STAY HERE SIX MONTHS AGO I DIDN'T STAY HERE SIX MONTHS AGO??? As a man of justice he decided it was his duty to clear out all these secrets. Mostly because he was pretty certain it would lead to Bradley.
It did not really lead to Bradley. It did lead to him uncovering the secret secrets surrounding Nile and one of their biggest heists, though. It also lead to Christmas trees and bowling but that is a different story. One time there was this painter named Osterzone. When he was living, he was a nobody, but some art dealer called Robert Evans found some of his works and A HIT WAS BORN. Paintings were just like... Flying all over the place and selling for tons. There was this one painting called Angel Opening a Door -- man, that thing was great. It had bookmarks and jigsaw puzzles and t-shirts and coffee mugs and all kind of kitschy souvenirs made out of it. One day Nile stole it and it was ~never heard from again.~
Except because this is a mysterious mystery, there's waaayyyy more to it than that and Kyle found out everything.
#1: Osterzone was not a really old painter. IN FACT in the 70s/80s he was still living. His name is Dunning Smith and he's another big fat jerk, but at least he has a reason to be. He met Robert Evans through a STRANGE COINCIDENCE: both of their wives died in the same plane crash. They were both left with daughters the same age and they both had interest in art. Evans wasn't an artist by any means, but he saw real talent in Dunning. He was like a genius, but as it stood he decided he probably wouldn't get much attention for all his work. At some point Evans came up with a BRILLIANT SCHEME. He wrote a book chronicling the life and times of a painter named Osterzone and published it under the pretense that Dunning's paintings were actually this painter's. They were rolling in cash, and life was good. Evans eventually crossed paths with Nile and got involved. Insurance fraud, oh boy. Nile wanted more paintings and Evans bought a hotel to hand them over. Hotel Dusk! Evans' daughter Mila and Dunning's daughter Jenny got along pretty well until Dunning decided he really really hated being this Osterzone guy, so he quit painting. Evans rose up in Nile's ranks and uh. Nile wasn't happy about one of their big cash flow sources quitting. One day some Nile folks just busted into the hotel, marched right into a room Mila and Jenny were playing in, and straight-up kidnapped Jenny. Mila was traumatized and went comatose. Rumors spread and people stayed away from the hotel, convinced there was a ghost floating around. GOD DAMN... Evans left the hotel in Dunning's hands and told him to just. Wait. It wasn't like Dunning had much of a choice -- as of Hotel Dusk he's spent 10 years in that nasty hotel. He cleaned it up some and made up a couple of interesting stories to get people to stop focusing on the ghost stories and, well, a struggling business was born.
#2: Bradley swiped Angel Opening a Door. This pickpocketing doofus Kyle used to arrest a lot, Louie? His best friend was in cahoots with Nile, and he hatched up this scheme to run off with a ton of money and the painting. OH TOO BAD... Nile caught wind of it and sent Bradley off to collect everything. Oops he shot Louie's best pal dead. FOR SOME REASON HE JUST RAN OFF WITH THE CASH AND PAINTING (it was a lot of cash).
#3: SOMEONE FOUND OUT OSTERZONE WAS DUNNING. It was Melissa's mom and she was most definitely blackmailing somebody involved with Nile. She disappeared and left a tape with her sister to "give to the man who made the angel painting." Also a book of matches from Hotel Dusk. Kevin Woodward be creepin'.
#4: BRADLEY FOUND OUT TOO. He made his way to Hotel Dusk 6 months before the events of the game, and stayed under Kyle's name. What a dick. He lurked around and left some ~presents~ for Kyle (a boobie magazine, his lighter, and a box with a letter in it. uh. ok. are you trying to tell him something or...), and then proceeded to get way too creepy with Dunning. That I KNOW WHAT YOU ATE LAST TUESDAY creepy. Dunning was rightfully weirded out and defensive. Before he checked out Bradley hung up Angel Opening a Door in the room he was staying at and POOF he was gone. Dunning was kind of pissed when he found it so he took it and doused the whole thing in a coat of white paint. Six months later Bradley called up Red Crown and Kyle was sent out to find that crap he left sitting around.
#5: THAT MUTE KID WAS MILA EVANS. WHOAAAAA. Yeah she was in a coma for 10 years and then just SNAPPED OUT OF IT with no family to claim her. You know uh Bradley's sister was named Mila, too. One time Kyle resuscitates her and SUDDENLY SHE CAN TALK AGAIN. Good job, Kyle.
#6: BRADLEY'S NOTE. It said he double-crossed the police because Nile kidnapped his sister. Dicks. In a STAGGERING COINCIDENCE Robert Evans was the guy there when Bradley went to rescue his sister and found her dead. AND SO he did dumb things like steal that painting and probably kill Robert Evans.
#7: KULE CAN HOLD HIS BREATH FOR A VERY LONG TIME. lock him in an airtight room and listen to him wheeze and complain for 20 minutes. It's pretty funny until he dies.
#8: Kyle met some jerkwad named Martin Summer. He talks a lot and smells funny. apparently he is a writer THIS WILL BECOME IMPORTANT.
Kyle left the hotel with Mila and she started going to a nice art school up in Seattle. And now Kyle still had no idea where Bradley was and he was sitting on all this fresh new information that would have him wearing cement shoes at the bottom of a river. UHH... Yeah he wasn't about to press on Nile too much. He kept his mouth shut, kept working for Red Crown, and put Bradley behind him. A year passed before Ed finally got so sick of Kyle's slacking off that he fired him. MAN...
So he grumbled and stomped off to his apartment building: Cape West. Look at that lighthouse it's so neat. When Kyle first moved back to L.A. he saw that lighthouse and HE WAS SOLD. I dunno, guy likes roofs and metaphors about being ~lost at sea.~ Oh and then his neighbor and landlady both come up to him and tell him about how the building's going to be demolished in about a week. And then he gets a letter in his mailbox telling him the same thing. MAN...
And lo, when he trudged all the way up to his room, he was met with a strange envelope! IT WAS... an order sheet? HA HA WHAT A JOKE OK HE GOT IT HE WAS FIRED... Wait no this looked like a legit order. And he could SMELL THE MYSTERY. Except it was just his garbage. It said something about finding a Scarlet Star to uncover the truth about something that happened 25 years ago. In response to this mysterious mystery, Kyle returns to what he does best and creeps all over the hotel like a creep a whole lot. He talks to all his neighbors way more in the week than he has in the past 4 years, and in between chugging Cool Pop and solving crossword puzzles and playing pool he uncovers some pretty interesting stuff.
SPOILERS, the Scarlet Star's a goddamn giant diamond! DOUBLE SPOILERS, Kyle gets his job back! TRIPLE SPOILERS, KYLE'S DAD WAS MURDERED IN THAT VERY BUILDING! BECAUSE OF THE DIAMOND! HOLY BALLS!! Somehow a jewelry theft ring called Condor ties into all of this AND THEY'RE TAKING ORDERS FROM NILE!!! OH MY GOD...... After a series of convoluted clues and more uncovering of mysterious mysteries, he found the Scarlet Star and tried to give it back to one of the only remaining people who knew of its existence, but she refused it.
AND SO, before he packed up all his stuff and left the apartments he wrapped it up, addressed it to the L.A. Museum of Natural History, and shoved it into a mailbox. Totally anonymous and that was a-ok with him. At this point all the loose ends are pretty tied up and this game is still kind of new so I'm trying to avoid spoilers :*|. Except uh you know Kyle doesn't have a place to live. SOMEHOW, SOME WAY, he gets sent to Final Destination City for a job and there was something funny about it that intrigued him enough to stick around and-- OH NO EVERYTHING IS REALLY EXPENSIVE IN THE FUTURE... A wizard thought it would be funny to send him to the future let's go with that or something ok. Basically free room and board got him to move in.
More stuff happened. SBG stuff.
SOMEWHERE ALONG THE LINE Martin Summer decided he was gonna write a book about the Adventures of Kyle Hyde, so he creeps on everyone who knew him and rakes up enough information on him to write a biography. Except he did not write a biography, he wrote a novel. Its name is Last Window and it was probably a Big Deal in the late 80s/early 90s. It sold pretty well and contained a lot of Very Interesting Information: Kyle is six feet tall... Kyle wears suits... Kyle... likes apples...... wait no.
Anyway, the book basically contains his life story, for better or for worse. Everything in it is true and if he ever saw a copy of it he would want to beat up Martin Summer with it.
Also somewhere floating around the publishing industry is Summer's big case file on Kyle. It's all his notes and anecdotes he collected to write that dumb book, and like it everything written in there is true. Yes even that part about him being a gigantic nerd in elementary school and his brief stint as a saxophone player after high school. KYLE IS A DOOFUS. How did Summer even lose it... what a wiener...