 This article contains spoilers. Read at your own risk!
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- "In desperation, world leaders turned to their last chance: an ancient artifact called the 'Time-Lock'. They believed this relic from a long forgotten race was a portal to a point in ancient history, and their only chance for survival. If only they knew how to turn it on."
- ―Serious Sam 3: BFE opening narrative[src]
The Time-Lock is a mysterious device that is capable of sending someone back in time, more specifically back to the date it was armed. It plays an important role in many Serious Sam titles, and serves a pivotal role in the Serious Sam 3: BFE campaign.
Overview[]
The Time-Lock is essentially a time machine. In Serious Sam 3: BFE, it requires an immense amount of power, as there are two generators dedicated to powering it, with one in Karnak and another one in Luxor.[1] This isn't the case in other games the Time-Lock appears in, and it is unknown if other Time-Locks require a power source or are self-sustained by an independent power source.
For the other time portals that appear in Serious Sam: The Second Encounter, they require a certain item to be activated. In the case of the Mayan time portal located in Teotihuacan, a crystal skull from the city of Palenque was needed.[2]
As the device and how it operates is poorly understood, it can cause anomalous effects when it is used. This is seen when Sam arrives in ancient Egypt via the Time-Lock, and a violent thunderstorm erupts shortly after.[3] The effects of the Time-Lock are powerful enough to be felt through space itself, and Mental is alerted to its use after Sam uses it. As a result, Mental sends his troops to invade Earth and to thwart Sam's efforts in his goal to save the human race, no matter what time period he appears in.
Design[]
The Time-Lock's appearance seems to vary between games. In Serious Sam: The First Encounter, it is a small gray device made from some sort of metal that can only transport a single person at a time. It can accept organic and inorganic matter, but it will usually strip off any large inorganic objects on someone when they use it, such as weapons.[4]
In Serious Sam 3: BFE, the Time-Lock has received a completely overhaul. It is a massive machine that can safely fit multiple people in it and is located just outside the temple of Hatshepsut. In addition, it is colored gold and dark blue and the four towers surrounding the Time-Lock are designed like Egyptian human shapes with alien faces on them.
History[]
The Time-Lock being excavated in Serious Sam 3: BFE.
The device was created by an unknown species, but discovered by the Sirians during their interstellar travels. During Mental's siege on the Sirians, they sent the Time-Lock to Earth, a planet they were just starting to explore, to prevent it from falling into Mental's hands. After the fall of Sirius, the last remaining Sirians decided to arm the Time-Lock to their time in case it was needed by the humans for whatever reason. After being armed, the Time-Lock was buried in the Mortuary temple of Hatshepsut, and it was lost for thousands of years.[3]
While the species was thought to be extinct, a few surviving Sirians placed time portals with each great human civiliaztion on Earth, such as the Mayans and Babylonians. This was part of a backup plan for someone to go forward in time to the location of the backup spaceship, should anything happen to the SSS Centerprice.
A few millennia later, in the year 2063, the Time-Lock was discovered in an excavation site near the Mortuary temple of Hatshepsut. Once uncovered, the humans began to find a way to turn it on. The implication of this discovery leads humankind to better understanding of alien technology, and eventually become advanced enough to develop interstellar travel, and they began to establish offworld colonies in other star systems.[3] Several decades later, Mental was accidently awoken from dormancy, and chose to invade Earth. As the humans were no match for Mental's army and their superior numbers and, in just 3 years, humankind was driven to the brink of extinction. Running out of options, world leaders began making a last-ditch plan to use the Time-Lock and send someone back in time to kill Mental in the past, thus changing the future and sparing humanity from total annihilation.[3] However, the main problem was that, since the humans struggled to understand how to use Sirian technology, let alone know the locations of the power generators, they couldn't find a means to turn the Time-Lock on.
In order to look into and find a way to activate the Time-Lock, the Earth Defense Force selected their best scientists and had them dig up some clues from the history of ancient Egypt to better understand what they were dealing with.
Appearances[]
Serious Sam: The First Encounter[]
Sam arrives in ancient Egypt via the Time-Lock.
Sam is seen arriving via the Time-Lock after the events of Serious Sam 3: BFE. He appears to hover in the air for a few seconds, then is abruptly dropped to the ground. The power of the Time-Lock being used is powerful enough to be felt through space itself, and this has alerted Mental, which causes him to send his troops to Earth in an attempt to stop Sam. The effects of the Time-Lock have also caused some atmospheric disturbance, but the weather calms down after a few minutes.[5] Now that Sam is in the era he needed to get to, he has no further use for the Time-Lock and proceeds on foot to start his journey.
Serious Sam: The Second Encounter[]
The Time-Lock plays a large role in Serious Sam: The Second Encounter, with several of them existing throughout different time periods. It seems that the Sirians bought these time portals to Earth so that someone from the future could activate the backup spaceship, in case anything happened to the SSS Centerprice, a spacecraft that would be sent to Earth if a homing beacon was activated in Egypt.[6]
Sam activates this beacon and the ship is sent to Earth. Once he makes his way to the Great Pyramid, Sam manages to board it after a massive battle between Sam, Mental's forces, and Ugh-Zan III. Unfortunately for Sam, something collides with the ship so that it ends up crashing in Sierra de Chiapas. After the crash, NETRICSA downloads a large quantity of data from the wreckage of the ship and tells him about a backup spaceship that he can use to get to Sirius, though it requires the Holy Grail to be activated.[6] NETRICSA also informs Sam about the time portals that were placed with each great human civilization. To activate these portals, a special item was required.
In order to get to the Time-Lock that was left with the Mayans, Sam travels on foot through the city of Palenque and obtains a crystal skull; the item required to activate the time portal that will take him to the ancient Persian era.[7] Next, Sam heads to Teotihuacan and eventually ends up at the Sun Pyramid where the time portal is located.[8]
However, little does Sam know that Kukulkán, The Wind God, is guarding the portal.[9] After Kukulkán has been defeated, he sees Sam as a worthy opponent and opens the Time-Lock for him, sending him forwards in time to ancient Babylon. In Persepolis, Sam arrives at a ziggurat in Persepolis, and NETRICSA says that the Babylonians left a time portal nestled deep in the city, but getting there will be a long and tedious journey.[10] Sam continues on his quest, fighting more hordes of Mental's forces through Persepolis, and eventually makes his way to the Tower of Babel.[11][12]
Upon arrival, Sam fights through many courtyards before being able to enter it, but it is not long before he is greeted by the Exotech Larva, a large insect-like cyborg that Mental created to prevent Sam from entering the second time portal.[13] After a tough fight, Sam defeats the beast and enters the last portal, which sends him further in time to the medieval era, in 1138 AD.[14]
Serious Sam: Next Encounter[]
In Serious Sam: Next Encounter, Mental warns the Evil Serious Sam Clone not to use his personal Time-Lock. However, the clone ignores his advice and hops into it, which starts the problems in Next Encounter that Serious Sam himself has to fix.
Serious Sam Advance[]
In Serious Sam Advance, humanity has managed to adjust the Time-Lock so that they can warp anywhere in history. They use the Time-Lock both to explore the past and to make sure that Mental doesn't tamper with the past in any way. The game starts out with some agents from Earth disappearing during a routine time traveling trip. Sam is sent back into the past via the Time-Lock to investigate what happened.
Serious Sam 3: BFE[]
At the start of Serious Sam 3 BFE, Professor Stein and his escort, Bravo Team, manage to find some clues on how to power-up the Time-Lock within the Egyptian Museum in war-torn Cairo. Eventually, though, Bravo Team lose contact with HQ and are killed, leaving the professor on his own.[15] Alpha Team are sent out to rescue the professor and to bring him back to headquarters. Sam, the only surviving member of Alpha Team, decides to rescue the professor alone, but he is too late when he discovers Stein's remains after he is killed by the aliens.[16] However, Sam manages to find data of the clues and sends it back to HQ, then he leaves Cairo to get to the Great Pyramid.[17]
Sam travels to the Great Sphinx, which apparently leads to a clue. The recovered texts stated that there was something under it and that there was a way inside, but Sam takes the easy way and blows the Sphinx up, which reveals the entrance to underneath the Great Pyramid.[18] Inside, Sam finds an old Sirian chamber and a hologram that reveals the location of the Time-Lock's generators. After he sends this information to HQ, Hellfire arrives to extract him and flies out to the first generator's location in Karnak.
Hellfire drops Sam off in Karnak, and he activates the first generator, Horus. He updates Quinn and tells her that the first generator is online. She is excited to hear that they finally have a piece of Sirian technology running, as they have never been able to achieve this before in the past.[19] After that, Sam travels to Luxor and activates the second generator, Anubis. With both generators operational, Quinn cheerfully tells Sam that he is relieved of duty and Charlie Team is ready for insertion to extract him and take him to the Time-Lock.[20]
However, later on, the Earth Defense Force come under attack by an ambush after Mental's forces attack the base. This results in the death of the majority of EDF personnel, including Hellfire and Quinn.[21] with Charlie Team missing as well, Sam vows to get revenge on Mental and decides to head to the Time-Lock on his own. He finds a car, fills it up with gas, and drives all the way to the Mortuary temple of Hatshepsut, the location of the Time-Lock.
From there, Sam fights his way to the temple of Hatshepsut. As he reaches the final stretch, he is attacked by Ugh-Zan IV. Thanks to some creative thinking, he manages to kill Ugh-Zan IV and enter the Time-Lock. Sam is then warped to ancient Egypt, and begin his journey to defeat Mental.[22]
This version of the Time-Lock is ultimately destroyed after the Moon plummets into Earth's atmosphere, but it still exists in the Serious Sam 1 and Serious Sam: Siberian Mayhem timelines.
Jewel of the Nile[]
During Sam's return to base, Quinn regrettly informs him that the Time-Lock failed to come online as they expected. Both of the generators were turned on, but it hadn't started the Time-Lock because there is a fail-safe mechanism somewhere in Philae that prevents it from activating, so Wilson changes course to drop Sam in Philae to find it. Sam fights his way through the enemy forces on the island and enters a Sirian chamber which he believes is the Time-Lock controll room, but instead is just an empty chamber with nothing but a key and an XL2 Lasergun.[23]
Quinn tells Sam that, as the control room is not there, it must be located in Abu Simbel, which had seen a lot of Sirian activity in the past.[24] As all the EDF's helicopters are needed elsewhere, Sam has to take a boat to get to the town. He digs through some clues left behind by the ancient Egyptians and is successful in solving in finding the statue of Nefertari, the key to opening the door inside the temple of Rameses. Sam enters the room, only to find another key similar to the one he found on Philae.[25] He tells Quinn about the bad outcome, and she believes the last possible location could be inside the Tomb of Sethirkopshef, which is about 3 miles from Abu Simbel. Sam does as instructed, goes to the tomb, and powers up the Time-Lock inside the control room.[26] With the Time-Lock fully operational, Sam then goes outside, but not long before Mental sends in a massive Scrapjack to stop him. Sam kills Raahloom, and Wilson arrives to extract Sam back to headquarters.
Related achievements[]
Serious Sam 3: BFE[]
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| Power up the Timelock. |
Serious Sam Fusion[]
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| Power up the Timelock. |
Serious Sam 3 VR: BFE[]
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| Power up the Timelock. |
Trivia[]
- In Serious Sam 3, Sam says he will see Mental in 3000 BC, but ends up in 1378 BC instead.[27] He probably just wasn't aware of the exact date the Time-Lock would send someone once they entered it.
Gallery[]
Artwork[]
Serious Sam 1[]
Serious Sam 3: BFE[]
List of appearances[]
- Serious Sam: The First Encounter (First appearance)
- Serious Sam: The Second Encounter
- Serious Sam: Xbox (non-canonical appearance)
- Serious Sam: Next Encounter (non-canonical appearance)
- Serious Sam Advance (non-canonical appearance)
- Serious Sam HD
- Serious Sam 3: BFE
- Jewel of the Nile (Mentioned)
- Serious Sam VR: The First Encounter
- Serious Sam VR: The Second Encounter
- Serious Sam's Bogus Detour (non-canonical appearance)
- Serious Sam 3 VR: BFE
References[]
- ↑ "There are two massive power generators under Karnak and Luxor, it looks like they power the Time-Lock" -Hellfire, The Silent Riddler, Serious Sam 3: BFE
- ↑ Serious Sam: The Second Encounter - NETRICSA Strategy - Sierra de Chiapas - The Lost Valley
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 Serious Sam: The First Encounter (opening cutscene)
- ↑ Serious Sam: The Second Encounter - NETRICSA - Strategy - Ziggurat
- ↑ Serious Sam: The First Encounter - NETRICSA - Strategy - Temple of Hatshepsut
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Serious Sam: The Second Encounter - NETRICSA - Strategy - Sierra de Chiapas
- ↑ Serious Sam: The Second Encounter level: Valley of the Jaguar
- ↑ Serious Sam: The Second Encounter level: The City of the Gods
- ↑ Serious Sam: The Second Encounter level: The Pit
- ↑ Serious Sam: The Second Encounter level: Ziggurat
- ↑ Serious Sam: The Second Encounter level: The Elephant Atrium
- ↑ Serious Sam: The Second Encounter level: Courtyards of Gilgamesh
- ↑ Serious Sam: The Second Encounter level: Tower of Babel
- ↑ Serious Sam: The Second Encounter level: The Citadel
- ↑ Serious Sam 3: BFE level: Summer in Cairo
- ↑ Serious Sam 3: BFE level: Into the Spider's Nest
- ↑ Serious Sam 3: BFE level: Under the Iron Cloud
- ↑ Serious Sam 3: BFE level: The Silent Riddler
- ↑ Serious Sam 3: BFE level: Unearthing the Sun
- ↑ Serious Sam 3: BFE level: The Power of the Underworld
- ↑ Serious Sam 3: BFE level: The Last Man on Earth
- ↑ Serious Sam 3: BFE' level: The Guardian of Time
- ↑ Serious Sam 3: BFE level: Gathering of the Gods
- ↑ Serious Sam: The First Encounter - NETRICSA - Strategy - Sirian Pictograms
- ↑ Serious Sam 3: BFE level: Together Forever
- ↑ Serious Sam 3: BFE level: Born Again
- ↑ Serious Sam 3: BFE level: The Guardian of Time (ending cutscene)
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