The control booth is to the left up the stairs as you enter the Tesla coil lab. That's where Ellie was when you were in the cage before for your demo.

And naturally, there's a lock on the door -- but not a normal lock in any way. Where on earth do the people in video games go to get their bizarre locks? My local Home Depot has NOTHING like this.

Anyway, we need some sort of help here. And you can find some sort of help in Ellie's desk drawer.

Oh, well, hmm. It's a logic problem, the kind they used to print in those old Dell puzzle mags. Read to the end of this hint for the answer, in case you're not the logical type.

One way to attack these kinds of puzzles is with a grid. You have three variables to work with here: shape, color, and order. Make yourself a grid that lets you match all three, like this:

You can now keep track of the negatives as well as the positives. That is, if one sentence says, "The red circle goes first," you can put a check mark in the boxes where red crosses circle, where red crosses 1, and where circle crosses one.

Also, if another sentence says, "The square is after the purple piece," you know that the square isn't purple, so you can put an X in that box. You also know that the square isn't first (because it's after another piece) and that purple isn't last (because another piece comes after it).

This kind of logical map will get you a long way, and in the case of the amateur puzzle, it may even get you all the way there. For the masters, however, you'll need to be more cunning.

For example, if one sentence tells you something about the yellow piece, look for other statements about the yellow piece. If one sentence tells you yellow comes before blue, and another sentence tells you yellow isn't in the fourth space, that tells you yellow is in space 1 through 3 because it can't be in the fifth space. See?

When you think you're getting close, try testing your theory. Make the shapes the colors you think they should be and press them in the order you guess at. If it works, hurray! If not, go back to the drawing board.

Sick of the whole thing? Yeah, me too. Here are the answers you need: