L.A. Noire five-star walkthrough and newspaper guide

Arson Case 3: House of Sticks

Investigation: California Fire & LifeInterrogation: Elsa LichtmannInvestigation: Elysian Fields SiteInvestigation: Demolished HouseInvestigation:Keystone Film StudiosInvestigation: Eysian Fields Site Two

Investigation: California Fire & Life

Look over Elsa's settlement letter to add it to your list of clues.

Next, look over the case file. Flip past the property slip and read through the accident report to add it to evidence.

Interrogation: Elsa Lichtmann

Ask Elsa bout the Disputed claim payout, and she'll give you an answer that you should respond to with Doubt.

Next, ask about her Connection to Buchwalter. Again, Doubt's the way to go.

Finally, ask about her Motive for dispute. This time, she'll give you the Truth.

Investigation: Elysian Fields Site

Head into the office and check the desk just past the door. There, you'll find a delivery receipt.

Next, check the other desk (where you found the memo in A Walk in Elysian Fields).

Here, you'll find an order-of-demolition letter...

... as well as another suspcious memo from Elysian Fields.

Investigation: Demolished House

After the fight, jog or drive over to the nearby demolished house site. All points of interest here are indicated by red flags.

Take a look atthe one shown above, and you'll find some suspiciously flimsy-looking timber.

However, the only area you actually need to check is around the back of the wreck, where the arrow below is pointing:

Here, you'll be able to pick up and examine a few different broken timbers.

Choose the one on the bottom.

Match it up with the jagged hunk of wood on your left, and you'll have your next destination.

After the bulldozer minigame,use the nearby gamewell toget an address for Keystone.

Investigation: Keystone Film Studios

After the guard takes a powder, vaultover the studio's front gate and keep an eye out to your left until you find the screening room.

Inside, look on the table to your right for a film canister.

It'll be empty. Naturally. Now where's that film?

It's in the projector (in the leather case), so go open it up.

Once the projector starts, you'll be confronted with two dials that control focus and speed, as well as a switch that controls the direction of the film.

Adjust them until the movie's understandable. Their final positions should look like this:

Before you leave the site, jump back over the front gates and then look across from the guard house tosee a fewpiles of lumber. Hop the fence to get over to them.

First, check this pile:

There, you'll find a lumber delivery receipt for your clue index.

Next, check this pile, across the yard from the first one:

Here, you'll find a warning label identifying the wood as inferior.

Before you leave, use the phone in the guard station.

Investigation: Elysian Fields Site Two

There are a couple points of interest in the unfinished house (none of them necessary), but if you want, check out the lightswitch shown below, and the plumbing in the kitchen sink. Then head upstairs and get ready for a fight (which you will lose).

After getting a car, get ready to be chased. Drive aggressively and try to crash your pursuers off the road, and then make your way to the yellow flag once they're all .gone to finish the case.

Next page: A Polite Invitation

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Mikel Reparaz
After graduating from college in 2000 with a BA in journalism, I worked for five years as a copy editor, page designer and videogame-review columnist at a couple of mid-sized newspapers you've never heard of. My column eventually got me a freelancing gig with GMR magazine, which folded a few months later. I was hired on full-time by GamesRadar in late 2005, and have since been paid actual money to write silly articles about lovable blobs.