Tales of the unexpected

A grasp of techniques helps many a traveller to avoid pitfalls in the micro adventure world. Richard Price puts his cards on the table.

THE STRANGE LANDS of adventure are full of unknown perils. Survival depends on your skill in interpreting and handling new problems and relationships. Impulsiveness and bone-headed aggression will end in a miserable death in some misty corner of those foreign fields.

Like any traveller into uncharted territory, you must prepare yourself for the dangerous and mysterious realms ahead by developing habits and ways of thinking which will carry you through to eventual triumph. Be persistent, enquiring, careful - and be ready for the unexpected. Remember, someone or something out there wants to get you very badly.

Whatever else you do or don't do beyond the frontier there is one thing you cannot do without - a map. Navigation without one is like climbing Kanchenjunga without a rope.

There are few games which use randomly set locations so even if objects and non-player characters shift you should have graph paper or a sketch pad to hand. On arrival at a new location draw a box or circle and mark all the known exits, along with any other information you think is worth remembering. If you drop - or are forced to leave - anything there is always the chance you will need it further on. Your detailed map will help a speedy return without floundering or running into unnecessary trouble.

The sadistic streak in the hearts of most adventure programmers means there will be times when keeping a coherent chart seems well-nigh impossible. Just when everything is going fine you find yourself lost in a warren of identical locations.

The featureless maze has become something of a tradition in text adventures and can still cause panic or hysteria in hardened veterans. The maze usually serves some purpose - it may hold a treasure of importance, as does the endless industrial estate in Hampstead, or it may be the route into the next set of locations. Orc Slayer, a reasonable example of the sword and sorcery genre, throws you into a maze within a few moves of starting and you must find your way through to enter the main part of the game.

Whatever its purpose, it is essential to face the grim reality and get down to working out the plan of your labyrinth - running away will do no good. In fact, most mazes can be explored easily and contain very few locations.

Before entering the maze it is worth having as many objects with you as you can carry. They will act as markers on your route and can be recovered when you have mapped the maze successfully. At the first location in the maze drop an object. Then test each direction for possible exits.

If you type in 'North' and the screen display still shows the object as present you will know the way north is blocked. Do the same for each direction including up and down - you never know. When you find you have changed your location drop another object and repeat the procedure.

Sometimes you will find that you cannot return the way you came - programmers will often jumble compass directions. Stick to your routine despite intense provocation and, nine times out of ten, you will eventually find your way around, often returning to your starting point. Mazes will soon become terrors for mere children, provided you create fixed points by dropping objects and exploring outwards - just remember Theseus and his ball of string.

There you are, deep inside your terra incognita with each step a threatening event and each location needing exploration for useful information or objects. Don't expect the programmer to make life easy for you. In a well crafted game the description will not contain every item of available information about the room and its contents. Search the area very thoroughly, testing the walls, floor and ceiling for hidden exits. Dig holes if you can and pull, push or thump anything likely to be movable.

Many games will show different results for similar commands. In Sherlock Holmes 'examine' may deliver little of interest. Add 'closely' to that request and much more may be revealed. Search, examine and look should all be used separately and then only omit such a command when you are certain the interpreter does not understand it.

Repetition of actions is always advisable. After you have performed some apparently useless action enter 'look' - or the program equivalent for redescription, you will find occasionally there has been an effect - without that second attempt you would never have known. It pays never to make assumptions or to take situations for granted.

Simply hanging around may, paradoxically, get you somewhere. To negotiate the forest path safely in The Hobbit it is essential to wait twice at each location and, of course, the only way to defeat the trolls is to wait for dawn in a safe place. In interactive games, where characters wander about, it is sensible to do that regularly. Dangers ahead can be avoided, or you could run into a character you have lost and from whom you need help.

Listening is also important - on occasions you could well be forewarned of an approaching threat or even given valuable secret information. Within a few moves from the start of Mountains of Ket there is a hint about hearing voices nearby. Listen carefully at that point and you will receive a password which will pacify a dangerous orc sentinel at a later stage.

If your game has graphic illustrations of the locations study them carefully - clues could well be present, especially if it is a program with pictures which alter after relevant commands. At a lonely snow-bound hut in Valkyrie 17 the picture contains the only clue that essential objects are present.

Sooner or later there will be times when you are entombed or imprisoned. Try every object you have with you - throw, drop, use, rub, even eat them. Something might work. In The Final Mission of the Ket Trilogy you begin by being locked up in the evil Vran's murky dungeons. Escape from the first cell is easy but you find yourself trapped in yet another. If you drop one of your very few possessions the door will open to the vast halls of the enchanter's fortress. That sort of lateral thinking - often combined with sheer desperation - is crucial in adventuring and you can expect to make little progress without it. Level 9 specialises in that sort of approach and the games are very rarely based only on the collection of significant objects; your score depends on solving puzzles and not in undertaking shopping expeditions.

Travelling abroad is more than simply a matter of exploring exotic places. The realms of adventure are populated by weird creatures ranging from dyspeptic and irascible dragons to cocaine-crazed ace detectives. A few are ordinary human beings but in the main these are sub-human, mythical or bestial. Some are just plain odd, like the bizarre En monster in The Final Mission or the prudish Mary in Valhalla.

Unless a game uses complex personality matrices - and there are few of those - most of the inhabitants you will bump into will be short on brain power and programmed for specific purposes; they will either help you or do their best to separate your head from your shoulders. Often they are capable of both, but if you behave like a boorish deadhead, and rub them up the wrong way with your input buffer, you will only have yourself to blame when you are cloven from top to toe or lasered into subatomic particles.

Look at it this way; when on holiday you will probably make an effort to understand the locals and behave in a courteous and reasonable fashion. Picking fights gets you slung out of a bar in Torremolinos and much the same applies in adventures. If you go in waving your battleaxe you are unlikely to get much information or help.

Be nice - to start with, at least - and say hello. Rummage around in your pack and offer some useful, though preferably inexpensive, present. Those gifts might persuade the creature to divulge a secret or perform some service for you.

You will often be surprised at the results. The reluctant hero of the Ket Trilogy runs into orcs and their kin on his journey. Almost all of them can be dangerous if provoked and fighting will diminish your stamina and luck points -absolutely essential for getting through to the world outside.

Although the orcs possess singularly unattractive personalities the game is sufficiently well designed for them to have their own needs. With ingenuity and common sense you can end up with a stash of treasure by striking deals rather than indulging in hand-to-hand combat. You should discover a lonely ogre who has his own little vice. By using your dice you can win an extremely useful piece of equipment if Lady Luck smiles on you.

Inevitably there will he times when sweet reason, politeness and courtesy will get you nowhere. Intractable trolls will chop you up, ceilings will fall in or you will stumble into a darkened pit. Violent death is commonplace in computer adventure. Sometimes you will see it coming some way off, sometimes it will sneak up from behind, sometimes you will seek it out in your recklessness.

Those thoughtful programmers have nevertheless given you the elixir of perpetual life in the form of the Save function. It is, probably, the most useful of all the features built into adventures. If you don't use it already then start now. Loading or saving a prepared position takes a matter of seconds and it is worth doing regularly as you work your way through an adventure.

If trouble is brewing and you have just met a bulbous-eyed spider, or you enter a room where you sense something is wrong - save it. You can return again and again to the danger zone and avoid impending doom by backtracking.

The alternative to saving is to go back to the beginning and even the best games then become unbearably tedious. Don't bother with games which don't offer this facility - they are simply not worth the strain. Saving enables you to keep different versions of each game and allows you to experiment with varying combinations of equipment or routes through the landscape.

A FEW NIGHTS ago TV gate guards, Zul and Zel, woke me long before dawn - never a wise notion. I keep these twin albino halflings at the Ogre more from sentiment than good sense as they are very weak in both body and head.

Me, I had been having a heavy night's drinking with a High Priestess of Ithuk and a band of travellers. Despite the effects of the Mountain Gold - a vicious upland liquor - Her Holiness and I were able to put a of them on the right track.

Several of them had been venturing into the magic mountain of Ket. One Bonecrusher Singleton of Derby had found a large dog near the orc's sleeping place and could see no way to use the beast.

In my experience animals only need feeding to make them docile and a chain and pillar to tie them up - they will then make excellent treasure guards and will keep rats and orcs at bay. This somewhat singed adventurer also had great trouble with a dragon who lived in the mountain. Pour oil on troubled reptiles, young Bonecrusher!

The great skull which protects the mountain has proved an obstacle to many. Thorne the Slayer from Mansfield cannot pass. Her Holiness told me she had visited this hellish place years ago and the only way to enter was in a priest's clothing, hat, cloak and beard. Thorne also requested other travellers to pass on their knowledge of the infamous Hulk - send me your news by Imperial Post.

Franklin the Farseer, whose home is in Bromley Cross at Bolton, confessed herself new to this trade and, having collected eight treasures and 9700 points in her attempt to solve the Inca Curse, wondered whether she could go further into the temple.

I have informants who tell that she has done well and has reached the maximum. She should now make her way back to where she started. By the way, the skull in the Eagle Room is merely for decoration and serves no other purpose. It cannot be removed.

Another maid, Spencer the Spy from Birmingham, has travelled to the Espionage Island, a bitter place to search in, overseen as it is by the magicians of Artic. She has found an explosive substance but knows not how it can be used.

Your trouble is ended, damsel - there is a landing light nearby. Remove the fitting from this lamp and place your explosive inside. Beware - this terrible weapon is detonated by some force called electricity and a switch must be located in a hut.

Ah, the awful dangers you all face out there in the grim world. Spencer has sailed the Ship of Doom. She says that there is a key, within a glass box, untouchable to her. In a dark place lie glasses which use infra-red light. Wearing those will help in seeing a battery. If this thing is placed in a rod with a slot it becomes an instrument of vast sonic power and may well release the key from the box if pointed properly.

Now, naturally, there is wisdom beyond the gates of the Ogre and those of you who wish help with searching the Smugglers' Cove or the dread Temple of Vran should apply to Stephen the Harper of Nottinghamshire. He claims total success in those quests and awaits the postrider with your letters.

Congratulations are due to Gareth Evans of Lytham and Andrew Ball of Bristol. All tell me that they have completed their travelling in Middle Earth with Baggins, the Hobbit. Alas Oliver, neither you nor the others are the first to win through in this place, but remember that your score is of prime importance so if others drop by here they should let me know their totals.

The vast city of London is full of adventurers struggling to attain Hampstead. Slasher Steele of Gwynedd cannot enter the merchants' bank and pleaded with me for aid. I relented and told him that he should visit a certain club, beyond the stalls and shops in a long street. If he is properly attired he will be given a passport to great wealth.

Gregory Timmis cannot make his way to Leatherhead to help Sherlock solve a case. He should make his way to King's Cross where he may find a fire belching conveyance to take him to the town.

But I digress. The twins woke me suddenly. Outside, barely visible in the weak torchlight was a single rider in fancy southern gear waving a scroll. "A letter, from Lord Janga", says he.

"What does he want of me?" shouts I, beset by a ringing headache as I was, "I am in no mood for riddles."

"True," sniggers this foppish oaf, "and you must be cold also, Gordo. Let me in so we can talk."

Over breakfast of boar meat and wine I broke the seal. Come over to the Ogre next moon and I shall tell you all the drift of this missive from Maru.

Gordo Greatbelly, Landlord.

Sinclair User
February 1985