Loadstar 128 11/q11.d81/t.labyrinth

Text File | 2022-08-28 | 14KB | 247 lines

                               L A B Y R I N T H

                                by Jon Mattson


    LABYRINTH is a one- or two-player arcade/adventure game which makes
full use of the 80-column screen and 8563 VDC.  In it, each player becomes
a valiant warrior, powerful wizard or clever rogue, exploring the maze-like
tunnels of a subterranean labyrinth and trying to wrest treasures from the
evil inhabitants therein.  While this idea is nothing new, I think that you
will find the arcade-like format refreshing: LABYRINTH has much of the
detail of a fantasy RPG (complete with MANY character classes, spells,
weapons, armour, magic items, etc.), but plays in only one or two hours and
doesn't require any intricate mapping skills, since it draws the map as you
go along.  Due to the detail and short playing time, you will have to play
many, many games before you discover all of the game's secrets.  Best of
all, two people can play - in fact, the game is most interesting with more
than one challenger.

    When you first run the program, there will be a slight pause while the
labyrinth is created: even in FAST mode, the massive amount of unique data
involved in each quest takes time to generate.  Next, you will be asked for
a number of players, 1 or 2.  Note that Player 1 uses Joystick 2 and Player
2 uses Joystick 1; the reverse procedure was designed to avoid using the
often problematic Port 1 in the one-player game.  Unfortunately, keyboard
control is simply not practical for a game of this nature and interferes
with joystick readings, in any event.  You will also be asked for a
difficulty level, Hard or Very Hard - there is no such thing as an easy
labyrinth!  Generally, you will want to play the Hard game. Very Hard is
just that: among others things, traps will be more frequent and harder to
remove, and The Shop (see below) will not be present.  If you finish the
last level completely in Very Hard mode, you may consider yourself a REAL
wizard!

    Finally, each player will be asked to choose his character and name him
or her.  There are many, many character classes to choose from, each with
their own strengths and weaknesses.  Using the joystick, you can cycle
through all of their listings, which display all of the game attributes and
the character's capability therein.  In brief, these are as follows:

SPEED:  This affects the character's initiative (who hits whom first) and
movement speed for fleeing.

PROWESS:  The character's ability to strike a foe in combat.

AGILITY:  The character's ability to dodge attacks and certain types of
traps.

STRENGTH:  The amount of damage the character dishes out in combat.

HEALTH:  The amount of damage the character can take in combat.

WILL:  The character's ability to use and resist magic.

PERCEPTION:  The character's ability to spot traps, learn spells and so on.

CHARM:  The character's "charisma" and ability to influence others.  Note
that some character types which are normally pictured as being popular with
humans - e.g.  Elves - have low Charm scores when it comes to monsters.

ABILITIES:  There are eight different abilities that a character may
possess, including:

 Scroll Lore:  The ability to learn new spells from a scroll.

 Archery:  Allows the character to fire an arrow or two at the beginning
  of a fight when he gains the initiative.

 Stealth:  The ability to move silently, hide when the initiative is
  gained and so on.  In theory, anyone can hide, but people with stealth
  are better at it.

 Detrap:  Gives a large bonus in detecting and neutralizing traps.

 Pacify:  Works only if you gain the initiative and try to negotiate at
  the very beginning of a fight.  It may have a very strong positive
  effect on the monster's reaction to you.  It will not work on undead
  and certain especially vicious monsters.

 Flight:  You have wings!  This is good for avoiding ground traps and
  also helps you flee from monsters, especially those which are difficult
  to avoid because they have wings themselves.

 Fast Healer:  You recover Health and Endurance (see below) faster
  than other characters.

 Fencer:  In game terms, this magnifies the effect of tactics in combat.
  When you charge, you will do extra damage; when you parry, you will be
  even harder to hit.

WEAPON:  Each character starts with one of two weapons, either a staff or
sword.  The latter is more powerful.  A few characters have no weapon at
all and will probably have to rely on good Strength or spells.

ARMOUR:  A character may begin with either Leather Armour or Chainmail, or
may have no armour at all.  Obviously, this will influence the amount of
damage he takes in combat.

MINOR ARCANA:  Some characters begin the game with one or more magic
spells, and those with Scroll Lore can later add to this list.  Spells are
split into two groups: Minor Arcana and Major Arcana.  The latter are more
powerful but also more difficult to cast, and they can only be learned
later in the game from scrolls.  Due to the large number of spells and the
fact that I have a nasty streak, I won't describe all of them here.  Most
of them are obvious, but a few will have to be figured out through trial
and error.  Two should be noted here, as their effects are not readily
apparent.

    FLAMETIP is cast on your normal weapon: the flaming aura allows you to
do extra damage to undead and stops creatures which normally regenerate
from doing so.  Most importantly, it enchants your weapon to do full damage
against those creatures which normally only take half-damage from non-magic
weapons (werewolves, gargoyles and the like).

    WARD simply instills fear in the creature and may cause it to flee.
Repeated castings of this spell have a cumulative effect.

    The first eight statistics are rated verbally as follows, from weakest
to strongest: Dismal, Poor, Low, Average, High, Good, Excellent and
Superhuman.  Scores below Low or above Good are exceedingly rare and are
not normally possible at the beginning of the game.

    Once both players have chosen and named their characters, the game
begins.  You will find yourselves on the first level, near the staircase
out of the dungeon.  Player One has a brown figure and Player Two has a
yellow one.  The joystick is used to move your icon around the dungeon,
which will begin to "form" around you as you enter new areas (at the
beginning, everything will be dark grey).  The area at the very bottom of
the screen lists relevant information for each character.  Two numbers to
keep careful track of are Health and Endurance: the former indicates the
amount of damage you can take before dying, and the latter indicates the
amount of energy you have for spells and the like.  Resting will gradually
restore both to their original levels.

    Except during combat, you can open a command window by pressing the
joystick button.  A menu will appear, and you can control the highlight bar
with the joystick, making a choice by pressing fire.  "Oops!" closes the
window without doing anything; most of the other choices are obvious.  Note
that some spells can only be cast in combat, and some can only be cast
outside of it.  Of course, while the command window is open, all other
action stops for both players.

    As you travel about the labyrinth, here are a few things to watch for:

STAIRS:  These point either up or down, letting you traverse between each
of the six levels.  Taking the stairs up on level one ends the game aor
that character; thus, your ultimate goal is to journey down to level six
and, when you are finished there, escape out the stairs on level one.  Due
to the nature of the game, if two people are involved they must both take
the same staircase.  The player who goes down (or up) first gets a
"patience bonus" to his final score which increases the longer he waits
there, so it is not a good idea to try and trick your ally into taking a
staircase while you clean up the rest of the level.  Naturally, the lower
levels are much tougher than those nearer the surface, so only move
downwards when you feel you are equipped to do so.

CHESTS:  Small brown boxes are scattered around the dungeon, and some of
these contain