BERTIE BISHOP by Robert Pilkington from Computer Gamer #15, June 1986, pages 68-70 The devil has grasped you and taken you away from your parish and into a prison along with yucky apples, batty beetles, and a bloodthirsty vampire! (His hand is by the side of the screen ready to knock off one of your "short-lived" lives.) Bertie has a friend who will enter one and clear some apples while the "A Team" music is played. (Well he is a kind of BA - very useful in rooms 4 and 5.) The game slows down later on as the computer has more to put on the screen. This doesn't matter because you'll have to think harder later anyway. You carry pineapples to aid yourself against the beetles. You will need ultimate speed to draw them from your pocket in time. You can't stop in this game or you will lose a life. You have three lives and I think that after a lot of work you'll be able to reach the end. Detailed instructions are included in the listing. Save the game by getting to the end of the prog. (Typing 9999 then pressing ENTER will do this for you). Now type SAVE "BISHOP" LINE 1 and press ENTER. Remember to VERIFY your SAVE. Good luck and remember keying it in bit by bit is easiest ... ============= Program Notes [by JimG] ------------- KEYS: Q = left; E = right; P = up; L = down; C = call for help M = take pineapple from pocket to splat beetle The main loop starts at: 55 FOR z=1 TO 5 where 'z' is the room number, and ends at: 3525 IF z<5 THEN BEEP 1,10: CLS : NEXT z The "lives" counter is the number of lives lost, not the number of lives left, as it starts at zero and it's game over when it reaches three. The graphic strings printed in the magazine in lines: 150, 3500, 3510, 5035, 5060; don't bear much relation to how they're actually supposed to look on the screen. Line 5070 in the magazine listing was missing a "NEXT n" at the end. In the printed listing none of the BEEP loops 4030-4190 actually do any BEEPing, because the range is a diminishing negative and they don't have a negative (or any) STEP, so they just drop through. However, adding a "STEP -1" makes the game unplayable, as there's too long a delay before returning to the INKEY$ at line 620. I changed the in-game instructions from all-CAPS to normal text, and from bottom-up display to top-down, as it's easier to read. [JimG] ============= REPLACED ROUTINES 155 REM FOR g=1 TO 2 156 REM IF g=1 THEN LET ac=0 157 REM IF g=2 THEN LET ac=24 160 REM FOR n=0 TO 21 170 REM LET ran=INT (RND*2) 180 REM INK 2: IF ran=0 THEN PRINT AT n,ac;"{F}" 190 REM IF ran=1 THEN PRINT AT n,ac;"{G}" 195 REM BEEP .05,n*2 200 REM NEXT n 210 REM NEXT g 211 INK 2: FOR g=0 TO 24 STEP 24: FOR n=0 TO 21: PRINT AT n,g;"{F}{G}"(INT (RND*2)+1): BEEP .05,n*2: NEXT n: NEXT g 220 REM FOR n=0 TO 24 230 REM LET ran=INT (RND*2) 240 REM IF ran=1 THEN PRINT AT 0,n;"{F}" 250 REM IF ran=0 THEN PRINT AT 0,n;"{G}" 260 REM BEEP .05,n/2 270 REM NEXT n 271 PRINT AT 0,0;: FOR g=0 TO 24: PRINT "{G}{F}"(INT (RND*2)+1);: BEEP .05,g/2: NEXT g 300 REM FOR n=0 TO 20 310 REM LET ran=INT (RND*2) 320 REM IF ran=0 THEN PRINT AT 21,n;"{F}" 330 REM IF ran=1 THEN PRINT AT 21,n;"{G}" 340 REM BEEP .05,0 350 REM NEXT n 351 PRINT AT 21,0;: FOR g=0 TO 20: PRINT "{F}{G}"(INT (RND*2)+1);: BEEP .05,g/2: NEXT g ============= In-Game Instructions -------------------- You are Bertie. Your mission is to escape the prison the Evil Devil has put you in. The door is open but avoid hitting Walls or hitting 2 Poison Apples at once (which pop up on every move!). You can splat Poison Apples if you only hit one at a time. Don't stop or you will die. When you lose a life watch the Devil's hand (at the bottom right of screen) and then see yourself burn up! Go under the archways into the 5 Rooms and out of them to win. There is one thing that can help you! Michael Monk. When you press 'C' he will fly just below your feet and clear that row of Apples!! but he can only be called on once. Here's a piece of advice - save him till a later screen because of the much greater amount of Apples It's easy to get trapped on 4&5! As you have a Secret Weapon so has the Devil!! Beetles!! In Rooms 1 & 2 you will suddenly hear a beep lasting just over half a second. You will see a beetle & in that time you must press 'M' to take from your pockets a Pineapple (left over from last year's Harvest Festival) that will splat Beetle and you will be saved. If you're too slow then it will lose you a life!! Remember once you've got him be quick back on a moving key or it's a life gone. There will be more Beetles but don't worry there're more Pineapples. In Room 2 you will see a blue cross. This is to kill the Vampire (if he comes) in Room 3. You have a choice: take the Cross and risk a bigger Apple build-up and the chance of the Beetle having another go at you or don't take it and risk getting killed by the Vampire, as he doesn't always appear. To get the Cross just go to it and when you're by its wall incline your head to it eg.{A}{B}{J} but don't hit the wall!! You are protected by it then automatically, otherwise he will take a life!! If the Vampire does appear he will never come again. He only appears in Room 3. The ever-growing Blue Walls stop Apples growing in those illegal places. You can go through them though. More are in the later Rooms. You move a bit slower in each Room. More apples will come in each Room and a Bonus of 100!!! ============= 40-pitch to 32-pitch CHR$ mapping --------------------------------- line from on listing scr$ line 150 actual 16 -- 12 6 17 26 26 14 6 18 40 20 12 6 14 6 19 14 8 13 18 11 6 20 16 8 12 18 7 4 21 0 3 2 21 28 28 5 4 4 0 =============