Game Chat

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Recently there was a big discussion about finishing "Time Tunnel" on Martin Pugh's message board. I'm happy to say that I've completed it, and so I'll share the solution with anyone willing to read on:

Time Tunnel

This game is about a gnome who has to reconstruct a parchment scattered across time by an evil goblin. Then he has to solve the final puzzle in order to complete the game and become the gnome king.

Firstly, in order to get the time machine working you have to find the missing green antenna. What you do is go to the room in the mansion where the swimming pool is and get the log. Take it back into the lounge room and put it in the fireplace. Shoot the log, and a fire will start. The green antenna then appears out of nowhere. Take it up the ladder next to the time machine and put it on the machine. Now the time machine works and can take you to the different time zones. In each time zone is a piece of the parchment, but you may need objects from different time zones to find them. I'll give the solutions for each of the time zones. Don't forget that the gnome has a "warp" function by holding down the fire button - he goes to ... uh.... I don't know, but you can stash objects in there. The torch is in there to start with, and you'll need to light that on the fire you started in the fireplace of gnome mansion.

Stone age - To complete this level, you'll need to make a lever to dislodge one of the large rocks blocking the way to the cave where the piece of the parchment is. You'll need a log and two stones. The log is in a cave, but there's no light in the cave. The torch can be found by going into the gnome's warp zone, which is where it is, and lighting it on the fire in the lounge room of gnome mansion.

Next, the rocks are hanging at the top of the screen (ever seen floating rocks before?) and to get them you have to shoot them down. Once this is done, carry them to the big rock on the bottom level. The log and the missdle sized rock should be placed next to the big rock. Then take the small rock up a level and drop it onto the end of the log. The large rock will roll away. The piece of parchment is in the cave, so don't forget the torch.

While you're in this level, get the red chemical bottle (in a cave) and the cage. These are useful in the other time zones.

Mythological Greece - This is one of the easiest time zones (next to the Black Hole!). First, you'll need the shield. The shield is in magical persia, just lying around, so you'll have no trouble finding that. With the shield, go deep into the building and you'll see Medusa, who, not being very nice will shoot at you. Since you have the shield, the shot will bounce off and kill her. Then take the flashing sword-thing behind her. Take the sword to the two blocks in the walls of the building that stick out. The blocks will dissapear and two candlebras will appear. Take the candlebras and put them onto their positions (in the screen before Medusa). Light the candlebras, and then the parchment piece will fall from the ceiling.

Colonial Salem - The parchment piece in this zone is on the island, to the far right of the time zone. To get there, you have to mix a witch's brew that makes the broomstick fly you there. First, you'll need the cauldron (which is on the Intergalactic starship, just lying around in the corridors), and the red chemical bottle (which is in the cave in the stone age). Also, get the broomstick and the blue chemical bottle which are in their respective buildings, and take everything to the empty building at the edge of town. Drop the cauldron in the fireplace, drop both chemical bottles in the cauldron, and if you shot a bat in the street you can pick that up and put that in as well (but the mixture seems to work without it). When everything is ready, shoot the cauldron twice to set off the chemicals. The broomstick which should be in the room will start to fly around. Get on the broomstick and go out the door. Then fly to the island. On the island, there are some mounds. Under one mound is the piece of parchment, and under the other is the way back to gnome mansion.

Magical Persia - The parchment is inside the snake's casket (!). Here, there's someone flying around on a flying carpet. There's also a jug in this zone. Take the jug up close to the man on the flying carpet, and place the cup (from the lounge room in gnome mansion) right next to him. The man then takes both jug and cup and gives you a key. This key opens the safe on the intergalactic starship, inside which is a stick of dynamite. Take this stick of dynamite up to the big rock at the top of this time zone, and take the lit torch and put it next to it. Run away, and then watch the dynamite blow up and open a hole in the rock. The torch may seem to have disappeared, but due to some bad character blocks, it's still there but just invisible. Take the torch and go into the cave. After running around in there you should find a magic lamp. Take the lamp outside and place it by the snake's casket. Shoot the lamp, and it will turn into a flute. Open the casket, and the snake will appear. Pick up the flute, and the snake will dance around and pick the parchment piece up from inside the casket, and drop it outside the casket for you to get.

Intergalactic starship - The parchment is on the planet's surface, and so you have to get down there to get it. First, you'll have to run around the starship, looking for two switches on either side of the wall. Flick these two switches, and the doors on each side of the main room of the ship will open. Take the circular flashing nodule off the console of this room, and go into the right door (the left door takes you to the exit back to gnome mansion). In the right door is the safe, which you can open with the key you get from Magical Persia (by giving the man on the flying carpet the cup and the jug). Inside the safe is the dynamite (used in Magical Persia) and a triangular flashing nodule. Put the circular flashing nodule into the slot on the wall, and the right door will open up. Go through, and then place the triangular flashing nodule in the slot on the ground. This room, with the purple tubes and numbers is the warp room that takes you down to the planet. The numbers must refer to how long you get on the planet before you are warped up again, but I'm not sure. Anyway, go onto the far right pad and press the button and you will warp onto the plant. On the planet, go straight for the piece of the parchment, and once you get it, wait a while and the ship will beam you up again.

California Goldrush - In this zone, the parchment piece is underground in the gold mines. First, enter the saloon with the torch (it's dark in there!) and get the bag of oats. Go outside, and you'll find that the horse will follow you (it's hungry). Lead the horse to the conveyor belt, and when it's on it, move to the left. If you've positioned the horse well enough, it will run on the conveyor belt, starting the lift into the mines. Go into the building where the lift is, and get the helium canister and place it on the grey holder next to the lift. Gas will then come out of the canister continuously. Go into the mine. Here, you'll need the cage (from the Stone Age). Keep walking left holding the cage until you stop and can't move anymore holding the cage. This is where you have to drop the cage in order to capture the scorpion that's running around here. Get the purple balloon (I know, it doesn't look like a balloon, yet.) and take it up the lift to the helium canister. The balloon should then expand with all the air inside it. Take the balloon back to where you dropped the cage and press the button. The balloon will then be tied to the cage and float off with it. When the cage is directly under the scorpion, shoot the balloon. The cage will fall trapping the scorpion, making it safe for you to proceed (this may take some practice, but at least the balloon and cage magically reappear if you miss). Past the scorpion is the next parchment piece. Watch out for falling rocks.

Black Hole - This is the easiest time zone. The parchment piece is sitting right there in fron of you! This is where you come when you have all parchment pieces. When all of them are here, they form together into the full parchment to read "The Daimyo Carries the Staff", although it's written backwards in a feeble attempt to confuse you.

To finish the game, you have to get the staff. It's well hidden, but it's in Magical Persia. Go back to the snake and play the flute for it again. The snake will then dance around some more. Then pick the snake up, and it will turn into the staff!! (God knows who the Daimyo was, but there was no Japanese time zone) Take the staff into the caves (the one which you blew open with the dynamite). Strangely enough the staff is bright enough to light it up for you, so you don't need the torch. Look around in the caves for a while and the throne room will appear, and this is the end of the game! Congrats!

Rags to Riches

I really got hooked on this game some time ago. It's a fun little game where your bum has to scrape together money to get educated and get a good job, and then try to make as much money as possible. I recently played it to death, so now I'll share some tips with ya all.

• As soon as the game starts, go into the 24 hour shop and get something to eat with the dollar you have. The soup kitchen won't open until 11 and you'll be dead by then.
• The alcohol meter isn't really useful in the game (a pity really, as it could have been put to good use!) so try to avoid it because it will stop you getting work. It's useful if you're just about to die and you have only $2 to spare. It will keep you alive.
• Pick up as much cash as possible (obviously). There is a cheat you can implement if you find a dollar on the street. Don't pick the dollar up, but move to the right or left. If there's another dollar in the direction you've chosen (Usually towards the right), go back to the left and pick the first dollar you saw up. Then go to the right until you see the dollar on the right, then go back to the left and pick up the dollar (Which has magically reappeared!). Keep doing this until you've got enough dough.
• Try to get as many subway tickets as possible. If you get robbed, they can't be stolen.
• To avoid robbery, wait until a pedestrian is walking in the same direction as you wish to travel. The travel in the same direction. A theif, cop or IRS cannot appear as long as there is a pedestrian on screen. Yep, there's saftey in numbers.
• Buying bones and going to the junkyard to get bottles is profitable, but not necessary really if you try out the cheat I explained above.
• As soon as you have a substantial amount of cash (about $6 or more) at about 7pm after going to the soup kitchen after it's closed, make your way to the East station and go right to the pizza palace. Hang out at the pizza palace until 8am when school opens. If you find a dollar on the path, you can do the cheat and make plenty of cash. The pizza palace offers a quick escape route if a thief comes along or a cop arrives. The IRS guy shouldn't be much of a problem as long as you have less than $10.
• After finishing class, make sure you have at least $1 to visit the pizza palace, and then catch a ride back to the South side to go to the soup kitchen. If a cop is around, get arrested! This will save you the food and a subway ticket!
• Keep repeating these processes until you are High School educated. You only need to go to school 3 times.
• Next, you should try to get to the West side and get a hair cut. This will allow you to get work. Then visit the soup kitchen again and wait there until it closes, so that you're rest/food meter is full for the night
• Go to the North side and go to the City Industries. When it opens at 8, go in. You will then score $100. Go to the Northcrest apartments and book in. Your bum will then take his hat off to let you know that you have a place to stay. Then go immediately to the Business lunch and eat up. At 8pm, go into the loft.
• If the IRS takes your money after work, go directly to the South Side soup kitchen, since you can't buy lunch or pay for the loft. You should make it if you go as fast as possible. You should have some subway tickets in reserve.
• At this stage of the game, make sure you have lots of notes in reserve as well as large amounts of cash. If the thief gets you, he only takes the notes leaving you with your remaining money in the green numbered display. If the IRS hits you, he takes all the money in your green numbered reserve. In this case, your spare notes will get you out of trouble. What really sucks in when you are hit by both before you've had a chance to get something to eat! In this case, try to get alcohol, or head to the soup kitchen.
• When you have about $150, after work at about 7pm, go to the East Side and go left to the Campus rooms. Stay the night there and in the morning wait outside the rooms until it's nearly 10am. If a thief or IRS comes by, run back into the Campus rooms. By 10 you should go to the university campus. After class, run to the diner by the subway terminal, then go back to Northcrest and stay the night. If you have the time and money, you should visit the Barber's often on the West side, as you can't work if you have a beard. If you get stung by the IRS or a thief, go to the South Side soup kitchen again directly.
• Do this several times until you are fully college educated.
• If you have a beard and are too late for work, head quickly to the west side and go to the barber, then go straight to the westside bar. If you get there by 10, you'll get work. After that, you can either head for the Hi-test service station or the Chez Frencoiz restaurant to get more work.
• Once college educated, and staying at Northcrest, at 7am in the morning you should run as fast as you can to the Executive towers. Don't stop on account of anything. After work you should head straight for the business lunch. If you are robbed clean before you get there, go straight to the soup kitchen, and on no accounts stop until you've got inside!
• Every so often after lunch, you should either go to the barber and get a haircut. This way you can get up the next day and not have the nasty surprise of having your beard again.
• If you don't need to go to the barber, then go to the Investment building and drop in your $10,000. Every day afterwards, you should get $2000 on that money, so you'll never be poor again! Put enough money in the investment house and then the money really starts coming in!

If you do this enough, you'll easily clock 1 million dollars. The trouble is, the game doesn't give you a congratulory message. The game simply keeps going ad infinitum. Maybe it stops after 99 days? By about 60 days I'd already clocked 1 million dollars!

Impossible Mission "Another visitor, stay a while, stay forever!" Ahhh, who could forget that? How about "Destroy him my robots!"? How many of you actually finished this game? Well, despite its name, I think that Impossible Mission is very easy once you know a few tips about how to win: I have completed this game about 5 times to date. My latest attempt left me with over 2 hours remaining.

How did I do it? Let me explain:

• Firstly, try not to die. Dying takes off 10 minutes of your time. It is far better to run all the way to those checkerboard terminal rooms and spend ages trying to get a snooze than dying.
• Search everything. Search every object in the game. This way you don't waste time calling up on the phone to see if you have everything. It also allows you time to sit down and do all the puzzles properly with all correct pieces. Also, you'll be able to remember which rooms have been searched for all objects and which ones haven't been entered. Clean out a room of objects as soon as you find one. If you need a snooze, but don't have one, remember that room and come back to it when you have one.
• Know your rooms. All rooms in Impossible Mission must be known well by you so that you know how to get to certain objects to search. Robots, however, are not the same on every room. Knowing the room layout will allow you to move quickly around it without dying.
• Spend ages in the checkerboard terminal rooms. It's much better to do this and get snoozes than race out and die and waste time. This brings me to my next point......
• Be patient! When that robot runs back and forth like a maniac leaving you very little time to race in and search an object, be patient. As long as it's not impossible to search without dying, be persistant! Racing in and dying is not clever. Same thing goes when you may have to run to the other side of the map to get a snooze.
• Remember where the checkerboard terminals are, as well as Elvin's room. You'll need to go there eventually, so remember where it is as soon as you find it.
• Conserve snoozes. The only time you should use one is when there is an object that is impossible to search without dying. Any other time is a waste of a snooze. If you're trapped in a room by robots, but don't have anything to search, you may be better off killing yourself.
• Puzzles are relatively easily done when you have searched everything fully. As long as you have at least 10 minutes left, you should be able to work them all out. Most pieces look like they fit with others, so try them out. Use the phone when you have fitted all the easy puzzles together so that the correct orientations of the rest of the pieces are easily fit together for the hard puzzles. If you have completed a puzzle, flip it over and over until it registers as a letter of the password to Elvin's room.
• Experiment with the robots. Some have different properties. The tricky ones are the ones that you think won't shoot when they do! Also watch out for the ones that look behind themselves all the time. They can be fooled if you go up a lift, then they can't see you. When you come down again, you may be able to sneak past them.

And that's it! Then you'll get to hear some lesser known speech in Impossible Mission, like : "No, No, No!!" and "Mission Accomplished, Congratulations!"

Maniac Mansion Well now, this is one complex game! I'll quickly run over all the tasks that you'll have to do in order to win. Be careful when planning these objectives so that you don't miss anything!

• Get in the mansion with the key under the mat
• Get to the basement by pulling the gargoyle at the foot of the stairs
• The Green tentacle wants to eat the wax fruit from the art room. He also wants a glass of water. Get the jar from the pantry which is through the kitchen. Take it to the tap in the kitchen and fill it.
• Watch out for the nurse in the kitchen, run away! Afterwards, return and raid the fridge.
• the key in the basement reactor room opens the door to in the pantry to go outside.
• Knock the developer off the top of the pantry.
• get the cassette from the panel in the library room. This has many uses. I'll explain later.
• the radio tube in the old radio works in the radio upstairs. You'll need Bernard though.
• Use the paint remover on the paint blotch to reveal a door in the room on the top floor, far right.
• That man eating plant can be taken out by filling up the glass jar with pool water (It grows big), then give it the Pepsi so it can't bite you. You can then climb up it to reach the telescope.
• The Green Tentacles room has an old record, and a yellow key. the yellow key opens the car's trunk in the garage.
• The grate and the garage door can only be opened by you if you have used the hunk-o-matic machine on the top floor.
• the faucet handle in the garage is used on the faucet in the top floor bathroom shower. Open the curtain to see the mummy, then turn the faucet. A phone number will appear. Remember the number.
• the old rusty key stuck in the chandelier can be retrieved by smashing it. Do this by using the old record from the green tentacles room on the Victorola in the piano room. Use the cassette tape to record the noise, then take the cassette downstairs to play in the tape recorder in the cabinet under the radio.
• the old rusty key opens the prison door.
• the prison door can be opened without the key if there are two friends inside the prison. One has to find the loose brick and press it to open the door for the other friend.
• through the grate by the front door, there should be a developer puddle. Soak this up with the sponge that you should have from the upstairs bathroom.
• The pool operation is tricky. Turn the tap which is through the grate and quickly send someone down into the pool (Because the tap drains the pool water). Make sure no-one is in the basement reactor room (Otherwise Purple tentacle will catch you). In the pool, get the glowing key and the radio and then quickly get out. Turn the tap off in the grate room quickly, and avoid nuclear meltdown!
• open the radio, and get the fresh batteries to go into the torch.
• the glowing key opens the padlocks on the outer door of the Secret lab.
• When the Little Ed hears his package arrive, steal it before he can get to it. Otherwise you might lose the game.
• get the uncancelled stamps off the package.
• the code to the inner door is the High score of the Meteor Mess Video game! The games are broken, so they have to be fixed. They can be fixed with the tools found in the car trunk. The damaged wires in the paint blotch hidden room need repair. To do this, someone will need to turn the power off. Whoever fixes the wires will need the torch on. When the job is done, turn the power back on, and avoid meltdown. Also watch out for that Purple tentacle.
• to play the meteor mess game, you'll need a quarter and the coin box key.
• to get the quarter and key, you'll need to go to the loft which can be reached by climbing up the ladder in the Nurse's room. To get her out of there is the tricky bit. You can fix the phone in the library downstairs (remember to dial that number you saw in the upstairs bathroom), and then quickly sneak someone past her. If you can't fix the phone, make sure you have the old rusty key to get people out of prison, then send one of your team into the room to get captured. Then send another friend into the nurse's room and climb up the ladder quickly!
• in the loft is a picture, look behind it and there is a safe. The code to the safe is in very small writing. To read it, you'll need to use the large telescope!
• to get the coins (and other things) you'll need to become friends with Little Ed. Do this by ringing the doorbell outside the house to get him out of his room. Then send someone in. Steal his hamster, get the purple card key, smash his piggy bank, and steal the dimes inside. When he comes back in and gives you a lecture, give him his hamster. If you have his package that you stole, give him that too. He'll then want you to find his plans. His plans will now appear by a bush outside the front door as a yellow square. (Don't ask me how they got there!)
• use the dimes to move the telescope right (I think!!) until you can see the numbers under the safe. Use this code to open the safe.
• get the quarter out of the envelope by putting it in the microwave (which is in the kitchen) with a jar of water. Turn on the microwave, and the letter will be steamed open.
• the envelope can be used for several things: If you have a musician, you can record them playing music on the piano onto cassette, you can get the Green tentacle's cassette by giving him a copy of your music cassette. You can fix up the meteor's manuscript if you have the writer girl as one of your members. Use the typewriter in the far right upstairs room. You need to type the address of the publishing company (which you saw on TV) on the envelope on this typewriter too. I haven't seen what the results of sending something to the publishing company are. I suspect it gets Green Tentacle on-side with you to break into the secret lab. I didn't finish the game this way.
• with the quarter and the coin box yellow key, go to the video game room and play the meteor mess game. The high score is the inner door secret lab password. If the Doctor doesn't play the game again, this code won't change.
• using the radio in the top floor room with the number on the WANTED poster, calls the intergalactic police. If the doors are opened, he comes in and raids the lab, arresting the meteor. This doesn't solve your other problems though....
• With that yellow film roll for Little Ed's attack plans, and if you have Micheal (Which I used to finish the game), go to the photography room. Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but red lights don't destroy film. However, if you leave the red light on in the photography lab and open the roll, the film gets damaged. In this case, turn the red-light off, open the film, and develop it. Use the developer sponge in the developer try to get the developer. Take these plans to Little Ed and then go straight to the secret lab.
• When you enter the lab, you should have someone chasing the Purple tentacle around the lab (Be this Little Ed, or Green Tentacle). This leaves you to enter the main lab where the Doctor, Sandy, and Meteor are.
• In the main lab, you can get yourself another Pepsi (If you want!). You'll need the card-key to get to the meteor's room. Before you do this, you need to be wearing the radioactive suit which is in the cupboard. Then go into the metoer room....
• as long as you wear the radioactive suit, the meteor can't kill you. Pick up the meteor, and go out the other door. You'll arrive in the garage. Put the meteor in the trunk of the car, shut it, and then use the yellow car key in the rockets! The Meteor will be sent sky high!

I know that this list is fairly incomplete because I have only won the game by using Michael. The other characters will have to use thier musical and written talents to get friendly with the gren tentacle. What the hell the surfer dude does is confusing to me. Anyway, if you can tell me a bit more about this game, please mail me and fill me in.

The Sentinel Ok, I found the highest landscape number that took me to level 9999. The secret level code for level 9999 is 76750745. After completing that, do you get a completion message? NO! The game just loops around back to 0000!!! What a disappointment!

Anyway, just out of interest, the secret level code to level 0000 is 06045387. You'll never need to type that in though, as the game will let you go there without any code!

Ok, that's all for now. I have also completed Zak McKraken and the alien Mindbenders, so if I have time, I'll outline that solution too. Bye, bye for now.

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