Wrath of the Sea King by Bloodlust Software written by Davide "Gendo Ikari" Mascolo (mana_kirishimaNOSPAM@hotmail.com) This little guide is intended to help you find the best strategies to beat the game dying the less possible times. Remember, the less you die, the longer the ending sequence will be. Even the most frustrating trap can become a breeze with some experience. However, most times it will be mainly a matter of your reflexes and ability. Have fun... SCENE I - Just go towards the hologram, then proceed. - "Looks easy enough". NEVER touch the brown face! It will make that sort of spinning and spiked face a lot speedier. Press the green face first, then the red and blue ones to exit. - "Too quiet". Go straight down, stopping under every "arch" to trigger the trap and proceed safely. - "Oh Joy!" Someone can tell me what those spinning things are? No particular strategy here, you have to avoid the things and exit. The upper right corner seems safe, so it's better wait for the right moment to move. - "Creepy!" Pay attention to the monsters' movements and kill them all. They flee very fast if you move towards them, but they're faster if you turn your back... - Only correct timing is needed here. A pain the first times, but after a while you'll beat it even closing your eyes. - That sort of giant skulls are darn fast, and I got killed plenty of times at my first try. Then, I noticed the lever at the bottom left corner of the screen... Shoot it and the skulls' speed will drop dramatically! - "I never was good at chess". Luckily, I know the basic rules :b. Remember that, if you get on a square where a piece can "eat", according to the rules, you will be shot. However, move right until you are aligned with the fifth pawn from the left, then move down and stand in front of it. Now slide to its right, move down towards another pawn, and slide right of it. - "Checkmate!" Move down until you are two squares right of the pawn. Move another square down, then move diagonally down and left to reach the end of the board. Avoid the giant skull now, and exit. - "It just keeps getting better and better!" Another screen where correct timing is the only weapon. Absolutely not difficult, after some tries. - A little slalom between the creepy stone faces, to avoid the... Syringes??? - As you enter, don't move and shoot like mad to destroy the wall which advances towards you, then run to the exit before the vertical force field comes. - Boss! Firstly, kill the annoying little spiders, then concentrate your shots on the big one. It doesn't move fast, but its bouncing is sometimes unpredictable, so beware. After killed, it will leave a sort of ball, grab it and exit. NOTE: if you want to do it fast, just crash towards the spider, on the side with the ball. You'll grab it and the exit will appear. - "What the Hell?" Just shoot the ball while facing right, it will bounce and touch the switch to deactivate the force field. - "What's the point of that?" Reach the bottom left corner of the screen, face right, shoot the ball, and it will automatically bounce its way to the switch. Useful little tool, this ball... - Boss! I don't know why a creature who wants to be killed, is the monster of the first really annoying screen of the game. His movement pattern is like a rough eight, and he moves constantly. The spot where Dust first enters the screen seems to be the safer. But, if you die, you will resurrect on the upper side of the screen... This is the bad thing. And you also have to avoid his projectiles - luckily, they can be deflected with your shots. Reduce him to a sushi to clear the first Scene. SCENE II - "I need a torch". Yes, there's one, but not so fast. If you move directly down, you will be killed by spikes you can't see. Move a little left, then a little down. Grab the torch to have some light, and prudently make your way to the exit. - "You little b*****d!" A bat steals you torch. Luckily, there aren't spiked walls here, but the only sources of light, are also the things that can kill you. Move slowly in the dark, and every time the light appears, stop and wait for the things (evil vases?) to move. - Quite strange screen, this. Don't get caught by the bubbles and touch the switches at the four corners. Incidentally, these switches are also the bubble generators, so beware. After touching the last, pay attention to the wheels, which will scatter around. - Boat Stage! Use the force field to destroy the small obstacles on your path. It doesn't protect yourself from crashing the walls, though. It's better to slow down (by pressing Up) sometimes, to maneuver and avoid the walls. - "Only with the blood of 100 souls will these gates open". Time for slaying, then. A good strategy is moving in circles and let the monsters group, then shoot them down. If Num Lock is activated, you can use a special Robotron-style control for these "swarm stages". You can move Dust in a direction with the arrows, and fire in eight directions with the numeric keypad. When you die, you will resurrect with a force field surrounding you for some seconds. Once in a while, a skull appears, grab it to kill all the enemies on the screen. Continue until the gates open. - "I am allergic to seafood!" This boss is quite annoying. Stay away from him, because he can extend his pincers and, most of all, his tongue. He wouldn't be difficult, however, if it wasn't for that sort of trilobytes wandering around and shooting! Patience... - Another "swarm" stage. It' better make the little monsters be killed by the rotating central section of the room. It can't kill the big ones, though, so it's up to you dispose of them. Continue until the central section stops rotating, and exit. - "Man, it's humid in here!" Wow, what irony. Simply, you have to run as fast as you can over the unstable blocks. It seems simple, you'll learn that is NOT simple... - And now for a choice! You meet the three weirdos you stole the submarine from, they split and you have to follow one. Let's see the three paths... Follow Mr. Foo (swarm stages) - Simply, kill the monsters until the exit appears. - Other monsters to kill. Shoot the walls made of square blocks to break them and reach the switch, wich moves a wall and opens your way to the exit. - Guess what? Other monsters to kill. Break the walls to open your way. The big monsters can break the walls too. - Boss! Mutated Mr. Foo. If you wanted to finish the game dying few times, following Foo wasn't a good choice. I think he's the most difficult of the Trio, because he generates blue monsters from his belly at an incredibly high rate. And there are the two other things (arms? Fish tails?) which generate red monsters, at a lower rate luckily. Use the Robotron-style control as best as you can! Follow Mrs. Pine (puzzle stages) - Wow, I like this puzzle. You have to reach the panel at the center of the screen, by walking on the only safe letters - the ones of the solution of the riddle. I died plenty of times before discovering it. Anyway, the solution is BREATH. After opening the exit, walk on the letters in reverse order. - I don't know if there's an exact logic in this puzzle, but 4 seems to be the unlucky number here. If you enter it, you can be sure to die. Anyway, the exact path is XI, XIII, II, V, VII, XI. - Another screen I love. The monsters are invincible, but you have to attract them to the holes. Following the color scheme you can see on the bottom of the screen, when the correct monsters falls, the hole will close. Close all four holes, and the exit will appear. - Boss! Mutated Mrs. Pine. She's a real wimp. She can't hurt you, but that sort of cannons can. Shoot like mad while avoiding the spiked balls, and let them hurt Mrs. Pine instead of you. There are some safe spots here and there, but if you stand still, Pine always seems to stay away from you. Hey, not stupid. Follow Nigel P. Spankenbury (trap stages) - Mmmh, quite a puzzle. Be careful, because if you move some object in the wrong way, there will be no alternatives than death. Let's start: pust the stone down until you can move one mirror, using it to deflect a fireball and destroy the flamethrower. Resume pushing the stone down, then push it left, to obstruct the flamethrower in the bottom left corner. In the meantime, a new flamethrower will appear in place of the first you destroyed. Go up, push the switch which opens the exit and move the mirror near it to destroy the new flamethrower. Finally, use the last mirror to destroy the last flamethrower. - ARGH! This is terrible! There's no particular strategy with this trap, you need only great timing. The only hint I can give is that I find easier moving through the opening of the wall coming from the upper left, then through the wall coming from the bottom right. If it wasn't for that... Cymbals?, it would be a lot easier. And don't think it's finished! Stay in the center of the screen to let the exit come towards you, or you will be splatted! - Not terrible like the previous screen, but timing is required to move from a platform to another. They have quite unpredictable changes of speed, so patience... - Boss! Mutated Spankenbury. Your shots can't harm him, so you will have to lure his head, and let him bite his own tail. Moving in large circles, than restricting the path, is a good strategy to make the head bite the tail even two or three times in a row. After 15 hits, he will be history. SCENE III - Stand on the glowing platform to morph into a lobster-man (hey... Don't tell me the dominion of the Sea King is called T'Leth :b ). Now, you can shoot fireballs with button 1, while button 2 generates a little flame which follows you. And, if you shoot it, a bigger fireball will be created. So, use it to destroy the wall. - Normal fireballs can't harm the golems, so use the big ones, and use the columns as a repair from their rage. Beware: their pieces scatter around when they are destroyed! - On my first play, I considered this screen one of the most (if not THE MOST) frustating ones. Wrong! If done correctly, it is a real breeze. Move to the bottom of the screen, generate a little flame, and quickly walk to the screen's upper border. Following you, the flame will touch the switch in the center, and you will be exactly where the exit appears. You ask: if not? Well, the exit MOVES. And the blue balls start shooting dozens of bullets. Let's see if you don't lose any lives now... - You have to wait for the skull opening its mouth. The key here is, don't panic, be calm, and use all your precision to destroy that sort of meteors before they move out of the screen, exploding in little, dangerous fragments. Another frustrating screen, turning to be not so difficult... (Developer's note: The skull actually moves when the rocks are destroyed. Keep blasting them long after the door is free and it will change into a "special" door that leads to a room where you can gain lives each time you hit our mascot). - First, destroy all the wood panels. Then, move to the upper right corner of the closed area, face up, and shoot. Your shot will bounce and touch the switch to the exit. WARNING: If you shoot the wrong panel, sometimes the shot bounces around and it's harmful for you. - After that terrible screen in Spankenbury's path (if you chose it, obviously), this trap is nothing special. Just a little timing and precision, and it's done. - Another "waiting" trap. The stone face blocks the exit, and rocks fall from everywhere. Wait until they destroy the face, and flee. There are some spots that are safe, or at least where rocks don't fall frequently. One of them is directly under the face. - Dust will be turned back to human form, but he will keep the ability to create little flames. - Now, Dust will use "something" (cockroach? Hamster? Model car?) to help him disable the electric lines. Move the thing slowly past the wires, paying attentions to the lethal sparks, and reach the little exit in the bottom left corner. - Maybe the most useless puzzle of the game. The labyrinth changes continuously, but reaching the yellow ball is absolutely not difficult. Touch it. - Now the path is cleared, use the exit in the bottom right corner. - DON'T MOVE! Wait for the white lightning (?) to pass, to see the position of the mines scattered throughout the screen, and move cautiously to the exit. - "Oh, s**t!" The Sea King himself! The left hand stomps the ground repeatedly, so wait for the right one to pass, and run to the bottom of the screen! - The legs: start to climb the left one, jump to the right one to avoid the hand, quickly jump back to the left one, and finish climbing. - Dragon's Lair style! Hit Down quickly! - Press Up only when the arrow appears, and Dust won't fall in the stomach. Climb back up. - Move to the bottom right corner, you will be safe from the tongue, then shoot it like mad. - Now you will be spitted, along with your own knives. Avoid them while falling. BUG ALERT! You could be safe by staying a little out of the right border of the screen, but sometimes Dust will remain stuck there, and you will have to restart the entire game! - The Final Clash! Never stop here, keep moving to avoid the energy globes shot by the pendant. Its "laser" and Poseidon's "ice breath" are not difficult to avoid, just don't stand in front of them. And keep in mind that the hands alternatively come from the sides. Shoot the head like mad and he'll eventually flee (die? It seems strange to me...). The pendant is yours! Congratulations!