You find yourself at the beginning of an awesome trek to gain the secrets of the touchstone. Your main objectives are to stay alive, to collect the wonderous treasures and get the keys to the vaults beneath the levels. Various monsters appear at strategic points throughout the mazes, intent upon stopping you reaching your goal. But Ra, in his infinite wisdom, has equipped you with a ray of light which shoots from your eyes, killing anything in your path.

11 Levels, 60 Screens, 100% machine code. High res graphics, sound and many intriguing extras. 1 or 2 players. Joysticks required.

Make sure your joystick(s) are connected to their appropriate ports. For one player use the left port only.

The number of players is selected at the beginning of the game when the "1 or 2 Players" question is asked. The player selects the number of players by moving the left joystick left for 1 player, or by moving it right for 2 players, and then by pressing the left fire button.

A player controls his man by using the appropriate joystick, and fires by pressing the corresponding fire button. The left player uses the left joystick and the right player uses the right joystick.

At the beginning of each level, an appropriate amount of time is allocated to complete the level. Time is not a critical consideration while playing; but, when it has expired, the player loses his ability to fire; meaning an almost sure end to the game. Also, remaining time is converted to bonus points.

Treasures are located throughout the mazes in treasure chambers. You get a treasure by walking past the open side of the chamber that contains the prize. The varied treasures are vases, anks and rings.

Treasures are scored in the following way:

Keys are loacted in treasure chambers throughout the mazes, and are retrieved in the same manner as treasures. Keys are worth 500 points. You can only carry one key at a time, making it necessary to go back to the front of the maze to pick up other keys. There is only one type of key, and it opens any door.

Doors are located towards the end of mazes. Doors are worth 1,000 points when opened by a key.

A bonus is awarded at the end of each level. The bonus amount is 100 times the remaining time.

Zoom chambers transport you vertically in the maze. These are handy, because monsters are not able to pass through them. Zoom chambers can be identified by a space partially surrounded by bricks with a blue bracket shape pointing towards the space. One entering a zoom chamber, you are moved vertically to a chamber which looks similar.

Poof chambers are locations where monsters appear in the maxes. Poof chambers can be identified by a space partially surrounded by bricks with a blue 'E' shape pointing toward the space. Also, monsters will come from these locations.

Freezes activated by pressing the SPACE bar. It freezes monster movement for approximately five seconds, allowing the player to manoeuvre through the monsters to a safe location. Monsters may be shot while frozen.

An extra man and freeze is awarded every 50,000 points. A player can accumulate a total of five men and three freezes.

The current game can be stopped temporarily by pressing ENTER. Play is resumed by pressing any key.

The current game can be aborted by pressing BREAK.

The screen is divided into two parts: the score box and the maze window. The score box, located at the top of the screen, displays both players' scores and the high score. It also displays number of men as heads, number of freezes as lamps, a key if you are carrying a key, current level, and time remaining on that level. Only the current player, denoted by an "UP" next to his score has his current status shown. When play switches to the next player, his status will then be shown. The maze window, located at the bottom of the screen shows one screen full of the current maze. When needed, the window moves over the maze horizontally giving the appearance that the screen shifts.

The 11 levels to Touchstone are made of four distinct mazes. Each of these mazes is on the average six screens long, providing at least 20 screens of original smooth-scrolling adventure. On successive times through a maze, an extra door is added. The order of these mazes and the number of doors for each maze is shown below.

All but first three levels repeated.

There are five different animated monsters in Touchstone. These are a squirming snake, a creeping spider, a rolling ball, a fluttering butterfly, and a spastic spark. Players don't see some monsters until higher levels. Also, in harder play, some of the monsters move faster than the man. A monster's main objective is to touch the player without getting killed. To accomplish this, monsters use many techniques including attacking from the top or bottom and dodging a player's ray.

Game difficulty increases smoothly throughout the game. Play starts with four slow monsters and increases at an appropriate rate to five monsters that move at double, and even triple, the player's speed. Poof frequency also increases at higher levels.

CLOADM (ENTER)

The game will run automatically after loading.