Sherlock Holmes: The Lamberley Mystery - 48K Spectrum INSTRUCTIONS Introduction It was Tuesday 3rd November, 1887. It had been a long two weeks for Holmes and Watson. Not a single case had come along since Holmes had solved the problem of the five orange pips, and Watson feared that Sherlock would soon slip into one of his deep depressions that always came along when he had nothing to excercise his brain. He just had to hope that something would come along soon. Fortunately something did ... Loading Instructions Because of its size, the adventure is split into three parts. You may travel between these parts when you wish and as many times as you like. You will need a blank cassette for this; full instructions will be displayed on screen at the time. But first you will need to start playing the adventure. To load any part (part one in this case) simply type LOAD "" and press ENTER, then press PLAY on your tape recorder and the game will load and run automatically. How To Play At the top of the screen you will notice a status bar. This contains your current score, the day, time and how ouch money you have. (See note on money below). You can input commands one at a time (eg. TAKE KEY) or more than this by separating them (eg. TAKE KEY, EXAMINE IT AND DROP IT). Any symbol other than a letter or a number (eg. . , ? ! @ - etc.) will separate two commands; AND and THEN will also do the same. As many commands as you wish can be chained together, up to a limit of 125 characters long. But please note! If the computer comes across a command which it does not recognise or cannot carry out it will not look at any more commands after it! You can move around using the standard compass directions (ie. N, S, E, W, NW, SE, etc.) and also using UP (or U) and DOWN (or D). And you can use the usual TAKE (or T), DROP (or DR), EXAMINE (EX or X), INVENTORY (or I), etc. (You will find that many verbs can be abbreviated to their initial or first two letters, which will allow you to play the gase faster when you become familiar with them.) LOOK or REDESCRIBE (L or R) will redescribe the current location. WAIT (WA or Z) allows time to pass in one minute steps. SLEEP (SL or C) allows time to pass in fifteen minute steps (useful for cab journeys or waiting for trains). HOUR (HO or 0 (zero)) allows time to pass in steps of one hour (should only be um when a long wait is expected). QUIT (or Q) will erd the game. HELP (or H) may provide the occasional hint. To make the game even easier to play, a number of "high-level" commands have been introduced, such as: AGAIN (or A) to repeat the last command. BACK (or B) to go back to the last location. FOLLOW (or F) to follow a character that has just left your location. TAKE ALL will take every available object in the current location, DROP ALL will do the reverse. To be more specific you can TAKE ALL BUT (object), or TAKE AND AND . You may, at some point, need to be even more specific, by using adjectives. For example, if a red book and a blue book are present you will need to type TAKE RED BOOK or TAKE BLUE BOOK. You will come across a number of containers. To find what they contain simply EXAMINE them. You can put one object at a time in them by typing PUT IN , or all of the objects you are carrying by PUT ALL IN (as long as the objects aren't too big!). You can also, of course, do the ooposite with TAKE FROM . Yo operate doors use OPEN, CLOSE, LOCK and UNLOCK (OP, CL, LO and UN). It is not necessary, when going through a door, to enter (UNLOCK DOOR, OPEN DOOR, W, for example. As long as you have the correct key (if a key is required) you can simply move in the direction of the door and it will unlock and open automatically. You will meet many characters in the game, some of whom may hold information vital to the case. To find out what a character knows, type QUESTION or INTERROGATE . To talk more specifically to a character, you will need to direct your conversation by entering SAY TO "" or SAY "" TO . From then on, if you wish to talk to that character again, you only have to type SAY "", until you wish to talk to another character. Sherlock will need to move from one place to another very quickly; he can do this by using hansom cabs. Whenever there are some cabs around, just HAIL A CAB to get the driver's attention. If someone wants you to pay them money, do this by typing PAY . The correct amount will be given automatically (providing you have enough cash! - see note on money below). Menus The adventure also makes use of menus to make some commands easier to access. Typing MENUS (or M) will cause the game to freeze and the status bar will be replaced by a menu bar. To select an option, use the left and right cursor keys and then press the down key to pull down the chosen menu. When you have selected a menu use the up and down keys to choose your option and the left or right key to select it, Alternatively, you could use a Kempston joystick. Here is a brief description of what the options do ... Buffer: This selects what you wish to use the buffer in memory for: RAM Save (the default option at the start of a new game) will allow to simply store a position to the buffer (using RAMSAVE) and restore it (using RAMLOAD). (NB: If you use the RAMSAVE command at any time the buffer option will revert to RAM Save to prevent the loss of the newly saved position.) AutoSave is similar, but your position is automatically saved by the computer every ten turns (a message is displayed when this is done). RAMLOAD can be used to restore the last AutoSaved position. Oops will cause your position to be automatically saved every turn. Therefore, if you make a fatal mistake, typing OOPS (or O) as the next command will undo it NB: If you should reset the computer the position in the buffer will be lost!! Access: allows you to load and save positions to or from cassette. Keys: lets you program kes 1 and 2 to perform any one command. For example, say if you used the command HIT THE RED DRAGON frequently in the game, instead of typing it out in full every time, select Program Key 2 and enter HIT THE RED DRAGON. From then on,, whenever you want to hit the red dragon you will only have to type 2 and the command will be entered for you, saving you a lot of typing time. Exit (in all menus): simply returns you to the adventure. Money For those unfamiliar with the old system of money, the status bar displays cash in pounds, shillings and pence (£. s. and d.). 12d.=1s. and 20s.=£1 Time Each command you enter will take a minimum of one minute, some may take longer. If you have not entered a command within a minute of the cursor appearing then WAIT will automatically be entered for you and another minute will pass. Hints Question everyone, examine everything and make a map. The phrase SAY TO "FIND " may came in useful.