- Cave Walker
- Downland
Legend has it that somewhere in the world lies the Great Cave of the Mystics, where the ancient wizards had hidden their gold and riches before they vanished from this earth, to be retrieved by them when they finally return. Of course, it’s just a legend. Or so you thought. But wouldn’t you know it, only day while exploring, you accidentally stumbled across the entrance to the Great Cave. You’re not about to pass up the opportunity to see if the legends are true. So now, with only your wits, you courage and your reflexes, you begin your journey into the Great Cave.
Released by Spectral Associates on disk in 1986, Cave Walker continues the journey of the nameless adventurer from Downland. The relative simplicity of Downland has been replaced by a deeper game, one that even supports saving and loading, but it lacks the pick up and play aspect of Downland. Perhaps to make up for this, Spectral Associates included a practice mode, in which you can explore the majority of the caverns and not die (the first nine caverns are all you can explore in this practice mode, and the ability to save and load is disabled). Cave Walker is much larger than Downland as well, featuring over twenty-five different caverns.
On the surface, Cave Walker resembles Downland, but on top of the screen is an upgraded status bar. The long bar on the far left is your life bar, and the short bar in the center shows you which position your joystick is currently in. As the joystick acts like an analog stick this time around, the further you have it in either the right or left positions is reflected on the bar, which shows you how far you’ll jump. There are also a row of icons that shows you how many of each item that you’re carrying. There are three different types of keys, bags of gold (represented by the dashes in the status bar), umbrellas (which will save you from a fatal fall), rings (which protect you from the Great White Bat) and flasks (which will protect you from fireballs or refill your life when it runs out) among them. There are also one-use items including bread (which help replenish your life), locks (which will open up new passages and make hidden doors visible), crowns (which give you an extra life), diamonds and gold bars (both of which give you two bags of gold).
Two very important items include the Treasure Chest, which allows you entry to the secret vault, and the Spell Books. Once you’ve gathered the three Spell Books (which are done by paying gold bags for them), a very large key will appear in the status bar. This magic key lets you open the Treasure Chest, which in turn opens the secret vault, where the wizards’ treasures lay.
As you travel through the caverns, you’ll encounter “cave phenomena” that will assist you. There are pillars that move up and down, floating islands that will let you cross wide spaces, and springs. These springs can be used in conjunction with the button on the joystick to do things like propel you into the air, or only let you bounce a short distance. All of these can help you navigate the hazards, such as firepits, which not only spew out fireballs but can kill you if you get close to them, steam jets (which look remarkably like laser guns), and cannons that fire missiles. Then there’s the Great White Bat, which was created by the wizards to be the guardian of the caverns. It will wake if you linger too long, and if it bites you, your life bar will be drained by half.
Once you’ve completed Cave Walker, your score is tallied. Of note is the thirty thousand bonus you’ll receive if you manage to finish the game without saving and loading the game more than ten times. This bonus goes down by five hundred points for every time you saved and loaded a game after the tenth time, so if you’re trying to get as high a score as possible, you’d better know the game inside and out.
Despite being marketed as the sequel to Downland, Michael Aichlmayr has completely disowned Cave Walker: “This is not a sequel to Downland, it’s a rip. [Spectral Associates] had nothing to do with writing Downland. They licensed it for me to Tandy. They were just a “middleman.” I did offer to make a sequel, but they told me Tandy wasn’t interested. I suspect this game was created using a lot of my code without my permission. I did not give them a copy of my source code, but they could have disassembled it.”
