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This is a ZX Spectrum inspired platform game where you are tasked with collecting all the coins in a level before proceeding to the next one.

The hardest part of developing this was emulating the ZX Spectrums 'colour clash' (which limits only 2 colours to an 8x8 cell) without tanking Pico 8's framerate.

Cart #diceydandangerdungeon-0 | 2023-05-23 | Code ▽ | Embed ▽ | No License
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It also comes with a retro-inspired manual (which can be found here: https://geeitsomelaldy.itch.io/dicey-dans-danger-dungeon )

Text Transcript:

HOW TO PLAY


Dicey Dan has discovered a deep dark dangerous dungeon under his home town. Your job is to guide Dan down this dank and dodgy delve, grab all the treasure, and return home safely! The Dungeons Denizens won’t be too happy to see Dan, and will try to stop him!

From the Beholders who guard the magical mazes, to the dastardly Goblin Queen, and other nefarious fairy- tale creatures who dwell within the depths. Determined to take down any who would disturb the dungeon. Guide Dan through the traps. Some require speed, some require patience, some require mental agility. All require the bravest of souls and the courage of legends!

Dan must collect all the coins (or other treasure) in a stage before the door is open. Once he has all the treasures he must make his way to the door to proceed to the next level.

Dicey Dan is determined, but he isn’t very durable. Dan is no match for the combat prowess of the dungeon’s denizens and will have to retreat if he takes damage. Grabbing a Shield will give Dan the chance to absorb a single hit. This can allow him to skip a difficult puzzle, or reach his goal faster.

CONTROLS


DICEY DAN’S DANGER DUNGEON can be played with a keyboard or with controller

On Foot:
Move: Left/Right D-Pad or Left/Right Arrows
Jump: Button 1, Z/C/B
Use: Button 2, X/V/N
Pause: ENTER/ESCAPE/Pause

On Ropes or Ladders:
Climb: Up/Down D-Pad or Up/Down Arrows
Dismount: Jump or Move Left/Right

Every room has a hidden secret treasure! See if you can find them all!

CHARACTERS

DICEY DAN

DICEY DAN’S is a seasoned adventurer Or so he says. He never seems to come back with any treasure.

POPPIK THE GOBLIN QUEEN

Poppik sees herself as QUEEN OF THE DUNGEON, and has set her Goblin subjects out to patrol and destroy anyone who tries to steal her treasure.

ADAM ANT

New Wave sensation, Adam Ant, has made his home in the dungeon. What he’s doing there, no-one quite knows.

ALF

The last adventurer to brave the dungeon, ALF was never seen again

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I was actually surprised at how good this feels to play. Puzzles are difficult, but mercifully short and there's lots of variety. I love how there was a breather level after a particularly hard one. I'm currently stuck on "Beholder's eye", trying to figure it out.

OMG I'm loving the aesthetic. Totally nails that Spectrum feel. Game plays really well too.

EDIT: OK finished now (152 deaths). That was brilliant! I can't believe you came up with so many interesting single screen puzzle platform levels. The character in the sprites was great, it was reminiscent to me of Manic Miner, but even better gameplay (and I don't say that lightly).

> "Beholder's eye"

That one requires patience and timing. And figuring out the safe zones.

That is an incredible game and really does capture the feel of the old Spectrum games - not just in the colour-clash but in the enemies and layout of the levels.

Really, really well done.



Haha, fun -- will have to dig into this more -- LOVE the "crustiness" of those old games.

I did one adhering to the Atari no-two-colors-on-one-sprite-line rule (except for one pixel in one sprite which might be obvious).

https://www.lexaloffle.com/bbs/?pid=85750#p

Will look forward to more nutty puzzles and rules heh!

Lovely game! 👌
I am a fan of ZX graphics, colour-clash, monochrome etc.. this is why I created this tool to have fullscreen (or smaller) gfx for pico8:
https://www.lexaloffle.com/bbs/?tid=49901
the output is just a p8scii string to simply print on screen, no functions needed for rendering it.

@geeitsomelaldy I see your pset method for intro graphics is quite heavy on both characters (16k) and CPU (1153% 😱) as you may have noticed.

So here's your cart but using the oneoffgfx method to paint the intro screen (3k chars, 18% CPU):
https://www.lexaloffle.com/bbs/files/66501/dddd1offgfx.p8



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