FATHOM by Imagic c 1983 Game program designed by Rob Fulop Graphics assisted by Michael Becker and Wilfredo Aguilar Titans have imprisoned Neptina, Neptune's daughter! They've shattered his magical Trident and scattered its pieces far and wide. Without his trident, Neptune is powerless. Proteus, a member of Neptune's Court, longs to free the lovely mermaid. He sets out to find the missing pieces of the Trident. He roams land and sea, changing from a dolphin to a seagull and back again in order to deceive the mermaid's captors. Deadly trials confront Proteus -- octopuses, tangled beds of kelp, screaming flocks of black birds, even erupting volcanoes! But he fights on valiantly! OBJECTIVES ---------- Locate the three missing pieces of Neptune's Trident and free Neptune's daughter 7 times from her prison at the bottom of the sea. * Switch forms from dolphin to seagull to search the sea and the sky for the three pieces of the Trident. * Learn to make magical stars appear in the sky and the starfish appear in the sea. They are your key to finding the Trident pieces! * Once you have the Trident, swing to the bottom of the sea and free the mermaid! Hurry! Time is ticking down! GETTING STARTED --------------- * Insert cartridge and turn power on. * To begin action: Flip Game Reset Lever. * Time begins ticking down when the dolphin dives underwater. DIVING DOLPHIN -------------- * You begin every game as a dolphin. * To swim, press and hold the red button. Release the button to stop swimming. * Use the joystick to control the direction the dolphin swims. * As you swim, avoid octopuses and strings of seaweed. You lose valuable points if you touch them. * Touch all the SEA HORSES you can. * You earn points for every sea horse you touch. * A starfish may appear if you manage to touch all the sea horses in one section before leaving that section. * You can acquire a piece or pieces of the Trident by touching starfish. The Trident parts will appear at the bottom of the screen. * Touch the right number of sea horses and a bird symbol appears at the bottom of your screen. With it you can turn into a seagull when you surface. [Image of the screen. The colors I use are the ones in the picture inside the manual. The dolphin is the character you control and is yellow. The Octopus look more like jellyfish. Their tops and red, and their tentacles are white. The seaweed looks like green plants. The sea horse has a white head and a purple tail. The following objects are located below the playing screen. The fish symbol looks like your dolphin. The bird symbol looks like a cross between a "v" and a picture of a bulls head (like the Long Horn's of Texas logo). The trident looks like a fancy fork. The fish symbol, bird symbol and trident are all yellow-orange. The level number is the white number that is between 1 and 9 (on the left), and the time/score is the other white number (on the right). WINGIN' IT ---------- When the dolphin leaps out of the water, you'll become the seagull, provided you have the bird symbol. * To fly, press the red button once for each flap of your wings. * The more often you press, the higher and faster you'll fly. * To glide, stop pressing the button. * Use the joystick to direct the seagull. * Fly off the screen to the right or left, as well as up into the clouds. Each time you free Neptina, you can fly farther and higher than before! * Touch the pink CLOUDS. * You earn points for every pink cloud you touch. * A star may appear if you manage to touch all the clouds in one section of the sky before leaving that section. * Remember: stars are your key to finding pieces of the Trident! * You have a limited number of chances to touch pink clouds before they turn grey. * Grey clouds can also lead to lucky stars, but touching grey clouds costs you points! * Touch the right number of clouds and a fish symbol appears at the bottom of the screen. With it you can change back into a dolphin. * Avoid running into black birds. Collisions subtract points from your score! [Image of the screen. The black birds are the black things that fly. The pink clouds are the pink fluffy things. The star is the yellow five pointed star that has lines coming out of it (showing that it is shinning). The seagull is the bird that you control. Its body is white, its wings are grey, and the tip of its wings are black.] FLYING THE HORIZON ------------------ * After changing into a seagull, while the dolphin appears on the screen, you can only fly to the left or right. * Once the dolphin is out of view, you can fly higher. * Similarly, when a volcano appears on screen, you can only fly to the left or right, not up. Once the volcano is out of view, you can fly higher. * Eerie volcanoes cover the landscape. You cannot pass the first volcano until you succeed in freeing Neptina for the first time. After that, you can reach more distant volcanoes each time you free the mermaid. * Each time you free the mermaid, the gods extend the territory you can cover by adding one section each of sky, land, and sea in every direction. * With more territory to cover, each level becomes more difficult! Finding a lucky star on higher levels will take a lot of shill and daring! Good luck! SCORING ------- * The Level number appears at the bottom left of the screen. All games begin at Level 1. * If you free Neptina, you automatically advance to the next level (2, 3 etc.). Your score for the new Level returns to 50. * When you free Neptina, the points you earn on the Level are added to the point bank with the total number of points earned on all previous Levels. * The points you earn are multiplied by the Level number you are on. Example: Earn 50 points on Level 2 and 100 points are stored in the point bank (50 x 2 = 100). FOR A HIGH SCORE * Run into all the sea horses and pink clouds you can. They're worth points. * Avoid obstacles -- black birds, grey clouds, octopuses, seaweed and volcanoes. They cost you points! * Time freezes when the dolphin and the seagull appear on screen together. Otherwise you lose points as the seconds tick away. GAME ENDS WHEN: * Your points reach zero. When this happens, the dolphin or seagull disappears. To resume play, hit Game Reset. * You run out of chances to get starfish. This happens when sea horses stop appearing before the dolphin succeeds in getting a fish symbol to appear. To resume play, hit Game Reset. * When the game end, you will see your final score. The number of levels you achieved is indicated by the number of hears that appear. * Free the mermaid seven times and watch for a special surprise! SURVIVING LEVEL ONE! -------------------- Here's how to fin and fly through Level 1. After that you're on your own! As the dolphin swims down, octopuses and two sea horses appear. Touch both sea horses. Then touch the starfish that appears. A piece of the Trident now shows at the bottom of the screen. Note: You must reach both sea horses and the starfish without leaving that section of the sea. If you don't, return to the surface and try again. Next dive through lines of seaweed. More sea horses appear. touch one and a bird symbol shows at the bottom of your screen. Return to the surface now, or try to reach other sea horses for additional points. Jump out of the water when you reach the surface. Fly to the left or right. Land appears. Flap your wings hard and fly up. Touch two pink clouds in that section of the sky and a star appears. Touch it. You'll have another piece of the Trident. Return to the dolphin. Fly until you reach land on the other side. Repeat the game of tag with pink clouds. Touch one pink cloud and acquire a fish symbol; touch the other and a star appears. Touch the star and the third piece of the Trident is yours. Return to the dolphin, change forms and dive for the bottom. when you arrive, the mermaid's prison will dissolve. And of course, this game was made by IMAGIC in 1983. This game manual was typed in by me! Who am I? I am Eddie Beiles. I can be reached at [email protected] if you have any questions about this game manual. Or you can email me and thank me for typing it in. Anyway, enjoy the game and this wonderfully typed in manual.