TIME SEARCH Millenium Software, 1983 ======================== Solution by Exemptus - December 2022 Overview and general hints: --------------------------- The scenario of this game concerns the Time Stabilizer, a device which can create a "time bubble" around an area, isolating it away from the rest of the world. For some reason, this was kept somewhere in Herefordshire, England, but something has gone wrong, the Stabilizer has been activated, and the whole county is being kept frozen in time. We are told that only the legendary Crystal of Mirrors can help us mend the Time Stabilizer by looking into the past, so we are sent off to sort this mess out. This scenario is probably inspired by Doctor Who, although the game does not make any explicit mention of the show's elements. However, the idea reminds us a lot of a typical Time-lording plot where the Doctor must fix some mischief caused by the pesky Master. We have a quest-type Quilled adventure: we need to explore the county, find the objects that will help in our plight, locate both the Crystal and the Stabilizer, and fix the latter, we are not told how, so we'll have to figure that out as well. As is typical with Quill fare, the game uses R to redescribe locations, LOOK or EXAMINE to inspect things, and NESWUD for directions, as well as NE, SE, SW, NW, ENTER and EXIT. Score is kept internally, but not displayed: we get 100% if and only if we finish the game. Vocabulary is otherwise predictable, except that GRAB/HOLD/GRIP is separate from GET/TAKE, UNDO is used (and needed) in lieu of UNBOLT, and UNSCREW is a different verb. We also have 4 inventory slots, plus wearables. The geography of the game is largely consistent, and not only that, it covers about 40 real-world locations in Herefordshire. Not that this is integral to the solution, but it's a nice touch. There are relatively few objects, no random elements, and no red herrings: everything serves a purpose. Hunger is a factor, but not an important one, since eating once (there are two food items) gives us ample time to finish the game. Puzzles are subtler than expected. There are clues, but they are well concealed, particularly regarding some codes or sequences which we need to find. It pays to examine things thoroughly, as not everything is what it seems, and to pay attention to descriptions: at least one puzzle relies on location text that is *very* likely not to be noticed at all. True darkness is just used in a single place, but a light source is needed anyway, and it also contributes to another puzzle. The game has a HELP feature, where we can ask for a hint for many objects, some of which are a bit tangential. It is only really needed once, since there are enough clues all around, but your mileage may vary. In any case, it's a nice thing to have. Walkthrough: ------------ [We begin in the city of Hereford, which is roughly at the centre of the map. It will be a kind of base for us. The first thing we do is gather a few objects that are scattered around, particularly the food.] S SW GET TORCH SW E E GET GLOVES WEAR GLOVES [We'll keep the gloves on, even if they're not needed until the end] N [A brass key is here] GET BRASS S S ENTER GET SPADE EXIT S S S [Base of Yat Rock] U [We are up Yat Rock, before a cliff. Notice in the description it mentions the sides are covered with trees and bushes. Also notice that we see something bright just over the safety wall. We'll investigate it, since we're here.] CLIMB WALL [The wall crumbles and we fall off the cliff] [But we don't die yet, as we can continue falling; on the way down we notice the bright thing was an old tin can, which is of no value to us. Now the idea is to get out of the falling predicament. Remember the trees we were just told about?] GRAB TREE [We grab it and stop the fall; we can also see a purse here] [The purse is actually a trap, since if we get it we'll slip and fall, for good this time. We can CLIMB UP the rock and get back to the top, but the interesting thing is the other way.] CLIMB DOWN [We slide down the side, get to the bottom, and see some pliers here] GET PLIERS [Our inventory is topped up, so back to base] N N NW NW N N N [Back in Hereford] DROP PLIERS DROP SPADE [The torch and brass key we'll need in a moment] ENTER [The old black & white house; there is a locked door here] UNLOCK DOOR OPEN DOOR DROP BRASS [key] ENTER [Everything is dark] ON TORCH [Oh my, the Crystal is here] GET CRYSTAL D [This is a metal complex, no doubt hidden below the old house, and a good candidate for the Time Stabilizer hideout.] S E SW [There is a biscuit here, which we can ignore at this time; it is food] S [Note there are blue, green and red lines going in several directions] S [Steel door with red flashing sign and a code keypad] [This is likely to be the door we want to open, but we don't have the code.] N W N W W [Smaller room with a screwdriver and a notice] GET SCREWDRIVER READ NOTICE [It says "NO SMOKING", but this is not a clue] N [A smaller room with vents; let's have a closer look] EXAMINE VENT [the vent is screwed to the duct openings] UNSCREW VENT [the vent falls to the ground] DROP SCREWDRIVER [not needed anymore] ENTER [Into the duct] S [The vents split in two. The S path ends here, and we can see the outer vent is welded to the wall here, so this is a dead end. But we can also see the room at the other side through the bars. It doesn't take a lot to realise this must be the room behind the door we saw before locked with a code. We notice a spanner and a sign on the other side of the room's door which reads "RE-ENTRY CODE - 97,,,,,,", the rest being obscured by a shelf. This must be the numeric code used to open the door, but we can only make out the first two digits.] [Also, if you have followed this walkthrough, you should have started to get hungry around now. We'll get that attended to in a moment.] GET SPANNER N W [There is a manhole cover above] U [Back in Hereford] [From now on, we can go D from here to enter the complex through the vents again if we wish. There are other two entrances to it: one is from the house, which we used before, and another is to go E from the location N of here.] DROP SPANNER OFF TORCH DROP TORCH N NE NE [There is food here] GET FOOD EAT FOOD [This fixes the hunger bit] NW [Bank Street; we see a path going down to the river] D [The crystal glows and in a moment we fall asleep] [In our dream we see five horsemen coming out of the river and galloping towards us.] WAIT [We wait, the riders pass through, and a sword mysteriously remains] GET SWORD U [Back to Bank Street] W SW W W [Kington] N [We see a pub with the sign creaking on the wind] READ SIGN ["The Five Horsemen"; hmmm, might the sword be of use here maybe?] ENTER N [There are stairs down here] [If we went D from here either carrying the torch or not carrying the sword, we would be told that a mysterious force prevents us. We need to carry the sword but not the torch, which is what we have done.] D [There are two eerie red eyes looking at us from the dark] E [We realize we can't move and are trapped here forever... or maybe not?] RAISE SWORD [Tremendous forces sweep us away] [We are sent back to Kington again, but this time we can see a ring here that wasn't before. The sword has disappeared, taken away by the Mystical Forces.] GET RING S W [Hay-on-Wye, by an office building with a brass plate] READ PLATE [It says "9779 Main Entrance. SPARK & SOLDER inc. Electronic Engineers. Founded: 1983." But wait a minute. Where did we read of a number beginning with 97? Yes, the famous 8-digit code for the steel door in the complex. Since there are eight digits here, we have good reason to assume the code is 97791983. We note that for later reference.] ENTER [The office only has a locked cabinet] PUSH CABINET [It slides, revealing some papers] EXAMINE PAPERS [There is a plan of a machine with the inscription "Addition: turn red lever right." We don't know what this means, but we file it for later on. The cabinet doesn't hold anything else of value and, anyway, it can't be opened.] EXIT E E S [Madley; there is a church here, which we need to keep in mind] S S [Outside a building in a radar base] ENTER [There is circuit board here] GET BOARD EXIT N N E N [Hereford again] [We have all that we need. We'll use the crystal one last time to induce another vision of the past, and we get to use the spade as well.] DROP BOARD DROP RING GET SPADE E E E [By an old house; the crystal glows again] ENTER [The interior is hazy and indistinct, but we can see a door here] [Without the crystal, this door is impregnable, and a force field will prevent us from passing, but now we can go through.] OPEN DOOR [We enter] [We see a boy looking at a silver chalice with an inscription on it and he places it in a chest in the corner of the room. There's nothing else to do here so we can leave.] W [Now this is the trick: if we OPEN DOOR again, the room will change to the present and become an enclosed garden, since it was long ago that it crumbled to dust.] OPEN DOOR DIG [We dig several feet and a chest can be seen] OPEN CHEST [We find the silver chalice] GET CHALICE EXAMINE CHALICE [it's silver and has an engraved inscription] READ INSCRIPTION [The chalice reads "When I return from whence I came, the many coloured lights will help your game." Right. This is obscure: it takes a bit of a leap to notice that a stained glass window, like those found in churches, is a possible source for "many coloured lights". We will be helped with this thought, at any rate.] W EXIT W W W [Hereford again] DROP CRYSTAL [Not needed anymore] S W [Madley again, but now there is another description pointing at the church] ENTER [There is a high plinth here] PUT CHALICE [The chalice reflects the colours of the window and the room spins] [This sets off another magic spell and the chalice is replaced by a marble statue holding a golden key.] GET GOLDEN [key] EXIT [The golden key is used to unlock a book in the Hay-on-Wye bookshop, which we haven't yet seen, but it has a golden seal so it's easy to link them in hindsight.] W S ENTER [Library] UNLOCK BOOK [It opens to a particular page] READ BOOK ["Steer the letters / thrice around, / to start again, / the secrets found / Red and green / should be heeded, / the word you find / shall be needed!." This requires a bit of pondering. Basically this encodes a password as a cryptic clue: the letters of STEER form an anagram with the meaning "to start again", that is, RESET. The second verse tells what to do with this password, but it will probably tell us nothing at this point as we haven't found the "red and green" yet. This is what the ring is for, so we'll get there in a moment.] LOCK BOOK [Let's be tidy and leave things as they were] DROP GOLDEN [key] EXIT N E E N [Hereford again] GET BOARD GET RING [We'll need these] S S S SE S [Disused farm buildings - we can see the door is open] ENTER [Stables; there is a metal plate on the wall] EXAMINE PLATE [There is a small circular recess] EXAMINE RECESS [About 1 inch] INSERT RING [It fits - then a wall crumbles down, revealing a hidden room] ENTER [The room is packed full of electronics, including a monitor with a red and green display with a slot which says INSERT CODE UNIT. No doubt this is the item the book verse meant before. Good thing we brought the circuit board.] INSERT BOARD [The auto-destruct sequence is active and asking for a keyword] RESET [The monitor is up and prints something, then everything switches off] [Some instructions are printed reading (sic) "TIME STABALIZER 6/001A: DESTRUCT SEQUENCE CODE / Status - ABORT PROG / cut BLUE / cut RED / turn BLUE switch to left." If we look back, we found an additional clue saying that we should add "turn red switch to right" to something: well, it looks like this is it. So we are told that the sequence to disarm the time stabilizer is: cut blue, cut red, turn blue to left, turn red to right". We have all we need, Now we just have to get to the time stabilizer (which we already had found, presumably, behind the keypad door in the complex) and that's that.] [For the final trip we'll need the gloves, which we have been wearing anyway, the spanner, and the pliers, so let's get these first.] EXIT N NW N N N [Hereford] GET SPANNER GET PLIERS D [Into the complex through the manhole we opened] E E E E SW S S [Before keypad door; time to enter the code] 97791983 [The door opens] ENTER [Electronics everywhere, with a raised cabinet at the centre] EXAMINE CABINET [It has a metal plate with four bolts, numbered 1 to 4] UNDO BOLTS [It says we need to undo the bolts in the right sequence] [This is another puzzle, thrown in for good measure. So far we haven't because the game provided enough clues, but now we are forced to ask for HELP, since there are no hints anywhere else.] HELP [With what object? OK, we need to be more specific] HELP SPANNER [A bit odd, but neither HELP BOLT nor HELP NUT work here] [The help says "To start a count from 1 to 4, / You have to use a basic law! / Change the odds, / The law will bend, / And move the start to the end!." Fine, not the best of verses, but we need to just find the right permutation of 1234, and there are 24 of them, not too many, so we could do this by trial and error. In any case, the "change the odds" bit means that we need to exchange each pair odd-even in the sequence, which "moves the start to the end" as well. So the right permutation is 2143.] 2143 [We remove the plate, and see blue and red switches, plus wires coloured red, blue, orange, white and green. But we know what to do.] CUT BLUE [With the pliers] CUT RED TURN [Colour and direction?] BLUE LEFT TURN [Colour and direction?] RED RIGHT [A drawer opens] [The drawer contains the rod that powers the Stabilizer, and we just have to remove it. This is where the gloves are needed, since the rod itself happens to be radioactive.] GET ROD [Success: the Time Stabilizer is off and normality is restored!] [End of game.]