Having played this game and its predecessor Windmere Estate I can aver that the layout for the two games is not the same.

I have never resorted to such Machiavellian techniques before but I finally succumbed to Ciderpress to try and find out how to enter the castle. After poring over the source code I still can't find the relevant section.

This version is bugged and can't be solved without changing the code. When you drop the rats in the torture room the grate should open, but this does not happen although the text does mention it.

What changes to the code did you make Alex? I am always loathe to "cheat" but when it comes down to bugs like the rats puzzle I think that Ciderpress is justified in this instance.

I am also considering another assault on Windmere Estate where I have previously amassed 23 of the 28 treasures but got stuck a while ago, so much so that I have forgotten the game play so I will probably have to start again.

I changed the memory location containing the room number to 9c after dropping the rats. Unfortunately I did not write down the memory location of the rooms in my notes, but if you want to I can search for it again. I should have some spare time to do that this weekend.

I already found it :) After you drop the rats you have to change the value of address 51D6 from 99 to 9C return to the game, LOOK and it should be open.

Thanks a lot for that, I hope to have a run at it in the next few days or so. I will have another pop at Windmere as well I think as I was pretty near the end when I got stuck; not sure if that was a bug too or my own inability to solve it. I had 23 of the 28 treasures if memory serves me correctly.

I looked a bit better today. It is a bit more difficult as the location in this game is stored in several addresses among them 5199 and 51D6. Apart from that the exits also have to be changed. I guess I changed one of the exits of room 99 to room 9c which is easier. Sorry. I'll check one of these days and I'll come back to it and I'll explain how to change the exit.

Changing the room is rather complicated in this game as the location is not stored as it is in most games, but the easy alternative is when you are in the torture room, after you've dropped the rats. Change the value of address 5485 to 9c. When you return to the game and you go N, you end up in the torture room with the open grate. Not a very nice solution, but it works.

By the way the Dynacomp catalogue does not state this game has the same layout/map as Windmere Estate, but that is has the same program layout which is a different thing. The game is clearly based on the same code, but changed into a different theme/locations. For instance the vampire bat has been changed into a dragon.

Having hit an impasse in Whembly Castle due to the intrasigence of the rowboat I thought I'd try another game from the same stable as it were, although the version I am playing is the North Star one. Whether this version, like the Dynacomp one has the same bug with the cellar door or not I don't know yet but the Catacombs are a problem. Every few moves when going in the right direction I receive a "You are not defined" message and the game exits. Ac a result I took to saving my position every three or four moves until I came out of the opposite end ok. Whether this happens with the oil lamp alight I am not sure but you have to turn it off or it is burnt out by the time that you get to the other end as the whole path is made up of 29 rooms.

Alex - in the Dynacomp version of this game can you remember if you were able to go N from the rear door of the castle? The North Star version claims that "You are at the rear door. There is a path leading north" yet you cannot go in that direction.

OK I can confirm that the bug in the Torture Chamber is happily not there in the North Star version. Fingers crossed now that I can see it through to the end with no more bugs to prevent completion.

I have managed to crank up my score to 365 out of 470 now but I may have hit another error. The Rear Door location is described as having a path leading north but moving north elicits "you cannot go that way." Whether this is a game breaker I don't know.

Alex I have now deposited 25 treasures in the Gilded Cock and have attained 465 out of 470 points completely unaided. I am however at something of a loss as how to deliver the final coup de grâce. The bow and arrow and dog have never contributed anything so I wonder if they are salient points and whether the well is just scenery or not.

Sorry for the late reply, but I overlooked your earlier comments. Problem with the comments when asking a question is I only see the latest few commands, so if there are a lot of them at one day I ll miss them. If you want to be sure that I read your question, it is safer to ask them on the forum.

yes there is a connection from the backdoor to the north, but those rooms can also be reached from another place within the castle. The dog is a very useful object. if you give a list of the treasures you ve found I can look which ones are missing.

The bow and arrow are involved in the same puzzle as the dog, but they are not needed as the dog is better. I dont think I used the well.

Interesting. I am now only five points short of the full tally yet I still haven't used the arrow or the dog. I also can't go north from the rear door for unspecified reasons.

I have deposited all the treasure in the requisite place and have actually scored 480 out of 470 points, i.e. more than the maximum! I suspect that the game's ending is bugged in the North Star version as you cannot go north from the rear of the castle despite the direction being clearly described as there.

How did you handle the dragon?
That does not seem ok having 480 points. You know that the dog apart from being very helpfull also gives 5 points for being a treasure?

When you have dropped all 28 treasures you should be transported to the end game.

Yes I worked out the use for the dog and the bow as well as the points for the dog. The only treasure I was missing was the one in the study the finding of which is as usual predicated on using obscure parsing. All 28 treasures are in the correct silo to give me ten more points than the purported optimum. Nothing is triggered.

Interestingly enough I am now trying another North Star game, Whembly Castle albeit by a different author. In my first assault it was impossible to board the boat. However, having restarted and not spent two hours mapping the maze as I could just follow my map that I hitherto created I can board the boat with exactly the same game play as in my first attempt. ENTER BOAT parses "you can't do that" using my first save game file but works second time after restarting from scratch. Looking on Renga In Blue it appears I am not the only one to stumble on this anomaly.

I suspect this is a game where multiple save game slots are to be avoided if at all possible.

Sorry - I neglected to answer your question. I dealt with the dragon via toxophily although I noted that this method only provides a temporary respite. Later I realised that if you carry (or meta carry if we are being pedantic) a certain object then the dragon never appears. There is a similar conceit in another of the author's games, viz. the vampire bat in Windmere Estate.