ATARISOFT CENTIPEDE Cartridge Instructions -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE ENCHANTED FOREST One glorious spring day you hike into a dense forest that you've never before explored. As you push deeper into the woods, the trees close up behind you and the forest grows increasingly dark and ominous. You get a creepy feeling and decide to go back. A chill plays up and down your spine when you turn and realize you're lost. You collapse onto a flat rock beneath an enormous spreading tree and try to regain you sense of direction. A grey squirrel chatters at you. "How do I get out of here?" you sigh out loud. NOTE: Always turn the console POWER switch OFF before inserting or removing the cartridge. To your amazement, the squirrel speaks! "Help us and we'll show you the way home," promises the squirrel. "What?" "This is an enchanted forest," explains the squirrel. "We peace-loving animals must suffer the hostile attacks of an evil Centipede, a deadly spider, a venomous flea, and a poisonous scorpion. We've waited a long time for a heroic human to enter our realm and release us from the Centipede's cruel dominion. Will you help?" "I guess so. But how?" The forest rustles as dozens of small animals rally around you. Rabbits, birds, deer, raccoons, maskrats, butterflies - and more creatures than you can name - appear. A bird flies over, releasing three white feathers. "Catch those," the squirrel instructs. As you catch the feathers, they transform into three glowing wands. "Now you can go to battle for us," says the squirrel. "With those magic wands, you can shoot sparks at the Centipede. When any section of the Centipede is hit, it turns into a powerless mushroom. You can also stun the spider, flea, and scorpion with sparks, and they will disappear for a short time. But, if one of them bites you before you spark it, you lose consciousness and your magic wand is snatched away." Suddenly, you hear a leaf-shaking shriek and the animals scurry about in a frenzy of terror. "Look out!" cries the squirrel. "Here comes the Centipede!" -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- GAME OBJECTIVE Use your magic wands to score as many points as possible by eliminating the poisonous pests. Use strategy and quick thinking to stay alive. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- GAME PLAY You start the game with three magic wands. Every time you score 10,000 points, you win a bonus wand. When you lose your last magic wand, the game ends. If the Centipede, spider or flea bits you, your wand is snatched away and you become temporarily paralyzed. The game stops momentarily and all the mushrooms are counted for bonus points. Your points are added to your running score, and the rejuvenated Centipede attacks again from the top. You must replay the previous wave until the Centipede is totally destroyed. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- THE POISONOUS PESTS CENTIPEDE Consisting of 10 segments, the Centipede attacks from the top of the screen and winds down toward you. Each time you hit a segment, it becomes a powerless mushroom. The body segment behind that mushroom becomes the head of a new Centipede. The Centipede attacks in five progressively harder waves. You play each wave twice. In wave 1, the Centipede is composed of a head attached to nine body parts. In wave 2, it has a head attached to seven body parts plus a detached head with one body part. The wave 3 Centipede is composed of five body segments with one head attached and two detached heads - each with a body. The Centipede continues to transform a body segment into a head until wave 5, at which time it has five independently moving heads, each with a body part. MUSHROOMS Dotting the floor are mushrooms. The Centipede slides along horizontally in one direction. When it touches a mushroom or the edge of the screen, it drops down to the next row of mushrooms and reverses direction. It takes three hits to eliminate a mushroom. SPIDER The spider jumps all over the battlefield, destroying some of the mushrooms it touches. The closer to the spider comes, the more points you score when you zap it. FLEA The flea starts bugging you after you shoot away most of the mushrooms near you. It drops straight down, creating mushrooms as it falls. You must hit the flea twice to make it disappear. Warning: After the first shot, the flea drops twice as fast! SCORPION The scorpion scurries across the battlefield, poisoning every mushroom it touches. It moves faster and appears more frequently as the game progresses. POISONED MUSHROOMS Poisoned mushrooms are created by the scorpion. These are the same color as the attacking Centipede. When the Centipede bumps into a poisoned mushroom, it goes crazy and plunges straight through the field of mushrooms toward you. As with normal mushrooms, you must hit a poisoned mushroom three times to destroy it. Each time you lose a wand, all poisoned mushrooms transform back into regular mushrooms. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- CONSOLE AND CONTROLLERS RESET Press the reset button on your console to start the game. Each time RESET is pressed, the game starts over. 2-PLAYER GAME Press the number 2 key on either handheld controller to select and start a 2-Player game. 1-PLAYER GAME To start a 1-player game, press anything on your hand controller except the number 2 key. PAUSE There are two ways to pause play. Simultaneously pressing the number 1 and number 9 keys will cause the screen to go black and pause the game. Or, you can freeze the action by simultaneously pressing the number 1 key and the Clear key. After about 30 seconds, the screen will go black. In either case, press anything on the hand controller to resume play. FIRE BUTTON Press the upper action keys to fire regular shots from your magic wand. Hold in the upper action key for unlimited, repeated firing. AUTO FIRE While playing a game, you can press any keypad key on your hand controller to start an automatic firing mode. To stop auto fire, press the upper action key until it fires a shot. CONTROLLER ACTION Press the disc on your hand controller to move the magic wand in the direction you want it to go. EXTRA SPEED To speed up the movement of your wand, hold down the lower action key on your hand controller. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- SCORING You can score a total of 999,999 points before the score rools back to zero. Point values are listed below. Centipede body segment 10 points Centipede head 100 points Spider (distant range) 300 points Spider (medium range) 600 points Spider (close range - look out!) 900 points Flea 200 points Scorpion 1000 points Mushroom (totally eliminated) 1 point Mushroom (shot 1 to 2 times) 5 points Poison Mushroom (totally eliminated) 1 point Poison Mushroom (shot 1 to 2 times) 5 points Poison Mushroom (not shot at all) 5 points Bonus Wand every 10,000 points -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- HELPFUL HINTS Shoot away mushrooms in a straight to create a "corridor." When the Centipede reaches this "gap," it will fall straight down the battlefield and can be easily picked off. Since the flea doesn't appear until you have eliminated most of the mushrooms near you, you can set up a shield to prevent this lightning-fast pest from striking. Simply refrain from shooting away mushrooms near your magic wand. Shoot Centipede heads to create new heads out of the body segment left behind. Since heads are worth 10 times the point value of body segments, you'll score lots of points. Each creature makes a distinctive sound. By becoming familiar with these sounds, you will know without looking, what is attacking and where it is on the screen. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- ©1983 ATARI, INC. CO24198-54 REV. A All Rights Reserved