Tarzan of the Apes

How to play. Version 1.0.0, for the Tronsoft Interactive Fiction Engine Core 2.3.0.

How to begin

Launch the game from your Tronsoft Games library. The cover screen offers two optional settings -- story narration and jungle ambience -- and then a button marked GO ASHORE. Press it. Audio only ever begins after that press, and the whole story is playable in silence.

You begin on the deck of the barque Fuwalda as John Clayton, Lord Greystoke. For the first twenty commands or so you are the father. After that you are his son, for the rest of the game.

Controls

Type a command and press ENTER, or use the buttons under the story window. Nothing in the game requires typing: choose an action button and the CONTEXT row fills with the targets that are valid where you stand. The palette has four bands -- ACTIONS, JUNGLE CRAFT, DIRECTIONS, SYSTEM -- plus that CONTEXT row.

Standard verbs	`LOOK` `EXAMINE` `TAKE` `DROP` `USE` `OPEN` `CLOSE` `SEARCH` `READ` `TALK` `WAIT`
Information	`INVENTORY` `JOURNAL` `QUESTS` `ACHIEVEMENTS` `STATS` `SCORE`
System	`HINT` `SAVE` `RESTORE` `TRANSCRIPT` `RESTART` `HELP` `ABOUT`

Short forms work: X for examine, I for inventory, Z for wait, L for look.

The eight jungle verbs

This story runs on eight verbs of its own. They are the actual vocabulary of the game, and they sit in their own JUNGLE CRAFT row so you never have to guess at them.

Verb	What it does
`SPELL`	Make or read the little bugs. Writes the diary in Act I; works out BOY, APE and MAN from the primer; nails the notice to your door; writes the letter to Jane.
`CLIMB`	Go up. The only way over the palisade at Mbonga's village.
`SWING`	Travel by the middle terrace. Carries Jane home, and carries D'Arnot out of the village.
`HUNT`	Kill. Sabor, Kerchak and Terkoz, and never without the hunting knife.
`NOOSE`	Use the grass rope. Tublat, Kulonga, and the thongs on D'Arnot's stake.
`BURY`	Dig, or put something in the ground: the mutineers' chest, and Kala.
`LISTEN`	Be still. Three times in the story something happens only if you do.
`LIE`	The last command in the game.

SPELL is the one to understand. Tarzan has no idea that letters make sounds -- he has never heard one spoken. What he has is a damp picture book in which every picture has a short row of marks beneath it, and the marks repeat. So he matches the rows to the pictures and reconstructs a written language backwards. Read the primer to see which rows you can match, then spell them.

Turn order

The game is turn-based and entirely unhurried. One command that acts on the world is one move. Information and system commands -- LOOK, INVENTORY, QUESTS, JOURNAL, SCORE, STATS, ACHIEVEMENTS, HELP, HINT, SAVE, RESTORE, TRANSCRIPT, RESTART -- cost nothing at all.

There is no hunger clock, no lamp timer and no wandering monster. Nothing bad happens because you took your time; looking at everything is free, and asking for a hint is free. Events advance when you advance them.

Movement

Eight directions: NORTH SOUTH EAST WEST UP DOWN IN OUT, abbreviated to their initials, or GO NORTH. The exits from wherever you stand are always listed at the end of the room description, shown in the EXITS panel, and offered as buttons.

The map is 20 rooms in 5 regions and is drawn for you in the WORLD MAP panel, which also carries the primer strip. Rooms you have not been to yet show as dots. From Act II onward the Middle Terrace is the hub: almost everywhere worth going is one move from it.

One boundary is one-way. When Kala carries the child into the trees at the end of Act I, the ship and the beach close for good. Anything you left down there is gone -- which costs 5 points and cannot make the game unwinnable.

Scoring

150 points in total, and the score is always on the status bar.

Quest	Points
Put Ashore	15	required
The Cabin by the Sea	15	required
Kala's Child	15	required
The Little Bugs	15	required
His Father's Knife	15	required
Bow, Arrows and Poison	15	required
King of the Apes	15	required
The Woman	15	required
The Chest Twice Buried	10	optional
Four keepsakes, 5 points each: the mate's scrawl, Alice's locket, Sabor's pelt, Kulonga's brass anklet	20	optional

Quest points are awarded when the quest completes; keepsake points when you pick the object up. There is no penalty for hints, for exploring or for dying and restoring. 14 achievements and 19 journal entries are recorded separately and do not affect the score.

Combat

There is no combat system and no dice. Fights are single decisive moves, and each one has exactly one precondition: the hunting knife out of your father's cabin. HUNT without it and Tarzan simply declines -- except with Terkoz, who does not give you the choice. Take the knife when you find it and never put it down.

Winning

Complete the eight required quests and reach the porch in Wisconsin. Ask D'Arnot for the telegram, read it, and then answer the question you are asked. The winning command is LIE. This is not a trick: it is the ending of the novel, and it is the only move in the game that costs you something.

Losing

Four places can kill you, and each is described in the room text, and warned about in dialogue or in something you can read, before it can happen:

Going north under the trees from the landing beach, as Clayton. The mate's scrawl says not to.
Going down into the grass in Sabor's clearing without the hunting knife. Kala will not follow you to the edge of it.
Walking in at the gate of Mbonga's village. You have watched what one poisoned reed does.
Going at Terkoz bare-handed.

Death is never final. Every death message tells you so, and RESTORE puts you back at your last save with the ending cleared. There are no unwinnable states: no object you need can be destroyed, and no door you need can be permanently shut behind you.

Saving and restarting

SAVE keeps a quick save; SAVE camp names one. RESTORE and RESTORE camp bring them back, and the SAVE MANAGER button lists, restores and deletes every slot. Saves live in your browser's local storage under one key, tronsoft_tife_tarzan_of_the_apes_save, and survive closing the tab. RESTART begins the story again and costs no move. TRANSCRIPT shows everything that has been printed and offers it as a text file, which is the most useful thing to attach to a bug report.

If you are stuck

HINT answers in every room, in three stages: a nudge, then a direction, then the actual command. It costs no move and no points. Ask three times and you will be told outright.