Pyramid 2000 Solution

Foreword

Pyramid 2000 was written by Robert Arnstein for Radio Shack, who needed software to accompany their TRS-80 Model I computers — one of the vanguard machines of the late 1970s home computer revolution.

Most players were unaware that Pyramid 2000 was not wholly original. It borrowed heavily from the original Crowther and Woods Colossal Cave adventure. Substitute a mummy for a pirate and a sarcophagus for a clam and you get an idea of how derivative a work Pyramid 2000 really is. Nevertheless, the game was enjoyable on its own merits, at least to the computer gaming audience of the late '70s and early '80s.

If the following doesn't look familiar to you, you probably don't want to bother further with this page:

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The rest of you are invited further into the pyramid to, at long last, uncover all its secrets (cue Raiders of the Lost Ark soundtrack)…

A step-by-step walkthrough would be very tedious for Pyramid 2000, where much of the time is simply spent moving through a very large map. Instead, this solution takes a question-and-answer format in approximate order of where obstacles present themselves. Feel free to skip questions that don't apply to you — that's what the scrollbar is for.

Outside the Pyramid

Here is a map of the outside of the pyramid.

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• Is there anything in the desert?

  No. Don't waste your time looking for undiscovered treasure there. See the map above of the exterior of the pyramid to see how the desert works.

Inside the Pyramid — Upper Floor

Actually there is quite a bit of up and down motion in this game, but as you'll see later, there is a convenient halfway point. Here's a map of the "first half" of the pyramid interior.

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• 1. What is the object of the game, and how do I score points?

  You're a tomb robber! Your goal is to collect treasures from within the pyramid and return them to the entrance, where the lamp, food, and bottle are initially found. You receive five points for carrying a treasure (which, apart from an item being described with an exclamation point, is how you tell it's valuable), and twenty for dropping it back at the entrance. When you drop it, you lose the points for carrying it. The SCORE command and some quick math will tell you that there are eleven treasures in the game. You also lose ten points for every time you are killed. Three strikes and you're out.

• 2. It's pitch black and everywhere I go I fall into a pit and break every bone in my body! What do I do?

  Turn on the lamp. Remember the shiny brass lamp in the entrance? ON LAMP works.

• 3. I've been killed! Where's my stuff?

  The lamp is returned, not to its original location, but to your original location, outside the entrance. It's also turned off. Your other items will be at the location where you died.

• 4. How do I get the statue bird? I can lift it, but I can't carry it!

  The statue bird goes in the statue box. If you're carrying the statue box, you may pick up the statue bird. That is, of course, unless you're carrying something else…

• 5. How do I get the statue bird? It comes to life and flies away from me!

  The statue bird does not like the scepter. Drop it. You can pick the scepter up again after you have the bird.

• 6. How do I get the nugget of gold up the steps?

  You don't. You can, however, go around the steps in two distinct ways. We'll get to that later.

• 7. How do I get across the bottomless pit?

  It's kind of funny how, when falling into a bottomless pit, you somehow manage to hit the bottom and break every bone in your body. If you WAVE SCEPTER on either side of the pit, it will cause a stone bridge to magically materialize and dematerialize. Don't worry, the bridge will never collapse out from under you.

• 8. Help! I've wandered into a maze of twisty passages and I can't get out!

  Well, if you've only just wandered in there and not moved anywhere yet, or only tried to go north, there is help. Go up. If you're deeper in the maze, see Part 4. If you're this early in the game, the best thing to do is quit and restart. The maze is the last thing you need on your mind at this point.

• 9. Help! Every time I pick up some treasure and go somewhere with it, a mummy comes up and takes it away!

  There are two ways of dealing with the mummy. The easy way is simply to not ever carry more than one treasure at a time. The hard way is to swallow your pride and let him take it. You'll learn, if you care to experiment, that he only bothers you once. After that, you can carry as much booty as you can fit in your arms.

• 10. How do I get past the huge fierce green serpent?

  There are two ways, actually. One is straightforward, one is roundabout.

  Make sure you are carrying the statue bird. You are? Good. THROW BIRD. Enjoy it — that's the most action you'll see in this game. The rest is logic puzzles.

  For the roundabout way, see the next question.

• 11. What's the story with that panel in the large room?

  Simple — it's just a shortcut to the entrance. GO PANEL to use it. You can use the panel from the very beginning of the game to "cheat" and get around the serpent. The serpent will still be a pain in the butt, since you can enter the pharaoh's chamber from any direction, but he always blocks your exit to the north, south, and west. By the way, the panel is the first way to get the nugget of gold back to the entrance. The other comes much later — don't hold your breath.

• 12. The rooms west of the pharaoh's chamber and west of the bottomless pit don't make any sense!

  It's a pain to get around in that part of the pyramid. I guess it's training ground for the maze, where things really get strange. My advice is to make a map, or use mine above.

Inside the Pyramid — Lower Floor

While making my map I noticed that the only way to avoid room overlap was to break it in pieces. A convenient place to do this is just to the north of the pharaoh's chamber, where there is a hole in the floor. Below that, I call the "lower floor". At this point, you should have collected the gold, the jewelry, the coins, the silver bars, and the diamonds. Two of these may be in the possession of the mummy if you weren't careful. So grab a map and work for those remaining treasures.

• 1. Help! I'm trapped in the Land of the Dead!

  "Those who proceed east may never return." Next time perhaps you'll listen! There is nothing of value in the Land of the Dead. The Land of the Dead is just one logical location, with exits that loop back on itself. The exit is selected randomly each turn, so eventually you'll get out if you keep moving. Shame on you if you dropped your lamp or a treasure and then got out without picking it back up! The author left the Egyptian Weekly magazines outside in the Anteroom of Seker as a clue to the trick of the Land of the Dead.

• 2. What do I do with the sarcophagus?

  You can't do much with it just yet. My suggestion is to try opening it, and wonder about what might be inside. Think hard about this one and we'll come back to it.

• 3. What do I do in the chamber of Horus? Is there any point to "exploring at random"?

  Indeed there is, particularly north and up. If you keep attempting to go a direction, eventually you'll get somewhere besides a U-turn. See the map below for more information.

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• 4. How do I get through the tight squeeze in the chamber of the high priest?

  You have to drop everything. And I do mean everything, including that which is more precious even than treasure, that which stops you from falling into the ubiquitous pits and breaking every bone in your body. The lamp.

• 5. I got the delicate, precious vase, but when I drop it back at the entrance it breaks and I don't get any points for it!

  Maybe you should drop it on something softer. You know, cushiony. Like a pillow. You mean you haven't been to the priest's bedroom?

• 6. What's a plover?

  It's a kind of bird. I don't know how big their eggs are, but I always imagine an ostrich egg. That should be big enough to tickle almost anyone's avarice.

• 7. How do I get to the hole high up on the wall above the west pit in the twopit room?

  If you've bothered to climb down into the west pit, you'll notice a plant there clubbing you over the head with a very unsubtle clue. If you've found a small clean climbable pit where a tiny stream enters and exits through slits, it is there that you can FILL BOTTLE. You can then return to the plant, POUR WATER again, and then CLIMB PLANT to get to the hole that was formerly inaccessible.

• 8. What do I do with the sarcophagus (revisited)?

  Now that you've seen the chambers of Osiris and Nekhebet, perhaps it has occurred to you that the key can be used to unlock the sarcophagus. All you have to do is go to it and OPEN it.

• 9. How do I keep the pearl from rolling away?

  You don't (or it didn't really roll anywhere, if you had picked the sarcophagus up, and put it down in the right place). However, the magic of the pyramid is not sufficient to defy gravity, so a good guess would be that the pearl rolled in such a manner as to minimize its gravitational potential energy. So GO DOWN until you find it.

The Maze

Fourteen rooms with the same description — "YOU ARE IN A MAZE OF TWISTY PASSAGES, ALL ALIKE." — twelve dead ends, and the brink of a pit. This thing is hell to map, but if you're up to some work, read on.

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• 1. My lamp is getting dim! Where's this vending machine?

  If you've read this far, you're approaching the end of the game. You can complete the adventure with maximum points in fewer turns than it takes to make the lamp go dim — I suggest quitting and economizing your moves. If you're bound and determined, you can use the maze map above. If you have the coins with you, DROP them at the location with the machine, and it will magically scoop them up and dispense some batteries. However, spending the coins means you can't get all the treasures.

• 2. I've only been able to find ten treasures! What's the eleventh?

  Before you ask, no, it's not whatever laid those eggs. The eleventh treasure is the chest, deep in the maze. You can map the maze yourself using the time-honored Hansel and Gretel trick: load up with items, enter the maze, and drop one. Then start moving. In some cases you'll find that going a particular direction takes you no place at all, because the item you dropped is in the "new" location — meaning you've really stayed in the same place. When you are in a new maze location with no item, drop another, and so on. The maze is basically laid out along the primary compass points (N, S, E, W), but there are a few places you can go up or down. And then there's the dirty trick...

• 3. What's the supremely evil dirty trick about the maze?

  There is one, and only one, place in the maze where a secondary compass point (northeast, southeast, etc.) is used. When you find it, you'll hit a dead end. Note the significance of this odd direction. Of course, if you let the mummy steal your treasure before you came here, the significance will be quite obvious. This piece of unadulterated sadism — teasing the player into not checking secondary compass points by having them completely eliminated except in this one place — is what added about twelve years to this solution's creation time.

• 4. Looking at your map makes my head spin. What's the magic recipe for getting through the maze?

  Okay, okay. To get to the treasure chest from maze location 1 on the map (go south from the west end of the Hall of Gods):

  E, S, S, S, N, E, E, NW

  To get out of the maze from the treasure chest dead end using the pit: SE, N, D

  To get out of the maze from the treasure chest dead end without using the pit: SE, N, W, W, W, E, E, W, U

• 5. Yeah, well, I got to the secret northwest dead end, and still no treasure chest! What's up?

  You had to show a willingness to part with your treasure earlier (or just a reluctance to waste time running around with only one treasure at a time to avoid the mummy). The mummy has to steal your treasure, or there will be no treasure chest.

• 6. Wait! What about the second way to get the gold around the steps?

  Climb down the pit in the maze. It's conveniently located near the secret dead end so you don't have to waste time backtracking through the maze all the way to the Hall of Gods.

You're done! Haul the last three treasures back to the entrance, drop them, and gaze upon your haul:

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If the game author had shaved a few bytes off that damn maze, maybe he could have put in a nice little "congratulations!" message. But alas — you have to be content with your own satisfaction.

As a final irony, the size of the original solution HTML file, not counting the inlined images, was larger than the original Pyramid 2000 executable. Just some food for thought.