Dark Chambers Vs Secret Quest

[Butt_Rogers]

I set out to play and beat both Dark Chambers and Secret Quest and try to enjoy them to the best of my ability. This will be a very long forum post. Forgive me.

Dark Chambers

Dark Chambers is a game programmed by John Palevich for Sculptured Software and published by Atari in 1988. I had dabbled with Dark Chambers before but I never gave it a serious shot because you really need to map the levels, and I hadn't been up for that at the time.

Then it hit me that I could mass produce map templates of all the levels, A-Z, because the maps have the same height & width, and always have 4 doors on each side - only the dividing interior walls are different.

Thus I traced an Altoids can, one trace next to another, and drew in marks representing doors.

Levels A-F are two screens wide. Levels G-P are three screens wide. Levels Q-Z are four screens wide. Tracing an Altoids can, you can fit 4 two-screen-wide levels, or 2 four-screen-wide levels on one sheet of paper.

http://i.imgur.com/x5lwvlO.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/oZKdsxS.jpg

Templates for all levels constructed, I set about to reach Level Z.

In Dark Chambers you play as an adventurer who can travel and fire in 8 directions from a top-down 3/4 perspective. Enemies can travel in any direction or angle. You're armed with a projectile weapon, presumed to be throwing daggers. You have unlimited ammo.

Your foes are Zombies, Wraiths, Skeletons, Wizards, and Grim Reapers. Each enemy takes two standard hits to kill, and each monster devolves into the previous form upon death. Killing a Skeleton turns it into a Wraith, killing the Wraith turns it into a Zombie, killing the Zombie makes it explode. The combat is intuitive and fun, and you'll find yourself using every direction of fire.

Spawners are piles of bones that create monsters. As the game starts throwing you more Wizards and Grim Reapers, and the Spawners seem to fart them out faster, you'll find your regular attack simply not capable of defeating them fast enough - a single Grim Reaper takes 10 hits to kill, and the Spawner more still. Spawners may drop Potions, Treasure, Traps, or Poison upon death.

To aid your quest the game gives you three powerups, each of which can only be picked up once. If you die, you can restart the same Level by pressing Restart, although your Score and Items will be reset to nothing. The Gun increases your rate of fire. The Dagger gives you x2 damage. The Shield reduces monster damage. Of these the Dagger is by far the most useful as it decreases the hits needed to kill a Grim Reaper from 10 to 5. Indispensable and the first item you should try to find if you have to restart a level.

Further aiding your quest are Potions, which increase your hit points.

Attempting to derail your quest are Traps and Poison. These are items that reduce your HP substantially and are often placed in doorway exits. You enter a room through a clear door, find yourself in an empty room with a Trap in the doorway, necessitating you take the damage in order to escape the dead end. Some later levels are absolutely chock full of these dead end traps.

Ostensibly the goal of your hero is to collect all the treasure in each level before finding the stairs down to the next. Treasure consists of the Gold Chalice, Amulet, Silver Chalice, or Strong Box. However, it is not necessary to acquire every treasure or even explore the whole level to advance to the next.

Frequently you require the use of Keys in order to open locked doors, which may lead to the exit, or simply an empty booby trapped room that injures you when you leave. Not every key must be used on a level, allowing you to maintain a small stockpile of keys which may be useful for levels which require you to endure several Poison/Traps in order to secure the key for that level.

Some say this game is a poor mans Gauntlet but I disagree. I would say Dark Chambers for the 7800 is a poor mans gauntlet. Dark Chambers for the 2600 has a much higher emphasis on pure maze exploration and solving and feels like a much different game.

In Dark Chambers 2600 it is imperative that you map your progress, and this is easy to accomplish and even fun. Looking down at your map and seeing how you need to go over two screens, up a door, left a screen, down a door, and right a screen in order to reach your objective is very rewarding with a map, and likely infuriating without. Mapping it out takes very little time and adds a whole new level of enjoyment to the game because you never feel lost and always have an idea of where to go. Furthermore, if you die and have to restart the level, you may have jotted down if there is a Gun, Dagger, or Shield on the level, making the restart much less painful.

One fault with the game is that the treasure is purely for points, and you don't need to pick it up. I would have preferred a mechanic that didn't let you go to the next level until you had acquired all the treasure. The treasure is why you're exploring these Dark Chambers in the first place! Forcing you to find it all would have been a welcome gameplay mechanic. However, you can sidestep this by simply making it a house rule. I believe I acquired every treasure in every level on my trip to Level Z. If not, I came very close.

The biggest fault with Dark Chambers is that it's easy. In the whole game I died two or three times. To be sure, dying sucks, and later levels are very annoying without your Gun, Dagger, & Shield. However, if you persevere you will obtain those items again, although it might take a few levels. You're gimped without your items, but it's not impossible by any means.

Dark Chambers is a long game anyone can beat on a system known for short games of medium to high difficulty, and it is perhaps because of this that a lot of reviewers dock the game points for being "easy", "boring", and "plodding". However, I found this game to be both fun and relaxing. This is the epitome of a game to be enjoyed with snacks and a beer. You can unwind with this game. Draw your maps, grab that treasure, have a good time. You'll probably lower your blood pressure.

Secret Quest.

Secret Quest is a game designed by Nolan Bushnell and programmed by Steve DeFrisco for Axlon and published by Atari in 1989. A very ambitious game, Nolan wanted Secret Quest to be the 2600's answer to The Legend Of Zelda for the NES.

The game features a familiar top-down 3/4 view perspective as seen in Dark Chambers and Legend Of Zelda.

The game features a Status Screen which can be accessed by toggling the TV Type switch. In this screen you can see which Space Station you are on, which weapon you have equipped - and even a set of 12 symbols that function as the games Password/Passcode system. Yes, at any time you can access the Status Screen and write down those symbols, then turn off the game & walk away. When you return, you start a new game using the same 2 initials entered previously, and from the first room on the first space station you can enter the Status Screen, press the Select switch and enter your symbols at the bottom of the screen then press the Select again, and bam. Your previous game has been loaded. Magic, and 100% necessary for this game.

In Secret Quest you have two health bars: Energy & Oxygen. Your oxygen goes down by 1 unit every minute. You use 1 unit of energy per Laser Sword attack, two units per Sonic Blaster, and four units per Particle Beam. Enemies drop either Energy Pods or Oxygen Bottles, sometimes as many as four, providing you with your only way of restocking your energy & oxygen. If you run out of energy, you can't attack. If you run out of oxygen, you die.

You start out on a space station consisting of a 4x4 grid of square rooms; 16 rooms on one floor. The second room you enter gives you the Laser Sword, and this is your only weapon until Station 4. Your goal is to kill or avoid all enemies, and find the Symbols needed to input into the stations computer to activate the Self Destruct, after which you must run to the Teleporter and transport to the next station before the one you're on explodes. The stations computer appears as one or more blinking prompts and you enter symbols by pressing up and down, pressing the button to activate the self destruct.

The second station has two 4x4 grids of rooms (two floors, 32 rooms total) and two symbols to input. This continues until the eighth station has eight 4x4 grids of rooms (8 floors, 128 total rooms) and eight symbols to input.

We can contrast some aspects of Secret Quest with The Legend Of Zelda. They have the same perspective, they controls are similar, and your first weapon functions similarly.

In Zelda Link and almost all enemies he face move Left, Right, Up & Down. Barring bats and a few others, they do not move diagonally. This is fine as Link can only attack L/R/U/D with his default attack and the enemies don't move that fast. Combat is easy and intuitive.

In Secret Quest your character can move in eight directions, but only attack in four. Enemies move in all directions and are very fast, moving with no pattern, bouncing this way and that unpredictably. At first I thought you could rotate your character as he swings his laser sword to hit diagonally - but no, the laser sword will switch from Left, to Up, but skip the Upper Left. This really gimps you and seems like a huge oversight. Clearing a room with 4 enemies (appearing one at at time) that require two hits each to kill can be very challenging to complete without taking any damage or wasting a dozen energy sword charges when you fail to land hits.

Things don't get better with the Sonic Blaster which shoots out two bars of slow moving propagating energy that only reach a short distance from your character. This isn't a true projectile weapon, and could be thought of as more of a wider, slower, laser sword. It does kill enemies in one hit that takes the Laser Sword two though, so that's nice.

But now we get to the biggest problem with this game. The mapping. You might be thinking "All the rooms are square. Even if there are a lot of rooms & multiple floors, that's going to be easy to map. What's the deal?" the deal is that starting on Station 4 one 4x4 grid floor might have 4 or more Up or Down stairways. Some of these stairways TELEPORT you to ARBITRARY parts of other floors. If you walk up a flight of regular stairs, you'll find yourself on the floor above and you know exactly where you are on that floors 4x4 grid. When a stairway teleports you to another floor, you have no idea where you are. And it doesn't end there. You'll get teleported to an arbitrary part of another level, a part of that level only accessible by teleport, which then leads you to another stairway which teleports you to another arbitrary part of another level. In short... It's infuriating.

There's one FAQ/Walkthrough for Secret Quest on GameFaqs and the walkthrough for Station 4 states:

"What a pain. My maps probably won't help, because
most staircases are one-way only! You'll be going around a lot of
circles. I haven't completely finished the level 4 map, but may not
anyway because of how much of a pain this level was to begin with."

The FAQ says Station 4 is an 8 out of 10 in difficulty. Later stations are even higher.

As you're struggling to land hits on fast enemies bouncing all over the screen, if they hit you, they'll steal your Energy, or Oxygen. But that's the only way to replenish your Energy or Oxygen. Meanwhile, every minute you spend trying to figure out where to go your oxygen goes down by one unit. You only have 15 units of oxygen. During all this you have to desperately try to map your progress taking as little time as possible. Meanwhile you're getting teleported to areas which teleport you to areas which teleport you to areas that are frustrating to map and completely not intuitive to explore or understand.

Furthermore, you can't just complete a space station and move on to the next. You have to do WELL and keep as much Energy & Oxygen as possible, because on the next station you're going to write down your passcode, and that's going to be how much Energy & Oxygen you start off with on that station when you load your game. If you start Station 4 with 2 units of oxygen and 3 units of energy, you're very likely going to die. You never have a chance to breathe. You never have a chance to relax.

I gave up on Station 4. I could beat it, but I don't want to, and I absolutely 100% refuse to beat the later stations which are 9/10 difficult, or 10/10 difficult, with as many as 128 rooms on 8 different levels.

This isn't a dig on a 2600 game trying to do the best it can. Secret Quest pushes the 2600 to its limit. It's wildly ambitious. But is it FUN?

If Zelda had the "you are constantly losing health and the only way to get more is to fight enemies that zoom around the screen in all directions but which can't be attacked on the diagonals" mechanic people would be pissed. If one Zelda dungeon had 128 rooms people would be pissed.

Zelda has 9 dungeons and 236 dungeon rooms total in the whole game (plus a huge over world). Secret Quest has that many rooms in Station 8 and 9 alone. Secret Quest has 576 rooms total. All that while you're running out of air.

I'm not going to lie. I hate Secret Quest. I hate it because I've tried so hard to like it. A 2600 game could never usurp Zelda off its throne, but for a 2600 game, I feel Secret Quest could have come surprisingly close. But bone headed design choices ruined it. I like mapping some old school dungeon crawl RPGs, I really enjoyed mapping Dark Chambers - but I hate mapping Secret Quest. I hate the combat. I hate the constant stress of running out of oxygen. I can't have fun in this game. All it does is stress me out, and not in the good "Only 5k more points to an extra life!" way. There's no pot of gold at the end of this rainbow. Just more suffering.

Conclusion

Dark Chambers is too easy, but it's easy to map and it's a good relaxing time. You can make an evening of this game. If it were a television show it'd be something simple and inoffensive like Cheers. Dark Chambers didn't blow my mind but I spent a solid 5 or 6 hours on this game and I had a really good time. How many 2600 games can you play for 6 hours and still be entertained?

Secret Quest is beyond difficult, and nigh impossible to map. The design choices in this game make it very stressful, the combat provides no sense of satisfaction or catharsis, neither the Laser Sword or Sonic Blaster are remotely as fun as the starting sword in Zelda - or even the basic dagger/gun projectile in Dark Chambers. And they clearly could have been. Graphics aside, Secret Quest very clearly could have emulated the hit detection, movement, & fighting mechanics of Zelda but chose not to. Saying "The combat sucks because it's a 2600 not an NES!" is a slap in the face to the 2600. The combat sucks because it was programmed that way. The game is stressful, frustrating, and tedious, because it was programmed that way.

I wanted to write my feelings on these two games because they came out around the same time, they're similarly expansive, have similar game play, yet on game critics websites Dark Chambers is consistently rated a C or even D-, while Secret Quest gets a B or B+.

It makes me wonder. How many of these reviewers have actually beaten Secret Quest? Yes it's wildly ambitious. Yes it's a phenomenal feat of programming for the 2600. But did anyone beat it? Did anyone have fun beating it?

I would argue that as Dark Chambers levels get larger and more difficult they get more fun. They're always very easy to map, you always know where you are, and you can take all the time you want. Unlimited time, unlimited ammo. On the flip side, as Secret Quest levels get larger and more difficult, up to a maximum of 128 rooms on 8 floors with 8 symbols to acquire, the game turns into the most torturous grind possible, and this is exacerbated by the limited ammo, limited health, that requires you to go as fast as possible while avoiding damage from enemies.

Anyone who has actually beaten Secret Quest has my admiration. You're a stronger gamer than I, with much greater stress and frustration tolerance.

Too Long, Didn't Read

Dark Chambers is a good relaxing time. I think critics are way too hard on it.

Secret Quest is simultaneously ambitious & awful and will give you high blood pressure, hemorrhoids, nightmares, bouts of rage.

[sloth-machine]

I really enjoyed both for different reasons. But I like Dark Chambers more.

 

I never played Secret Quest back then, but if I did I'm sure I would have had the patience that it requires, especially the fact that it's a Zelda style adventure and I loved Zelda once I nabbed a copy in 89'. However, now a days I don't have the patience and I never spent enough time with it to really tell, the mapping does get crazy, and the password system is a chore. Secret Quest is definitely not as accessible as Dark Chambers.

 

Dark Chambers on the other hand feels more arcade like, I can just jump in. It's pretty much Gauntlet for the 2600. It's easy once you memorize the maps, yes...but the same can be said for a lot of games. I wish Dark Chambers had a random mode that would move around the exits and power ups, ala Adventure. Although, to stretch out the life of Dark Chambers, I tried speed runs (never helped the fact the game runs at a snails pace, haha) and avoided potions and powerups to give me a handicap. I did play this one back then, I remember my local department store sold the redbox games for dirt cheap (5 bucks) and I was able to score a bunch of games to tide me over until my parents got me and NES for Christmas that year. Dark Chambers was my NES-style game before I got an NES. I spent a lot of great hours on that game. I never bothered mapping it out, I would just wander around until I stumbled upon the exits. I still play it that way. There is a Dark Chambers speed hack in the programming forums, it's great. Makes the game much faster paced.

Edited April 3, 2016 by sloth-machine

[Butt_Rogers]

I agree that some way to randomize rooms, items, or exits would have been a very welcome addition to Dark Chambers. I'll have to check out the speed hack. I found the Gauntlet hack a while ago and that's fun.

I was thinking of completing Dark Chambers without the Gun, Dagger, or Shield. In later levels taking down a spawner with your basic attack can be challenging and I find myself avoiding crowds of enemies or ducking past them, as much as killing them, course then you miss out on some loot.

The number of enemies on the screen at one time is another point for Dark Chambers. I definitely felt like I was mobbed several times. In Secret Quest enemies appear one at at time, perhaps as a caveat to the difficulty of combat as implemented.

[edladdin]

I agree that some way to randomize rooms, items, or exits would have been a very welcome addition to Dark Chambers.

I love the idea of some level randomization. I was very sad to go through A-Z and find it just started over in the same maps with the destroyable spawners replaced by endless spawners. Those things immediately tilt the balance to extremely hard, taking the fun away.

[7800fan]

So wondering... is Dark Chambers basically copy of Gauntlet? Everything seems similar overall.

[sloth-machine]

So wondering... is Dark Chambers basically copy of Gauntlet? Everything seems similar overall.

 

This all stems from a game called Dandy released in 1983 before Gauntlet and Dark Chambers.

 

Gauntlet was created 2 years later in 1985 as "inspiration" from Dandy. Dark Chambers is fully based off Dandy and is much more similar to the original game play.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dandy_(video_game)

Edited April 4, 2016 by sloth-machine

[CDS Games]

I'm a big fan of adventure games, but Secret Quest I have not really gotten into for some reason. Maybe it's the sci-fi theme.

 

So wondering... is Dark Chambers basically copy of Gauntlet? Everything seems similar overall.

 

The original poster said it well...Dark Chambers on the 2600 is more about maze exploration. Gauntlet is more about relentless fighting to the exit over and over. DC has a slower pace, and there are fewer enemies to fight but they are more powerful. More different kinds of treasure with different values also--in Gauntlet you only have treasure chests.

 

And to add to what sloth machine said, we should also keep in mind they were released on two very different platforms. Ed Logg specifically designed Gauntlet as a quarter eater at the arcades--and it was very successful in that respect. Arcade owners loved it because 4 players could be feeding the thing at once and adding quarters constantly as their characters died. Dark Chambers as a home console game could afford to take its time and be about exploring without your life continually draining away.

 

Agree with everyone about the room randomizer, though I'm not sure how hard it would be to hack something like that in. The item locations are currently pulled right from a table. It might be easier to randomize the room sequence, so that when you get to the exit you have no idea what level comes next. And I've often thought about the beyond Level Z problem....but I have not been able to come up with what *should* happen. Should it just end? Should you be given a whole different quest, with different room arrangements, treasures etc?

[sloth-machine]

Agree with everyone about the room randomizer, though I'm not sure how hard it would be to hack something like that in. The item locations are currently pulled right from a table. It might be easier to randomize the room sequence, so that when you get to the exit you have no idea what level comes next. And I've often thought about the beyond Level Z problem....but I have not been able to come up with what *should* happen. Should it just end? Should you be given a whole different quest, with different room arrangements, treasures etc?

 

CDS, your Gauntlet hack is just incredible and I encourage any Dark Chambers fan to download it here on the forums (http://atariage.com/forums/topic/238273-dark-chambers-to-gauntlet-conversion/). It's one of the few hacks that literally feels like a whole different game and plays just like Gauntlet. This and Dark Chambers compliment each other nicely!

 

 

On topic, if anyone would do it, it could be you You have seemed to have explored the code the best with the excellent Gauntlet hack and DC speed hack. A randomized would make the game basically a Rogue-like. I still play Adventure just because of level 3.

 

Maybe beyond level Z is when the randomization actually starts indefinitely. Kind of like endless secret levels. The random levels could be numbered instead of alpha for basically endless progress and gameplay (haha, easier said than done). To top it off, It would also be cool to have a level select from A to Z and to the start of the Randomizer, almost like a replacement for a password system so you don't have to start over every time. Ok...please stop me if I am requesting too much here :) I just have an appreciation for the game. It's one of the only Dungeon Crawlers on the console.

 

All these added features with the speed hack could truly make it 'Dark Chambers Enhanced'.

Edited April 4, 2016 by sloth-machine

[CDS Games]

Thanks! Ironically, I wasn't a huge fan of Dark Chambers before I started the hack. Liking it more and more now though.

 

An enhanced version of Dark Chambers has been tempting me for a while. I'll have to think on it more. Out of the ideas you mentioned, the level select would be easiest. And adding levels after Z is no problem with bankswitching. It's the random item location part that seems tough...I don't have any bright ideas on how to do that.

[Butt_Rogers]

One issue with randomized item & exit locations...

Dark Chambers maps were made to be beatable even if you have to restart them with no extra keys, no powerups. If you're forced to take damage from traps/poison, the level always has at least one health potion. It's a very fair game that way.

Now take Level T.

There's something like 8 traps/poison and only one health potion. There's a whole gaggle of booby trapped rooms. However, you don't need to explore all these rooms, and the exit is easy to find. It's a case of "Lets trick the player into going and looking for treasure then kill him!".

If the game randomized the Exit into the wrong room, it might be impossible to complete the level with default items & health.

[CDS Games]

Good point. A randomized version would likely need a redesign.

[Bradley A]

I just cracked level 4 of Secret Quest.  I wouldn't say anything was arbitrary about it.   I think its designed well to confuse you.  Attached is my map and initials and code if you want to attempt.  There was nothing other than "extra" behind the sonic door. 

So to solve it (make sure you have the sonic gun selected):

1. Get the 4 energy

2. Get the 4 oxygen

3. Get code 3

4. Get code 2

5. Get code 1

6. Goto and get Code 4

7. Enter the codes

8. Exit by going to the teleport.  No time to spare on this.

Also, I tried to only attack for the 4 energy, 4 oxygen and medusa(s) (they give oxygen on this level, but take energy).

 

 

Edited May 10, 2020 by Bradley A

[jhd]

 

That was an excellent and detailed review!

 

I bought the cartridge for Dark Chambers in the early-1990s, and I quite enjoyed it. I was a huge fan of Gauntlet, and the same origin is obvious.

 

I have never played Secret Quest.  I do not much care for the original Legend of Zelda -- one Link loses the projectile weapon, the game becomes too difficult (IMHO).   

 

[hizzy]

Does Dark Chambers have an ending? Do you go back to level A after beating Level Z?

[Voxel]

It's nice to see a good write up about DC, showing it in a good light.  I've always enjoyed the rather casual nature of the game play.

 

On 4/4/2016 at 7:32 PM, CDS Games said:

An enhanced version of Dark Chambers has been tempting me for a while. I'll have to think on it more. Out of the ideas you mentioned, the level select would be easiest. And adding levels after Z is no problem with bankswitching. It's the random item location part that seems tough...I don't have any bright ideas on how to do that.

If you do I'd like to request the player characters be made smaller.  It would make the game area seem larger and it would make it easier so I don't keep bumping into things, I'm clumsy what can I say.

[roadrunner]

I prefer Dark Chambers over Secret Quest