SOLUTION TO COMIC

From the starting position work your way all the way right, getting the key, to the last door and leave the forest for the lake region. Work left to the spaceship and leave the lakes for the moon. On the moon work all the way right, picking up the first treasure (gems). All gaps can be jumped - the long blind one must be jumped, literally, from edge to edge. Leave the moon and enter the 'base', immediately back up and jump up to the upper level to avoid rolling globs which you can't destroy until you get the corkscrew (you should have 4 cans of blastcola at this point, 1 at the start of the game, 1 just as you enter the lake region, 1 on a shelf beside the spaceship in the lake region, and 1 as you step onto the moon).

Work left and as you exit the first base room you should be on the middle of the three levels. As you enter the 2nd room jump up again to avoid the globes and continue to work all the way left where you will find the corkscrew. If you are running short of lives this is a good place to rest and increase your score and restore some lives (the threshold of the spaceship in the lake region was the best place you already passed from which to build lives if needed - you will also, repass that point later). Ignore the two doors above the corkscrew location, for now, and work your way back to the right to the end of this room. After entering next room to your right drop down to the lower level go left and re-enter the room you just left (but now on the lower level). Work left till you reach the door and exit. You now enter the right area of the base and must work right to the next door. This door takes you to another location in the right most room of the base. Work all the way right, drop down to the lower level and work left till you pick up the boots and find another door. This door leads you to the upper of the two doors you previously saw above the corkscrew location. The door just below you is your exit from the base back to the lake region.

Once again that corkscrew location is a good place to build score. If you are a klutz, like me, you must find many of these places - and there are many where the enemy is fairly predictable. Another thing you should note is that with all lives every time you add 50,000 points you get a bonus of full shield energy and another 24,000 - 30,000 points. By raising your point score to just below the 50,000 multiple (with all lives) before you enter a particularly tough region, you can get all shield energy restored as you transit the region.

Actually the proof of skill in this game isn't really the maximum score since klutzes like me need to keep sitting in one place to restore lives. The guy or gal who can complete the game with the minimum score is the most skillful. My "successful" score was over 3,000,000.

You are now back in the lake region (to the left of the spaceship and the wall you couldn't jump before you had the boots). Work left to the next door and exit the lake into the cave.

As you work right, in the cave, you will see a door above you. Ignore it, and resist the temptation to get the shield located by that door, and continue right to your first opportunity to jump up to the ledge over which curtains are hung. Proceed along this ledge to a door. This door takes you to the far right position in the cave. Work left and you will find the wand just as you reach the pit. Use your wand to cross the pit (in 3-4 waves) and get the bag of coins on the other side, your second of the three treasures. Face right and wand back to the bottom of the pit and go through that door which takes you to the door near the entrance which you previously passed up and that shield is probably something you really need at this point. Jump down, face left, approach and wand across that crazy step, work left and exit the cave by the same door you entered. The portion of the cave you didn't explore contains nothing of value.

Now you are back in the extreme left part of the lake from which you must work right, to the extreme right part of the lake where you will find the door to the shed.

Work all the way right in the shed through two rooms, wanding across many areas and through some walls. There are a series of narrow pillars along the way which may frustrate you since you can't wand across the boarding abyss from below them or jump/wand up to their tops. You must jump across the top of these pillars and the lack of headroom requires you to, literally start the jump from a position where you have only one foot on the starting pillar. At the far right, of the second room, you will see a door in a closed room above you. The wand point is about 7-8 steps to the left of a point just below the last blastcola can, facing right. Get the blastcola and go through the door to the third shed room (this point in the second shed room is the best place to build score since you can shoot through the wall to your left with no danger of getting hit). Work all the way right in the third shed room and exit the door into what I will call the tube room.

Work right through the maze and the tubes, jumping and wanding till you get the lantern just before you reach the right-most tube region where you will exit back to the forest. (I found the tube room the most easy region, save perhaps for the forest, to traverse.) Back in the forest work left back to the extreme left which is the place you started the game from and go through this door. (This is the castle, the last region, which is dark and couldn't be safely entered until you had the lantern).

You immediately see the last treasure above you but, alas, you can't get to it yet. Work all the way left until you reach the door which takes you to the second room. The exit door is immediately above you but you will have to work all the way right then back left along the platforms to reach it. Here you encounter, for the first time, a nasty cube. Like the bee the only effective way to kill it is to jump to the ceiling and zap it. Also, like those pillars in the shed, the last few platform jumps will require you to hang over the edge before jumping. Once you reach the door you will be in another room to traverse left to right where you will find one last door. This door takes you to the last room where a few short steps to the right you will jump up and get the crown and end your quest!

Note added 10/8/88:

Ok, I tried it again to try and find two shortcuts. There is no reason to go through the shed except to get to the lantern which is near the extreme right side of the tube area. Indeed, there is a way. Go back to the forest from the lake and thence to the tube room, proceed left till you are hanging over the ledge under the lantern, then wand to the lantern. The time and frustration saved by this trick is dramatic!

Likewise there is no reason to go through the castle except to get to the last treasure which can be seen from the entrance door. I was unsuccessful, however, in finding a wand point which would take me directly from the area near the entrance door to the crown room. The castle, which is the toughest room, must, it seems, be traversed.