Resource centre for ZX Spectrum games
using Manic Miner and Jet Set Willy game engines
II. Jet Set Willy (JSW48)
A. New games using Matthew Smith's original Jet Set Willy game engine for the 48K Spectrum and its modifications
38. Maria vs. Some Bastards
Author: Vidar Eriksen (Erix1)
Publisher: Manic Miner Technologies
Year: 2003 (Revision E)
Bugfix (by the the JSW & MM Community Team): 2019
Language: English
Maria vs. Some Bastards is a game by Vidar Eriksen (Erix1), which uses a modified JSW48 game engine that has come to be known as "Erix1 Mode". Its first short demo version was released in October 2000. The game was gamma-released in March 2003, with four bug-fixed revisions (called Revision B, C, D and E) following within the next few weeks.
A menu screen implemented by the BASIC loader allows the player to choose one of the three modes: Easy, Normal or Hard. Furthermore, pressing "c" on the initial screen brings up a cheat menu with several options, such as infinite lives, auto collecting items, only one item to collect, setting the starting room and position, walking through guardians and pre-activating two in-game switches. Additionally, pressing "0" launches Manic Mining Robot's Day Out, "a secret bonus crap game" attached to Maria vs. Some Bastards.
According to the message which shows in the opening room, you need to collect 120 items to complete the game if you choose the Easy mode, 240 items if you choose the Normal mode and 246 items if you choose the Hard mode.
Daniel Gromann raised the question of the game’s completability on the Manic Miner & Jet Set Willy Yahoo! Group in June 2007, when he pointed out that Maria did not disappear after he had collected 251 items in the Hard mode.
In March 2012, Vidar Eriksen promised to look into the problem and check whether some 'end-game corrections' he had done in Rev D were not left out in Rev E. He mentioned that a Rev F might be necessary, but it did not materialise in the following years.
Ian Rushforth investigated the item-collecting code in Maria vs. Some Bastards and discovered the cause of the bug which made the game non-completable. He announced his findings on Manic Miner & Jet Set Willy Yahoo! Group in February 2019, offered a bug-fix for the problem and also showed the way to collect one of the items Daniel had not been able to reach.
After some further discussions, the Jet Set Willy & Manic Miner Community Team produced a 2019 Bug-Fixed Edition of the game. The changes in relation to Rev E are described here.
The following information is the same for both Revision E and the 2019 Bug-Fixed Edition:
Number of edited rooms: 62
Number of rooms accessible without cheating: 62
Number of rooms which need to be visited to complete the game: 62
Spare lives at the start:
Hard mode - 3
Normal mode - 8
Easy mode - 10
Bonus lives awarded? YES: 5
Starting time and the best documented completion time: N/A
(There is no clock in the game.)
Revision E
Number of items to collect:
Hard mode - 246
Normal mode - 240
Easy mode - 120
Bugfix needed after original release? YES
Official bugfix released: NO
Completable? NO
2019 Bug-Fixed Edition
Number of items to collect:
Hard mode - 256
Normal mode - 240
Easy mode - 120
Bugfix needed after release? NO
Completable without loss of life? YES
Download links
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2019 Bug-Fixed Edition's download page on JSW & MM Community |
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Game files of both Revision E and the 2019 Bug-Fixed Edition in TAP and TZX formats |
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A 128K Russian hack of the original game from TRDos ReCracks |
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The game's page on WoS |
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The game's page on Spectrum Computing |
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The game's map on Speccy Screenshot Maps |
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RZX walkthrough of the 2019 Bug-Fixed Edition of the game |
Videos
A walkthrough of the 2019 Bug-Fixed Edition of the game on the JSW Central YouTube channel
A walkthrough of the 2019 Bug-Fixed Edition of the game on the RZX Archive YouTube channel
A complete screenshot gallery will be presented on this page in the future.