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
51. Willy does the Great Pyramid!
Author: Geoff Eddy
Year: 2021
Language: English
Willy does the Great Pyramid! was the fifth JSW game by Geoff Eddy. In 2006, Geoff worked on a game file using the so-called "Geoff Mode II" - a set of modifications to the JSW game engine that he had first introduced in ZX Willy the Bug Slayer. He designed 64 rooms and he added items and guardians to a part of them. However, he gave up on the development of the game due to lack of both free time and inspiration.
Many years later, Geoff resumed the game's development, "returned to the Pyramid and bashed it back into shape". He beta-released the game in the Contributor Lounge of the JetSet Willy & Manic Miner Community in early March 2021 and gamma-released it at the end of that month.
Along with the gamma-release of the finished game, Geoff offered his old Z80 file for public scrutiny. It can be downloaded from here.
Willy does the Great Pyramid! in its final shape could be classified as using "Geoff Mode III" (or, as the author himself would have it, "Pyramode"), as the modifications to the original JSW48 game engine it features go further than those in Geoff Mode II (e.g. each room has a Room-Setup Patch Vector and a Main-Loop Patch Vector). Obviously, the game has the characteristic features typical of all Geoff Modes, such as diagonal guardians, wrap-around guardians (which move in one direction only and "wrap around" at the end of their path), fast-moving horizontal guardians, different sprites used for the remaining lives counter, each successive remaining life sprite showing a different phase (rather than all of them being the same phase), a time counter using a 7-digit number which counts down from 9999999, items animating through eight colours, etc.
The game's map is a pyramid, indeed, with room exits tweaked so that the layout is logical (in each of the rooms where there is more than one upward/downward exit, the player can exit upwards/downwards to two rooms located above/below on the map).
The game features some novel effects created using Patch Vectors, a totally modified Game Over screen and a brand new end sequence.
Number of edited rooms: 64
Number of items to collect: 201
Bugfix needed after original release? NO
Spare lives at the start: 16
Completable without loss of life? YES
Starting time: 9999999
(In Geoff Modes there is no clock like in the original JSW, but a timer using a 7-digit number which counts down from 9999999.)
Best documented completion time with no unnecessary loss of life: 9966633
(The game is not toilet-, bed- or Maria-completable; instead of these elements, it features a custom-made end sequence, with a partial reference to Manic Miner).
Download links
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The game's home page on JSW & MM Community |
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Game file in TAP and TZX formats |
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The game's map on Speccy Screenshot Maps |
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RZX walkthrough of the game |
Videos
A walkthrough of the game on the JSW Central YouTube channel
A walkthrough of the game on the RZX Archive YouTube channel
Screenshot gallery |
The game's endings
