Beelzebubble  -  a fast-thinking arcade game

by Richard Taylor

Beelzebubble is a tactical arcade game in the Tetris mould. It features
smooth sprite graphics and 30 levels of increasing difficulty. The game is
set in a world full of bubbles and the object is to complete each round by
removing all the bubbles from the screen. In order to do this you are
given control of a launcher which fires new bubbles from the bottom of the
screen, upwards to join the existing bubbles at the top. If, as a result,
three or more bubbles of the same colour are joined together, they will
burst. Any bubbles that are then left unsupported will fall to the ground.
You must remove all the bubbles from the screen before any of them touch the
dotted line above your bubble-launcher.

Unfortunately, to make matters worse, the roof is gradually falling down
step by step, reducing the space in which you can operate. You also have a limited time in which to launch each bubble, otherwise it will be launched for you. However, there
are some compensations. You may bounce bubbles off the side walls in order
to reach awkwardly placed bubbles. And you can skip up to two bubbles in
each round if you judge that firing them would complicate the situation
rather than make it better.

Further problems arise as the game progresses. Once you have cleared the
first level you will find that a limit on the time you can spend deciding
what to do with each bubble comes into operation. You will also meet,
amongst other things, cream coloured bubbles which cannot be burst but must
be detached by destroying the bubbles around them.

Running Beelzebubble
The program on the disc is archived and must be de-archived and moved to a
permanent home on your hard disc oron another floppy before running, as otherwise it will not be possible to update the high-score table. Running the item from the RISC User menu system will open the archive, inside which is the application. Drag this out of the archive to the desired location before running the game.

When you run the program, the title screen will give you the option of pressing Space to start at Round 1, or pressing P to enter a password. Every fifth screen has a password, so if you want to skip earlier screens next time you play the game, make a note of the passwords as you see them. Note that the password is case sensitive.

The following keys are used in the game:
       Z - Rotate launcher to the left (anticlockwise)
       X - Rotate launcher to the right (clockwise)
       Space Bar - Fire bubble
       Return - Skip bubble
       S - Sound On
       Q - Sound Off
       G - Give Up      

On all screens other than the first, there is a time limit for you to launch each bubble. When the limit is getting close, you will see "Hurry" appear on the screen together with a countdown. When the countdown reaches zero, the bubble will be launched automatically in whatever direction the launcher is currently pointing.

If you manage to complete all the 30 levels provided you may wish to use the
screen editor. Open the !Bubble application directory and before doing
anything else make a copy of the file 'Data' which contains the original
screens. Then run the Basic file called Editor. Use the mouse to
select different colour bubbles from the bottom right of the screen. Then
use Select (the left button) to place bubbles of the current colour into
position and use Adjust (the right button) to clear them. The following
keys may also be used:
       N - Next screen
       P - Previous screen
       C - Copy screen
       V - Paste screen
       X - Delete screen
       S - Save the screens as file Data in the !Bubble directory

Note that you may have up to 99 screens at once so you may wish to add to
the existing levels rather than replacing them.

Acknowledgement
The idea for this game is based on Puzzle Bobble by Neo Geo.

Copyright  RISC User 1996
