A game created by Michi & Tesa

for the One Switch competition arranged and hosted by

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Alice and Rabbit have gotten themselves lost in a bewildering hedge maze. The day is almost coming to an end, and they are most anxious to get home before it gets too dark to find the way.

One switch, one player

Alice Amazed is a one switch game, which means that it can be controlled with a single button or switch. This makes the game more accessible to people with disabilities, but it is still fun to play regardless.

The objective is to guide Alice through the maze, and attain points on the way through various mini games and challenges.

Two switches, two players

But the fun doesn't stop there, as two can play the game together. If the Full Game or Minigames are accessed using Enter (or Return), you suddenly get a two-player game, where Rabbit is no longer being controlled by the computer, but by the second player.

Controls

Use Space to control Alice and select options in the menus.
Use Enter (or Return) to control Rabbit in the full game or minigame two-player mode.
To start full game or minigame in two-player mode, use Enter (or Return) to select it.
To exit from within the game, press Escape.

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It begins...

At the title screen, you are presented with the following options:

Full Game:

Selecting this starts the full game, with Alice and Rabbit entering the maze.

Minigames:

This brings up a special menu presenting the available minigames. Currently there are four to choose from.

Settings:

This menu allows you to change the current game settings.

• Controls
  • High Scores: Toggles whether high scores are enabled.
  • Instructions: Not yet implemented.
  • Menu Speed: Toggles the speed with which menu items are highlighted.
    Can be slow, medium or fast.

• Difficulty
  Toggles between five levels of game difficulty.
  All games are affected by the selected game difficulty, and there can be some variations of pace, obstacles and scoring.

• Graphics
  • Full Screen: Toggles between full screen and windowed mode.
  • Stabilize graphics: Switch on to avoid issues with tearing graphics, but leave it off if it slows your computer down.

• Sound
  • SFX Volume: Toggle sound effect volume, and turn sound off. Not yet implemented.
  • Music Volume: Toggle music volume, or turn music off. Not yet implemented.

Quit

Quits the game entirely

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Amazed

Alice and Rabbit have gotten themselves lost in a bewildering hedge maze. The day is almost coming to an end, and they are most anxious to get home before it gets too dark to find the way.

Alice has to cross the river at the right side of the maze in order to get home, but the bridge has been dismantled and stuffed into a chest hidden within the maze. She has to find the magic timber for the bridge before she can cross it. But she can't get to the magic timber unless she has cleared enough obstacles in the maze, and acquired enough points for the chest to open. So off she goes to do her best to get home, and she has to hurry before time runs.

Rabbit has to cross the river at the left hand side of the maze in order to get home to his wife and baby bunnies. In one-player mode, Rabbit is controlled by the computer, with skills based on the game difficulty settings. In two-player mode, the second player controls Rabbit.

First one home wins.

Controls

When entering the full game, both Alice and Rabbit are snoozing. Each player has to press a button to ensure that both are ready.

The maze is navigated using control bricks that come floating down the rivers. Alice's bricks are located on the left hand side, while Rabbit has his control bricks on the right hand side. The bricks come in groups of five, and will be highlighted sequentially. Use your button to select the brick you wish to use from the current group. In the easiest mode, you move for every brick you picked, but in the other modes, you have to plan a number of moves before moving.

Bricks

Alice is controlled by green bricks while Rabbit is controlled by beige bricks. Grey bricks affect both players. The following is a presentation of available bricks:

Encounters in the maze

There are things that you will stumble upon in the maze, that will either help or hinder you. There are four minigames (we were making nine, but well, yeah, so we ran out of time at four - you get to play each game twice instead), your primary method of racking up the points.

The magic timber chest contains the building blocks for each bridge. Each player needs a certain number of points to reveal his chest.

Oh, and some one let some unpleasant cats into the maze. The kind you can't be really sure if they exist or not.

Variations

With increasing difficulty: brick selection speed increases, more steps have to be planned in advance, new bonus bricks become available, and the maze becomes more complex, filled with nastier items. On "medium" difficulty, one Unpleasant Cat will start hunting you. On higher difficulty settings, two Unpleasant Cats stalk the maze. The score required to open your magic timber chest rises with difficulty as well.

Common to all the minigames is the lowest levels of difficulty being noticably slowed down and, when appropriate, allowed more time for completion.

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Shooting Stars

Alice and Rabbit are equipped with bow and star arrows, and try to shoot each other down.

Objective

Break your enemy's shield and shoot him before he does the same to you.

A better score will be given for popping a balloon than for sending it flying. Extra points are awarded for taking out both balloons with one shot and for popping a balloon in flight.

Flying objects

Special objects sometimes fly by in the sky. Hit these for extra bonuses:

Controls

You will continuously change the aim of your weapon from straight up to straight ahead and back. Press your button once to freeze your aim. A power bar will appear, indicating the draw length. Press your button again to release the shot.

Reloading is automatic. Once reloaded, your aim will be frozen in its last position for a brief moment before starting to move again, allowing you to fire several arrows rapidly in the same direction.

Variations

Increasing difficulty brings wilder landscapes and stronger winds. The highest levels are faster, and have less restrictions on the balloon starting locations.
The lowest levels grant additional targeting aid in the form of a tracer beam during draw.

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Climbing the Wells

Ooops, Alice and Rabbit fell into a deep, dank well. How will they get out?

Objective

Climb the well before it is flooded with water, stopping only to accumulate score by picking up any rare mushrooms you come across on the way.

Balloons, used wisely, will speed your ascent. Grab one and you'll soar to the nearest platform above.

Electric dodos on the other hand; vicious, explosive creatures with the brains of thick porridge. Should one come in contact with you, the resulting shock will throw you off your platform and send you falling down.

Another obstacle on your way to safety is the state of the platforms themselves. Some are worn with age and will start to crumble once stepped on. Hurry onto more solid stone lest you want to fall.

Win by ascending all thirty floors and seeking shelter in the bucket. If you are submerged in water, you lose.

Controls

This minigame is in splitscreen mode, which means that the left side of the screen will follow the ascent of Alice, and the right side follows Rabbit.

Press your button to jump. Once you take the crouching landing position you are ready for another jump.

Variations

With a higher difficulty setting: more items fall into the well, the dodos cause you to fall further, fewer stones are available to walk on and more of those are fragile.

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Pelican Hoops

Alice and Rabbit stumbled upon a couple of hungry pelicans by some docks, obscured away inside the maze. But there's plenty of fish in the sea...

Objective

Feed your pelican with the fish that keeps jumping out from the sea (there IS such a thing as a free lunch), and try to hinder your opponent from stealing your fish.

Controls

Press your button to grab the fish when it is within reach. If it is too far in front of you, you will jump towards it. When the fish is behind you, press the button to turn around and run towards the fish.
When the fish is in your hands, press the button to jump and throw it towards your pelican.

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Snail Pace Race

Alice and Rabbit have to cross the desert as fast as possible, and there is only one snail carriage, the other player has to run! But whoever said snails were fast...

Objective

Rider: Avoid the stones (which will slow you down) and collect as much lettuce as possible (mostly to stop your opponent from getting it).

Runner: Pick up any lettuce you come across and use it to lure the snail towards you and off track. The more lettuce you have, the stronger your influence over the snail's movement. You can carry up to five heads.

Controls

Rider: You will automatically swing your carrot stick back and forth. Press your button to move the carrot in the direction your stick is pointing. This will in turn lure the snail in the chosen direction as he keeps hunting the carrot. Each time the snail has to turn, he slows down a bit, though left alone he will soon be back at top speed again. The attainable speed varies with the snail's direction. A sharper turn means a lower maximum speed to reach.

Runner: You will automatically run along the track to the best of your ability (and boy are those snails tough to outpace). Press your button to cross the road (or change direction mid-road).

Variations

With increasing difficulty comes narrower tracks and more desirable lettuce.

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High Scores

If you manage to get onto the high score list, you will be asked to enter your alias.

The high score name screen has a spinning alphabet wheel. As your desired character enters the marked area, press the button once to stop the alphabet wheel spinning. Wait for your character to light up then hit the button again to enter that character into the name field.

For a short while after entering a character an arrow will show on the screen. Pressing the button during this time will reverse the direction of the wheel.

Then the wheel will start spinning again.

Select END when you are done.

Special characters

SPC : blank space

CASE: Toggles between upper and lower case characters. Though the wheel will automatically change to lower case after you enter your first character, CASE allows for more unorthodox capitalization schemes.

DEL : Deletes the last entered character. Repeatedly pressing the button with DEL selected will delete several characters in a row.

END : Ends the character input and saves the name on the high score list.

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Requirements

DirectX 8 or later. Graphic card with 16 MB video memory.

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Download

Go to http://www.michi.nu/alice/download.php to see the available options.