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One of the crown jewels of Atari prototypes. Not only is this
game seem to be fully completed, it's also a whole lot of fun to play! Telepathy came up
for sale on eBay in early 2000, and was won by a very kind person in Germany (well, at least
his email was from Germany...) who very quickly dumped the ROM for all of us to play! Now, his
web page has been long since deleted, but the remains can still be found on
http://web.archive.org. Unfortunately, the cart scan was not archived, but this is the
archive of the page this game was originally released from, and he never gave his name or internet
nickname so he could be credited for this game properly.
This game was originally
intended for use with the Atari Mindlink controller, but will function normally with a standard
controller, which I have confirmed myself with the Cuttle Cart.
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For a couple of years, I enclosed the name of this game in quotation marks.
This is because the name of the game itself has been debated. The EPROMs on the original board that
was discovered said the name of the game was "Telepathy," and both EPROMs indicated that name.
However, from the description of this game I've discovered reading the Stella Mailing List,
I believed, incorrectly, that this was another intended Mindlink game named "Mind Maze." Since the name of games often change through development, or like in the case of "Alligator People,"
the game may have simply been mis-marked. Mind Maze surfaced however, and it was a completely different game. Oh well, can't be correct in every guess.
For those who don't keep up on this kind of thing, it was
recently proven by Matt "Tempest" Reichert that the game labeled "Alligator People" was
in fact the prototype version of "Planet of the Apes." (I always said the bad guys looked like
monkeys...)
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The game play of Telepathy is simple - you can move your character
either left or right, and holding down the button will make you walk instead of run. That's it! It may sound simple, but once you've played this game, things
are not as simple as they may seem. The game will start on Mine #1 - with a screen telling you
which mine you are in. The first board of the game, pictured two rows above this one, starts
you out running towards the mine. The flashing triangles in the picture can be collected for points.
There doesn't seem to be any other purpose for them, but soon enough you will reach the mine and
jump in. The first screen of the mine, pictured above, has you running through multiple levels avoiding spiders.
After dropping off the bottom of the screen, you reach what seems to be your goal - an injured
mine worker, pictured to the left. Grab him, and it's time to get out of the mine.
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Due to the fish present on this level, the only logical explanation
for this level is that you have to swim out of the mine, taking your rescued worker with you.
The goal is simple - get to the top and avoid the fish. There is a slight glitch you can use to
your advantage on this level - if you're going get eaten by one of the fish, slam yourself into
the left side of the screen and keep holding left - the fish will not be able to hurt you. After
swimming to the top, you move onto the next mine.
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On your second trip through the mines, this screen is added on
after the spiders' screen - the elevators. Step on one and it will carry you back up to the
highest level that it stops on. At this point it's worth noting - you can die all you want - you do not have a limited
number of lives in this game - each screen has its own timer. You must clear the screen before
the timer (the bottom set of numbers) reaches zero, or it's game over. Any time remaining on
the timer will be added to your score following each screen.
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Starting with the third mine, this screen gets added - falling and
avoiding the flying purple blobs. This screen is probably the hardest one in the game. The trick
is to land on the platforms every so often to avoid the purple splooge flying at you from the
left. To make things even more fun, starting in Mine #4, the platforms move around the room and the splooge
flies across even faster. Also added in the fourth cave is another screen following this one -
the Chompers. I do not have a picture of this one, but it's similar to the elevator level, except
chompers slam down from the ceiling and attempt to crush you. As far as I saw, there was
nothing added to Cave #5
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Overall, it's quite a good game. Before it was finally
uncovered and dumped for the internet, there were some screen shots of the game circulating
which were often misnamed "Indy II," however, the release of the ROM at least ruled that
particular scenario out. Personally, I suspected that this game might have been Mind Maze, but since that game surfaced, thats another name ruled out. So, we stick with the name on the EPROM stickers - Telepathy.
By any name, give it a download - it's a great game!
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