Walkthrough for

                               The Lost City

                            by an unknown author

                           Written by Richard Bos


  First, a few notes. 
  
  To start with, this is a Quilled game for the ZX Spectrum, with all that
implies. Commands are one or two words only, first four letters significant.
There is no "it", and no "all" either, nor are multiple objects recognised.
Luckily, in this game there is only one place where this is even remotely
onerous.
  It is not clear who wrote this program, but it bears all the hallmarks of a
work abandoned halfway through. It doesn't seem to have been spell-checked, and
the punctuation is broken - though at least semi-regularly so... The puzzles,
at least, are all there, and have been debugged, although the larger structure
could be improved on. The scenery in the later part of the game makes it clear
that the author intended for there to be more, possibly much more, to follow,
and the final screen all but explicitly says so. Strange, then, that this was
issued as a loadable tape (or TZX derived, presumably, from a tape), complete
with modified charset and self-written, non-Gilsoft loader. Was it perhaps
meant as a beta-test version, not to be released to the general public? We'll
probably never know, or even who the author was.
  Obviously, since this is a walkthrough, spoilers are rife below. There is no
help command, and examining things is not always as helpful as it could be. It
is unclear whether this is because the game is old-fashioned or unfinished. 
I'm not taking you past every single clue and sight, but I do provide some
commands which are not necessary to get to the end, but which would be required
for any player to discover what to do next. There is no score, so it is not
possible to tell whether this is a complete or (almost) optimal solution, but I
think it is.


  We start in a bit of an abrupt situation...

  Search the wreck and take the lighter. Ignore the map, it doesn't tell you
anything interesting. Go up twice and get the spade, then back down once.
Search the bushes. Argh... ok, _part_ the bushes. Go east, search the debris
and take the lantern, then go back west and down twice.
  Light the lantern. Search the shaft and get the blade. Go through the maze:
east, south, east twice and north. Dig here and take the machete. Go back
south, west twice, north twice, and up twice.
  Cut the bushes, then drop the machete and take the bushes. Go down and west,
and dig here. Now drop everything so you'll fit through that hole: drop spade,
drop lantern, drop lighter, drop bushes, drop blade. Go west.

  Go north and get the helve, then south, up and east and drop it. Search the
hut; take the mask and wear it. Go back west, down and east. (You still can't
pass this way carrying anything including the mask, but wearing it is fine.)
  Take the blade and helve, fix the blade (to the helve), then enlarge the
hole. Take the bushes; you will now fit through the hole with them. Go west,
north, and east twice. Examine the rock, then examine the crack. Insert your
hand, and get the axe.
  Go west four times. First drop the bushes, then go west again, and south.
Search the dust, then search the hut. Sharpen the axe and get the rope. Go back
north and east thrice, then north. Cut some trees. Make a raft and launch it.

  On the other side of the river, go east twice, then south. Examine the tree,
then look under it; examine the log and retrieve the rope. Go back north and
west, then north thrice.
  Examine the gate. Remove the blade and insert the helve. Pull the resulting
lever, wait four times - until the boat is fully afloat - then board the boat.
Throw your rope and pull on it. Go up and north. Yup, that's all there is.