TONY - Montezuma's Gold
A downloadable game
Greetings, digital explorer!
Embark on a pixelated journey inspired by Tony Halik, the real-life Polish explorer and filmmaker whose adventures spanned continents and decades. He was exploring ancient civilisations for NBC, Tony's love of discovery knew no bounds. Now it's your turn to step into Tony's digital shoes and unravel the mysteries of Montezuma's Castle in this nostalgic 8-bit homage.
Ordering boxed version:
System Requirements
- A trusty Commodore 64 or reliable emulator.
- A sense of retro adventure, fired up and ready to go.
- A supported storage device: 1541 (after transferring disk images into the floppy disk), SD2IEC, 1541 Ultimate, Ultimate64, Pi1541. We plan to support EasyFlash/EasyFlash3 in the near future.
- Optional: A joystick plugged into port 2. Keyboard controls are also supported.
Game overview
As Tony, you'll traverse the pixel art of Montezuma's Castle. Watch out for those tricky traps, avoid pixelated dangers and let chip tune rhythms guide your path.
Controls & Commands
- Joystick left/right or A/D on the keyboard: Standard movement.
- Up/Down on joystick or W/S on the keyboard: Navigate through ladders.
- Down / S on the keyboard: Makes Tony duck and dodge. (A useful skill in tight spaces!)
- Fire button or Space on the keyboard: Make Tony jump, whether to avoid danger or to reach the tantalising treasure.
Additionally:
- F1: changes colour scheme.
- Run/Stop: kills the player and restarts the room.
- Run/Stop + Shift: ends the game and goes back to the title.
Tips from an earlier explorer
Legend has it that Montezuma's Mask is more than just an artifact. Find it, and you may reveal more than its shiny surface. The door to something monumental awaits you!
Now, let’s talk strategy! Think of your points as your lifeline—literally. Every 3,000 points grants you an extra life, so collect those treasures like a squirrel hoarding nuts. You start with five lives, and they don't come easy, so cherish each one. Jewels, worth 200 points each, and potions, worth 100 points, are your best friends. But hey, if you’re feeling feisty, you can use those potions to send enemies to an early grave, earning you 50 points per vanquished foe.
Your inventory is a bit of a tight squeeze, with only four slots available. Keys, masks, and potions are the hot items here, while jewels thankfully don't take up any space. Be strategic—once an item is in your inventory, it’s there to stay until used or booted by a higher-priority item. Masks top the priority list (essential for level completion), followed by keys, and lastly potions. Don’t forget, keys unlock doors, masks complete levels, and unused items vanish into thin air when you advance to the next stage. So, plan wisely and keep an eye out for Montezuma’s legendary mask—your ticket to the next adventure!
Oh, and here’s a juicy secret for you: keep an eye out for hidden rooms, packed with additional treasures like jewels. They’re the stuff of legends, often tucked away where you’d least expect them. And sometimes, if you're lucky, you'll stumble upon hidden passages that whisk you away to higher levels. So don’t just walk by that suspicious-looking wall—give it a nudge and see what happens. Your path to glory could be just a secret passage away!
Tributes
To the legacy of Tony Halik for inspiring this pixel quest. For those of you who remember the days of 8-bit adventure, we hope this brings back fond memories. To newcomers, welcome to a legendary era of gaming!
About authors
Game concept & graphics: Rafał Dudek
Programming: Maciej Małecki
Music: Adam Gilmore, Sami "Mutetus" Juntunen
Sound FX: Maciej Małecki
Testing: Raffox, Rafał "Yogi" Wypych, Vladimir Jankovic, Louie Dimovski, Sönke Smiletzki, Krzysztof Odachowski
Help: David "Jazzcat" Simmons
Pixel-perfect adventure awaits!
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Purchase
In order to download this game you must purchase it at or above the minimum price of $9.99 USD. You will get access to the following files:
Download demo
Development log
- Tony: Montezuma's Gold is out87 days ago
- Tony: Montezuma's Gold release set on 7th June, 2024!May 28, 2024
- Source code for Tony's demo is availableOct 09, 2023
- Tony demo v1.3 patch is now available for downloadOct 08, 2023
Comments
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Nice final release !
I will agree about the unintended "double jump" "feature". Also ducking unexpectedly off ladders too.
One "bug" I have found is that when you start level 5, go up the ladder, go right, you can then jump off the platform into the middle of the two doors and get stuck. Only way out is to suicide yourself.
Ducking off ladders, agree. Double door - funny bug, will be fixed too
Have you thought about making Commander X16 version?
Well, honestly... yes. Stay tuned!
😃
Moja ulubiona wersja! :D
Here are a few details about the bugs found that affect the current version 2.0.1 which has been tested with the built-in trainer for infinite lives. In the first level, there is apparently a point where you end up directly in level 4, instead of in another room as initially assumed (see 05:56:30 and 06:04:31 in our longplay video). Furthermore, at the end of level 3 there were two keys left that apparently had no use. In level 4, a key is "swallowed" by the game or simply swapped for the master key found in the 4th slot if you do not follow a specific order for using the keys and all slots are already occupied with keys (see 07:12:40). This means that a key is missing in the level, so you cannot open the last door before the main exit and thus cannot complete the level. If you have used the keys for some doors beforehand, the problem does not occur (see 07:30:54). In level 5, you can't pick up a key or a potion at a certain point, and then suddenly you can pick them up again after you've moved away a few rooms and then come back there (see 08:03:42). There are also a few rooms where you can get stuck in the wall. The controls are sometimes very frustrating, as you often do unwanted double jumps if you hold down the fire button for a little longer. 🙁
Hello, thank you for your review and bug reports. Quick answers:
1) Warp to level 4 is anticipated (similar warp is available from level 2)
2) It was indeed a problem with that level in demo, in full versions two missing doors were added thus number of keys is balanced. There is one room with extra jewels guarded with two doors. Opening these doors is not necessary to finish the level, maybe you missed that one?
3) Yes, mask can swallow the key thus preventing finishing the level. This is a smart inventory management that has been implemented in the game, as it is not possible to throw away items. I can reconsider this mask thing, however and include this in bug fix release.
4) Double jumps has been already pointed out and will be fixed in bug fix release. Other platforms didn't have this problem and simply nobody pointed that earlier. I myself learned not to keep fire pressed but agree, this is frustrating, esp. for somebody that switches from Atari to C64 version.
5) Oversimplified collision detection is a problem, I'm trying to mitigate this by fixing the map design (not to let Tony to jump into the wall).
Great game that stands out especially for its individual, high-resolution graphic style, even if it is only in one color. Unfortunately, some bugs and playability spoil the fun, see separate posting. Our German-language review can be found in our recorded livestream starting at 00:53:21 and there is also a longplay at 05:47:37. English subtitles are also available. Subscription to our YouTube and Twitch channel is welcome. 🙂
Would it be possible to have a mode with two SIDs where the first SID plays music and the second SID sound effects? Or does that create problems with lack of CPU time or would you run out of memory?
That's wild, I came looking for info here about that very same possibility. xD Dual sid support would be awesome.
The only reason why FX cannot be mixed with music is that one of musicians was reluctant to do this. Dual SID would obviously do the trick however how many users have this set up (I mean on a real Hardware). I can think about it, however, in an update.
Well, I guess a lot more people than you may think have have a dual SID setup nowadays. I can think of:
Ultimate64 owners have three eight SIDs in their C64 as well. Ultimate64 owners have up to eight SIDs in their C64.Some of these pieces of hardware sold quite well, for example the 1541U2 sold thousands and thousands. There I expect that a significant part of the user base nowadays has a dual SID solution.
Personally I both own a 1541U2 and an ARM2SID, that I have installed in my Commodore 128. I have quite a few C64s, that all have a single SID, so I may not always use a setup that is dual SID capable. However, for a game that does support dual SID, I will certainly grab my C128.
Amazing aestetic. Love the pixelated cartoon style graphics (But why use generative AI on the cover?). While the game looks sublime, I don't think the music fits the game, and it makes no room for sound effects. Nevertheless I applaud your achievement.
Why generative AI?
Looking closely at the cover, you can really tell it's ai. Put me off of this game unfortunately
Fantastic game. I started playing it and was instantly hooked. I made it to the end (using infinite lives of course) and really enjoyed it. I did encounter a possible bug. I jumped and ended up inside a wall and couldn't move. But I could still jump, so I kept jumping until I encountered a tunnel and then everything worked normal again.
Pls post a screenshot or tell which level / room is it. We will correct this and provide an update.
Breathtaking game; and the jump in the longplay at 19:30 was nuts. Enjoy!
I'm watching your video and I'm shocked at how well you play... Would you like to be our tester for Tony 2 :D
Sure, but keep in mind that my longplays are created with savestate support. My true skills are not as impressive as they appear in the video, but I can dissect any game in Vice Snapshots to find bugs. I can't even count on one hand the number of developers who have fixed bugs in their games after the release of my longplays.
Probably just me! 😁
No, not just you. When I said that I can't count the number on one hand, I meant that there are already more than 5 developers who have fixed bugs after watching the longplay of their respective games, or at least made minor changes to their games.
Excellent game. Already finished it, but only because I used the infinite lives option and also because while exploring the first level ended up finding the shortcut to level 4 which reduced the time it took me to finish it. It is a hard game that required good timing when avoiding traps and enemies. But still, an excellent game. Will be going back to it to explore all the parts I missed.
A few tiny niggles already. Startup resetting the VIC-II and displaying version number means that the default colours for border and backround are set. Better keep as black to prevent the blue flash.
In game holding F1 to cycle the colours causes the screen to glitch as $DC01 is not checked against being equal to the previous value before changing colour.
Yellow screen means that the score is not visible.
You should pad the CRT (ie unused space) with $FF and not $00.
Interesting! I will try to address it in 2.1
I think with yellow it was like this in demo as well. So no leading zero'es are visible. There's a missing shade for yellow in VIC-II ;-)
Ah, yeah makes sense. No light yellow 🤣
But its just leading zeros. Points are displayed normally.
The blue flash is on the cartridge image startup
Try to solve it like this POKE 18707, 7
Very good game and great music. This is something to look forward to. The full version didn't make it to this May video, but in the video I mentioned that soon you can buy the full version. You can watch my new video "Gameplay of New C64 Games from May 2024" at this link.
Great playable Demo. A friend of mine played it:
The worldwide premiere of the game TONY will take place during Pixel Heaven and Pixel Expo from June 7 to June 9. ( https://pixelheavenfest.com/en/ ). Pre-orders will be available in a few days on the publisher's website: https://ka-plus.pl/en/tony-montezumas-gold/
Did I misunderstand that the full version of this game was released yesterday?
I heard it was delayed till June.
Me too. I read a post that the release was yesterday but I think that was an error.
Yes, it is not delayed, but was planned for 7th of June, at PixelHeaven 2024 fest. We will open preorders for boxed releases shortly.
Awesome game!
Absolutely beautiful! Finally got a chance to play. Really looking forward to the finished game on the Commodore64. Will give the Atari 800 version a go too on my new mini :-)
thank you
does anyone else have this problem? Some games I try to download and I get a blank Install box, had this problem seemingly forever. I'm on Windows 11, latest. My To Location: is filled out, but the Install: is blank. Can't download or install it.
Try with different web browser.
Looks lovely. Trying now!
thank you
Oh I love the motorhome GFX... Very well done.
Excellent thank you!
www.commodoreblog.uk
Good job! /c64universe.wordpress.com/2024/01/17/tony-montezumas-treasure-preview/
thank you
Tiene muy buena pinta! espero que lo puedas terminar.
absolutely fantastic, the look and feel is perfect, the graphics are lovely and detailed and the whole game oozes quality, can’t wait for the final version, brilliant.
Excellent playable preview. Superb hires graphics and excellent music. It reminds me of Databyte/Parker Bros' classic "Montezuma's Revenge". I really look forward to seeing the final version of this game when it comes out.
Jak dla Halika, to musi być super :)
Very clean and promising conversion of the Amiga version. We are very excited about the final version. Our German-language review can be found in our recorded livestream starting at 01:57:13. Subscription to our YouTube or Twitch channel is welcome. 🙂
A great game! I love the graphics and animation. It's really enjoyable to play, I can't wait for the full version ^^ !
Nice gameplay! Reminds me of my favorite Amiga game: PP Hammer. Would be nice if the game gets a bit more color the more you reach the end...
Warning, contrary opinions ahead: Snowflakes must not read on.
Ugh. Black&White ugliness should stay on the Spectrum. We have 16 colors available, how about using them! Not a fan of this at all. Quite frankly, I hate this look - reminds me of the Spectrum crap that is all too prevalent on the C64. I thought these cancerous days were over, seems I was wrong :(
Update (and reply to Roysterini, as I got blocked from replying directly):
No tricks, just my honest opinion. I am not as ass-kissing machine, if that bothers you that's your problem not mine. Now, the graphics might look nice to you, but in my opinion black & white only graphics are a bye-product of the dastardly Sinclair era and should be forgotten already. There is nothing good about that look, no matter how nice you think they are drawn. Let's leave it at that.
In the next version of TONY 2 we will try to meet your requirements.
I think your gfx look great
I see you are up to your usual tricks, Noggerinos. Different name, but same negative input.
If you have nothing good to say, why must you post?
I actually think this style looks lovely. Horses for courses.
Lots of people like Spectrum games, btw.
It's one thing to give constructive criticism, but yours is destructive criticism and has nothing to do with being a sycophant or not. If it bothers you, don't play it.
Awesome!
I have created an account just to let you know I love what you have done here. Amazing work, graphics, music and atmosphere. Count me in for a full version!
this rox!! DO BURGERTIME!!
;d thank you
please can I get that shirt!!! and ... guys and gals... please do Burgertime, and Splash Lake, and a Donkey Kong with random levels! and a decent chess game , and a pachinko.
Awesome graphics!! I love it.
Congrats!!! The demo looks real amazing!!!
This is a dream game!!! I'm backing in time and enjoying every second of it!
very nice