michi.nu: Instructions for To Hell with Johnny

Instructions
Contents

1. The basics
2. Scoring
3. Difficulty and extras
4. Accessibility
   - Controls
   - Game speed
   - Modes
   - Color and contrast
   - Spoken interface
5. Appendix

## Accessibility

The game offers several features that target special requirements such as low vision, color blindness and reduced mobility. You control these features under the accessibility settings.

Most of the accessibility settings drastically alter the looks or behavior of the game and while they can make the game fun and playable where it would else be not, they will also make the game less fun and playable if enabled when not needed. Random changes here are not recommended.

### Controls

Several ways of controlling both game and menus are offered. Keyboard, joystick and mouse are all supported as are six reduced keyboard modes meant for mapping to devices with a limited number of control options. Mouse control is indirect, with a visible cursor, suitable also for other analog devices such as pointers and head trackers.

#### Keyboard/joystick

The default option. Play using the arrow keys or any of the other preconfigured keyboard controls.

You can also choose to play with a joystick. When playing with a joystick, press the fire button to pause a running game. Press and hold the fire button after game over to return to the main menu. After a game primarily played with joystick, name entry for the top scores is done through a virtual keyboard also controlled by the stick.

If joystick support is disabled in the framework settings, this option will present as regular keyboard.

#### Mouse

The cursor is visible as glowing ball of light and Johnny or Brianne will continuously move towards it. Pause the game with the mouse button. Name entry for the top scores is done through a virtual keyboard controlled by the mouse.

#### Choose on start

With this option active the control method - keyboard, joystick or mouse - depends on the device you use to navigate the title screen menu and start the game.

#### Reduced (full)

This mode is essentially the same as regular keyboard but for name entry for the top score list using a virtual keyboard controlled by the arrow keys. Suitable if your control device can map multiple controls but not the entire alphabet.

#### Reduced (three keys)

This mode lets you control the game and navigate all menus using three controls only; left, right and space/enter. Name entry for the top score list is done through a virtual keyboard. Where escape is required to leave a screen, the left control is used instead.

#### Reduced (two keys)

This mode lets you control the game and navigate all menus using two controls only; left and right. In menus use the right control to cycle through the options and the left control to select. Name entry is done through a virtual keyboard using the same principle. Elsewhere, when necessary, the left control is used instead of escape and the right instead of space.

#### One switch control

You can also control the game with a single switch mapped to either space or enter. There are three control schemes to choose from. They all have in common that multiple choices (as in menus or after a game has ended) are automatically cycled through and selection is made by activating the switch when a desired option is lit. The speed of this rotation is decided by the menu scan option, as is the speed of the high score wheel used for name entry.

One switch control makes the game inherently harder. To compensate for this, use the game speed setting in the accessibility menu to reduce the speed to a manageable level.

The high score wheel
Activate the switch once to stop the spinning and once more to select the desired letter in the marked area as it lights up. An arrow will appear briefly after each choice, letting you change the direction of the spin with the switch.

#### One switch (scheme 1)

When standing still, the button changes the way you face and starts you running. While running the button makes you stop.

#### One switch (scheme 2)

The button changes the way you face. Running is automatic. In this mode there is no way to stop or to stand still.

#### One switch (scheme 3)

A tap on the button changes the way you face. Running is automatic, but holding the button down halts you in your tracks.

Top

### Game speed

While very easy goes a long way to slow down the game, in some cases you may need to lower the speed even further. You can use the speed option in the accessibility settings to adjust the game speed all the way down to 25% of normal. Unlike using a CPU limiter (which will not work with this game) this affects game play elements only, leaving most eye candy running at regular speed for more pleasing visuals. It also allows you to play the higher difficulties at a slower pace.

Top

### Modes

To further customize the difficulty, go to mode in the accessibility settings. Here you can control the appearance and behavior of most of the elements of the game. This includes turning off some or all traps, rendering monsters and debris mostly harmless or eliminating them altogether, removing bad items, stopping moving platforms, and adjusting the damage that is taken.

For online scores, games played with modified settings are clumped together in a single list. See Online Scores for more information.

Top

### Color and contrast

You can aid visibility in two ways, both found under graphics in the accessibility settings. The first is to change the color scheme to one of the preset modes. Some will help with color blindness, some with clarity and some are just for fun. Try them out to see what works best for you.

The second is to set the contrast option to either high or very high. High leaves most of the original graphics intact but lowers the brightness of background elements and raises it for elements in the foreground. In addition you may selectively remove some graphical elements such as the lightning flashes, parallax scrolling or even the entire HUD.

Very high removes all eye candy and alters most of the graphics to make the significant parts stand out as much as possible. It works in one of three modes: blocky - which replaces all important elements with differently colored blocks, outline - which turns the elements into monochromatic silhouettes, and mixed - a combination of the two.

The HUD in very high is visually quite different from the regular. The health, platform bonus counter and progress bars run vertically along the whole left side of the screen, followed by blocks counting out the current platform multiplier. On the right side of the screen, from top to bottom, come the network indicators, up to five yellow bars counting out the score speed bonus, and finally four stacks of blocks showing the score. Each of the stacks represents a digit in the score when divided by a hundred, the rightmost stack holding the least significant.

Top

### Spoken interface

The spoken interface is enabled in the speech accessibility settings or by pressing `F3` on the title screen. It lets you navigate the menus and the game by audio cues and reads all in-game text aloud through SAPI on Windows or VoiceOver on Mac OS X.

In the speech settings, Menu controls the verbosity of the menu descriptions. At detailed all options of the menu you are looking at are read aloud as are the settings of each option you navigate to. When new to the game you might want to keep the setting here, but once you learn the layout of the menus changing to regular

While playing, if any of the monsters, items and traps options are enabled the voice will also inform you when these come into sight, optionally together with a locator ping panned to the position of the approaching element.

Whether the spoken interface is active or not, many elements of the game can be located by the sound they make. Stereo panning tells where the element is in relation to the center of the screen while the volume is adjusted for its distance to Johnny.

When the spoken interface is active a few utility keys come into play. Most important is the `-` (minus) key which will repeat texts such as tickets, award star information and credits pages. It also reads the name as entered on the high score entry screen.

On the award screen, you can use the arrow keys to jump back and forth between the entries. Left and right will move one entry back and forth respectively, while up and down skip to the next page, fifteen entries.

On the scores screen, use the left and right arrows to skip to the previous or next list and the down and up arrows to jump to the previous or next difficulty level. When online scores are active the `-` (minus) key controls which scores are read and in which order. Pressing it repeatedly rotates through the four options: local scores only, global scores only, alternate scores and alternate tables.

Top

<< Difficulty and extras
Appendix >>