RetroHub games
The King's Valet
Nine rooms, nine sealed chambers, and three reserves running down.
Find the keys that open the chambers.
Collect all nine bolts to clear the dungeon.
Run from the ghosts, or catch them with the sword.
Characters and items
The fool
That's you. He walks the maze, going from room to room through the openings in the walls.
The ghost
It wanders the room at random. If it touches you, you lose a life.
The fleeing ghost
White while your sword lasts: it slows down, runs from you, and you are the one who catches it.
The key
One per room. It opens the chamber of another room, never its own.
The lightning bolt
Walled in at the centre of each room. Collect all nine and the dungeon is cleared.
The sword
Fills the shortest reserve: the time during which you are dangerous to ghosts.
The apple
Fills hunger, the survival clock. Missing from the three rooms of the middle column.
The candle
Fills the light: while it burns, you can see the ghosts.
The flower
Appears when the last ghost of a room falls. It goes into the princess's bouquet.
The goal, and the keys
The dungeon has nine rooms, laid out three by three. Each one has a walled chamber at its centre, and inside that chamber a lightning bolt. The dungeon is cleared once all nine bolts have been collected.
Every room holds a key, and no key opens the chamber of its own room. The one you pick up here opens a chamber somewhere else — so you have to work the whole dungeon rather than empty it room by room.
An open chamber is entered from the left or the right, never from above or below: the keyholes are on the sides.
The panel on the right
At the top, the dungeon map: the dungeon number and its nine rooms. The yellow frame marks the room you are in. A room is red while its chamber is walled up, green once it is open, black once its bolt is taken.
Below, the three reserves: sword, apple and candle. They run down all the time, and each one fills up when you pick up its item from the floor of a room.
Every room holds a sword and a candle, but the apple is missing from the three rooms of the middle column — including the one the game starts in. Hunger cannot be fixed just anywhere.
The ghosts, and the sword
The ghosts move at random, never turning back while another way out is open to them. If they touch you, you die — unless you hold a sword.
The sword turns the tables: while it lasts, they are the ones running, and you are the one catching them. But the sword is by far the shortest reserve, and it only really pays off if you chain your catches.
The count starts over in the next room. And a ghost never enters a chamber, even an open one: the bolt is not a trap.
Entering a room
For the first few seconds, the ghosts are visible even if your candle is out. After that grace period the dark takes them back — and you hear them without seeing them.
The flower and the magic item
When the last ghost in a room falls, something appears at the exact opposite of where it died: a flower, or the dungeon's magic item.
The flower gives no power: you pick it up, it adds up, and it is counted at the end of the dungeon. It is a bouquet for the princess.
Take it right away. If you leave the room without picking it up, it is gone — and it does not grow back: a cleared room never makes ghosts again. A flower left behind is lost for the whole dungeon.
The magic item does something. There is one per dungeon, and four that take turns:
The boots
The fool moves a quarter faster, for five minutes.
The magic candle
The light stops running down: the ghosts stay visible, for five minutes.
The heart
One more life, right away and for good.
The helm
Hunger stops running down, for five minutes.
Dying
You start with three lives. When you die, you come back below the chamber of the room you fell in, never at the centre of the dungeon — and all three reserves start full again.
You are untouchable for a short moment as you come back: long enough to see where the ghosts are.
Clearing the dungeon
The last bolt collected freezes the dungeon. The anthem plays, then the flowers are laid down one by one, counted in front of you. The dungeon is worth a thousand extra points.
Nine dungeons, four virtues
Each dungeon opens on its tower and its virtue. There are nine dungeons, and four virtues that take turns, each with the item walled into the chambers:
the bolt of Fortitude
the eye of Prudence
the scales of Justice
the cup of Temperance
The nine rooms stay the same from one dungeon to the next: what changes is the pressure. The ghosts get faster with every dungeon, and the three reserves run out sooner.
By the ninth, the sword and the candle are down to half: a sword lasts under fourteen seconds there. Hunger runs down more slowly — three quarters are left, because three rooms out of nine have no apple and you starve on the way, not on the spot. You can see it on the gauge, which keeps its frame and stops filling all the way to the top.
The ghosts end up a hair short of your speed. They never catch you on a straight line, but they leave you nothing.
Controls
Phone and tablet
| ▲ ▼ ◀ ▶ | walk |
| ✓ | carry on, between dungeons |
| ✱ | leave the game |
On a screen too narrow for the pad, the twelve-key keypad takes its place: 2 4 6 8 to walk.
Computer
| ↑ ↓ ← → | walk |
| 2 4 6 8 | walk too, like the original keypad |
| Enter Space | carry on, between dungeons |
| Esc * | leave the game |
Television
| the arrows | walk |
| OK | carry on, between dungeons |
| Back | leave the game |
Any key skips a dungeon's opening, except the star, which stays the way back.