What is Spelunx and the Caves of Mr. Seudo (B&W)?

If you've never played Yodel Toasters or climbed a Pigtoad tree, it's high lime you tried Spelunx and the Caves of Mr. Seudo, a Brøderbund release for — yes, it's true — kids of all ages.

Spelunx is the latest production from the Cyan team of Robyn and Rand Miller, who created The Manhole and Cosmic Osmo, Like their earlier efforts, Spelunx is not a game but rather a "noncompetitive exploration environment." There are no points to score, no levels to attain, and no ways to “die" The whole idea is to explore and to learn along the way.

Kids can play with Spelunx and not realize they’re learning about biology, astronomy, music, chemistry, and so forth, because they're busy having fun. They can mutate wacky trees by splicing genes with the Tree Gene-orator, for example, or they can use Cartesian coordinates to find planets with the P. Seudo Scope and make them spin.

All these activities occur in Prof. Alexander Spelunx's caverns, a set of rooms and tunnels filled with references to famous children's books as well as to more-obscure items (would you believe a MacWEEK mug?). You can click on virtually everything in the caves, with highly unpredictable results.

Like previous Cyan productions, Spelunx is HyperCard-based but with a welcome new twist: MacroMind Director Files are integrated within the stack. By combining black-and-white HyperCard graphics with colorful Director inserts, the Millers have created an unusual look and kept the space requirements for the program relatively modest; Spelunx fits on five 800K disks, rather than requiring a CD-ROM. And because the color portions are limited, you can still run Spelunx effectively on a Mac with a black-and-white monitor.

Although the program's resource needs are carefully contained, its entertainment capabilities are boundless. There's even a secret room with an ingenious entrance that lets you keep modifying the caves with new tunnels and rooms of your own — making Spelunx a game that grows hut doesn't grow old.

Gruberman, Ken. (November 1992). Spelunx and the Caves of Mr. Seudo. MacUser. (pg. 85).

Download Spelunx and the Caves of Mr. Seudo (B&W) for Mac

Architecture

Motorola 68K

Compatibility notes

Emulating this? It could probably run under: Basilisk II