Swagman on PS1

Lateone night when the rest of Paradise Falls is asleep, Zack and his twinsister Hannah read a poem about the Swagman and his gruesome gang of NightTerrors. It tells how these sinister characters emerge from their twisted,bad-dream landscape – The Terrortries – to spread nightmare-inducing Dreamashon sleeping folk.

As Zack and Hannah read this, a rush of wind and a noise from the window freezesthem in alarm. But a soft light illuminates the room around them and as theyturn, they see a Dreamfly sprinkling Dreamdew into their room. The kids rushto the window, watching as she flies back off across town.

But hunched in the darkness on the bough of a tree is the Swagman. Reachinghis crooked hand up towards the Dreamfly, he captures her in a swarm ofDreamash. She is fated to the imprisonment of one of the bell-jars – just likethe other eleven members of the Dreamflight.

With them imprisoned in this way, the Swagman can safely send his Terrorsthrough the portals between his and our world to extend the boundaries of theTerrortries. Without the Dreamflight to neutralise the bad dreams coilingthrough sleepers’ minds, they will never waken from his nightmares.

Playing the Game

Zack’s Mission

Swagman is a top-down adventure game in which you begin as Zack startingin his and Hannah’s bedroom. To summarise the rest of the introduction to thegame, Hannah has been shrunk down and imprisoned inside their toy birdcage.Some Skallywag creatures have, in the process, stolen all of Zack and Hannah’sfavourite possessions including Zack’s bug collection.

Zack’s mission is to free Hannah and then discover the whereabouts of theGood Great Dreamfly and the eleven members of the Dreamflight, rescue them,so that we can all sleep in peace again.

What this means is that you, as Zack, have to go round the house and gardenpicking up things that Zack can use to get around such as Zack’s flashlightwhich he uses to swipe at the bad guys to kill them (or in the case of ghosts,make them disappear long enough for him to get past), smash bell-jarscontaining the members of the Dreamflight or those containing Dream-livesto give him extra energy, or flick switches to activate certain thingsnecessary for Zack to progress.

Other items available are Zack’s frisbee which works like a boomerang, and whenHannah’s been freed, she can use her yo-yo to bash the bad guys and grab itemsor flick switches in hard-to-reach places. Both characters can use the CherryBombs lying around which dislodge blockages, kill bad guys or destroy parts ofthe wall or surroundings to help you get on in your mission. Don’t get tooclose to the bombs otherwise they’ll blow YOU up as well! You can alsofind keys or pressure pads which will open certain doors.

One of the most important items to pick up is Zack’s bugs, of which there aremany. These are used when you finally get to Limbo where one of the Dreamflightare trapped. The bugs will move across the chunks of earth and show you a saferoute across. Make sure you have enough bugs or else you’ll have to guess therest of the path, and it’s not easy. However, if you pick up all the bugs youcome across you shouldn’t have any problems.

The leader of the bug army is the Scarab, who with the knowledge of thenightmare terrain, is able to give advice at key points of the game. TheScarab is summoned when you open the Scarab chests, and these also allow youto save the game at that point.

The Real World and The Dream World Terrortries

The game is split into two areas – the Real World and the nightmare lands ofthe Terrortries, the latter of which link between different parts of the RealWorld and can be accessed by full-length mirrors found about the locations. Asyou pass through into the Terrortries, you turn into the Dreambeast and can killthe bad guys there with your fire breath instead of the flashlight. WhenHannah’s in play, she uses her Laser Eyes to attack. In this world you cannotuse your other items collected in the Real World either.

Dreamdew and Dream-Lives

To make it through the game you’ll need to collect the Dreamdew which, accordingto the manual, is a magically-enlivening blur moisture that falls from thewings of the Dreamflight to transform Nightmare into Good Dreams. It can bemostly picked up from the Dreamdew flowers, and is a form of energy which canbe diminished by the Ashplants.

Similarly, Dream-Lives (shown as Z’s) can be picked up from certain areassuch as your sleeping parents or the cat whose Zee’s float upwards and can becaught. These are also a form of energy which can be depleted as you take ahit from the bad guys. Lose all your Zee’s and it’s game over. You can restartyour game from that position as long as you press START before your 10-secondcounter drops to zero.

Controlling Zack

The directional buttons move Zack around as you’d expect.

Triangle – allows to you push/pull certain objects such as a crate.
Square – Use the item in Zack or Hannah’s left hand.
Circle – Use the item in Zack or Hannah’s right hand.
Cross – Jump. Hold it down for a higher jump.
SELECT – Access inventory screen.
R1/R2 buttons – Hold either one down in conjunction with the directionalbuttons to slow down and walk.
L1/L2 buttons – Toggle control between Zack and Hannah.
START – Pause/resume game.

In the Dream World, the Dreambeast directional control is the same, but someof the action buttons differ :

Square – Punch (Zack) or Claw Ripper (Hannah).
Circle – Controls Zack’s fire-breath and Hannah’s Laser Eyes.
Triangle – Mega-butt (Zack) or Pirouette (Hannah).
Cross – Jump. Hold it down for a higher jump. Also, Hannah can perform asuper-jump is the Cross button is pressed twice in succession.
START – Pause/resume game.
SELECT, R1/R2 and L1/L2 are unavailable in this mode.

Options

On starting the game, you can select a new game, or select one of thepreviously-saved games from one of eight save-game slots.

The options allow you to alter the music and/or SFX volume, toggle the stereosound on/off, choose one of 5 preset control settings, or choose a language(English, French or German).

Gameplay Tips