Melkhior's Mansion
A downloadable game for Windows, macOS, and Linux
A fast paced, action packed throwback to the classic games of the 80's, in 15 glorious colours, hand picked from the infamous ZX Spectrum colour palette (we left out bright black!)
Melkhior, the great wizard, the protagonist of the tales of Castle Knight Lore, now passes his twilight years alone in a decrepit yet curious old mansion. Legend talks of sorcery, spells, and superstition from within the walls of Melkhior's Mansion. But what has the old nitwit been up to now? The wizard cares not for the monotony of age, for to this day he pursues his ultimate destiny, divine control over all that is natural and supernatural, and anything in between.
Sadly, things have gone awry. A spell fashioned to tame the entities that live below has gone horribly, horribly wrong. Evil now runs amok throughout the mansion, the underwurlde has been unbarred. In the caverns beneath, a pentagram marks the spot where the portal opened. Ghouls & ghosts, devils & demons draw power from the pillar of stone that sits atop this demonic glyph. A dark spell cast upon Melkhior keeps him trapped in the attic. Alone and afraid, he awaits his grisly fate...
The good news is that word of Melkhior's predicament has reached the fabled Kingdom of Leicestershire. Princess Ashby, heir to the throne and former student of Melkhior, who now lives a tedious life of luxury and leisure....has a plan. She has the knowledge to reverse Melkhior's tinkering, and with the help of her trusted friends, believes she can free Melkhior, close the portal and rid the mansion of evil forever.
Default keyboard controls are:
- Cursor keys to move
- Z to fire
- X to pickup/drop, open chests and use map consoles
- Esc to pause the game and show in game options
If you're really stuck on figuring out what to do, then there are some very handy tips here: http://www.bitglint.co.uk/MelkhiorsMansion/Tips.aspx
1.1 Update Changes
- Fixed room colour issue in one room on the ground floor
- Fixed crash bug when health hits zero
- Fixed crash bug when sound effects volume is set to zero
- Fixed hole in the wall of one of the cavern rooms
- Added gamepad thumb stick control
1.2 Update changes
- Fix another palette saving bug when palette count reaches 10
- Fix food respawn timing bug
- Both issues already fixed in Linux and Mac version 1.1
Download
Install instructions
Windows Installer - Download and run the .exe to automatically install on Windows.
Windows Portable - Download, unzip and run "MelkhiorsMansion.exe"
Linux Portable - Download, unzip and run "Melkhior"
Mac Portable - Download, unzip and run Contents/MacOS/Melkhior
Comments
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Can you make an option to spawn less monsters or at least make spawns less frequent? It’s quite frantic for an isometric puzzle game. And not just frantic but like… constantly frantic.
Melkhior's is a finished project now, so I can't see me finding the time to make any more changes. The game it's inspired by, Atic Atac, is a frantic run around exploratory game, rather than slow and steady puzzler, so removing the frantic nature of the enemies would take away from the essence of the game. I appreciate it's not everyone's cup of tea. One day I would love to do a sequel that's a bit slower paced and requires more thought to achieve the game's tasks.
it shouldnt have the zx tag if its not spectrum imo.
still however, excellent game and fanatastic work.
Thanks for the feedback, glad to hear you're enjoying the game. The "zx-spectrum" tag is used because the game is inspired by a Spectrum classic, and it also uses the Spectrum colour palette. :o)
which i dowload of the windows?
i dowloaded the exe if the better is the zip say it to me
The exe is an installer, the zip file just lets you unzip and run the exe. They are both the same version of the game.
Okay
my geometric thinking skills always fool me while playing but the soundtrack and game itself is insanely good
Haha, thanks :o)
Excellent soundtrack, well designed, gorgeous graphics and a plethora of scenarios for the mind to fill in the blanks of what possibilities may be had. A true oldskool game, sticking to a strict formula, that is executed in near-perfection. This is one addictive game, once you get into it. I'm not one who's ever turned to walkthroughs, nor spoilers so this should keep me going for quite some time. Really looking forward to beating this one, on just about any difficulty level. Nice to see several palettes represented (although I do thoroughly enjoy the ZX Spectrum one), well as options with regards to movement. If you ever wondered 'what made games so great back in the days?' I strongly suggest you give Melkhior's Mansion a spin - it doesn't try to reinvent the wheel, nor is it trying to 'modernize' anything. It is simple, fun and addictive, with a few extras sprinkled on top for good measures. A solid videogame.
Wow! Best feedback ever, thanks so much. You totally get what I was trying to achieve with this game. I hope it lives up to your early expectations. Knowing the map is key to doing well. Good luck.
Melkhiors Mansion 2 confirmed!
(/test project)
Haha! Cheeky! :o
This is absolutely incredible. The attention to detail shows a lot of love. And its haaard!! Digging me graph paper out to make a map. Not done that in a lot of years! :) Thank you.
Thanks, a lot of love certainly went into it. Knowing the map is key to being successful in the game. Good luck, I would love to see any maps you do create.
Congratulations for this amazing work.
What about a linux/arm/RaspberryPi version ???
(I think that "RasPi" has the philosophy of ancient 8bit microcomputers)
Thanks, glad to hear you like it. One day I'll have a tinker with other Linux versions, just got too much other stuff going on at the moment :o)
Can't get the executable to even launch on Manjaro (Vulcan 23.1.3), but I've been playing Undrium on the same system just fine. Am I missing something?
That's odd. Melkhior's uses a slightly earlier version of Monogame. It uses 3.8.0, whereas Undrium uses 3.8.1. Perhaps it's something to do with that. I'll look into it when I have some time.
Doesn't install on Linux Mint 21.2 after following the instructions for Linux Portable. Can this game be put on Flathub?
Possibly, I'll take a look at the Flathub documentation. I'd never heard of it until you mentioned it.
Or / and Snap: https://snapcraft.io/about
Thanks!
I tried it on LinuxMint 21.3 and wouldn't work, then I added the game to Lutris (a linux game launcher for all sort of games) and it worked.
Never heard of Lutris but tried it and, yep, it works. Thanks for that.
The problem, for me, was the absence of a library. If you try to run the game via terminal you can possibly see the error message: "No usable version of the libssl was found". I installed from terminal (sudo dpkg -i libssl1.1_1.1.0g-2ubuntu4_amd64.deb) and now the game work without Lutris.
Thanks for that, I might give it a go.
I'm getting constant black flickers on my Win7 with GT940MX, which renders it unplayable. I tried tinkering with various settings, nothing helps. (including turning off flash effects)
It doesn't happen in the title screen - it only happens if I actually play. Does this game uses DX11? Is there a DX9 switch?
That's odd, not a problem I've seen before. It's written using Monogame, I'm not sure which version of DX that targets, a quick search doesn't reveal much. There is no DX switch. I've just compiled an OpenGL version for Windows if you'd like to try it. The link is http://www.bitglint.co.uk/temp/mmgl.zip
Kudos, it is indeed a rendering issue, the GL build runs perfectly. (Looking closesly, I realized the DX build on my machine not only flickers but also stutters)
I saw there's a dll named SharpDX.Direct3D11 so I assumed it's DX11, but it's just a guess, I'm not familiar with it myself....
I played a bit, pretty fun, and pretty hard! (even with Stamperlot!) I can live with not having a map whenever I want but the constant hp drain really makes me want to start up a certain "engine"... then I scroll down and see someone beating the game with all 4 characters with a hand drawn map... seems like I've been spoiled by modern game design... (though I think I'll still use "the engine" eventually...)
Thanks for the GL build again!
Oh yeh of course, it'll be DirectX 11, I'd forgotten about the SharpDX files. Yeh it's a hard game to start with, but becoming familiar with the map makes things easier. There's also a hints and tip page at www.bitglint.co.uk/MelkhiorsMansion if you're getting stumped. Anyway, glad you've got it running ok now, I'll add that GL build to the download list. Have fun! :o)
Fantastic thank you so much! ;-)
Thanks! :o)
This is so cool but I'm having trouble understanding the controls. What key do you press to attack the monsters/open chests? Or are you just supposed to run away fast enough?
Just press the fire button to shoot a projectile at the monsters. The default key to fire is Z, or button A on a gamepad, but you can also redefine the keys. Press X to open chests, or button B. Again, this can be defined to a key of your choice.
Thanks!
I need some cheat codes like old POKEs system.
Sorry, there are no cheats built in, gonna have to do it the hard way. :o)
In Ubuntu 23.04 I needed to modify Melkhior.runtimeconfig.json by adding
to the configProperties (note - needs a comma to the previous line)
full file is below...
{
"runtimeOptions": {
"tfm": "netcoreapp3.1",
"includedFrameworks": [
{
"name": "Microsoft.NETCore.App",
"version": "3.1.11"
}
],
"configProperties":
{
"System.Runtime.TieredCompilation": false,
"System.Globalization.Invariant": true
}
}
}
works a charm - thanks
Thanks for the info. I tested the game on Ubuntu 22.04 and I didn't have to do that. I'll upgrade the OS and see if I get the same problem that you're seeing.
very good
Thanks
I need this to play on my next ,is it ready to download for the next ?
No, I think it's stalled again. There's been no update on the project blog for over a year... Melkhior’s Mansion – SpecNext Developer HQ
looks and playes great!
greetings!
Thanks! Hi.
Looks slick my man. Which engine was this game made in ???
Thanks. It's my own isometric engine created using Monogame.
Sheeeshhh my man.
Hi! No ZX Spectrum version?
Hi, no not yet. See https://bobs-stuff.itch.io/melkhiors-mansion for more info on the Specie version.
Just discovered this game from some indie game competition hosted by https://www.twitch.tv/seijouf and had to try it myself. Really enjoyed it and have managed to clear all 4 characters now. Very satisfying drawing out my map of the mansion.
Even found a certain room in the caverns, though utterly stumped at if there's more to do there.
Anyway great game!
A hand drawn map! That's made my day, thanks for sharing it. Good to hear you've been enjoying the game so much. There is nothing more to do in that "certain room", although there is another entrance to it that you may not have found.
I've clicked the Twitch link but I don't see any video about the competition. Is it still there?
https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1749154061 here's the vod where they played it. About 20 minutes in is when they start the game. The competitors don't know what they're playing before hand so they're going in completely blind.
Today I've stumbled upon this wonderful looking game. Unfortunately I wasn't able to run in on Ubuntu 22.10 (x86 64bit, Wayland and XOrg). When I start it, it terminates with the following error:
Process terminated. Couldn't find a valid ICU package installed on the system. Set the configuration flag System.Globalization.Invariant to true if you want to run with no globalization support.
at System.Environment.FailFast(System.String)
at System.Globalization.GlobalizationMode.GetGlobalizationInvariantMode()
at System.Globalization.GlobalizationMode..cctor()
at System.Globalization.CultureData.CreateCultureWithInvariantData()
at System.Globalization.CultureData.get_Invariant()
at System.Globalization.CultureInfo..cctor()
at System.StringComparer..cctor()
at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Content.ContentManager..ctor(System.IServiceProvider)
at Microsoft.Xna.Framework.Game..ctor()
at Melkhior.Main..ctor()
at Melkhior.Program.Main()
Any ideas what library or setting could be missing? Thank you a lot!
Marc
I've googled a bit and found that I can export the following variable:
export DOTNET_SYSTEM_GLOBALIZATION_INVARIANT=1
When I do this and start the game, I now get the following hint:
No usable version of libssl was found
It then crashes again.
Hi Marc,
Sorry to hear you're having trouble getting Melkhior's running. I haven't tried it on Linux since it was released a year ago, I think that was on Ubuntu 20. I've just tried it on version 22 and I can't get it to run at all, which is odd. I'll try and find some time to look into it over the next few days, I might need to rebuild it. Have to say, I'm not a Linux person, so I'm not sure how far I'll get with it.
Cheers,
Rich.
Thank you very much! I'm not a .Net person but maybe I can help with the Linux build. Let me know 😃
Is there a possibility for an Android version of this wonderful game? Specially with all these latest generation of Android-based handhelds this would be a winner! It's a fantastic couch game.
At any rate, thanks for the wonderful adaptation of Ultimate's brilliant classic.
An Android version was considered, but performance is an issue, so it wouldn't be a straight port. In all honesty, it's very unlikely to happen. Glad you're enjoying it anyway, thanks for the feedback ;o)
love that art
Thanks ;o)
Do you have plans to make the source code available?
No plans at the moment.
Am I missing something? It seemed to me as if enemy movements were completely random, which in a game with one-hit kills and limited lives is kinda insane. Isn't entire point of any platformer, isometric or not, is ability to predict timing of your enemies and obstacles so you can plan your movement? I haven't much experience with isometric platformers, but both Batman and Head Over Heels remakes had predictable and easily read enemy patterns - it was clear how to avoid them, the difficulty was in the execution (also in traps and puzzles).
The aesthetics are amazing and so is the idea, but I genuinelly cannot grasp enemy patterns.
Thanks for the feedback. It's based on Atic Atac on the ZX Spectrum, which had random movement patterns. Quite a lot of games back then had random movement, especially the Ultimate games. This is a run around exploration game, whereas Batman and HoH are puzzle solving games, so it's important for enemy positions to be predictable. In games like Atic Atac, it isn't, in my humble opinion. Hope it hasn't spoilt it too much for you, but if it's not your thing, that's cool, thanks for trying it out. ;o)
Everything inside of me as a designer yells that that's a terrible idea but I'm trying to be openminded. How do you prevent player from getting stuck in an unwinnable situation if patterns are random? It's a game with one hit kills and limited lives, and it might just downright not be your fault if you die and lose all your progress because all enemies randomly decided to surround you.
It's not what I'd personally call good game design but if your primary goal isn't to make a game that appeals to a modern audience with 'fun' but to simply make a clear homage to these games of old without concern of modern concepts of 'fairness' (which to be fair is a bit nebulous) then sure, more power to you.
I guess there's other revivals of classic isometric platform-adventures I can try, like Abbey of Crime, Naya's Quest, King Boo or Lumo.
It's probably not for me, but a lot of people in this comment section seem to love it, so good on you.Thanks for the feedback. If you want to discuss it further then please feel free to contact me directly. I'm not one for public debate, it never ends well. :o)
I really recognized the Atic Atac design and aesthetic. But Atic Atac hasn't one-hit kills.
Not sure what you mean by one-hit kills?
That's great,Took me strainght back to 1984!! Most excellent!
Thanks :o)
what are the controls besides arrow keys for movement.
You can redefine the control keys, or use a gamepad if you prefer.
Awesome little game, quick and frantic. And a thousand bonus points for offering a Mac version. Kudos!
Thanks, glad you like it. Appreciate the bonus points! :o)
I came here for Klass of 99, but found you made this fantastic game! I’m really bad at it, but the quality of the game is amazing, really polished (I specially love all the different rooms, I find the design really fitting!). And like the previous commenter, I appreciate it being available on Mac, so thanks for that too!
Really looking forward for your next thing, I’m sure it will be amazing.
Thanks, good to hear you're enjoying the game. Good luck with it! ;o)
Glad to make your acquaintance!
I've only played for about 15 mins so far, but I'm genuinely impressed by the quality of this game and the way you've managed to capture the character of Atic Atac whilst bringing it into the 21st Century. Delighted that it's available on the mac too (quite a rare treat). Must have been quite the ultimate labour of love; free too.
Well done to everyone involved; I'm quite envious that I'm last to the party, just turning up to play the game.
Thank you. Your talents and generosity are both appreciated.
Thanks, that's really sincere feedback. Mac and Linux versions were a bit of a learning curve, but got there in the end. Sadly the downloads on both are quite low, compared to Windows PC, so for solo devs like me, it's hard to justify the time and hassle. Tricky one. Anyway, enjoy the game! ;o)
Amazing game, lot of fun! 9,5/10!
Thanks, glad you like it. ;o)
This is a beautiful superbly rendered game, everything here shines. It is super tough at first but you get the drill after a while and realize you can´t really take your time admiring the backgrounds and animations for time if of an essence (Do that when a friend is playing ;) ).
This is highly recommended, deep root oldschool and will sure remind you what a challenge in-game is suppose to be. Sound effects and music are also awesome and so is the presentation. Can´t wait to see what the team is going to come up next.
Beware, if you are the kind of person who plays to always win and prefer a fake-game to massage your brain prior to sleep, it might not be the game for you.
Thanks for the feedback, appreciate it. ;o)
gracias por el juego
De nada :o)
Supremo !!!!! May the Ferranti ULA bless You.
Haha, thanks very much, although the Ferranti ULA will play more of a role in this version... Melkhior’s Mansion by Bob's Stuff (itch.io)
Right, and I'm waiting for the Zx Spectrum Next version too...
:o)
This black and white version would look stunning on the Playdate.
Wow! I was a Speccy user back in the day and got my first start in programming on that machine. I downloaded the demo of this game when it came out and was pleasantly surprised when I revisited it again recently and saw that it had been released. The final version is very impressive and captures the essence of Atic Atac in a modern way with a fantastic art style and retro sound.
I have noticed one thing however that might be an easy fix - the game does not appear to be aware of so-called "ultrawide" desktops e.g. 2560x1080. If I select "full window" or "full screen" the aspect ratio goes out of whack as the horizontal dimension is greater than the game assumes, 2560 as opposed to 1920. I assume there is no 4x scaling option as it was assumed that this would be the same as full-screen (1920x1080) on most machines.
Adding a menu option for 4x scaling, i.e. 1920x1080 would be great, or perhaps a software check to test the available desktop size, and reformat accordingly.
Best regards and well done.
Thanks for the feedback, glad you're enjoying the game. It does try to figure out the highest resolution you're going to want to see as an option. It doesn't include your highest resolution, because that's full screen. The logic assumes standard HD aspect ratio. Have to be honest, I didn't even consider ultra wide. It's a lot of work to "resize" the display for any aspect ratio in a way that avoids changing the ratio so if you select full screen, it simply stretches to fit, which is why you're seeing a stretched display.
Sure, I understand that reformatting the game to a detected desktop resolution is a big job, but that's not what I'm suggesting. It's simply that today's desktops that exceed the 1920x1080 standard and/or are not 16:9 would benefit from a 4x, 5x, resolution scaling option. In fact, 8x would get you all the way to 4K as a soft-of future proofing, assuming your CPU/GPU was powerful enough. That's the part I though would be easy to implement as you already have the scaler done.
I'm not complaining though, it's still playable in a 3x window on ultrawide.
Yeh that's cool, I understand what you mean and the game does already support those higher resolutions, but only if it thinks your desktop resolution is high enough. When determining what zoom levels to offer, I look at the logical height of the game window, which is 270 pixels, then see how many times I can zoom that before it equals or goes over the height of the desktop, that's why you get offered up to x3. On a 1080 pixel high desktop, x4 is the same a full screen and x5 would be too big, so those options aren't offered. I think the maximum you'll see, if you desktop resolution is high enough, is x7, so that would be 3360 x 1890. There's always the option to manually resize the window if the option you want isn't available, and it will remember the window size. I do wonder if I tried to make it too clever! It was fun to code, but a pain in the back side at the same time :o)
When the time passes one hour it becomes wrong.
I think this is already fixed in version 1.2
Err ... the latest version doesn't recognize my gamepads.
The demo version still does.
Tested on Windows 7 Ultimate, DirectX 11 installed on two different hardwares.
Any suggestions ?
Support for none XBox compatible gamepads worked in the demo version by using a 3rd party component, it's not natively supported by Monogame. That component had extra dependencies which was proving troublesome for some installations of Windows, so I chose to remove support for gamepads not supported by Monogame.
Sorry about that.
Hi all, just reporting that M.M. is running beautifully on latest Manjaro Linux KDE. See screenshot.
Excellent, thanks for the info. ;o)
Hi BitGlint,
Amazing that you support all the desktop platforms. Unfortunately, I'm stuck on a iMac 2011 with 10.12.x (no longer upgradable, since the 10.13 requires more GPU HW).
Is there a chance to target 10.12 as minimum, not 10.13?
I will of course in the meantime enjoy this on my Manjaro Linux, as a fall-back.
Thank you for your dedication and passion to produce this pearl of beauty, looking very much forward to see this on the 'Next,
Cheers,
Gunther
Hi Gunther,
Thanks, it's been a bit of a learning curve, and I'm not quite there yet with some Mac hardware, but I'll keep plugging away.
I'm at the very edge of my Mac knowledge, it's all quite new to me. I can send you a test build that targets 10.12. Can you email me? You'll find my email address at BitGlint Games
Cheers,
Rich.
Email sent.