So, brave hero… You went to the Orcish Mines and got their Crystal Crown? Hah? You really think this is over? Watch for the surprise that orcs prepared especially for you…

After a long way up, with blunted sword in hand and Crown in the backpack your face was finally covered in Moonlight. However the pain from bleeding wounds was too strong to let you perceive beauty of rocky area where entrance to  Orcish Mines was. There was only one way home, long way east, where human civilization lays.

A noise recalling whispers of stream, suddenly changed into a roar of hundred voices, when distant shapes spotted  you. “Ooooorrrrcs!” you screamed and started to run for your life…

Rules:

• Use the number pad to move. You can only move E,NE,SE,N,S (6,9,3,8,2) as anything else would be deadly.
• Press ‘p’ to use magic power to teleport you east a distant equaling your MP
• You are wounded and bleeding. Every turn you loose HP.
• Orcs will find you by blood traces, you have to run. Orcs are chasing you from west, run east.
• Run far enough to loose them and win.
• Take herbs ‘?’ that grow among rocks. They add 20 HP and for a moment allow you to run faster.
• Orc guards are on your way. They have different strength (A-F). A is the weakest one, F the strongest.
• Kill guards to get MP. Every killed guard gives you 1 MP and a boost in health.
• Avoid guards hiding by the rocks – they will catch you and throw west.

Like many games by the same author, Ooooorrrcs has a beautifully simplistic game play executed in a minimal way. In short it is a game of catch up on several levels. You’re trying to catch up with the east edge of the screen, but every move you make could push you further back from it. Picking up herbs move you a little closer, but they don’t do as much for your health as a fight with an orc. Fighting orcs helps you catch up with your dwindling health, but may push you back further to the west where you’ll have to play catch up with your goal again. The code was originally written to be no more than 1k. This version has been fleshed out a little but don’t expect to learn much about how to code from the source of this game.

Ooooorrrcs is by Jakub Debski.