DIAGRAM 1
Here's one way to get up to the hidden world of Mountain King:
At the small
mountain, stand on the 2th plateau from the top, very close to its right end
[a].
Jump up+left and hold your joystick in that possition to bounce
near the left corner [b] of the plateau above. If instead you bounce in
the center, try again; you must bounce near the far end at [b].
_b________
__________________a
_________ ________________________________
And while still holding your joystick in an up+left position and never
letting go, you'll bounce back up from [b] and fly to come down again to
hit the very right tip - (if not the tip, try again) of the top plateau
of the highest mountain [c]
______________c
_______________________
__________ _______________
And then bounce from [c] to fly way, way up this time up to arrive at
four red plateaus hanging in mid-air as shown here (not to scale):
# # # _ _ # # _ _
Then, carefully make your way to the blue ladder at left.
DIAGRAM 2
This is for SECTION A, STEP 5 of the main page: Climb up the 'left paddle' ladder. Half way up there's a gap in the ladder and a short red plateau to the left of the gap.
_ _ ##*###### ....(level 56, white flame)
# #
#____________#
# #
# # /___This is 'right paddle' ladder.
# _ \ "Gateways" begin here & continue
# # to the right of this ladder.
______\ _ _ _ _ Also see Flame Trick below.
/ / # #
The short / # #
red plateau / # #
in the 'left paddle' ## ##
ladder. ## ##
# #
# #
# #
# #
Note: The drawing above may not display properly on cell phones and other
devices. Most blue ladders [#] have red plateaus attached above & below them but
not all are shown here. And I couldn't color this.
DIAGRAM 3
In the diagram below a, b, c, and d, are the steps to take that are outlined in
SECTION B, Step 4, of the
Main Page.
[a] is at level 48 in left Paddle ladder plugged in the right port.
[b] is at level 47 in the 'C' ladder created and controlled by
the C button from a Sega Genesis (not Sega Genisis) controller plugged in left
port!
[c] is at level 46 in another ladder also created by the Sega Genesis
also in the left port.
[d] is level 45; the short blue ladder you must grab to climb higher.
Jump from [a] to the 'C' ladder at [b] (from level 48 to 47).
At level 47, of the 'C' ladder, there's a short red plateau. Stand on the
very right edge of it [b]. Then, jump up-Left from this short red
plateau [b], and almost simultaneously remove the 'C' ladder (by pushing C
button) *just* as you are leaving so that your explorers' head doesn't hit the
rest of the red-plateau ladder above. In other words the 'C' ladder must be
removed just after milliseconds having jumped up-left from level 47.
Practice this manoeuvre.
You should come down to bounce off [c] and skip up to grab a short blue
ladder at [d].
If done properly your explorers head should catch the short blue
ladder [d] (the availability and location of which depends on your TIME).
______ 43 (levels)
# # _ ## _ 44
### #d _ # _ _ 45
c_ _ _ 46
###### # _ _b _ 47 enters an alternate version of MK
# ######### a_ # #_ # # # 48
### _ # ###### _ 49
_ #### _ # # 50
_ ###### _ 51
#### _ ### ##### 52 explorer falls thru the mountain
. #######_ 53
. ##### _ 54
. ######## ## 55 explorer changes colour (orange)
. #*########## 56 the white flame here
The 'C' ladder here. _
.
.
....here's the right paddle ladder.
The drawing above may not display properly on cell phones and other devices.
Easter Egg Trick!
Credit for finding this trick is mentioned in the:Introduction.
Credit for finding the easter egg at the top of the mountain goes to: Patrick Forhan. In the early 2000s I did a few searches in most Newsgroups for all messages posted about Mountain King and found one in particular very interesting. It mentions the easter egg area at the top of the mountain to increase the score. It was posted by Patrick at Newsgroup: alt.atari.2600, who calls it the "Unlimited money" area.
At the top of the biggest mountain, stand one level below the flame near its
left end.
Sit down (push joystick down) in this area. Your SCORE will rise
very quickly nonstop!
X = is approx. where to sit down.
______________
__X_____________________
__________ _______________
The drawing above may not display properly on cell phones and other devices.
It's what I call the invisible zone at each level of a small area in the hidden
world, that when entered, creates/causes many different things.
Horizontally, they begin at the 'right paddle' ladder and continue to
the right for a short distance. To see how far horizontally, read FLAME TRICK
below.
Here's another: Climb up carefully on the left side of the 'right paddle'
ladder, to level 47 (see Diagram 3). At 47, cross over carefully to the
other side of the 'right paddle' ladder and you'll enter an alternate version of
Mountain King! You reappear back in the mountain with the diamonds missing.
Someone has taken the diamonds up to the hidden world! Walk and climb around
inside the mountain. Many areas will cause very strange things: Some areas you
travel in will cause thin white vertical lines to slide left and right on the screen.
Other lines are blue and/or look like a chain. In other areas you'll also hear
ringing sounds like bells and many other peculiar and spooky noises!
Other Gateways fill the entire mountain with blue ladders so that you can
travel around without falling anywhere!
Here's another trick: Return to the 2Th gap mentioned above and this time jump to the right while
shining the flashlight. The flashlight pattern will change. Before you jump,
your explorer's colour will turn orange or beige like the little figures below
the spiders' lair. Incidentally, this is one of two colours you're explorer
changes to in the hidden world (the other was blue mentioned in step 4b).
Here are drawings we had made of things we had found:
https://www.angelfire.com/mt/mountkingatari2600/roughdrawings.html
This trick will show you the horrizontal lenght of the Gateways.
Vertically, they start somewhere above the regular mountain and below
the bottom of the hanging ladders from the blue buildings of the hidden world.
They then continue all the way up to level 12 where the small beige figures are.
The two top levels of the 4Th pillar mentioned in Section A, Step 4b
are two 'gateways' that when we entered, added the Time. The top level was for
the minutes and the one just below was for the seconds. About two levels below
those, is one to change the Score. Go to that level and watch your score rise.
And in Steps 7-8 Section A, we entered at (Gateway) level 52 which as we
know causes another interesting trick.
Every level of these does something
different.
In some areas the TV picture may twist and stretch at the top. Those areas
should be avoided as they might cause some newer TV sets to display a blue or
black screen and you won't see where you're going, or worst, it will cause the
game to crash!
Travelling in one area causes a colourful horizontal bar
across the top of the screen that changes colours (red, purple, violet, blue,
green, and many others) as you walk very slowly horizontally. Another area
places lite green borders with orange or yellow trim on both sides of your TV
screen that may remain permanently even if you Reset the game (unless you turn
game off-on). Beware, some areas will cause the game to crash. The reason for
this might be that since the diamonds have moved up to the hidden world, the
gateways that causes the game to crash have exchanged places with them.
From level 56, climb down the 'right paddle' ladder. When you reach the first of
two gaps, jump off to the left to land on a plateau (at the 2Th gap) below.
Continue climbing down the ladder and you'll see a strange block of pattern that
will appear on your ladder. You can pass through it. When you shine your
flashlight anywhere below this, a stretch out version of the same odd pattern
appears in the light of your flashlight! I had hoped that the programmer's
initials appeared here so I taped it and played it back frame by frame but it
just looks like gibberish. The gibberish is a pattern that repeats itself many
times/per sec. Here's where I think would have been the perfect place to
hide the programmer's initials or a message. But unfortunately, it's nothing.
Do not climb down too far or you'll get stuck because there are other
gateways below you that does this!
Notice in 4th drawing we colored the areas where some of these Gateways are.
Note that they are not referred to as gateways in the drawing because we did not
now what to call them at the time.
At level 56, pass through the white flame and travel right. The flame will
follow you while being within you. Try not to fall or travel up to far.
Eventually when you've travelled far enough to the right, the flame will vanish.
At the place the flame disappears is where the Gateways' zone ends! Here,
without a ladder to use as a reference point, it's more difficult to know where
the gateways ends. But you can also enter the gateways from here too; the right.
In fact, we've already done so in Section A, Step 4b when we added the
time - we had entered that gateway that added Time, from the right end.
It is important to note that in the hidden world, nothing happens at ramdom.
Although ladders and plateaus seem to appear and disapear for no reason, there
is always a reason. Some follow the Time, others follow the Score, others
react to your location and still others the controller inputs in either ports.
Travelling into one or more Gateways can cause peculiar occurences and changes
that may become permanent even if you reset the game (unless you turn the game
Off-On).
Here's a thing I found that is in the regular game:
At one level below and to the right of the castle, shine your flashlight in this
area. The diamonds one level above will flash. Usually it's the ones on the
same level that suppose to flash. I'm guessing that it's because there
are too many items on screen at the same time. But aren't there other areas in
that same location where you can shine the flashlight and there are just as
many?
Some sound effects in Galazian (made for Atari 2600) are the same as heard when you fall in Mountain King.
Stamped or printed on the game chip inside the cartridge:
"1983 Toys, A Division of CBS Electronics 4L-2738-0000 - made for the Atari 2600 VCS"
"340 VM1340, 2384-1006, Mt King CBS RAM+ 5A-5367-5700, Korea-A". And, "P32162".