Treasure Island (Mastertronic) Walkthrough

Finally, after 20 years of trying.... Treasure Island has been solved!!!!!

Thanks to everyone who contributed to make this possible: Richard Mace, Ealan Pearce, Ulf (in January 2008) and Stefan Wolff (in October 2008)

On this site, there are two walkthroughs:

1. The Long Walkthough (not completed yet)

2. The Short Walkthough (aka the dirty cheat version). This version allows you to finish the game.

For the impatient, there is the end

Here is a gallery of interesting things to see in the game

Long Walkthrough

To complete the game properly, this is what you need to do:

Take everying to the cabin
Once at the cabin, kill the pirate
Give grave pirate rum, dig up parchment
Read John Silver's Note (this appears on day 2 - use LOOK command if in cabin)
Meet John Silver by the river on day 3 (12:20pm-12:40pm)
Go to Cave, dig up empty rum bottle (get clue EAST 18)
Go to Dead Tree, dig up cannonball (get clue SE8)
Go to Skeleton Island
Get the map
Go to the "Cape of Ye Woods"
Find the Treasure (E18 then SE8 from the "tall" fir tree)
Get the Treasure back to the beach

NOTE: Thanks to Ulf (in January 2008) for the discovering the graves location (and finding the parchment, graves pirate solution), meeting John Silver.

Items 1 - 3 are fully documented.

Need to write down path to and from the cabin to the tree on skeleton island

Item 4 - have not met John Silver yet (still following Ulf's instructions)

Items 5 and 6 are fully documented

Item 7 is not documented - use the map (basically keep heading west).

Item 8 is not documented. The treasure is buried in the "Cape of Ye Woods". You can GOTO the specific location, I need to provide a non-cheat path to the supposedly "tall" tree, which is not tall at all. From the tree, you go EAST 18, SE8.

Manual

Here is the manual

Map

NOTE: all the following directions are designed to work in PICTURE mode. They may not work in text mode.

Start of the game

The game starts with John Silver saying the following:

"YOU'D BETTER MOVE ALL THE STUFF FROM THE BEACH TO THE CABIN, JIM. I'LL GO NORTH AND LOOK FOR MORGAN."

Getting from the beach to the cabin

NOTE: leave one flag on the beach. You will need this to find the cabin in the future.

NE
RUN
WALK
WALK
WALK
ENTER

Getting from the cabin to the graves

LEAVE
E
WALK x 2
RUN x 2
N
RUN x 3
WALK x 3
SEARCH

Ulf's notes (10/1/2008):

"After staring at the map for a few hours my eyesight suddenly got blurry and I could finally read it: Graves! There are graves above your cabin. And some well spent hours later I even found them. Amazing... But anyway, they are quite easy to reach. Leave your cabin, face east, walk two times, run two times, then turn north and run four times. And finally a 180 degree turnaround (face south) and you will see them. As a bonus you will see a pirate walking around in front of the graves. Give the bottle of rum from the killed pirate in the cabin to him, so the gravepirate will leave. Then dig four times and you will find the parchment with "TALL FIR TREE". Can't take it of course."

Getting from the graves to the cabin

S
WALK x 3
RUN x 3
W
RUN x 2
WALK x 2
ENTER

The note in the cabin

On day 2, John Silver will leave you a note in the cabin:

"THERE IS A MESSAGE HERE WHICH READS:v JIM, MEET ME AT NOON TOMORROW BY THE LARGE BOULDER ON THE EDGE OF THE RIVER SE OF SPYE GLASS HILL - JOHN SILVER"

Meeting John Silver

Ulf's notes (10/1/2008):

"Meeting with Silver. After the second night Silver's note will appear in the cabin. After the third night you can meet him. Walk to the middle river, the left edge (facing north), then follow the river way to the north. After the big L-Turn almost at the end of the river, you will came across some rocks, one of them is directly on the edge of the river, almost in it. Get as close as possible with Search (you cant go on the rock) and wait. Shortly after noon, Silver will turn up and say his lines. Thats it."

"For Silver. I think, he will only appear on the day after the note appeared in the cabin. In one try I showed up at the rock two days later, but Silver didn't. So it doesn't count when you find the note, only when it appears. The rock should be easy to find. It sits exactly on the left edge of the river. Silver showed up between 12:20 -12:40."

Getting from the cabin to the beach

LEAVE
SW
RUN
WALK
WALK
WALK
S
SEARCH
SEARCH
SEARCH
SEARCH

Getting from the beach to the "boulder"

NOTE: it takes approx 3 "hours"

W
RUN x 2
WALK x 2
R
WALK x 7
L
WADE x 5
WALK x 4
R
WALK x 8
L
WALK x 4
R
WALK x 6
R
WALK x 6
L
WALK x 4
L
WALK x 4
R x 2
WALK x 3
R
SEARCH x 5
John Silver will appear at approx 12:30pm. You will get the following message:

"AH, JIM LAD, NOW HEAR THIS ME
OLD MATE: I OVERHEARD MORGAN
LAST NIGHT - IT SEEMS THERE
BE ANOTHER MAP BURIED ON
SKELETON ISLAND. NOW OLD LONG
JOHN CAN'T BE GETTING ACROSS
THAT SAND WITH THIS CRUTCH
HERE, SO YOU GO JIM. FIND THE
SOUTHERNMOST TREE ON SKELETON
ISLAND AND MOVE FIVE PACES
TOWARDS THE MOUNTAINS IN THE
DIRECTION OF A LARGE BOULDER
AND DIG. GO TO IT JIM, BEFORE
THEM SWABS GET THERE."

NOTE: the boulder has a berry bush to the north.

Now head south (you will have to go left or right occasionally to avoid the river, keep it to your left) until you hit the beach. Then head east until you find the beach flag

*** NEED TO ADD RETURN PATH BACK TO BEACH ***

Getting to Skeleton Island

From the beach, head east, and follow the coast round towards the south. You should be able to walk down a narrowing peninsula with a "white rock" at the bottom.

Wait at the white rock until it gets dark. You should now see a new piece of land appear towards the south and Skeleton Island. Walk across the sand to get to the island.

Find the second map

Once on the island, go south as far as you can go. Now look north. There should be one small tree that is closer to you than any other (with a boulder next to it. Get to that tree. NOTE: you need to be EXACTLY on that tree, so once you are on there, go right 8 times, if you cannot see the tree then you are on it.

Then do the following:

NW
SEARCH x 5
DIG

You will get the following message:

"I'VE FOUND AN OLD BAG. THERE ARE A FEW WORTHLESS COINS IN IT, TOGETHER WITH AN OLD MAP OF THE ISLAND, VERY SIMILAR TO THE ONE I ALREADY HAVE BUT WITH A RED CIRCLE AROUND THE AREA MARKED AS CAPE OF YE WOODS'. THERE'S SOMETHING WRITTEN ON THE BACK AS WELL: SE OF CAVE 16, THEN SOUTH 10"

There is also a map at that location. Pick it up:
GET MAP

Now that you have the map, you do not get the "YOU HAVE DELAYED TOO LONG. MORGAN GOT TO THE TREASURE BEFORE YOU AND HAS REMOVED IT FROM THE ISLAND." message, and can explore the island at will, using plenty of rest, water and berries to keep you alive.

Finding the fake treasure

Just to confuse things, there are two different piles of treasure to find. The treasure described below is NOT the real treasure.

Ulf's notes (10/1/2008):

"Thats all I got done, now follows wild speculation. The treasure is on the Cape of ye Woods (Map from Skeleton Island). You need to find a tall fir tree (parchment from the graves) and search 18 times east (bottle of rum from the cave) and 8 times southeast (cannonball at the dead tree) >from it, to get the treasure. I looked for hours but I cant find any special tree. The cape is full of large trees, who all look the same. I tried searching from a few trees, which seemed outstanding enough (e.g. standing lonely or at the edge), but no luck. Tried digging randomly, no luck. Now I give up. Maybe someone will find it someday."

Path from the cabin to the treasure

LEAVE
N
RUN x 13
WALK x 3
COLLECT BERRIES x 4
S
RUN x 3
W
WALK x 3
RUN x 3
WALK x 5
RUN
N
RUN x 3
NW
RUN x 2
W
WALK x 3
NOTE: You can only carry one jewel at a time
NOTE: The Jewels actually form an square of adjacent squares, ie:
xxxxxx
xoooox
xoooox
xoooox
xoooox
xxxxxx
Where o is a jewel
NOTE: They are the same jewels. If you take a jewel from one square, it dissapears from them all.

Getting from the beach to the dead tree

W
RUN x 2
WALK x 2
R
WALK x 2
N
WALK x 6
L
WALK x 5
R
RUN x 9
WALK x 2
R
WALK
L
WALK x 2

Finding the cannonball

Get to the dead tree, and do the following:
SE
SEARCH x 3
DROP ALL
GET SPADE
DIG
You then get the message:

"THERE IS AN OLD CANNONBALL EMBEDDED IN THE GROUND. SCRATCHED ONTO IT IS THE INSCRIPTION : SE8"

I have tried doing the following, but found nothing:

SE
SEARCH
SEARCH
SEARCH
SEARCH
SEARCH
SEARCH
SEARCH
SEARCH
DROP ALL
GET SPADE
DIG

SEARCH x 8 SE from the dead tree does not work either
WALK x 8 SE from the dead tree does not work either
RUN x 8 SE from the dead tree is not possible
SEARCH x 8 NW from the dead tree does not work either
WALK x 8 NW from the dead tree does not work either
RUN x 8 NW from the dead tree does not work either
SEARCH x 8 SE from the cannonball does not work either
WALK x 8 SE from the cannonball does not work either
RUN x 8 SE from the cannonball is not possible
SEARCH x 8 NW from the cannonball does not work either
WALK x 8 NW from the cannonball does not work either
RUN x 8 NW from the cannonball does not work either

Getting from the dead tree to the cave

N
RUN x 3
L x 2
RUN
R
RUN x 3
WALK x 4
R
WALK x 4
RUN x 6
R x 2
RUN
L
WALK x 3
L
RUN x 3
L
RUN
WALK
R x 3
WALK
L
WALK x 2
ENTER
Then you get the following message:

"I AM IN THE CAVE SCRATCHED ON THE WALL IS A MESSAGE WHICH READS: DEAD TREE NW OF SWAMP, E OF SPYE GLASS AND E OF SMALL HILL, 3 PACES SE, DIG"

Finding the empty rum bottle

From within the cave, do the following:
SEARCH x 16
S
SEARCH x 10
DROP ALL
GET SPADE
DIG
Then you get the following message:

"THERE IS AN EMPTY RUM BOTTLE HERE. IT CONTAINS THE MESSAGE: EAST 18"

Getting from the cave to the dead tree

LEAVE
S
RUN X 10
R
RUN
L
WALK X 14
RUN X4
L
RUN
R
RUN
L
RUN X3
L X 2
RUN
L
RUN X 2
WALK X 2
L
SEARCH

Getting from the dead tree to the beach

S
RUN X 12
L
WALK X 3
L
WALK X 11
R
WALK X 3
R X 3
SEARCH X 2

General Notes

Goats

You should save your "meals" until you have nothing else to eat. Collect berries or Goat meat. Shoot the goat then collect the joints from the goat's position.

NOTE: Goat "joints" only last 24 hours. Drop them once the 24 hours are up. If you eat a joint older than 24 hours, then it will make you ill.

Goat positions:

SW of cabin
One on "Cape of ye woods"

Collecting Berries

You can collect berries from a bush. You can hold multiple bags of berries. Looks like a "boulder" but is spiky. Good places are SW of the cabin towards white rock, and the boulder area.

Path from cabin to berries and back again (useful to build up stock when meals runout

LEAVE
SE
RUN x 3
COLLECT BERRIES
NW
RUN x 3
ENTER

Short Walkthrough

Thanks go out to Stefan Wolff (in October 2008) for this. It was he who scoured the machine code to discover a way of enabling the cheat mode that we hoped existed (we knew of the GOTO and COORDS commands but could not use them).

I need to refine this section as it is a bit rough, and you should not really use it because it is a dirty cheat and I do not feel proud posting this. To be honest, the game brought it upon itself by leading us all to a "tall fir tree" when it actually meant a insignificant random tree in a forest!

This walkthrough will allow you to complete the game in under an hour

ZILOG581964

That command enables all the cheat commands (GOTO, COORDS)

First of all some description about the GOTO command. It is not precise, it only takes you to within a few searches of the desired location.

If the coords do not match, adjust your position using the following guide:

4 pairs of coordinates:

The first 2 pairs of characters make up a 4 digit hexadecimal number corresponding to the east-west coordinate. You can only specify the higher-order (ie first two digits) using the GOTO command, so you will have to move using search to get to the correct position (your current position is specified by the COORDS command).

The second 2 pairs of characters make up a 4 digit hexadecimal number corresponding to the north-south coordinate. You can only specify the higher-order (ie first two digits) using the GOTO command, so you will have to move using search to get to the correct position (your current position is specified by the COORDS command).

1 2 3 4

To increment 2 by 1, search in a east direction
To decrement 2 by 1, search in a west direction
To increment 4 by 1, search in a north direction
To decrement 4 by 1, search in a sorth direction

Once you are in the right place, I would recommend dropping a flag, so that when you return (you need to move all 5 bags of jewels to the beach starting point - 9c 00 45 03), you can find the position easily.

Right, let's finish the game:

To complete the game, the following needs to happen:

1. Dig up the empty rum bottle (to get the message EAST 18)
2. Dig up the treasure
3. Take the 5 bags of jewels one bag at a time to the start point on the beach

1. Dig up the empty rum bottle (to get the message EAST 18):

Rum Bottle: 80 01 C5 1

(At start of the game)

ZILOG581964
GET SPADE
GET FLAG
GOTO
80 C5 1

Once in the correct position, dig.

2. Dig up the treasure

Treasure: 4C 02 50 02

GOTO
4C 50 2

Type coords to confirm (they need to say 4c 02 50 02)

Once at the correct position, drop a flag and then dig

3. Take the 5 bags of jewels one bag at a time to the start point on the beach, using the flag at either location to find the precise point.

Beach: 9C 00 45 03

GOTO
9C 45 3

Other notes

The WHERE command

The WHERE command needs the command "ZILOG581964" run to make it work. It basically shows you the location of other characters in the game:

1. Silver
2. Morgan
3. Cabin pirate
4. Graves Pirate

Gallery (with coordinates)

Starting position	$9c $00 $45 $03
Boulder in river	$6d $00 $69 $00
"Tall" fir tree	$46 $00 $52 $02
Treasure	$4c $02 $50 $02
Cave	$7c $01 $cb $03
Cannonball	$8c $03 $7b $00
Graves	$ad $00 $5d $00
Old bag	$a2 $00 $21 $01
Rum bottle	$80 $01 $c5 $01
Morgan's ship	$aa $?? $32 $?? (I believe Morgan is moved here when the message can be read at the cabin)

The End

Here is the exciting end to the game. This must rank as the worst ending ever in C64 history:

Still, it took us 20 years to complete the game, so it was worth it!

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