Complete List of bugs, quirks and anomalies

[Metalmickey]

Firstly, apologies if a similar topic like this has already been created elsewhere feel free to delete it if there is a better one, i did have a look around and couldn't really find anything like it so i thought i'd create a thread where everyone can contribute to the list of all known oddities found in the game.

 

Secondly this is not a request for help in working around these bugs, more really a point of reference and maybe a source of information for newcomers and those who didn't play the game so much and don't already know about them all and one single place where they can be looked up

 

I thought i might start with the most obvious and well documented ones the first four of which prevent the game from being completed:

 

'The Attic' - The most famous and destructive of them all which of course is triggered when Willy ventures into the attic. A rogue arrow causes all manner of destruction around his house and ultimately renders the game unplayable.

 

'Conservatory Roof' which features the booby-trapped item, or maybe it's just a little too closely guarded by a 'fire-cell' 

 

'The Banyan Tree' with what looks like an out of place earth-cell right of the trunk meaning that Willy cannot make his way upwards to the Bit Of Tree above

 

'First Landing' with the phantom object which is neither seen nor collectible.

 

The rest of these are comparatively harmless or can be avoided

such as...

 

'The Nightmare Room' featuring the ugly green blob which, when i first encountered it i thought it was a fire-cell and so i spent many a long afternoon trying to work out how to collect the object without hitting it... turns out that it was just a conveyor belt ... who knew?

 

'Cuckoo's Nest' with the somewhat disorientated saw that doesn't change direction when it comes back the other way

 

'Under The Roof' with the phantom 'fire-cells' that prevent Willy from dropping out of the bottom of the screen to the right of the tree trunk, interestingly enough this one was even left in the 'Nightmare Edition' ... maybe Mr Smith deliberately left it there... who knows?

 

'The Beach' and 'The Roof' both feature a rope that Willy can jump from and reappear at the bottom of the screen

 

'Rescue Esmeralda' has, in all probability, an unintentional secret passage to 'Ballroom East' when jumping from the conveyor belt at the top right of the screen

 

'The Watchtower' also has one which takes Willy all the way to the 'Off Licence'

 

'The Swimming Pool' has an object which Willy needs to make no effort whatsoever to collect, he merely needs to enter the room and it's his

 

'The Orangery' Here Willy has been endowed with a magnetic head when jumping up and hitting the ledge from the stairs at the bottom left of the screen - not so much a bug, more of a quirk

Apparently i never knew this but there is also a bug which means that the conveyors in rooms such as the West of Kitchen and Tool Shed are not drawn properly .. and the one in the Wine Cellar is not supposed to be there at all.

 

Finally there's that 'halo' effect where a nasty as a 'bright' blue background following it around, this is evident in 'I'm sure I've Seen This Before', the Emergency Generator and On A Branch Over The Drive

 

There's probably a few that i have missed, feel free to contribute!

[IRF]

Most of those 'quirky features' are mentioned in the Bugs and Trivia sections of SkoolKid's JSW disassembly:

 

http://skoolkit.ca/disassemblies/jet_set_willy/index.html

 

I would add a couple of comments:

 

The 'High Jump' entry covers the 'magnetic head' phenomenon (if you keep jump depressed when on a ramp, the code that determines Willy's exact y-coordinate when he's on a ramp is bypassed - if he happens to have an Earth cell above him then he can appear to 'hover'!)

 

If Willy were to fall down on the right-hand side of Under the Roof then he would enter an Infinite Death Loop, so the 'bug' (which is caused by the fact that there are Fire cells at the very top of the screen, directly above where you are trying to get him to drop off the bottom) is actually quite a useful artefact of the code!

Edited June 8, 2016 by IRF

[Metalmickey]

Thanks for the link, guess i should have checked there first  :)

[Metalmickey]

is anyone of the opinion that after Willy has collected all the items and headed back to the Master Bedroom, when he jumps on the bed there appears to be an invisible wall there preventing him from getting anywhere near the top end which could be another bug, i am aware that of the killer pillow and perhaps Mr Smith could possibly have deliberately put the a block there .. but why go to the trouble of making the pillow a firecell if Willy can never actually reach it. Skoolkid has already pointed out the oddity with not being able to use 'P' to move Willy off the bed but i thought this might be something else.

 

Happy to discuss

Edited June 13, 2016 by Metalmickey

[IRF]

Willy enters the 'toilet dash' as soon as he reaches the foot of the bed, regardless of whether he walks or jumps to reach that point.

His getting stuck on the bed is caused by the bed's Conveyor action 'cancelling out' Willy's automatic urge to run rightwards (there's an XOR command involved).  The fact that the 'P' key doesn't release him from this predicament is probably a 'bug' (although Danny might disagree!).

I guess the pillow is a Fire cell because there were no other cell types available when Matt Smith designed the room!

Edited June 14, 2016 by IRF