Dunnet Guide

First, you start with this command in CMD / Bash--

emacs -batch -l dunnet

--and then you get this prompt.

Dead end
You are at a dead end of a dirt road.  The road goes to the east.
In the distance you can see that it will eventually fork off.  The
trees here are very tall royal palms, and they are spaced equidistant
from each other.
There is a shovel here.
>

Huh? What do I do here?

Or maybe you got along nicely until the part where you get to the UNIX computer, and you figure out that you have to stuff the CPU you found earlier into the VAX to get it to work:

> PUT CPU IN VAX
As you put the CPU board in the computer, it immediately springs to life.
The lights start flashing, and the fans seem to startup.

Yaaaaay!

> TYPE

UNIX System V, Release 2.2 (pokey)

login:

What? Am I supposed to know the login for this? Maybe the username is root.

login: root
password:

Oh well, its asking me for the password, so maybe the username is correct. But what's the password?

That's why I am writing this tutorial. It took me AT LEAST ten tries to beat the game, and yes, I looked at PLENTY of spoilers along the way; but none of them were organized very well and many of them were incomplete. Some of this tutorial was actually provided by others; for example, the Maze map was provided by Christopher J. Madsen. Much as I would like to provide a nice reference manual for those playing Dunnet, I don't want to be the one to be spoiling a nice game, so while I am providing directions, You will still have to do certain things (i.e. writing down things, figuring out passwords, etc.)

Directions

{

These directions assume that you are starting at the beginning of the game; also, the directions are capitalized, but you should type them lowercase.

DIRECTIONS LEGEND:

E	 :	East
W	 :	West
N	 :	North
S	 :	South
U	 :	Up
D	 :	Down
NE	:	Northeast
NW	:	Northwest
SE	:	Southeast
SW	:	Southwest

Note that the words in the brackets [ ] are comments and should not be typed.

}

First Section

TAKE SHOVEL,
E, E
DIG, LOOK [ What did you find? ]
TAKE CPU
SE, TAKE FOOD [ Don't eat it! ]
SE, EXAMINE BEAR [ He's a beauty, isn't he? Write down what type of bear it is.]
FEED BEAR
LOOK [ What did it leave behind? ]
TAKE KEY
NW, NW
NE, DROP KEY
NE, IN

Oops, you need that key that we dropped earlier. Go get it yourself. OK, you have the key, and you are back at the front door of the old house.

IN
E, EXAMINE BINS [ WRITE DOWN these name ]

Maybe one of those people have an account on their computer.

W, W
PUT CPU IN CABINET
TYPE

Now we are at the UNIX login prompt. Try each of the names we wrote down earlier and see which one had an account on the computer. HINT: People sometimes use their lat name as their username and their first name as their password. Could that be the case here?

OK, now you logged in, we are at the UNIX $ prompt.

$ ls [ List all out files here, you are in the /usr/toukmond/ directory. ]

See all those files that end in the .o extension? Those are the items in your inventory.

Second Section

Until now, everything was realistic. Here we venture into the depth of the surreal part of Dunnet. Before, we walk around, feed ferocious bears, pick up shovel, dig, find hidden bracelets, etc. Now, we are going to roast ourselves in a Sauna, walk around INSIDE a UNIX computer, teleport ourselves around the ARPANET, explode jars of dynamite without an inch of harm to ourselves, etc etc etc etc. All kinds of things are possible. Be prepared for things to get really strange.

Back to the UNIX prompt.

You see, we are going to teleport ourselves to another IBM PC called GAMMA. But if we go there, we will lose all our objects, including the ones we need. To move our inventory to GAMMA, we need to ftp our inventory there like so:

$ ftp gamma

Now we get our login prompt, but we don't have the password. The password it stored on a file in the UNIX computer in a compressed file. We need to uncompress it and read it.

ftp> login: idontknowwhatistheusername
ftp> Password required for user idontknowwhatistheusername.
ftp> Password: idontknowwhatisthepassword.
ftp> Login failed

Now we got out of the ftp and are back to UNIX.

$ uncompress paper.o.Z [ type it as paper.o.Z, not paper.o.z with a lowercase z ]
$ cat paper.o [ oops, that does not work ]
$ exit
INVENTORY

Now you see, the slip of paper has magically appeared in our inventory.

READ PAPER [ Write down the word that the paper tell you to remember. ]
TYPE [ Back to the UNIX prompt. ]
$ ftp gamma
ftp> login: anonymous [ The username is anonymous ]
ftp> Guest login okay, send your user ident as password.
ftp> Password: ***** [ Type the word on the paper we read earlier. That is the password. Actually, the password is not really required. ]
ftp> Guest login okay, user access restrictions apply.
ftp> type binary [ Remember, we are sending our inventory as .o binary files, which will arrive as a worthless pile of protoplasm if we don't set the type to binary instead of ASCII. If you want to see what happens, after you have sent everything, type type ascii and send the paper.o file to satisfy your curiosity.]
ftp> send bracelet.o
ftp> send lamp.o
ftp> send shovel.o
ftp> send key.o
ftp> quit [ We're done! ]

Now we are going to teleport ourselves.

$ rlogin gamma
$ Password: [ What was the word on that paper? ]

Then you read the following:

You begin to feel strange for a moment, and you lose your items.
You step back from the console.
Receiving room
You are in a round, stone room with a door to the east.  There is a sign on the wall that reads: `receiving room`

Let's continue from here.

TAKE ALL
E, N, E
TAKE PRESERVER
DOWN
DROP PRESERVER
DROP SHOVEL
DROP BRACELET
DROP KEY
UP, TAKE WEIGHT
DOWN
PUT WEIGHT ON BUTTON [ Write down how many pounds the weight weighs ]

Ok, now I am going to give you the map, and you figure out how to get through here. (This maze is very interesting -- you have chambers that lead into each other) Note that as you move, the description of the chambers change.

Map

	N	S	E	W	NE	NW	SE	SW	UP	DOWN	You Move
0 Weight room	.	.	.	*	.	.	.	.	.	1	Down
1 Maze button room	.	.	1	1	1	(2)	1	1	0	1	NW
2 little twisty	2	2	2	2	2	2	.	2	3	2	Up
3 thirsty little	.	2	2	3	3	3	4	3	.	2	SE
4 twenty little	.	.	.	2	.	.	.	.	.	5	Down
5 daze of twisty little	.	.	.	.	.	6	4	.	.	.	NW
6 twisty little cabbages	2	2	2	2	0	7	2	2	2	2	NE or NW
7 Reception area	.	*	.	.	.	.	3	.	.	.

What do I do with this map? Now, just follow the directions on the map under the header You Move.

Actually, just follow my directions here.

TAKE ALL
NW, U
TAKE STATUE
TAKE FLOPPY
SE, D, NW, NE
W, DROP FLOPPY
S, E
TURN DIAL CLOCKWISE
TURN DIAL CLOCKWISE
TURN DIAL CLOCKWISE

What happened?

EXAMINE DIAMOND
TURN DIAL COUNTERCLOCKWISE
TURN DIAL COUNTERCLOCKWISE
TURN DIAL COUNTERCLOCKWISE
W, N, TAKE FLOPPY
E, D, NW
U, SE, D
NW [ Or type NE if you need to get back to the Weight Room. ]
S, S
INVENTORY [ Check that you have the life preserver. ]
SAVE mygame [ Save your game, just in case you die; if you do die, open Dunnet again and hit RESTORE mygame ]
SWIM, S
PUT BRACELET IN CHUTE [ You just scored! ]
PUT DIAMOND IN CHUTE [ You scored again! ]
S, TAKE GOLD, E
E, N, D
SLEEP, D, SW
E, U, DIG
TAKE PLATINUM
D, W, W
D, E, TAKE TOWEL
D, S, S
PUT FLOPPY IN PC, RESET

Now you are typing on a Pre-Cambrian MS-DOS PC.

A> Enter a new time: [ Enter whatever you want for the time. ]
A> dir [List all the files in the current directory. Why is this so slow? ]
A> type foo.txt
A> [ Write down everything in the file. ]
A> exit
N, N, N, N
U, EXAMINE BOX
PUT KEY IN BOX
U, U, NE, NE
TAKE AXE
D, N, D
S, PUT GOLD IN URINAL
PUT PLATINUM IN URINAL
FLUSH URINAL
SAVE mygame
N, U, W
[ Type the combination that you wrote down. ]
CUT CABLE WITH AXE

And BOOM -- you magically appeared at the UNIX computer again.

$ exit
TAKE KEY
E, N
TAKE ALL, W, N
E, E, E
E, E
N, TAKE ALL
N, W, W
W, TAKE EGG
N, E, E
E, IN
W, W, W
W, W, S
S, S, NW
OUT, N
TAKE BONE
E, N, TAKE ALL, E
TAKE GLYCERINE
SOUTH
TAKE ACID
SWITCH SWITCH
W, N, EXAMINE BONE
S, W, S
IN, SE, N
N, E, E
E, E, OUT
PUT ACID IN JAR
PUT GLYCERINE IN JAR
DROP JAR [ BOOM ]
IN, N, N
D, TAKE ALL
UP
PUT AMETHYST IN DISPOSAL
PUT RUBY IN DISPOSAL
PUT SILVER IN DISPOSAL
PUT EGG IN DISPOSAL
PUT COINS IN DISPOSAL
D, NE [By now, you should have 90 points. Find out by typing SCORE. ]
EXAMINE [ Isn't this pretty? ]
SW, U, U
W, S, W
W, S, SE
S, E, S
W, TYPE
$ rlogin endgame
TAKE ALL [ You probably won't be able to carry everything. ]
S, S, S, S
[ At this point the game will ask you some questions, the answers are at the end of this tutorial. Along the way you will find a $100 bill, pick that up too.]
[ Drop all your treasures here in the Treasure Room. ]
N, N, N, N
TAKE ALL, N
N, TAKE MONA LISA
S, S, S, S, S
SCORE [ The score you say that you have won if you did everything right. ]

There is still more to the game:

The game is over, but if you want to change some things, you can get in wizard mode. To do this, start the game again and go to the computer room. TYPE and then set the variables you want. The first time it sees the '=' symbol, it will ask for the wizard password.
-- sunwukong

Question	Solution
password on pokey	robert
password during ftp	worms
places to put treasures	4
login on endgame	toukmond
price of the shovel	20
bus company	mobytours
last name	stock / collier
character on towel	snoopy
author of EMACS	stallman
memory on CPU	2
U.S. state	vermont
street over subway	fourth
corners in town	24
type of bear	grizzly
found by digging	platinum / CPU
network protocol	tcp/ip

Credits

The Maze map is Copyright 1994 by Christopher J. Madsen. Permission is granted to distribute verbatim or modified copies of this hints file, provided that this copyright notice remains intact. You can reach him at [email protected].

The Question/Solution table was written by a nice guy named sunwukong, who wrote a guide similar to my own and put it up on the Internet.

kiedtl/README.md

Dunnet Guide

Directions

DIRECTIONS LEGEND:

First Section

Second Section

Map

Credits

DarkMinerULTRA commented May 21, 2022

bitten2up commented Aug 26, 2022

DarkMinerULTRA commented Sep 24, 2022