Rammstein Computerspiel für Windows (game)

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Rammstein Computerspiel für Windows (game)

Rammstein Computerspiel für Windows

Game by Rammstein

Produced:

Oliver Czok

Released:

Monday, 24 November 1997

Format:

PC (Windows)

Label:

Motor Music

Rammstein Computerspiel für Windows is a game by Rammstein. It was released on Monday, 24 November 1997.

Release

The game is a small Windows jump-and-shoot game that is on the CD-Extra part of the Das Modell single. The program file is RSTEIN.EXE. On the title screen it is called "Rammstein – asche zu asche…", and its windows are titled "Rammstein Level 1" to "Rammstein Level 3". You play a man with a flamethrower who has to get through three screens. On each screen he shoots the heads of two band members free and gets past the creatures and traps on the way.

The end screen says it was produced for Motor Music GmbH (a PolyGram company) and produced by Oliver Czok, matrix and ABSOLUTE, ©1997. It was written in Visual Basic 3 and uses a small sprite library of its own (RAMM16.DLL).

Running the game

According to README.TXT, the game needs Windows 95, at least a 486 processor and 8 MB of RAM, and it is "optimised for 256 colours". If it does not start, the README says to copy RAMM16.DLL and VBRUN300.DLL into WINDOWS\SYSTEM.

RSTEIN.EXE is a 16-bit program. It runs on Windows 95/98/ME, and on 32-bit Windows versions that still have 16-bit support. 64-bit Windows can't run it directly, so use a virtual machine or a 16-bit compatibility layer instead. The game has been tested under Wine on Linux and can be played through to the end there.

Command-line switches

Switch	Effect
/GODMODE	Shows a "Godmode aktiviert" message. You get 100 shots instead of 30 and never run out of lives: if you die, you are simply put back at the level's starting point. You also get the snorkel for level 3 without having to collect it.
/Tn	Sets the game timer to n milliseconds per game step (the default is 80). Higher values make the game slower. The game shows "Timer-Interval=n" as a message. Example: RSTEIN.EXE /T120

Controls

Key	Action
← / →	Walk
↑	Jump in the direction you are facing. Hold the arrow key in the same direction for a long jump, or hold the opposite arrow to jump on the spot. If you keep ↑ and the arrow held, the man hops continuously and moves about twice as fast as walking.
Space	Fire a fireball in the direction you are facing. Only one fireball can be on screen at a time. It flies a bit less than half the screen width.
Any key / mouse click	Start the game on the title screen. On the "game over" screen, any key quits.
Esc	Quits on the loading screen and on the final score screen. It does not work during a level.

The bottom line of the screen shows the ammunition bar (red, left), the score (green, centre) and your lives (small faces, right).

How the game works

One death without a spare life ends the game

• The plot of the game is extremely vague. The player is an unknown man wearing a white mask, a reference to the Du hast music video.
• Each level is a single screen with three floors: bottom, middle and top. The floors are joined like a snake. If you walk off the edge of one floor, you come in on the next floor at the opposite side of the screen.
• To finish a level, walk off the left edge of the top floor.
• You start with only one life. If you die without having collected an extra life, the game is over. Each of the first two levels hides one extra life. If you die while you have a spare life, you start again at the level's starting point. Anything you have already destroyed stays destroyed.
• You have 30 shots for the whole game. They are not refilled between levels.
• Hopping is the fastest way to move (hold ↑ together with the arrow key). A jump does not carry you over anything: an enemy or a barrel you pass during a jump still kills you. The only exception is the sea urchins in level 3. So hop across empty stretches and walk where precise positioning matters.
• A standing shot flies at chest height. Some targets hang higher up and can only be hit at the top of a jump: press ↑ and fire straight away.

Scoring

Target	Points
Band member head (6 in total, 2 per level)	10,000 each
Water monster, helicopter (×2), cockroach (×2), flying gun, doppelgänger, hula girl	5,000 each
Latex doll (×2)	2,000 each
Doppelgänger shot while it walks to the right	−5,000
Torches, icicle, barrels	0

At the end the game adds 1,000 points for every shot you did not use and subtracts 10 points for every second of playing time. One unused shot is therefore worth 100 seconds, so the best highscores come from quick runs with few shots. Hitting every target gives 104,000 points collected, the maximum.

Play the game

• Play the game interactively here Gamepad

Walkthrough

Level 1 – Ice

• 
  The first torch lights up the left half of the cave
• 
  The icicle has fallen on the grave and uncovered the urn
• 
  Second torch: the whole cave is lit and the ice trap is armed
• 
  Shooting Schneider's head brings up the ice floes
• 
  The water monster rises from the lake
• 
  The helicopter on the mountain
• 
  Flake's head freed: walk off to the left

The top floor is a snowy mountain, the middle floor a frozen lake and the bottom floor an ice cave.

1. You start on the right-hand rock ledge above the lake. There is nothing to stand on in the water yet, and touching the water drowns you. Walk right off the ledge. You come into the ice cave from the left, and the cave is pitch dark.
2. Fire to the right. The shot hits the first torch, which lights up the left half of the cave. Now you can see the grave, and a large icicle in the middle that blocks the way.
3. Standing shots pass underneath the icicle. Jump and fire at the top of the jump. The icicle falls onto the grave, smashes it and uncovers an urn.
4. The second torch is optional. Shooting it lights the rest of the cave and shows the head at the far right, but it also arms a row of big icicles on the ceiling: the ice trap, which comes down and kills you if you walk under it. The head can be shot in the dark, so it is quicker (and saves a shot) to leave the second torch alone.
5. Walk (or hop) right to about the second torch and shoot Schneider's head at the far right (10,000). Ice floes now appear on the lake.
6. Walk back to the left and pick up the urn (a choir plays): this is an extra life. When you walk past the spot of the first torch, the ice trap falls down harmlessly.
7. Leave the cave to the left. You come back onto the starting ledge. Cross the lake on the floes:
   • The first gap is wide. Take a long jump from the very edge of the ledge.
   • The water monster rises as soon as you are over the lake and moves towards you. Touching it kills you. Shoot it right after you land on the first floe (5,000); once it is killed, it does not come back.
   • Jump from floe to floe. Walk to the edge of a floe before jumping, and use a long jump when the gap is wide. The last jump onto the left-hand ledge is safest as a long jump.
8. Walk off the left ledge. You come onto the mountain from the right.
9. Walk left until the helicopter takes off at the left edge (roughly when you reach the first third of the mountain). It flies towards you and drops a fireball every two seconds. The fireballs fly diagonally downwards in front of it, and jumping only protects you from a fireball that is near the end of its fall.
   • As soon as the helicopter appears, walk back to the right a few steps, then tap ← once so that you face left again. The first two fireballs then land short of you.
   • When the helicopter has flown about a quarter of the way across the screen, shoot it with a jump shot (5,000). Don't wait much longer: its third fireball reaches you.
   • A second helicopter then comes in from the right, behind you. Turn round and shoot it standing straight away (5,000), before it drops its first fireball.
   • If a helicopter is not shot, it keeps coming back.
10. Flake's pale head in the top-left corner blocks the way. Shoot it (10,000), then walk off the left edge of the screen.

Level 2 – Concert hall

• 
  Start: the snorkel hangs just to your left
• 
  A giant cockroach
• 
  The flying gun above the seats
• 
  The rubber dinghy collected: two lives
• 
  The latex dolls above the stage

The bottom floor is backstage, the middle floor the rows of seats and the top floor the stage. In this level you keep walking left the whole way.

1. You start at the bottom right. A snorkel hangs from the ceiling a little to your left. As soon as you take a few steps left, a giant cockroach crawls in from the left edge. You cannot jump over it, so stand still and shoot it as soon as it is on screen (5,000). If it gets close to you, a second, faster cockroach follows. That one is so fast that a shot can pass through it, so keep firing until it is hit (5,000).
2. Collect the snorkel. Stand about one body width to the right of it and make a short jump straight up (↑ only), so that you are at the top of the jump when you are under it (a choir plays). If the snorkel is still there, step a little and try again. This is essential: without the snorkel you drown right at the start of level 3.
3. Optional: shoot Paul's head at the bottom left (10,000).
4. Walk off the left edge into the seating area. You come in from the right. A flying gun glides back and forth above the seats and fires arrows at you. Stay at the right edge where you came in. The gun starts at the far left and flies towards you. Its first arrow does not reach you. When it is about halfway across, shoot it with a jump shot (5,000).
5. Walk over the rubber dinghy for an extra life.
6. Walk off the left edge onto the stage. Two latex dolls hang there. They slide sideways depending on which way you are facing, and touching one kills you. Because you have been walking left, one doll now hangs right in front of you and the other at the far left.
   • Right after you come onto the stage, shoot Till's head at the top right standing (10,000). Do this first, because a jump would carry you past it.
   • Then shoot the doll in front of you with a jump shot on the spot (↑, then hold → while you fire): 2,000, and you hear a rubber squeak.
   • Walk left until you are about three quarters of the way across the stage and shoot the second doll with a jump shot (2,000).
7. Walk off the left edge of the stage.

Level 3 – Beach

• 
  Start under water, wearing the snorkel
• 
  Your doppelgänger (right) patrols the reef
• 
  A barrel drops into the sea in front of you
• 
  Jumping over a sea urchin
• 
  The hula girl on the beach
• 
  Oliver's head is freed

The bottom floor is under water, the middle floor is the sea and the top floor the beach. Again, walk left all the way.

1. You start at the bottom right, under water. With the snorkel from level 2 you can breathe. Without it you die before you reach the middle of the screen.
2. Richard's head at the bottom left blocks the way. Walk until you are a little past the middle of the reef and shoot it from there (10,000), before you go any further.
3. When you are about two-thirds of the way across the reef, a figure materialises right behind you: your doppelgänger. It first walks away from you to the right for about a second, then turns and comes back towards you, firing along the floor. You cannot jump over its shots.
   • As soon as it appears, turn round (→) and stand still.
   • Fire just as it turns back towards you. It is then walking to the left, and the hit gives +5,000. If you shoot it while it is still walking away to the right, you lose 5,000.
   • If it kills you, it patrols a wider stretch afterwards.
4. Walk off the left edge into the sea.
5. While you move through the sea, barrels drop from above, about one body width ahead of you. You cannot jump over them, and walking into one kills you.
   • A barrel drops when you start moving. It takes about a second to sink below the surface, and no new barrel can drop for about another second after that. No new barrel drops while you stand still.
   • The barrel always drops in the direction you are facing. Trick: when no barrel is falling, take one step back (→). The barrel then drops behind you, and for the next two seconds or so you can walk left freely, because no new barrel can drop while it sinks.
   • Without the trick, move in short stretches: take a few steps, stop, wait about a second, and repeat.
   • Shooting barrels gives no points.
6. There are two sea urchins in the sea. Touching one kills you unless you pass over it in the middle of a jump. Take a long jump (↑ while holding ←) from about one body width before the urchin.
   • Jump about a second after a barrel has dropped. The barrel has then sunk, and no new barrel can drop where you land.
7. Walk off the left edge onto the beach. A hula girl dances there. When you get close, she turns into a sand monster and charges at you. Walk a few steps onto the beach and shoot her from about a third of the screen away (5,000). From the very edge your shot falls short.
8. Optional: Oliver's head in the cloud at the top left needs a jump shot from roughly below the palm tree (10,000). It does not block the way.
9. Walk off the left edge of the beach. You have finished the game.

End of the game and the highscore competition

The end screen

The end screen ("Glückwunsch! Du hast das Spiel mit folgendem Highscore-Ergebnis überlebt:") shows:

• Gesammelte Punkte (points collected)
• Punkte für Restmunition (1,000 per unused shot)
• minus Spieldauer (−10 per second)
• DEIN HIGHSCORE-ERGEBNIS (your final score)

The red button next to "Ja, ich will am Wettbewerb um den höchsten Highscore teilnehmen." writes the result to C:\HISCORE.TXT. The README explains the competition: you e-mailed this file (or faxed a printout) with your name, address and phone number, and the ranking and the prizes were announced on rammstein.de.

The file is "encrypted" in a simple way. The score is padded to ten digits. The first line (verschlüsseltes Highscore-Ergebnis) is a sequence of number pairs: each pair is a random digit followed by one digit of the score, and the score digits are written in reverse order. The second line (Kontrollziffer, check digits) is also a sequence of pairs: a random digit, then (score digit + its position 1–10) mod 10.

Video

A complete run from the title screen to the end screen without losing a life, hopping wherever it is safe. Every target is hit (104,000 points collected) in 99 seconds of playing time with 20 of the 30 shots, for a highscore of 113,010.

The video shows one complete play-through that follows the walkthrough below. It was recorded under Wine, so the "HISCORE.TXT saved" message box at the end is drawn in Wine's style rather than Windows 95 style. The sound was rebuilt from the game's own WAV files, timed to the moments the game played them.

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