Tommy and the Monster Prison

Guide Tommy as he escapes a dungeon by dodging traps, sneaking past enemies, unlocking chests, and defeating bosses using only mouse controls in this short yet tricky stealth adventure. The opening scene doesn’t explain the story particularly well. It shows an evil sorcerer with tentacles on its head capturing glowing orbs, placing them into a flask, and locking the flask inside a chest. Meanwhile, your character, Tommy, is caught by one of the evil master’s henchmen and thrown into jail. Fortunately, a fairy-like creature manages to unlock the gate and help you escape. The controls are extremely simple but rely entirely on the mouse. When you press and hold the left mouse button, Tommy dashes toward the cursor and continues following it as you move. Releasing the button makes him stop. There are no additional controls because everything else comes down to navigating the stages. Gameplay revolves around sneaking past sentries, whose fields of vision are clearly marked, as well as avoiding enemies and various traps like lasers, spikes, and fire. Your goal in each stage is to reach the exit. Sometimes the exit is already open, but most of the time, you’ll first need to find a chest containing a key. Stages are small and usually take only a couple of minutes to complete, but caution is essential because being caught or hit instantly resets the stage. Luckily, there are objects such as barrels and crates that you can use as cover to hide from enemies or moving lasers. Keys and chests are often blocked by firewalls, which can only be deactivated by touching fires scattered throughout the stage. Some fires remove specific connected firewalls, while others require you to extinguish every flame to unlock all barriers. Besides the key chest, there are also regular chests that make progression easier. Opening one releases a flash explosion that destroys sentries or traps, clearing a safer path toward the exit and any collectible coins. Collecting all chests and coins in a stage earns you up to three stars. You’ll need a certain number of stars to unlock the next prison block, though this requirement isn’t too demanding. The game is divided into four prison blocks, each containing nine stages and a boss fight. Every new block introduces additional enemies and hazards. For example, some stages feature icy floors that you can melt by stepping on numbered switches, while others include pools that must be drained by activating a lever. Boss battles focus on dodging attacks while running around the arena to grab randomly spawning potions. Pretty easy except for disappearing potions, which artificially prolong the battles. A secret achievement is tied to three perks available in the first stage of each block. You can choose between an extra heart, which allows you to take one additional hit; a protective cloak, which serves the same purpose; and a pair of boots that increase your movement speed. However, unlike the boots, which are permanent, the heart and cloak disappear the moment you take damage. This design makes it impossible to unlock the secret achievement unless you complete all 40 stages without being hit even once. And you will get hit, especially by the infamously unfair traps that shoot three bullets simultaneously. The general strategy is to zigzag, but the timing of the shots is unpredictable, and these traps rarely appear alone. You’ll often have to deal with multiple projectiles coming from different directions at once. Thankfully, there’s a clever workaround. If you don’t interact with a pool after finding it, you can revisit it later from the stage select menu. You should do this after completing the game, as by then you’ll have unlocked access to all pools. Each time you pick a reward from a pool, exit back to the stage select screen and move on to the next one. Repeat this process for every pool, and you’ll eventually unlock the secret achievement without needing a flawless run.