Levels of Difficulty

When you first start Microcosm, the level of difficulty defaults to the easiest setting. If you don't think that the "beginner" mode is challenging enough, you can use the preferences window to change the difficulty to "intermediate" or "expert". The main differences between difficulty levels are explained here.

In the Beginner setting, only one key is used for firing DNA pills. The pills are fired forward. In the case that the robot is not moving when a pill is fired, the pill is fired in the direction that the robot last moved. The temperature remains constant. (See the description of the Expert setting for a more in-depth explanation of why the temperature matters.)

The Intermediate setting is roughly the same as the Beginner setting, except that four keys are now used to control the firing of DNA pills. This allows the player to shoot in directions other than the direction in which his or her robot is moving. If you are comfortable with typing lots of different keys in rapid succession (or if you have three hands), this mode might actually be easier than the Beginner setting. For most people, however, it is not.

The Expert setting introduces the concept of temperature fluctuation. The basic idea is this: the higher the temperature, the faster the viruses reproduce. The more you move your robot, the higher the temperature becomes. You can cool the maze down by shooting ice cubes from your robot. In the process of melting, each ice cube will chill the maze six degrees celsius. Of course, using ice cubes requires that you master four more keys, but you don't need to use the ice cubes very often. In the Expert setting, mutation also occurs. Mutation happens when a radiation symbol appears in the maze and a virus moves over it. The virus's DNA sequence is partially scrambled, due to the exposure to the radiation. This new DNA sequence will be passed on whenever that virus reproduces.