The Time Machine

General tips

Play Time Machine in a rectangular-pixel display mode such as mode 15: some
of the collision detection routines for detecting when you drop things into
or onto some other things are very ropey in higher resolutions. Another bug
is that objects can start to disappear if you put too many in one room, so
keep the number of objects in a room (particularly in the Portaloo) down as
much as possible.

Complete solution
by Tony Houghton
(with additions by Andrew Clover)

Go left, pick up the milk bottle, pickaxe and plank, then go back. Go right,
pick up the clock from behind the bags, then go back. Click the Portaloo door
and type "what", followed by "0.3". Click the door again to open it, then go
forwards.

Click the right-hand button of the group of three to the right of the III/X
sign on the console and pour the water from the bottle into the collector;
keep the empty bottle and press the right button again to put the funnel
away. Go right and put the anti-paradox network on the flux inductor, then
put the flux inductor on the carrier. Pick it up and put everything else you
are carrying except the milk bottle on the map. Go left and put the flux
inductor on the red panel below the row of buttons.

Go back outside, then right. Drop the empty bottle in the road to smash it,
then drop the bag of rubbish (the one on the left) onto the glass; pick up
all the items and go back inside the Portaloo.

Click the middle button on the console and put the battery in the collector
device; click the middle button again. Open the right cupboard and put the
black quantum disc into the slot to the left of the fraction, then close the
cupboard. Click the space/time activator switch. (All cupboards etc. must be
closed to activate the switch.)

Go outside and quickly drop the aluminium cans into the volcanic fissure,
pick up the sulphur from just to the right of the fissure and go back into
the Portaloo. Click the left button to eject the quantum disc (by clicking
the left button), discard it and insert the red one from the right cupboard.
Go right, put the fly spray on the mat and pick up the pickaxe. Go left and
activate the time switch again. Outside, use the pickaxe on the basalt
outcrop near the bottom (many times). Leave the pickaxe and pick up the
corundum. Drop the sulphur into the bowl and pick that up.

Enter the Portaloo and take the jelly babies and the battery from the left
cupboard. Go right, put the bowl on the mat and assemble the lamp by putting
the battery inside the plastic container and the piece of clear plastic on
top; pick the lamp back up. Put the corundum into the top of the corundum
processor and pick up the ruby. Go left and put the ruby on the flux
inductor.

Eject the red quantum disc and replace it with the orange one, then click
the switch. Outside, drop the jelly babies and wait for the jellyfish to go.
Switch on the lamp and click on the ancient column to hear the warning.
(Without the lamp on this speech will be incomprehensible.) Go forwards and
a click on the bird, snake and star symbols as they appeared on the column;
the III symbol is made from two distinct symbols on the pyramid, and the
X symbol is the last. Next you have to sort the chemical symbols on the door
in order of their atomic numbers: H, He, Li, Be. Each click on a symbol moves
it to the top, so click on He then H. Click on the column symbols again -
without the III/X sybols - to light the interior, then go forwards.

With the lamp still on, click on the blindfold on the wall painting. The
braille tablets spell out an anagram of IRRIGATION. Pick up the pi and the
light from the heart and go right. Click the statue and enter IRRIGATION.
Abandon the lamp, pick up the key segment and go back into the Portaloo. (You
shouldn't need the Blackbordian Unstickapods if you save your place before
attempting the sums leter on.) Eject the quantum disc, but keep it this time
and also get the yellow one from the cupboard. Go left, put the orange disc
on the shelf, pick up the remote control and put the key segment on the
picture, go left again, put pi and the light on the mat and pick up the fly
spray. Go left again, insert the green quantum disc and go to Dune.

 Drop the remote control and the quantum disc just outside the Portaloo and
go backwards. Pick up the magnetic tile, go left, pick up the tile, left,
pick up tile, left, left, pick up tile, left, pick up tile, left. In the
order that you picked up the tiles, place them on the board in the following
positions: top-right, bottom-right, bottom-left, bottom-middle, top-left. Put
the tile already on this screen on the middle-left. Go left and spray the bug
from just to its right. Pick up the tiles, front one first. Go left again,
pick up the tile, go forwards, then left. In the order picked up, put the
tiles on the board: middle-right, top-middle, centre. You will then hear
MORSE being spelt out and be awarded with a coin.

Pick up the coin and the letter H and go forwards, pick up the coin then go
left. Drop the H on this screen, pick up the F, then go left twice. Drop all
the letters in the letter box in order to spell FARTHING. Pick up the coin
and go left twice.

Next, click on the sandcastles in the following order to get a gold coin:
Australia, Canada, France, Ireland, Japan, The Netherlands, Spain, UK. You
now need to visit all the locations in order for the sandstone markers
to spell TheWayOut, so go left (spray the bug), forwards, right, forwards,
right, right, forwards, forwards.

Back outside the Portaloo drop the coins and pick up the Quantum disc and go
inside. Eject the Dune disc and replace it with the yellow one. Go outside
and use the remote control. Pick up the coins and go forwards. Drop all the
coins into the slot on the top right of the control panel. You must now play
the game of Simon, matching the computer's sequence of lights and notes to
get the next segment of the key to time.

Go forwards to the T marker then make your way along the exit route again.
This time pick up the gravestone and the charcoal sprigs from the 'w' room,
and the dull yellow card from 't' on the way. Pick up the remote control
and take everything inside. Put the remote control on the key room shelf
with the orange disc and mount the key segment on the frame. Put the other
objects on the mat in the other room; the charcoal goes in the bowl to make
gunpowder.

Take the pi and go to Automatia (the blue quantum disc). Wait for VI to
appear above one of the doors and go in that direction. Drop the apple onto
the pi and pick up the pie to eat it. Get the metal bowl and press control.
Go to room V and pick up the metal top, then to room III. Assemble the
smallest bowl and lid to make a 'Rooskie darl' and put it inside the next-
biggest bowl (the one you collected earlier), put the lid on and so on until
you have one large Rooskie darl. Put it on the shelf hanging from chains to
collect key 2. Also pick up the shilling.

Go to room II and click on the planets in the instructed order to collect a
hydraulic pump. (I've managed to use the pump in one of the Dune rooms for
an extra 0.5% - once - but this appears to be a bug and is not the real use.)
Then go to room IV and open safe 2 on the right. Take the figure 7 and the
circuit board. Key 3 is also hidden in safe 2. Use it to open safe 3 on the
left. Go back to room I, click on the robot, drop the circuit board and the
pump in the slot at the bottom of the robot and everything else onto the
floor. Pick up all the program fragments and go to room VI.

You now need to drop all the program fragments into the linker. Put the
resulting blue floppy disc into the compiler to get a red disc. (It would
appear that programs in Automatia are compiled and linked in a different
order to here on Earth.) Go back to room I, collect the 7 and then go to
room V, where the sums should read "7 + 9 = 10" and "6 x 4 = 18" (they're
hexadecimal, see?) - if you get this wrong and you haven't saved you position
you can get the blackbordian unstickapods from Mars; you might as well get
the yellow submarine too if so (see next paragraph). Then get the
Paracetamol. Get the key segment and key 0 from the second safe you opened
earlier in room IV, then back to room I and drop the paracetamol and the disc
into the droid. Click on the droid and collect the key segment, then the
other objects you left here. Take everything into the Portaloo, mount the
key segments and put the other things on the mat.

Now it's time to take a return trip to Mars (with the orange quantum disc).
Go to the Guttak chamber where the statue will now be holding a yellow
submarine which you need to collect. Now take the portaloo to Abbey Road
(green/red quantum disc). As well as the submarine you will need the grave-
stone, the clock, the press control and the light from the heart.

To get into the back room at Abbey Road you must enter a sequence on the left
row of press buttons and then the same sequence on the right. One sequence
that works is to click each button from bottom to top, then from bottom to
middle (and then the same thing on the right). In the back room, put the
Madonna picture on the A platform and the light from the heart on the B
platform. Similarly, put the gravestone on A and the submarine on B. (If
you get it the wrong way round, it still works - you just get 0.5% less.)
Pick up the new quantum disc. Mend the press by putting the press control on
top of it, and put the records in the press one by one, stamping them into
CDs. Also stamp the copies of Penny Lane to make a shilling and the clock to
make a spring. You won't have room to carry both of these at the moment. Go
back and solve the puzzle of the CDs: you can listen to each one on the
player and you should put them in the storage device from left to right in
the order of number of words in the title. The correct order for those
without the requisite knowledge of the Beatles back-catalogue is: pink,
green, yellow, blue, orange. Collect the key segment and what you left in the
other room.

Now use the new quantum disc to go to the catacombs after mounting the key
segment. Here you will need everything on the mat except the plant; as you
can't carry it all, leave the 5 card for now. In room 1 of the catacombs is
a sonic accumulator. The first musical clue is Beethoven. Drop the spring and
the plank, go left, open the safe with key 0, get the lager, the quantum disc
and the magpie. Left again, and drop the two shillings into the robbin's
(sic) nest, then click the catch on the spinning wheel to release the bobbin
which goes in the nest. Collect the robbin and the picture of Beethoven the
dog. Left again, click the lever to open the oven door. Put the bowl of
gunpowder next to the bricked up hearth and drop in the phosphorus to collect
Aladdin's lamp. Put the magpie on the TV screen.

Go left again to the sonic accumulator and drop in Beethoven, then the lager
(it ain't heavy), the spring (from Vivaldi's Four Seasons), Aladdin's lamp
(David Bowie clue), the robbin (Robin of Sherwood?), and the plank (Norwegian
Wood). Get the 5 card from the Portaloo and all the other cards from the top
of each catacombs room. Drop them into the accumulator in the order 5, 4, 3,
2, and 1 to collect the last segment of the key.

When you mount the segment (number of items bug permitting), a new quantum
disc appears. The new message in the communications room gives the final
clue, so go back to Earth (blue/green disc). When you get there, put the
vortex disc in, but don't activate it. Now go outside and operate the remote
control. Go forwards. Congratulations!

(What a strange man Gordon Key is...)