Thunderbirds/Walkthrough

You will first have to: connect your Sinclair ZX Spectrum or Commodore 64 and cassette recorder to your television set, then switch all three of them on; you'll then have to place the cassette of Firebird Software's 1985 action game Thunderbirds in the recorder, rewind it (unless it is your first time playing), type LOAD "" (without leaving a space between those quotation marks) and push Enter to load the program into the console. Once you have done so, the game will proceed to the screen shown above (which is a shot of the swimming pool on Tracy Island) as the controls come up on it - and if you push R on this screen, you can redefine the movement and "switch" keys (however, the "save", "load", "pause" and "music" keys cannot be changed). You can also push Shift and Break together to abort the game; however, you should only do this if you have absolutely no chance of winning. Once the text THIS IS THUNDERBIRDS - ONE OF THE NEW FIREBIRD SILVER SURFER RANGE FOR THE (CONSOLE NAME). has scrolled off the left side of the bottom of the screen, the following text (which is Geoff Tracy's briefing to his two oldest sons, Scott and Virgil, for the mission) shall appear on it:

YOU START YOUR MISSION WITH 4000 POINTS AND NO CARGO.

THUNDERBIRD TWO CAN CARRY UP TO 40 TONS OF EQUIPMENT, IN IT'S HOLD.

EACH TON CARRIED WILL LOSE 100 POINTS FROM YOUR STARTING SCORE.

EXPERIENCED PLAYERS MAY CHOOSE NOT TO CARRY ANY EQUIPMENT, BUT KEEPING THE POINTS - MAKING THIS SIMULATION MORE DIFFICULT.

The misspelling of "its" in the second paragraph is also accurate, and once you have pressed any key, the game will proceed to the equipment selection screen shown above; use the selected "up" and "down" keys to move the arrow, which has the word "SELECT" on it, up and down and select an item of equipment then press the selected "switch" key to confirm your choice. On the first page, Weedkiller, Heavy Duty Acid, Emergency Transport (which is an old penny-farthing bike) and Guided Missiles all weigh five tons, while Thunderbird 4 (piloted by Gordon Tracy) weighs fifteen - and if you select the word "OTHERS", it shall proceed to the second page on which Acme Cave Sonar (which is a reference to Warner Bros. cartoons) weighs ten tons, while Bulldozer, The Mole, and Earthquake Bomb all weigh fifteen and Extra Fuel weighs five. Once you select the word "TAKE-OFF", the game will proceed to a short cutscene of both Thunderbirds 1 and 2 taking off from their launch pads (however, the latter's launch-ramp sequence from the show is not replicated); they will then reappear on the first screen of Map 1, as two red blocks fall down in front of and behind them (the latter trapping them).