Manic Miner

No gamepads detected. Plug in and press a button to use it.

Press Keyboard right side: Alt+Enter keys to switch to full screen game play, and Alt+Enter keys to return.

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How to play Manic Miner

Each game uses different controls, most DOS games use the keyboard arrows. Some will use the mouse.

Manic Miner Description

At the time, its stand-out features included in-game music and sound effects, excellent playability, and colourful graphics, which were well designed for the graphical limitations of the ZX Spectrum. The Spectrum's video display allowed the background and foreground colours to be exchanged automatically without software attention and the "animated" load screen appears to swap the words Manic and Miner through clever manipulation of this feature. An homage to this loading screen appeared in one episode of the 2005 British sitcom Nathan Barley.

On the Spectrum this was the first game with in-game music, the playing of which required constant CPU attention and was thought impossible. It was cleverly achieved by constantly alternating CPU time between the music and the game (which accounts for the music's stuttery rhythm). The in-game music is In the Hall of the Mountain King from Edvard Grieg's music to Henrik Ibsen's play Peer Gynt. The music that plays during the title screen is an arrangement of The Blue Danube.

Manic Miner - additional information

Platform
DOS
Game year
Cover Art
Manic Miner - Cover Art