About Dungeon Tunnel
What a perfect maze buys you
In a maze with loops, a dead end might mean you missed a hidden passage. In a perfect maze it never does, which means every moment of confusion is about remembering where you have been rather than doubting what you have seen.
That in turn makes the useful habit obvious: track junctions, not corridors. A maze only feels confusing while you are trying to remember the shape of the passages instead of the branches you have not taken yet.
The maze grows with depth but stops at 13 by 9 cells. Past that size a lantern run stops being navigation and becomes endurance, which is a different and worse game.
Keys and oil, placed by computation rather than guess
The shortest route from the entrance to the exit is computed with a breadth-first search over the generated maze. Every key is then placed on one of the three cells furthest off that route.
So a key is never incidentally on your way. Collecting all three is guaranteed to take you somewhere you would otherwise never go, by construction rather than by hope.
Oil flasks use the same rule one tier down - a little way off the route, adding fourteen seconds each. Relighting always costs a detour, but never the whole run.
The lantern and the dark
You see a radius around the wizard and nothing else. The radius shrinks as the lantern burns, from about 250 pixels at full to 120 at the end, so running low is felt before it is read.
The lantern also burns faster the deeper you go. A level-one maze is comfortable; a level-five maze is a route problem with a stopwatch attached.
Cave bats are the only creature down here and cannot be fought. One costs four seconds of lantern, which is the same currency as a wrong turn - so a bat is a navigation problem like everything else.
Descending
Three keys open the exit. Reaching it banks a bonus that includes 25 points per second of lantern remaining, and carries eighteen seconds of that lantern into the next maze.
That is the compounding decision of the game: every second spent on treasure is a second not banked, and every second banked makes the next maze easier. Good runs take the keys, take the treasure that is on the way, and leave.
The chest is always on the single furthest cell in the maze. It is worth 250, and it is very often not worth it.
How to play
- Press Space, Enter or tap to enter the first maze.
- Move with WASD, the arrows, or by dragging anywhere.
- Find three keys. They are always on the cells furthest off the direct route.
- Collect oil flasks to add fourteen seconds to the lantern.
- Avoid cave bats - they cost four seconds each and cannot be fought.
- Reach the exit once all three keys are found to descend and bank your lantern.
Controls
| Where | What to do |
|---|---|
| Keyboard - move | WASD or the arrow keys |
| Touch - move | Drag anywhere; the wizard moves towards your finger |
| Touch - buttons | Four-way pad below the canvas |
| Keyboard - pause | Escape or P |
Scoring
These are the point values this game awards, before the combo multiplier is applied where it uses one. Hit quality changes the figure: a strike at the centre of the correct moment is worth substantially more than one at the edge of it.
Tips
- Remember junctions, not corridors. That single habit is most of maze navigation.
- Every dead end here is genuinely a dead end. Backtrack without second-guessing.
- Keys are always furthest off the direct route, so plan a loop rather than three there-and-backs.
- The descent bonus pays per second of lantern, so leaving early compounds.
- The chest is on the furthest cell in the maze. Check the clock before going for it.
- Bats cost four seconds, the same as a wrong turn. Treat them as terrain.
Common mistakes
- Searching a dead end for a secret passage that a perfect maze cannot contain.
- Taking three separate trips for three keys instead of routing one loop.
- Chasing the chest at level four with twelve seconds of lantern left.
- Trying to dodge every bat rather than accepting the four seconds and keeping the route.
- Treating the oil flask as free - it is always off the route, and the detour is the price.
Features
- A freshly carved perfect maze every run, with exactly one route between any two cells.
- Keys placed by breadth-first search on the cells furthest off the direct route.
- A lantern that shrinks the visible radius as it burns, and burns faster with depth.
- Oil flasks that cost a measured detour rather than an arbitrary one.
- Lantern carried between levels, so banking early compounds.
- Personal best depth, keys found and treasure count stored locally.
