Gruntz

Gruntz is a logic puzzle game with the addition of combat and a pinch of absurd humor.

Hidden Level Triggers#

Each level of the game (including tutorial levels) contains a secret teleport to a planned hidden level; however, the developers added only one such level, for the first stage of the area "Rocky Roadz". The functionality for each map having its own unique hidden level does still exist, as can be seen by injecting custom levels named using the internal ID of the base level plus 100 (e.g., a level named LEVEL102.WWD will load from the teleport in the second stage of Rocky Roadz).

Each teleport is triggered by the player giving their Grunt a certain toy and/or tool (via the game's built-in cheat codes) and having it step on a specific tile.

Rocky Roadz - The Giant Rock

To trigger this teleport, give your Grunt a yo-yo (from typing the cheat mplametoy) and step on the middle arrow, just like in the video below: Watch on YouTube

Unused Original Questz Triggers#

Rocky Roadz 3

In Gruntz Level Editor one can notice, that there are unused TileSecretTriggers that should change the direction of arrows. That's because the logic has an ID of a non-existent, cut out switch with ID 260. It would let the player return to the earlier area.

On the image above cut out switch marked with blue, arrows that would change their direction marked with red and actually used secret arrows with green.

Timed Questz Mode#

Although a timer can be applied to a custom levels, there are hints that also a "Questz" mode was going to have timed mode. One such hint is that checkpoints have logics with specified values, that are used in levels with a timer.

- this pickup can be seen in a statistics menu next to the elapsed time after finishing each of the Questz, but it can be added to a custom map, where after picking it up it gives the player another precious minutes.

- A Grunt happy to pick up a timer pickup.

Unused Multiplayer Victory Conditions#

WarpStone Pads#

The game dev Kevin Lambert revelied that in the secret from the rest of the team he had added to the game a secret "WarpStonePad" logic for a hidden "Battlez" mode. This logic functions like a switch. The mapmaker can designate this logic to up to 4 tiles, that a grunt is capable of walking on. Up to 4 Warpstone pieces can be placed anywhere in the world, including a hole, or a rock. Placing 4 Warpston pieces in corresponding spots (as an icon by pressing T) on the map in Battlez mode would allow a player to defeat all the other players at the same time. A grunt just standing on the tile while carrying the warpstone does not activate the logic. Each player must receive the same number of pads as there are Warpstone pieces.

Unlike Quests levels, should a grunt carrying the warpstone die in battle, the warpstone does not break nor does the game end; rather the warpstone falls to the ground where another grunt can pick it up. If a grunt dies by way of a death tile or hazard, i.e. drowns in the water or falls down a hole, etc., then the warpstone returns to the point on the map where it was last on the ground.

An AI grunt merely wander around with the Warpstone.

The creation pads and forts are randomized but warpstone pads are not randomized, so in this case the first player's Warpstone Pad will be always in the left upper corner, even if the creation pad will change it's place with every new game. So, on the first gif, the player fulfilled the victory condition for the 2nd, green player and lost. On the second gif player won, by placing Warpstones on his pads. On the third gif player placed Warpstones on the pads of the player that didn't take part in the game (player no 3), thus causing his and player's no 2 Gruntz death. The victory screen after this "lose" looks like this:

Defending Multiple Forts#

It's possible to assign a multiple forts to a one player in the Battlez Mode. Still, if one of the forts will be conquered, the player looses the game. Curiously enough the rest of the players still can capture the rest of the forts, but without any further benefits. In Questz Mode adding additional forts does nothing, only bringing the Warpstone to the first placed fort gives a victory.

Unused Enemies#

Magic Wand Grunt#

Unused enemy Grunt for Questz mode with assigned ID no 15. He casts only Freeze, Health and Resurrection spells (respectively spell ID 1, 2 and 3). Each time a Magic Wand Grunt cast a spell, his health decreases by one-fourth from his original full health state. He is rotten green in colour. He cannot attack¹.

The Scroller#

"The Scroller" grunt is unused enemy AI type (ID 16), that gives to a player Grunt a scroll. Just like the Wand Grunt, he is rotten green in colour and just like him he can only give Freeze, Health or Resurrection spell scroll. After this action he defaults to a non-assigned AI (usually performing an attack). Probably because of his ridiculous behavior, he can't be found on a standard levels, but on custom levels in combination with lethal weapons he was put to use as "instant death" trap².

Unused Animations#

There are a few unused attacks animations:

Projectile#

A "normal" Grunt (without a weapon) has a folder with this animation called "Projectile", so probably under certain circumstances he could throw some kind of a curved knife?

Warpstone Grunt Attack#

There exist an eight animations for all eight of the points of compass. Looks like an attack would irrevocably destroy the Warpstone:

There is also one frame for north and northeast animation folder, that presents early, untextured Warpstone and a Grunt in a bit different position during throwing, probably from earlier animation:

Early	In-Game

Early	In-Game

The rest of the six folders also contains one frame of earlier unused animation, but with textured Warpstone, for example:

Wand Grunt Attack#

There are two different unused attacks for each of eight sides, here the West for example:

Unused Graphics#

Oven Mitt#

An unused cursor icon, most probably meant to be used in the Oven menu?

Pre-release Screenshots#

Some cut screenshots with prerelease content found in the .REZ file:

Unused Tiles#

³ Area 2

Early	In-Game

Area 4

Early	In-Game

Early	In-Game

Early	In-Game

This area also contains this strange tooth in the tiles graphic set:

Area 5

Even if it's a solid tile, it's internal number (268) is the same as an unused mound from area 4:

Multiple Areas

Unused Tiles numbers

These Tile numbers do not have any Tile images assigned to them in any graphics set⁴:

0
85
86
87
88
89
96
141
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
210
211
212
219
220
295
296
297
298
299
300

Wormhole Colours#

There are 4 unused teleport colours (only red, green and light blue are in use), that can be found in ATTRIBUTEZ.TXT:

//LMCT_LIGHT 0
//LMCT_RED 1
//LMCT_GREEN 2
//LMCT_BLUE 3
//LMCT_YELLOW 4
//LMCT_BLACK 5
//LMCT_LTBLUE 6

Via editing the ATTRIBUTEZ.TXT (the encryption key is 1212⁵) file it's possible to swap existing teleports with unused ones:

Placeholder#

Removed Cheat Codes#

GRUNTZ.REZ contains a CHEATZ.TXT file that contains three removed cheats. The encryption key for CHEATZ.TXT is K3V1 (another Kevin Lambert's hidden credit?...)⁶.

Three cheat codes had different names:

Debug Cheat Codes#

⁷

Cheat Code	Triggered Text	Effect
mpstepitup		Loads the next level
mpstepitdown		Loads the previous level
mpcheatcheatcheat	They should call you Cheat Cheatelson from Cheatstown Virginia who lives at 1105 Cheat Circle just behind the CheatMart superstore.	Unlocks all Areaz, all Levelz and the Final Movie
mpstopwatch	Elapsed Time Display is ON/OFF	Toggles the time counter until a level's completion
mpfps	Frame Rate Display is ON/OFF	Toggles the Frames Per Second counter until a level's completion
mppos	World Position Display is ON/OFF	Toggles the main screen's coordinatez counter until a level's completion
mpobjects	Count Display is ON/OFF	Toggles the object counter until a level's completion
mpnoinfo		Toggles all activated counters until a level's completion
mpcrash		Displays a fake error message dialogue box titled "PSYCHE" (title is not visible in-game).

Unused Sounds#

Unused Switch Type#

There are 2 empty spaces in switch tiles IDs and there are also 2 empty spaces in user values between switches, so there's very likely, that there were plans for a one more switch type. One of the box images shows blue pyramids, so this might be a hint, that the switches were controlling these pyramids. According to Kevin Lambert aka Sylvermyst, one of the devs:

Oh blue = bridgez. Right. Yeah, before they were bridgez, during prototyping, they were blue pyramids... It was evidently a marketing decision to put more color on the box than to be accurate.

Hare Krishna Grunt#

Interestingly internal name for a Grunt with a Conversion Powerup is "Hare Krishna Grunt".

Developer's Hard Drive#

Inside Gruntz.ZZZ file, contained within 1.01 patch, there are a few fixed Questz maps files. When trying to load them, map editor looks for developer's Gruntz folder path, but can't find graphical resources:

The last level 31 had a bit different path...

Claw Leftovers#

There are a few leftover files from Claw, an earlier game by Monolith:

Unused Map Editor Boxes#

The Gruntz .WWD map file is a descendant of previous Monolith games, that used the WAP32 engine (e.g. Claw and Get Medieval). Thus it contains some unused fields in "Edit objects" menu such as "User" and "Misc" categories.

Hidden Developer Credits#

Typing cheat codes mpgoble and mpscorpio will trigger a line:

Brian L. Goble is a programming God...

One more cheat code is mplambert. It causes all gruntz to self destruct, but it also shows the line:

My name is Kevin Lambert. You typed in my cheat code. Prepare to die.

References#