How to play Infiltrate online
- Run left and right: left and right arrow keys
- Duck: down arrow (you cannot shoot while ducking)
- Fire your laser: Space bar (fires in the direction you last moved)
- Player 2: F/H to run, G to duck, A to fire
- Choose a game variation: F11 (the console’s Select switch)
- Start a new game: F12 (the console’s Reset switch)
- Novice or expert: F4 (Player 1) and F9 (Player 2) difficulty switches
- Save and load your progress: Ctrl + 0–9 saves to a slot, Alt + 0–9 loads it
Gameplay
The fortress is a stack of floors joined by moving elevators. To get the documents, your agent has to reach both the top and the bottom floor, and you score each time he crosses all the levels from one end to the other. Walk up to an elevator shaft and the agent stops at the right spot on his own, then steps on when the elevator arrives. To get off, push left or right as the elevator passes a floor.
Assassins patrol the floors and ride the elevators too. Their laser shots can be ducked, but touching an assassin is as deadly as being shot. You start with three agents, shown as hats above your score, and gain another for every 10,000 points, up to six. As the game goes on, the assassins get faster, smarter and more persistent.
| Action | Points |
|---|---|
| Crossing all levels, top to bottom or bottom to top | 3,000 |
| Assassin destroyed | 250 |
| Extra bonus if the assassin was on an elevator | 75 |
Variations and switches
The twelve variations are numbered 1-1 to 1-6 for one player and 2-1 to 2-6 for two. Within each group, the first three set the assassins’ speed and intelligence to level 1, 2 or 3, and the last three repeat those levels with Invisible Assassins, who can be seen only while they ride an elevator. In two-player games the players take turns, switching each time an agent is lost.
Each player’s difficulty switch sets the range of enemy fire. In position B (novice), assassins’ shots reach only about half the screen. In position A (expert), they cross the whole play area.
Tips
- Start in novice mode. On B, an assassin across the screen cannot reach you, so you have time to learn the elevators.
- Duck, then shoot. Ducking lets a laser pass over you, but you cannot fire from that position. Stand up and return fire as soon as the shot has gone by.
- Face the right way. Your laser fires in the direction you last moved, so tap towards an assassin before pressing fire.
- Pick off riders. An assassin on an elevator is worth 75 points more, and in the invisible variations that is the only time you can see him.
The story behind Infiltrate
Games by Apollo was founded in 1981 by Pat Roper, head of an educational film company. Apollo was among the first third-party publishers for the 2600 after Activision, but neither its first game, Skeet Shoot, nor the ten that followed caught on, and it was one of the first companies to go bankrupt in the video game crash. According to Wikipedia, Infiltrate was developed for Apollo by Innovative Design Software Inc. (IDSI) and programmed by Don Hoffman, and it came out in September 1982. It later appeared on many Brazilian labels and multi-game cartridges, and it also appeared with a French subtitle as Infiltrate – Nid d’Espions.
