How to play Mouse Trap online
- Move the mouse: arrow keys
- Open or close the doors: press and hold Space a little longer
- Turn into a dog: a quick, short tap on Space (you need a bone)
- Start a game: F12 (Reset)
- Smart or dumb cats: F4 (Player 1 difficulty: A = smart, B = dumb)
- Fast or slow cats: F9 (Player 2 difficulty: A = fast, B = slow)
- Invisible maze: F2 (switch the TV type to black-and-white)
Gameplay
Your goal is to eat every piece of cheese in the maze. Three cats roam the corridors, and touching one costs you a mouse. The maze has doors that you can swing open or shut with the fire button, which changes the routes through it. Used well, the doors let you cut off a cat that is closing in or open a shortcut for yourself.
Bones are scattered around the maze. You start with one in reserve and can store up to four. A quick tap of the button uses one to turn your mouse into a dog for a few seconds. As a dog you can bite the cats instead of running from them. Eating all the cheese clears the maze and earns a bonus.
| Action | Points |
|---|---|
| Eat a piece of cheese | 1 |
| Bite a cat (as a dog) | 10 |
| Clear a maze | 100 |
You start with three mice and earn an extra one every time your score reaches a multiple of 500.
Switches and the invisible maze
Mouse Trap is a one-player game with no numbered variations. Instead, the two difficulty switches set the cats: the left one makes them smart or dumb, the right one fast or slow. Set both to B for the easiest game. The colour/black-and-white switch hides a bonus mode: in black-and-white the maze, the cheese and the bones all become invisible, while everything else plays the same.
Tips
- Learn the two button presses. A tap and a hold do different things. Practise the difference early, so you don’t waste a bone when you meant to move a door.
- Use doors as walls. Moving the doors when a cat is close can shut it off from your corridor.
- Keep a bone in reserve. The dog phase is short, so use it when a cat is right next to you, not from across the maze.
- Chase points with bites. A cat is worth ten pieces of cheese, and extra mice come every 500 points.
History
The Exidy arcade game, programmed by Larry Hutcherson, had six cats, colour-coded doors worked by separate buttons, a hawk that flew over the walls, bonus prizes and an “IN” box that teleported the mouse. The 2600 version is much simpler: it has three cats, and the hawk, the IN box and the prizes are gone. Coleco also made a ColecoVision version. Atari later reissued the 2600 cartridge under its own label.
Similar games to play next
- Pac-Man – the maze chase that started the genre
- Ms. Pac-Man – a smoother maze game on the 2600
- Lock ‘n’ Chase – a maze game where you close doors behind you to trap the police
- Jawbreaker – eat candy in a maze while dodging chomping teeth
- Lady Bug – a maze game with turning gates that change the paths