Elated over their victory against the vicious Stickster, the stick figures soon realized their pages had been shot to pieces and smudged with remains. Repair work would be difficult, and so many of them had lost their lines to the creature that many wished to move on. Its horrible shriek still terrorized their dreams. After long debate, the figures sent scouts onto the shelf in search of another place where they could build a new home.

On the shelf they found a children's activity book, a colorful landscape that seemed just the perfect place to live. The environment was friendly, the crayon walls were bright, and the book was just the right size to explore. When news of a new home reached the other figures, they left their sketchpad behind and journeyed to their ample new ream. They spent days on end visiting the passageways and hidden nooks of the mazes in the territory they had discovered.

But stick people aren't the only things that like mazes. Not long after they had settled in, the book opened again. A few of the outlying scrawls began to disappear one by one. At first the figures hoped there was nothing to fear, but soon they began finding scribbles of bones and blood in the corners. Some who went to the margins to search for the missing figures never returned themselves. The Squiggle encampment reported hearing strange noises at the far edge of their page; a week later they were all but annihilated, the survivors too stunned to speak. From the bindings came rumors of an unseen horror.

By the time the others knew the truth, it was too late. In an echo that seemed to roll forever down the long corridors, they heard once again the blood-chilling scream they thought they had erased forever. As the Arterial Red crayon hovered overhead, the figures knew they would have to do battle once again with the lineavorous pencil beast—or perish.

Playing as a stick figure, your role depends on the game. In a classic game, you will attempt to kill the Stickster as many times as possible without blowing away the other players. In other games the goal is usually different, with other players either helping or hindering you while the Stickster is a constant menace.

To survive longer, make the best use out of any weapons you find lying about.

It takes 3 hits from your trusty dotgun to kill the Stickster, but only one to kill another player. In some games you lose points for killing other players, but in others that may not apply.

You can destroy walls in your path by hitting them. From a dotgun, a wall takes 5 hits to destroy. This is a good way to escape a constricted section of the maze, and sometimes to make a quick getaway from the Stickster. Flags or scavenger hunt items may also be hidden inside walls.

Ladders will appear whenever a new page opens up. In a classic game this happens whenever the Stickster is killed; he reappears on the new page, until there are no more pages to open and then he can appear anywhere. Ladders go down to the next page, or up to the page before.

To go from one page to another, find a ladder going in the direction you want, then use the Up or Down commands, or the Insert key (up) or Delete key (down). Up ladders appear to be freestanding; down ladders go down through a hole in the floor. But don't think you can escape the Stickster so easily: He can climb too. He may even go to a different page and come back if there's a faster route to reach his prey.

Sound carries throughout the page. If you hear a sound in the distance, it's someone on the same page as you. The Stickster can hear sounds, too, and whenever he's confused about where to go, they can attract his attention.

Your state-of-the-jot tracking device can help you track down the Stickster, roughly predict its movements, and avoid it when necessary. If the Stickster isn't on your page, the tracker will tell you which page it's on. Otherwise, it will tell you the Stickster's direction and approximate distance. In Stick Tag, it will tell you where to find your target as well.

You can coordinate with other players by typing Say and a message. If you like you can tell them where you are in the maze, but nothing says you have to be honest about it. Whether you want to help the others or feed them disinformation is your call. In team games you can talk to only your team with the Teamsay command.

There are several different weapons to be found throughout the maze. Each has different abilities to make you more effective against the Stickster. To change weapons, click the icon on your screen or use the Tab key. Any weapons you collect will be dropped when you die. Whenever one is used up, a new one will be created elsewhere in the maze.

Most weapons can be fired up or down ladders or diagonally, not just in four directions.

	Dotgun All stick figures start out with a dotgun, which can fire 6 rounds. It will reload slowly, giving you a new shot every 3 seconds. Conserve your ammunition when the Stickster is nearby.
	Barrier Crayon Use a crayon to draw a barrier between two walls. The barrier can only be crossed by you or your team, and it takes 3 hits (even from the Stickster and other weapons) to destroy. The barrier will also fail if one of the walls on either side is broken down. Standing on top of the barrier offers no protection from anything, but it will block most weapons and the Stickster if you stand on the other side.
	Eraser Grenade An eraser grenade is a powerful short-range weapon that damages a small area; it does the equivalent of 3 hits of damage compared to a dotgun. Grenades can be tossed over walls or barricades to attack targets on the other side. (But they can't be thrown off the edge of the page!) If thrown upstairs or down, they will ricochet off in a random direction on the next page. Watch out for secondary explosions!
	Typo-flage Instead of concealing mistakes, conceal yourself instead! An application of Typo-flage is good for 30 seconds of invisibility. While you're invisible, the Stickster will still be able to smell you and hear any noises you make. When he gets close enough to see you, seeing nothing will confuse him and he'll try to find someone else to attack. Stay out of his way long enough and you can avoid becoming a meal.
	Chalkporter The chalkporter is a miracle of modern doodlology. It fires a bolus of strongly charged chalk ions that, when it destabilizes, will open a one-way portal to a random destination. The shot is short-range, and will detonate if it hits a wall or obstacle. Any player or the Stickster, if hit directly, will immediately teleport away. The portal will remain open for 10 seconds, allowing further material—including projectiles—to pass through. Anyone traveling through the portal will be temporarily disoriented.
	Paperclip Trap A paperclip can be used to set a trap with another weapon. To set a trap once you have one, use the Trap command or the numpad + key. Only certain weapons may be used as a trap. The trap will be visible to you and your team, and will be triggered when stepped on by anyone else (including the Stickster).

In the book there are different types of games to try.

Classic Game

In this game, the goal is to kill the Stickster as many times as possible within the time limit. Each time the Stickster is killed, ladders to a new page will appear, until there are 6 pages in all. Players earn 1 kill for killing the Stickster, and a 1-kill penalty for killing other players. There is no penalty for accidental suicide, or for killing a rogue player who has negative kills.

Team Classic

Just like in the classic game, it's killing the Stickster that counts, but this time the players are on opposing teams. The whole book is wide open, instead of new pages opening up every time the Stickster is killed. Killing the other team doesn't affect your score.

Scavenger Hunt

Items are scattered throughout the book, and it's your goal to retrieve a particular list of them. Each player will have a different list of 10 items to collect and bring back. Wherever you appear in the maze will be your home zone, and you must return your items there.

Some items are hidden within walls. Use the Ping command or the Backspace key to get a distance to the closest item. The first player player to collect all their items, or whoever has the highest score when time runs out, wins.

There is no penalty for killing other players, nor any bonus for killing the Stickster.

Team Scavenger Hunt

In a team scavenger hunt your whole team looks for the same list of items, which must be returned to your team's home base. Working as a team has a lot of advantages, but the other team knows where to find you and can intercept your scavengers on their way home.

Capture The Flag

Each team has 3 flags to protect. Teams earn points by stealing the opposing team's flags and bringing them back to their home base. To protect your flags, you can build walls inside your base using the Trap command or Numpad + key; a wall can be built right over a flag to hide it. Use the Ping command or the Backspace key to find a flag, in case one is hidden or lying abandoned on your current page. Killing players or the Stickster does not affect the score.

Stick Tag

Points are measured in kills. Players are assigned targets at random: other players or the Stickster. They earn 1 kill and a new target whenever they successfully kill their target, a 1-kill penalty for killing the wrong player, and no change for any other kills. If the Stickster is not a target no points are awarded or lost for killing it. Players with negative kills may be killed without penalty.

Free-For-All!

The stick figures are in an all-out war to kill the other players at any cost, with no penalty. The Stickster is around to ensure that he gets his fair share of the inkshed, too, but he's not worth any points.

Ink Feud!

The teams are fighting for dominance. Their goal is to kill the other team's players. Killing is the only thing that counts, which means merely stunning an enemy in their own team's base does nothing for your team's score.

Team Play

Most of the individual games have a variation where players are part of a team. Players are assigned randomly to each team. Each team has a home base, located at either end of the book, in the center of the page. Weapons that normally benefit just one player may benefit the whole team, and traps will not trigger on other members of your team. The Stickster can't go into a team's home base, but he'll gladly eviscerate anyone crossing the pages.

Inside their home base, players cannot be killed but can be stunned. A stunned player will remain out of commission for a short while.

Walls can be built inside your team's base by using the Trap command or Numpad + key. Be sure you don't have a trappable weapon selected first, and then build. The wall will appear after you leave that square.

Scream of the Stickster was first written in 2002 for the BYONDscape 4K challenge. Constrained by its size, it was kept simple. The theme was pen-and-pencil, black-and-white with minimalist graphics. It was inspired by the old home arcade classics of the '80s, and to an extent kept some of that flavor.

The sequel was a product of player suggestions and a goal to make a more complete game to live up to BYOND's potential. Players often asked how to acquire weapons, only to learn that there were no other weapons. That led naturally to the question: If there were more weapons, what would they be? The idea to extend the concept to other types of group games like capture the flag was another simple upgrade.

In the early concept, volume II was going to differ from the original game by using actual stairs between pages, eliminating the Up and Down commands, and eliminating perennial stupid questions along with them. The problem: Stairs pretty much made it impossible to find a simple way to destroy walls without also destroying stairs. They had to be scrapped, in favor of the familiar ladders.

One thing that was new was the inclusion of a new AI for the Stickster. The Stickster uses a modified form of A* pathing to find the best route to a player. This is updated from time to time as new targets arrive, although there are many limiting factors preventing the Stickster from finding the closest target every time. Eventually I think it would be nice to include some sort of waypoint system to speed the AI up even further.