Settings

Press  space  to throw ice cream scoops. The scoops can be helpful in pushing balls of ice cream to where you want them and are also good for dealing with vermin.

 Arrow left/right  turns Tom left or right

 Arrow down  brakes

 Space  throws scoop (hold to throw continuously)

Gameplay

Cold Comfort Ice Cream Parlor has sixteen superb flavours to choose from, served in dishes, cones or glasses, depending on the size of a customer's order. The dish fits two balls, the cone fits three and the glass fits four.

Once a customer has placed his order, the order details are pinned up and the ice cream container arrives on the conveyor belt. Balls will be piped in from the freezers and Tom Khas has to hurry up and fill the order as soon as possible. If he's really quick, he might even manage to decorate the treat with a topping. Customers love toppings!

The gnomes in the freezers work hard to make sure Tom gets the correct flavours with which to build his treats. Sometimes (more often as the difficulty increases) they will mess up, or just throw in a random ball for fun. Chances are Tom will mess up too, and leftover balls will slide around the floor. As only a limited amount of balls can be present in the room at any one time (this number too increases as the levels progress) Tom might find himself with a roomful of unusable flavours. He can then use the waste chute in the upper right corner to get rid of the offending balls. However, doing this will incur a score penalty.

Work would be much easier if Tom was left alone to do his job. Unfortunately it's not only our customers who take delight in our lovely ice cream. Ice cream ant spiders live in, eat, and lay eggs in the balls of milky goodness, and they do not approve of Tom trying to steal their homes. As the game progresses in difficulty, an increasing number of ant spider commandos are sent to reclaim the missing balls. While generally harmless, a swarm of angry ant spiders with an agenda will surely get in the way. A tough and hardy breed; nothing but well-placed super-sonic ice cream scoops will crush them dead.

Customers these days expect perfect service, instant response times and ridiculously low prices - the bastards. If Tom takes too long filling an order, the customer starts to get impatient. He will rewrite his order on angry red paper to make sure you prioritize his important treat. Should you still delay, he will leave our establishment, slam the door on his way out and never return. The container associated with his order will be crossed out and must be returned, all evidence to Tom's foul-up destroyed, before the remaining customers can relax. As long as there are crossed-out containers on the floor, the satisfaction meter won't increase.

Too little ice cream in a container: irrevocably angry customer

Impatient customer (red note): satisfaction down

Customer got tired and left: irrevocably angry customer

Less than 100% of flavours correct: satisfaction down

Less than 50% of flavours correct: irrevocably angry customer

Topping: satisfaction up

Umbrella: increases Tom's turn rate for better control

Strawberry: increases the speed with which Tom throws scoops

Wafer roll: improves Tom's acceleration and deceleration

Wafer: increases Tom's top speed

Cherry: gives an extra boost to the satisfaction meter

If he has a high overall customer satisfaction, he will also be awarded more generously. This, like the difficulty bonus, is a multiplier.

Customers love surprise toppings, so Tom can get some quite extravagant tips this way. This is also a multiplier.

Multipliers stack, so a topped, quickly served, four flavour treat on hard difficulty will rake in points by the tens of thousands.

Minor points are awarded for killing ant spiders, as well as adding balls and toppings to containers. Points are lost for wasting ice cream down the garbage chute.

The all-time top score for each difficulty is remembered and displayed on the title screen.

Have fun. And remember, the customers' eyes are upon you.
The Management