How to Play

Contents

Account System

When you first launch BashQuest, you’ll see a login screen styled after a real terminal login prompt.

Create an account:

  • Choose a username (no spaces)
  • Choose a password (minimum 4 characters)
  • Your progress is saved to ~/.bashquest/yourusername.save

Login:

  • Username and password are checked against ~/.bashquest/users.db
  • Three failed attempts locks you out of that session (re-run the script to try again)
  • Multiple players can have accounts on the same machine

The Interface

Once logged in you’ll see the main menu and a persistent status bar showing:

👤 alice   ⭐ Level 3   ✨ XP: 85   ❤  Lives: 3
Element Meaning
Level Your current level (1–28)
XP Total experience points earned
Lives Remaining lives (start with 3, replenish on login)

Answering Challenges

Each challenge shows:

  1. A description of the task (what to do and why)
  2. A fake terminal prompt for your answer
bashquest@terminal:~$ _

Type your command and press Enter. The game checks whether your answer is correct using pattern matching — it accepts equivalent valid answers, not just one exact string.

Special Commands

During any challenge, you can type:

Command Effect
hint Shows a detailed hint for the current challenge
skip Skips the challenge — costs 1 life

Lives & Game Over

  • You start with 3 lives
  • Each wrong answer costs 1 life
  • Skipping a challenge costs 1 life
  • Reaching 0 lives triggers Game Over — your XP is kept but lives reset to 3

XP & Scoring

XP is awarded for each correct answer. More difficult challenges give more XP:

Difficulty XP
Basic 10–15
Standard 20–25
Advanced 25–30

XP accumulates permanently and is used for the Leaderboard ranking.

Levels & Progression

  • Levels unlock sequentially — complete level N to unlock N+1
  • Use Level Select from the main menu to replay any unlocked level
  • Replaying a completed level does not reduce your saved progress level

Leaderboard

The leaderboard ranks all player accounts on the machine by total XP. Access it from the main menu — option 4.

Tips

Always read the challenge description carefully — it explains why the command exists, not just what to type. That context is the actual learning.

If you’re stuck, use hint before skip. Hints are free. Skips cost a life.

The game validates command syntax and intent, not exact strings. ls -la and ls -al are both accepted where either is correct.