Periodically, during game play, I have one of the rolling boulders change direction. In this case, it has closed off the one way out of a room I am in (preventing the game from being played.

The boulder was originally rolling towards and away from me, not moving left or right in the short corridor (3 tiles long).

Any known solution for getting around/fixing this issue?

Rais

Reload. Or run through this three-tile corridor anyway; you'll get hit, but the boulder will (most likely) reverse direction.

He's got a problem with a regular relatively-easy-to-bypass boulder that he accidentally bumped into and it went haywire. Honestly, 3 tiles is not a problem if you need to run across, man up and take damage, boulders are not fatal unless you're stuck in a spinner (the twin spinners in Dark Lantern dungeon are particularly asstastic). It's when a boulder is blocking a single tile in a 1-tile corridor that things really turn sour.

Unfortunately, I have tried this. The problem is I can't get into the 3 tile corridor without the boulder being in the way of moving forward and out of it. I don't need to get down the longer hallway.....I need to move through the 3 tile hallway. And with the boulder moving between only 3 tiles, it is impossible to get by it.

A restart may be in order....A reload is not possible, as the latest save happened after the boulder changed directions. Since the boulder changing direction is more of a bug than a feature, this isn't an option for this area.

Also had the same problem, luckily I had a backup save. If you really don't want to start over again, the only option would be using Universal Game Editor to give yourself Ritual of Unmaking & enough spell points temporarily to get rid of the boulder. :/

As it moves into a less-useful end of the 3-tile path, try running past it over the middle tile / getting hit to get it stuck in that end, rolling perpendicularly to the 3-tile.
And Use Multiple Save Slots. You have ten of them for a reason.

You can try facing the bolder and quickly turning left or right. If you're very lucky that can sometimes work. It's best to keep a save when starting a level, that way you only have to go back to the start of the level.

Certainly, the boulders are a complete annoyance after they go haywire/block a way, especially in the Dark Lantern Catacombs (as there's not much to do about it, other than move as fast as you can to fetch those two pieces).

Here's a tip/simple demonstration how to fetch 'em quick without any damage (you may get hit once, if you're a slowpoke. [getting items ASAP from chests - Right click the chest; right click again; left click; run]): http://i39.tinypic.com/se2e5w.png

The dark lantern's easier to deal with than the root in the elder tree, more than a boulder there to deal with.

So far I've had to restart the game twice. Once because a boulder made it so I couldn't get a pearl in the dungeon with the lady of the lake and the second time because I stepped on a pressure plate that opened a hole in the floor in front of the stairs in the dungeon with the giant.

Now I keep an extra save at the start of a level and don't turn until the boulder's moved past where I want to go.

I had that one happen too, but I think it's reversible if you mess around with the pressure plates enough. I never entirely figured out what all those plates were doing in some of these dungeons, though.

I use the eye thing that shows the whole map. I only need one because I save then reload. I picked up one in the underground city. Sometimes those pressure plates will open secrets if you can figure them out. You can get some nice stuff like the armor in the elder tree that gives 30 protection and makes all earth spells cost 50% less.

I've had a boulder get stuck in a bottleneck in the Dark Lantern, blocking off an entire section of the map. I just rammed it a few times, took some damage, but was able to set it back on its normal course. If it's going left and right in a single tile and you need it to go forwards-backwards, I think it's critical to ram it just as it's in the middlemost frame or something like that. That's why persistence in ramming it is necessary; sooner or later you hit the sweet spot. As the manual says: boulders can be pushed, provided a free path exists in the desired direction.

You know, I remember playing this game back in the day on a Pentium 100... Never seen this happen. Is this some kind of Dosbox issue? It seems to be constant.

Just bought the game yesterday and ran into this three separate times, locking out the horn in the Dark Lantern Catacombs. Any ideas? Game is literally unplayable if this keeps happening.