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Text File
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1994-01-23
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19KB
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507 lines
Pickle Wars
by
Karen Crowther
A Redwood Games and MVP Software Production
Pickle Wars is shareware. You are free to evaluate this software for 30 days,
after which you must either register with MVP Software or delete the software
from your system. Thanks for playing Pickle Wars and for supporting
shareware. Your honesty pays.
This is volume one of the Pickle Wars trilogy.
To order the Pickle Wars trilogy, call 800-968-9684 toll-free 24 hours a day.
Please have your Master Card or Visa ready when you call. Or fill out the
order form at the end of this manual and fax it to: 616-245-3204. Make
sure your credit card number and expiration date are legible. Or if you
prefer mail the order form and your check to: MVP Software, 1035 Dallas SE,
Grand Rapids, MI 49507-1407.
For overseas orders or technical support call 616-245-8376.
Now you can get all MVP shareware FREE of download charges from MVP's
home BBS, Ryan's Bar. Call (616) 456-1845 or (616) 456-5342 with your
modem and check out the free MVP file section.
_______
____|__ | (R)
--| | |-------------------
| ____|__ | Association of
| | |_| Shareware
|__| o | Professionals
-----| | |---------------------
|___|___| MEMBER
MVP Software is a member of the Association of Shareware Professionals (ASP).
ASP wants to make sure that the shareware principle works for you. If you are
unable to resolve a shareware-related problem with an ASP member by contacting
the member directly, ASP may be able to help. The ASP Ombudsman can help you
resolve a dispute or problem with an ASP member, but does not provide
technical support for members' products. Please write to the ASP Ombudsman
at 545 Grover Road, Muskegon, MI 49442-9427 or send a CompuServe message via
CompuServe Mail to ASP Ombudsman at 70007,3536.
INSTALLATION
------------
If you downloaded this file from a BBS, you don't need to run Install. If you
purchased an evaluation disk from a shareware vendor or the story, follow these
directions. To install Pickle Wars, place the diskette into the A drive and
type A:, or into the B drive and type B:. When the A> or B> prompt appears on
the screen, type INSTALL. Follow the directions to install the software.
To begin the game type PW1.
Note to Windows Users
---------------------
Pickle Wars will run as a DOS application, spawned under Windows, but you may
encounter sound card conflicts. The best solution if you run into conflicts
is to completely exit from Windows before starting Pickle Wars. Clicking on
the DOS prompt is NOT exiting Windows. You must actually close your Windows
session.
Note to OS/2 Users
------------------
Pickle Wars will run under OS/2, but you'll have to do a little tweaking to
make it run correctly, and at the right speed. Here's how to do it.
Run Pickle Wars in a full-screen DOS session rather than a windowed DOS
session. In addition, use the following DOS session settings:
DOS_BACKGROUND_EXECUTION OFF
DOS_UMB ON
HW_TIMER ON
IDLE_SECONDS 0
IDLE_SENSITIVITY 75
VIDEO_8514A_XGA_IOTRAP OFF
VIDEO_ONDEMAND_MEMORY ON
VIDEO_RETRACE_EMULATION OFF
The HW-TIMER and VIDEO_xxx settings are critical to running the game under
OS/2. Anything else makes the game look hyperactive, with things running
way too fast. Depending on the speed of your system you may have to
experiment with these settings.
Pickle Wars and Sound Blaster 16
--------------------------------
The Sound Blaster 16 sound card causes special problems, especially in 486 DX2
systems. If the game locks up, try running it without digitized sound effects.
Another option is to include the following command in your AUTOEXEC.BAT:
SET SB-SET FM:9,9
This command may also make the music louder if it is too soft on your SB 16.
Making a clean boot disk
------------------------
If you encounter problems running Pickle Wars there may be a conflict between
it and a program resident in memory. Here's a way to avoid the conflict.
Place a blank, unformatted diskette into drive A of your computer. Then type
FORMAT A:/S/U
and press enter. When the computer is finished formatting the disk and
copying the system files to it, press the RESET button on your computer or the
ALT-CTRL-DEL keys at the same time. After your computer has rebooted, go to
the Pickle Wars directory and play the game. If it runs, there is a conflict
between a resident program loaded by your AUTOEXEC.BAT or CONFIG.SYS file.
Whenever you want to play Pickle Wars, simply reboot your computer with the
boot disk you have created.
The Story so far
----------------
Warlike aliens resembling giant dill pickles have invaded the peaceful human
colony of Arcadia. After 500 years of peace, the people of Arcadia have put
away their weapons. Their only military organization is the Coast Guard.
They appear to be helpless against the alien onslaught.
Fortunately, an enterprising teenager discovers that the Aliens are deathly
afraid of vegetables (no one knows why --- well, actually WE know why but we
aren't telling you, until all becomes clear in Underneath the Planet of the
Pickles). So the inhabitants of Arcadia arm themselves with SaladShooters(R)
and do battle with the dread Pickles.
You alternately play our hero, Dave, a history student at the University, and
Linda, a Coast Guard officer. You must accomplish many tasks including
finding Lord Geric's Depository of Ancient Weapons, finding the Ancient
Weapons themselves, finding more SaladShooters(R) and ultimately finding the
Doomsday Machine itself.
The following keys allow you to run, climb, jump and use the SaladShooter(R)
to toss sliced cucumbers at the Alien Pickles, which causes them to faint.
Keyboard
--------
Alt or Space ....SaladShooter
Ctrl or Up...............Jump
Right arrow........Move right
Left arrow..........Move left
PgUp..................Look up
PgDn................Look down
Enter..............Open door,
Flip switch,
Activate warp
S................Sound toggle
Esc.........Brings up menu or
backs out of menu
You can redefine the keyboard from the "Options" "Keyboard" menu.
Joystick
--------
Button 1...........Jump
Button 2...SaladShooter
To use the Joystick you must first go to the menu and choose
"Options"
"Joystick"
"J"
If you do NOT have a Joystick and you tell the program to use one, the program
will slow to a crawl. If this happens go back into the Joystick menu and answer
"No".
Collect SaladShooters to help you toss vegetables at the Aliens. Aliens faint
at the touch of vegetables! Your job is to collect all the Salad-Shooters so
that you and your fellow Arcadians can fight off the alien invasion.
Use your SaladShooters to break the spheres blocking your way. Ok, Ok... we
know that cucumbers don't explode but we like explosions. So Arcadian
cucumbers have been genetically altered to explode on nonliving objects.
Press the SPACE BAR, ALT key or Joystick button to activate your SaladShooter.
When you see a red button, press the <ENTER> key to activate the moving
platform. Switches are on when they blink red.
Collect carrots for health. Remember to eat lots of vegetables to resist the
Pickle Invaders!
Don't let the Pickles near you! They will take away your health points!
Warps
-----
Press the Enter key to activate the red switches or the Warps. Warps look
like doorways. Switches are rectangular and blink when activated.
If you have trouble getting a warp or a switch to activate when you press the
<ENTER> key, try holding the <ENTER> key down as you walk back and forth in
front of the door or switch.
Save/Restore
------------
Press Esc to bring up the main menu. Then choose "Game Options" to see Save
and Restore. The program automatically saves the games when you quit and you
can restore "last game played".
Mail
----
You will see pieces of paper fluttering in the breeze. This is your mail and
you can read it by touching the paper.
Do not accidentally shoot your mail!
Mail machines deliver your mail. Do not accidentally shoot them or you will
lose points and miss your messages.
There is only a limited amount of mail that you get on each level.
Beware, though, the Aliens have flying machines about the same size as the
mail machines. Don't let the Alien machines touch you!
Difficulty Levels
-----------------
On Easy level the aliens are not very good at chasing you and when they faint,
they stay out cold until the end of the level.
On Medium level the aliens are a little smarter at chasing you and wake up
after the faint.
On Hard level the aliens are very smart and wake up quickly after they faint.
You can change difficulties at any time by pressing ESC to bring up the menu
and then choosing "Game Options", "Difficulty".
Sound and Music
---------------
Press 'S' to activate the sound menu. Your soundcard information, joystick
setting, and special keyboard definition are all saved in a file called
CONFIG.PW1. If you have a soundcard installed and tell the program to turn off
music, the music will play next time you restart the program. The
configuration file only saves information on the type of card you have.
You can delete CONFIG.PW1 if you want Pickle Wars to allow you to change your
soundcard settings or you can choose "Reconfigure Soundcard" off the 'S' menu
or you can answer 'Y' when the program asks you whether you want to change
soundcards at startup.
If you choose a soundcard that you do not have installed, the program will
hang your computer!
If you have chosen an incorrect soundcard you can run PWSETUP to change it or
delete CONFIG.PW1.
Hints
-----
You can skip the opening cinematic sequence (or any other cinematic sequence)
by pressing <ESC> a couple of times.
Hold the ENTER key down as you walk back and forth in front of switches or
doorways to make it easier to activate switches and warps.
TROUBLE SHOOTING
----------------
> Game hangs or acts weird.
Delete CONFIG.PW*. Next time you start the game tell it you do NOT have any
type of soundcard at all. If it runs OK, you have a soundcard conflict.
The most likely explanation is that you have told the program that you have a
soundcard that doesn't match the one in your computer.
If you are sure you have told the program the correct soundcard then you may
be having a conflict with some TSR. See the instructions for booting from a
special bare-bones boot disk.
> Game runs slowly.
You may have Joystick set to "Yes" without a joystick connected. Go into the
Game Options and choose Joystick and answer "No".
Since this is a true 256 color dual-parallaxing game, it just runs slowly on
a 286. Try answering Y to the question about soundcards during startup and
tell the program you don't have any soundcards. The music and digitized
sound effects do slow the game down.
Try pressing the grey '+' key. it speeds up the frame rate. The '-' key slows
it down.
> Music is messed up or too soft.
You may be running from Windows which sometimes messes up soundcards. Read
your Soundcard documentation to find out how to fix this since there are
usually settings that will fix it.
You may have one of the SoundBlaster cards that plays music too softly with
our drivers. Unfortunately, that is something that is intrinsic to Midpak
and one of the SoundBlaster cards.
Check the volume adjustment on your card.
> Joystick only goes in one direction or pegs over.
Try choosing Game Options, Joystick and be sure to center the joystick before
pressing 'J'.
Some joysticks need to be calibrated. Read your joystick manual to find out
how to do this.
If all else fails, turn the Joystick option to NO and use the keyboard.
> Insufficient Memory message.
This message means what it says. You may have limited memory because you are
running from Windows or have a large shell program loaded. Try making a
"bare-bones" boot disk and running the program.
> Missing File.
You are missing one of the PW*.* files. Either it was accidentally deleted or
never installed. The most common cause of this is if you have run out of room
on your hard disk. Type DIR and look at how many bytes free there are. If
there are fewer than about 1,000,000 bytes, lack of disk space is the problem.
NOTES ON YOUR PROGRAM FILES
---------------------------
(Do not read this unless you are a sophisticated user)
All files that start with PW*.* are necessary. Don't ever delete any of them.
Files that end in *.PW? can be deleted if you want. They are:
high.pw?.....high scores
config.pw?...music/sound/joystick information
save*.pw?....save files
Those zillions of *.com, *.adv and *.ad files are part of Midpak which runs
your soundcard. If you don't have a soundcard you can delete them if you want.
f you do have a soundcard, you can delete the ones that don't apply to you.
Do NOT delete:
PMIDPAK.COM
MIDPAK.*
SOUNDRV.COM
Your specific *.AD, *.ADV and *.COM files.
The above files are necessary for any soundcard.
If your card is not listed, ask your card manufacturer if they have a Midpak
file for it. If so, just copy it to the Pickle Wars directory and it SHOULD
work if it is for the correct Midpak version which is NOT the protected mode
one.
Remember: Arcadia is counting on YOU!
Pickle Wars was created by Redwood Games, Inc. and is published by
MVP Software, Inc.
Design:
Karen Crowther
Story:
Ellen Guon
Music:
Robert Prince
Programming:
Karen Crowther
Artists:
William Penn
Cygnus Multimedia
Les Pardew
Randy Wakefield
Mike Tidwell
Electric Paintbrush
Jimmie Homburg
Dale Homburg
Assistant Programmer
Sage Statham
Quality Assurance
Ron Taylor
Robbie Sholars
SaladShooter (R) electric slicer/ shredder is a registered trademark
of National Presto Industries, Inc. and is used here by permission.
Pickle Wars is Copyright 1993 Karen Crowther. All rights reserved.
Please don't copy the registered versions except for backup purposes.
Ordering Information
The Pickle Wars Trilogy is available from the following authorized
distributors:
In the United States:
--------------------
MVP Software
1035 Dallas SE
Grand Rapids, MI 49507-1407
phone: 800-968-9684 24-hour order line only
(616) 245-8376 information, technical support, or orders.
fax: (616) 245-3204
order price: $29.95 plus $3.00 shipping in the US, $4.00 shipping to
Canada, $5.00 shipping everywhere else. Michigan residents please add
appropriate sales tax.
In Australia:
------------
Budgetware
9 Albermarle St
Newtown NSW 2042
phone: (02) 519-4233 Fax: (02) 516-4236
order price: $A45.00 (includes shipping)
In the United Kingdom:
---------------------
Testware Ltd
46 The Avenue
Harrogate, N Yorks HG1 4QD
phone: (0423) 886 415 Fax: (0423) 889 728
order price: 30 pounds (includes shipping)
In Denmark and all of Scandanavia:
---------------------------------
Pro-Soft
Benloese Skel 4 G
DK 4100 Ringsted
phone: 53 61 90 42
fax: 53 61 93 91
order price: 210,00 kr. + VAT 25% + s/h 25,00
In Japan:
--------
P. & A. Company Ltd
302 Bellwins, 1367-23
Nakagami, Akishima, Tokyo 196
phone: 425-46-9141
fax: 425-46-9142
BBS: 425-46-9143
4500 yen includes shipping and taxes
PICKLE WARS TRILOGY ORDER FORM
Name ________________________________________________________________
Address _____________________________________________________________
City _______________________________ State ______ ZIP _______________
Country (if outside USA) ____________________________________________
CIRCLE HD DISK SIZE: 5-1/4" -or- 3-1/2" IMPORTANT!
Price of Pickle Wars Trilogy $29.95
Shipping and Handling (US) 3.00
Shipping and Handling (Canada) 4.00
Shipping and Handling (all other countries) 5.00
Michigan residents add sales tax 1.32
------
Make check payable to "MVP Software" Total enclosed: $
Master Card/Visa information (credit card orders only)
Card number __________________________________________
Expiration number ____________________________________
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
VOLUNTARY QUESTIONS: Please help us determine what features you would like
==================== in future products.
Circle what type of equipment you have: 8088 286 386 486 Pentium
Circle the speed of your computer(Mhz): 10 12 16 20 25 33 40 50 ___
Circle any that apply: Joystick Mouse Modem_______ SVGA card____________
(speed) (type)
Sound Capability: Adlib Sound Blaster SB Pro Thundercard
PC speaker only Other ____________________________________
Where did you get Pickle Wars?
Friend CompuServe GEnie AOL Prodigy Software Creations
BBS (name): _______________________ phone # __________________________
address _______________________________________________________________
Shareware Distributer (name): _________________________________________
Are you a game player? Please answer the following questions about what you
like and don't like in computer games.
Approx # of commercial games owned: ____ #Registered shareware games: ____
Circle preference: Beautiful Graphics Game Complexity
Circle preference: Solo against computer -OR- Modem 2-Player
Circle preference: Strategy Action Simulation Other_________
Long term game playability: Few Levels w/ hard difficulty Lotsa Levels
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Send this order form and your check to:
MVP Software, 1035 Dallas S.E., Grand Rapids, MI 49507-1407
US or Canada 24-hour order line: 800-968-9684. Fax: 616-245-3204.
Tech support, information, or overseas order line: 616-245-8376.