Conundrum is an abstract hexagonal based board game, where the object is to negate all of the colored tiles by placing them next to each other. This game was inspired by all of those hexagonal floor tiles you commonly find on bathroom floors. Despite the high level of abstraction, Conundrum is very simple to play, and it can be very addictive for any puzzle gamer.
******* THE PLOT THICKENS *******
Why does everyone insist on having plots to go with games? This game is entirely abstract, with no humanly explainable practical purpose for the game's design. Wnyway, does anyone want a plot for this game? Well, here is one anyway...
One day, you decide to tile your bathroom floor, so it's off to the hardware store for a couple of boxes of tiles and a few other things. You get home, open up the boxes, and discover that you have some kind of cannabalistic vampire tiles, and a box of exploding tiles. You decide to go ahead and lay the tiles on the floor. Of course, since this is a game, the tiles can't seem to leave each other alone, and they start draining the colors from one another. Anyway, it's back to the hardware store, where the person at the returns counter takes one look at your evil little tiles, and runs away, screaming in terror. Obviously, you are going to be stuck with them, so you take them home and proceed with destroying them, using the exploding tiles. Oh yeah, did I mention that when you destroy the tiles, you get bonus objects. Well, this is when you discover that there never was any plot in the first place. This is rather good, since who wants to think about cannabalistic vampire floor tiles.
******* INSTRUCTIONS *******
Well, First off, the ESC key will end a current game and bring you to the main control panel. The tilde "~" key will also do this, since if you read the Mangled Fenders docs, someone broke their ESC key, and I thought it would be nice to support them (and I am going to milk this for every bit of publicity I can :).
The main control panel will let you quit the game, and go to where ever you started the game from. It will also let you select the round to start at. You can start at the early rounds, to get the hang of the game, or go directly to one of the later rounds, and get a bonus score of 100,000 points per 10 rounds you jump. The game changes subtly from an easy, simplified game, to a difficult, complex game.
Once you start, you will have 10 seconds to place a tile on the board, or the game ends. The tiles range from 1 to 10, each having it's own color configuration. The number on the tile is the number of negations that must be done on it. Tiles must be negated by placing them next to each other. The game starts with 6 negations per tile. A tile can be negated from any position adjasent to another tile, up to the number of negations allowed, or to the numbers on the lower of the tiles.
The number of tile types is limited at first, so as not to confuse you, but at regular intervals through out the game, you are given more tiles to work with, as well as exploding tiles.
Exploding tiles destroy everything in a given pattern, centered on where you click to drop the tile. Exploding tiles destroy themselves, and convert any colored tiles they destroy into bonus objects that may be picked up by dropping tiles on them. Bonus objects will be collected when completing the round, so it is not necessary to collect them manually. Exploding tiles become available at round 18, and remain until the current game ends.
Bonus objects: These range from 500-3000 points, using conventions in slot machines for weighing the scores. In fact, the objects were designed for a slot machine game I made a couple of years ago, although it had neat features, I didn't release it since all you did was press a start button and watch the 5 spinners go either horizontally or vertically. I decided to through out the purple thing, since no one really wants to see it anyway.
Bonus rounds: There are bonus rounds at every 10th round, starting at round 5. You cannot lose the game in bonus rounds, and you are only given one type of tile for solving the round. In a bonus round, you are given all 6 negations, to make it a bit easier. If you complete a bonus round by negating all the colored tiles, then you get a bonus of 50,000 points.
You lose the game if you fill up the board with tiles, or if you wait more than 10 seconds in placing a tile. If your score is high enough, you get to enter your name into the high score table. The top 15 high scores are saved, as well as 15 letters for each name. Most people's names fit in a 15 letter space, which is a whole lot better than the former 3 initial standard. Hopefully, the 3 letter standard will be abolished forever, as well as the 1 point scoring for ANY object on the screen, common on arcade games where the programmers were afraid to exceed the maximum integer value.
The high scores in Conundrum go up to 327,680,000. This is done with 2 variables, one for numbers from 0-9999, and another for the 0-32768*10000. Of course, the nature of the game may only let you get about 5 million before you get bored (if the game doesn't kill you off first). Remember, score inflation doesn't hurt the economy, so go ahead and get 5 million or more.
The snowflake thing that responds to mouse movement is your pointer, since this game is mouse controlled, and there was no sane way of making it a joystick game (people making this type of game joystick only should be mangled, quickly).
Distribution of Incinerware: Incinerware may be distributed in other ways, including on 3.5" floppy disks, on Internet, and BBS's, with the stipulations that the games are known by all to be the demo or unregistered, weakened versions. Also people can't be greedy, and I own the compilation copyright on my fleet of games, as well as the individual copyrights on each of the games, and on all of their supporting files, documents, and icons.
I reserve all rights, including the right to make exceptions and to modify any part of this to fit my designs. I also reserve the right to declare future versions of any games as fully commercial, or whatever else I think of :) :D
******* REVOLUTIONARY PRICING STRATEGY *******
Here it is! You can get any 2 disks of my armada of games
for $5 for just 1 disk for $3. These prices effectively negate
previous declarations (since it might be possible to combine them
with this one and wind up with the entire fleet of games for
something less than I can afford :). This lets you get 4 disks
for $10, instead of the previous 3 as offered earlier.
These are the FULL VERSIONS, which are only available
directly from me :).
Disk #1) Incinerator and CheckersConquest
Disk #2) Castle Incinerator and Conundrum
Disk #3) Mangled Fenders (V1.1)
Disk #4) SplatterPaint Version 1.67 (with some of my artwork)
Disk #5) SNOWFORT
Disk #6) Mangled Fenders: Armored Combat Edition
Disk #7) New CheckersConquest and New Conundrum
Splatterpaint is freely distributible in it's full form, so
spread Splatterpaint around :)
(Version numbers may increase, which is a good thing)
Mangled Fenders V1.1 has memory conservation code, and will
try to fit the game in available memory by substituting car
graphics (This is also a good thing).
******* AWESOME GAMES BY ME *******
In 1994, I have developed and released an entire fleet of 5
awesome games. These games have set new standards in the
games industry. My games are simply the greatest ever to
exist. They have the highest quality graphics, gameplay, and
ingenuity that exist only in my games!
In the first part of this document, I declared cheaper prices
for my games, so I have removed the original prices for full
versions from the descriptions below.
CONUNDRUM is my abstract hexagon based board game, where
the object is to negate all of the colored tiles by placing them
next to each other. This game was inspired by all of those
hexagonal floor tiles you commonly find on bathroom floors.
Despite the high level of abstraction, Conundrum is very simple
to play, and it is very addictive for any puzzle gamer.
My awesome original has a new swath of power in the new
version of CONUNDRUM. It has 20 new bonus round puzzles, as
well as several new "Super Tiles". Super tiles enclude a Wipe
Tile to destroy the grey matter, and Super Negator Tiles that
drain color from all of the tiles on the board. The greatest
enhancement yet is the addition of a second "ready" position, so
you can choose between two different tiles to place on the
board. The Storonskij invention of the 10 second Death Limit
remains as ominous as ever.
MANGLED FENDERS is my top view, 6 player demo derby game,
where the objective is to destroy all of the other vehicles, by
crashing into them. There are cash awards to all the players,
depending on the order in which they are destroyed. There are
different types of vehicles, so you can pick the one that suits
you. You can even pick multiple cars to one input device, as a
novelty feature. Both joysticks are supported in Full Version,
as well as continued play.
The AWESOME COMBAT EDITION of Mangled Fenders lets you
stock up on essential ammo and blast your way to victory with
your choice of 6 battle tanks from various countries. The fire
button releases barrages of powerful munitions against enemy
targets that lie in your path. This is true Mangled Fenders
Style!
INCINERATOR is THE Decisive 3D missile attack/defend game,
where you defend your city from the enemy's missiles and
helicopters, with your laser cannons, forcefields, and super
bombs. Every other round, you get to pulverize the enemy city,
with missiles of your own. It supports NTSC/PAL, is hard drive
installable, has high scores, and a secret cheat mode. It is
shareware, and I throw in Checkers Conquest, since it fits on
the disk.
ONLY INCINERATOR IS 3D, ONLY INCINERATOR IS AWESOME!!!
ONLY INCINERATOR ALOWS YOU TO DESTROY AN ENEMY CITY!!! YAY!!!
CASTLE INCINERATOR is a graphics rewrite of Incinerator,
with castles instead of cities, and horses instead of missiles.
The graphics are the only real change, but WOW, they are so
awesome. Well, I have had the chance to improve it a bit more
than that, as I have improved the sounds and gameplay too.
I have made what used to be the helicopter more powerful, as
it can now drain the shields with a special beam. Actually, the
helicopter is now a giant bird, with flapping wings instead of
rotor blades. It was fun rewriting the docs for it.
It looked silly in text, having to defend a castle from
flatulent horses, with laser wielding mages. It will be available
from me only, since I am greedy (well, not really :), so it is
another incentive to register with me.
Castle Incinerator is not distributible, and is only available
directly from me.
CHECKERS CONQUEST is a checkers game with lots of
features, and has intelligent computer opponents. There are
lots of options, including changing the board layout, and showing
possible threatened positions. There is no demo version of
Checkers Conquest, as the freely distributible version of it is
available almost anywhere, another testiment to my generosity.
It is "shareware" however, for a token amount, as it took a lot
of my resources to develop the game, and the graphics are
really awesome too.
The New Version of Checkers Conquest has another level of
computer intelligence, a standard numbered game board, and new
options like Fast play and a new rule option.
Gee, let's see, thats one... two... three... four... FIVE games,
all released in 1994, that was a lot of stuff, I should be
exhausted by now, but no! As you are experiencing first hand,
I have another game, a paint program, and a few of my awesome
