(Playable Competition Demo Version 1.5 - 8th Oct1996)
In Europe the full version can be obtained from:
Empire Interactive.
We can accept credit card orders by telephone on
+44 181 343 9143 or Fax on +44 181 343
7447.
Cheques, Euro-cheques or postal orders can also
be sent to: Empire Interactive Mail Order
Department, The Spires, 677 High Road,
North Finchley, London N12 0DA, UK
If you would like to order by Fax or mail we have an
order form available for printing on our WWW site.
HTTP://WWW.EMPIRE.CO.UK
What’s This File For?
This file details last minute updates, changes, extra features and trouble-shooting.
Differences between the demo and the full version
The demo is limited to 99s play. Certain missions including the ultimate showdown are also missing.
The full version will run in a window up to 1024x768 at thousands of colors. The demo is limited to 640x480 at 256 colors. The graphics appear grainy at 256 colors.
The full version has sampled sound effects at 16 bit 22kHz. The demo is limited to 8 bit compressed samples which sound fuzzy in comparison.
The full version comes with profesional music recorded on the cd that you can play on an ordinary cd player. The music was written by Jake Burns and Bruce Foxton ex The Jam and now Stiff Little Fingers.
The full version comes with full preferences setup and save and 6 different views of the table.
System Requirements
Pro Pinball will run on any Mac with system software 7.0 or above, a cd drive and a monitor capable of displaying at least a resolution of 640x480 by 256 or thousands of colors.
Pro Pinball is a "fat binary" which means it will run optimised on both Power PC and the older 68k Macintoshes.
Additional features
During play, you may press ‘P’ to pause the game. The options detailed below will then become available under the File Menu.
Hide/Unhide Desktop
Selecting this option will cover/uncover any visible desktop area with black.
Advanced Config
i) Visible Nudge
When disabled, nudging will be invisible. ie. The table will not give visual nudge feedback (although the ball will still move accordingly). You should not need this disabled on the 640x480 screen size, but on the larger screen sizes, the nudge may take a long time.
ii) Music Track Restart
Only affects the full CD version.
Trouble-Shooting
Memory
Note: You don't need to understand the following section. If you do not consider yourself an advanced user, you may wish to read APPENDIX A first.
Virtual memory - will slow down Pro Pinball whilst playing sound samples. Therefore, if you do not have much real memory (RAM) available and the program seems ‘jerky’ try reducing the sound quality.
If Pro Pinball runs out of memory whilst starting, it will recommend that you try reducing the settings - it will even set them for you if you want. To get some idea of your optimum configuration, from the finder, pull down the Apple menu at the top left of the screen, then select the About This Macintosh... The Largest Unused Block figure is the amount of memory you have free. Subtract about 500K from this (the program needs this much to load its instructions), then look the value up in the table below.
Table 1. Available memory needed to run Pro Pinball in its various configurations.
Please note the playable demo will only run in 640x480x256 colors.
If Pro Pinball runs out of memory whilst loading sound effects, it will continue loading to the end, but will warn you that not all the sounds could be loaded.
The full program supports 6 levels of quality of sound (these levels only refer to the sound effects, the music is standard digital audio recorded on the cd - so you could put the disk in your cd player and play it).
All samples are 22KHz.
Extra - uncompressed 16 bit sound.
Very High - uncompressed16 bit and 8 bit sound.
High - uncompressed 8 bit and 3:1 compressed 8 bit sound.
Medium - 3:1 compressed 8 bit and 6:1 compressed 8 bit sound.
Low - All samples are 6:1 compressed 8 bit sound.
No Sound - No sound data is loaded.
Snapshots & Other Applications
Detailed below is advise for taking snapshots of the screen, allowing other background applications processor time (while playing), and fixing the playing screen if it appears corrupted.
Two further options can be set for Pro Pinball. You will need to find the "pro pinball prefs" file in the preferences folder (in your System folder) on your startup drive. Select Get Info. The option are set by typing the words detailed below into the comments box.
i) Pro Pinball totally takes over your macintosh until it is paused - it even turns the mouse arrow off! This means that no time is allocated for other applications in the background, thus such actions like - shift - 3 (take a snapshot of the screen) will not work. If you need to take snapshots of the screen or need other applications working in the background, type the word "snapshot" in the comments box. This will however, affect the performance of the game.
ii) Certain video cards with lots of memory may cause problems for Pro Pinball. If the screen contains garbage or obscure colours, try typing "keep local" in the comments box.
Hi-Scores
You will find the current International hi-scores for Pro Pinball the Web on the World Wide Web at http://www.empire.co.uk. If you get a really hi-score and want to register it with us do the following. While the game is displaying the hi-scores on the dot matrix display (before starting a game) hold down both flippers. The hi-scores will be encrypted, type the code into the form on the hi-score page and send it to us. Please note the playable demo is limited to a maximum score of 200,000,000.
APPENDIX A
A simple guide to how your Mac gives memory to applications - advanced users can skip this section.
First some of the very basics...
If you're confused about the difference between memory and hard disk space don't be!
Both are used to store information, your hard disk is mechanical a bit like a cassette tape, getting information to and from it is therefore slow. Memory on the other hand is electronic it's a lot lot faster but being electronic once its turned off it, it’s contents are lost.
If you highlight any application from the finder by clicking on it once and then go to the File Menu and select Get Info, you will be presented with a box containing three numbers (at the bottom). (Note: If you Get Info on a file which is not an application, you will not be given the figures).
You can alter the last two numbers by clicking in the relevant box and typing a new number. The first number has been pre-set and is the maximum size we recommend the application will need, this is the Suggested Size: figure.
The second number is Minimum Size: figure, the program will not run if it has less memory available to it than this number. If the available memory is not equal to or greater than this value, your Mac should tell you so, advise you to close other applications and then try again.
The third number is the Preferred Size: figure. You can change the actual amount of memory the application gets by changing this figure. When any application starts it will be given some memory to use called it's partition. The amount will always be between the Minimum Size and the Preferred size. If the Preferred Size is available it will be given this much, if less is available it will be given as much as is available.
Virtual Memory
If you run out of real memory and have virtual memory switched on (see your Memory control panel), your Mac will use virtual memory to run applications. It does this by using space on your hard disk instead of real memory. Using virtual memory is therefore slower than real memory (performance is reduced).
