OK, folks, you bugged me incessantly for it, you got it (slur on a certain brand of cars intended). This is the newest (9/23/90) version of Solarian II, and, I hope to God, the last, but then that’s what I said with every version before this one. Live and learn. This is version 1.04. A brief version history:
1.0: This doesn’t have the version number on it anywhere that I can recall, since I thought it was bug-free (silly me...) Doesn’t work on the IIci, and has one bug that can cause crashes. A few other kinks: fails to update the screen correctly after quitting in MultiFinder, doesn’t support a non-extended keyboard.
1.01: A “quick fix” for the IIci users out there. This version also fixed the one fatal bug, but didn’t address the MultiFinder update bug or the keyboard bug, and it was still a little klunky. This version might work on 3rd party screens that 1.0 wouldn’t work on. The version number is to the right of “Solarian II” on the main screen with the high scores.
1.02: The was to be the final version. It works on any keyboard. If it doesn’t, you can reconfigure the keys (to anything you want), and then it will work, guaranteed. The update bug was, I thought, fixed in this version. Sounds are everywhere, not just in the game proper. The main screen is a little spiffier-looking. You can reset the registration. It remembers your key configuration and your sound level. It is even smaller by some tens of K (made possible with a grant from...no, I took out a sound that was only used in the two-player mode and seemed to confuse people, and tightened up another sound that was originally 140+K by itself). And for those of you who, for whatever reason, - no, let’s get into the reasons. There are two. Either you didn’t like the “Damn” because you had young kids, or you didn’t like it because you’re a fundie (that’s a fundamentalist Christian, for all you not too well versed in theospeak). I didn’t hear from anyone except these two groups. Those of you with kids can now change it so it says “You Lose” when you lose. Those of who who are now, have been, or ever plan on becoming fundies can change it to “Praise Jesus!”. Yes, I’m serious. Cater to everybody’s needs, I always say... Everybody else can stick with the original, spicy flavor meat patty, now with a bigger, softer bun. The version number of this version is the same place as it is in version 1.01, but bigger. It’s also on the icon now, for easy reference and entertainment reading.
1.03: Yet another bug fix. There are a number of things fixed in this version, and for the first time it has been extensively beta-tested on multiple sites, so I think (hope) it works on everybody’s machine.
It now should work completely correctly with multiple monitors and 32-bit quickdraw and 24/32-bit boards and all that fancy graphics stuff. It must have a monitor in 8-bit mode that is at least 640 by 480 to run on. If the main screen satisfies that and is in color (not grays), it chooses the main screen. Otherwise it scans the whole list of attached monitors until it finds a color monitor or, failing that, a B&W monitor, that it can use. It should center all graphics on the monitor it chooses, and black out all other attached monitors to prevent distraction/burn-in. It should also correctly restore the desktop on all monitors when you quit.
It now checks for specific functionality - color QuickDraw, and a useable monitor. It used to check if it was on certain machines and refuse to run if it wasn’t. It should no longer do this, it now checks for the specific things it needs, so an SE/30 with a secondary monitor, or some new color machine Apple puts out, should all work if possible.
A problem with using the ’?’ key to get help has been fixed.
Conflicts with QuicKeys have been fixed. If you had a QuicKey defined for, say, command-q, then quitting wouldn’t work properly. Solarian now temporarily disables QuicKeys. This, unfortunately, also disables all FKEYs, including some screen capture utilities that people said they used to print out the help screens and stuff. This seems to be unavoidable, and it’s better to work fairly well than not work at all.
A bug regarding high scores not being registered if Caps Lock was used has been fixed. It is still the case that if you use Tab to single step in a game, your score is invalidated. This is intentional to keep people honest. Your score is also invalid if you start with the command-number keys (start on level x) not the mouse button.
There are no bugs in the game mechanics, for those of you who are still dazed and confused by certain things in the game. The gray presents are *supposed* to be empty, they’re duds. If presents fly off the screen it means you tried to catch them in the wrong way. If the program crashes and erases your hard disk, I meant for it to do that. Not really, but trust me, that game doesn’t do weird things for no reason, it does them because *I’m* weird. Like father like program, or something. My, but I’m a mass of clichés tonight.
It now uses entirely SANE for it’s math, so it doesn’t require a floating point coprocessor. This is specifically in response to rumors that Apple will be releasing a new machine with color but no math coprocessor. Solarian should work on such a machine.
The Warp sequence has been taken out, since nobody was really very impressed and it got rather wearing after the first few times.
It should now work under MultiFinder and A/UX fully and completely, as well as System 7.0 and other fun things like that.
Two player mode now switches players only when one player actually dies, not whenever a player finishes a level. I was told the way it used to work made for a “musical chairs” sort of scenario.
It now frames the playing field on big monitors so you can see where the edges are more easily.
The sound should work all the time (or so I thought). It once had a problem with “dropping out”, and occasionally would crash the machine. This should all be fixed completely (nope...see version 1.04). The volume level is now shown at the upper left of the main screen. You can change the volume on that screen with the number keys. The “start on level x” function has been changed to Command plus a number key to allow the volume keys to work.
The ship now starts every board centered, as opposed to how you once had to guess which way the ship would go. This is done by setting the cursor location on the fly, a somewhat questionable technique. An additional bonus is that those of you with multiple monitors no longer need to worry about the cursor getting “lost” on another screen - it will be kept on the screen you’re playing on.
Some more technical points on version 1.03:
First of all, for those of you weird enough to care, the picture and animation resources are now compressed in a format compatible with my compression/decompression utility LZWRes. What this means is that you can decompress a picture, *change* it to whatever your little heart desires, and compress it with the same id and so on, and paste it back in. Customizeable pictures, with a little work. Enjoy it - send me any really cool screens you make. BTW, the clut all the screens use is the default clut in PixelPaint - the “rainbow” clut. And there’s no way to move where Solarian draws the high score list, the volume level or the 2-player mode icon - you’ll have to work around them in your designs.
The sounds are all named, both so you can know which are which without playing, and so that you *can* play them. Many programs refuse to play unnamed sounds. Now they should be directly playable in ResEdit 2.0 and SoundEdit with no modifications. Also, although this hasn’t been tested at all, I see no reason why you shouldn’t be able to put your own sounds in. I think format 1 or 2 ’snd ’ resources should work equally well, but if you have problems with format 1 switch to format 2 (format 2 are “HyperCard” format sounds). Just preserve the id numbers and all and it should be fine.
*Please*, those of you who modify Solarian, don’t distribute your modified copies.
Version 1.04: Well, this one got written quite soon after 1.03. There were some bugs with the sound stuff, and there probably still are, but it should work better under System 6.0.6 and stuff. Lots of thanks to Pat and Rob for giving me their latest sound code, which was much more clever than it would have been if I had written it, and actually seems to work (quite a feat with Apple’s extremely questionable Sound Manager stuff). The sound should work a little better after quitting now, too.
I made the memory management somewhat more intelligent. If you run out of memory it will now usually display an error message and exit, as opposed to the usual crash that prior versions exhibited.
I made it so when you set the sound volume on the main screen it makes a little sound so you can tell how loud the sound is.
I fixed a small (tiny) bug regarding premature termination on errors that could make all of a persons FKEYs die until restarting the machine.
This version was written primarily for Discovery Systems’ Nautilus CD-ROM periodical, and it’s a sufficiently small revision that it wasn’t publicly posted anywhere, although I sent it to anyone that asked. Assuming I’ll have to do a big revision at some point (and assuming I’ll get some bug reports from 1.03), I’m waiting until then to post it.
By the way, one often-reported bug is that the shield isn’t as responsive as it should be. This is basically not my fault. Different Macs and different versions of the System software deal with keyboard handling differently, and some of just take a long time to tell the application running that a key was pressed. Some machines (mine for instance) seem to really be pretty brain-dead in this regard. If I move my mouse in a tight circle, it moves smoothly, but if I start hitting any key (even Shift or something), the mouse starts moving *very* intermittently, like about once every quarter-second. This works in reverse on my machine too - if I’m moving the mouse around it takes *much* longer for keyboard events to be reported. There is absolutely nothing I can do about all this - it’s a ROM/hardware thing, really. Sorry. Complain to Apple.
Please, send your money. I’ve been continuing to keep Solarian up to date, as you can see. I do this because people seem to pay more often for good, well-maintained programs. If you don’t pay, maybe someday Solarian will break on your machine and there won’t be a new version. Besides, you don’t have any idea how longingly I await each crisp clean check. Also, those of you who don’t already have everything else I’ve written (you don’t know who you are...) can send me three disks. Everything should fit on three disks for a few more months...
Stick Software
c/o Ben Haller
32 Deer Haven Drive
Ithaca, N.Y. 14850
e-mail: BITNET deadman@garnet.berkeley.edu /* For important stuff only, ok? */
Please don’t expect fast turnaround on mail. I don’t have a secretary or anything. This means YOU, you slime-sucking sleazeballs who leave messages on my answering machine pleading for me to return your disks. I’ll get around to it. Just gimme a year or so, awright?
P.S. You can keep your high scores across the upgrade. Use ResEdit. Copy the SolS resource (560 bytes) from your old copy, and paste it into the new copy (same id). Have fun.
