Aminet 1 (Walnut Creek)/Aminet - June 1993 [Walnut Creek].iso/ab20/games/adventur/omega160.zoo/omega/Omega.doc

Text File | 1991-11-17 | 17KB | 382 lines

Version 1.60 (Large)                                  Copenhagen 24/10-91


                              Distribution.

   You  can  spread  this game as much as you wish, as long as this file,
together  with  'Versions',  is  to  be found near the executable program
omega in a readable form.  This is only a must since these files contains
information needed to run Omega.

   The  game  is  not ShareWare but ordinary Public Domain, i.e.  I'm not
charging anything for anyone using it.  But if you care to support a poor
student  (that's  me), you are welcome to send a small donation, but only
if you think the game is worth it :) This will go to support my wonderful
Amiga, so I can continue making even better programs.



                              Introduction.

   So  what  is Omega?  Is it a greek opera quiz, the final frontier or a
frogtoaster?  No!  It's life...Hmmm...life?

   Omega  is  a  dungeon/adventure  simulation game, that sets you in the
role as the hero.  It is very similar to the former games Moria, Nethack,
Rogue,  Larn  etc, just a tad more complicated...The gamesystem creates a
whole  world around the player.  There are several cities and dungeons, a
parthenon  representing  the  two  alignment sides Law and Chaos with The
Druids  in  between,  lot's of guilds that all can be joined (though some
exclude others) plus different shops and service-centres in the cities.

   The  graphics  is  Ultima-like,  but in HIRES...!  If you are confused
about the designation of one of the images, use the 'x' command.  Besides
the  'W'  command  brings  up  an additional output window, which gives a
tandem perspective.

   Refer  to the inside-game help for more a specific introduction to the
gamesystem, and the file 'Versions' for a history of the coding.


                           Object of the game.

   The  main  goal  is  to  get  on  the hi-score list.  There is several
entrances  on  it.   One  for each guilds, one for each religion, one for
each end of the alignment scala, and finally the hiscorer.

   You  can  also choose just to play for completing all the quests, that
either  your  guild leader(s) sets for you, and/or follow what the oracle
advises  you  to  do.  But remember it's not a need to be a member of any
guild, it's just very very convenient!


                        Special about this version.

   This  version  is  made  for  Large  systems.  Meaning it is meant for
Amiga's with *MORE* than 1M and a *LOT* of available chip ram.  It is not
completely true, you *CAN* play it on a smaller machine (minimum 1M), but
only without any external drive(s) connected, and that's very annoying, I
tested  it  on my A500.  This is due to the increased amount of pictures,
plus  the  new  menues.   I  would  dare  to  say,  that  it is virtually
impossible  to  keep this game under the magic border, if one has to come
out  with  reasonable  good-looking  changes.   But if you have any ideas
please  E-mail  suggestions,  that  is  possible to code without too much
hokus-pokus,  to  me.   Jon  Ballard  advised  me to split the game up in
several  executables,  but  no large parts are significant different (not
even country-side <-> dungeon), every part is used criss-cross.  I myself
have plans to make the graphics optional, but that would severely cripple
the  joy  after  my  opinion  (What did we do before the invention of the
colour-tv?)


                             Caution to take.

   If  you  delete lines in the omega.log please change the number in the
top  too,  which  tells the program how many NPC there are in all.  It is
important  that  the line is 10 characters long including spaces.  Please
do  not  change anything in the other files, unless you know what you are
doing, since it could confuse the program, and make it work unproperly.

   If  you  are saving levels to ram:  there will be *NO* check to see if
the  machine  is  running  out  of  memory,  so please use the manual 'X'
command  to  check  for yourself if it's safe to change level.  Save ('S'
command)  then  reload ('!' command) to make the program delete the level
saves.

   As  usual I do not take any responsibility on the use of the game.  It
was  not created to wreck havoc but to spread pleasure.  But should there
accidentally  happen  something, that the game obviously causes, which is
very unlikely, I do not carry any fault.  The game, as far as I know, had
no virus attached to it, when it left my hand.


                    Changes from the original Omega.

   This  game  is  originally  written  by Laurance R.  Brothers, and ran
under  the  UNIX  system  V.  He remain all copyrights and is in fact the
owner.

    I've  taken the liberty to rewrite most of the source-code to port it
to  the  Amiga.   I have also made 'severe' changes to clear it from bugs
and  to  reduce  both size and speed it up.  Nothing (except one function
that  showed 3*17*64 chars forming a shifting omega sign) in the original
game  system  have  been removed, only rewritten.  I have not implemented
the curse.h system, though, I found that to be quite slow and inadequate,
when  we  got  the  console.device  on the Amiga, so I used that instead,
making the output faster, but a bit shaky at times.


   Apart from the debugging I have added some extra stuff:

 o Three new types of items.
 o More special effects on handling objects.
 o Some new monsters.
 o Nastier dragons.
 o A configuration file-reader.
 o An easy to use file-selection, with 'delete' function.
 o A manual memory-check function.
 o All levels are saved to disk, not in memory (ram: is kept as an option)
 o Menus.
 o No automatic quit after a save.
 o No deletion of savefile at gamestart.
 o Higher prizes (due to inflation).
 o Higher required exp values to raise in guilds.
 o You can drink, eat and read things from the ground.
 o 'Stethoscope' plus 'Creation' and 'Magnify' option for wizards.
 o Possibility for showing pictures.
 o Some monster's immunity to spells now works. (He He)
 o Neat graphics.
 o More userfriendly display.
 o Closure of some popular loop-holes. (Need to close more in the future)
 o A small overview board which echo all actions as small pixels. ('W'-key)
 o Athmospheric fonts.
 o More roboust read and write routines to disk.
 o Inside load & newgame function. Press 'cancel' to restart completely.
 o Graphical inventory, shop, stats and option menu.
 o The moon's phase is shown as a picture.
 o More that I've forgotten...Or won't reveal.



                      Using The configuration file.

   Omega uses four paths to access files.  In the configuration file they
are called

   #SAVEPATH
   #LEVELPATH
   #LIBPATH, and
   #PIXPATH

   #OMEGALIB  is  the only directory private for the game, it would spoil
your  fun  to  look  in  the  files...Btw the file should always be named
omega.cnf  and be present in the directory from where you start the game.
Besides  from  setting  the  paths,  you can also set a default name, and
enable cheatmode by entering the same string.

i.e.

  #NAME = Mjoelner
  #WIZARD = Mjoelner

   Furthermore  it is possible to set two options controling pictures and
ramsaves.   If  you negate the picture option (which is neccessary if you
only  own  1meg)  no  pictures  will be shown.  The ramdisk option simply
disables  the  "left  on disk" check before each levelchange, letting you
use ram:  as medium.

f.ex.

   #OPTIONS = !ramdisk, !pictures (very small system)

or
   #OPTIONS = ramdisk, pictures (larger system)

To  make  the  program  stop in a couple of sekunds instead of ***MORE***
wait, you can set the #DELAY option to a positive integer value.

f.ex.

   #DELAY = 2

freezes  the  game  for 2 sekunds everytime an important message is shown
and  when  the text-area is cleared.  Default is 0 which states, that you
wish  morewait.   It  is  only  possible  to  change the wait-time in the
configuration  file, if you want to disable or reset it you must quit and
restart  the game once more.  (Hold down the right mouse button to freeze
the  game  and  thereby  the  text-output  if  it  goes too fast, f.ex in
connection with the printing of spells.).

A semicolon placed on the first position on a line yields a comment.


   An important notice is, that the longest filepath the game can read is
80  chr.  the game will crash, if it's longer...Besides white-spaces will
be skipped.  So to get a character with both for- and surname use the 'R'
command.


                     What is needed to run the game.

   The first thing you must do is to check the uncompressed files you get
when  using  'lharc  l <filename>' or 'zoo l <filename>' depending on the
way  the  package  is distribuated, to see if they all are complete.  The
list in 'This_Directory' should help you with that task.

   Second  Before  running  the  game  the  first time, you must copy the
library-file  iff.library  to  your libs:  directory, otherwise you won't
see  the pictures.  Next make sure, that the configuration file is set up
to fit your system.

   Each  time you run Omega you should set the stack to at least 25000 in
the  shell  environment  from  where  you wish to run Omega, i.e.  if you
intend  to start it from the workbench, it must also have a stack-size of
25000...

   The  game is very large...so you must be in possession of a 1meg Amiga
or  larger,  plus  a mouse plugged in and hopefully a colour monitor.  It
might not run for a very long period with only 1M, anyway remove anything
that you suspect will eat memory, like extra diskstations, shell, WB, use
60  chr  WBscreen,  run  'wbdepth  1'  etc...I'm  not sure of whether the
program  runs  in  a 2.0 environment or not, some rumours says no, others
yes, so use 1.3 if possible.  A500 users with only 500 KB Chip-ram should
be  very  careful  since  Omega needs a lot of this precious area and run
FastMemFirst,  that  should  be  situated  on  your workbench disk in the
System directory.

   If  you  are  worried  about  the seemingly memoryleak (people like me
always  are), try applying the 'flushlibs' menu from the workbench, using
'LoadWB  -debug' before and after without moving any windows around.  The
following  runs  after  the  first  allways gives the same result, so I'm
quite convinced there is no holes in the bucket.

   There  should  not be any problems using the program in a multitasking
environment.   I  myself  normally have 'bout 5 background tasks running,
and  I've  not  had any trouble.  Though you obviously cannot make use of
any quick-typer tools, since I check the VANILLAKEY's from the IDCMP...

(Only for versions under 1.53 or thereabout)
   If  you  only  got  1M, your life will be tough...You won't be able to
load  the pictures.  You should also switch off your second drive to save
any  memory, plus use fastmemfirst.  Omega is a large and greedy program,
so remember to check the memory amount often.

   A  final note on installation, that I've been asked to enlighten.  The
game  copies  certain  files into ram:  to speed up the loading sequence.
Therefore  the Ram-Handler must be present in L:  and ram.device in Devs:
on  your  system.   So  to  make  a  special  Omegadisk:   (Only commands
neccessary to run the program are mentioned)

(FDU's)

 - Format a disk.
 - Install it.
 - Make the usual directories c,s,l,devs,libs,fonts
 - Copy stack, run, fastmemfirst and other useful commands like ls to c
 - Extract iff.library to libs. The diskfont.library should also be present
   in this directory. Maybe also icon, arp and info.library if you want
   to make it a workbench-disk.
 - Make a startup-sequence and put it in s (stack 25000 could be put here).
   Also Fastmemfirst is good if not neccessary.
 - Copy ram-handler to l
 - Copy ram.device to devs
 - Copy omegaf8.font and the omegaf8 directory to fonts
 - Extract the executive, Readme.doc, Versions and omega.cnf to the root of
   this boot-disk.
 - Next format 3 (yes three) other disks.
 - Extract everything from the OmegaLib directory to one of the disks.
 - Extract the pictures to this disk too since there should be room here.
 - The two other disks are for levels and saves.
 - Now change the path-names in omega.cnf to the names of your disks.
 - Reset the computer and check if the game starts correctly, if not check
   everything once more.
 - 1M users should now run preference on the workbench disk, to change the
   workbench-screen size to lo-res (60 coloumns), this should give a little
   extra memory. Perhaps also run the small program 'wbdepth' included in
   this package with option '1' which gives the WBscreen only 1 bitplane.
   (I don't know who made this smart little program, and if it's freely
   distribuable, just that it's very useful)
 - Phew...

Of  course  this  only goes for a pure floppydisk system, if you got more
free mem than 1meg, you might want to save levels to ram:

(HDU's)

 - Copy the archive to where you want the omega directory.
 - Extract it with lharc -x -r e, or zoo e/// this should restore the
   directory tree.
 - cd Omega
 - Copy omegaf8.font and the omegaf8 directory to fonts:
 - Copy from libs/iff.library to libs:
 - Change the pathnames in omega.cnf to fit your system.
 - See the comments written above in FDU, if you only got 1M
 - stack 25000
 - run omega

The installation for RAD: users should be simular as for floppy-disk users.


   There  seem to be a strange need for A1000 owners to have a stack size
of  at least 150000.  Don't ask me, why it has to be soooo large?!?!  For
all the rest of us mortals, 15000-25000 should be enough, and remember to
check that chip-ram often!



                              More to come.

 - A better text output routine in cooperation with an expandable window,
   that was suggested by Jon Ballard from Sacramento.
 - A fast 'scroll one square' routine for displaying the map, where the
   player all the time is centered in the middle.
 - Each special site should have it's own picture like the shop.
 - Compression  of  save-files  on  disk.   There doesn't seem to be any
   programs on the marked that takes input and/or gives output to an other
   program (or does there?) Please let me know if you heard of one in Public
   Domain.
 - A better inventory interface. Perhaps in connection with the icons like
   in 'Dungeon Master' and 'Eye of the Beholder'. So far I don't use Bobs.
 - A neater way of expressing stats for instance with colour bars, the
   display should anyhow be totally rearranged, and most stat put to a
   separate screen.
 - Completely bugfree routines...

   I'm  willing  to  distribuate the source code on two disks for a small
fee  of  60.00 Dkr.  in Europe (10$, disks and mailing them are expensive
in Denmark) or 15$ if you live abroad somewhere.  You can also contact me
via E-mail to [e-mail], if that is possible.


   Besides,  I'm  open to any suggestions, idea's and possible bug fixes.
I've  already received a lot, both criticism and roses, and am very happy
for  every  response  I  got  so  far  :) It is always good to know, that
somebody, somewhere out there is using the programs you write.



                                 Hints.

 - First seek out all the special sites in Rampart the City, by walking
   inside every door. Open it if it's closed, don't try to open locked doors
   yet.
 - Next join one or several guilds of your like, be careful to choose
   something that fits the alignment you heed for...
 - Now you should equip yourself in the shops. Don't buy too expensive things
   yet.
 - You probably wondered why there is a large empty area in the lower left
   side of the city...Thats the botanial gardens, it's perhaps time to take
   a closer look at it...Don't walk into the hedges yet...
 - Did you find the oracle? She can tell you what should be your next move...


 - Travel along the north going highway to the nearest village perhaps there
   is something you could use...
 - The Arch Druid resides in a temple far to the north.

 - In case of doubt press the '?' key for online help.

That  should  be  enough to get you started.  Remember to save often, and
good hunt.

                        - Yours sincerely

                        Klavs Torben Pedersen
                        Grønjordskollegiet v.3404
                        DK-2300 Copenhagen S
                        Denmark
                        tlf 31- 58 34 69

                        [e-mail]


P.S. If  you  are  in  the  lucky  situation  that you are able to draw
     pictures or compose music/make sounds (which I must admit I'm out off),
     and you wish to donate them for the benefit of the game, they are VERY
     welcome (IFF-format)!!! Nice 32x16 colour images, for displaying characters
     are likewise adopted immediately.
     Pictures displaying special site's like the shop, order of Paladins etc.
     are needed too.
     (I slap myself for never learning to paint or compose.)