This game was programmed on an Amiga 500 using Amos v1.2. Graphics were
designed using Deluxe Paint III.
Optional in-game music written by Luke Millar. Tune taken from the Amos
public domain disk no. 34.
Special thanks to David Nagle and everyone else who helped with playtesting and debugging this game.
AMOS is copyright (c)1990 Mandarin/Jawx
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Introduction
I originally designed and programmed Top Of The League back on an Amstrad CPC 6128 computer in May 1989. By the time I had finished, it was around 14K in size. However, I kept coming up with lots of new ideas to put into the game and by the end of the year it was a much more respectable 24K in size, with far more features, and virtually de-bugged.
In 1991 I finally upgraded to a Commodore Amiga and a year later the Amiga version is finally here. The Amiga version is a far larger 50K in size, with around 250K of graphic screens designed with DPaint for the game. The graphic screens (no masterpieces, I`m afraid) are accessed throughout the game so you are advised to keep your game disk in the drive all the time.
The Amstrad version quite successfully circulated the Amstrad public domain scene, but the Amiga version boasts many new features, including proper league tables, a 220 player databank (as opposed to just 24), much more graphics, editor programs (if you register!), results of other teams, improved scoring system, goal descriptions, better team selection and many more improvements.
I hope you enjoy playing this game. If you really like the game, you might like to register it. See next page for details.
Tony Kingsmill, TotL Author.
Registering Top of the League
To become a fully fledged Top of the League player, you might like to register with the author. So why pay?
* You will receive a disk containing:
- A personalised registered copy of the game.
- TEAM NAMES EDITOR : A program that allows you to alter all the team
names. Easy to use and menu driven.
- PLAYER NAMES EDITOR : Change the player names around as you wish.
Like the Team Names Editor, this is menu driven.
- CUSTOM TEAMS : A special program to change all the team names in the
league is also on the disk. This effectively does the same thing as
the Team Names Editor, except all the typing is done for you. Just
press a few keys to change all the names! Includes a Scottish league.
* Registration certificate as a paid user.
* Information of other shareware/public domain titles on offer.
Just send 4 pounds (cheques/PO payable to T.Kingsmill) at the address below. Overseas: payment should be in UK pound sterling only and please add an extra 50 pence for extra postage costs.
Tony Kingsmill,
2O2 Park Street Lane,
Park Street,
St Albans,
Hertfordshire AL2 2AQ.
(England).
Many hours of work has gone in to designing, coding and debugging this game, your support is appreciated.
Starting Up
This game was programmed and tested on an v1.3 Amiga 500 computer and has been tested on an A500 Plus. As you can imagine, it is not too easy to gain access to every Amiga model that has ever appeared. As it stands, I do not know of any reasons why it shouldn`t work on other machines. I would be interested to know of any Amiga models it does not work with.
Before loading the game, it is a good idea to run the disk through a virus checker (if you have one - most PD libraries stock them). When the disk left my hands the disk was virus-free, but passed between many users makes it liable to infections. After that, you can write-protect your disk to avoid viri from infecting it in the future (note that you will need to remove the protection to save your position when playing the game).
Once you have finished reading this file, the disk will load the main part of the game. It is important you do not remove the game disk while playing the game as data is constantly being accessed while you play. Once the game has loaded, press any key to enter your name in.
Starting Off
Once loaded, the game will ask you to enter your name. Once you have done this, select a club to manage using the instructions on screen. After this, you are ready to start your new job!
The main menu is easily recognized (I hope!) as it should resemble a football managers` office. You may also notice numbers scattered around the office which are simply the number keys you should select for different options.
eg: The bin has `8` printed on it. Press 8 and you can quit the game.
The options are as follows:-
( 1 ) Fixtures List
Displays your teams` games, highlighting the next match.
( 2 ) Managerial Information
Lots of vital info. about you and your club.
( 3 ) View Transfer Market
If you want to buy a player, this is where you should go! Follow the on screen instructions to operate.
( 4 ) Sell A Player / View Squad
See a list of your players and their abilities. Besides each player is his age, stamina, skill and pace. All abilities are rated between 1 and 100. Pressing return will go back to the main
menu, but typing a player number will make an offer come in for the player you`ve selected.
If an offer appears, you can choose whether to accept or refuse. If you refuse, bare in mind the next offer may be even less!
( 5 ) Load Game Position
The game will attempt to load a previously saved game position.
Warning! Your current game will be lost!
( 6 ) Save Game Position
If you are a long way into the game but want to come back to the
game at a later date, select this option, checking that your disk
protection tab is read/write. Previous saves will be lost if they exist on the disk.
( 7 ) Continue Week
When ready, press this key to continue week. See later notes.
( 8 ) Quit
Quit as manager and exit the game. Reboot to play again.
Later In The Week
Once selecting 7 from the main menu, a screen of information about your opponents. This is important to your strategy - use this to plan your own game. Attack and defense skills are rated between 1 and 100. Moral can range between 1 and 10.
Press a key to move on to formation selection. If you are not familiar with formations, all it means is how many you choose to play in defense, midfield and attack. This gives a three-figure number.
eg: 5-3-2 means
5 defenders
3 midfielders
2 attackers
To operate team formations use X to select the next formation and Z to move back to the last one. Remember to press <Return> after pressing each key. The little players on the right side of the screen illustrate the starting positions of your players in that formation.
When ready, press C <Return> to continue week.
Selecting Your Team
Here your squad will be displayed. Only the first 11 players listed will actually play. Players 12 to 18 are your reserves and will not play in the next match. To change the position of players is simple.
Type in the number of the player you want to move and press <Return>. Now type the number of the position you want to swap him with, followed by <Return>. Keep doing this until you have your chosen line-up. Press <Return> when finished.
The Match
A display of a part of your stadium can be seen in the top part of the screen. The latest score is displayed in the middle of the screen and important match incidents in the bottom part of the screen.
After The Match
When the match has finished, you will run through a number of fairly self-explainatory screens.
Some helpful points about these screens:
- On one screen you are asked if you wish to expand your ground capacity of your stadium. If your match attendances are equal to your ground capacity, chances are that loyal fans are being turned away! Quickly expand the seating capacity of your stadium to allow in more fans. More fans means more revenue, but watch your cash - expanding your stadium isn`t cheap!
- The world isn`t a perfect place and every now and then a nasty corrupted manager may write to you. If they do, simply follow the on screen prompts. Whatever you select may well have an influence on your status or the teams performance, so select wisely.
Your Job
This game obviously a simplified version of being a real one, based on my own perceptions. As with most jobs, you have to strike a balance in this game, between:
- Making your team do well (winning promotion, championship etc)
- Financial profits. Keeping an eye on finances means you can spend more on players, can avoid loans from the bank and won`t be closed down if heavily in debt!
- Managerial Performance: Your performance is closely monitored by the
club board and is rated out of 100. When you first join it will be 50 but will fall if you`re not running things too well. Likewise, lots of wins will make you popular!
If you can balance all these interests, you are well on your way to being Top Of The League!
That is about all the things I can think of. If you need any more help about something in the game, or you`ve found a bug (OH NO!!), please let us know at the address near the top of this doc file.
