Monster Media 1994 #1/monster.zip/monster/GAMES/PRIME9.ZIP/PRIME9.DOC

Text File | 1993-12-27 | 15KB | 343 lines

                          Prime9 Baseball
               Shareware Exhibition Game Version 1.0(E)
                          December 5, 1993

                          Dick Withington
                       Redding, CA 96001 U.S.A.


This is the shareware "Exhibition Game" version of Prime Time
Baseball. Like the registered version, this game simulates
just about everything that happens in actual baseball,
including scores and statistics (hits, runs, errors, etc)
very close to those of major league games. But where the
registered game goes into extra innings if necessary, this
version stops after 9 innings, regardless of the score.

The full-length registered version also has provisions for
inserting team lineups, with the name of the batter and
pitcher appearing in the spaces provided on the scoreboard,
plus several other enhancements covered later in this
document.

But for those who like to play a game without having to do
a lot of reading first, this game can be as simple as:

1. Typing "Prime9" at the DOS prompt.

2. Selecting the Game Speed and Pitching Speed levels at
   the prompts provided.

3. Typing in the team names, then hitting Enter to "play ball."

4. From there on, playing the game is simply a matter of
   pressing "P" to pitch, then the space bar to swing the bat.
   Wait until you get the pitching prompt at the bottom of the
   screen before pressing "P" to make your next pitch.
   Press "Q" if you want to leave the game before it is
   it is completed.

The first time you play the game, Step 2 (selecting the speed
levels) will take some experimenting.  These levels are really
speed controls -- provided to slow down the speeds of the ball
and the baserunners so that with the faster 386, 486 (and above)
processors, they don't flash across your screen too quickly --
in some cases, perhaps, too fast to be seen.

The faster your computer, the higher the speed control levels
you will need.  By way of some guideposts, on the XT compatible
NCR computer used to program most of this game, level 1 was
fine for both Game Speed and Pitching Speed. When I moved up
to a 486 SX 25, it took levels of 10 to 12 for speeds comparable
to those on the older, slower unit.  Some of the faster 386
and 486 DX units (and those beyond) may/will require even higher
speed control levels.

You have a choice of 20 levels for both Game Speed and Pitching
Speed -- or if your computer has a turbo switch, a choice of
40 speeds.  If things are still happening too fast, try one of
the slowdown utilities available from bulletin boards and
shareware distributors.

Game Speed, incidentally, determines the speed of everything
except pitches.  This includes the speeds of batted balls,
baserunners, pickoff throws, and throws by the catcher on
stolen base attempts.  I considered having one set of speed
levels cover everything, including pitching speed, but decided
that offering separate levels for pitching provides a
difficulty factor -- i.e., you may feel, as I do when I'm
"seeing the ball well" as they say in baseball, that using a
faster speed for pitches offers a greater challenge, although
probably with more strikeouts as well.

If you start a game and want to change either speed, just type
"S" at the prompt that appears for each pitch, make your new
selections at the prompts provided up on the scoreboard, and
the game will continue from where it was when you made the
change.  You will not have to go through the opening visuals
and team selections, and all game totals -- runs, hits, errors,
etc. -- will be the same as they were before you changed speeds.

If you need help remembering which keys to use for changing
speeds or leaving the game, "H" produces a help line at the
bottom of the scoreboard.

SOME FEATURES OF THE GAME

As the game starts, the home team takes the field in white
uniforms, with the visitors at bat in blue.  The gray uniforms
traditional for many visiting teams either didn't provide
enough contrast with the white uniforms or seemed too drab.

For the bottom half of each inning, you'll see the visitors
take the field in blue, with the batters now in white.

Each time you press "P" to make a pitch, the pitcher goes
into a 3-stage delivery -- peering in for the sign, going
into his "wind up", then throwing the ball.

The batter waits with bat cocked, then moves into either a
"swing and miss" or "connects" position.  And from there,
your imagination takes over.

Somehow, the sight of little elf-like players scampering
around the bases in choppy animated steps just didn't seem
to cut it.  It seemed to detract from the flavor I have
tried to put into the game.  So as designated baserunners,
I have used moving dots -- yellow, in contrast to the white
of the baseball.

You will see these dots for baserunners in plays where ...

    1. A batter gets on base via a base hit, walk,
           error or being hit by a pitch.

        2. A baserunner is advanced by any means -- hit,
           walk, error, sacrifice bunt or fly, a stolen
           base, wild pitch, etc. -- or tries to advance
           with an attempted steal.

For fly balls or ground balls that result in outs, you will
NOT see the runner going to first, but you WILL see any
baserunners who are moved up on these plays.

For everything except strikes and balls, letters appear near
where the ball ends up, with "H" indicating a hit, "O" an
out, "E" an error, "F" a foul ball not caught, "WP"  a wild
pitch, "HBP" signifying hit by pitch, "PB" a passed ball, etc.
Different colors are used for these letters to help register
the results, and a table showing what these letters stand for
is provided at the end of this file.  An "action line" at the
bottom of the scoreboard adds a brief bulletin-type
description of each play.

As on many baseball scoreboards, the runs scored while a
half-inning is in progress will be printed in yellow,
changing to white when the half-inning has been completed.

A few "beats" after a game is completed, the words "FINAL
SCORE" will appear at the bottom of the scoreboard.

If a no-hitter is thrown, a special bulletin will follow in
red at the same location.

After every game, a panel will appear, offering the choice of
playing another contest or exiting the game.

Because processing speeds vary so widely with the different
microchips used in computers, and because speeds will also be
determined by your choice of speed levels, there may be cases
where a ball described as a line drive seems more of a soft
liner or fly ball, and vice versa.

When a base is occupied during the game, it changes from white
to yellow, then back to white when it is not occupied.

There are three basic types of pitches thrown in Prime Time
Baseball:

1. A "sinker" that curves down on your screen.

2. A "slider" that starts down but then curves slightly back
   upwards.

3. Straight pitches ranging from almost unhittable "high hard
   ones" to change-ups.

If some of the tantalizingly slow "blooper balls" seem too easy
at first, you may feel differently when you lunge at one too
early after the pitcher has been throwing heat for two or three
pitches.

When you swing at a pitch, you will hear a beep if you make
contact with the ball, or a low-pitched sound if you swing and
miss.  If you push the space bar to swing and do not get either
a hit or a miss sound, you have the equivalent of a "checked
swing" situation and the "umpire" decides if the pitch was a
strike or a ball.  If you seem to be getting too many of these
checked swings, you should switch to a higher speed control
level to slow down the pitches.

As in real baseball, pitchers make pickoff throws and runners try
to steal bases. There are wild pitches, passed balls, balks and
batters hit by pitches.

Many of the pitching errors mentioned above only occur with runners
on base, on pitches the umpire calls a ball. So if you're like me
and don't "take" many pitches, you're not likely to see them
happen very often.

As in an actual game, a pitcher will sometimes make several
pickoff throws between pitches to the plate.  There have been
instances in my test games where a runner got back safely two or
three times before being caught off, or before an error on a
throw permitted the runner to move up a base.  There have also
been times when a runner advanced on a throwing error, only to be
picked off with the next throw.

Once in a blue moon, a runner will attempt to steal home, but as
in real baseball, the odds against succeeding are very long.

The play bank also includes a triple play, but again with odds so
long you may never see it happen.

Runners sometimes score or move up a base on fly balls or
groundouts, and are sometimes thrown out at the plate.

Home runs range from a ball that barely curves around the foul
pole in left, to one that just makes it into the "short porch"
seats in right.  When someone does "go deep", the scoreboard
flashes out a strobing "HOME RUN" in giant letters with a
musical fanfare.  And when a ball reaches the seats or clears
the scoreboard with the bases loaded, the message is "GRAND
SLAM", with the music "Stars and Stripes Forever."

When the bases are loaded for the home team, each pitch is
preceded by the "Here We Go" chords played at many athletic
events.  When the visiting team loads them up, "suspense"
chords are played.

Like my earlier shareware baseball game, Percentage Baseball --
an all text game released in 1987 -- this game, in its
default mode, is designed to produce about the same totals
of runs, hits, errors and home runs as major league baseball.

In the text game, where the percentage of strikeouts and walks
were programmed into the game, these also approximated major
league figures.  With Prime Nine Baseball, however, they will
depend on such factors as your skill and patience as a batter,
and the pitching speed you select.

While there will occasionally be both "big innings" and
"blowouts", this is basically a "pitcher's game", with low-
scoring games the rule rather than the exeption, and some
pitches all but unhittable when they appear in certain
sequences.

For those who prefer higher scoring games, however, the
full-length registered version includes a Higher Scores Option
that adds 284 hits to the "play bank" -- about 60% more than
the default mode -- and increases the "Game Batting Average"
-- i.e. the number of hits possible divided by the the total
number of plays in the "play bank" -- by over a hundred points.
The default mode for the registered version will be the same
as for this demo version for those who prefer lower scoring,
more realistic games.

Other standard and optional features included with the
full-length registered version include ...

1. Provisions for inserting team lineups, with the names of the
   batter and pitcher appearing in the spaces you will see provided
   on the scoreboard.  You have the choice of using designated
   hitters or letting pitchers bat, and you can replace players
   during the game.

2. 5 additional scoreboard messages picked at random when a
   home run is hit, reading --

   * Big Fly
   * Dinger
   * Downtown
   * Tater
   * "GONE" -- moving left to right across the scoreboard,
      replaced by "Out of Here" when it moves off the board.

3. A choice of day or night games. With the latter, the sky is
   a darker "midnight" blue, and the lights are in their "on"
   (yellow) mode.  If an extra inning game goes into the 13th
   inning, the lights are turned on automatically at the end
   of the 12th inning.

4. A Sound Off/On Option. This is for those who might want to
   sneak in a game at the office now and then, or might prefer
   to have their spouses think they are working on taxes,
   household record keeping or work from the office v.s.
   playing a game.  There may also be times when a player
   would just as soon not alert and/or attract a son (or
   grandson) who has just been put to bed or is supposed to be
   doing homework.

5. As another camouflage measure, pressing the "Esc" key
   at the pitching prompt will put a spreadheet on the screen,
   with any other key then returning you to the game precisely
   where you left it.

As a 6-year-old, my grandson started playing this game with
no help other than selecting the game and pitching speeds the
first time he played it.  He usually types in only the first
letter of the team names, skips the team line-ups in the full-
length registered version, and uses game and pitching speeds a
notch or two slower than I do.

While I prefer the lower scoring but more realistic default
mode standard in both versions, he ALWAYS uses the Higher
Scores Option, taking special delight in the home run graphics,
usually accompanied by a resounding clenched-fist "Yes!"

In the process of playing the game and reading the play
descriptions at the bottom of the scoreboard, he has learned
to read many words -- i.e. single, double, triple, sacrifice,
gapper, etc., as just a few examples -- not yet encountered
in his school reading.

In the course of a game, there may be situations where you
disagree with the umpire's calls on balls and strikes, or
whether a runner is safe or out in stolen base situations.

That's baseball.

Enjoy.

The following table provides the meaning of the letters
that appear on the field at the conclusion of each play:

        B   = Balk by pitcher
                CO  = Runner Caught Off base in a pickoff
                      play
                DP  = Double Play
                E   = Error
                F   = A foul ball not caught in the air
                H   = Hit (i.e. a base hit)
                HBP = Hit by Pitch
        HR  = Home Run
                O   = Out
                PB  = Passed Ball
                S   = Safe
                TP  = Triple Play
                WP  = Wild Pitch

**************************************************************
                      DISCLAIMER OF WARRANTY
**************************************************************

      This software is sold "as is", without any warranty as
      to performance or any other warranties whether
      expressed or implied.  Because of the many hardware and
      software environments into which this program may be
      used, no warranty of fitness for a particular purpose
      is offered.  The user must assume the entire risk of
      using the program.  Any liability of the seller will be
      limited exclusively to product replacement or the
      refund of the registration fee.