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Night Owl's Shareware - PDSI-006 - Night Owl Corp (1990).iso
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SYSOP.TXT
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Text File
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1991-08-09
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8KB
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200 lines
WIZARD'S ARENA -- RELEASE 1.12
(C) Copyright 1991 by Douglas Summers
SYSOP DOCUMENTATION
Thank you for trying out Wizard's Arena.
The Wizard's Arena (hereinafter, WA) is a BBS door game, allowing a
number of players to wander around in a large maze-like area and fight
it out, using a wide variety of spells and a certain amount of
ironmongery. Further details on the setting of the game -- and on
actual play -- can be found in the player's documentation.
SETTING UP
----------
Check your distribution files. You should have the following :
WIZARD.EXE -- the game itself
REGISTER.TXT -- a description of the benefits of registering
WIZARD.TXT -- the player documentation
COMMAND.TXT -- the on-line quick-help file
CHANGES.TXT -- a list of the modifications to the game since 1.00
SYSOP.TXT -- this documentation
COPYRIGHT.TXT -- the copyright notice for the game, and legal stuff
WA0000.* -- the initial game database
GENERIC.SYS -- used to run in LOCAL mode
There may also be a README.TXT. If one exists, you should read
it IMMEDIATELY. If there isn't one, don't worry about it. There
may also be an ADS.TXT file, which will be a small file describing
other games you might be interested in. If it's not there, don't
sweat it particularly, either.
Make a directory somewhere, and put these files in it. All the files
should remain in the same directory; the game depends on the
database being in the same directory it is (although that doesn't
have to be the CURRENT directory at the time the program is run).
You will now need to set up a batch file for running the game.
SETTING UP THE BATCH FILE
-------------------------
You'll need to make a batch file to call the program with. The line
actually calls the game can look something like this:
C:\WIZARD\WIZARD C:\PCB\PCBOARD.SYS [options]
The directory the game is in doesn't need to be on your path;
of course, your batch file must be.
The first parameter to the program is the location (full path-and-
filename) of the door-information file for your BBS. Different BBS
types use different ones, so if you're not sure how to set this up,
just refer to your BBS documentation.
The options are, well, optional; in fact, they have no effect until
you register the game. There is a seperate file describing them,
named REGISTER.TXT.
You'll have to make sure that only 1 player can get in at a time.
The batch file should look something like this (this example is for
PCBoard):
IF EXIST pcboard.txt GOTO inuse (skip if in use)
COPY inuse.txt pcboard.txt (pcb displays this after the door)
C:\WIZARD\WIZARD C:\PCB\PCBOARD.SYS
DEL pcboard.txt (mark it unused now)
:inuse
board.bat (crank the bbs back up, pcb displays pcboard.txt)
SETTING THE BBS NAME
--------------------
You should run the game once before your users do. This will allow
you to set up the BBS's name -- which is important for registration
purposes. You can reset the name anytime, but doing so will de-
register you (if you've registered); the Registration Sequence you
paid for won't work unless the name matches the old one.
Run the program with the -N option (you can omit your door-info
file parameter, if you wish).
C:\WIZARD\WIZARD -N
Then the game will prompt you for the name of your BBS. Enter it,
and hit return. Now you're ready!
RUNNING LOCALLY
---------------
The game can be run locally simply by calling it directly
with no parameters. It'll prompt you for a user's name; any user
in the game is available to you.
REGISTERING
-----------
Registering the game is pretty easy. Just enter the game, run the
help command '?', and take the 'Registration Info' option.
It'll give you a sequence of numbers and some letters, called
the 'Key Sequence'. It is based partly on the BBS name you set
up, so if you change the name of your board, you'll need to
contact me for re-registration. Write this sequence down. The
game will ask you if you have the Registration sequence, and
you (being truthful) will answer No.
Simply drop me a letter, with the key sequence and $15 enclosed.
You must also include a phone number for your BBS; and any comments
you have about the game are more than welcome.
After the post office has done in glacial best to lose the letter,
I will return to you (via a postcard) a similar sequence of
numbers and some letters (along with my eternal gratitude). Just
go through the Help/Registration sequence again, this time answering
(truthfully, as always) Yes. Enter the code from the postcard.
If you get it right, nothing very obvious will happen -- but the
next player to enter the board will be overjoyed to see that you
support a starving shareware artist. And you'll have access to the
features described in REGISTER.TXT.
The address to send your hard-earned cash and Key Sequence are:
Douglas Summers (even though I like 'Rick' better)
PO Box 671652
Marietta, GA 30067-0028
SYSOP FUNCTIONS
---------------
The author is ver much indebted to Rickie Belitz for his excellent
CKIT library for the nuts-and-bolts of door handling. Since I don't
have the source-code to this shareware library, my ability to support
it is limited. If any problems come up, though, I'l try. I've culled
a small amount of documentation from his text files, to describe the
features that my program provides via his library.
Certain functions are allowed to the sysop while the remote user is
running the door.
These (as drawn from his documentation) are:
Function Key
------------
F5 Shell to DOS
F8 Return user to system
F9 Toggle display
F3 Toggle Printer (PCBoard only)
F4 Toggle Bell (PCBoard only)
F7 Toggle Caller Alarm (PCBoard Only)
Alt-H Toggle status line
Alt-N Toffle sysop on next
Alt-X exit to DOS after call
CKIT further supports customized COM ports. By putting an
additional parameter before the options, you can support
pretty much ANY bizarro com-port arrangement you might have.
The format for this parameter must be PORT:aaa:i, where aaaa
is the base address and i is the interrupt. For example,
C:\WIZARD\WIZARD C:\PCB\PCBOARD.SYS PORT:02F8:3
sets the system to use a com-port whose base address is 02F8
and which uses IRQ 3.
CKIT uses the same mechanism to support FOSSIL drivers. The
format for the parameter is PORT:F:n, where n is the number
of the com-port to use the fossil driver on.
IF ERRORS OCCUR...
------------------
If an error should happen during game-play, the user will be
dumped back to the BBS and a file named ERRORS.OUT will contain
specific information about the error.
Try fixing the obvious things -- low RAM, not enough handles,
and so on. If these don't work, contact the author. He'll
try to sort it out.
After errors are resolved, you might want to delete (or at least
edit) the error-file. The game doesn't even try.