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1987-04-08
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Mack's DOMINO Parlor
Copyright (c) B. J. Ball, 1984
This program is distributed under the "shareware" concept. It may be
freely copied and distributed for private use only; satisfied users
are asked to send a contribution of any amount ($15 suggested) to:
B.J.Ball, 2551 Antioch Ch. Rd., Watkinsville, Georgia 30677.
Comments, questions and suggestions from any user will be welcomed.
Mack's DOMINO Parlor
Copyright (c) B. J. Ball 1984
Requires: IBM PC or Compatible, 128K, disk drive, graphics card.
Operation: Start the system, but do not load BASIC. Put the game
disk in the default drive, type DOMINO and press the ENTER key.
Description of game.
At Mack's Domino Parlor, you have a choice of nickel, dime
or quarter games (Levels 0,1,2). There is also a game for high
rollers in the back room, but it is by invitation only; to be
invited, you have to win a dime or quarter game by a big margin.
The back room characters are unsavory, to say the least, and you
probably won't want to go there more than once or twice, even
when invited.
After you choose the level desired, you will be presented
with a sequence of options. These will be discussed in detail
later, but to get the game under way quickly, just press the
Enter key once in response to each of the queries.
The only game played at Mack's place is the two-person draw
game. The discussion below presupposes some knowledge of this
game, but an appendix, adequate for one who has never played
dominoes before, is included. (Since domino rules tend to be
somewhat local, even those quite familiar with some version of
the game might wish to scan the Appendix for possible minor
variations from their rules.)
The game proper begins with a "Draw for Down". The machine
(Mack) will randomly select a domino for you and one for himself,
displaying both draws and announcing who won the first down. To
continue, press the space bar. (This is a recurring process, not
always indicated by a prompt. Whenever the machine seems to be
waiting for you to do something and you don't know what, try
pressing the space bar. Something might happen, and nothing very
bad ever does.)
Following the "Draw for Down", there will be a very short
pause for shuffling and dealing; your hand will then be
displayed, along with the current score and, if it is your down,
a prompt asking you to specify a domino to be downed. If it is
Mack's down, a domino will be played almost instantly and you
will then be prompted to indicate a domino to be played from your
hand.
If it is your turn and you wish to play, for example, the
2-3, you simply type 23 and press the space bar. (If you make a
mistake or change your mind, you may reenter your play by typing
X before hitting the space bar. Once you press the space bar,
though, your domino is considered to have been exposed and must
be played if possible.)
It is important to remember that the FIRST number typed is
to be played against a domino on the board; even though the
domino 3-2 is the same as the domino 2-3, entering 32 is NOT the
same as entering 23 .
If you type 23 as your choice and there is no place to play
a 2 on the board, you will be asked to reenter your play. If
there is exactly one legal place to play a 2 , or if all places
are equivalent, the play will be made as soon as you hit the
space bar; if there are two or more inequivalent places to play a
2 , however, you will be asked to indicate the "End" on which you
wish to play. (There are at most four ends; here they are
numbered 1,2,3,4 , counterclockwise, starting with the end at the
right.) Among equivalent ends, the computer will choose the one
containing the smallest number of dominoes.
If it is your turn and you have no domino that will play,
enter D to draw or P to pass (or press the space bar). A request
to pass will not be honored if the boneyard is not empty;
instead, it will be treated as a draw. Similarly, if the boneyard
is empty, a request to draw will be interpreted as a pass.
Neither Draw nor Pass will be accepted if you have any domino in
your hand that will play.
In case you are dealt five doubles (four if the initial draw
is 7 or 9) and do not wish to play them, you may enter F (on your
first turn only) and get a redeal. In case Mack has made a score
on his down - before you have had an opportunity to ask for a
redeal - it will of course be cancelled if you have too many
doubles.
Each time you play a domino, the domino played will be
removed from the display of your hand, and the last domino in the
display will take its place. Thus your hand is continually being
rearranged (which can be disconcerting). This is done to make
room for the dominoes on End 3, which will be snaking around the
table and might otherwise run into the dominoes in your hand.
Whenever either you or Mack plays a domino, the count, if
any, will be displayed. To go to the next play, after verifying
the information given, you should press the space bar. Initially,
since Mack plays so rapidly, you may find yourself waiting
overlong before realizing that it's your turn to play. It is
important, though, that you have a chance to note where Mack
played and what, if anything, he made on his play, so he always
waits for you to digest this information. Similarly, Mack
politely waits for you to confirm that your play has been
properly credited before making his own play - you must press the
space bar a second time to tell Mack that he may proceed. (When
you Down, Draw, or Pass, however, the play is made without
waiting for the second spacebar press.)
When the first double is played, the board will be redrawn,
if necessary, so that the spinner is in the center of the table.
This leads to a special House Rule, the only deviation from
conventional play: one of the first fourteen dominoes played must
be a double. Since it is virtually impossible to play fourteen
dominoes without a double, this rule very seldom comes into play.
If it arises, though, a misdeal is declared, scores revert to
what they were at the beginning of the hand, and a redeal is
made.
During the course of play it may happen that so many
dominoes have been played on a particular end that no more can be
played there without (possibly) interfering with other parts of
the display. When this happens, there will be a beep, and the
last domino properly displayed on that end will be printed in red
(if you have a color monitor). Subsequent plays will be indicated
either by numerals (ends 1 and 3) or by overprinting the last
domino in a different color. In either case, but especially the
last one, some care is involved in remembering the dominoes on
these ends. Fortunately, this arises relatively infrequently,
especially with ends 2 and 4.
Special Features.
The first of the sequence of options mentioned above is the
Initial Draw, the number of dominoes dealt to each player at the
start of a hand. The default is 11, which seems to give the best
balance between luck and skill. Here (and for each of the other
queries) the indicated default value may be accepted by pressing
the space bar. The other options allow an initial draw of 7 or 9,
both of which are popular is some parts of the country.
The next choice to make is the number of points which will
constitute a game. This is customarily set at 250, but you may
use any multiple of 10, starting with 100, the minimum allowable
game score.
You are then given the option of making a printout
(hardcopy) of the hands and plays as the game progresses. To
select this option, press Y (not Yes) and be sure the printer is
turned on and ready.
The final initial choice you have to make is whether or not
you wish to repeat a (previously saved) game; if you choose to do
so, you will have to give some additional information, as
described in the next paragraph.
At the conclusion of each game, you will be given an
opportunity to save the game just played for later replay. Saved
games are written to the DOMINO disk as GAME-1, GAME-2, ...,
GAME-9; if any games have been previously saved, you may, at the
beginning of a succeeding game, exercise the option of replaying
one of these. If you choose to do so, a list of the games on file
will be displayed, and you will be asked to enter the number of
the game to be repeated. You will then be given the option of
switching hands this time around, with you playing the hands
given to the computer the first time. If you can consistently
beat Mack playing the same game both ways, clearly you are the
better domino player. On the other hand, ...
When you choose to save a game for later replay, you will be
shown a list of the games already on file, and asked to enter a
number for the current game. If you enter the same number as a
game already on file, the current game will replace that game.
At most 9 games may be on file at any one time. At least one game
must be on the DOMINO disk, or the program will abruptly
terminate when you ask to save or repeat a game. This is the
reason for the dummy file "GAME-0" on the original disk; if the
program is copied to another disk, be sure to copy GAME-0 along
with it.
All responses may be made with single keystrokes (except the
choice of the number of points for a game), and letter responses
may be either capital or lower case. In responding to Y/N
questions, use the letters, not the words Yes or No.
You may, if you prefer, use the ENTER key whenever the space
bar is called for. Moreover, if you get fed up with a game, you
may start over by pressing R to Run the program again, or Q to
Quit. These entries may be made whenever the machine is waiting
for a response from you (which is most of the time).
One of the queries presented to you at the end of a game is
"Another game now ?". If you press Y in response, the next game
will have the same parameters (level, initial draw, etc.) as the
one just played, and Mack will keep a running total of the number
of games won by you and by him to be displayed at the end of each
subsequent game. If you wish to change any parameters, press R
instead of Y in response to this question.
Mack is totally honest in his play, and uses his knowledge
of the dominoes in your hand only for checking purposes - to
determine whether you do indeed have too many doubles, whether
you own the domino you wish to play, and whether you actually
have no legal play when you ask to draw or pass. His decisions
as to his own play are based only on legitimate information - the
dominoes in his hand, those on the board, and the number of
dominoes remaining in your hand and in the boneyard. This is due
not so much to scruples as to ineptitude in crime. Mack always
plays levels 0,1 and 2 - the up front games - but when a live one
shows up and shows off, he is invited to play with the boys in
the back. The back room is run by Mack's cousin Maxie, who is
equally unscrupulous but a lot more skillful. Maxie can make
mincemeat of almost anybody. (Try him and see.) Of course the
back room game is a joke, not to be taken seriously, in which
Maxie is allowed to cheat badly - not as badly as possible, but
flagrantly enough to win easily against most competition. The
fact that he will not allow a printout of a Level 3 game (don't
put anything in writing, you know) is something of a tipoff.
----------------end-of-author's-documentation---------------
Software Library Information:
This disk copy provided as a service of
The Public (Software) Library
Disks in the library are updated monthly.
For a copy of the latest monthly software library newsletter
and a list of the 800+ disks in the library, call or write
The Public (Software) Library
P.O.Box 35705 K
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(713) 721-6104
We are not the authors of this program, nor are we associated
with the author in any way other than as a distributor of the
program in accordance with the author's terms of distribution.
Please direct shareware payments and specific questions about
this program to the author of the program, whose name appears
elsewhere in this documentation. If you have trouble getting
in touch with the author, we will do whatever we can to help
you with your questions. All programs have been tested and do
run. To report problems, please use the form that is in the
file PROBLEM.DOC on many of our disks or in other written for-
mat with screen printouts, if possible.
