Welcome to Tai Chi Game

     version 1.02

Contents

What is " Tai Chi Game" ?

How to install "Tai Chi Game" ?

How to use "Tai Chi Game ?

Can I redistribute Tai Chi Game ?

LICENSE & WARRANTY

REGISTRATION and REGISTRATION FEE

How to register ?

REGISTRATION FORM


What is " Tai Chi Game" ?

In ancient China, some philosophers believed that everything that existed in the universe

could be classified into FIVE CATEGORIES. These philosophers used the FIVE CATEGORIES

combined with Tai Chi  to build a theory of the universe.   It's hard to translate the FIVE

CATEGORIES into English without losing their real meanings, however, we try to give an

explanation here:

First category : 	metal, or things made of metal

Second category:	water, or anything in a liquid phase

Third category:	plants, things made of wood or related to plants.

Fourth category:	fire, or things with heat

Fifth category : 	ground, land, soil, dust, ash etc.

There are interesting relations between these categories.  For each category, there exist four

different interactions between it and the other four categories. These four interactions are

"GENERATE", " BE GENERATED BY ", " DESTROY, and "BE DESTROYED BY". As illustrated

in the picture

The top icon represents the first category. In counterclockwise order, the other icons

represent the second, third, fourth, and fifth category respectively.  Each category "GENERATES"

its counterclockwise neighbor , and "IS GENERATED BY" its clockwise neighbor.  In a similar way,

each category can "DESTROY" its second  neighbor  in the counterclockwise order, and "IS

DESTROYED BY" its second  neighbor in the clockwise order.  The wisdom of those ancient

philosophers is easily appreciated by using some common sense. For example, if you burn wood,

there comes fire, and after the burning, you see ashes. This explains why the third category(plants)

generates the fourth one(fire), and why the fourth category generates the fifth category(ash).

Furthermore, these ancient Chinese philosophers believed that these FIVE CATEGORIES have to

be kept balance.  If they lose balance, there comes the disaster.

Many people recognize the symbol of Tai Chi as shown here,

but most people may wonder what it represents?  To answer this question, let's first come

back to the word " Tai Chi".  The English word "Tai Chi"  actually only resembles the sound of two

Chinese characters.  If we translate its meaning in English, it may be expressed as " The Final

Limit".  The ancient Chinese philosophers believed that while the universe is created from

emptiness. In the creation of the universe,  the first stage is the appearance of Tai Chi which

represents a chaotic state composed of the POSITIVE elements and the NEGATIVE elements.

Everything in the universe originated from Tai Chi  as a combination of  the POSITIVE elements

and the NEGATIVE elements in a certain form.

As stated in its name, "Tai Chi Game" is a game based on the philosophy of Tai Chi and the FIVE

CATEGORIES.  The game rules will be stated in the section " How to play Tai Chi Game".


How to install "Tai Chi Game" ?

First , please check that you have all the files listed below

TAICHI.EXE

TAICHI.REC

TAICHI.WRI

TAICHI.HLP

REGISTER.TXT

Second, please create a directory(you can call it any name you like) and copy all the above

files into that directory.

Third, under FILE MANAGER, please double click on TAICHI.EXE and have fun!


How to use "Tai Chi Game" or How to play "Tai Chi Game" ?

Basically, after the game starts, an icon representing a category(called category icon

hereafter) will show up on the top of the game frame and move towards the bottom. The motion of

the category icon will be stopped if it hits another category icon or the bottom of the game frame.

Before the category is stopped, you can use six control keys to control the category icon.  These

control keys are used to

1. make the category icon move right ( default key : l ).

2. make the category icon move left (default key: j ).

3. make the category icon switch to its neighbor category counterclockwise (default key: i ).

4. make the category icon switch to its neighbor category clockwise (default key: k ).

5. make the category icon become Tai Chi. (default key: Enter )

6. make the category icon drop down right away. (default key: Space )

Note, if the falling icon is blinking, it can not be changed into any other icons.

There are 7 kinds of icons in this game. Besides the icons for the FIVE CATEGORIES, there are

icons for the EMPTINESS and Tai Chi.   The EMPTINESS icon looks like

At the beginning of each level, there are some category icons along with several EMPTINESS

icons on the bottom of the game frame. The mission for the player is to clear up all the

EMPTINESS icons before the time is up and then advance to another level.  There are two ways to

clear an icon. First, the player can make a consecutive line of at least 3  icons of the same kind.

This consecutive line can be either horizontal, vertical, or diagonal.   Second, the player can make

the falling icon become Tai Chi for 3 seconds.  Every icon hit by Tai Chi will be cleared up. There is

a special way to clear the EMPTINESS icon.  If the 4 nearest-neighbor icons surrounding a

EMPTINESS icon are of the same category,  the surrounded EMPTINESS icon will change into

that category icon.   At the beginning of the game, the player has 3 Tai Chi. After the player

changes a falling icon into a Tai Chi icon, the number of Tai Chi decreases by 1.  If there are no

Tai Chi left, the player can no longer change the falling icon into a Tai Chi icon.  There is only one

way to create a Tai Chi.  The player has to arrange 5 different category icons in a horizontal

consecutive line with the cyclic order as shown in FIVE CATEGORIES picture above.  Once this

condition is satisfied, these 5 category icons will turn into a Tai Chi icon.   The player can stock up

to 10 Tai Chi icons.    On the screen, the player can also see a Tai Chi spinning in a circle. The

FIVE CATEGORIES icons are distributed on the circle and form a pentagon.  If the player clears

up one category icon, this spinning Tai Chi will move one step towards the category icon on the

circle.  Keep in mind that the universe is stable only when the FIVE CATEGORIES are balanced.

Once the Tai Chi touches the edge of the circle, the game is over.

If the player turns on the "Advanced mode " ,  the falling icon will interact with the icon it hits.   The

interaction rules are listed below

1. If the "hit" icon GENERATEs the falling icon, the falling icon changes into the "hit" icon.

2. If the "hit" icon is GENERATED BY the falling icon, the "hit" icon changes into the falling icon.

3. If the "hit" icon DESTROYs the falling icon, the falling icon changes into the category icon it

   GENERATEs.

4. If the "hit" icon is DESTROYED BY the falling icon, the "hit" icon changes into the category icon

    it GENERATEs.

Before you use the MOUSE to click on the PLAY button.  You can make several choices from the

MENU BAR. These choices are:

SPEED 	The SPEED option controls the time for the next icon to appear.

START LEVEL	Check your desired start level.

OPTION	You can check the "Advanced mode" to turn on the interactions between different

categories.  If you check "Define control keys", you can choose your favorite keys

to control the category icon.

COLOR	If your graphics display card can support 256 colors, please choose 256 colors

mode.

SOUND            	In this version, we don't offer  support for multimedia devices.  You can only

turn the sound "ON" or "OFF".


Can I redistribute Tai Chi Game ?

You are very welcome to redistribute Tai Chi Game if all the files listed in "How to install...."

are included without any modification.  Of course, you should not, either directly or indirectly,

distribute the PASSWORD or the  REGISTRATION NUMBER in any way.  SUNMOON USA is

very serious about fighting software piracy.


LICENSE & WARRANTY

LICENSE

SUNMOON USA hereby grants to the registered user of Tai Chi Game a non-exclusive, non-transferable license to use Tai Chi Game in accordance with the terms of this license agreement.  Without the permission of SUNMOON USA, you should not modify, alter, decompile or reverse engineer the software program, database or related materials in any way.

Under no circumstances, a registered copy of the software may be used on more than one computer at a time.

WARRANTY

Tai Chi Game provides absolutely NO warranty of any kind, either expressed or implied.  SUNMOON USA is not liable for any loss caused by USING or NOT USING Tai Chi Game. Before you run this software, you have to use your anti-virus software to check the copy of Tai Chi Game you get to make sure it's virus-free.


REGISTRATION and REGISTRATION FEE

 If you use this software and think it's useful, please register your copy.  The registration fee is only $10 for using in the home computer. With your registration, you can not only  access the full power of the software, but you are also supporting SUNMOON USA to create more useful, enjoyable, and really affordable software.

Home License Registration Fee:

$10 per home computer

$30 for all the computers in your household

Public Computer Lab License Registration Fee:

This license applies to all the computers which are generally accessible by more than 5 people.  In case of the software is installed in the network, each networked terminal should has its own license to use this software.

Up to 20 computers or terminals:

$50 per computer per year

More than 20 computers or terminals:

please contact SUNMOON USA for discount


How to register ?

If you have a printer, please print out REGISTER.TXT and complete all the necessary information.

If you don't have a printer, please write down the information listed below on a piece of paper as the registration form. You can find the "Distributor Number" under the "Help menu" in the Tai Chi Game.

Please make money order or check payable to SUNMOON USA, sent along with your registration form to :

SUNMOON USA

P.O. BOX 167

Drexel Hill, PA19026

* Outside the United States, please send US dollars or equivalent currency in cash.


REGISTRATION FORM  for  Tai Chi Game

Distributor Number: ______________________________________________

Last Name: _____________________________________________________

First Name:_____________________________________________________

Origination(School,Company,etc):___________________________________

Address :_______________________________________________________

  _______________________________________________________

  _______________________________________________________

I'd like to register

_________ copy(copies) for Home License

 total due: $____________

I'd like to register

________  copy(copies) for Public Computer Lab License

total due: $_____________

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