Astro Rally 1.0
published by Aggressive Game Designs

Racing Ship editing/creation information

Do you want to make new ships for Astro Rally, or just fiddle with the ships
that come with the game? Well, you've come to the right place.  This document
is designed to help you.

First, let's talk about the four data files that compose an Astro Rally
racing ship.

The first is a file that ends in ".SHP".  This file is readable by any text
editor, such as NotePad, and contains all of the information about the ship.  

The second and third files are picture files, and thier names end in ".BMP".
BMP files are picture files that any paint program (such as Microsoft Paint)
will recognize.  You can use Paint to change a picture, and save it into a
file that ends in ".BMP".

One of the two BMP files will be used as the "big" picture of the ship,
which shows up in the game when you select which ship you will race with.
The other BMP will be the "small" picture of the ship, and is used to
represent the actual ship on the race track.  These BMPs can be any size you
want, BUT you should examine the BMPs of the ships that come with the game,
to make sure your pictures are of a similar size.

Both ship BMPs should point straight up.  In both pictures, the area around
the ship should be pure black, because the game makes pure black invisible,
so you can see through it.

The fourth file is a sound file, which is used for the motor sound of the
ship.  This file ends in ".WAV", which is a standard Windows sound format.
Windows doesn't come with a good sound editor, but there are many sound
editors available on the WWW.  The one we recommend is "GoldWave", which
can be found at http://www.goldwave.com.  Different ships can use the same
motor sound file, so don't be afraid to use the motor sounds that come with
the game for your new ship.

Now, lets get back to the .SHP file.

This file has several bits of information in it.  Each bit is on its own line,
and there are no blank lines between the information.

The text between the asterisks is the information in the .SHP file for the
slowest ship in the game.

*
Freespace
Frog
A1F.bmp
A1S.bmp
1
1
1
cheap-high-motor.wav
10
*

The first line is the Make of the ship, and the second line is the Model
of the ship.

The third line is the file name of the "big" BMP file we talked about earlier,
and the fourth line is the file name of the "small" BMP file.

Line 5 is the acceleration of the ship.  The higher the number, the faster
the ship will accelerate.
Line 6 is the turning rate of the ship.  The higher the number, the faster
the ship will turn left or right.
Line 7 is the damping rate of the ship.  This determines how much the ship
will slide sideways while turning.  The higher the number, the better the
ship will handle.

When Astro Rally wants to know what class a ship belongs to, it adds up the
acceleration, turning rate, and damping rate, subtracts 2, divides by 3, and
adds 1.  So, a ship is Class 1 as long as the acceleration, turning rate,
and damping rate, added together, equal 4 or less.  When a ships numbers total
5, it is Class 2, and when they total 8, the ship is Class 3.

Line 8 is the file name of the motor sound your ship will use. Line 9 is the
basic pitch of the motor sound.  As a ship accelerates, its motor sound "revs
up", from a bottom level.  This number determines that level.  A ship with a
lower motor sound will have a low number, like 1 or 2.  A ship that should have
a high-pitched motor should have a higher number, like 7 or even 10.

That's it!  Those 9 pieces of information define a racing ship.  You might want
to start by adjusting some of the information in the ships that come with the
game, but in any case have fun, and remember to share any cool ships or tracks
you make with us at http://www.aggressive.to.