(C) 1996, ORIGIN Systems, Inc. This document may not, in whole or part, be copied, photocopied, reproduced, translated, or reduced to any electronic medium or machine readable form without prior consent, in writing, from ORIGIN Systems, Inc.
ORIGIN Systems, Inc. believes the information contained in this document is accurate and reliable. ORIGIN Systems, Inc. reserves the right to update this manual at any time and without notice.
This help file has been provided as documentation for Wing Commander IV. It details key commands, features, and the most common questions asked and their answers.
Welcome to Wing Commander IV. This latest installment in the Wing Commander series puts you back in the shoes of the Terran Confederation's Colonel Christopher Blair, to investigate the skirmishes with our long-time allies, The Border Worlds.
From gameflow (the room you start in), one can choose to fly the demo mission or quit the demo. Upon completion of the demo mission or hitting Command-X, the demo returns to gameflow.
When you select to fly the demo mission, you will be at the helm of a Confederation Hellcat fighter. The mission has a default time limit of 5 minutes.
To autopilot to where the enemies are, press A once. You will see a view of your ship flying by on its way to the enemy. Once you reach the second action sphere, groups of fighters will be continually jumping in until the time limit expires, or you die.
The circular display with the red dots on it is your radar. If you maneuver the ship so that one of the dots is in the center, you should be able to see it in front of you. It will be bracketed by a red box. Maneuver each of the enemies into the crosshairs on the screen and fire by pressing the mouse button or spacebar. If you hit them, you will see a blue shield effect. Fire until their complete destruction! You can also fire missiles at it using the Return key.
To exit the Demo, press Command-Q at any time.
Wing Commander IV features many new improvements over Wing Commander III.
These include :
o Digital Music
o Realistic textures for the spaceflight objects
o Cool cockpit HUDs
o New weapons/missiles
o Improved movie player allowing the playback of 16-bit color/16-bit
The only Extension you need to run the Wing Commander IV Demo is Sound Manager 3.1. This is available from Apple at their Internet Web site: http://www.info.apple.com.
Turn off all other Control Panels and Extensions to get the most memory for the program.
[3.1] 8 MB Machines
If you have just 8 MB of RAM on your machine, you may need to turn VIRTUAL MEMORY on. To do this, click on the Apple icon, choose CONTROL PANELS, then click on MEMORY.
Q : I get the message "Malloc returned nil". What does this mean?
A : This means that the program has run out of memory. Try giving the program more memory by changing the numbers in the Get Info window. To do this, select the file "Wing Commander IV Demo" in the Finder. Choose Get Info from the File menu. Increase the number in the Preferred Size box.
You may also need to free up more memory on your Macintosh. This can be done by quitting all open applications and restarting your computer with as few Extensions and Control Panels as possible.
Q : The game runs slow on my Macintosh. How can I make it run faster?
A : Try changing the screen size (Command-R) and the texture detail (Command-T). Turning off music will help a bit as well.
[7.0] Where can I purchase Wing Commander IV Macintosh?
Wing Commander IV Macintosh will be available around the first week of June, 1996. It will be available at these locations.
- Direct
Electronic Arts Direct Sales, 1-800-245-4525
- Retail
CompUSA
Computer City
Computer Town
ComputerWare
Datavision
Egghead
Fry's Electronics
J&R Music World
MicroCenter
Sun TV
Virgin Megastores
- Catalogs
Educorp, 1-800-843-9497
MacWarehouse, 1-800-255-6227
[8.0] What files accompany the Wing Commander IV Demo?
If you would like to contact Origin Technical Support, please call 512-434-HELP (4357) M-TH 9:00am to 1:00 pm, 2:00pm to 5:00 pm, F 9:00am to 1:00pm, 2:00pm to 4:00pm. All times are Central Standard Time (CST).
