Mission 3/Mission 3.zip/Mission 3.iso/spiele/sac/manual/chapter3.doc

Text File | 2012-11-26 | 18KB | 378 lines

                        CHAPTER THREE
         Entering adventure information into the data creator
  *****************************************************************

  When you first put this disk in your drive you will have been
  faced with the sac title screen followed by a message saying...

             Press left mouse button to continue
             Press right mouse button for desktop

  In order to reserve more memory for your adventure data sac
  loads from an auto folder thus saving an extra 32k. Pressing the
  right mouse button will return you to GEM allowing you to read
  this manual and also loading the example game St brides.

  Pressing the left mouse button will enter the sac data creator
  program. This allows you to enter your locations, connections,
  objects and so on, ready to be loaded into the editor program.

  You will now be faced with a list of options which can be
  chosen by pressing the right letter to select it. "L" is to
  select locations, "C" for connections, "K" to load data and so
  on. If you hear a boom sound when pressing a key that means that
  caps lock is on. Just press it and all will be fine.

  This is the main menu and some options lead to sub menus. So
  first lets select the load data option by pressing "k", a file
  selector will appear asking you to choose a adventure data file.

  This has the extension ".ADV" and trying to load any other kind
  of file will cause the creator to crash. The ".ADV" file is the
  data saved by the creator and we are going to examine the data
  for St brides. Click once on the ST_BRIDE folder and select the
  file "bride.adv" and click on return, The creator will then load
  the data information and sound a bell when its loaded the file.

  Lets have a look at the locations in the game. Select the
  locations option (l), this brings up the location menu.

  Select the list location option (l) and the creator will list up
  the location descriptions along with their ID number. Press
  space to pause the listing and Esc to abort it.

  Lets add an extra location to the list, Select the insert
  location option and type the following......

  You are in your bathroom. There is a sink and toilet here with a
  washing basket in the corner. The door is east.

  Press "RETURN" and the creator will print on screen, the location
  description as it will appear in the game. You have now added a
  new location to St brides and you can view it by pressing "l".

  Now select the print location option (p), the creator will ask
  you for a location number so type "1" followed by "RETURN" and
  you will see the description for location one which is the main
  characters bedroom. As you can see, this location has a door
  which leads north to the corridor location so lets also connect
  it to our new location. Select the amend location option (a),
  type "1" and press "RETURN" and type the following......

  You are in your bedroom. There is a cupboard and a bed here.
  There is a door to the west and one to the north.

  As with insert location, press "RETURN" to enter the new
  location in the list. List the locations and you will see that
  location one notes the extra connection. We can later connect
  this location to our new one with the connections menu.

  Typing locations the right way will take practise, a few things
  to remember are the items in the location, The bathroom location
  which is location 11 tells the player that there is a sink and a
  toilet in it. As these items can't be picked up and moved they
  can be mentioned in the location description but a washing
  basket could. Therefore you could tell the adventure that if the
  player trys to pick up the basket to tell him its too heavy or
  any other reason it can't be taken. If they try to take the sink
  or the toilet then the game tells them they can't get that, this
  is because they are fixed to the floor. Another problem that you
  could encounter is putting an item in your location where the
  state of it could change later, look at this location...

  You are in a room. An open door leads north west.

  This location would look a bit strange if the player decided to
  close the open door, told the door has now been closed and the
  location still says its open. In this case you would change this
  location to say the following......

  You are in a room. A door leads north west.

  So now the player does'nt know if its open or closed. The same
  would apply to other characters such as a dragon which could
  move around and go to other locations.

  You are by a cave. There is a large dragon here.

  The adventure could have moved the dragon elsewhere and if the
  player tries to kill it then the game would tell him that theres
  no dragon there even though the location says there is.

  Once you've played a few adventures the writing of locations
  will become clearer and easier to do.

  Chapter 6 explains about writing adventures, it tells you what
  do each step of the way and also has a full plan out of a game
  for you to write. All locations,objects and messages are all
  listed for you to copy along with Command lines to enter into
  the editor program, this is for subscribers only.

  Press "m" to go back to the main menu and select connections
  (c), this is where we enter the direction data for the editor
  program, in other words tell it which directions are used in
  each location. You should now be faced with the connection
  definer and if you select the list connections option (l) you
  will see all the connections for each location, pressing Esc
  will return you to the connections main menu.

  The print connection option (p) is the same as the location one.

  When you enter your locations into the location definer the
  connection definer reserves the same number of connection
  numbers as location numbers, for example if you entered four
  locations there will be four connections each containing space for
  ten directions. We shall now put connections in locations 1 and
  11 with the amend location option (a).

  When you press "a" the creator will ask you for a location
  number so enter "1" as we need to add the extra direction.

  The definer now waits for you to choose a direction, the top of
  the screen says Connections from location 1 and underneath that
  is the two rows of direction letters. The letter or letters in
  brackets () are the choosen directions and the letter before it
  is the selector for that direction. We need to tell the definer
  that we need one direction to location 2 (the corridor) which is
  north and one to location 11 (the bathroom).

  Press "n" and the definer will print.......

                North goes to location ?

  Type "2" and press return

  Press "w" and the definer will print......

                West goes to location ?

  Type "11" and press return

  Press "q" to go back to the connections menu and press "p"
  followed by "1" and press return. As you can see we have
  connected location one to locations two and eleven.

  Press Esc to abort, then press "a" followed by "11" and press
  return. We need a connection from the location eleven which is
  the bathroom to the bedroom (location one).

  Press "e", type "1" then press return followed by "q", we have
  now connected location eleven to location one so when the player
  types "go east" or "e" at location eleven he will go straight to
  location one, the bedroom.

  Chapters 5 & 6 explains all you need to know about connections.

  Lets take a look at objects, go back to the main menu and select
  the objects option which will bring you to the objects menu.

  Press "l" to list the object descriptions along with their
  object number and present location.........

               Object 1 is a teachers gown.
               The object word is gown
               And it appears at location 8.

  In St brides there are four objects, each at their own chosen
  location. Object 1 is at a normal location, in other words it
  appears in a certain location waiting for the player to find it.

  Looking at the listing we see the other objects have other
  locations, these are known as special locations.

        Worn: the object is worn by the player.
        Carried: the object is carried by the player.
        Not created: the object does'nt exist in the game yet.

  We will now insert an object of our own, from the object menu
  press "i" and the message Object 5 is.. will appear.

  The object definer now waits for you to type in your objects
  description, this should be a short description of it. For
  example, a front door key should be typed in as "a key" or even
  "the key", as I said before, anything in quotes "" means that you
  type or press the letters or numbers in between the quotes.

  Press return and you will be asked for the objects word, this is
  just one word that names your object. For example the front door
  key would be typed in as "key" without a full stop, this is so
  when the player types "get key" the key would go to the carried
  location and tell the player he has the key.

  For the above example, define a book as an object like this...

   Object 5 is..
                 >an old book.

  The word for this object is...book

  Press return and any key to go back to the object menu. The next
  thing we need to do is put the book in the bedroom location so
  press "o" and you are asked for an object number so type "5",
  you are now asked which location this object appears in so as
  it appears in location one (the bedroom), type "1" then "RETURN".

  Remember to type everything in lower case letters and not
  capitals otherwise the editor won't accept it.

  Object locations decide where your object starts and ends in the
  adventure, this can be in either one of the games locations or a
  special location, the object we've just defined will now appear
  in location one when you play the adventure and remain there
  until either the player picks it up or you decide to move it
  elsewhere at a certain stage in the game.

  As usual you can amend your objects description using the amend
  object option and you can also change the objects location at
  any time with the object location option.

  Other objects can be put in one of the special locations, for
  example if your main character is a barbarian you could define a
  sword and put it in as a carried object so when the game starts
  he will be carrying it. If your adventure is based on a spaceman
  and the first location is inside his rocket then you could
  define an airpack for him to wear on his back in which case it
  would be defined as a worn object.

  The NOT CREATED option is for objects that are hidden in the
  game waiting to be discovered. Such an object could be a wallet
  in somebodys pocket and if the player examined the pocket then
  the wallet would be moved from the not created location to the
  present location the player is in.

  Lets change the location of the first object, the teachers gown,
  this currently appears at location eight so we are going to
  put it in the carried location. Choose the special location
  option (s) from the object menu, as before you are asked for a
  object number so type "1" and press return and you will see the
  three special locations that you can choose for your object.

             Press "w" for the object to be worn
             Press "c" for the object to be carried
             Press "n" for the object to be not created

  Note the extra option "k", this is in case you suddenly decided
  that you don't want a special location for your object but bear
  in mind that this option will cancel the last chosen location
  for this object if there was one and you'll have to do it again.

  List the objects and you will see how object one has been
  changed and the book object has been included. As with locations
  you can press "space" to pause the listing and "Esc" to abort.

  Press "m" from the object menu to go back to the main menu.

  Most adventures allow you to examine objects, characters and
  parts of the present location so I've included an EXAMINE option.
  Select the examine option from the main menu (e) which will call
  up the examine menu and select the list examine messages option.

  This lists the examine messages for the objects in St brides,
  note that they are just longer descriptions for each objects.

  There are two kinds of examine options which are NORMAL and
  REVEAL. The normal messages just describe the object for, example
  examining a picture could print the message....

       The picture is old and faded, and very dusty.

  Normal examine options apply to characters and parts of the
  present location as well. For example......

               The elf looks very unhappy.
         The fireplace is made from limestone brick.

  The reveal examine option is as it says, A certain object could
  reveal another object. Theres an adventure called THE PAWN which
  uses this option. In the castle grounds there is a mat and when
  its moved or taken it reveals a key, an object that was not
  created at first then created when the mat object was moved and
  put in the castle grounds location.

  As well as objects, locations can be either normal or reveal
  options as well. For example......

          The fireplace is made from limestone brick
             Inside the fireplace is a cauldron
           Behind the fireplace is a secret room

  Inserting an examine object option is easy, so press "i" and the
  message Examine message for object 5 will appear. Just enter a
  message describing the book and press return.

  The examine location option has also been used in St brides.
  This is to examine the window in location 3, select "u" to see
  the listing of the locations examined in St brides.

  Lets use this option to allow the player to examine the toilet
  in location 9 which is the location defined earlier, the bathroom.

  Press "l" and you are asked for a location so type "9" and press
  return. The message Examine message for location 1 appears.

             Type in the following message.

           Yuk!!! it has not been flushed today.

  Press return and the message Examine what??? appears so type
  "toilet" (no full stops) followed by return.

  Now when the player types "examine toilet" at location 9 the
  above message will come up.

  There are other options in the main menu. One is the folder
  option which will put a folder on your disk, just press "f",
  type in a name for it and click on return.

  Some adventures have graphics, These are pictures that show the
  present location so one half of the screen is the location picture
  and the other half is the location description. Sac allows you
  to add these graphics to your games quite easily.

  Select the pictures option (p) from the main menu and a file
  selector will appear. This looks for a picture with the ".mbk"
  extension. In other words a packed neo or degas picture packed
  with the STOS compact accessory. Click on the file you wish to
  load and click on return. The packed picture will load and
  display itself on screen for a few seconds. You are then asked
  to name the saved file. This can be any name you want up to eight
  characters but don't add any extension. For example....

                Forest.mbk (wrong)
                Forest (right)

  To create one of this pictures load up your art program and load
  the file FRAME.PI1 into it which is one this disk. This picture
  is just a large square. You can change the palette if you wish
  but your picture must be drawn inside the square.

  When you have finished it save it on a different disk, pack it
  with the STOS compacter and just load it into sac with the "p"
  option. Another thing you are asked is what location does the
  picture appear at. Just type in the location number and "return".

  If you have subscribed your copy of sac, then you will have
  recieved two extra games, one of which has graphics.

  All that remains now is to test the game to see how it looks so
  far, so select the save data option (s), type in "test.adv" and
  click on return. On this disk is a file called test.prg which
  must be on the same disk as the .adv file. Sac will sound a bell
  when the data is saved. All you have to do then is exit to gem
  by reloading sac, click on the right mouse button and double
  click on TEST.PRG. This will load your data file which must be
  called test.adv and saved on the root directory of the disk,
  that is.. not in any folders.

  Once loaded you can play your adventure in the normal way
  testing the objects are in their right location and so on.

  You will see that our new defined object the book appears at
  location one as we entered it and any pictures will load also.

     Any mistakes can be reloaded into sac and fixed.

  Thats it for this chapter. In the next one (chapter 4) we shall
  be learning about adding extra bits.