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1992-09-02
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R E B O U N D A R E N A
VER 1.0 (21-04-97)
by Aaron McDonald ©1997 Solaris Software
Contents:
Background / History.
Installation
Loading.
Game Options Screen.
Playing the Game.
High Score Table / Leaderboard.
Technical Info/Requirements.
About the Author.
Other Solaris Games.
Credits.
Background / History:
Rebound Arena is based on a very old Amstrad CPC 464 game of the
early 80s - 'Bouncer'. I'm sure many of you have never even heard
of this game before, even if you actually owned an Amstrad. I quite
enjoyed a quick bash of it when I had an Ammy, even though it was
programmed in BASIC. So one day I was tinkering around in AMOS,
and decided to make a Bouncer clone, with Rebound Arena being the
result.
The idea is to control a lone ball that continues to bounce off of
the left and right sides of the screen whilst avoiding the grey blocks
and collecting the blue gems - as simple as that! This must be done
in the quickest possible time to qualify for a place on the High
Score (well Low Time) table. A collision with a grey block results
in game over. The blocks are layed out randomly (so there is little
chance of the same game being played twice) aswell as a random start
position of the red ball (however the start direction is NOT random
- the ball always starts travelling right).
Installation (Hard Disk):
Installation is very simple. Just double click on the 'Install-to-HD'
icon and choose a place to install Rebound Arena on your Hard Disk (or
whatever) and run it from there - simple! The whole installation takes up
about 950K.
Installation (Floppy):
If you wish to copy the game to floppy, format two disks, naming them
'RA_Disk1' and 'RA_Disk2'. Below is a list of which files to place on
each disk:
RA_Disk1:
rebound.exe (executable)
Install-to-HD
Rebound.guide
S [drawer]
--> startup-sequence
scores.dat (high scores - if this file does not exist,
the game will create it for you)
RA_Disk2:
Pics [drawer]
-->arena.iff
title.abk
credits.iff
credits2.iff
Intro.iff
Sound [drawer]
-->samples.abk
princess.mod
title.mod
checknonotice.mod
Don't forget to include the 's' drawer with startup-sequence (that just
contains the line 'rebound.exe'), and then to install the disk, by typing
'Install df0:' from shell or cli.
Loading the game:
The game can be run straight from floppies (Disk 1 should autoboot) or by
first installing it to hard disk and running it from there by double-
clicking on the 'Rebound_Arena' Icon
Game Options Screen:
-Rebound Arena has several options to enable beginners to practice the
game with more than one life and more or less blocks in the arena. You
can alter the ammount of Blocks by move the highlighted text (using 'K'
and 'M') over the 'Number of Blocks' option and pressing '+' or '-'.
-Similarly, the same technique changes the ammount of lives given on the
'Number of Lives' option.
-Instructions can be brought up in the game by selecting 'Instructions'
from the main menu with the <SPACE> bar.
-Music and Sound FX can be toggled from the menu to select the sound
during the game.
-High Scores can be viewed with the High Score option believe it or not.
Credits and Exit to Workbench/AmigaDOS options are also available aswell
as, of course, Start Game.
N.B.
Games are only timed if 30 Blocks are selected and 1 life is selected.
When both these factors are true, timed games are eligable for the
High score table. All other combinations of these options are used for
practice only. The mode the game is in is shown flashing at the bottom
of the screen. The timed mode can be quickly selected by moving over
the 'Number of lives' option or the 'Number of Blocks' option and
pressing <SPACE>.
Playing the game:
Playing Rebound Arena doesn't really need explaining, all there is to
say is that the ball can be moved up and down using 'K' for up and 'M'
for down - Avoid the grey blocks - 'bump' into the blue gems - do all
this in the quickest humanly possible time.
HINTS:
- Plan out how you are going to 'attack' the arena before you press
<SPACE> to start, by plotting a rough route you are going to take.
You can take as long as you like here because the timer only starts
when you press <SPACE>.
- The ball ALWAYS starts moving right.
- Don't just fly around the screen in any old order collecting gems,
if three are in a row, try to attack the middle one first, then
bounce out for the other two.
- Don't look directly at the moving ball - look at where the ball is
actually going to move to.
- Be Quick!
High Score Table;
You will qualify for this if you time is fast enough (ie better than
position 20 to appear on the Leaderboard). Every time the Table changes
it is updated on the disk, so it is essential that disk 1 is write-
enabled for it to save the scores.
If you do happen to get a fast time, you will be prompted to enter your
name, and you and your time will then be highlighted on the Leaderboard.
The scores will then be saved. If you wish to clear the high score table
just delete 'scores.dat'in the 's' drawer on Disk 1, and a new table will
be created next time you play the game with times of 99.99 to beat in all
20 positons. I have included my high score table just as a matter of
interest to other players (called scores.dat-mine). They were done on a
50Mhz 030 machine, so might not be possible on a stock 500 for example!
Just rename the file to scores.dat, and place in the 's' drawer on disk 1
or in your Hard Disk's's' drawer) to see if you can beat any of the times
to get to position 1 - email me if you do do this -I'll be interested to
see if anyone can possibly beat my number 1 time ( I dont think so! ;] )
NOTE:
(If you play the game from CD, the scores are still saved, because they
are saved to 's:scores.dat', ie your SYStem or boot disk).
Technical Info / Requirements:
This game was created on an Amiga 1200 with 6 megs of Ram, Blizzard 1230
IV with 420 Meg Hard Disk, ATAPI Quad-Speed CD-ROM, 2xFloppy drives and
an Amstrad Colour Monitor.
I have tested the game on a standard 1200 (68020 - 2 Meg RAM) and it
worked fine (with not much of a speed difference) - I think it should
work on a machine with less than 2 Megs, but dont quote me on that. It
does not make use of the AGA chipset, so will work on a A500/A600 etc.
One floppy drive is needed only, but a hard drive speeds things up quite
alot as you would expect.
About the Author:
Name : Aaron McDonald
DOB : 28 - 04 -77
Well I'm 19 currently studying Computer Science at Sussex University (it
doesn't show in this game does it?). This is the first real game I have
actually finshed, becuase of coursework/exams etc, with 90% of the work
being done by me alone. The in-game graphics were drawn by my brother
(including the rendered title screen), the rest of the artwork and sound
done by me.
My interests? Well as you may have seen I like programming, including
'C' and Modula-2. I like most things to do with Science fiction (Star
Wars especially) as well as going to the Cinema, Sunbeam Rapiers
(SUNBEAM RAPIERS ?!!??! - what are they?). Go and visit my web site
to learn more :
http://www.tripod.com/~Sunbeam_Rapier/
You can also E-Mail me with any comments / bug reports or anything you
like:
aaronmc@cogs.susx.ac.uk
Enjoy this little effort.....
Other Solaris Games:
Well since this is the first Solaris release, no other games are
available at the time of writing, but a few are in the pipeline:
'Picaxe Pete' A nice platform game - collect the keys to advance
through the doors - destroy the boulders before your
pickaxe crumbles away, and more...
(nearly finished)
- 'Boolz' Pang - Type game set over various locations - destroy
the bubbles!
(50% complete)
Also I have written a handy '16 Greyscale ILBM' to 'ASCII' coverter to
convert pics to a nice looking ASCII text picture - handy for sprucing up
those E-mails quickly and effectively.
Credits:
CODE: Aaron McDonald
GFX: A. & Eiden McDonald
Sound: A. McDonald (Again?)
Music: Various anon authors - mods found on various CD's, I thank
them all for their mods - email me to include your names
in the credits in furure updates of Rebound.
Testing: What you have to TEST a game? (Joke)