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The Games Machine 49
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5TH_DEMOS.iso
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exp_main.LZX
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Expansion
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History.Txt
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2012-03-01
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The history of Expansion
* This is really a development history - most of the notes can be ignored!
(here lie the mad scribblings of a perfectionist)
V0.0 (pre 9/97) - First demo, released via the RAMTronicsNET web site.
Many major ommisions in this version, but farming,
fishing, gathering wood and expanding your borders work.
V0.1 (25/ 9/97) - Main program renamed to 'Expansion' from 'Expanshell'
to ( 6/12/97) the name came from the fact that I started the project
with a demo version of the Amiga E compiler, so could
only compile executables <10k, so Expansion contained
the maths, and Expanshell contained the GUI (the shell).
When I bought the Amy resource CD containing the full
version, I moved all of the code into one.)
- Added 'Yearly report'.
- Changed routine that picks initial starting point, to
ensure that there is a supply of wood right at the
start.
- Fixed 'Newest Message' bug.
- Automatically assigns FONTS: directory, for a tidier
installation. at last when run from Cli anyway -
fixed later.
- The About requester now displays built in text, rather
than using a pre-drawn IFF file.
- Made toolbar less 'picky' about which button you clicked
on.
- Updated land identification database (Query sometimes
identified shoreline as 'unknown').
V0.11 ( 7/12/97) - Many small experimental changes (such as an options menu
to ( 1/ 1/98) which got removed again later when the prefs program was
INTERNAL RELEASE introduced (see below)
V0.2 ( 1/ 1/98) - I realised that the Expansion font that was being
to present distributed was not the most up-to-date version (The
sub-menu arrows appeared as shaded squares with the old
font)!
- Added Random map generator.
- Added background music.
- Sound is played using a 'plug-in' system, allowing
players for cdda, midi, Ahi, etc to become available.
(Currently only protracker, and 'no music' modules are
available)
- Re-drew the tree / forest tiles.
- Converted readme file into AmigaGuide format.
- The map window can now be resized. (Note that as a side
effect, the white box that shows which part of the map
that you can currently see is not present in this
version.)
- The map window redraw is now handled by a seperate
process, so that the game continues to run whilst the map
updates!
- The mouse pointer now changes shape to suit the current
tool selected.
- Changed 'Query land' to 'Query'.
- Villages now exist on the map, although they don't
actually do anything yet, except take up land and look
pretty!
- Added 'Assistant' entry to the subjects menu.
- Completely re-wrote the window scrollbar code - It now
uses nicer-looking 3D bars, scroll arrows, and adjusts
properly to hires screens! :-)
- The main window is now also handled by a separate process
This makes the game far more responsive, since on slower
machines the redraw process could halt the program for
a fraction of a second.
- Assitants code currently disabled.
- The new messages indicator now detects the width of the
screen's depth gadget, and opens in the correct position.
- The program can now be run at any screen depth between 4
and 8, meaning that ECS users can run it in 16, 32 and 64
colour modes, and AGA and gfx card owners can use 128 and
256 colour modes too!
- A prefs program replaces the old tooltype system, making
changing the screenmode, graphics and sound modules much
easier.
- A change in requirements - Kickstart v39 is now needed.
Sorry if you still have V37, but sadly Kickstart 3 adds
many functions which are imposible on earlier versions.
Besides, upgrading your Rom will give your Amiga a new
lease of life!
- Program icons are now IconX scripts which start the real
programs, since I had huge problems with Workbench startup
code. (This also fixed the problm with the automatic FONTS:
assign - it didn't work when Expansion was launched from
Workbench)
- Added AHI module, which plays samples using AHI's Audio:
handler (see the Ahi docs) - If you get a requester asking
you to insert volume AUDIO: then you need to install AHI and
make sure that the Audio dosdriver is in devs:dosdrivers/
- Started work on a border fade effect which applies a mesh
effect around the edge of vision.
- Newest unread message menu now works.
- Added NewLookMenus flags to all the other windows (It had
been added to the main window, but the others had been
overlooked) - This makes the menus look much better.
- Assistants added (Can be toggled from the Subjects/Assistants
menu (note that with all three checked, the game pretty much
plays itself!)
- Cleaned up the 256 colour map tiles, givin a more smooth
appearance (If you're running in less than 256 colours,
you're loosing out!)
- Deserts (no, not pudding!) added - these currently serve no
purpose except to use up land!
- The villages now all have unique names!
- Added a second AHI module which copies all the sounds to the
Ram Disk first, to prevent the continual disk access caused
by the non-caching version.
- Fixed the bug where the main window's title got scrambled.
- The message window now scrolls, so as a side-effect, the
minimum size of the window is much smaller, and the messages
can be longer.
- The main and map window threads now use semaphores, so
should no longer attempt to run twice at the same time.
- A few more tweaks made to the game's font
- Added another semaphore to help provent the occasional
graphic errors where the program accidentially draws
in the wrong window.
- Changed the positions of the graphics on screen, so that
there is no longer a single pixel gap between the bottom
of the title bar and the top of the toolbar, and also
made the line at the left of the new message indicator
black instead of grey.
- Added tooltips - leave the mouse pointer over the toolbar
for a couple of seconds and it will tell you what that
button does.
- Updated the query tool, so that it's message automatically
updates.