¢ADDING A MOUSE¢¢Part 7¢¢by Kevin Cooke¢¢¢ This time I hought I would take a look at the latest development from KE-Soft, namely THE BRUNDLES EDITOR.¢¢ The first thing to note is that this program requires you to own a mouse - it will not work with a joystick! KE-Soft should have included a joystick option to open up a larger market for their product. Never mind, I own a mouse! Also, take note that you will require the original Brundles disks (reviewed by Stuart in issue 11 of Futura).¢¢ The program comes in a plastic re-sealable pouch. Inside comes an A4 instruction sheet, folded in half to allow a front and back cover. The first thing that becomes obvious here is that the English instructions start on the back page and continue inside, split over two pages and mixed with the German instructions! I really feel that KE-Soft should have seperated these so that all of the English instructions came on page 1 and part of page 2 and the German instructions took up the rest of page 2 and the back cover (or vice verca). This would have made the instructions look much more professional. In their current state they really start the product off in the wrong way. Anyway, the real test of the package was the program itself, so I booted the disk with an open mind.¢¢ The first thing that surprised me was to see Turbo BASIC loading. I'm not against commercial products being created in Turbo BASIC (indeed, it is a very good programming language) but it was a surprise after the original Brundles program. Anyway, the first thing to appear was a fairly drab title screen, showing the option of loading either the SCREEN EDITOR or the CONVERTOR. I opted for the screen editor and eagerly waited for it to load.¢¢ A text-only menu quickly appeared displaying the various options available. The first thing to do, I discovered, was to choose the landscape to be used in the level. This is done by clicking on the left and right arrows next to a box at the bottom of the screen, changing the landscape option each time. When you have chosen the landscape, a click on the "OK" box loads in the scenery data, allowing you to start editing the playfield. However, first you will want to alter the specifics of each game, e.g. the time allowed for completion, the amount available of each special skill, the number of Brundles to save, etc. Again, this is done in the same way as before, working well and allowing changes to be made quickly. To edit the playfield, a quick click on the "EDIT PFD" box brings up the screen editor.¢¢ At first glance this looks quite impressive. The playfield is blank but at the bottom of the screen are all of the items available for use on the level. Here, movement of the mouse moves an arrow which is closly followed by a small selector box. I would imagine that the box is supposed to move at the same rate as the arrow but it does tend to lag behind a little, meaning that you often have to wait a second for it to catch up with the arrow! It would have been better to dispose of the arrow and have the mouse move only the selector box. Anyway, by clicking on the object you would like to place on the playfield you can place one of that item with every proceeding click. This method is very similar to that used in the screen editor of games like Mr Robot and works very well. As an added bonus, a special keyboard command will allow you to fill a large area with the piece which you have selected.¢¢ One other problem is that you sometimes think you have selected an object to use but then realise that it has not registered with the computer when you try to place it on the playfield. This is because the mouse button has to be held down for around a second - a quick click may well not register! However, these are only minor bad points on a generally good editing system.¢¢ The next step is to save a copy of your new screen to a back-up of your editor disk. What, you didn't read the instructions to discover that you needed a back-up?!! Never mind!¢¢ Anyway, when you have done this, you can convert your levels to a back-up of the level disk from the original game. What, you didn't read the instructions to discover...!¢¢ Right, converting your levels for use is a fairly simple process from now on. First of all you insert the disk with your levels into drive 1, type in the level number which you previously saved it as and press RETURN. The level is then loaded into memory. By then inserting your level disk and pressing the drive number, the level can be saved to disk and ERROR - 170 ?FILE AT LINE 5 can appear on your screen! Yes, that's right, the program isn't even error trapped properly! This is inexcusable in a commercial product nowadays - it's so simple to do - even I could modify the code to do it! The program will have converted your level to the level disk but it does not return to the beginning of the program like it is supposed to do as it is looking for a program on the editor disk which obviously is not in the drive! You have to re-insert your editor disk and type RUN again! This really shouldn't happen and brings the presentation down considerably.¢¢ Other minor irritations include the fact that as levels are numbered 1-100 in the game but 0-99 in the editor program, a level which you save as level 4 will be converted as level 5 onto your level-disk! OK, this is only a minor grumble (and it IS mentioned in the instructions) but I'm sure it could have been fixed easily.¢¢ Also, any items placed on the far left or right squares of the Screen Editor will be partially obscured by the screen-scroll arrows in the actual game! Again, only a small problem but one which should have been corrected or mentioned in the instructions.¢¢ Don't get me wrong. I admire KE-Soft for releasing a level editor rather than just selling us endless numbers of level disks but I wish they had taken just a few extra hours to finish the product off - believe me, that is all it would have taken! Also, a little while spent testing the product might have been a good idea.¢¢ The Brundles Editor serves it's purpose if you are desperate to create more levels for the original Brundles game. However, I cannot help feeling that, in it's current form, it is overpriced. If you are desperate to create levels then by all means buy it. If you are only slightly interested in creating levels I would have to recommend that you look at some of KE-Soft's other excellent programs or, alternatively, wait for forthcoming Lemmings clones to be released.¢¢¢ I hope you enjoyed this column. The content of my next column is currently TOP SECRET so you will have to buy the next issue of Futura to find out what it is! See you there... same place... different time!¢¢¢¢MOUSE TRIVIA¢¢ If you have to keep unplugging our mouse due to lack of space next to your computer for joysticks, etc. then you may well find a mouse holder useful. A mouse holder is basically a plastic case into which your mouse can slot. By then fixing the mouse holder to a convenient place (i.e. the side of your TV or the wall behind your computer), you can place your mouse inside of it, still allowing it to be connected but taking up no desk-top space. In the UK, mouse-holders vary in price from around 2-7 pounds although I wouldn't pay more than 4 pounds. The more expensive models tend to have no more features than their cheaper counterparts.¢
