Atari Mega Archive 1/Atari Mega Archive - Volume 1.iso/games/llamatrn.lzh/read_me.txt

INI File | 1994-08-27 | 20KB | 432 lines

[UPDATE at 02/04/91: I have split the program into two versions.
Run the version appropriate to the amount of RAM you got in yer ST.
All the samples would not comfortably sit in a 520, so rather than
drop any I have done 2 versions, TRON1MEG for systems with 1M or
more, and TRON_512 for all you halfmeggers. _512 has the same sample
file but quantised by 50%, the SFX are OK but the speech sounds
well muffled on this version, however the gameplay is the same for
both versions. {You want the best sonix get more RAM!!} Also, as
I believe I neglected to mention in the body of these instructions,
if you press 'x' during any wave you will be returned to the title
screen {so you don't have to get yourself killed when you want to
restart a crap game!}.

Enjoyo....

-- YAK apres-ski 02/04/91]


To use the old commercial line...

Congratulations! You are now the owner of LLAMATRON, a fast-action
arcade-style game guaranteed to have your FIRE button finger dangling
off at the tendons! '90s ultraviolence in its very essence! Hours of
fun for you (and a camel-friend if you like) blowing away horde after
horde of alien fiends in the comfort of your own personal environment!

This is the ST version of the latest Llama blast. It runs on all
incarnations of the ST. It can be transferred freely to hard disk.
Please transfer it, and this README file, to anyone you think might
benefit from a bit of serious mayhem. Upload it onto BBSses. Send
it to your favourite contacts. Only circulate it, iz all!

There will be an Amiga version in about three weeks (as of today 21
March 1991) - I'm just off skiing, I'll do the port when I get back.

[Update - there probably will be an Amiga version if it goes OK
on the ST, but I have a bunch of new hardware in my life right
now and I need to devote all my attentions to the P.... to the
new thing. So I will do an Amiga port if all you ST owners make
me proud and when I've done some Kore routines for ..the new
whatsit.. and I can spare my weekends.  YAK 10/4/91]

-- WHY?

You may be wondering why you have the latest Llama release either for
free or the price of a PD disk. Loads of reasons. Loads. Call the
cops.

Allow Yak to explain:

Llamasoft has been around since 1982. This makes us just about the
longest surviving software house ever {okay except Microdeal, hey
you guys, I know, well done, glad you are still around and hey!
don't sue me, I just play this here keyboard} and we have a pretty good
perspective on the industry of video game production and the way it
has evolved.

This is how it was:

In the very early days, there was a very close relationship between
the originators of games and those who played them. You would go
along to (say) the Vic Centre, there would be a bunch of games, you
play them and buy the ones you like. Funky. Bad games didn't sell,
good ones did.

Then, as with anything which becomes popular, the Men In Suits moved in.
They saw some programmers getting rich selling to the people, so they
decided to move in. "Let us help these poor programmers", they sez.
"We can sell these games to the people. Let the programmers get back
to their assemblers and not have to worry about duplicating tapes and
filling their living rooms with huge piles of stock".

And so the Men In Suits came, and placed their full-page airbrushed
artwork adverts in all the mags, and the programmers went back to their
assemblers and for a while they were happy. The Men In Suits were happy
too, because they got to take a cut, and soon some of them were driving
Porsches.

The Men In Suits looked out upon the market, and they were sorely
dismayed at the diversity of the products. "This is not efficient",
they thought. "How can we best use this market? How can it be made
to serve us well?"  And they created film licences and arcade
conversions. They burned the midnight oil, murmuring incantations
over their calculators and their mobile 'phones, and eventually they
came up with the Formulas. "Loads of graphics!", they told the
programmers. "Loads of music! Arnie Schwarzenegger in it! No need to
design a new game - just change the graphics in these few basic designs
and put a picture of Indiana Jones on the box! You'll never have to
think again!"

The programmers went back to their assemblers. The Men In Suits handed
them pieces of paper upon which were written the exact specifications
for the games.  The programmers had to pay their mortgages, so they
coded and were employed. The Men In Suits laughed, and took a bigger
cut, and moulded the market to make themselves an even bigger pile.
Soon, some of them were driving Ferraris and getting pissed at
industry dinners.


This is how it is:

All video games are designed for a theoretical entity known as Darren.
Darren is a spotty 14-year-old male who doesn't get on that well with
people, so he spends all his time in his bedroom playing games on his
computer. Darren is easily impressed by graphics and music, and he
doesn't really want to learn anything really tricky - as long as it
has Ninja Hampsters in and works with a Kempston, that's OK. Somehow
he can persuade his Dad to fork out 25 quid once every few weeks for
the latest version of R-Type with different graphics on his Amiga,
don't ask me how. Either that or he waits and hits up his mate Wayne for
a pirate version in a couple of weeks' time.

Consequently, it has become much harder for programmers to retain
their creative integrity and earn a living too.  It is virtually impossible
for a small independant developer to get games out to the people
without first hooking in to one of the larger companies for distribution
and advertising, and those larger companies tend to want stuff that's
very normal, spaceship-and-alien stuff, no llamas please and not too
weird.

However, with popular disk-based machines, the idea of Public Domain
programs has really come into its own. PD libraries give access to
a large amount of free software.  PD is usually sub-commercial stuff,
often good utilities but without the 'polish' of commercial
versions.

It would be nice to use the existing PD libraries to distribute software
to anyone who is interested, and make a bit of money too - and that
is where Shareware comes in.

The principle of Shareware is simple. The game is distributed by the
PD libraries, by uploading onto BBSes and giving copies away. Users can
get a complete version of the game just for the price of the media,
and then take it home and play it. If the user likes the game, he
sends the author a Shareware fee.  Usually, the author will send
back a few goodies (as an incentive to register) and, if enough people
send in the dosh to make it worthwhile, he may do more Shareware stuff.

Naturally you don't have to pay anything if you don't like the game.
Of course a lot of people might like the game and decide not to pay,
but if too many people do that then nobody will ever bother doing any
decent Shareware at all, and it's back to Darren's 25 quid games.
So, it's down to the users - if they're honest, then programmers will
be more inclined to work hard on Shareware releases.

The idea of Shareware is very idealistic, perhaps impracticably so,
but the advantages over the conventional videogame market are so
enormous that I thought it had to be tried, at least once.  The response
from this experiment will determine whether or not Llamasoft release
any more shareware.

Advantages of Shareware:

1- It is a totally honest way of selling. All users can try the game
and only those who get hooked are morally obliged to pay the fee.
Nobody is disappointed or feels ripped-off.

2- There are no constraints on creativity. No-one says 'we cannot
publish this because it ain't mainstream'. Programmers do what the
hell they like and the users vote with their Shareware fees.

3- Anyone can play. The mechanism of distribution is already in
place in the form of PD libraries. All the originator has to provide
is a disk to each of the PD libraries with game and documentation.
So if you have good stuf