Amoszine 5/Amoszine 5.adf/arts/Diary.asc.cm/Diary.asc.cm

Text File | 1992-02-26 | 56KB | 970 lines

@4
                         Fortress II(Part Four)
@5
                   Author: Lee Bamber of Digital Ninja
@6
Well, dispite the final part of this diary already published, welcome to yet
another final part.  Hopefully, we'll see the final final part of this great
diary eventually.  But is that what you want?  Hmm.

We left our diary during the compilation of the main code, and we begin with
this rather awesome task in as many days as it is nessesary.  With luck, and
consider I write this at the start of each diary part, we should, by the end
of this diary,  have  a very impressive main program running pretty much all
the sub-prototypes that have been programmed over the last few months.

Further, we may even see how I get on submitting it, reflecting on the first
few responses and crying into our collective hats at the unfavourable reply.
But 'tis not a matter for premature conclusions.    Let's get stuck into the
job at hand...Making the best damn Digital Ninja game yet.

When this diary does finish, another project diary is unlikely as it is very
hard work.  You may not realise, but taking time out every day to enter a
report on your activities is very demanding and requires alot of discipline.
I know some of you actually enjoy reading it, and for that I'm pleased to
continue.  Just to see how many find this beneficial, write if you would
like me to continue beyond F2 and diversify into all of Digital Ninja's
activities.  That simply means finding a 'Diary of a Programmer' article, in
which you'll read in no great detail what Digital Ninja and I are getting up
to.  What's being programmed, what letters I've found interesting, which PD
library has stabbed me in the back, which individuals have suddenly formed
an opinion of me and a general look-see into my personal life.  Interested?
Well you'll have to tell me or I'll instantly drop it as a bad idea and too
much work for a bunch of unappreciative layabouts.  Not that YOU are, just
everyone else (think about it).  Well, I'm running out of vocal energy, so
why not open a door to the past and delve into a development now history.

@5
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
@4
DATE: 25th November 1994
NOTE: No worries, plenty to do
@1
   Knowing exactly what is required for the next two weeks of work is a very
   tortuous business indeed.  Where is the fun of exploration when you know
   exactly the tasks you will be doinng right down to the hand-movements.  I
   am one for persistance, and the effort I put into stuff is moderated by
   my interest.  I pity the work that lies in my schedule for the next week.

   But for the better, I know what I'm doing is positively great and I'll at
   least have fun playing the routines during all the coding mayhem.

   What have I done since Issue 4?  Well, I've eaten alot of deep-pan pizza!
   But apart from eat, sleep, study, sleep and sleep, I've done quite abit
   in the way of putting together the skeleton of the main code.  And quite
   comprehensive too.

   The main code, as it will frequently be refered to, was based on the map
   prototype, and this also conveyed the chap movement stuff, so it was a
   logical choice.  I quickly and professionally added the town and fort
   window programs into the main code and coupled the many variables to make
   it one single program (no easy task!).  I then skipped into my F2 World
   Maker, and added facilities to edit the contents of each town.  I did not
   do this for forts as I have decided (or re-affirmed) that the forts all
   start off as either ruins or rocks.  Only at the start of the game is a
   small castle created for each empire taking part and they will be settup
   then.  With the town data saved by the editor and loaded by my main code,
   I had in my arrays the data I needed for the town windows.

   Two days later, I could scroll around a map, clicking towns and forts,
   and getting the fully error trapped and instant windows relating to the
   plot selected.

   Next, I had to tie the town and the fort together by common nessesity.  I
   got the town blacksmith sending a catapult to the fort, training a
   resident troop division.  I got the town military selling the fort a
   trainer.  All the time error trapping for stuff like clicking YOUR fort
   and not an enemy empires.  Checking for whether the fort was full of
   trainers (maximum of 6 I decided).  And general boring limitaions you
   really don't need to know until you're playing it and suddenly find you
   can't send 2000 catapults to a fort with a small courtyard!

   In considering another town service, the builders.  I needed more graphic
   work done.  Specifically, I required some skafolding.  When the builders
   start working of the fort, it would be nice if not essential to see the
   improvements and building represented somehow.  Into DPaint I went and
   drew some skafolding over a 'fixed backdrop' of a typical fort.  In the
   next few hours I found I needed different designs of skafolding for the
   different forts.  In the end, I had three types of skafolding.  All are
   static with no animation, and I'm happy with that for now.  Can't think
   of a way to make this fort&skafolding look like a busy building site?

   In fully intergrating the town window, it lead to the creation of
   campaign troops.  This would be an actual chap, standing just outside the
   fort wall.  Creating the chap was no problem, as the code already existed
   from the origional map prototype.  Come to think, it wasn't that hard to
   achieve.  It was straight forward because I had spent so long dreading
   it, by the time I did it, I knew EVERYTHING.  It only took about 20
   minutes.

   Now in creating a chap, standing outside the fort and doing nout, I then
   needed a way to move the chap around the map.  All the path movements and
   stuff was done, fine!  But how the PLAYER actually says 'move' to the
   old chappy.  Decided it was that a little minature menu should be used
   for all your little chappies.  Unlike Fortress I, which controlled the
   armies from the forts, these chaps will be controlled from themselves.
   Let me explain, please...

   When you see a chap and want to move it, or make it attack something, or
   join it with another neighboring army or even make it retreat if it's
   already attacking.  You simply click and hold down the left mouse button
   on the chap itself with the mouse pointer.  Ok, no when you do this a
   small menu system will appear over the chap:
@5
   /---------------------\
   |      | TRAVEL       |
   | Pic! | ATTACK       |
   |      |--------------/
   \------/
@1
   Where 'pic' is, an icon will be graphically representing what the chap is
   currently doing.  You can click on a chap at anytime.  Things may need to
   be clarified, eg.

      A chap is moving to a neutral town...
      If it is attacking, the town will fight back and a battle will begin
      If it is travelling to the town, they will enter and pose no threat

      As the chap is simple walking, how can you know what he is doing if
      you have been doing other things and just come back to it?

   So the icon will look professional, help the forgetful and basically give
   the game a touch of simplicity.

   The actions to the right will simply light up when the pointer moves over
   them.  They select what action to be performed.  Should the PLAYER let
   go of the mouse button, the menu will disappear and no harm will have
   been done.  Moving over a selection and remaining over when the button is
   released will select it.  The control system is widely used it business
   applications due to it's simple nature.  F2 needs alot of simple control
   systems.  The game is full to the brim, so everything else needs to be
   no-fuss logic.

   At the moment, I've considered for actions:  TRAVEL, ATTACK, RETREAT and
   JOIN.  These where the four from Fortress I, so maybe later this list
   will be added.

   NOTE:  Just as a helping tip, it such a situation arises, where you may
   need to add stuff in your graphic work.  Make the design of the grabzone
   bottom-open or open-ended.  In DPaint, the actions have been typed out
   so the menu can be constructed faster, but the words TRAVEL, ATTACK, etc
   have been placed in a box with no bottom line.  it looks like:
@5
   __________________
   |     ATTACK     |
   |     TRAVEL     |
   |     RETREAT    |
   |     JOIN       |
   |                |
   |                |
 @1
   I may decide to extend the list by another four actions, so this is a
   wise move for the future, you'll see.

   Right, that's about it for now.  I have to go into AMOS tommorow and
   write the code to make this little menu system work.  I'm not using the
   main code as everytime I run it, it takes about 15 seconds after all the
   loading, setting up, etc.

   NOTE: Creating sub-programs may be fiddly when compiling the main single
   program, but you're assured of a faster development and dedicated code
   for the task at hand.

   The skafolding isn't so much a program as a small addition.  Just create
   some extra grabs while it is grabbing the rest of the general game grafix
   and add a line into the bob plotter for the flag and gate of each fort.
   Maybe a small array to store the offsets of each skafolding plot on each
   fort type.  No problem.

   But F2's completion is now assured.  I didn't want to scare you, but with
   a game so broken up into so many sub-prototype programs.  It is very very
   likely the final program never gets compiled.  The programmer is so bored
   with each piece, there is very little incentive in putting them all in
   one program.  Fortunately, I'm no ordinary programmer.  My skills at
   coding is only exceeded by the effort I can summon when required.  Let's
   now hope my single worry (whether the small menu is constructed fast
   enough) will be stomped on in the next few days.

@5
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
@4
DATE: 5th December 1994
NOTE: Returning to the light
@1
   Over the last week, I've been working on F2 with a passion.  A mad
   violent run of eagerness to complete the game.  Absolutely no where near
   a finishing date, but I like to think lots of little bits worked on with
   as much force as possible brings the end that little bit closer, faster!

   So what have I done?  Well the chap can be directly clicked and a
   mini-menu is produced with the actions that is available to the chap's
   current situation.  If he's attacking, there is an option to RETREAT.
   If there is more than one army, there is the option to JOIN.  TRAVEL
   and ATTACK are constant and are always avaiable.

   After this was working (only took me about 2 hours), I went on to the
   next part I wanted which was the logic behind the JOIN action.  It
   started simple enough, but it went on throwing up stupid outcomes for
   the next three days.  Eventually, I took each peice aside and gave it a
   right analysis.  Once I altered a few techniques that didn't seem to
   make the action any easier, I started to put in all the code in which
   detected for situations where an army was not clicked and other stuff
   which the game would not accept.  e.g Moving to an occupied town.
   TRAVELing to an enemy town or fort (must ATTACK!), etc.  The list of
   things the user couldn't do was extensive which cued my next piece of
   code.  I needed an error message prompt.  In true, quality games style,
   I created an error box that fades into the screen, centres the prompt
   text, allows the player to press any button, then fades out.  All the
   errors are stored in a strong array, using my well-cool routine which I
   have been using for quite a while.  It goes something like this:

   [Pseudo code, so don't try and enter this as an AMOS Listing!]
@6
   Dim MES$(50)
   MES$(1)="Cannot enter enemy town"
   MES$(2)="Cannot join with enemy army"
   MES$(3)="The town is already occupied"

   Do
    '
    If Error occurs because you tried to move into town occupying 2nd army
       ERRORMESSAGE=3
    End If
    '
    ...rest of code...
    '
    Gosub _HANDLE_MESSAGE
    '
   Loop

   _HANDLE_MESSAGE:
    '
    If ERRORMESSAGE>0
       Print MES$(ERRORMESSAGE)
       ERRORMESSAGE=0
    End If
    '
   Return
@1
   Yep, mega simple, but the full version would bore us daft!  The Print
   command is much more sophisticated and uses further routines from the
   main loop, but the logic is sound.  The variable controls WHEN and
   WHICH error message is thrown to the screen.  It saves on repeating the
   equivilant of the Print command everytime you want to declare an error
   message.

   So, I did myself an error message system.  Next came a pause where my
   next few steps where considered.  Some problems found:

     o Don't know what is in each army that's roaming about
     o If army has to turn back because their destination was suddenly
       taken, then the player may come back and find their army somewhere
       else!  To solve this, the army leader must explain what has happened

   To answer these nagging doubts in my own mind, two new actions where
   created for the army MINI-MENU system, they are:

   ROLL-CALL = Displays division types and quantities of the army selected
   REPORT    = This is conditional.  It only appears in the Mini-Menu when
               the army had to change their orders for any reason.  The
               reason is explained to you by the army leader.

   Ok, so proposing the remedies is fine, but I had to design and code it.
   Using old DP faithful, I drew up a panel which adds neatly onto the
   'still-present' mini-menu if you select ROLL-CALL.  The division types
   and quantities will be drawn using text plotting in the main code.  The
   REPORT was more sophisticated as I had to display the army leader, and
   have him speak/text prompt his (or her, lets not be sexist pigs!).  The
   explanations will be generalised to a particular change in orders will
   result in a message for that response.  These responses will be stored
   the same as our error-messages.  Fortunately, and I should damn well
   hope so, the routine for all this was coded earlier, if you remember?!?

   Called the POP-UP sub-project, it will create a head-and-shoulders image
   of a person and text will be dotted on screen at a speed equivilant to
   average speach.  Terminated by pressing a button at any time, this was
   a simple matter of putting the pre-coded routines in with my main code,
   enter the calls into my main loop and set a single variable when I wished
   to prompt the use of the pop-up facility!  Good code tahnks itself, you
   can bet your grandmother on that.

   After that, my dear brother discovered a TRAVEL/JOIN bug, and I spent a
   good few days sorting that out!  (again!)

   So on the 4th, I compiled a version of F2 that had full fort and town
   control.  Full (or as far as the driving code goes) army control.  Full
   error message and pop-up speach control.  Full control over path movement
   and place searching.  In fact, I spent the next half hour testing it with
   an absolute frenzy of orders.  The system handled with calculated ease!

   So I'm here.  It's the 5th.  I went to college, 09:55.  The network was
   once again, down.  That was no lecture until 12:00.  Did some shopping
   in Wigan.  Priced some stuff.  Went home, checked for letters.  Dropped
   of my Amiga Shopper magazine and the four-plug extension I had purchased.
   returned to college for 12:00.  2-and-half hours working through business
   plans and cash flows.  Lecturer expressed an interest in my general
   involvement in writing my own software, nothing new.  Discussed the idea
   of marketing F2 myself, using professional methods all the way upto the
   price.

   If a diary-part six is likely, maybe you can give me your opinions on my
   idea.  Have secured some backing for this idea, and looks to be the start
   of something quite wonderful for my game writing future:

   The quarter-page advertisement would detail-
@3
   Fortress II
   All Amigas (with 1MB) (A1200 enhancements)

   Contents: Large Box (Gloss Colour Illustrated Cover)
             3 Disk Pack + Fantasy World Disk
             Disk Labels (Colour Illustrated)
             Plastic Sealbag for Disks
             User Manual (Gloss Colour Cover, Laser Printed Contents)

   Features: Upto six empires competing for world domination
             Serial/Datalink option for 2 player campaign
             Sampled Speech (for A1200)
             Each world 88 screens in size
             PAL/NTSC Compatable

   Price: £25.99 (inc Postage and Packing)
@1
   The question is, do you want this 'commercially presented' game at a
   'commercially correct' price, via mail order?

   Everything you see above is exactly what I intend to do if F2 does not
   appeal to a Software House.  As I write, Christmas has gone, so those
   purses will be tight, and the big-boys won't want unsecure send-ins I
   fear.  All I can assume is the re-occurance of the large advertisments
   pretty much confirms the fact a great deal of people order software this
   way.  I don't.  So I'm hardly in a position to judge the market.  It's
   more an experiment than anything else.  Real money comes from knowing
   what's what.  And I want to know what's what before I spend a fortune
   attempting to do what I think 'what's what' is.  Get it?

   If I can just get across they will be getting a game, at commercial
   price, of commercial quality, commercially presented and exactly what
   they would get if they bought it from a shop.  But the money goes
   straight to the author and they are supporting a greater cause, without
   sounding like a sad-cloth-head who's written a back-bedroom game!

   Well, this remains to be seen, doesn't it?  I can handle all the colour
   illustrations through a friend I know.  The disks, labels and sealbag
   are standard purchases.  The manual comprises of one piece of A4 card
   and numerous photo-copied A4 sheets.  A gum-backed or sticky A4 colour
   cover will be placed on the card, folded with the sheets to form an A5
   booklet.  I have the photocopier.  The large page stappler is no large
   purchase.  The main problems are the box and the advertising.

   I need to get hold of alot of (but not bulk) large-game boxes.  Typical
   designs would be just smaller than A4, deep, and pure black with a
   white interior.  The sticky back cover illustration could be placed on
   the front of the box to complete the external presentation.  The adverts
   need to be good for the money I will be paying.  As it is not a utility,
   I'll have a harder time getting orders for a game via mail order.  I'm
   THE most honest person I know.  I never drop litter.  I can't lie.  I'm
   a moral angel.  I'm the most legal person on the face of the earth, but
   people see mail-order and they'd prefer to get a game from the local
   shop.  My adverts would need screenshots (so they can see it's not a
   crappy text-based or green-line strategy).  It needs a cartoony, colour
   blazing presence.  Not too much writing to read.  Just highlights of the
   most original features.  That's just the objective side.  I also need
   to deal with the administration.  I've never done this before, and I
   don't have a clue as to how I can specify my advert to such great lengths
   without incurring higher prices than nessesary.  It's a sod of a problem
   I must proclaim, but a well-guarded sod of a problem.

   You can see I'm taking the management side of this game just as important
   as the software itself.  I've given quality software, now it's time I
   gave myself some quality management skills.  Granted, if a Software
   House takes it, I'll take the money and be just as content.  You see, if
   this happens, I'll have even more money to spend on advertising, on
   the software package itself and with this higher risk, I will create
   an even better piece of software.

   Anyway, I stand-down.  If you've any insight that will nudge me alittle
   bit further down this rather unfamiliar road, My team and I will say
   such things as 'oooh' and 'what a nice dude'.

   So, what's next.  Well, I don't know.  I suppose I should do the ATTACK
   and RETREAT actions of the Mini-Menu system now, shouldn't I?  I have no
   reason otherwise other than the fact that it's 02:31 in the morning
   and I'm quite out of energy.  Nackered to the rest of you.

   Any why is that?  Well I have re-arranged my bedroom from a design I
   thought was unbeatable.  My new design was inspired by the fact that
   because our house (thus all the rooms) are lob-sided.  That's right, we
   have a house that leans to one side.  Now shut up and listen.  The
   computer was situated such that I was breaking my back leaning back and
   to one side (45 degrees).  It caught up with me after two years and so I
   decided to rearrange everything.  I took this opportunity to better
   settup my Amiga workstation (as it is increasingly becoming).  After a
   very brief lecture on Ergonomics, which I now know all about, my
   layout reflects an efficiency that a professional settup would strain to
   match.  Would you like to see:
@4
   ########/#######/#WALL WITH WHITEBOARD/CORKBOARD#////////#########/
   ##HIFI## #T.V#&#    #SECOND DRIVE#SAMPLER#VIDI12#        #FILING##/
   ######## #VIDEO#      #CDROM# #SWITCHER# #PRINTER#       #CABINET#/
   ######## #######            #AMIGA#             |     ___#########/
   /              |______________________ #MOUSE#  |    |            |
   #                            /   \    |##MAT##  |    |            |
   D                             Me!     |         |    |            |
   O                            \   /    |_________|    |            |
   O                                                    |            |
   R                                                    |            |
   #                                            _____   |            |
   /                                           |     |  |    Very    |
   /                                           |TABLE|  |    Nice    |
   /                                           |_____|  |    Cosy    |
   ################ #ALARM# /////////////////////////// |    Bed     |
   ##PHOTO-COPIER## #CLOCK# /////////////////////////// |            |
   ################         /////////////////////////// |            |
   ################         /////////////////////////// |____________|
   ///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
@1
   My lord, what is this guy like.  You want to read about F2 and the quite
   marvelous developments of this epic game, not what Lee's bedroom looks
   like.  Oh well, you're enjoying yourself.

   Still, I'd better leave you for tonight.  See you later...

@6
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
@4
DATE: 6th December 1994
NOTE: Smeg, what was I on last night?!?!!
@1
   Righty, have a good mind to remove the second half of the last entry,
   but I don't think it would go well with the philosophy of this diary.
   Which basically is tell it as it is.

   No direct work on F2 today.  But a significant indirect step towards the
   sound and music support F2 will eventually starve for.  Something I've
   knocked around in my head for a while, and now finding the people and
   the purpose to do it.  It's a music creator for games programmers.  It
   differs from Soundtracker, Med and ABK music because the music it creates
   is COMPLETELY controllable from the game, handles sound effects as a
   combined and cohabitting entity (instead of an interuption), plus the
   music is generated using the amigas sound chip and the music data can
   be stored completely in FAST ram.  Lots of good points to this move, and
   Fortress II will be wanting some serious 'sound/music' support later.

   Between Mike Richmond and myself, we've cast the idea into an experiental
   coding run.  Seeing what AMOS can do, and how exactly the music will be
   run.  Mike is a great musician, and has the point of view of someone who
   has had extensive sessions writing music using very well established
   music packages.  It's felt he can bring over the better features that are
   required, plus recommend new and desired functions to set it apart.  I
   have proposed the project to another fellow chum, Andrew Campbell.
   Already established for his high-quality productions, he can bring in the
   game writers point of view, plus provide that edge which just shines
   through the many interfaces he has written so far.  I'm using the working
   title of SYNTHAMOS for the moment (SYNTH to describe the access to the
   Amigas sound chip, and AMOS for the blinding news that it's written in
   AMOS).  As one word, it rolls of the tongue and I quite like it.

   Plans?  Well, SYNTHAMOS will be completed with a professional editor,
   the procedures to include into the users programs and a host of source
   code examples, pre-defined wave patterns and music scores.  I think all
   concerned would agree the best form of distribution will be SHAREWARE.
   If they agree (it is a team thing), it could be a test run for F2.  Get
   all the same ingredients.  Box, Colour gloss illustration stickers, etc.
   Get some advertising out, not to the scale of F2 but significant enough
   to reach the high-buying market, not just PD.  At the very least, it's
   something I can use in F2 and future AMOS productions.  At the very
   best, it becomes a known AMOS product under a team-label combining the
   efforts of a top AMOS team and makes enough money to put utility writing
   up a rung in Digital Ninjas future project considerations.

   As at 03:20, now morning almost, I have half-written the Wave Pattern
   Editor with a very slick, graphically finished interface.  I'm sure
   Andrew Campbell can make the interface graphics ten times more striking,
   but I'm asking myself whether people would want the utility to look
   serious and spacious, or crammed with detail and realism of some
   relevant scenario.

   And no, Steve, I'm not doing a 'diary-of-a-utility'.  I have to get up
   again in about 4 hours, and I'm still at my keyboard!

@6
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
@4
DATE: 6th January 1995
NOTE: HELLS 'Jingle' BELLS!  Where have you been?  I've been to the castle
      to see the queen.  Larr-de-darr, is he drunk?  Let's hope so...
@1
   Well, HELLO!  What!  It's been a pretty good month.  I always enjoy the
   months with christmas thrown in.  Lots of smiling faces.  Buying things
   of little or no practical value to offer as gifts, and generally wasting
   hard earned royalty money making people happy.

   I've not updated the diary for a month for a very simple reason.  It's
   so simple I won't tell you, cos it's just so simple.  Anyway, I'm here
   now and that's all there is to it.  I've been working on F2 alot, and
   focused my efforts on completing the chap movements so all the code is
   done.  The only code to be entered is very simple and structured addons
   to the framework.

   The mini-menu for the chaps now can offer TRAVEL, ATTACK, RETREAT, JOIN,
   ROLL CALL, REPORT and POPULATE.  All of them work perfectly now, and
   enables my armies to move anyplace your empire owns and can shuffle,
   monitor and transfer peasantry, skilled warriors and catapults.

   The news one you don't know is POPULATE!  This was malcs idea, and is
   designed to re-populate deserted towns and re-enforce existing town
   malitias.  You simply take x amount of peasants into your army, go to
   any town that's either yours or is neutral and the POPULATE option is
   offered.  Selecting it will present a little menu where you can transfer
   to and fro, a few, most or all of the peasantry.  It works well, and has
   opened up a new angle to the game.  Now you can murder an enemy village
   and repopulate with your own people!  Barbaric or what!!

   In the implementation of the POPULATE option, I had to add another
   two features to the MAYORS SECTION when you click on the town.  If you
   remember all the faces repesenting the different services of the town.
   Well clicking on the mayor gives you the window that allows you to set
   tax for the town based on how generous you are and how mean the mayor
   is.  Well I've added another sub-section of the mayors window where you
   can demand the drafting of peasantry to be recruited as soldiers.  They
   can fight as simple peasantry, but you may also buy trainers from a
   military service and train them up to become knights or whatever.  All
   this has been done.  Try to demand too many, and the mayor will wage his
   own personal war against you.  Battleing with insignificant towns for fun
   may prove a worthy sport for the really EVIL!  The second feature, and
   not to be fully understood at the moment is the priority switch.  If I
   have already covered this, who cares, I'm the boss.  This switch will
   set whether the town will get help from surrounding allies if attacked
   or will fight with the malitia currently residing.  This is useful when
   you may have a number of strategically placed towns and you wish to
   block passage by enemy armies.  Low priority towns are fought for and
   is left to planning and later, hindsight.  But high priority towns can
   pull the needed amount of peasantry (if they are available) from any
   town that neighbors it.  It's a playful element, and should really get
   the strategists sweating!  For the rest of us, we set them all to very
   important towns and hope the enemt doesn't perform a parallel attack!

   Parallel attack is an understatement to Fortress II with six empires all
   wanting to be the ruler.  It's like playing space invaders on five
   machines at the same time!  The trick is to plan, show no mercy and
   protect your back.  You'll see!

   Now, what else?  I'm sure there alot of tinkering I did and just forgot
   but not much.  I really shouldn't omit any important features, as that
   would just defeat the objective of this diary.  Oh!  I also added the
   PEEP animations code.  I now have random happenings code imbedded and
   ready for all the little suggestions to make F2 landscapes come alive.
   What PEEP-Animation is, is very small animations that happen for about
   5-10 seconds then disappear.  Currently, I've done smoke pouring from a
   chimney in a town.  Little tiny dot-people walking around the town.  It
   presents a scale problem as the chap armies are about 15 pixels high and
   the peep-people are about 2 pixels high!  See?  There are welding light
   effects from the craftpersons barn.  When forts are under construction
   and the skafolding is up, you can see a little workman either hammering
   or sawing while balancing on a skafolding rib.

   Er, if I haven't mantioned it.  I did some code tied to the upgrade of
   the forts which surrounded the fort walls with skafolding graphics to
   show work is underway.  The drawbridge also automatically opens which
   adds another element to the strategy.  When you are building, the fort
   walls offer no added protection if the fort is attacked.  As the gate is
   open the walls are bypassed and the troops just fight it out as though
   there was no wall!  Clever huh?  They idea here is to make sure your fort
   is protected by campaign armies.  You can't suddenly cancel building as
   the builders will have removed vital elements of the door mechanics, just
   so you can't cheat!  I'll make something plausable up later.

   Before the final element is intergrated(the battles), the only remaining
   thing uncoded is the spy activity.  I'm leaving this 'til after the war
   code so the spy can make use of all the variables involved in the
   battle process.  Obviously to me, maybe not to you, I've not done the
   titlepage, world selector, victory sequence, game over screen, intro,
   cartoon inserts, music driver, sample driver, compatability limiters,
   enemy intelegence and modem control.  But hey, who's perfect.

   Righty, that F2 for the last month. Other TOTALLY-UNRELATED news is that
   I, Lee Bamber, have been honoured to find my 'Relics of Deldroneye' hit
   the top of the 1994 Amiga Format Best PD Games List.  Does that make me
   the best PD programmer of 1994, well at least that's how I'm going to
   interpret it!  And I'll be the best of 1995, darn it, too.  I'm going to
   enter the AF AMOSPro competition so I can have an official award to put
   on my wall.  They £1000 quid thing has nothing to do with it.  It would
   probably get me an advertisment in a single magazine for about 3 months!
   It is very unfair, I know.  It doesn't give you starters much of a
   chance, but I think the 'best amos game' should look decent enough not
   to push amos into another dusty cloud of false perspective.  That AF
   interview would be great fun too, I expect.  Whether the public is er,
   ready for me yet is something we'll have to look into.

   Other news, I've completed the first-draft storyboards to complete the
   Relics trilogy.  Relics 2 - 'Phantoms of Medivia' and Relics 3 - 'Lyvian
   Saviour'.  Relics 2 features alot of underwater action and Relics 3 has
   an explosive ending!  At the moment, I plan Relics2 to be an F1 release,
   and Relics3 to be released as a commercial game by my publishing wing of
   Digital Ninja (not yet online).  With my digitising system, I'm able to
   hand-draw the screen outlines so you'll be getting graphics from my own
   hand.  And speaking of art work, I've managed to rope my own mother into
   putting her oil-painting talents into the presentation of all Digital
   Ninja commercial games.  After all the box needs a professional cover
   illustration and it's certainly a fresh turn from what everyone now
   takes for granted.  I'll say no more at this early date, but alot of the
   £26 you will pay for the game goes towards the production of a pack that
   far exceeds the standard commercial game pack.  I'm not saying exactly
   what you'll get as I don't want anyone nicking the ideas.  Let's just
   leave you with the notion that should it meet with public approval, you
   will have a commercial game software house that not only uses AMOS but
   is damn well proud of it.  Furthermore, it will stand as a mildstone to
   the many AMOS programmers who may lose their way.  Rest assure, my only
   concerns are the advertising costs, and more immediately, the quality I
   put into the final stages of Fortress II's implementation.

   It's been a fully ol' 1994.  Filled with good times and bad times.  And
   of course times when it's a bad time because you feel like it and you
   can't be bothered to find out whether it's a good time or not!  Stay
   AMOS dudes, I'm going to start the Fortress II war code now, so catch
   y'all soon...

@6
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
@4
DATE: 8th January 1995
NOTE: Progression to Royalty
@1
   For once, I don't mean royalty of the fiscal kind!  I actually mean the
   kind that does what they want and suffer the press when they are caught
   in the act.

   I was watching a medievil film some time ago and someone commented on
   the fact that kings would grant titles to important people in exchange
   for money/soldiers.  I liked the idea but couldn't really put it in the
   game for design reasons.  Well yesterday, I started to think about it and
   have come up with a simple, yet exciting attribute to the game.

   Lets say you treat a town well, and the mayor isn't asked for too much
   tax and the town services do alot for your empire, the loyalty of that
   town's mayor will go up.  Maybe a scale of 1(hatful) to 10(loyal).  When
   it reaches 10, uy\\your advisors put the mayor up for a possible title.
   You decide whether to grant him a KNIGHTHOOD, an EARLSHIP or LORDSHIP.
   I don't know the hierarchical rank yet, I'll research that.  You can
   pick the title offered, and the higher the rank, the more money you get
   from the mayor.  Something around 5000, 7500 and 10000 gold pieces.
   As a consequence, the town is given static priority which means they
   will always be more important that normal towns (but not more important
   that towns with a mayor sho has a higher title).  Simply, important
   towns can summon assistance from other neighboring towns when attacked.
   Low priority towns can't.  Also the titled towns population can't be
   treated as peasants and are given the rank of subjects.  Subjects cannot
   be demanded for recruitment like peasants.  Subjects must be payed for
   upon recruitment.  The higher the title, the more important the subject
   is and the higer the price (per person).  The third feature of a titled
   town is a tax limit and recruitment mimimum level will be set by the
   titled mayor.  You MUST and WILL abide by these and the mayor MUST and
   WILL pledge total and forever support to your empire.  The only way a
   titled town can be re-influenced is by attacking and killing everyone
   and repopulating with peasants of another empire.  What do you think?
   Great or what.  As town mayors loyalty levels start of fairly low, the
   number of titles offered won't be high.  I'd try and get it so the town
   needs to be used and treated fairly for about 10-15 minutes realtime
   before the level reaches 10.  Remember, to demand high tax and force
   large amounts of recruits would make you less popular and I might add
   other factors when and if I think them up!

   Yesterday night (and through the early hours (and breakfast)), I coded
   the fundamental basis for the town and castle battles.  As the town and
   castle battles can have anything upto 20 divisions, each division with
   upto 10,000 troops, the battle code would be different from the army
   battles which only have 4 divisions maximum.  The new code, I named the
   'feeld fighting'.  The battles are very fair and primarily go off the
   size and strength of the combined whole.  There is also a small random
   element to give the battles some variance.

   Once this was done, I started on the graphics that would depict the
   results.  I began first with the castle attack.  I needed to begin the
   castle attack.  Maybe second, use the catapult, third storm the walls
   and finally get a final result graphic.  Went into DPaint, drew out
   the bits I forgot in the prototype code I did for the charge section
   (which is what I called the castle attack at the time).  I then modified
   the prototype code to use the feeld fighting maths and corrected some
   other bits.  The end result of that first session was to have a fully
   working battle between the troops that where safe in the fort and troops
   that where attacking.  Bit of a mis-match?  Well there should be.  To
   make the castle attack more interesting, I originally (in the prototype)
   gave the seige attackers ladders, grapplers and battering rams to
   overcome the defence of a fort wall.  In perfect game sense, I gave the
   fort boiling oilpots, rockdroppers and gate reenforcement stacks to
   counter the attacking devices.  And obviously, these items are obtained
   elsewhere in the game (probably from the travelling salesperson you
   should have read about earlier in the diary).  Anyway, this has all been
   done.  Next, I did the code for when the castle is yours and an army
   was attacking with catapult.  You would have your archers firing on the
   catapult operators and from your side of things the goal is to kill all
   the catapult operators.  This display was quickly coded and I still need
   to do the maths.  But then I stopped.

   In another prototype program, I have got afully working catapult routine
   which has the maths for archers firing on my catapult men.  In order to
   have some backdrop consistantcy, I decided to implement the catapult
   routine in the castle attack window NOW.  This I have still to do and
   it is now 10:10am, and this will be my next job.

   I often wonder what it must be like, working in a team of game writers
   with the design all layed out in front of them and not being able to
   change it to any great degree.  In the regard, I hope I never stop the
   kind of programming I do now.  People would say the code is poor and
   not thought out.  At first, this is very true.  But let that coder
   do spagetti programming for a few years and they will begin to handle
   it.  Either modifying their style or beginning to follow their own
   form of spagetti.  So what if noone else can understand it.  It's code
   that works and as soon as that coder begins more professional quality
   creations, they are as competant as any number of team coders.  I've
   been taught by the academic system that programming in a team is the
   only way to produce large systems that are efficient and deamed to be
   the only code that's taken seriously.  But I really believe one person
   who knows every byte of the code they write is in a much better position
   to shape the code to the best possible finish.  And being a games writer
   this theory is even more advantagous when you consider the power we
   have to change the idea as and when the creation demands it.  I remember
   readin something about the 'back-bedroom programmer is a dying race',
   well I'm certainly not dying, and having seen the flip side of the coin,
   I still believe a single programmer has competance above a team effort
   in areas where a team must surely fall.  And in team, I mean a team of
   coders.  Granted, should the team consist of an artist, musician, design
   clerk, coder and playtester then the combined whole is a force to be
   reckoned with.  But a room of coders is certainly not greater than the
   sum of it's parts.  I also conceed that one person who is the coder,
   artist, musician, sound tec, designer, playester and critic is stretching
   the canvas just abit.  But in my case, this simply means I take longer
   to create what would take a development team not half as long to produce.

   Strictly speaking, I have been blessed to have found a decent musician
   and a few very honest (that means they'll slag it off and not think
   twice) playtesters.  They know who they are, I'm sure.  And of course,
   the digital ninja crew is as good as any one professional games designer
   as the observations are those of customers, not suppliers.

   In as far as finding a good graphics artist (which is the last post to
   be filled before I can be treated as a coder and nothing else), the
   task is much more refined.  Talents such as A.Campbell who deals in the
   death and devestation graphics and M.Lavery who's very well drawn art
   stems from a more cartoon perspective are just two examples of good
   artists.  But they have their own software to write.  I find a good games
   artist is also a good games writer as freelance PD dudes usually start
   off as a one-man-band and needs to show the player what is going on
   by graphics before they can tell the game what to do by code.  If anyone
   out their reading this have a few hours to kill and can draw, then I'd
   like to hear from you.  Even so, I haven't found an artist yet who I can
   say 'you can do all the graphics', because I know I could do better
   in some areas and what would be the point in still doing graphics after
   appointing an artist.  This is an issue that I haven't found the need to
   resolve.  I have, to some degree, been using some exclusive graphics
   from Andrew Campbells portfolio, as they simply exceeded my own skills
   in the style they where drawn in.  And that's rare.

   One other snippet of news is that I plan to commission a huge poster
   from one of the cover illustrations created by my oil-painting mother.
   From the canvas original, I'm using my local reproduction shop in Wigan
   to get an A0 blow-up of the thing.  Use my friends laser printer prior
   to submitting the original to add the 'FORTRESS II - The EPIC Seuqel'
   text onto the canvas by super-emposing the text onto assitate, and then
   onto the illsutration.  For the unknowing, A0 is about 16 A4 papaers
   forming a rectangle (which is 84cm x 120cm - which makes the poser over
   a meter high).  Ans why?  Well, when you see all those interview pictures
   with the software designer and his settup he sits in, you always see the
   promotional illustration on the wall.  Well to boost my own efforts and
   make F2 more of a professional effort, I'm going to make F2 my first
   'proper' game.  Obviously I've done lots, but I'd like this to be one I
   can say I wrote for absolutely everyone, not just those in the Public
   Domain.

   Well my thoughts for today, ending 10:46am.  I'll just nip off now and
   see if I can complete the field fighting windows for the town and castle
   invasions.  After than, all that needs attension is the army battles
   and the spy workings.

@6
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
@4
DATE: 15th January 1995
NOTE: Feild of fluff
@1
   If you have written enough games, you'll get to a stage where your own
   arrogance can very easily get the better of you.  The charge window which
   I was to include the catapult routines, and the castle assault and all
   the maths that goes with it, if you remember.  Well all that's done.

   I now have a single prototype program which, if you are the troops
   laying seige to a castle, you will:-

   i) Wait in camp for order (advance with catapult if got one)
   ii) If got catapult, use until think it's ok to charge/attack
   iii) Attack castle with troops by scaling wall and fighting like that

   If you where the castle, the routine would depict:-

   i) Display of how many archers you have, how many enemy catapult
      operators are left to be shot and how much wall damage has been done.
   ii) Show actual assault of seige troops when computer/enemy decides to
      attack your castle troops

   Both shared a common fighting routine which is universal for all fights
   of this type (including the town fights, later).  The window display is
   as I expected, and I think everything in this quarter is done, exclusing
   the town battles which need alittle more thought.  My arrogance was in
   thinking this was a simple, straight forward peice of code to presume
   would only take me a short while.  It's taken about 6 months off my life!

   Something I think I have faced for the first time is the required nature
   of Fortress II.  It is very important for each of the six empire enemy
   intelegences to be able to do everything I can do.  This is for two
   reasons.  First, it gives the game unparalleled dimension(Oooh!).  And
   second, if a serial link is going to occupy the movements of one of your
   enemy empires, each controlling king player (whether computer, player or
   player via serial link) must be able to play as normal.

   The revelation came about as I was coding the enemies attack via catapult
   on your castle.  The enemy needed to settup the seige troops, decide how
   long they are to attack via catapult and then rush in the troops to kill
   and conquer if possible.  A tall order for something that I always
   treated as a control panel activity for the human player only.  It seems
   this will also need to be applied to everything.  The buying and
   recruiting bits I can handle.  They are instant transactions.  The big
   sods to tackle are the things like the fighting, the chain of tasks that
   need hindsight and forethought.  Like attacking towns, castles and army
   campaigns.  It seems I'm getting closer to enemy intelegence sooner than
   I would have scheduled.

   Don't ye worry, Uncle Lee will sort it out.  I have a knack of putting
   much effort into something deserved.  F2 is too far to be spoiled by a
   logic problem.  It was really something that should have been nipped in
   the butt at the design stage.  It served me well though.  From this day
   onward, I should never underestimate the intricasy of multi-user control
   strategies.

   About the serial link, it is perhaps arrogant to assume I can get a good
   serial connection when the time comes to program it.  I have only used it
   to transfer String messages to and from two Amigas, and never to convey
   real-time data to and from.  It is for this reason, I have been chewing
   on the idea of writing a game based on this study.  I have the concent of
   the Digital Ninja team, and the idea is good.  It will mean, however,
   that F2 will be put on ice as the game is programmed.  Just as Fortress
   the original was coded half way through Relics.  I shall not be doing it
   now, however.  The background maths has gone into another dimension and I
   must get my head around the many different occurances that I must plan
   and code for.

    IDEA: Orbstruck - Valley of Orbstock
    COPYRIGHT: Lee Bamber

    DESCRIPTION: Picture; A grid taking half the screen spanning into the
    distance.  On the horison, across the middle of the screen, a distant
    line of trees from one end to the other.  In the centre of those trees,
    a very small turret (only a few pixels in size, but nonetherless, it
    exists).  In the centre of this grid arena, a cone.  At the top of the
    screen, simple sky with the odd bird animation.  At the very bottom of
    the screen and obviously representing YOU, two soldiers in control of a
    modern digital mortar.  A device used to fire bombs.  The mortar can be
    pitched at a range of angles both up-down and left-right.  When fired,
    the bombs are thrown into the arena to land and explode at a grid point
    relative to the angles set.  In the arena, and always appearing from the
    sides, are Orbstock.  Orbstock are spherical entities that use magnetic
    tractor waves to move.  The tractor waves kick up dust from the sandy
    ground and create clouds in their ever speeding wake.  When the Orbstocks
    accidently hit the cone, they are absorbed, bringing the end of existance
    closer and closer.  Aim; Stop the Orbstocks destroying existance.  Stop
    then hitting the cone.  Task; Control the mortar and destroy the moving
    Orbstocks by firing bombs at their expected position.  Game; Use a serial
    link to have an identical player at the other end of the field.  The game
    can be team based or first-to-fifteen kind of thing.  Plus, the game is
    perfectly playable as a One-Player-Game.

    REASON: It will represent the first real-time serial link in a Digital
    Ninja game and is well worth the time-investment to create.  As for the
    playability, it feeld good in my head, and I have a craving for some
    really big explosions and lots of debree.  Also intend on bringing some
    more math based effects like sin/cos curving and close-up views using the
    extrapolated impact point and distance.  Nonsense notions for the moment
    but we live and hope.

   Anyway, that's for the future.  The immediate future maybe, but for now,
   something to chew on.

   Another quick tip-bit is the idea of Religion in Fortress II.  Nothing
   heavy just in case me and Rushti end up in the same basket, but a hint of
   the power the church had back in the medievil days.  Basically, it will
   go something like this:

   a) You start of the game as a set religion (it will never change)
   b) You can play as normal
   c) Towns sometimes have a church, with a preist you can speak to
   d) If the preist is of a different order, you cannot ally with the town
      Your only course is to subdue the population by attacking
   e) If the preist is the same religion, he to will contribute a tax just
      like the mayor.  This tax is also set by the crown (you).
   f) If you demand too much of the preist, your religious popularity will
      fall and lose respect.  Fall too low, and you are ex-communicated
      which results in no pease with god-fearing towns with churches.
   g) Not concrete, but might be able to commission the building of churches
      in selected towns to increase income and have a stronger posture if
      enemy empires try and take your towns.

   But that is another kettle of fish, along with the mayors title rights!
   For the time being, will want to add an 'ARCHERS BAY DESTROYED' prompt to
   the enemy catapult assault window, which I have forgot.  Need to finish
   the code off by programming in the detection of town battles which is
   abit more work than I first thought.

   In a town battle scenario, I have sussed the more finer points I had
   expected.  Now I find I actually have to code it!

   Upon travelling to an enemy/neuntral town:
                 a) we either truce and the town is allied with your empire.
                 b) or the town does not respect you or your religion and
                    demands that you leave
                 c) you can attack straight away or after you tried to ally

   Once owned, you may need to be called in for:
                 d) When town angry, riot needs to be subdued by force
                 e) or town is completely torched and left deserted

   Righty, once the town is dealt with, I shall need to solve another new
   problem.  When an army enters an enemy for to lay seige, they turn into
   the seige camp icon.  This icon can be sent any number of divisions and
   troops.  Upto twenty divisions, each holding 10,000 troops of that skill.
   When and if that army should leave, it is not possible to treat those
   massive numbers as one army.  It would completely ruin the army battle
   routine I've written.  It's too late to modify the idea of only having
   four divisions per army and I can't have more than four divisions anyway
   in the army.

   My only solution for the time being is to have somrthing called a LEGION
   BARRACK.  It's like a massive army, that has too many numbers to be
   controlled by one order.  These BARRACK icons can be placed next to
   towns, forts and other plot points.  They cannot move, nor do anything but
   send out armies, absorb armies, display the current inventory of divisions
   and troops.  Plus anything else I find will be needed.  Big question is
   will the player, you, bare having to manualy disband the LEGION into the
   army groups everytime you want to use the troops.  Maybe it is a natural
   request and not seen as extra effort, but it does go against the idea of
   having one place for troops, and one icon representing the movement of
   troops outside of forts.  Plus I'll have to deal with the interaction
   between LEGION BARRACK icons, army icons, enemy armies and suchlike.  I
   will be able to program the ramifications of this idea in a day with the
   right designs, all thought out, but alas, this isn't paradise.  No matter
   how much I think about it before coding, I'm going to miss something uut!

   Have mercy on me, until my next encounter with this station of confession
   that allows us both contemplation.

@6
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
@4
Well I think that's your lot.  It is perhaps fitting to break up a diary
like this as it gives you that air of anticipation until next time.  This is
one such break and forgive the briefness of this text, but for you to get
the latest possible entries, I have to act now.
@5
Until next time, see you soon!
@1
Yours in spirit, Lee Bamber of Digital Ninja.  Stay Amos!