Cream of the Crop 25/Cream of the Crop 25.iso/bbs/sorc092.zip/HISTORY.DOC

Text File | 1997-05-18 | 13KB | 246 lines

Sorcery vx.xx History File

*** v0.50a 5/29/96

        - Initial Version Released.

*** v0.60a 6/23/96

        - Fixed Problem with "Forfeit the Game" prompt.
        - Made a few cosmetic changes.
        - Changed the way Sorcery reads and writes Scores.Dat.
        - Sorcery now Strips Pipe "|" Color Codes from handles, for you
          Sysops who don't like your users to see |15Their |04Name that way.
          This may be put in again at a later time, with coding for colors.
          Sorcery does not at this time support Pipe Color Codes.
        - Optimized the code a bit. Some of the searching and randomizing
          routines run a bit faster on slower machines, now.
        - Fixed the problem where the computer's monsters could attack your
          character more than once per round. One attack per round is allowed
          directed at the player (or computer) by creatures.

*** v0.70a 6/26/96

        - Fixed Bug where enemy's creatures would attack your creatures
          sometimes even when you didn't have any creatures, displaying
          "Enemymonstername attacks your   for   damage!"
        - Fixed a long-standing problem writing scores.dat when the very
          first user exits the game. It now asks if you want to display
          high scores regardless of whether you are a new or previous user
          or if you won or lost you game. It also writes to scores.dat file
          every time you win or lose, also regardless of whether you are the
          first user or not.
        - Fixed "Time Limit Exceeded" error, when the user actually had quite
          a bit of time left. Remote Access seems to have negative seconds
          left in the door.sys file, when you actually have plenty of time
          left. It now reads seconds first, then if it is negative, it reads
          the minutes left and multiplies by 60 (for seconds). Thanks to
          Wayne Schroeder (1:280/1500) for that one.
        - Sorcery does not support RIP. If RIP is detected, it will default
          back to ANSI.

*** v0.71a 7/1/96

        - Fixed problem where game would drop "Time Expired" when the
          security level of the user was higher than 32,767. Changed drop
          file reader so that it accepts long integers and chops the
          security level down to 5000, since the game does not give any extra
          options for being at a higher security level. Thanks to Richard
          Owens (1:280/1600) for this baby.

*** v0.72B 7/7/96

        - Some minor timing changes. More effective scoring routines.
        - Computer is a little bit tougher to beat. Thinking about adding
          an IQ setting in SORCERY.CFG. Would be available to registered
          users.
        - Fixed "Time Expired" problem for RA Sysops using DORINFOx.DEF.

*** v0.73B 8/7/96

        - Computer now has a "memory". It remembers some of the moves the
          user has made during his last game. This is effective when a
          user is playing one game after another. It does not remember from
          day to day.
        - Due to responses from users on *MY* board, the computer is yet, a
          little bit tougher AGAIN. I am leery of making him too tough,
          which might make people not want to play it, but I guess not!
        - A *MAJOR* change in the file handling code of monsters.dat. it
          no longer reads the file every time a monster is summoned, but just
          does it once at the beginning of the game. I had known about this
          for some time, but I hadn't fixed this, until a friend who runs a
          386 pointed out to me that it ran VERY slow on his machine.

        * NOTE: Some major cosmetic changes are in the works, but are going
          to have to wait a little until the game is worked on a little more.

*** v0.74B 11/10/96

        - Everyone (including the computer) gets more spellpoints to start
          out with. That makes the game length a little shorter. In fact,
          you get almost twice as much as before.
        - A little code optimization. People have been complaining that on
          slower machines the game is running slowly, especially when it
          is writing and reading from files. It runs a little faster now.
        - I have experimented with other colors, but have not had much
          success, at least with the QB library I use.

*** v0.75B 12/02/96

         - I am almost embarrassed to say this, but I lost the source code
           for .74B in a hard drive crash I had, and I didn't back it up.
           So I had to go back to .73B and rewrite from there. However, I
           did have some better ideas and changes I wanted to make. So,
           here they are:
         - Version .74B should have never been released, with the number of
           bugs that were in it. Please upgrade with this version.
         - Monsters.Dat is now only read ONCE total. No longer does it read
           the file once for user summon at initialization, and once for the
           first time the computer summons, but I use the same variables for
           user AND computer monster summoning, so that either can summon the
           same monsters. I am considering making a cmonsters.dat file that
           only the computer can summon monsters from. That way you can
           create a good versus evil or creature versus human sort of game.
           Kind of like creating a new deck, (for those of you who play Magic:
           The Gathering, like I do.)
         - Fixed a bug where when you have a Spell Defense Bonus, which you
           have cast on yourself, via the Aura of Protection spell, and you
           have fireball cast on you from the computer, it did not display
           the right number of hitpoints you were saved from losing, because
           of your defense bonus.
         - Added ENEMIES.DAT, which allows the Sysop to configure and create
           other opponents for his users. You can make the enemies VERY
           tough, VERY easy, or a combination, using health and spell points.
           I am going to be adding an incremental enemy scheme in which each
           time the user wins, he goes up a rank, or something. I haven't
           really worked out how this will all work, but it is in the design
           stage. The coding isn't that tough, just how I am going to decide
           the ranks, etc...

*** v0.76B 1/09/97

         - Sorcery now truncates enemy names in ENEMIES.DAT to 17 characters
           so that the centering and writing of the enemy's name to the
           remote screen is not affected by extremely long names.
         - Sorcery also truncates monster names in MONSTERS.DAT to 15
           characters, so that the STAT screen listing does not wrap the
           monster names incorrectly.
         - When entering spellpoints and healthpoints into the ENEMIES.DAT
           file, not always does the enemy have that many points of each.
           There is now a random chance that the number can change plus or
           minus by a few points, so that users don't get used to certain
           enemies having the SAME number of points each time they fight.
         - Added a routine that checks enemy and monster names for errors
           which may occur during parsing and truncating.
         - Fixed a few bugs that most people wouldn't notice, but there are
           some sysops who run some WEIRD systems out there.
         - Fixed a small error in which if the first person who finishes a
           game, wins, it says they won 1% of their games, instead of 100%.
         - Changed the Cast Spell option, so that the spells come up
           instead of just the (0-9)[L=List Spells] menu.

*** v0.80B 1/15/97

         - I changed the truncating of monster names to 16 characters. Some
           monster names were exactly that long, but some will still be cut
           off short.
         - Added some comm routines that should make the game run a little
           better with some odd fossil drivers.
         - Sorcery now uses two seperate monster files. MONSTERS.DAT is for
           the user monsters, and EMONSTER.DAT is for the computer enemy's
           monsters. You can now create good vs. evil or human vs. orc, or
           whatever the heck you want to do. Just follow the directions in
           the *.DAT files. This should make the game more fun for Sysops
           who like to design their own game.
         - The Scores display has changed once again, believe it or not! ;)
           It now displays the total number of games played, so users who
           win after one game who have 100% of their games won  ;( will
           say they have only played one game.

*** v0.85B 2/10/97

         * MAJOR ADDITION *
         - A Basic E-Mail System (BEMS) has been added, and will be referred
           to from now on as BEMS. It is crude, and will get some touching up
           but for now it is just in testing. You can write to any other user
           who has played and won or lost a game. Only users who have gone
           through one game, won or lost, can receive E-Mail. However, anyone
           can SEND E-Mail. I haven't decided if I will restrict E-Mail to
           users who have played a game, but they can't receive E-Mail for
           now. Sorcery creates a MAIL*.DAT file, which the * is the order
           number in which the player resides in the PLAYERS.DAT file. If he
           is on the 3rd line, he is MAIL3.DAT, etc. It does not go by score
           rank, so do not get confused with that. I don't see how it could
           happen, but it is theoretically possible that the MAIL*.DAT files
           could get out of order and the wrong players could get wrong
           E-Mail. This is just a chance we have to take until it has been
           tested further. For now, I am going to leave the BEMS MAIL*.DAT
           files unchecked, and see how well I guess I can write programs...
           :) You can check your SORCERY.LOG file to see if the BEMS is
           sending E-Mail correctly.

           * NOTE * - As as Sysop, if you notice that the mail files are not
           indexing correctly, you should just DELETE MAIL*.DAT. This will
           correct the problem, rather than having to mess with it, and I
           know how that is for a Sysop.

         - I mentioned it in the last part, but the BEMS logs the SENDING of
           E-Mail in the SORCERY.LOG file. That way if a user is harrassing
           another user (and each Sysop can determine the limits they want to
           impose), you can see who is writing who messages. It does not
           allow the Sysop to read the E-Mail from the log file. On the line
           it specifies which MAIL*.DAT file it wrote to. That way if you
           feel the urge, you can read your users' mail or find indexing
           problems easier.

         - The Install program clears out all old MAIL*.DAT files when you
           choose the INSTALL > RESET option.

         - FINALLY! I am so sick and tired of problems with the damn scores
           sorting, displaying, and printing to files that I could PUKE!
           I think it is FINALLY working. It works, at least on my system...
           FINALLY!

*** v0.85B 2/12/97 *FIX*

         - I'm not stupid, I'm just drawn that way. I had changed the hit
           points of the computer very low for testing purposes, but forgot
           to change it back when I release version 0.85B. It has been fixed
           and a S085FIX.ZIP file has been released to DDSDOORS and made
           available locally for FREQ and download.

*** v0.90B 2/20/97

         * MAJOR ADDITION *
         - User Versus User battles are now available! Have you watched one
           of the other users rise so high in the scores that you didn't
           think you could catch them? Well, now you can. You have to keep in
           mind though, that, the higher the user's number of wins, the
           harder they are going to be to kill.  ;) When you fight another
           user, both yours and the user's scores will be affected. This is
           a registered-only function.

         - There is something else new, but if I told you what it is, you
           wouldn't enjoy it so much.  ;)

*** v0.91B 2/24/97

         - Small Fix - Version 0.90B had a small error I had overlooked that
           would cause the game to lock up when selecting to fight a second
           game after you had won or lost the first. Fixed.

         - I also deleted and changed a few things that should make it need
           to access files less.

         - If you had noticed that I am having to release fixes more often,
           here is my reasoning. When you add more features, there are more
           bugs to squash. That's it.

*** v0.92B 5/18/97

         - Fixed logfile problem that displayed the computer and user ending
           spellpoints incorrectly.

         - Fixed doubling of monster and enemy names when you entered the
           game for the second time in the same gaming session.