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The Dezerian Assignment Code Name: REDKEY and Code Name: DESTRUCT Copyright 1992 Steven Englestad All Rights Reserved _______ ____|__ | (R) --| | |------------------- | ____|__ | Association of | | |_| Shareware |__| o | Professionals -----| | |--------------------- |___|___| MEMBER REGISTRATION Shareware is a way for you to try out the performance of a package of software at minimal expense. This software is not 'freeware' to be used to its fullest with no compensation to the author. Please support Shareware as that is the only way you will continue to have available high quality packages from quality programmers. You are invited to share the distribution disks with others as Shareware thrives on the wide dissemination of packages along with appropriate registration for users. To register, print out REGIS.DOC to a printer, fill it out and send in to the address provided. You will be added to the database as a registered owner and can write for support should you either have problems running the game or wish further help in doing so. Registration also gets you a Hints document covering both REDKEY and DESTRUCT. _______ ____|__ | (R) --| | |------------------- | ____|__ | Association of | | |_| Shareware |__| o | Professionals -----| | |--------------------- |___|___| MEMBER "This program is produced by a member of the Association of Shareware Professionals (ASP). ASP wants to make sure that the shareware principle works for you. If you are unable to resolve a shareware-related problem with an ASP member by contacting the member directly, ASP may be able to help. The ASP Ombudsman can help you resolve a dispute or problem with an ASP member, but does not provide technical support for members' products. Please write to the ASP Ombudsman at 545 Grover Road, Muskegon, MI 49442- 9427 or send a Compuserve message via CompuServe Mail to ASP Ombudsman 70007,3536" THE DEZERIAN ASSIGNMENT RED-KEY SYNOPSIS The Federation's prize weapon, the Galactic Vaporizer Device (GVD) has been stolen by the Rebels. Dezeria's underground mazes provide a most unusual hiding place and that is what the Rebels needed to hide the Galactic Vaporizer Device, or GVD. This quite intimidating device was designed by a Dr. Swelt and Mr. Johnston. During transport between planets, the Rebels made a surprise raid in space and stole it. They took it to Dezeria and hid it in the mazes. Unable to follow with any size force without raising a war cry from the Urgandians, the Federation was forced to find an individual of unusual valor and cunning to send after the device. Since Dr. Swelt and Mr. Johnston were the inventors of the device, they were the two who knew the destruct code to set the device into an auto-destruct mode. Dr. Swelt, being of considerable age and being a genius in his field was not considered for such a mission but Johnston, though bright, was certainly the more expendable. And so, off to Dezeria he is sent. The weeks passed and there is no news. It is with some degree of desperation that the Federation decides to send in another agent. And who should they choose but YOU. When they went to ask Dr. Swelt for the destruct code they found that his planet had been raided by the Rebels looking for the arming code, and the good doctor kidnapped. Dezeria is a desert planet divided into four quadrants by impassable walls. Movement from one quadrant to another is only possible through the underground mazes and most of these require 'keys' to pass from level to level. Having captured a rebel, the Federation has obtained the Green Key. This key will permit you access to search for the Red Key which is needed to leave the Trader Quadrant where you will be landed. The REDKEY assignment is to find the Red Key and return to the pick-up point. You are to make contact with various traders and find out what you can. You may be able to purchase various objects to help you on your quest. DESTRUCT SYNOPSIS In Code Name DESTRUCT you return to Dezeria with the Red Key and all other objects you have managed to find during the Red Key Mission. Your object is to now proceed to the other quadrants looking for more clues and objects. You will need money to buy more objects from the traders and to do this you will need to obtain objects in Quadrant I and return to the trader Quadrant to sell them. Thus you will be able to move on from quadrant to quadrant until you find the hidden GVD device and set the code to destroy it. Then you must once again return to the pick-up point within the time allotted. In Code Name DESTRUCT you will find many new and strange obstacles including the underground caverns of Dezeria that can provide a short cut between quadrants. PACKAGING, REQUIREMENTS AND INSTALLATION The Dezerian Assignment will run on any IBM PC compatible computer with 512 K Ram, hard disk and EGA graphics capability. It comes on two 5 1/4 inch floppies or one 3 1/2 inch floppy. You can NOT run from the floppies. This game must be installed onto a hard disk to be played and requires EGA level graphics capability. REDKEY Installation To install on a hard disk, follow these steps: - Copy all files to the directory of your choice. - Run UNPRED to unpack the compressed files. - Enter REDKEY to start the game. or REDKEY Q to start it silently. The F10 key will turn the sound back on if you change your mind once the game is running. Before running the adventure, you must make sure there is a CONFIG.SYS file with the lines FILES=20 and BUFFERS=10 in the root directory. It is okay if you have these lines with larger numbers. DESTRUCT Installation Once you have completed the mission of RED KEY, the files are saved in a way that allows you to load the Code Name: DESTRUCT disk directly over the old files. Many of the files from RED KEY are used to support the ongoing mission. To install on your hard disk, do the following: - Copy all files from DESTRUCT disk into same directory you have successfully completed RED KEY. - Run UNPDES to unpack the packed files. - Run INITDES to get the files ready to start DESTRUCT - Run DESTRUCT to start the DESTRUCT Mission. or DESTRUCT Q to start it silently. When you are landed on the planet you will be at the point you were when you requested pick-up from RED KEY. You will have full fuel, health, and five days of food and water regardless of your state when you ended RED KEY. You are now free to use the Red Key to exit the Trader Quadrant or you can continue your exploration of that quadrant as money permits. It is noted at this point that you now have RED KEY and DESTRUCT loaded in the same directory. This is necessary to run DESTRUCT. Read below how INITRED and INITDES work. SAVING/INITIALIZATION Once you start The Dezerian Assignment, you will continue the adventure until you have either completed your assignment, have had your life level reduced to zero or have taken too long to complete your quest. At the end of a session, you exit and save your progress by using the S-key save function. You must NEVER shut the computer off before exiting from the adventure as it will leave the files corrupted. Having saved the session successfully, you can return and start it up at any time and it will put you back where you were when you saved. During a session you can get into trouble by running into things or by being attacked and injured. When this occurs, your life level is reduced. As long as it remains above zero you are permitted to continue. RED KEY You can manually initialize the adventure any time you want to. Entering INITRED at the DOS prompt while in the subdirectory of the hard disk where the adventure resides will call up the initialization routine. Confirmation is asked for. You confirm by entering a Y. You would want to initialize whenever you want to start the adventure fresh. If you complete the adventure successfully or if your life level falls below zero, initialization is automatic. DESTRUCT You can manually initialize the adventure any time you want to. Entering INITDES at the DOS prompt while in the subdirectory of the hard disk where the adventure resides will call up the initialization routine. Confirmation is asked for. You confirm by entering a Y. You would want to initialize whenever you want to start DESTRUCT fresh. Whereas INITRED starts you at the beginning of the entire mission, INITDES once again begins you at the point you ended RED KEY. Snapping and Restoring You can save and restore the game at any point from the DOS prompt by entering SNAP i to save the game at a point you can later return to with RESTORE i where i is the set number. Thus, for i from 0 to 9, you can save up to 10 save sets of the game to return to if things should go wrong during a session. Since you can not exit REDKEY without your progress being saved (and you should not boot the computer in the middle of a session since this can corrupt the files) the SNAP/RESTORE set of functions at least lets you save a point to return to. It is up to you to keep track of what point you were at in each save set. Note that SNAP'ing merely makes a copy of certain files that change during the progress of the game and hence will take up some extra room on your disk. DEZERIA Dezeria is a planet on the outskirts of the galaxy in space unfriendly to the Federation. It is a desert planet divided into four major quadrants numbered, appropriately, I, II, III, IV, in a clockwise fashion starting with the upper left, or northwest, quadrant. The quadrants are neatly divided by impassable walls. The only quadrant that is known to be inhabited regularly is quadrant II. This quadrant is sometimes referred to as the Trader Quadrant for it is in this quadrant that a number of small-time criminals have found sanctuary and run posts for the infrequent visits of the Rebels. This will be the best place to drop you. The drop will be made at a time when there should be no Rebels on the planet. It is not unheard of for a supply ship to stop off at the Trader Quadrant. Since you will need information from the traders to assist you it is best to leave you where there are people. Once dropped off, you will have a vehicle which you will drive forward to a site. From there you are on your own to gather information and seek out the hiding place of the Red Key. The traders of Dezeria are mostly crooks who are taking refuge, manning the posts where they live and occasionally selling food and ammo to the Rebels. The traders will sell certain things including information. They will probably buy objects also. As for mapping your way around Dezeria, the latitude and longitude values are based on a world of 20,000 by 20,000 units with the 0,0 point at the upper left corner of the world. The Great Walls of Dezeria run along the 10,000th latitude and longitude. Once you are properly equipped, you will know your latitude and longitude wherever you are on the surface. HEALTH The maintenance of your health is vital. You carry food and water. Indicators show your thirst and hunger conditions. When hungry or thirsty, your health slowly deteriorates. You must drink and eat when necessary to maintain your health. Each press of the Eat or Drink key uses up some of the food and water you are carrying until you are full or run out of food/water. Obtaining water and food is, of course, vital. Oases provide water, and posts will sell food, fuel, ammo and who-knows-what. SURVIVING It is vital that you maintain your levels of fuel, food and water, restocking at posts and oases frequently. You must also use your funds wisely. There is more information and there are more objects than you will have money for. Your initial goal must be to get some basic equipment and then retrieve objects from the other quadrants that you can sell so that you can buy more information and other items that you will need to probe deeper into the other parts of Dezeria. Use the ESC key to pause at any phase of the adventure, for food and water are consumed rapidly. Pay careful attention to the information you receive from the opening assignment screen and from the traders. POSSESSIONS Whether you are traveling the surface of Dezeria, at a site or in a maze, the P-key toggles the possession window. You can carry up to sixteen items at one time. At sites, you can sell or leave any number of objects you want. An item is made active or effective if you hold it. Some items will serve you in your quest while others have value only in that you can sell them and then use the money to buy more information or other items that are for sale. The only object that will 'work' without being held is the pistol. You can shoot without holding the pistol but you must possess it. Actually, there are a few items that can effect you just by possessing them. Keep alert. If your health is declining while the hunger and thirst indicators show green, it could be something you are carrying. With the possession window up, the right and left key pad arrows move the yellow box from item to item. This is how you select an item to be held. The up-arrow key pad key is used to take the selected item into hand. If you are already holding an item, it will be swapped for the new item you have selected to hold. The down-arrow key pad key will store away an item you are holding, leaving you holding nothing. Both the up and down arrows will also exit you from the possession window. If you wish to exit without doing anything, press the P key again to toggle the window off. If you are carrying a full load of twelve items, you will not be able to buy another until you sell some. On the open desert and in the mazes you will come across objects to be picked up. If you are carrying a full load of twelve items, you will be given the chance to exchange an item for the one you have found. The exchange screen is the same as the possession screen. You place the yellow box around the object you are giving up by using the right and left arrows. Pressing the up or down arrow key on the key pad will indicate that you have made your choice. Pressing P or the return key will exit the window without making any exchange. Knowing what objects are useful and which are not is part of the problem to be solved. In some cases, information from the traders will provide the clues. In other cases, you will only discover much needed advice by venturing to further quadrants. And of course, there are always the subterranean computer terminals. KEYBOARD INTERFACE All messages that are presented to you as a line, scrolled from right to left, can be terminated before they complete by pressing the Space Bar. There will be some informational messages of this type that you will become familiar with and will want to cut off when they begin to appear. - - Surface Travel - - F1 - Neutral gear F2 - Forward gear F9 - Silence Low Fuel Alarm F10 - Sound on/off ESC - Pause M - Start Motor E - Eat D - Drink P - Possession window toggled on/off Right/Left Arrows - Rotate selection of item. Up Arrow - Take hold of selected item. Down Arrow - Store item currently in hand. S - Save your progress L - Leave request: Transmit request to be picked up V - Vehicle viewer toggled on/off T - Transport mode. Only works with vehicle viewer on Shift Up Arrow - Fire at spiders while in transport mode W - Whistle (must be holding whistle) KEYPAD: See Driving Keypad Surface travel is accomplished in two modes. Initially, only the first-person mode is available. The keypad is used to accelerate, decelerate, turn left and turn right. Hazards will come at you across the desert. If you hit them with the hood of your vehicle you will lose life points. Over the horizon will come greenery of an oasis or a structure. Head toward it until the screen reverts to a top view of the site. Once you have obtained the receiver, you can use the vehicle viewer to see what lies about you as you travel. The orientation of the vehicle viewer always has North towards the top of the display. The red mark at the center of the screen is the location of your vehicle. Black marks indicate posts and objects on the desert and green marks indicate oases. Having the viewer displayed also permits you to enter Transport Mode. With the viewer displayed, entering 'T' activates the Transport Mode once you have brought your vehicle to a standstill. In the Transport Mode you move a cross hairs to your desired destination with the keypad arrows and then enter the 5-key to indicate your selection. If you have enough fuel, water and food to be permitted to use Transport Mode you will be shown the amount of food, water and fuel that will be used and you will be advised to press the 5-key to confirm your selection. Pressing the '5' key will bring up the Travel Window. Any other key will abort you selected destination. Once the Travel Window is displayed with the top view of the vehicle, the keypad is used to control speed and direction to steer around obstacles. Once you have the Travel Window up and you start driving there is no way to pause or stop your trip. You must carry on through to the end. Use the keypad to move the vehicle left and right. The up and down arrows will alter your speed. Don't hit the hazards. In quadrants where there are desert spiders, they will come at you. You can either try to dodge them or shoot at them with the Shift Up Arrow key. A red bar at the top of the Travel Window moves from left to right. It marks your progress. Once you get to your selected destination, the screen will revert to the first person view and you can drive into the site if your destination puts you at or close to one. Transporting uses up chunks of food, water, fuel and time so keep that in mind as you transport from point to point. Make frequent stops at sites and oases to stock up after transporting. If you are out of food or water, you can proceed with your adventure as long as your life force is above zero, but, you cannot use the Transport Mode unless the food and water levels are sufficient to complete the trip without going below zero. Also, Transport Mode can only be used for trips of at least 10 miles. Thus, in some situations you will be required to use the first person mode of travel until you are able to restock your supplies. Once you have completed your mission and have returned to the pick-up point, you will want to call for a pick-up with the L (Leave) key. Note that a request for pick-up will always be honored and will always complete the adventure. You get one chance to be picked up. - - At a Site - - F10 ESC E D P W as above. KEYPAD: See Movement and Shooting keypad You cannot save the adventure at a site. Get into your vehicle and you will be put back into surface travel mode at which time you can save. At a site you move the person about with the keypad arrow keys. The figure will not be able to move through certain objects such as walls and greenery so you will have to maneuver around such objects and structures to get where you want to go. An accessible grayish area denotes a trading post at the site and a red square indicates a maze entrance. Blue indicates water. Moving to each of these color coded areas will result in some action. Moving the man back to the vehicle you arrived in will return you to a first person view. You will always be placed to the south of a site, facing north, when you leave it. Thus, to proceed you must drive around the site or you will keep returning to it. At the trade post you will be permitted to buy or sell. There is no PAUSE while in the trading post mode. In fact, ESC serves as a quick-key to exit from the trade screens rather than having to use the arrows to move the highlight to the EXIT item on the menu. To select an item, the left and right keypad arrows move the highlighting forward and backward. The up arrow acknowledges the choice of the highlighted item for sale. Each press of the up arrow key buys more of a supply until you are told you are FULL and cannot obtain anymore. At the Objects part of the screen, the space bar will scan through the objects, showing each one to you. The up arrow key again serves as an indication to purchase/sell/take/leave the object showing. Some posts have no objects for sale and you will be told that. Information is available at many posts. If they are manned posts, you will have to pay for information. There may be a number of information 'packets' available to you. Entering up arrow will show you the cost of the next one if there is one and permit you to enter Y or N if you wish to pay and see it or not. As you journey further into the adventure, you will come upon hidden mazes. These are encountered at a site. Upon moving to a magenta square you will be presented with a maze you have to traverse that is mostly hidden under a roof. The keypad will move the man about from square to square using the up, down, left and right arrows. The figure will disappear as it moves under the roof and will be gone from sight until it emerges into an open space. If you try to move the person to a blocked square, a sound will be heard and a red indicator will momentarily show where you currently are. Banging into the walls will cost some health. It is helpful to note the path as you discover it by bumping about. Once you have traversed through the maze to the further corner, you will be placed within the walls that surround this kind of site. To leave the site, you must retrace your steps by moving to the magenta square within the post and recrossing the maze in the other direction to return to your vehicle. Record the path you have discovered as you may need to return to these sites again. - - In a Maze - - F10 ESC E D P S W as above. KEYPAD: See Movement and Shooting keypad The subterranean mazes of Dezeria provide means of moving from one quadrant to another. They also hold stashes of money, food and water as well as computer terminals and, of course, the Galactic Vaporizer Device. While in a maze you move the figure of the man and shoot in the same manner as you do at a site, described above. In moving about the maze, you will come to various red items along the maze path. The red squares are transfer points to move you up or down to different levels of the maze complex or to the surface. The red ovals are computer terminals and red X's are objects you can obtain. A red triangle marks the location of the GVD. Moving the man to the red markings activates some action depending on the nature of the particular spot. Though the red squares usually lead to elevator type shafts, moving you from one level to another, there may be a hazard you will have to traverse. These occur when you are further into the adventure. A window will show the person on a ledge with a ledge on the other side of the window. Blocks are rising and lowering between the two ledges. The figure must be made to jump to the next block as it becomes level with his position. The right and left arrows will make the person jump to the next block position. Holding the Shift key while hitting the left and right arrows makes the person jump two blocks in either direction. Again, the target block must be at the same level as the block you are moving from. Every two failures at moving from one block to another results in the loss of some life force and being put back at the ledge from where you started. Moving out from the window puts the person on the maze level associated with the entry/exit point of the obstacle. KEYPADS Driving Keypad |--------------------------------------------| | | Accelerate | | | | ** | | |--------------------------------------------| | Turn left | Straighten | Turn right | | | Wheels | | |--------------------------------------------| | | Decelerate | | | | | | |--------------------------------------------| The driving keypad is used when looking out from the vehicle and moving on the surface of the planet. Once the engine is started and the lever put into F for Forward, the keypad permits control of speed and direction. This same keypad layout works for the Transport Mode with the addition of the Shift Up Arrow (**) for firing at spiders that may come at your vehicle. Movement and Shooting Keypad |--------------------------------------------| | SHOOT | SHOOT | SHOOT | | Move | Move | Move | |--------------------------------------------| | SHOOT | - 5 - | SHOOT | | Move | | Move | |--------------------------------------------| | SHOOT | SHOOT | SHOOT | | Move | Move | Move | |--------------------------------------------| Caps are shifted key: Hold the Shift key down and press the desired key. Move and shoot in direction of key. The Movement and Shooting keypad is used both when at a site and while in the maze. Movement of man and direction of your shot is in relation to the position of the key pressed to the 5 key. When shooting, the direction of the projectile can be altered by pressing a different keypad key. This way you can shoot around corners and at targets coming at you at odd angles. HINTS AND SUGGESTIONS With no intention of giving much away, the following suggestions may save you some grief. There is a Hint book that describes each item and, ultimately, gives away much, but not all, of the puzzle if read completely. It is part of the registration packet. o You must have the Folis Pistol and Receiver if you hope to get very far. The Traders will advise you properly on how to obtain these items. Listen to them. o To run out of fuel is deadly. Carry the fuel can if you hope to get far in the quadrants other that Quadrant II, where you start the adventure. o Extra ammo is vital when scouring the further quadrants for loot. The spiders are active where objects lie on the desert. Also, the transport mode is a bit more difficult in quadrants where there are surface spiders and you will need to defend yourself more actively. If you pay attention to information from the traders, you will know how to be able to carry more ammo. o The transport mode, though the prime means of travel once you have the receiver, can chew up your health. Some first-person ground travel is the best way to rejuvenate yourself, assuming you are well fed and watered and do not run into things. o It is vital to gather information... From traders, computer terminals, abandoned posts... From anywhere you can get it. You must gather items and sell them so you can buy information and objects from the traders. You can not carry everything at once so you must leave some things behind now and again and remember to bring what you need for each stage of this adventure.