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YNOT Version 1.00 (1st Release) 18th July, 1993 - A Dice Game for the Psion Series 3 - Copyright 1993 Right Hand Software Ltd. 45, Kenilworth Gardens, London SE18 3JB, UK Phone/Fax : 081-319-8576 - Email - righthand@cix.compulink.co.uk chennings@cix.compulink.co.uk 100010,511@compuserve.com 1) Description YNOT is a version of the traditional game played with 5 dice. The game requires both luck and strategy to score as many points as possible from 13 turns in each of which the dice may be rolled up to 3 times. Points are awarded for various combinations of dice such as 3-of-a-kind, full-house, straights etc. A full description of the rules and game play are provided below. YNOT can be played as a solitaire in which you aim to get into the highscore table or to improve your personal best and average scores. YNOT also has a 2 player mode in which you might chose to play "first to an agreed total score" or "highest total in an agreed number of games". YNOT is called "YNOT" because - why not ? (Yes I know this is a hostage to fortune if the time comes for foreign language versions). Enjoy! 2) Shareware & Registration YNOT is fully functional. You are granted a limited licence (please see the detailed Terms & Conditions set out below) to enjoy and evaluate YNOT as follows :- You may run/launch YNOT up to 25 times for evaluation purposes (of course you may play as many games as you like each time YNOT is launched). If you intend to play YNOT once this evaluation period has expired you must register your version as described below. You will be able to tell once your evaluation period has expired because:- * For the very first time you run YNOT, the full registration and copyright information is displayed. * For the next 24 times you run YNOT only a brief welcome screen is displayed. * For any subsequent run of YNOT the full registration and copyright is always displayed. I hope you will agree that the evaluation period is generous, the "nagging" is minimal and of course the "crippling" is nil! Indeed, the approach here to the expiry of the evaluation period is to provide a gentle reminder rather than a heavy handed "lock out" and in any case I'm sure many of you will realise the relatively trivial steps required to hack the system. However, it is to be hoped that such concerns will be immaterial as long before the expiry of the evaluation period you will want to register your copy of YNOT. This you can do with a nominal payment (suggested minimum 7.50 ukp or local equivalent). Payment should be by cheques drawn on UK Banks or Building Societies made payable to Right Hand Software Ltd or in cash. Please contact us if you wish to discuss other forms of payment. On registering you will receive a code which can be entered with your name so that your name appears as a registered user in the program information display. This will also suppress any further copyright information displays on start up. Registration also has the major benefit of giving you the warm feeling of satisfaction that you are supporting the development of software for the Psion Series 3. 3) Installation & Logistics a) Setup Copy the file YNOT.APP to any directory on any drive and use PSION-I to install YNOT to the system screen. YNOT is a type 0 application and so has no filelist on the system screen. Alternatively, place YNOT in an \IMG\ directory so that it can be launched from the RUNIMG filelist. b) Free Memory YNOT needs between about 25k to 30k free memory to load and run. We hope to reduce this requirement in future releases through the use of overlay or other techniques. c) Support Files YNOT uses 2 types of support file. Firstly, YNOT is resource based (English language resources are embedded in the main .app) and YNOT will look for foreign language resource files in a \YNOT\ directory that must be located under the directory from which the app is launched. No foreign language resource files currently exist but if anyone is interested in doing the translation work, we will be happy to supply them. Secondly, YNOT saves various items of information to a file called YNOT.INI. If the drive from which YNOT was launched can be written to and is not a FLASH SSD, the .INI file will be created in a \YNOT\ directory under the directory from which the program was launched. Alternatively, the .INI file will be created in LOC::M:\RHS\ d) General Operation. YNOT has extensive online help. Press the HELP key for details of how to use the various facilities available. 4) Terms & Conditions a) YNOT comprises the files YNOT.APP and this file YNOT.TXT. YNOT is copyright material of Right Hand Software Ltd. and all ownership rights are retained. b) You may use and distribute YNOT only in accordance with the terms and conditions stated here. c) You may NOT modify YNOT in any way. d) You may use YNOT free of charge ONLY for the 1st 25 times you launch the program. For all and any subsequent use of the program, you must register your copy as described in section (2) above. You may use YNOT only in a personal and private capacity. Use within commercial, corporate or government institutions requires a commercial users licence. e) You may distribute YNOT only provided that : i) All the original files are included (in particular these terms and conditions). ii) NO charge is made other than to cover the fair and reasonable costs of distribution. Any distribution of YNOT that renders any form of commercial advantage (financial or otherwise) to the distributor, requires a commercial distributors license. f) While appropriate care has been taken in the creation of YNOT, Right Hand Software Ltd. does not warrant that the software is error free. Indeed, Right Hand Software Ltd. disclaims all and any warranties relating to the software. g) Under no circumstances shall Right Hand Software Ltd. be liable for consequential, incidental or indirect damages of any kind arising from the use of the YNOT software. 5) YNOT - The Game A game of YNOT comprises 13 turns. Each turn comprises up to 3 rolls of the dice. For the 1st roll of each turn all 5 dice must be rolled. For the optional 2nd and 3rd rolls you may select any or all of the dice to be rolled. You may choose to score the turn after the 1st or 2nd rolls and the turn must be scored after the 3rd turn. There are 13 different ways in which points can be awarded to score a turn. Each of these ways must be used once and only once during a game. The objective of the game is to score as many points as possible. 6) YNOT - Scoring The ways in which a turn can be scored are organised into 2 sections. The 1st section has 6 ways to score a turn. These are :- 1s - Score the total of all dice showing 1 (ie 1 5 1 1 2 = 3) 2s - Score the total of all dice showing 2 3s - Score the total of all dice showing 3 4s - Score the total of all dice showing 4 5s - Score the total of all dice showing 5 6s - Score the total of all dice showing 6 Additionally, if the total of all points in the 1st section is 63 or more you get a bonus of 35 points. This means that you should aim to have at least 3 of a kind when you score a turn in the 1st section to stay on target for the bonus. If you are forced to score an "under par" turn in the 1st section try to go for a low way. For example to recover from scoring only one 2 in the 2s, you need only to score four 4s. Conversely you would need five 3s to recover from two 6s. The 2nd section has 7 ways to score a turn. These are :- 3 of a kind - Score the total of ALL dice (ie 4 4 4 6 5 = 23) 4 of a kind - Score the total of ALL dice Full House - Score 25 points Low Straight - Score 30 points High Straight - Score 40 points YNOT! - Score 50 points Chance - Score the total of ALL dice Where :- A Full House = 3 of a kind PLUS 2 of a kind Low Straight = A sequence of 4 dice High Straight = A sequence of 5 dice YNOT! = 5 of a kind Chance = Any combination of dice YNOT! Bonuses - any subsequent YNOT! gives a bonus of 100 points provided that a previous YNOT! has been scored as such. Roll! Bonuses - If you score 3 or more of a kind in section 1 OR score anywhere in section 2 except "Chance" and do so in less than 3 rolls, you get a "Roll Bonus" worth 10 points if you take just 1 roll and 5 points if you take 2 rolls. As well as the luck of the dice you will need strategy as to how to score a particular turn at a particular point in the game and indeed to decide which dice to hold or roll. This is because you often have a choice as to where to score the turn. Remember also that scores are "downwardly compatible" so a High Straight can be scored as a Low Straight, a 4-of-a-kind as a 3-of-a-kind and a YNOT! can score as a 3 or 4-of-a-kind or a Full House. For example :- * Should you score four 6s and a 5 in section 1 and be comfortably on the way to the section 1 bonus but only get 24 points or should you score a 4-of-a-kind for 29 points? * You might decide to "throw away" two 2s, two 1s and a 3 in the YNOT! slot (betting that you wouldn't get a YNOT! anyway). You then get 2 YNOT!s - that "throw away" just cost you 150 points! The Series 3 implementation of YNOT has various features to help you get the hang of scoring. Firstly, you can at any time switch to the score board and examine what scores are available before committing to a particular score. Secondly, until such time as the section 1 bonus has been won or lost, a running total of how much you are under or over performing on the 1st section is shown. Lastly, when you switch to the score board, YNOT always jumps to the highest score for the current dice (unless this means under performing in section 1). However, note that the HIGHEST score for a given throw is NOT always the BEST score given the overall state of the game - but that's where you come in! 7) YNOT - On the Psion Series 3 On the Series 3 screen, YNOT presents 6 display areas against a shaded background. Looking from left to right / top to bottom :- * The first 3 areas are the score card. * The next area shows the dice. * The next area shows the player names and running totals for the current sequence of games. * The last area shows a push button which indicates the current state of the game. The 3 score card areas each have 6 rows and 2 columns. The 1st column shows icons to represent a type of score. The second column is blank if that score has not been used in the current game or alternatively shows the score gained. The 1st score card area is Section 1 with the slots for scoring 1s through to 6s. The 2nd score card area plus the 1st row of the 3rd score card area is Section 2 with slots for the various scores (3-of-a-kind through to Chance) as described above. The remainder of the 3rd score card area shows as follows :- * The total of Section 1. * Either the section 1 bonus (indicated by an = sign) or by how much you are on/off target for getting the section 1 bonus (indicated by a +- sign). For example scoring two 3s in the 3s slot would show -3. Subsequently scoring four 4s in the 4s slot would change this to be +1. If you then get the section 1 bonus, the +- sign is changed to an = sign and the 35 points shown. * The total of Section 2. * The value of YNOT! and Roll! bonuses. * The total score for the current game. 8) YNOT - How to Play At the start of each players game, his or her name is highlighted and the button shows "Start". Press ENTER to begin the game. The dice will roll. When they stop, the button shows that the next roll will be roll #2. At this point we consider the dice and decide whether to score them as they stand or to roll some or all of them again. If you want to roll dice, use the cursor keys to move the box which surrounds one of the dice indicating this to be the current dice. Then use the space bar to highlight the dice (indicating that this dice is to be rolled). You can change your mind - just press the space bar again to turn the highlight off. For the 2nd and 3rd rolls you can also use Shift-SPACE to rehighlight the previous set of dice. Once all the dice you want to roll are marked in this way, press ENTER to roll them. Alternatively, you may want to score the dice as they stand. The TAB key switches you between the dice and the score card. Press TAB and a cursor will appear in the highest scoring free slot in the score card (remember this is just tactics - you need to add the strategy) and the results of selecting this score are shown. The button also changes to indicate that the ENTER key is now used to pick a score. Use the cursor keys to move between the available score slots. If you decide to score the dice, press the ENTER key. If you decide not to score and want to continue rolling dice, just press TAB again to switch back to the dice. After you score a turn, the 1st roll of the next turn is done automatically. Points to note : * For the 1st roll of a turn, all dice will be rolled - you don't need to mark them using the space bar. Also you cannot switch to the score card until you made the 1st roll. * After the 3rd roll, you are automatically switched to the score card and cannot switch back to the dice until you've made a score. After a player completes their 13th turn, any high scores or other statistics are notified, the running total for the current series of games is updated and the next players game begins. 9) YNOT - Highscores and Statistics YNOT maintains a high score table which shows the player names and scores for the top 5 scores ever made. YNOT also maintains the names and various statistics for up to 6 people. These stats include the players all time best score, the number of games played and the overall average score. The same stats are also calculated for the current sequence of games. When a player completes their turn one of the following events is notified :- * The player gained the highscore table. * The player gained an all time personal best score. * The player's all time average rose or fell. At any time, menus or the following hotkeys can be used :- Psion-H : Displays the high score table. Psion-C : Clears/Deletes all entries in the high score table. Psion-P : Displays player statistics for the current players. The player stats shown are the number of games played, the best score achieved and the average score. In each case, the "all-time" numbers are shown first, followed by those for the current series of games. Press ENTER in the player stats display to toggle between the current players. Press ESC to return to the game. 10) YNOT - Game Setup, Options and Other facilities. At any time, menus or the following hotkeys can be used :- Psion-N : Starts a new series of games. This has the effect of resetting to 0 the statistics relating to the current series of games for all current players. Psion-S : This has the same effect as Psion-N above but in addition you are presented with dialogs from which you can specify the number of current players and who they are. The Select Player Dialog presents a choice list from which you can choose any of the 6 available players. Press ENTER to simply select an existing player. Alternatively to setup a new player OR to reset the overall statistics for an existing player, press SPACE and you will be presented with a further dialog where you can enter the players name. Psion-O : This presents the game options dialog from which you can control the dice animation and sound effects. Psion-R : This presents the YNOT registration dialog where you can enter your registration name and code. Psion-A : This displays program information and copyright details. Psion-X : Exits the game. === End of YNOT v1.00 Documentation ================================== CREDITS Many thanks are due to the following folk for their help in producing YNOT :- 1) Psion for producing the Series 3, EPOC and the C-SDK and for helping me learn how to use them. 2) PMR (Tonmeister) for the sounds. 3) The brave band of beta testers whose time, effort and ideas resulted in the following features :- * Dice automatically roll after a score except after 13th score. * Shift-Space reselects the same set of dice to roll. * Psion-X to exit is now on the Special menu and does not have a confirm dialog. * Sound actually turns off when requested. * Error beep (if sound=on) if you try to roll with no dice selected. * Clearer help topics (I hope) for folk unfamiliar with the game. * Sounds play AFTER dice finish rolling * Error beep (if sound=on) on moving dice cursor before 1st roll. * Major Sources of OOM errors handled better. * Button Titles and animation more consistant. * Added Roll<3 Bonus. * YNOT can score as a full house.