PC/CD Gamer UK 17/PCGAMER17.bin/text/outridge.txt

Text File | 1995-12-21 | 15KB | 377 lines

                                  PC GAMER FEBRUARY 1996
                                      OUTER RIDGE DEMO
                                  DISK EDITOR:  TED O'NEILL



0.0 LANGUAGE:

     OUTER RIDGE  can  be  played in either English or  German.   Press  F1
     during game play to switch the current language.

     The language  can  also be selected from within SETUP.EXE by selecting
     LANGUAGE / SPRACHE from the setup main menu.

0.1 REQUIREMENTS:

  - 80386+
  - VGA video card
  - 4MB ram
  - A Human type thing to play it

0.2 THE STORY SO FAR:

     You've been assigned to clear the  asteroid  belts  between  Mars  and
     Saturn.  The Corporation Regulating Advanced Propulsion  (CRAP)  is in
     need of  additional  testing  grounds  and have hired you, yes you, to
     clear the way.  You must achieve your quota for each sector before you
     can move on to the next.  Follow  up  crews  will  use  Capped  Rocket
     Utilizing Detonators (CRUDs) to destroy any remaining  asteroids after
     you have hyperspaced into the next sector.

     Your ship  has been equipped to turn raw materials from asteroids into
     useful propellants and armor.  Your on-board factory will generate all
     kinds of weapons for you to clear  the  belt with when you collect the
     raw materials.


0.3 THE STATUS BAR:

     From the interior of your cockpit, you will see the  status bar at the
     bottom of the screen:

     SCORE:   Your current score.  Score is obtained every time you hit
              an asteroid, destroy an asteroid or pick up a bonus. You will
              lose score when you destroy a bonus.
     MISSION: Your mission percentage will tell you how many more asteroids
              you must destroy before you can go to the next level.  In the
              first level you will only need to destroy 10 asteroids.
     SHIELDS: This is your ships shield status.  When you get hit without
              any shields,  you're dead.  You can replenish your shields by
              collecting PowerUP's (blue  bonuses) or Double Power's (green
              bonuses).
     CANNON : Number of Cannons you have left in your ammunition arsenal.
     ROCKET : Number of Rockets you have left in your ammunition arsenal.
     SUPER-S: Number  of  Super-Schnots  you have left in  your  ammunition
              arsenal.

0.4 RADAR PANELS:

     In the  top  left  and right of your cockpit you have 2 radar screens.
     The left radar shows depth vs width while the right radar screen shows
     height vs width.

     The distance an asteroid is from your ship determines the intensity of
     the radar blip.  Dark brown radar  blips are far asteroids while light
     brown denote near asteroids.

     All bonus spheres on the radar appear at full intensity.

0.5 REALLY COOL WEAPONS:

     * = registered version only

  - Schnot gun.

     Yes it is actually called a "schnot" gun. Listen, it's green and looks
     just like the real thing.  Hence the name.  The green  schnot  gun  is
     the least  powerful weapon, but you can never run out of schnots.  The
     schnot gun is great for busting lone  asteroids saving your heavy duty
     ammunition for heavy duty applications.

  - Dual Cannons.

     The cannons are great for blasting smaller asteroids  into  pulp.  One
     shot gets  'em.   Your  ship  is  equipped with two of these fantastic
     weapons - one on each side.  The  cannons  are  slower than the schnot
     gun, but have far more power.

  * Rockets.

     Oh yes, the infamous "rocket" weapon - all games should  have rockets.
     The rockets  are  computer  controlled  and  "seek"  out  the  closest
     asteroid for destruction.  The rocket  will  self  destruct when it is
     nearest to the asteroid.  Once detonated, the rocket  will  apply  the
     force of  destruction to all neighboring asteroids.  Shooting into the
     middle of many asteroids will destroy  all  of  the  asteroids! (or at
     least wear them down - depending on distance)  You do not even have to
     hit the asteroid for the rocket to detonate.  It will detonate when it
     is at  its "optimum" destruction distance.  Fortunately,  rockets  are
     "smart", and  will  not  destroy bonus spheres. (Whew).  You will only
     get 5 rockets per rocket-bonus, so use them sparingly.

  * The All-Illusive Super-Schnot.

     Simply the possibility that such  a  weapon  could  exist  caused  the
     entire 4th regiment of NME's to dive into a wormhole.   Who would want
     to be  covered  with  schnot,  let  alone  super-schnot?   Preliminary
     reports suggest that the super-schnot  is  fast,  ultra  powerful, and
     very accurate (unlike our friend the green schnot gun).

  * Dual Super-Schnots.

     Nothing stands in your way.


0.6 NME's (Enemy's)

     * = registered version only

  - Schnotoids

     The Schnotoids are spherical camouflage Space-Tanks.   Why  camouflage
     in space?  I don't know, it just looked good in 3D Studio.  Schnotoids
     fire bursts  of  green  schnots  and  can be easily toasted with a few
     cannon blasts. Once you hit a Schnotoid though, it will track you down
     until you kill it (or it kills you).

  * Cannonoids

     Guess what Cannonoids are?  Yes, they are those hexagonal thingys that
     fire cannons.  Getting splatted  with  a few of its cannons can really
     ruin your day.

  * Mine layers

     A special battalion of NME's have been dispatched to  lay mines.  Both
     schnot mines  and  cannon  mines will be dropped.  Mines self-destruct
     about 5 seconds after being dropped.   Collision  with  a  mine almost
     always results in instant death.  When a mine layer  is near, you will
     recognize it's distinctive beep.

  Note:

     Schnotoids, Cannonoids  and  Mines only collide with the player.  Yes,
     it is actually possible for these devices to travel through asteroids!
     (Programmers note:   When  we   had   the  mines  colliding  with  the
     asteroids, they were blowing up all over the place,  and were rarely a
     cause for concern to the player)


0.7 BONUSES

     There are 9 different bonuses in OUTER RIDGE:

     * = registered version only

     Name                     What it Does            How to recognize it

  -  Powerup               10% shields                           Blue Sphere
  -  Double Power          20% shields                          Green Sphere
  -  Cannons + Ammunition  Extra Cannon Ammunition                Red Sphere
  *  Rockets + Ammunition  Extra Rocket Ammunition             Yellow Rocket
  *  Super-Schnots         Extra Super-Schnot Ammunition         Yellow/Grey
  -  Hyperspace            Completion of level            Purple "EXIT" Sign
  *  WHAMO                 Contents Unknown                   Colour Unknown
  *  Extra Ship            Bonus Ship                                    Red
  *  Superfast Weapons     All weapons fire at double speed     Lighting Rod

1.0 SOUND CARDS SUPPORTED:

  - Gravis UltraSound
  - Sound Blaster

     The initialization  checks the environment settings to determine which
     type of  soundcard you have installed.   Only  Gravis  Ultrasound  and
     Sound Blaster are supported at present.

     Make sure your environment settings are set to something like these:

     ULTRASND=220,1,1,7,5          - if you have a Gravis Ultrasound
     BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 T1         - if you have a Sound Blaster

     Note: Obviously you will not use these exact settings  as  your  sound
           card may  not  be  located  at  these addresses.  These are just
           examples.

    With the Gravis UltraSound:

     With 512K or more of GUS memory,  all  music  and sound effects can be
     played.  With  only  256K  of  GUS  memory,  the  music  will  not  be
     available.  Only sound effects are available with 256k of GUS memory.


1.1 CONTROLLERS SUPPORTED:

  - Mouse Support

     Press "M"  once  in  the  game to select mouse control or select MOUSE
     control in the options screen.   Mouse  control will only be available
     if your mouse was detected at startup.

  - Joystick Control

     Pressing "J" during the game will select and configure  your joystick.
     You can  also  select  "JOYSTICK"  from  the  options  screen  or from
     SETUP.EXE.  At any time during game  play,  you can press "J" again to
     re-calibrate and center you joystick.

  - Keyboard Control

     The keyboard is active at all times.  The keys can  be  re-mapped from
     within SETUP.EXE


1.2 SCREEN CAPTURE:

     At any time during game play you can press F2 to capture the action to
     a 256  colour 640x400 .PCX file.  Once dumped, the message "PCX Screen
     Dump as OUTER00.PCX" will appear.

     If you don't want the PCX message to clutter the picture for the next
     PCX capture, you can prevent the  message  by  using  the command line
     parameter -pcx to suppress the message.


2.0 GAME STRATEGIES:

  - Stay moving.  Most of the time you can't see what hit  you  or  what is
    about to  hit  you.   When  you  stay  still,  you're  a  sitting duck.
    Avoidance of death is directly related to how fast you can get away.

  - You can't run out of schnots (gun  type  "1").   So  use it against the
    asteroids whenever you can.  Save the rockets and super-schnots for the
    NME's.

  - Don't favor one type of gun.  You can run out of ammunition  quickly if
    you favor  one specific type of weapon, so switch between the different
    types as you get low.  This way,  when  you're  confronted with an NME,
    you won't be stuck with your little green schnots.

  - Shoot  asteroids  in bursts.  Do this to avoid destroying  any  bonuses
    that may  come  out  of  exploding  asteroids.   When  an asteroid does
    explode, wait to see if there are  any  bonus  spheres in it before you
    resume shooting.

  - Destroy all sizes of asteroids.  All sizes of asteroids may surrender a
    bonus sphere, so don't just hit the big "easy" targets.   Not only will
    you save  ammunition  by going after the small ones, but you will avoid
    having a billion little tiny asteroids  zooming  about  space  at  high
    velocity.  Remember, bouncing off the small asteroids  won't  hurt your
    shields as  much as the larger ones, but if they explode when they hit,
    they can really cause some damage.

  - Use rockets on big asteroids.  The  rockets  will  affect all asteroids
    which are near to it when it explodes.  So try this:  Shoot a rocket at
    a big asteroid, when it explodes, fire another at the  middle  of the 3
    or so  medium  sized  asteroids.  When they explode, destroy all of the
    smaller asteroids with one last rocket.   The  rockets  are "smart" and
    will not  destroy  any  bonus  spheres.  So shoot first,  then  collect
    bonuses when all is clear.

  - Use  the  mine  layers  and  NME's to your advantage.  If you can avoid
    their fire, follow the mine layers  or  NME's  around,  let  them  blow
    things up  and simply collect the bonuses they extract.   Although  any
    asteroids that they destroy will not count for your score, and will not
    advance your  standing  in  the  level.   You  must  still destroy your
    percentage of asteroids to complete the level.


3.0 CONFIGURING YOUR PREFERANCES:

    The following keys are supported:

              m  - change control to mouse     (and keyboard)
              j  - change control to joystick  (and keyboard)

              1  - schnot gun
              2  - dual cannons
              3  - rockets
              4  - the all illusive super-schnot! (toggle dual super-
                   schnot)
           enter - rotate through guns

            ctrl - thrust
           space - fire
         crsr up - rotate up
       crsr down - rotate down
       crsr left - rotate left
      crsr right - rotate right

             F1  - toggle English/German language
             F2  - dump screen to PCX file
             F3  - controller speed adjust down
             F4  - controller speed adjust up
             F6  - toggle cockpit graphics
             F7  - toggle between inverted and normal flight controls
             F8  - change thrust type between sliding or gripping (default
                   is gripping)
             F9  - sound effect volume down
             F10 - sound effect volume up
             F11 - music volume down
             F12 - music volume up

     pause/break - pause toggle
     ctrl-q      - instant exit to DOS

   Mouse control:

     Left Button - fire
    Right Button - thrust
   Middle Button - change gun

   Joystick control:

        Button 1 - fire
        Button 2 - thrust
        Button 3 - change gun (4 button joystick)

   Command Line Parameters:

      -memory    - display actual memory used during initialization
      -devparm   - set Developers Mode ON (cheat keys available)
      -pcx       - pcx status suppression (won't clutter status line with
                   PCX filename during screen capture)


4.0 TROUBLESHOOTING:

     If you have problems, first remove  all TSR's and re-boot with a clean
     system.  OUTER  RIDGE  does  not  need  any  memory  managers  to  run
     correctly.  Remove any memory managers such as EMM386 or QEMM.

     If you   still   have   problems   running  OUTER  RIDGE,  delete  the
     OUTRIDGE.CFG file and re-run OUTER RIDGE.  This will reset OUTER RIDGE
     to the default configuration and write a new configuration file to the
     disk.

     OUTER RIDGE will run correctly on  stacked drives.  OUTER RIDGE should
     not be  run under Windows or OS/2.  OUTER RIDGE  can  be  run  from  a
     floppy.

  Q: My sound card is not detected at startup.  Why?
  A: The  initialization checks the environment settings to determine which
     type of  soundcard you have installed.   Only  Gravis  Ultrasound  and
     Sound Blaster are supported.

     Make sure your environment settings are set to something like these:

     ULTRASND=220,1,1,7,5          - if you have a Gravis Ultrasound
     BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 T1         - if you have a Sound Blaster

     Note: Obviously you will not use these exact settings  as  your  sound
           card may  not  be  located  at  these addresses.  These are just
           examples.

  Q: The startup screen says my SoundBlaster  is  detected,  but  I have no
     sound.
  A: You  may  have an original Version 1.0 Soundblaster.   These  original
     cards do  not  support  the  Auto-Initialize command 1Ch.  If you have
     this type  of card, you will not  be  able  to  have  music  or  sound
     effects.  Remove the BLASTER environment setting to turn off sound.


5.0 CREDITS:

     Code & Graphics By: John McCarthy
           MOD Music By: Karsten Koch
           SETUP.EXE By: Robin Ward



This Edition:  PC GAMER February 1996
Disk Editor:  Ted O'Neill