This release, v2.0.3, replaces the TaskMaker application and makes minor changes to the color and sound files. The preferences and player character files remain fully compatible with the previous versions.
It is recommended that all users switch to TaskMaker v2.0.3, but especially v2.0 users.
CONTACT ADDRESS
Storm Impact, Inc.
2148 Rugen Road, Suite B
Glenview, IL 60025-5521
America Online: “StormImpac” [no spaces or final ‘t’]
Internet: stormimpac@aol.com
Fax: 708-729-2667
Voice (toll-free domestic): 800-786-7696
Voice (domestic / international): 708-729-2666
THANK YOU, AND KEEP THOSE CARDS AND LETTERS COMING
TaskMaker v2 is a wonderful success. We have several bulletin boards (real, physical ones) full of letters and e-mail overflowing with comments and compliments. David, Tom, and the entire TaskMaker team thank you! You have no idea how much it has meant to us.
The product has proven amazingly stable and compatible across a wide variety of computers (thanks Apple). We take every single bug report seriously -- and every single comment and suggestion, too! We constantly update and improve our products. We hope this document shows our continuing commitment to high quality, stability, and compatibility.
Below is a list of bug fixes and other improvements (and despite David’s fragile programmer’s ego -- we’ve listed everything). No doubt you’ll find something you reported in this list.
------ CHANGES FROM v2.0.2 TO v2.0.3
Monday, September 19, 1994
STORYLINE
• Players are no longer required to kill the rebel leader to complete task #7. Since moral departure is unnecessary and can be out of character, players may take the easily discovered, non-violent alternative.
INTERFACE
• Highlighting, such as in a list, is now shown properly on color Macs that have the highlight color set to black. Previously, under those conditions, the entire highlighted text became completely black. Now it’s properly inverted.
• The b&w floor safe has been centered within the tile.
• The startup picture no longer obscures the PlainTalk speech recognition window upon startup.
• The About TaskMaker and Keyboard Help menu commands can now be chosen using PlainTalk speech recognition without instantly being dismissed.
SPELLS
• The ship making spell no longer works in Castle Hall. Some players were using it to obtain a powerful weapon in an unforeseen manner.
• A particular insignificant object can now be used to avoid teleportation by spell (including the spell cast when using the Teleport Scroll). If you’re wise enough to figure out the object, carry it in your pouch and you’ll really take the bite out of the final bad guy’s annoying teleportation defense.
• A spell has been added to control the use of the new multi-channel sound routines (which play many sounds simultaneously). Choose Other Spell To Invoke from the Spells menu and type “multisound” to see whether the multi-channel sound routines are currently turned on (the default in System 6.0.7 and up). Type “multisound off” to force the multi-channel sound routines to return to the old single-channel method (play one sound at a time). Type “multisound on” to allow the use of the multi-channel sound routines if the Mac has System 6.0.7 or better. The “multisound” spell is really a precaution in case the multisound routines turn out to be unstable. If you experience crashes or high pitched random noises, turn off multi-channel sounds. Your preference for multi-channel sounds is automatically remembered in the TaskMaker Prefs file.
EVIL ONES
• In v2.0.3, the final bad guy rarely casts a spell when the player is more than ten tiles away. This makes returning to Castle Hall during the final battle much easier.
• As a precaution, the final bad guy absolutely can’t be generated by the random monster generator (although it’s doubtful that he ever was before).
DUNGEON IMPROVEMENTS
Note: The v2.0.3 improvements to a particular dungeon won’t appear for player characters that have already explored that particular dungeon in a previous version of TaskMaker. Improvements appear only for any unexplored dungeons (and for completely New players).
• Silver Creek: Removed Pete from a locked, hidden room. Sorry about that, Pete.
• Poet’s Nightmare: A stairway has been added behind a wall south of the first official exit. This new stairway leads directly to the end of Poet’s Nightmare, and should be used to finish task #5 only in cases of extreme frustration. Use an ethereal potion to get to the stairway.
SUPPORT
• To be consistent in all of our products, some of the commands in the Play menu were moved around and renamed.
• Enhanced the contents of the Technical Support dialog, including the addition of the names of the Performas and newer computers.
• Changed the order form, including the addition of Discover and American Express.
• Added an advertisement in the Play menu for MacSki.
• Altered the text in the Product Information dialog for consistency across products.
• The register dialog now visually “cleans up” poorly typed registration numbers containing errors. This makes it more apparent that the registration dialog ignores upper/lower case differences and extra spaces.
INTERNAL CHANGES
A reasonably sized updater isn’t available to change TaskMaker v2.0.x to v2.0.3 because of the internal organizational changes standardized while working on our second product, MacSki.
• Expanded and separated code resources in expectation of future changes necessary to compile PowerPC native code.
• Internally compressed more resources, specifically 'STR#', 'TEXT', and 'styl'.
• Made some code and resources generic for use by all of our products.
• Improved the initial AppleTalk function call to prevent the system from hanging if a prior application blew out (highly technical term) AppleTalk.
• A lot of minor internal improvements and fixes were made to the mutual libraries while developing MacSki.
------ CHANGES FROM v2.0.1 TO v2.0.2
Thursday, May 26, 1994
SOUND
• TaskMaker now runs faster on machines with Sound Manager 3.0 or better. The hard disk is no longer accessed every time a sound is played (which was occurring on newer machines such as the Quadra AVs and PowerPC-based Macs).
• Information relating to the installed version of the Sound Manager as well as the machine-type number has been added to the Technical Support dialog.
• A sound is played in addition to the usual message if the player’s strength is too tired to bend bars, dig, or open a stone-wall passage.
OBJECTS
• Bestow is now much more effective. A player can choose to fight less often, and, in many cases, take the kinder, gentler route of gift-giving (although the game doesn’t care either way). Now, less valuable objects (depending on how mad and how evil the monster) may be cheerfully accepted by the monster recipient. In exchange, the monster recipient’s health is revived when receiving a gift; so don’t try to kill by attacking - bestowing - attacking - bestowing, etc.
• The Put All button does not appear when putting objects into a recycling bin.
• Only depositable (cash type) objects are listed when putting objects into an Auto Teller.
• Fixed a nasty bug in which items that the player didn’t possess were capable of being sold, even though those items weren’t in the player’s pouch.
• Increased by 25% the maximum number of objects that a dungeon can hold.
SPELLS
• Now the player loses ONLY ONE level of experience when casting the Escape To Outer Terra spell, rather than losing ALL BUT ONE level of experience. (Sorry about that.)
• The Escape To Outer Terra spell now properly updates the screen even when the player is already in Outer Terra.
• The Frighten spell adds to the player’s score, even when the player is deaf.
• Changed the name of the “GO BULLS” spell.
EVIL ONES
• The player must visit the island prison before the final bad guy will initiate a fight.
• If the player happens to kill a rogue duplicate of the final bad guy outside the bad guy’s home, the game does not end.
• If the player appears in Hell and the devil is immediately adjacent to the player, the devil automatically disappears. This prevents the player from becoming permanently cornered in Hell.
KEYBOARD
• During normal play, the mute key is now ‘?’ rather than tab. Tab now transacts.
• The tab key also switches between the pouch and the shop when transacting.
WINDOWS AND DIALOGS
• The Keyboard Help window now shows the non-numeric movement keys (which are useful for machines without a numeric keypad, such as the PowerBooks).
• The New Player dialog no longer suggests a default player name, because people weren’t inclined to override it with a name of their own creation. However, if the player name remains blank when the user clicks OK, a default player name will be suggested.
• Modified the “Save changes?” dialog and the Revert dialog to conform more closely to the Apple Human Interface Guidelines.
• The “Save changes?” dialog no longer appears if the player character file is unchanged since the last revert.
• Revert now displays a “cancelled” message if applicable.
• Changed and removed some error dialogs.
TEXT
• The wording used during Determine has changed from “Minimum health” to “Approximate health,” because the creature’s true health is not accurately displayed.
• The descriptive text generated in the Wear / Wield screen no longer describes which part of the player’s body an item was removed from.
• Edited some text in the Order Form dialog.
• Changed some of the text in the generated order form, and included the machine-type number.
• Altered a line of text in the tutorial to remove the first person narrative.
• Removed some punctuation and edited some general text.
UNINITIALIZED PASCAL STRINGS BEING COPIED INTO A 40 BYTE ARRAY
• Now operates on a machine which is missing the Sharing Setup control panel but has AppleTalk turned on.
------ CHANGES FROM v2.0 TO v2.0.1
Friday, December 10, 1993
GENERAL IMPROVEMENTS
• Balloon Help menu now displays the correct names for the Keyboard Help, Technical Support, and Order Form menu items.
• Modal dialogs should no longer occasionally freeze with the OK button highlighted (such as during Other Spell To Invoke).
• Fixed a bug that could have resulted in a bomb if an alert appeared during TaskMaker’s startup.
• When there is not enough memory to run in the current monitor’s depth, TaskMaker runs in B&W and alerts the user as to the proper partition sizes required (this avoids an “out of memory” error message for Thousands and Millions modes). Also, TaskMaker can now run in 16 color mode with only a 1300K partition, as opposed to 1750K.
• The “TaskMaker” sound now plays fully during the startup screen for all Macs.
• Maybe fixed 840AV intermittent sound bug when a sound would get garbled and high pitched. (It’s tough to do when you don’t own an 840AV. Hint, hint, Apple.)
• A number of minor changes to the Order Form.
• Entering an incorrect registration number no longer refers you to the non-existent “registration card.” Also, the incorrect registration number is automatically highlighted.
• Blank spaces or extra dashes in the registration number are ignored.
• Removed some hidden, needless, sample DITL text.
• In order to be a little more world friendly, TaskMaker now uses a System 7 function to find the preferences folder rather than creating a folder using the English word for “Preferences”. If you live in a country with a different name for the preferences folder (we apologize), be sure to move your TaskMaker Prefs file to the correct folder to retain your Hall Of Fame and registration information. (By the way, if the System 7 function is not available, TaskMaker looks in 'STR ' resource 20000 for the name of the folder. Using ResEdit you can change the folder name as it appears between the two ':' colons.)
GAME PLAY IMPROVEMENTS
• Added a set of four diagonal movement keys ( [ ] ; ' ) for keyboards that don’t contain numeric keypads (like PowerBooks). There wasn’t enough room anywhere on a normal keyboard layout for a mock numeric keypad, but at least the newly added keys are grouped logically to make diagonal movements easier.
• The bad guy in the final battle is a lot less difficult to kill. His beginning health is less, his self heal occurs a third less often, and the self heal amount is lowered to 10-75 from 50-200. He also attempts to teleport you half as often, and doesn’t cast as many spells when frightened. However, he can now summon monsters.
• Also, he should no longer appear in Hell prematurely.
• Mary no longer says “I shouldn’t be telling you this...” because people thought she had more to say. Ha, ha; She never did.
• Names and comments have been modified for several people and monsters.
• The TaskMaker clearly repeats the gist of tasks when asked a second time.
• You won’t get a valuable response if you transact with anyone while you’re repulsive.
• You can’t talk to the TaskMaker if you’re repulsive.
• Guards no longer leave their posts just because you’re repulsive.
• You can’t transact with a shopkeeper if you are repulsive or invisible.
• The Determine command now includes the creature’s approximate power rating and minimum health.
• Changed the tired attribute pattern from gray to diagonal stripes for easier viewing. (By the way, if you still don’t like the pattern, TaskMaker uses the first pattern in 'PAT#' resource ID 1000. Using ResEdit you can change the pattern to whatever you’d like.)
• Wear / Wield can now display armor / aim / damage numbers up to four digits long.
• The B&W picture for Wear / Wield has been slightly improved.
• Intermittent menu bar flashes no longer occur when clicking on various body parts.
• Removing items in Wear / Wield now correctly calculates powers like x-ray vision.
• Under certain conditions, some of the magic scrolls resulted in a negative base armor class (and possibly negative base aim and damage). The bug has been corrected, and afflicted v2.0 characters are now automatically repaired when opened.
• Wielding wands no longer exaggerates your power rating.
• Added a missing B&W graphic mask for the wand shape.
• Books can now be used to gain intellect. (David says: Now why didn’t I think of that?)
• Increased the effectiveness of the food ring.
• Holy Light now includes some armor protection.
• Changed the name of “Chest” to “Old empty chest” to show true worth.
• If a bug occurs when attempting to sell an object, you’ll automatically exit the shop.
• No need to “press a key” in Examine if you are already at the end of the list.
• The scroll rate of lists has been slowed to an acceptable rate on faster machines.
• In list mode, users without page up, page down, home, and end keys can use [, ], {, and } respectively. This is an undocumented feature which was also present in version 2.0.
• A sound is played if you fail to successfully cast a spell.
• You can no longer try to teleport if you are in a ship.
• Experience points are now properly removed by the Escape To Outer Terra spell.
• Other Spells: Added a ship making spell, as well as (for Masters) Kill and Teleport.
• You can win or lose only up to 500cp at a time when gambling.
• The spell for resetting the entire world now works.
• The spell for resetting a single dungeon does not save to disk until Save is chosen.
• Wishing for an object (by spell or scroll) treats both straight ( ' ) and curly apostrophes ( ’ ) the same when matching object names. For example, wishing for “Wand o' Frost” will now correctly give you a “Wand o’ Frost”.
DUNGEON IMPROVEMENTS
Version 2.0 players note: The v2.0.1 improvements to a particular dungeon won’t appear for v2.0 player characters that have already explored that particular dungeon. Improvements appear only for any unexplored dungeons (or, of course, for New players).
• Tutorial: A square symbol wall has been placed adjacent to one of the switches and its associated force field floor to indicate the connection between them.
• Outer Terra: A teleport is available next to the Island Prison.
• Castle Hall: Removed touchy Ooze from switch room. (Even though I still don’t think he started all of those fights.)
• Castle Hall: Far left bank teller counter now operates.
• Castle Hall: Moved cool stuff away from the sides of the inner sanctum to prevent Grasping, and replaced inner sanctum’s side doors with impenetrable walls.
• Skysail Village: Removed “2 DIG” message because SOMEONE thought he was supposed to dig somewhere around there.
• Skysail Village: Removed Trish the Dish, because she appears elsewhere.
• Poet’s Nightmare: The ethereal cheat has been prevented by the addition of a required switch near the conveyor maze. A minor addition to the gray room allows players to go back if they miss the switch.
• Poet’s Nightmare: Added a few secret messages.
• Poet’s Nightmare: Expanded some of the openings in the conveyor maze.
• Fierce Fold: An exit is immediately available.
• Lupercelia Lemma: An exit is immediately available.
• New secret dungeon: A short, cute dungeon available to new Masters only.
