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- CAESAR II PLAYABLE DEMO -- DOCUMENTATION
- Copyright * 1995 Sierra On-Line, Inc.
- ----------------------------------------
-
- Welcome to our playable demo of Caesar II. This demo lets
- you try many of the features of the finished game, and has
- been set to easy mode to make exploring the game fun. These
- notes will help you learn what different features in the
- game do, and give you some tips for doing well.
-
-
- OVERVIEW
- Caesar II is the sequel to the original Caesar, the hit
- simulation of city-building in the Roman Empire. As in that
- game, you take on the role of Governor of a Roman province,
- committed to expanding the Empire through the conquest of
- distant lands. You are responsible for building the capital
- city of a province, as well as connecting that city to other
- towns and resources within the province. You must also
- defend that province from incursions of raiding barbarians,
- both passively by building walls and towers, and actively by
- raising armies to do battle against them. Your career is of
- vital importance, and is linked to your success in ruling
- your lands; if you achieve the required ratings in Peace,
- Culture, Prosperity and Empire for your current province,
- then you are offered promotion to another, more challenging
- province and expected to achieve even higher ratings. When
- you have conquered enough provinces, then you achieve the
- ultimate promotion and are crowned Caesar -- Emperor of
- Rome.
-
-
- RUNNING THE DEMO
- After you have installed this demo, you run it by accessing
- the directory where you installed the demo and typing:
-
- C2DEMO <ENTER>
-
- This will take you through some introductory screens, and
- then place you in the City Level.
-
- To reconfigure the game for your sound card, access the
- directory where you installed the demo and type:
-
- SETSOUND <ENTER>
-
- Follow the instructions to select options for playing sound
- effects and music.
-
-
- MEMORY REQUIREMENTS
- This demo is designed to run in 4 to 8 megabytes of memory.
- To make the game run in 4 megs, you need to access the
- directory where you loaded the demo and type:
-
- SET DOS4GVM=1 <ENTER>
-
- -- BEFORE you run the game.
-
- The game will run with most memory managers, but it prefers
- certain memory configurations. If you have problems running
- the game, try reconfiguring your computer for no EMS, or
- disable all memory managers.
-
-
- THE CITY LEVEL
- The demo takes place in the City Level of the game. The
- main view of the city is located on the left side of the
- screen; the right side displays an overview map and several
- icons. Right-click on these controls to learn what they do.
- A menu bar featuring game options stretches across the top.
-
- Here are some notes on the structures you can build on the
- city level.
-
- NOTE ON LAND VALUE: All structures on the map exert a
- positive or negative on the value of the property
- surrounding them. The sum total of the effects of
- structures on each map-square determines its LAND VALUE.
- This value is used to calculate to what level your housing
- will develop (or decline). In short, land value is the KEY
- to growing your housing.
-
- In addition, some areas of the map will be LIMITED to a
- certain level of land value, based on the PRESENCE or
- ABSENCE of particular structures or supplies. For example,
- areas that are near a barracks are limited to low land
- value; and areas that do not have water supply are limited
- to a very low land value.
-
- NOTE ON AVAILABILITY: Remember that some structures are not
- available until you reach certain levels of population. In
- the demo, this means that you will not be able to build
- libraries, or upgraded versions of some structures.
-
- PEOPLE: After you build some housing, roads and other
- structures, you will see people walking around your city.
- These people are the links between some city buildings. To
- learn about them and how they are doing, QUERY them (see
- below) and select the "People" option.
-
-
- ROADS AND PLAZAS -- these form links between the following
- structures:
- * Forums and Housing -- for tax collection
- * Businesses and Housing -- for employment
- * Markets and Housing -- for customers
- * Barracks and housing -- for security
- * Praefectures and structures -- for fire prevention
-
- The people that walk along roads and plazas are the actual
- links between structures; in a few cases -- specifically
- soldiers and "vigiles" (watchmen) -- these people will react
- to situations in the city. A good road structure will
- ensure that structures are linked as needed. Remember that
- in order for most structures to gain the benefit of a road,
- they must be within TWO squares of it.
-
-
- WATER -- There are four structures used to get water through
- the city:
-
- RESERVOIRS are the main source of water for a city; they
- create water supply (water that is used by people) in a
- small radius, and pipe access (water that is piped -- via
- underground networks which are not shown -- to other water
- structures) in a larger radius. A reservoir only has water
- when it is either adjacent to a river, or linked to one such
- reservoir via an aqueduct (see below).
-
- FOUNTAINS can be placed in areas with pipe access, to create
- water supply over a much larger area. Most of your housing
- will get its water from fountains placed within range of
- reservoirs.
-
- AQUEDUCTS are used to send water from one reservoir to
- another; in this way you can create water sources all across
- the map. Many reservoirs can be linked in a series;
- however, later reservoirs will supply water to smaller
- areas.
-
- When money or space is tight, WELLS can be used to create a
- water supply within a small radius. It does not create
- water access.
-
- Water supply can also be had from RIVERS, but this is
- considered primitive and will restrict the development of
- housing.
-
- NOTE: For help in placing water structures, use the PULL-
- DOWN MENU above the overview map to access the Water map-
- report. Water supply is indicated in blue, pipe access is
- red, and areas with both are purple.
-
-
- HOUSING -- To succeed, housing should:
- * have high Land Value
- * have Water Supply (but NOT from a river)
- * have access to a Forum
- * not be near a business, market, wall, gate, barracks or
- praefecture
- * have bath access
- * have high security
- * have market access
- * have access to a grammaticus and rhetor
- * have close access to all three types of entertainment
- (theater, coliseum and circus)
- * be in a city with high hospital-to-population and
- library-to-population ratings
-
-
- SECURITY -- There are four structures associated with
- security:
-
- WALLS and TOWERS enclose areas to give them high security.
- YOU MUST ACTUALLY ENCLOSE AN AREA to get this security
- bonus. Since barbarians cannot cross rivers without a
- bridge, these are also considered walls for the purposes of
- enclosure. Be careful -- watch out for breaks in walls, or
- bridges on rivers!
-
- BARRACKS generate soldiers that patrol the city in search of
- barbarians or rioters. If found, these people will attack
- and kill them. Soldiers also pass a security bonus to any
- areas they walk past.
-
- PRAFECTURES generate vigiles ("watchmen") that patrol the
- city in search of rioters or fire. If found, these people
- will take care of them. Praefectures also pass a security
- bonus to any areas they walk past.
-
- If security is low in the city, then ROBBERIES may occur.
- Robberies lower productivity of businesses and land values,
- and can even take gold from your treasury (see TEMPLES,
- below!)
-
-
- SANITATION -- There are two structures associated with
- sanitation:
-
- BATH HOUSES need to be placed near housing to affect its
- sanitation levels. Make sure they are built in areas that
- have pipe access.
-
- HOSPITALS can be placed far from the populations they
- service; you must establish a high hospital-to-population
- ratio for them to be effective. Hospitals must be
- accessible through roadways, so build them next to roads
- that people use (particularly forum workers).
-
- If sanitation is not attended to, then DISEASE may occur.
- These kill houses and lower land values. You can eliminate
- the symptoms of plague easily enough, but you must eliminate
- their cause (i.e. low sanitation) if you don't want them to
- come back.
-
-
- ENTERTAINMENT -- There are six entertainment structures in
- the game: two theaters (THEATER and ODEUM), two coliseums
- (ARENA and COLISEUM), and two circuses (CIRCUS and CIRCUS
- MAXIMUS). The latter building in each category is identical
- to the former, except that it accesses a larger area.
- Housing likes to be within close proximity of ALL THREE
- entertainment types.
-
- INDUSTRY -- On the city level, you build MARKETS near
- housing to sell your goods, and up to eight types of
- BUSINESSES. The "Jars" in each business indicate its
- output, which directly affects your industrial taxes.
- Markets will develop as your city and businesses develop.
-
-
- EDUCATION -- There are three types of educational
- structures. The GRAMMATICUS is the school for younger
- Romans, while the RHETOR is for older students; build these
- near housing to help it develop. The LIBRARY affects
- housing across the entire city; build enough to maintain a
- high library-to-population ratio. Also, libraries must be
- accessible somehow through roadways, so build them next to
- roads that people use.
-
-
- FORUM -- The Forum is used as a meeting place by your
- citizens, and as a tax-collection agency for your
- government. There are three sizes, with increasing areas of
- effect. They will develop as your city develops.
-
-
- TEMPLES -- These structures increase land value, and also
- store your treasury's gold! Make sure to build them in
- secure locations, or else risk having your gold stolen.
- They will develop as your city develops.
-
-
- GARDENS -- Placing gardens in your city's open spaces is a
- good way to increase land values.
-
-
- QUERYING STRUCTURES -- You can query any structure, person,
- icon or control on the screen by right-clicking on it. You
- can also query them by selecting the Query icon and then
- clicking on them.
-
- When you query something, you access the query panel for
- that item. When a structure is selected, this panel has
- three modes:
-
- General -- Displays the most pressing need or problem, if
- any, for this structure.
-
- Detail -- Displays all relevant statistics for this
- structure -- however, not all statistics will be relevant
- for the structure that is built there.
-
- People -- If any people are near the part of the map you
- selected, then you can poll them individually through this
- mode. Click on their pictures in the panel to find out
- their name, job, and how well they feel their job is being
- accomplished in the city.
-
- There are also three links on this panel, which lead to the
- pages of on-line help, tips and history for that structure.
-
- When you select an icon or control on the screen, this
- instead accesses a brief description of that control.
-
-
- MAP REPORTS -- You can view a number of reports for your
- city by clicking on the pull-down menu above the overview
- map. Select a report from the list provided, and it will be
- overlaid onto the overview map. Press AND HOLD "?" button
- next to the menu to see an explanation of the colors in the
- current report, and to see those covers overlaid onto the
- scrolling view.
-
- To remove any reports from the map, select "Geography" from
- the pull-down menu.
-
-
- THE FORUM
- By clicking on the Go to Forum button in the center of your
- game controls, you can access a number of reports on your
- progress. These are listed in a menu at the bottom of the
- Forum screen; you can also access them by clicking on the
- people and structures on the Forum screen itself.
-
- Important reports are:
-
- RATINGS: View your current ratings in Peace, Culture,
- Prosperity and Empire. (Culture and Prosperity are the only
- ratings that apply in the demo. These ratings determine if
- and when you can get promoted from your current city to a
- more difficult one.
-
- TREASURER: Lets you view your accounts, and set tax rates.
-
- ROME: Indicates your current favor with the Empire, and
- lets you send gifts to the Emperor.
-
- PERSONAL ADVISOR: Lets you view the status of your career,
- set your salary, and donate money to the city from your
- personal savings.
-
- PLEBEIAN TRIBUNE: Lets you commission more plebes to
- maintain the city, and assign them to specific tasks.
- Plebes keep your city from falling into ruin.
-
-
- HOT-KEYS
- The following hot-keys can be used in the game:
- + Zoom in
- - Zoom out
- 1 Jump to Furthest Zoom level
- 2 Jump to Medium Zoom level
- 3 Jump to Closest Zoom level
- < Rotate counter-clockwise
- > Rotate clockwise
- BkSp or Del Select "Clear Area"
- spacebar Cancel current building activity (useful for
- roads, aqueducts etc.)
- Alt-F Enter Place Flag mode
- D Jump to Danger Spot
- F2 or F Jump to Forum
- P pause game
- Y Yes for Yes/No panels
- N No for Yes/No panels
- Esc Exit current screen/panel/menu
- ALT-X Exit to DOS
-
-