**********************************DARK QUEST***************************V.1.1*** 
********************Chapter I. : Secret Of The North Lands*********************
***********************************************************by Lachie D. 2002.**


Table of Contents
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1.0 - About The Game
2.0 - Running The Game
   2.1 - Requirements
   2.2 - How To Play
3.0 - The FAQ 
4.0 - Credits
5.0 - Designer rambling 'bout making this game
6.0 - Version Update
7.0 - Contact
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

1.0.About The Game
==================
Dark Quest is a top view,action battle game set in a fantasy world.It's a 
mixture of several genres:action,strategy and RPG.
You control a hero and party of 4 men.You have 4 spells,you gather mana from 
kills and battle with numerous enemies through several levels and sceneries.
Dark Quest also offers 2 players mode.
Still it's not a large game so don't expect to spend hours and hours
playing it.It's my first,small but proffesionaly done game.Play it
if you want a not too demanding game or something to relax yourself.

Dark Quest is coded in QBasic using Rellib,a QBasic library by R.E.Lope
which uses a lot of assembler code.

This game is FREEWARE.

All ideas,tiles and sprites used in this product are my hard work
and I will allow other persons to use them in their projects just 
contact me.All I really want is credits.

2.0.Running The Game
====================
You run this game with DARKQ.EXE.Make sure that all .pal files are in
PAL directory,all .gfx files in GRAPHIC directory,all .map files in 
MAP directory and all .put files in PUT directory.That's it.

All game files: DARKQ.EXE, MAP1-5.MAP, MAP5A.MAP, SHEEPZ.MAP, SCENERY1-4.PUT,
                BATTLE1-3.PUT, SHEEPZ.PUT, SCORING.PUT, HIGHSCOR.PUT, 
                HIGHSCOR.DAT, MAP.PAL, RELPAL.PAL, MAIN.PAL,
                PAL0-7.PAL, EPAL1-3.PAL, INST.PAL, MAINMENU.GFX, 
                STORY0-6.GFX, EPILOG0-3.GFX,INST1-10.GFX
                
                
2.1.Requirements
================
You need a 386 or higher to run this game.Engine of this game is tested in
all Windows versions(and XP) and nobody reported serious bugs.It's best
that you run this game from MS-DOS.
Dark Quest does not require EMS memory.It runs purely on conventional 
memory.Tested in low DOS with mouse driver installed.It still had enough
mem!

2.2.How To Play
===============
Dark Quest has two game modes.

Quest Mode is playing with 4 men in your party,using 4 spells,gathering
mana and fighting with numerous enemies.Playing the game according 
to storyline.
Quest Mode requires tactics for succesfull playing and it has a lot of 
parameters which unfluence on that from using your men wisely to gathering
mana from kills and distributing it after each level.
But most important thing is to learn to use your hero effectivly.Simply,if
you don't play good with the hero you won't get enough kills and you party
will have to do most of battle.One the end,without mana you won't be
able to heal them.Use spells wisely!Esspecialy bombs.Bombs and
posion clouds are CRUCIAL if you want to finish Dark Quest.
You control your party with 6 commands.Please read INSTRUCTIONS within the
game to get full info about using commands,spells,mana distribution,ect.

Sheepz Galore is a small practice mode.Basicly you run around and kill
sheeps.Your goal is to kill all the sheeps in smaller amount of time.
In two player mode your goal is to have more kills than your opponent.

Controls:
---------
HERO:
Use arrow keys to move.
Use ENTER or second key left from RIGHT SHIFT to swing.
Commands: 1 - stand still and do nothing
          2 - stand still and look for target
          3 - follow hero and do nothing
          4 - follow hero and look for target
          5 - massive attack
          6 - go home
Spells: 7 - fire spell
        8 - bomb
        9 - dark orb
        0 - poison clouds

1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,0 are not numbers on numeric keypad!Don't mix them up.

SECOND PLAYER:
Second player controls one man from the party.
   D - left
   G - right
   F - down
   R - up
   Q - special ability
   W - swing sword

Options menu offers several variables to change.You can turn on and turn 
off the FPS counter,sound,save highscore option and change number of players.

During the game you can turn off or on the sound with S.

Speed of this game is reduced to 18-19 FPS on any PC.Trust me,that is 
the normal speed for Dark Quest.Anything faster would be wrong.
So don't complain on this game speed reducer.

3.0.FAQ
=======
I saw this in Terror(space shooter coded in QBasic) readme file and I 
thought it was a nice way to say some things.So I stole the idea for my 
readme.txt.Sue me! :P

What is this Chapter I. thingy in the game title?
-------------------------------------------------
Well I imagined this game as a part of a long serie.Like 30 sequels which
I plan to make till the day I die.And they should expand to the far future.
Now when I've finished first chapter I'm not sure anymore.Well,one thing for
sure you won't see a sequel for some time now since I'm preocupied with
other projects.And the code needs a lot of modifications if I plan to
make a larger game.

Does this game have sound blaster sounds?
-----------------------------------------
No.Sorry for that.I know that this makes my game a bit unproffesional.
I don't have a sound card.Still I tried to make descent PC SPEAKER 
sound effects.I was kinda prepared to make sound effect for sound
blaster with some niffty QBasic routines I downloaded but this new used
PC I got few months ago was a piece of shit without a sound card or 
anything usefull on it.

Why do you have in options menu save highscore on/off thingy? 
-------------------------------------------------------------
I've noticed that in Windows 2000 when I run a QBasic programm i cannot
use keyboard if it's coded with QBasic statements like INKEY$.
Luckily RelLib keyboard handler(Assembler),which this game uses works fine.
Highscore name input routine due its complexity is made with QBasic 
keyboard statements so on some PCs game might freez when you need to input 
your highscore name.So for that people I enabled an option of turning off
save highscore routine.

Same thing for FPS counter.Do I need it?
----------------------------------------
Well some people like to know on how much FPS game is runing.Me too.
It was usefully when I used a milidelay routine to control the speed
of game.Now it's just a cosmetic thingie.

Game is too difficult,gimme cheat codes!!!
------------------------------------------
I didn't made any cheat codes since the game is way short so I can't
allow you to just walk throught it.
Anyway I finished it two times in a row.It's never completely easy but
if you play it smart you really shouldn't have any serious problems
unless you have really bad luck.

Game is too complicated.All those commands,spells,mana distribution,ugh...
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
I don't agree.All you need to do is to read instructions and give it 5
minutes.If you can't handle it play Sheepz Galore dummie.

How do I use 4th spell?
-----------------------
You don't have it one the begining of the game.You need to find a certain
item on a certaing level to be able to use it.And that is not the only thing
in this game which is adventure like.

In two players mode dialoges in game are not printed on right places.Why?
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
These dialoges are coded to work in one player mode.If you play in two
player mode text might appear "off place".I don't find this to be a serious
problem since dialoges appear only two times in the entire gime.Just live 
with it.

Why do i need to click twice on ENTER when inputing my name for highscore?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Beats me.I had some problems with that routine(ENCODE.BAS).It skiped every
second inputing of name in highscore without apparent reason so I fiddeled
with it and fixed it.All you need is to press ENTER or any other key after
you press ENTER for the first time.Nothing serious.Hope you don't find
it too frustrating.

Err...in story I cannot skip scenes.I must wait.
------------------------------------------------
Story and epilog part of game use SLEEP statement to control the 
flow of scenes.Most times I use SLEEP 10 which is a delay of 10 seconds.
To skip SLEEP you need to press any key but it only works with QBasic
keyboard handler so if you can't skip it QBasic keyboard handler is not
working for you so you'll just have to wait these dreadfull 10 seconds.
I use SLEEP with highscore screen too.

My hero is stuck with one of his men on the begining of level.
--------------------------------------------------------------
Just press any of commands which will make him move away from you.

Massive attack command is silly.Why?
------------------------------------
Yes,after your warrior kills one of enemies he just stops.You'll need to
press 5 again to make him look for another target.To solve it I would have
to add a whole lot of code.Don't want to do it.

Why is AI so stupid?Sprites tend to stuck behind a tree and such.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Uh,AI is damn complicated.Coding it took most of my time.
If I also implemented AI which can go around colliding tiles then it would
be perfect.Well,I'll be honest,that is simply a too large cookie for me 
in this moment.

Where's the source code?
------------------------
Sorry,I'm not making my code public.For many reasons.For example
my code is messy and lot of people will just make "revisions" of my code
and nothing really usefull.Also code is on the edge with memory when 
it comes to compiling so if you want to expand it you'll need to do a lot
of modifications.Heh,I just figured out how to get rid of all RelFonts in
the code with one sub.And they take a lot of mem.Well,it's possible to save 
up a lot of mem but still you'll need to use another programming techniques
to make serious expanding.I will give my code to a person who is making a
serious project in RelLib,using a similar or same engine(SCROLL20) and
is really interested in battle routines I used like blood splattering,
flicker or hit routines.

Why is so easy to hack highscores?
----------------------------------
If it really makes you happy hack all the way!
But I don't see any point in it.

If want more FPS!Why can't I play this game with 25 or more FPS?
----------------------------------------------------------------
Cause I'm using a specific speed reducer.Also,18-19 FPS is speed like
made for the Dark Quest.It's prefect.And I repeat again,anything faster
is wrong and makes the game unplayable!


4.0.Credits
===========
Game idea,concept and design : Dean Janjic(a.k.a. Lachie Dazdarian)
Programming : Dean Janjic
Graphic : Dean Janjic,Kelly Duffy,Alan Millard
Level Design : Dean Janjic
Main Game Font : Adigun Polack
Testing : Dean Janjic (so far)

I am a founder of Kentarui game desing group so everything I release solo
is automaticly released as Kentauri product and should promote primarly 
Kentarui not me.Why you don't see a Kentauri logo in this game is purely
a techincal issue since my old hard disk got broke and I forgot to
download my logo from the net.Uh,if I release a a new version I'll 
add Kentauri logo in game loading screen.

Thanks to...

R.E.Lope for being supportive from the first moment I asked him for help.
You are my friend,mentor a coder's dream buddy.You are the author of
divine RelLib and RelLib's RPG engine in which this game is build.Without 
you this game would never be made.Some other game perhaps,but not Dark Quest.
Thank you for all you've done for me.Good luck with your future projects.

C.Chadwick for making Pixel Plus 256.All sprites and tiles are made in
that programm.PP256 is simply a small masterpiece.From coding to interface
and icons.Best tile editor for QBasic deffinetly.

Ingmar v.d. Steen for making nice sprites of a RPG hero for his old
screen by screen scrolling engine.I used those sprites as a starting 
point to make most of the characters in Dark Quest.

Nathan for making "Pushing the limits of QBasic"(i think i got the title
right :P) article which was very usefull when I needed to split my code in 
modules althought I didn't used your object coding technique and I used  
a lot of common shared variables to emulate it.Sorry for betraying your
teachings,mwahaha...Seriously your article was a big help when I had to
wrestle with memory overflow errors.

Adigun Polack for making nice fonts in PP256.I got them from RelLib and
various packages from R.E.Lope.I'm sure you don't mind me using them.
In advance,thanx for understanding.

Marcus Kasumba(Piptol) for taking interest in my project and giving me
good tips about making my code shorter.

Kelly Duffy for agreeing to work on graphic for my game.Althought her
pictures weren't on the level probably cause she couldn't work on them
properly it was nice to find somebody who acctually wants to help you
with the art.

Alan Millard for the picture of Tellin which I used on main menu screen.
Althought he promised to make more graphic this one image he made was 
still a lot.

CMA Death Adder for the help with the story.

PC-72 for giving me that tip with $DYNAMIC metacommand.It's evil!!!

Glenn Stampff for his help with saving full screen images and palettes.You 
were very kind and helpfull.Your knowledge just amazes me.And it's funny 
how you tried to explain me in comments that memory adresses and stuff.Man,
I am a dummie for that kind of things.

All the people in QB community who every took notice of me,my problems and
my projects.I love you all....well most of you. :P

For the creation of this game I used 3 screenshots from Lure Of The
Temptress and Moonstone.One in story(Dala talking with the King) and
in epilog(combination of two images).I don't feel too happy with it but
what is done is done.I recolored and redesigned them to put some effort 
in it and to fit them in story.And have in mind that combining two images 
with two different palettes is a bitch.


5.0.Designer blabing bout making this game
==========================================

This will be long and dizzy...so only for people with steel nerves.

Phew,the game is done!After all the troubles.It's a miracle!All i need to
do now is to spill my guts to people in this readme file.Wohooo!

When i started to make this game,several months ago I belived that I'll be
able to finish it in few weeks,which was for me few weekends since at that
time I had college obligations.I don't know what was i thinking.Probably
cause i made the game core so fast since I implemented some routines
from Ritual Combat.How did I sliped from my mind all the sprites and
tiles needed to draw,all levels to design,all the menus to code,all
routines and bug problems?

I soon realized that I will need a lot of free time to bring it to a 
complete game.Still during that weekends I didn most of the code.All that
was left is to complete it which is,and that all game designers know,the
biggest work you'll need to do.

But before my college classes and exams finished my hard disk got broke.
It was a disaster in full meaning of that word.Luckily all the files
concerning my projects I had backed up with various people on the net.
Still getting a new hard disk was another problem.I've lost an entire week
of my hollidays before my dad got me a new used PC which was a piece of
wreck.It had only DOS and Windows 95,system didn't recognized if mouse 
was plugged(and i checked the conection inside the PC) and hard disk 
acted like a 80 years guy with a bronhitis.Yup another fucked up hard disk.
I had to take it out from that PC since I couldn't plug my mouse there
and put it in my old PC.It was fine.Hard disk coughed but I could work on
my project.Not being able to code for few weeks(exams period and that week
without a hard disk) had influence on me.I couldn't get near to code.Don't 
know why.I simply didn't enjoyed it.Scary I know.I mostly spend time working
on graphic for story.Recoloring and fiddeling with pictures from Kelly Duffy
and making main menu screen from the black and white image that Alan
Millard made.I also desided to rip 3 images from other games.I didn't feel 
right about it but they fited nicely in my story.And I did made a 4th image 
ripped from Lure Of The Temptress which came out nice but it wouldn't fit in 
the story so I didn't used it.I needed few days to get rolling with the code.
Once again coding was fun and extatic.

My code never got so big that I couldn't run and save it from QB IDE.
Problem was compiling.On many levels.First problem was memory.
I had to break my code in modules to be able to compile it but then I 
couldn't run my code from QB IDE.Luckily game was near completion so the
whole procedure wasn't that frustrating.
Parts that I didn't made,mostly menus could be coded as separate programms.
Engine I used wasn't designed for modular programming so I need to
do a lot of improvising.I made two modules and in second one I removed all
the subs that were using COMMON SHARED variables,from main menu,to story
scene slideshows.I did a lot of code managment in main module.Had to make
it shorter and use tricks.Code got bigger and bigger and form time to
time i had to move more and more code in second module.Some times I used
more COMMON SHARED variables to emulate object programing techniques since
the stuff Nathan said in his article I simply couldn't implement on my
code without somebody showing me how can I do it exactly.I mean,he's
example in article is ok but when it comes to using it on exact problems...

Second problem were bugs.Yes!Programm migh run in QB IDE just fine and 
you'll might be all happy but when you compile your game wierd bugs will
appear.So I recommend you to compile your programms before completion so
that you wouldn't get overwhelmed with bugs.
One bug was relating tile collision.I didn't planed while making my 
put files so I mixed up colliding and non-colliding tiles in
different sceneries instead of making all tiles colliding from one tile
number in all tilesets.That is not that big problem you say,right?Just use
IFs...IF this level then tile colliding IF not then non-colliding.But that
caused bugs in my tile collision routine when compiled.I don't know why and
what the real problem was but hero tend to stuck on tiles which were
colliding on one level and non-colliding on other levels.So I had to make
all colliding tiles on one tileset to be colliding on other tilesets.Same 
thing for non-colliding tiles.And the bug disappeared.Whipeee!
Second bug that appeared was in encode routine used when you input your name
for highscore.Game would just skip this part if you entered highscore
a game before.I did some fiddeling and the problem seems to be fixed.
More bugs appered when I made some modification on the code and caused them
myself.Like when I forgot to put a statement which passes the right number
of NPC from Draw.NPC sub to AI.NPC sub which moves NPCs by AI algorthms.
Man it was Twilight Zone!Corpses moved,enemy warriors followed hero
commands,I thought compiler got possesed again.Took me half an hour
to find the problem.

Second hard disk got broke too.A day before I completed the game.Althought I 
had the code backed up of floppys since those coughings were warning enough 
it was frustrating.I shaked the hard disk a bit.No good.Tommorow I desided 
to throw it on the carpet.Heck,it's not working,should I take care of it?
Few gentle throws and then one stronger.Cling!I put it back in and it works!
Seriously!The throwing worked!You might not belive it.You might find throwing 
childish but dammit it had effect.And hard disk worked even better.Still it 
worked only for a two days.Enough to finish Dark Quest but you wouldn't 
belive what can you do without a hard disk.Especially if you have 2 floppy
disk drives.All you need is a boot disk.I managed to put QBasic on one 
floppy disk and compile programms on it.Last nicpicking on the code I did 
without a hard disk.And it was quite a lot of nitpicking.I'm almost 100%
sure that now,Dark Quest is completely bug free.

Anyway Dark Quest is finished.I can enjoy at least that.I made a computer 
game!It came out nice...well,I feel it did.You'll be the judges.
It's not exactly how I wanted it to be.There is no load of breathtaking,
full screen anime pictures,no dreamlike tunes and trembling sound
effects.But being a freeware game designer with serious technical
difficulties you must lower your ambitions and standards.

I just hope around 200 people will download and play this game and
at least 20 will feel enough motivated to email me.
That is my goal.And to get as much reviews posssible.
Peace be!

6.0.Version Update
==================
There is nothing mega new in this version nor I plan to improve something
visible.All larger improvements will be in sequels.Now,what I done is I 
fixed last two(I sure hope so) remaining bugs.First one was on main menu.
I don't know if you ever noticed it but you could go one place below exit.
Dot would remain on the same place but you were not on exit option.All you 
had to do is to press UP to get back on exit.Anyway I fixed that thing.

Other,more serious bug occured when hero would get kicked into one of
his warriors and remain stucked with him.Now that can't happen.Well 
I checked the nature of bug on old version to see when it occurs and then 
tried to cause it in new version on the same way.Now Hero is simply  
blocked with warrior from the party if he get's kicked into him.

7.0.Contact
===========
My email:lachie13@yahoo.com
KENTAURI website:www10.brinkster.com/lachied

Feel free to email me bout anything concerning my games and game design
in general.Comments,bug reports and such are welcomed.You can also use 
KENTAURI forum if you please.


---Lachie Dazdarian, 1.8.2002.









