Nukes3D
Release v1.0
June 2, 1999

Biggins
biggins@verge-rpg.com
http://biggins.verge-rpg.com/

===========================
Quick and Easy Installation
===========================
1. Unzip everthing to a new directory.
2. Run SETUP.EXE
3. Run NUKES3D.EXE

=====
Setup
=====
You must run setup before you run the game.  This will configure
the sound settings and cd player.  There is an autodetect option
for the soundcard, but if this doesn't work you can manually
input your sound card settings.  After configuring everything,
choose 'Save Settings and Exit.'

=====
Intro
=====
If all goes good, when you run the game you should see the wonderful
intro, and will take you to the menu when its done.  To skip the
intro press <esc>.

=========
The Menus
=========
You begin in the menus.  The menu system can be reached during the
game play by pressing <esc>.  To select a menu option, press <Enter>.
To go back up a menu level, press <esc>.

  --------
  New Game
  --------
  This menu begins a new game.  You are taken to another menu screen,
  where you enter info for the game, such as player names, team numbers,
  and whether a tank is player- or computer-controlled.  There can be
  from 2 to 10 players in a game.  An option called 'Give Random Names'
  fills all 10 spots with assorted names.  You may also input your own
  names by moving to the desired slot and typing the name.  You do NOT
  have to fill all 10 spots.  Any name slot left blank (all dots), will not
  be used in the game.  There is a 'Game Options' menu where you can
  change various settings for the game.  Select 'Begin Game' when ready
  to begin.
  
  ------------
  Options Menu
  ------------
  You can change several options from this menu.  All options are always
  saved to the configuration file.
    
  * Set View Distance *
      This menu changes the distance that you are able to see during the
      game.  Reducing this GREATLY increases the speed of the game.  If
      you are having problems with framerate, this should be your first
      change.

  * Sound Volume *
      This changes the level of all sounds in the game.
  
  * CD Volume *
      This changes the volume of the CD player.

  * Set Keyboard Controls *
      Allows the keyboard settings to be changed.  To change a key, scroll
      to the desired setting, then press <enter>.  The old key will change to
      three dots (...).  Now press the new desired key.  'Restore Defaults'
      resets all keyboard settings to their default layout.

  ----
  Exit 
  ----
  This exits the game.

================
Playing the Game
================
NOTE: This is described using the default keyboard layout.  Keys may vary if you
have changed them in the options menu (see above).

The current keyboard settings and other helpful information can be reached
by pressing <F1> while playing the game.

Current statistics can been seen by pressing <F2> during the game.

The game begins with a trip to the Tank Shop, where you can outfit your
team however you like.  Click on a tank name to edit that tank.  Ammo
is stored by team, so you must share between your other tanks.  To buy
more ammo, click on the 'Buy More' text in the upper right corner.

Once you have left the tank shop, the tank order is scrambled and tanks are 
randomly assigned a location on the playing field.  The turn begins with
the first team.

  -----------------
  On Screen Display
  -----------------
  The name of the current tank is located in the lower left of the screen,
  along with its life, current weapon, current ammo, and team. In the lower right
  is the turn timer, which shows how long is left in that turn.  If you do
  not fire before it reaches 0, the you are skipped and the turn goes to the
  next team.
  
  Along the right edge of the screen are several settings.  'View' tells the
  current view location.  It begins in the internal tank view, and can be
  changed to external view.  Views are toggled by pressing the 'v' key.

  'Missle View' is a setting that when activated, has the camera follow your
  projectiles after they have been shot, so you can see where they land.  This
  is toggled with the <Backspace> key.

  'Gas' shows the amount of gas remaining in your tank.  When you run out, you
  can't drive.  More gas can be bought in the tank stop following the level.

  ------
  Firing
  ------
  To aim the barrel, use the arrow keys.  <Up> and <Down> raise and lower the barrel,
  and <left>/<right> change the yaw of the tank.  The tank can be driven (if you have
  enough gas) by pressing the <a> and <z> keys.  Most objects such as trees and rocks
  can be run over if you are going fast enough.

  To change your weapon, press the <enter> key.  This cycles through all available
  weapons.  When you run out of ammo for a particular weapon, it is no longer
  available.  The ammo left and weapon name are displayed in the lower left of the
  screen.

  To fire, press and hold the <space> bar.  A power indicator bar will appear on the
  bottom of the screen.  When this has reached the desired power level, release the
  <space> bar.  The longer you hold it, the farther the projectile will go.

=====
Money
=====
There are several ways that a tank can earn money in the game.  The survivors of the round
recieve large sums of money.  You get a bonus for every tank that you kill.  Also
there is money awarded by the damage points that are done each turn, so you don't actually
have to completly kill someone to earn money.

=======
Weapons
=======
There are many weapons available for use in the game.  These include:

  ------
  Cannon
  ------
  Just your average explsive tank bullets.  Can cause some
  damage with a direct hit.  Not very exciting, but they're
  free.
  
  -------------
  Trojan Bovine
  -------------
  This modern reinvention of the ancient horse has much the
  same purpose, except that instead of being filled with 
  soldiers, this one is packed with dynamite.  And quite
  a lot of dynamite at that.  Enough to level a small hillside.
  New stealth bovine technology allows for it to pass through
  objects, however it slows down significantly when this
  happens.  Unpowered and unmanned, Balistic Betsy here
  will tend to roll downhill, so let her fly and hope she
  doesn't come back towards you.  It sucks to be around
  when she blows.
  
  -------------
  Cluster Bombs
  -------------
  This projectile flys until it hits something, at which point
  it blows up into four other projectiles.  These fly off in
  random directions and cause a little havoc.  Because of the
  small number of projectiles and total randomness of thier
  flight, these only work well when there is much to hit.
  
  -------------
  MIRV Clusters
  -------------
  Umm, does the phrase 'blanket bomb' mean anything to you?  This
  neat little missle flys until the highest point in its path,
  then explodes into a ring of 10 high powered bombs.  Fairly
  effective at obliterating everything in a small area.  Chews
  through tanks like they were cardboard.
  
  ----------------------
  Hungarian JAFFA Rocket
  ----------------------
  This rocket was designed by a Hungarian student using materials
  found commonly in Scandanavia.  Doctored a bit to contain many
  liters of highly explosive fluid, this rocket yields a low radius,
  high powered blast.  Good for point blank executions.  Due to
  the nature of the fuel however, the guidance system has difficulty
  maintaining a straight path of travel.
  
  ------------
  Mighty Moles
  ------------
  So what happens when you strap lots of TNT onto a small rodent?
  These furry friends just keep going until their time runs out
  or they smell a tank in the vicinity, then they go boom.
  
  -------------
  Flame Thrower
  -------------
  Its name being fairly acurate, this gun simply fires flames.
  You get several seconds of exploding plasma-type shlong coming
  out of the barrel of your gun.  It tends to blow up anything
  it hits, though with minimal power.
  
  --------
  Da Bombs
  --------
  The technical term for this weapon is BoSTEBB (Bovine Stealth
  Technology Encapsulated in a Bowling Ball), however most people
  simply refer to them as Da Bombs.  These small explosives are
  shaped like a bowling ball, and function in much the same 
  way: they roll.  Launched from the barrel of your cannon, they
  have several seconds after they land to run into a tank, otherwise
  they self destruct.  The ability of Da Bombs to travel through 
  ordinary objects has been recently achieved by the use of
  bovine stealth technology, hence their cow-like color.
  
  ---------------
  Fiesta Mobile!
  ---------------
  The government design began as a small undetectably craft, able to
  sneak behind enemy lines and attack any target using its advanced
  artificial intelligence systems.  Unfortunatly these AI systems
  became more inteligent then their creators, and soon, under the
  influence of such things as rock and roll, Scandanavian rocket fuel,
  and females, they became wildly uncontrollable.  No longer very
  good at subtle, they are now quite detectable.  This, however, is
  not a concern as they have an insanely large onboard arsenal, and
  are not hesitant to use all of it.  A caution: because of their
  unstable systems, these craft have a strange tendancy to detonate
  all remaining weapons at the same time, leaving a crater slightly
  smaller than Texas.

  ------------------
  Rag in da Gas Tank
  ------------------
  A fine display of what happens when you lose track of da gases, your
  tank has this strange tendancy to just blow up.  Think of it as a
  $21 million Molotov Cocktail.  Quite potent and one hell of a blast
  radius.  It shouldn't need to be said that you don't live through
  this one.

  ----------
  Air Strike
  ----------
  Fire out a small homing tracer, then sit back and watch the fireworks.
  A low altitude bomber comes by and drops a few presents onto the
  tracer.  Watch out though, the tracers are light and will get stuck
  in trees and other such objects.

  ----------------
  Super Air Strike
  ----------------
  Just like the Air Strike, only instead of one bomber, you get a whole
  squadron of them.  Hehehe.  These can actually be quite effective
  against closely grouped tanks.

  -----------
  Rocket Pods
  -----------
  Availible as an add-on pod to the top of your tank, these twelve shot
  missle groups are quite effective.  Because of thier constant rocket
  propulsion, they travel in a much straighter line than the other
  projectiles.

  ----------
  Laser Pods
  ----------
  Stolen from a secret government lab, this pair of UIP-354 high power
  lasers are able to emit very strong pulses of caustic laser energy.
  Deadly to just about everything but the ground itself, these are sure
  to brighten your day.

=======
Shields
=======
You can upgrade your tank to have several levels of shield protection:

  ------
  Normal
  ------
  By default, your tank comes equipped with high grade armor, able to
  defend itself fairly effectively against most attacks.  This isn't
  to say that a good hit won't cause damage though.

  ------
  Strong
  ------
  This upgrade includes stronger armor, sometimes up to double the
  protection.  Also included is a magnetic resonance energy deflector,
  which activates when it detects strong explosions, refracting
  pulse waves away from the tank surface, thus protecting the tank
  from blasts.

  ------
  Active
  ------
  The latest in shield technology, this system is dependent on a quad
  set of rotating sensors, which orbit the tank searching for incoming
  projectiles.  When detected, they move to intercept, thus allowing
  detonation a distance away from the tank itself.  This system is
  very effective against small charges, protecting from almost all
  damage.  There are still several bugs with the technology however,
  it is unable to distinguish between projectiles that would completely
  miss the tank, thus causing detonation when not necessary.  This
  can be a disadvantage when dealing with strong warheads.

=======
Engines
=======
The engine of your tank determines how much driving power you have and
the rate at which your tank consumes gasoline:

  ------
  Normal
  ------
  The standard in manufactured tanks, this engine has a fair amount
  of power at low speeds, but accelerates slowly and struggles with
  higher speeds when loaded down.

  -------
  Mule XP
  -------
  Like its name says, this engine was developed for a much heavier tank,
  therefore it gives impressive power when put into a tank this size.
  A significant speed increase over the standard engine.

  ---------
  XG5 Turbo
  ---------
  Race car meets work horse.  This engine has impressive acceleration and
  a huge amount of power.  It can plow through anything and conserves
  gasoline very well.

===============
Troubleshooting
===============
Q: The game runs too slow.
A: The biggest speed improvement comes from decreasing the view size.  This can be changed
   in the options menu.

Q: Its still too slow.
A: Go to the console (press <esc>) and type "speed .5" without the quotes.  This causes it
   to run at double speed, basically skipping every other frame, so there is a quality drop.
   Warning: Use this only as a last ditch effort, becuase it's sort of a fudge in the code.

Q: I am positive that my sound card settings are correct, but all it does is make annoying 
   buzzing sounds out of the speakers and hangs when I try to play something.
A: Are you sure that your card is 100% soundblaster compatable?  Beyond that I havn't
   figured out why it does this.

========
Feedback
========
Please tell me what you think of Nukes3D!
Email me at biggins@verge-rpg.com

As I cannot test Nukes3D on all systems, you will help me to improve Nukes3D and hopefully
fix most of the bugs.

=========
Register!
=========
Had enough of only four players?  Want to play with the rest of the way cool weapons?  Then
register and get all 10 players and tons of weapons at one time!  You also get lots of other
goodies like the source code and tons of docs that explain how to cheat and change things.
Fun stuff!  See the file REGISTER.TXT for complete information.

=======
Contact
=======
Biggins
biggins@verge-rpg.com

The latest version of Nukes3D and information concerning its development are always available at:

http://biggins.verge-rpg.com/

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