¯ZONE RUNNER ---------------------------------------------------------------- ¯INTRODUCTION Looking into the vastness of space, you think about the galactic voyage ahead. You are a ZONERUNNER, an interplanetary soldier of fortune, about to embark on your next mission. Your adventure entails flying your spacecraft amongst planets located in the outlying area of two closely-situated galaxies. Your livelihood depends on buying and selling vitally-needed goods. The job has its advantages. It's beneficial to the civilizations involved, and it can probe to be quite profitable to you. But there are a few obstacles to be considered, such as finding and bargaining with the planets, working within the capacity of your carog hold, and avoiding the most incredulous intergalactic adversaries. Of course, all the while you must monitor and conserve your ship's energy. As if that weren't enough, you also have to consider supply and demand. If you don7t meet a planet's need for an item quickly, the price of the item goes up. If you don't meet the need adequately, the planet perishes, leaving one less source of supplies. As planets die, you have to wwork harder. The battle to find and deliver the goods is fierce. If you don't succeed, all the planets die, and the game is over. But, if you're good, you can attempt the toughest challenge of all, a run across the Neutral Zone between the galaxies. Here lies the opportunity for the greatest wealth...and with it, the threat of instant death. ¯SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS To play ZoneRunner, you need the following equipment: *Tandy Color Computer 3 (minimum 128k memory) *CM-( Color Monitor or standard television set *Disk drive and cable *Color Mouse (recommended) or Joystick ¯LOADING THE GAME Before you play ZoneRunner, make a copy of the program diskette. use the stndard procedure described in your Color Computer Disk System Owner's Manual. After you make the copy, place the original program diskette in a safe place. Use only the copy to play the game. 1.) Be sure your computer, monitor, disk drive, and mouse/joystick are properly connected, and turn on the system. 2.) Insert a copy of the ZoneRunner diskette into the primary disk drive. 3.) At the OK prompt, type DOS . If you have a RGB monitor, type GW$ . Then, at the OS-9:prompt, type ZONE . The screen shows a galactic navigational map and the spaceship's control panel. To start playing the game, proceed to the "playing the Game" section. To change the screen colors, or to indicate the high resolution interface oprion, continue to Step 5. 4.) Press [F1]. The screen Shows Configure Colors: Foreground:Up Down Background:Up Down Mouse Type: Normal Select "F2" to Resume. 5.) To change the foreground and background colors of the screen, position the pointer on UP or DOWN. Then, press the button. The screen color changes. Continue to press the button until the screen colors you desire are displayed. 6.) To indicate you are using the high resolution interface with your mouse or joystick, position the pointer on NORMAL, and press the button. The HI-RES option is activated. Other- wise, leave NORMAL in the field. NOTE: If you are having difficulty moving your pointer, use the keyboard mouse to change the interface option. To use the keyboard mouse option, press [CTRL][CLEAR]. Use the left and right arrows to move horizontally on on the screen. Use the up and down arrow to move up and down. Press [CTRL][CLEAR] again to return to the standard joystick/mouse option. 7.) Press [F2] to enter the changes, and to start the game. ¯PLAYING THE GAME While you're waiting for the lsat seconds of the launch countdown, you study your course of attack using the atlas for galactic travels. When the mission begins, your navigational map of the two galaxies appearss on the screen. The intersection of the horizontal and vertical lines pinpoints the location of your starship(+)> Together, the two alaxies are home to planets(circle), cargo ships( square), other ZoneRunners(diamond),pirate vessels(triangle), and patrol ship(black triangle). Currently, these various entities are represneted as small clusters of dots. Yor'realmost ready for Phase I of the mission, the liftoff. You take one last glance at your ship's control panel, the instruments surrounding the map. According to the seven control indicator gauges, the HEADING CONTROL, ENERGY, WEALTH, DISPLAY, SHIELD, WEAPON, and SECSOR, all systems are "GO". ¯MANEUVERING YOUR SPACESHIP The entire operation of your spaceship is keyed to the control panel. As you program your flight direction, remember that precision, along with ZoneRunner expertise brought you this far. Located in the upper left corner of the display, the HEADING CONTROL registers north by northwest. Locked in with a press of the button the only way to change directions now would be to ppoiint the directional beacon toward a different hash mark. Now to regulate the amount of energy expended during the opera- tion of the spasceship. This generally takes routine programming, but regiment must always be maintained on your ship. Systematically you point the indicator beacon toeach of the ENGINE, SHIELD, and WEAPON controls, raise the lever to approximately one quarter, and press the button. Suddenly you feel the vibrations of the spaceship increasing the ENGINE energy to the power boosters increases. The liftoff is a success. ¯USING THE NAVIGATIONAL MAP Your naigational map currently displays in GALAXY mode, the lowest magnification. This mode shows only the general vicinity of your position amongst the planet. That's not going to be sufficient for this stage of the mission. For a closer view of tyour ship's locale and totest the monitoring system's capabilities, you shift the indicator beacon to MAG 1. With one quick press on the button, you noww have a better perspective of the northwest sector. This looks promising-a couple of planets and several other space travelers are spotted! Not only can you begin the process of buying and selling, but you can also engage in a bit of intergalactic combat to earn extra income. A few minor adjustments to the HEADING COTROL to steer the spaceship closer to the planets, and you're on your way. ¯SCANNING A PLANET Now that you've located an area populated with other planets and ships, you decide to magnify the map once more. By switching to MAG 2, the largest degree, you can zero in on the planets to determine their supply needs. You've spotted one planet in particular that looks like a good prospect for trading. First, you've got to target it so your onboard scanning computer can determine the trading status. You steady your hands because planet pinpointing takes atom-splitt- ing dexterity. The indicator beacon has to be placed directly over the planet before pressing the button or you'll miss your chance. you did it-you successfully targeted the planet because a large circle now appears around it. ¯BUYING AND SELLING GOODS Everything so far is going A-OK. Its getting closer to the time to execute Phase II of the mission: the acutal buying and selling of goods. Because all ships began the mission with 100 monetary units and no cargo, you'll definitely want to plan your purchases and storage space carefully.. The cargo hold has the capacity for only eight items. Knowing how you hate to part with money, its not surprising that the BUY indicator is your least favorite option on the control panel. you've always had a tendency to monitor that mode down to the last wealth unit each planet was willing to sell their goods for. No one has to tell you that if the cost of an item is low, no planet needs it right now. However, that item might be needed in the future. After scrutinizing the prices different planets charge, you decide to purchase three items. This is going to b4e painful (parting with your money was never one of your better attributes), but its a necessary evil towards accomplishing your ultimate trading goals. Executed like the true miser that you are, you hastily place the indicator beacon on one of the items, then press the button. Look on the bright side-you finally have merchandise in the cargo hold. Grudgingly, you repeat the buying procedure for the other items. Don't forget that occasionally you can purchase SHIELD, ENGINE, or TORPEADO (WEAPON) energy units from another planet to replenish your dwindling stock. You can transact the purchase in the same manner you use to buy other items. Instead of being added to your cargo, the units are added directly to the appropiate energy tank. All of your gauges read relatively full, so you bypass this option for right now. Having made several astute purchases in the current sector, you finally decide to sell some of your goods. The buyer's offer has to be rather lucrative or they can forget it!! Here you go again-you have to target a planet before you can access the SELL option to see your current cargo items, the price you paid for each item, and the current price the planet is willing to pay. The buyer's offer seems relatively appealing, so you'll trade this time. Anticipating more wealth in your pockets, you adjust the indicator beacon to zoom in on the item. This time you happily press the button. This mission definitely has the potentiasl of being a cakewalk afterall!!! ¯COMBATTING ENEMY ADVANCES Just when you're feeling really laid back, you spot an enemy spaceship off your starboard wing. According to the readings from your tracking radar, the Pirate vessel is approximately 13 shiplengths away, and its closing in fast. That gives you only seconds to get your act together! The true test of your flight academy training is about to be revealed. You're flustered. You got caught off guard becausee your mind was elsewhere, still worrying about the wealth units you spent earlier. Let's see... according to ZoneRunner Principles and Practice, "TO defend your vessel against dangerous encroachment, raise the WEAPON energy level. The inverse square law as it applies to photon energy in a wave matrix states that energy bursts lose their effectiveness as distance from the firing vessel increases." Oh boy, you remembered that much, but you're running out of time! What's next?! Quickly, you set the indicator beacon to the ARM control, then press the button to activate the torpedo. Easy now, this is a live round you're dealing with. Beautiful! The ship is slihtly off center to the right of your firing scope. At least your eye for spotting the enemy is still hanging in there. With less than seven seconds left before the Priate will be close enough to make scrap metal out of your spaceship, you point the indicator beacon towards the Piratevessel on your map, close your eyes, press the button to release the torpedo, and hjope for the best. That was close! It took four rounds of torpea do launches, but the satisfaction of knnowing your cargo and money are still intact justifies the excessive use of the WEAPON energy. ¯SPRINTING ACROSS THE NEURTAL ZONE/DEFENSE Time to regroup and get your head together. First, you activate the STATUS indicator to check your rank in the trade competition. It looks like disintegrating that spaceship added quite a few wealth units to your already brimming pockets. According to the list of the top ten, your assets have made you the leader of the pack. The bad news is that your wealth has also resulted in a couple of greedy space travelers being in hot pursuit of your vessel. your only chance for excape is to make a dash across the Neutral Zone. Hopefully you can lose everybody along the way. BEsides, if sucessful, the trip could easily double your present fortune. Time is running out! The planets in both galaxies are perishing quickly. The ships are closing in. And they're rapidly wearing down your protection shield with their torpedoes. You're on the verge of being out of ENGINE energy. Your WEAPON system is almost depleted, too Now you realize your short-sightedness for not purchasing energy earlier in the mission. As you enter the outskirts of the Neutral Zone, a Patrol ship is detected on your SENSOR radar. Great...that's jusat what you don't need right now!! Another glance at the control panel reveals that the ENGINE gauge is registering empty. Will you make it across??? You cant turn back! Can you save your cargo? Can you deliver the goods before its too late? Is there still a planet in existence where you can buy energy toreplenish your systems? Surely you can at least hold on to your riches?! ¯ENDING THE GAME Need a break for a couple of seconds before resuming your mission? Perhaps adjusting the screen colors again might turn the tide of winning towards your favor. Even if you're ready to call it a day from the rigorus demands of intergalactic trading, the [BREAK] key is at your command. Just remember-two alaxies are depending on you. WHAT'S IT GOING TO BE????!!!!!