1Kuklomenos-0.4.5 2================ 3Released under the GPLv3 by Martin Bays (mbays@sdf.lonestar.org) 2009 4 5Dependencies 6------------ 7 sdl 8 libcurl (optional; required for high score reporting) 9 libvorbis (optional; required for sound) 10 11 12How to play - very short version 13-------------------------------- 14 15Keys: cursors, 1234. 16Aim: to not die. 17 18The rest you can figure out, maybe. If not, see below. 19 20 21The plot 22-------- 23 24Peace reigns. We guard the Nodes. Years pass. 25 26Evil comes! Evil seeks the power of the Nodes! 27 28We must defend the Nodes. Evil must not extract their power. 29 30If it is the only way, we must destroy the Nodes ourselves! 31 32It is the only way. 33 34 35How to play - less short version 36-------------------------------- 37 38Use the cursor keys to aim, and the numbers 1, 2 and 3 to shoot. 39 40The encroaching Blobs of Evil will kill you if they hit you. 41 42Evil wants to control the triangular Nodes. It will send big blue armoured 43Blobs of Evil to infest them. 44 45You can control the Nodes yourself - press '4' to send a Capture Pod out. 46 47Whoever is in control of a Node gets bonuses - see the list below. 48 49Evil extracts from Nodes it controls, filling the cyan bar in the top right. 50If it fills the bar, it will launch a deadly Wave of Mutilation! 51 52Disinfect an infested Node by shooting the Blob of Evil before it manages to 53put up a shield, or by sending a Capture Pod. 54 55If you keep control of a Node for a while, it will start to pulsate. It is 56then primed for destruction, and a red shot will destroy it. 57 58YOUR AIM: to destroy 4 of the 6 Nodes. Evil will then give up and leave. 59 60 61Further details 62--------------- 63 64Aiming: 65The closer together the red lines, the better your aim. 66Your shots will fire between the two bright red lines approximately two thirds 67of the time, and between the dark red lines about 95% of the time. 68When your aim is sharp, you turn slower and can see less of the arena. 69Pressing 'down' will de-aim. 70Pressing 'up' will zoom out so you can see what's going on without losing much 71of your aim. 72 73Display: 74You can toggle zooming with 'z' - though your vision will still be restricted 75when aiming. You can toggle rotation of the arena with 'r'. 76 77Heat: 78Shooting or sending out a pod increases your heat, as indicated by the 79red bar in the top left. You can't shoot while doing so would cause 80overheating. 81 82Shields: 83While your heat is at 0, you will slowly add to your shield. Each hit 84by a Blob will take off one layer of shield. The current level is indicated in 85the top left. 86 87Node powerups: 88 When you control them: 89 Red, Yellow, Green: 90 increases the speed of the corresponding colour of your shots, and 91 decreases the reload time and heat cost; 92 Blue: 93 improves your Capture Pods, including decreasing the time it takes 94 to prime a Node for destruction; 95 Cyan: 96 increases shield charge rate; 97 Magenta: 98 improves aim. 99 When Evil controls them: 100 Red, Yellow, Green: 101 increases the speed and general nastiness of the corresponding 102 colour of Blob; 103 Blue: 104 increases speed and rate of shield-charging and healing of the 105 blue Blobs; 106 Cyan: 107 increases rate of extraction from Nodes; 108 Magenta: 109 causes the Blobs to occasionally unpredictably reverse their 110 direction of spiraling. 111 112Rating: 113The better your rating, the stronger the force Evil will send to fight you. 114Your rating improves when you win games and diminishes when you lose them. 115You have a rating for each speed setting. Can you make it to Elite? No, me 116neither. 117 118 119Options and Configuration 120------------------------- 121 122Press escape to bring up the menu - navigate with direction keys and escape. 123 124Run with -h for a list of command-line options. 125 126Permanent config settings are stored in ~/.kuklomenosrc, or kuklomenos.txt 127 128 129If you get a low frame rate: 130---------------------------- 131 132For reasons as yet undetermined, SDL sometimes fails to pick the correct 133colour depth for the display, resulting in poor performance. If you have 134problems, try adjusting the colour depth either with the '-b' command line 135option or in the menus (settings->graphics->display->depth, set). One depth 136may run faster than the others. Anti-aliasing and displaying a grid both 137adversely affect performance; try 'A' and 'g' respectively. 138 139 140Default Keybindings: 141-------------------- 142 143cursor left/right: turn left/right 144cursor down: de-aim 145cursor up: glance back 1461,2,3: fire 1474: launch capture pod 148 149p: pause/unpause 150q: quit 151 152escape: menu 153 154s: toggle sound 155z: toggle zooming 156r: toggle rotation 157g: toggle grid 158a/A: increase/decrease amount of anti-aliasing 159 160[, ]: alter fps 161 162+,-,=: alter game rate (not while playing) 163 164 165Details of Game Mechanics: 166-------------------------- 167(For those who must know exact details but don't want to sourcedive) 168 169Table of shot stats: 170 171|Colour | Damage | Speed | Delay | Heat | 172+-------+--------+-------+-------+--------+ 173| Green | 1 | 20/25 | 20/10 | 40/28 | 174|Yellow | 2 | 15/20 | 30/25 | 70/49 | 175| Red | 3 | 10/15 | 40/30 | 100/70 | 176 177Where there are two numbers separated by a slash, the latter refers to the 178value when you are in possession of the correspondingly coloured Node. 179 180"Speed" is rate of travel of the shot, "Delay" is how long (in 100ths of a 181second measured on Normal gamespeed) you have to wait after firing a shot 182before firing again, and "Heat" indicates how much heat is generated by firing 183the shot. 184 185You can fire one pod every 10 seconds. 186 187Table of shootable objects: 188 189| Name | Hit Points | Armour | 190+-------------+------------+--------+ 191| Red Blob | 1 | 0 | 192| Yellow Blob | 2 | 0 | 193| Green Blob | 3 | 0 | 194| Blue Meanie | 3 | 1/inf | 195| Pod | 1/3 | 0 | 196 197A shot with "Damage" d does d-Armour points of damage. Capture Pods normally 198have 1 HP, but a Pod launched when you possess the blue Node will have 3 HP. 199Blue meanies have armour 1 until they manage to put up a shield; they are then 200invulnerable to shots, and can only be destroyed by a Capture Pod. 201