ZX-News #51 22 апреля 2000

News ON - Game: Worm World, Dizzy "A", Clickmania. Download: AON v0.5, E-mage Work Station, PIformat v2.1, Sprite Editor v1.01. Magazines: Adventurer in 1910, RUSH 2.

               Software News



   The first thing we want to apologize to
Valentin Pimenov (Style Group, St. Petersburg) for the 
misdirection of his name in the last issue of "ZX-News".



             Z X - G A M E S


   ■ Second Viktor mednonogovskoy territory! The light produced 
demoversya another real-time strategy - "Jackals" (C) 1999

by BKA (Belgorod). True, unlike the
"Operation" OIL ", is not so fruitful (or destructive?), So to 
speak, play:) but you can admire the

well-executed figures of people (the size of the corresponding 
demons and Kostolomov from "Black Crow"), which even allowed to 
drive on the field. 


   However, management is very poorly chosen - and indeed, no 
need to invent its standards (this applies to the authors of 
"Operation" OIL ")! Take a basis management of the "Black Crow" 
as spektrumisty to get involved in similar games (ie potential 
customers) already accustomed to it, so, for example, 
reassigning the "fire" on the key Enter to be perceived as an 
attempt to make an amateur "Q, A, O, P, Space" change seats on 
the arrow keys ... 


   ■ Fans of puzzles can happily
rubbing hands: left original puzzle game "Worm World" (C) 1999 
by Ardo (Krasnodar). In the sense it is somewhat similar to 
"Lemmings", but here you play the role of protector is not herd 
of lemmings, and a worm, and your goal is to ensure the safety 
of this substance, which occurred to crawl aimlessly. All 
anything, but that's because of some inexplicable circumstances 
(the author of them silent), the worm was not a simple

land, but in the labyrinth, I mean in a maze, and very strange 
- where did you see sewers only twice thicker worm (although 
there is a possibility and a giant increase them)? :) In 
general, there must always be an introductory story, otherwise 
the player is difficult to penetrate the world game. But back 
to the maze. Place it is certainly not the best for careless 
walks - here is full of dangers and traps, as indeed befits any

self-respecting computer game. :)


   Outwardly, it looks like this: on-screen crawls, and more 
precisely measure the path (like a caterpillar tree), a worm, 
which all as the saying goes, give a damn about. You need to

its time to put the road in dangerous places bridges, barriers 
and strange devices, because of which the blind traveler loses 
weight and starts soar into the air until it reaches the 
ceiling or other solid places - in short, You have three ways 
to secure the road worm. However, all complicated by the fact 
that they can be used only in limited

amounts to the same on some levels
you will be released very little time
So, before you use one or the other
object will need to carefully calculate everything. The program 
has a little help, where have all the necessary details.



   Finally have to notify that the idea
"Worm World" was so interesting that one of St. Petersburg took 
coders a remix of this game.



   ■ Surprise! A fourth in a row
St. Petersburg's game Dizzy, a symbol of Spectrum games - 
"Dizzy" A "(C) 2000 by Yury Nazarenko / Rezident (N-Discovery)! 
The plot of is this: a troll (bad) stole

Daisy (good), and Dizzy, of course, must once again rescue her. 
Learning from his grandfather, that the castle, where the ugly

troll locked sweet Daisy, you can get
only through a secret passage, he decides to first
find it - but we'll see how to settle accounts with this 
byakoy, I mean troll for interrupted the hunt for berries ...



   Its way recommend starting with the labor of the farmer 
(hrestomantiyno sounds, not Is it true? :)). In general, in the 
village snogglov Seek out a shovel and try to use it in the 
woods. Sooner or later these experience will turn into 
something - Now, where the game will go like clockwork.



   In "Dizzy" A "nearly forty locations
that is not so little, so puzzles
will be enough to, at least temporarily
aside from the dreams of "New Super Dizzy
Fantastic ". ;-)


   ■ It seems that our writers remembered
his trademark reception - conversion to
Spectrum games from other platforms. An example
of this is a great puzzle game "Clickmania" (C) 1999 Optical 
Brothers (Minsk). The first catches the eye and the original 
high-quality graphic design of the game, whose unique hard to 
find. What does one intro, which can be called the best among 
games released in recent times. 


   The gameplay can be described as follows: imagine that in 
the famous "Square Head" instead of pocketing for themselves 
squares they should be refined to destroy, and

computer is trying in every way you prevent this by making 
combinations and trudnosochetaemye moreover, substituting, 
literally, the stones, which are very prevented complete party. 
They can, of course, removed with the help of simple devices 
such as missiles and bombs, but not so easy to do this,

for discharge the same tend to be in
very wrong place ... In the program,
True, there SetUp, where you can adjust the game options to 
suit every taste (as in "Square Head" - by the way, this 
upomninanie the game does not serve a hint of plagiarism ;-) 
just another quite difficult to give an exact description of 
"Clickmania":)). 


   As the destruction of the squares in front of
you will show the picture: either with
specific humorous story, or
with the girls depicted in the style of anime
(Depending on settings) - by the way, hand (not scanned) 
graphics done at a fairly high level, and deserves

commendable. This gives "Clickmania"
that spice that makes the game a sustained interest.


   ■ And finally, on "Black Crow-2.
Vyacheslav Mednonogov / Copper Feet (St. Petersburg) has 
released a new demo of its game in which the whole spectrum

Representatives Kung, plus some of the
Army men. This time it is already possible to manage them 
(unlike the previous demos), but there is no way to pit them. 
By According to the author, everything is almost ready, and

to end the game there are about 3-5 percent of the total work. 
However, because of lack of time, the output of the project is 
delayed, but one can assume that the presentation of "FT-2" 
will be on CC'000, in August. Vyacheslav himself on this 
subject preferred to remain silent. :) 


           Z X - S Y S T E M S


   ■ We are pleased to note the fact that the wishes of 
"ZX-News" began to find a response among the authors - an 
example of this is "AON" v0.5 (C) 2000 by Rezident, Ivan Savin 
(N-Discovery, St. Petersburg). It now implemented the ability 
to download another driver to the modem type Vicomm,

XTR and C-DOS, save settings, as well as
number of other useful features.


   The next version of AON'a "the author intends to write from 
scratch, resulting in program using the new system overlays

(Drivers) can be configured to any
Vicomm-compatible modem, under any ports.
Yet you can create your own driver hours. Besides all this will 
be window-turnout interface and extensive SetUp, stored in the 
body of the program (for reduction of number of working files, 
and generally speaking, to save disk space, have an idea to 
introduce the original service function: gluing all overlays 
and Driver modem in a packed candy bar).



   ■ In the light there was the E-mage Work Station "v1.0 (C) 
1999 E-Mage (Grodno), the new Commander GUI. According to the 
authors, the program was created with the expectation that it 
will be sewn instead of the BASIC-128 - it will enable

after clicking Reset'a fall into the Spectrum menu, and in the 
Amiga, where you can ;-) will work with facilities on the disk. 
New file shell has developed an overlay system and built-in 
memory manager (it is very useful when the firmware instead of 
the BASIC program). By "EWS" is attached a detailed description 
of the author, where You can pricherpnut all the necessary 
information on practical work with the Commander.



   Incidentally, the authors argue about the complete absence 
of glitches - agree that such courage is rare. :) 


   In the future we plan to release a version of
2.0, which will be realized work
with MS-DOS, as well as, among other options
and innovations will include new service
overlays.


   ■ Finally, once again began to appear
utilities to work with the disk - so any more!
For example, "PIformat" v2.1 (C) 1999 by PIcon (Kharkiv) - This 
program allows TR-formatted disk with increased DOS'ny

quality, and even those who ranshe
considered to be beaten. The instructions distributed with the 
utility, is described an entirely new principle of the program.



   On the basis of the new method, the author also wants to 
release a disc restorer TR-DOS, IS-DOS and MS-DOS.



   ■ Of the copiers should be noted the utility "Converter" 
v2.1 (C) 1999 by ART, with which you can copy and convert files 
from floppy Spectrum in format, MS-DOS. The program supports 
three the most common format: trd,

hobeta and scl. Incidentally, this is the first of the known 
tools that lets you convert files in the format of scl, widely 
spread in recent years. Only wish to support other formats in 
following versions (for example, fdi), as well as when the 
program starts to type a query name and floppy-disk drive unit 
and the source (Because the existing system is not very 
convenient). 


   ■ A new version of the widely known
Today "PKUnZip Fast" v1.2 (C) 2000 by
Alexei Porfiryev / RLDG (Yoshkar-Ola). This
program is now developing another author,
since the old one, Andrei Isayev, unfortunately,
landed in the army. The prefix "Fast" is not coincidental - the 
utility and, indeed, a unpack twice as fast (without checking 
the CRC, and from thereof - by 1.8 times) than the classical, 
so to speak, version. In addition to other innovations (see 
author's instructions), it should be noted very valuable SetUp 
(At the start to keep a space) with a variety of useful options 
and availability Kemston Mouse. We wish the author further 
dimmed with the program - for example, would be nice to 
implement support as many as possible of number of different 
formats Spectrum software, in which it is located in the 
networks. 


   ■ "Sprite Editor" v1.01 (C) 1999 by
Darth Vader (Orion Group, Chelyabinsk) -
so called the new program, the appointment
is clear from the title - is the work of
with sprites. The set of functions described
in the original help'e, which is in
fact editor. According to the author, the best
award for his work would be to use
"SED'a 'when creating games such as" Last
Battle "," UFO "," Black Raven ", etc - indeed, the best 
rewards come was difficult. :)



   ■ For all the diversity of players
AY-music, "Hyperion Player" v1.0 (C) 2000
Real Software (Brest) has attracted
attention with its modern and very user-friendly, tasteful. 
Office of place on one screen (without conversion to any 
submenu and Other jungle that so love to send

many of the tools) that allows you to quickly listen to the 
desired music, and most importantly - make it a series of 
experiments (see be is the author of music:)), for example, 
change playback speed, clicked positions, disable channels, 
etc. (See copyright description). Of course, in the first 
version is a number of annoying glitches, but in future they 
will certainly be caught. It is also desirable provide support 
for as many as possible count the different music formats.



             Z X - P R E S S


   ■ Released "Adventurer" # 10 (C) 1999 CPU
(Rybinsk), today he is perhaps best of all the Spectrum 
magazines. Congratulations to his editors with the first 
anniversary! "Adventurer" # 10, in which most

materials devoted CC'999, distributed by the authors by mail.


   ■ In December, was released on a young magazine
"Rush" # 2 (C) 1999 Rush (Chernihiv), Smash
(Sevastopol) on two platforms - ZX-Spectrum and Amiga. It is 
worth mentioning a very good awareness about the occupation of 
the editorial board of many Spectrum groups in Europe and 
Russia. Distributed free of charge - on computer networks. 


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