[ ELiter ]
[ v 2.0i ]

"the game that's soda like space invaders'


VERSION HISTORY

2.0i    [09-28-02]
    - Has it really been two years since I added anything to this game? Wow...
	- Upgraded the game to work with the new Hilgard 1.14 engine. Featuring:
		- Working Stretchblt (used for jones)
		- Midi and Sound Capabilities
		- Recovery after minimize and alt-tab
        - More accurate framerate counter
        - Various other optimizations and cleanups
	- Added sounds:
		- explode.wav
		- gunshot.wav
		- gunbeam.wav
		- item.wav
		- missile.wav
    - Changes around the shield code a little bit, now limited to 10 shield balls max.
    - Fixed a bug in the explosion momentum caused by the addition of the gunshot momentum (it was added wrong)
    - Then removed gunshot momentum affects on enemies alltogether cause I didn't like the look of it
    - Played around with stuff...
    - Added Distance-counter
    - Jones Soda appears when you reach a certain distance
    - You can now kill Jones soda - it just takes a (huge) amount of damage to do it
    - Changed to 16 bit color - lemme know if you notice a difference (good or bad)
    - Updated this document to be more up to date.

2.0h	[12-21-00]
	- Boy, it's been awhile. Haven't updated this game in ages it seems.
	- Added a radar system to the top right corner of the screen. You like?
	- Soda cans that come from off the screen now have half the speed of ones that come from in sight. This makes it a little bit easier. I hope. :)
	- Radar now has 4 different size indicators. So you can distinguish between most enemies.
	- Yay! I fixed the long confusing bug which plagued me for several versions. The game would sometimes crash a few seconds into play if it was located in certain directory names. Not neccessarily long names though, so I still don't understand fully why those directories caused the problem.. But regardless it should be fixed now.
	- Corrected a bug were the sheild would sometimes stop spinning.
	- Changes the sheild code so that it evenly distributes the balls when some are lost.
	- 'R' button toggles on/off radar display

	[To do for next release:]
	- Find some way to get that 'J' jones soda into the game. Either as a boss, or as a mothership to protect, or something... We'll see...
	- Add new weapon: "Spank-ray" to spank your enemies to death.
	- Insert a nice blantant plug for Chibinet.com

2.0g	[4-17-00]
	- Fixed a bug which caused you to get extra points for 'overkilling' an enemy. (Hitting them with more than one shot when their health was already at 0 and they had not been deleted yet)
	- Trying a new style for the missiles. Let me know what you think. Like the old one better? 
	- Items no longer appear randomly at the top. They now appear when you kill some enemies.
	- Working on some new ideas for a future version. Hit 'J'  to check it out. :)
	- For those who complained the 'Speed Up' Gun Powerup was a Powerdown since it left you with less shots on the screen, it now also doubles the rate of fire. So it is now a definate powerUP.
	- Added a 'Sheild' powerup. Very cool, desu ne?
	- Since the game is getting a bit to easy, I added a feature so your gun powerups slowly wear off.
	- Back by popular request. The ships that fly from the bottom of the screen are no longer allies. (Yes, they were SUPPOSED to be before.) Since everyone just shot them anyways, they no give you a positive score. So go ahead and shoot the crap outta them. :)
	- You start with 5 missiles now.
	- Using a new version of the Engine. You probably won't notice much, but there are a few new speed ups to graphics routines... Sprite stretching, etc...
	- Midi music can be toggled by pressing 'M'. Sorry still doesn't loop. Maybe next release. As usual it can be disabled completely by deleting song.mid . This no longer gives you an error message either.
	- Removed a bunch of keys used for developing.
	- Changed stars a bit more. This should be a speed up now. Before the game was processing stars that were off the screen. This is no longer an issue. Also you can change the number of stars on the screen by pressing/holding the 'K' and 'L' keys. 
	- And ahh!!! I finally found the mysterious crash that recently I was having. I doubt anyone else has seen it... It was recently caused when the score text string exceeded the 255 character limit I had stupidly (and lazily) put in when I first made the score system. I never expected to be showing all that info in the score system. :)
	- For those of you who think the big score system gets in the way, I have now put a toggle on it. Press 'D' to toggle between normal score display and 'Developer Mode' to see all sorts of usless stats. :)
	- Changed redraw code so the system only redraws on IDLE events. This may cause a lowered framerate, but will provide better responsivness to the user input. This helps a lot on slower systems (like the ones at school). :P

2.0f	[4-2-00]
	- Fixed a small problem with the ally movements... They only went right.
	- Added some more counters: debris, stars, and enemies. Counts the total number since the game was started. The number in parenthesis is the number in existance currently (both on and off screen). 
	- Changed the stars. They no longer use layers... Now they are individual particles. This should be a significant speed increase from the old 3layer method, however I still use one layer for a black background so 640 users probably won't notice a speed up. But they WILL notice the stars look more random now instead of a tiled pattern and they WILL notice that there a three 'layers' of stars moving at different speeds.
	- Modified the missiles. Right click to fire a missile, right click again to detonate it. They also have a larger explosion size now. Send me comments on what you think of the new missiles.
	- A few changes to the graphics. Trying some different shading on some sprites and the items pickups look different now. Also the title screen and ready message are shaded. 
	- Messed around with the explosion variables a bit. Nothing too major.
	- Default resolution is now 800x600x16. This release does not include a 1024 or 640 dll. If you would like me to continue including those options in future releases e-mail me and I will.

2.0e	[3-26-00]
	- Added framerate counter! Yes!
	- Changed the code around which was limiting the visible framerate to about 20 FPS.
	- The visible framerate is now limited to about 100 FPS. However, the FPS counter shows your actual FPS.
	- Removed all the tile-layers except for the bottom layer. This was turning out to be a signifacant speed problem for some systems. The game should run a lot faster on older video cards now.
	- New version of Hilgard Engine. This version has a much faster tile-drawing routine. However, it may not be that noticable on ELiter since, the game isn't very tile-dependant. It makes a big difference in my Zelda clone though. What? You haven't tried it? Go download it from my site then!!!
	- New High Score! Yes, I've got a new high score. Can you beat it?
	- Some Enemy behavior changes. Pop cans move different, and so do friendly 2-liter ships. Triscuits are slower and some other stuff I forgot.
	- Various changes to explosions/debris.
	- Annoying MIDI music added. If you want it disabled just delete/rename song.mid and it will go away.
	- Gun shots are now deleted when you start a new game. So missiles can't be leeched from a previos game...
	- New easter egg added if you hit Alt-F4. (It's a secret, so don't tell people!)

2.0d	[2-1-00]
	- Added left/right scrolling based on x position.
	- Removed 'A' and 'Z' acceleration keys. Forward speed is now based on y position.
	- Added 'AutoCenter' option press 'A' to toggle.
	- Added speed display under score.
	- Tweaked the difficulty settings a bit.
	- Added new "Fly in" animation for when the player starts a new game.
	* Added "Ready" message.

2.0c	[10-16-99]
	- Added a display for score, hish score, and missiles.
	- Added High Score system with save functionality. (Can you beat my highscore?)
	- Made a small speed up by taking away the third stars layer. This should help game performance on slower systems. I guess since I got a fast computer now, I just assumed everyone did. :P
	- I added an icon for ELiter.
	- Added 'Speed' gun powerup.
	- Changed the guns a bit and redid most of the power up graphics.
	- Added a title screen.

2.0b	[7-31-99]
	- Added a new gun system (as many as 32 possible gun combonations!) and missiles (right click)
	- Added enemy cracker asteriods. 
	- Ally 2 liter fighters come from the bottom of the screen. (Don't kill them, they are on your side and will deduct from your score. Well, as soon as I add a score/high score display. Maybe in the next release...) 
	- Did a little work on various other visual things.
	- Missiles are fired with the right mouse button.
	- Switched the game to 640x480x16 instead of 800x600x16 to speed it up on slower systems.

2.0a 	[7-29-99]
	- First Release


PLANS FOR FUTURE RELEASES:

    - Ability to disable those annoying sounds
	- I want to add levels to the game so as you go on the difficulty increases.
	- I want to add GAME OVER and STAGE CLEAR messages.
	- Considering adding a boss of some sort. 
	- Ideas? E-mail me!


DESCRIPTION

	ELiter is my first C++ game I have released. ELiter is my elite space-invaders's like game. Well, it isn't really that much like space invaders, but that is the best description I can think of. You are a two-liter pop bottle with wings, and you are flying through space blasting various junk food on your way. 


HILGARD (1.14)

	The game now uses version 1.14 of the Hilgard Engine. The engine was designed by my friend Ben and I for a school project (Programmed by him originally, but I'm working on it too now). 
ELiter was originally written as a demonstration of Hilgard for our class. However, everyone enjoyed it so much that I have rewritten it outside of school and updated it for the latest version of Hilgard.


DIRECTX REQUIRED

	In order to use Hilgard (and this game), you will need to have <A HREF="http://www.microsoft.com/directx/">DirectX</A> 6.0 installed. Ummm... I dunno why I put HTML in a text file. Get it at this address: 
	http://www.microsoft.com/directx/


INSTALLATION

	Installation is simple. Extract the game into a directory of your choice and double-click engine.exe . (Note: the exe file is actually the Hilgard Engine, the game is actually stored in the dll named prog.dll) DO NOT RENAME ANY OF THE FILES. THIS MAY PREVENT THE GAME FROM FUNCTIONING.


FILES

	The following files are included with this release:

	eliter.exe	- The Hilgard Engine, which executes prog.dll
	prog.dll	- The actual ELiter game file.
	sprites.bmp	- These are the sprite graphics (you can edit them with paint! fun!)
	tiles.bmp	- These are the tile graphics (yes, you can modify these too!)
	text.bmp	- The font for the scoring system.
	eliter.cfg	- The file that stores the high score information. (don't cheat!)
	eliter.txt	- Gee, I forget what this one is for.
	eliter.ico	- This is an icon incase you want to make a shortcut on your desktop.
	song.mid	- This is the midi file that gets played when you run the engine. Delete it to disable midi music.
	explode.wav - Sound for explosion
	gunshot.wav - Sound for standard gun
	gunbeam.wav - Sound for beam gun
	item.wav    - Sound for item pickup
	missile.wav - Sound for missile shots


CONTROLS

	Use your mouse to move around on the screen, press (and hold) the left mouse button to fire your gun. You have unlimited ammo, but your powerups will wear off after shooting a whole lot, so conserve your gunfire. Pressing 'A' toggles "AutoCenter". Right-click to fire missiles, you get 5 to start with. Right-click again to detonate them. Press 'K'/'L' to adjust the number of stars on the screen. Press 'D' to toggle Debug display and 'R' to toggle Radar display.


CREDITS
		Programmer:
					Jeff Van Boxtel
		Graphics:
					Jeff Van Boxtel
		Engine Programmers:
					Ben Higgins
					Jeff Van Boxtel
		Special Thanks:
					John A. Van Boxtel
					Jones Soda
		Midi Music:
					Wesley Backous
        Sounds:
                    Jeff Van Boxtel


CONTACT

	Please send comments, suggestions, bug-reports to SailorH@chibinet.com . Visit my website at http://www.chibinet.com/ .


NEW GRAPHICS

	If you are creative and would like to, you may change the graphics to the game by editing the BMP files. Have fun designing various different looks. However, you may NOT redistribute the game with your modified graphics. If you would like other people to use your graphics e-mail them to me and if I like them I will put them on my website for others to download with the latest version of the game. I will ofcourse give you credit for your work and if you like a link to your email or site. But I repeat, DO NOT distribute modified versions of ELiter. This means no modified graphics, sound or anything else. Thank you for your respect. 


LEGAL
	ELiter is freeware. You may distribute it unaltered and in original form. In fact, the author encourages you to do so. Give it to your friends, your neighbors, your pets... Just make sure that you are including all of the files listed in the 'FILES' section of this document. (That includes this document).
	Any similiarity between the graphics in this game and any real life snack food is purely purposeful. I love junk food. So I made a game about my favorite kinds. Ofcourse, I am will not mention any of my favorite food's names, but you can probably guess.. And my favorite soda, ofcourse, is represented by the game's main character.
	ELiter is Copyright (C) 1999, Jeff Van Boxtel, All Rights Reserved. To see some of my creative work please visit my website at http://www.chibinet.com/
	Jones Soda is a Trademark of Jones Soda... They were kind enough to grant me permission to use their graphics in the game. Visit their site at http://www.jonessoda.com. And if you haven't tried their soda yet, you should! Cause it's good stuff!

ENJOY!