!!!!! IMPORTANT IMPORTANT IMPORTANT !!!!!

FOR THIS VERSION OF SPECTRE VR/PC THE SERIAL NUMBER IS LOCATED WITHIN
THE INSTALL INSTRUCTIONS, NOT ON THE DISC.

Spectre 

Click on the box with the word describing the action you with to invoke.  You can 
press the key representing the first letter of the action as well.

To begin playing Spectre. Simply select "Play" from the Main Menu.  This will begin 
the game.  Other options are described below.

Play            Select this option to begin playing the game.

Net Play        Select this option to begin playing a multiplayer network game.

Scores          Select this option to view the high scores.

About           Select this option to find out about the authors.

Help            Select this option if you need an explanation of how to play.

Options         Select this option to configure your copy of Spectre.

Quit            Select this option if you'd like to exit now.

KEYBOARD  CONTROLS

Esc     Return to Main Menu            
+ & -   Zoom View
~       Hyperspace
Tab     Change View
P       Pause Game
Alt     Fire Special Weapon
Ctrl    Select Special Weapon
Space   Fire Canon
5       Jump (on keypad)

CANNON - (Space)
This weapon is fired by pressing the (spacebar) or the (0) key on the numeric
keypad.  The cannon fires one round of ammo and causes one point of damage to
anything it hits (i.e. destroys 1 armor shield).  Note that this will not
always kill whatever you are shooting at.  If you hear a short beep-beep, this
is a warning that you are getting low on rounds.  If you hear a click when you
fire, it means you are out of ammo.  Drive over ammo dumps to resupply.  This
weapon will reach to the limit of your vision.

SPECIAL WEAPONS
---------------

GRENADES
It uses 10 rounds of ammo and explodes in midair, doing damage to anything near,
and will destroy anything it hits directly.

SMART MISSILES
A Smart Missile will cost you two ammo points to fire. The good thing is that they
lock onto and track enemies quite effectively!

SEEKERS
A Seeker will cost you two ammo points to fire.  It is simply a cannon shell that
has a limited aount of self-targeting logic.  If a target is in your sights, the
Seeker will usually lock onto it and cause a point of damage.

SCATTERSHOT
Scattershots are shotguns.  They fire in a wide patteren, in about a 75 degree
angle. They are especially effective against closely knit units of multiple enemies.

PROXIMITY MINES
With Proximity Mines, you can lay down a mine which can destroy anything that it
touches.  You are limited in the number of mines that can be placed at one time,
so be careful.

SPINNERS
The Spinner is a weapon that imparts angular momentum to the target.  For example,
if your enemy is too strong to destroy, you might spin it for a few seconds, in
order to get around it!  This is the best way to beat a turret.

EM PULSEBURSTS
A pulseburst is a weapon that can only be used by a craft with flight capabilites.
When used, a Pulseburst becomes an electromagnetic disturbance which propagates
over the surface of the ground.  A Pulseburst has a greater width than a Cannon round
and may be more effective against squads of enemies.

CYBERBOMBS
A Cyberbomb is an electromagetic bomb.  It's like a grenade, but it's dropped straight
down by a hovercraft.  It can be used to terminate any enemies intent on tracking
you from behind.

(ESC) will exit the game and the (P) key will pause you in the single player
game.

ENEMIES
-------

The following is a list of the enemies added to Spectre VR.  Little is know about these
strange automated beings in cyberspace, so it's up to you to figure out what
their strengths and weakness are, this is your key to destroying them.

ROVERS

CLOAKED ROVERS

OPTICALLY CLOAKED ROVERS

SLICERS

GUN TURRETS

HUNTER KILLERS

ORBITERS

KEYPAD MOTION CONTROLS
----------------------
Note that the corner keys do two actions at once:  turn and move.

VIEWS - (Tab) or keypad (*)
You have three views in Spectre.  The view control switches from the internal
view, to an external view behind your tank, to an overhead view of the arena,
and back again.

HYPERSPACE - (Backspace) or (~) (Tilde)
Press the (~) or (Backspace) key to be transported to a new position in the
Arena.  You must have enough energy to hyperspace or you run the risk of being
destroyed.  The "H" indicator shows how much hyperspace energy you have at any
given moment.  This energy builds up over time and is totally expended when you
hyperspace to a new location in the Arena.

Press the (D) key at the Main Menu for demo mode.  You may also hold down the
(Alt) key while pressing (P) to start the game at a higher level.

INSTRUMENT   PANEL
Lives:
Shows the number of lives remaining in this session, the damage level that you
have sustained, and the number of cannon rounds you have remaining.

Score:
Shows the current score for this session, the level you are currently
attempting, and the number of bonus points remaining.

Hyperspace:
Shows the state of the Hyperspace Launch Energy Cell.  You must recharge this
cell before attempting to hyperspace.  If you launch before fully charged the
ship might explode.

Radar:
This is the radar screen.  The center is your vehicle.  Red dots are flags
enemy robots.  Flashing dots are flags, and green dots are ammo dumps.

Flag:
This is a flag.  You collect flags by running over them.

Crosshair:
This is the crosshair of your aiming reticle.

Ammo:
This is an ammo dump.  It can recharge your shields and re-arm your cannon. 

Choose a Vehicle

Choose the Spectre vehicle you wish to use.  Different vehicles are useful for
various strategies, and each of the four has its own strengths and weaknesses.
If you wish to create a more finely tuned vehicle, select the Custom Spectre
at the bottom of the dialog, and select "Edit Custom..." This will bring up
the custom vehicle dialog.  You have 15 points to distribute between speed,
shields and ammo.

Speed - You will need to experiment with these settings to become familiar with
just how fast a setting feels to you.  Here's a hint:  the Speedy craft may be
more easily destroyed, but in many cases you can play "chicken" against a robot
or your opponent, run past him, quickly swing around and open fire.

Shields - Each point is one shield of armor - each shot that hits your Spectre
destroys one shield.  Shield settings may range from 1 to 10.

Ammo - Each point of ammo allows you to carry to rounds (shots) for your cannon.
You may not carry more than the maximum number you set here.  Ammo may range
from 1 to 5, giving you between 10 and 50 rounds.

After you have selected the vehicle you want to use, select play to descend
into the Arena.

Movement Controls

You can navigate your battle craft using the keyboard, or a joystick.
Most users will probably prefer to use the keyboard.

Movement - the numeric keypad The arrow keys on the numeric keypad move your
tank in the specified direction.  You can also use combinations of keys to move
and turn at the same time.  (Up) arrow and (Left) arrow will allow you to move
forward and turn left at the same time.  You can back up by pressing the (Down)
arrow.

Jump - keypad (5).
Jumping can prove useful in certain situations.  You can dodge enemy fire by
jumping. Sometimes a jump will give you just enough time to plan an escape
from a desperate situation.  However, jumping will use up some of your hyperspace
energy. When your hyperspace energy is gone, you will have to wait until it
recharges to jump again.  Press the (5) key on the numeric keypad to jump.

Weapon Controls

Your Spectre battle craft is equipped with two weapons:

Fire Cannon - (Space)
Each press will fire one round of ammo which will do one point of damage to
anything it hits.  That is, it will destroy one armor shield.  If you hear
a "beep-beep" sound, that means you are running low on ammo.  If you hear a
"click", you're out of shots.  Better find an ammo dump QUICK! keep in mind,
in the higher levels, enemy robot tanks may require more than one cannon round
to destroy.

Zoom View - (+) and (-) on keyboard  In the exterior or map views, you can zoom
in and out.  Use the (+) and (-) keys.

Display Controls

Spectre allows you to customize the display to suit your tastes.  Users with
fast machines may want all display features turned on.  Users on slower
machines may prefer to turn off some display features to increase the
"frame-rate" of the game.  The "frame-rate" refers to the smoothness of
animation.  If you feel your display is too slow or "jerky", you may want to
turn off some features.

Grid Dot Control - (D)
The (D) key will change the density of the dots on the ground of the arena.
Users with slower machines may want to decrease the number of dots to speed
up the display.

Filled Polygon Mode - (F)
Users on slower machines may want to turn off filled polygons by pressing (F).
Your Arena will now appear in wire frame mode. To turn filled polygon mode back
on, simply press (F) again.

Flag Texture Toggle - (F5) 
Billboard Texture Toggle - (F6)
Windmill Texture Toggle - (F7)

Misc Texture Toggle - (F8)
These keys allow you to customize the amount of textures add a lot of visual
impact to the Arena, but they take additional processing power.  Users with
slower machines may want to turn some or all of the textures off.

Miscellaneous Controls

Here are some other important controls in Spectre:

Sound ON/OFF - (S)
This toggles the sound effects on and off.  If you're blasting away, and the
boss walks by, you may want to hit (S) to play it safe.

Return to Main Menu - (Esc)
At any time, you can return to the main menu by pressing (Esc)

Pause Game - (P)
Pressing (P) will pause the game.
Pressing (P) again will resume the action.  Pausing is not allowed in network
play!

Joystick Calibration - (J)
If you have selected the Joystick as your controller, you can recalibrate during
game play by pressing (J).

Save Game (Alt-S) (between levels only)
If you're doing great, but you just can't keep playing, you can save your game
after the completion of a level.  After you see your level stats, the "Level"
message will spin up.  During this, press the (Alt) and (S) keys together.  You
will be prompted to save your game.

Options Menu

The options menu lets you configure Spectre to your preferences.  To select an
option in the OPTIONS menu you may either click on the desired option with your
mouse or press the keyboard key corresponding to the underlined character in
the option title.  Most options can also be changed during game play.  See the
previous section on GAME CONTROLS.  Here are the main sections of the OPTIONS
menu: 

Controller - Keyboard, Mouse, or Joystick
Select your preferred method of controlling your tank by clicking on the option
with your mouse or pressing (K) for keyboard, (M) for mouse, or (J) for
joystick.

Selecting keyboard or joystick will still allow you to use the mouse for making
menu choices.

Sound Driver - PC Speaker, Adlib, or Sound Blaster
You must have an Adlib or Sound Blaster compatible sound card to get the full
range of sounds and voices from Spectre.  If you do not have an add-on sound
card you must set this option to PC Speaker.

Sounds ON/ Sounds OFF
If you are like some of us and want to hog Spectre all to yourself, you can
turn all sounds OFF so your kids won't hear you playing! This is the same as
pressing (S) during game play.

RUNNING SPECTRE FROM WINDOWS

Recommendations

Because Windows is multi-tasking, and it places great demands on your computer
system, the recommended equipment for running Spectre from Windows is a bit
different.  We suggest:

  A 386/33 or faster machine
  4Mb of RAM or more

Setting Up An Icon

Spectre VR contains a DOS program and a Windows.
You can add Spectre to a group in the Program Manager to make starting Spectre
even easier.  First, select the program group in which you would like Spectre to
reside.  This is done by simply clicking on the selected group.

Next, select NEW from the FILE menu.  You can now use the browse feature, or
enter the name of the Spectre Windows program.  This program is called
SPCWIN.EXE.  If  you chose the default drive and directory during installation,
the full drive and path will be 
C:/SVR/SVRWIN.EXE.

You may also want to do the same with VRedit.exe, the game editor.  This game
editor will allow you to edit the arrangement of your playing field.  VRedit
can only be run from Windows, and help information is available on-line.

To run Spectre or VRedit once you have set up a program icon. you will see a
Windows version of the Spectre main menu.

If you are having Network problems, contact Velocity at:

(415) 392-HELP (392-4357)

or

Velocity Inc.
4 Embarcadero Ste 3100
San Francisco, CA 94111

or

CompuServe--76670, 2202
America On Line--VeloctyDev
