A2 - THE ULTIMATE SEQUEL TO AUTS - THE ULTIMATE STRESS RELIEF GAME
##################################################################


WHAT IS A2
==========

A2 is the sequel to three-year-old game called AUTS. The old
(good-proven) idea is to fly in caves and shoot other players. You can
play in team mode or pure deathmatch. Choose from a multitude of diverse
weapons and use them to spread destruction and claim glory.

Improvements since AUTS:
        - complete rewrite of code (Win95&Dos friendly)
        - high color graphics with alpha blending and other cool stuff
        - computer AI
        - random level generator
        - new weapons


LEGAL STUFF AND REGISTERING
===========================

A2 is being distributed under the shareware concept. So, if you continue
playing A2 you must pay the registration fee of 40 FIM (see below if you
would like to register with your country's currency). People who have
already registered AUTS will receive their registered A2 for 20 FIM.
For more information on registering please see the REGISTER.TXT file
in your A2 directory.

You can distribute the shareware version of A2 if:
        1) No money is charged for it
        2) All files are included in the package and are intact

The registered version must NOT be distributed!

For info on putting A2 on a cover CD please contact me at mips@sci.fi

You can make your own level editors and such, but be sure to mention that
they are in no way official.

It is strongly recommended that you spread the original A2 package.

If you wish so I can send your registered version by e-mail. Just mark
the "I would like to receive A2 by e-mail" in register.txt and be sure
to include your e-mail address! Also make sure that your e-mail program
can handle file attachments. Some ISPs or e-mail providers has maximum
e-mail size so make sure that your will handle 3Mb e-mails (e.g. Hotmail
won't).

Registered version will be delivered on two disks or as a file attachment
in e-mail. You do not need to any extra for disks nor postage.


CURRENCYS ACCEPTED
==================

You may pay with any of the following currency. Please round up to nearest
paper money accessible price. Discounts are for people who have registered
the old AUTS.

        normal          discount

FIM       40               20
SEK       60               30
GBP        5                3
USD       10                5


COMPUTER REQUIREMENTS
=====================

A2 requires VESA 2.0 support:
If your graphics card does not support VESA 2.0 you should obtain
SciTech Display Doctor and run its UniVBE or some other third party
utility similar to that. (Scitech Display Doctor is made by SciTech
Software Inc. and is their intellectual property. Therefore it is NOT
included in A2 package). Scitech Display Doctor trial version can be
obtained from http://www.scitechsoft.com
Pentium processor is required (133MHz should do fine) and about 16Mb of
memory (8Mb might also do it).


CONTROLLING
===========

You can change controls with -changekeys commandline parameter.
Reset controls to default by deleting keys.cfg file in A2 directory.
Default controls are:
        Plr 1:
                Thrust                  - Numpad 8
                Turn anti-clockwise     - Numpad 4
                Turn clockwise          - Numpad 6
                Shoot                   - Right shift
                Shoot special weapon    - Numpad 5

        Plr 2:
                Thrust                  - W
                Turn anti-clockwise     - A
                Turn clockwise          - D
                Shoot                   - Tab
                Shoot special weapon    - S

        Plr 3:
                Thrust                  - I
                Turn anti-clockwise     - J
                Turn clockwise          - L
                Shoot                   - N
                Shoot special weapon    - K

        Plr 4:
                Thrust                  - T
                Turn anti-clockwise     - F
                Turn clockwise          - H
                Shoot                   - C
                Shoot special weapon    - G

                or if joystick available

                Thrust                  - Joy up
                Turn anti clockwise     - Joy left
                Turn clockwise          - Joy right
                Shoot                   - Joy fire 1
                Shoot specialweapon     - Joy fire 2

                Joystick will be calibrated when initializing A2 so it
                must be centered then. If your joystick seems to have
                its own will, re-run A2 and make sure your joystick is
                centered.

During game:
        P       - Pause game / Resume game
        F7      - Toggle accelerated time on/off
        F12     - Screenshot

If you have a cdrom installed you can use A2's cd audio player. Use the
following keys:

        F1      - Previous track
        F2      - Stop playing
        F3      - Play / Pause / Resume playing
        F4      - Next track
        F5      - Volume down
        F6      - Volume up

Note that you may have your cd audio volume set to very low in
Windows 95/NT volume controls and therefore you cannot hear anything in
A2. It is not recommended to change the cd while playing A2 under
Windows 95/NT because they will normally start autoplaying the cd,
something which may cause problems with A2.


MENUS
=====

If you find zooming letters annoying try option -fastmenu in the
command line.

You can press the F11 key at any time for online help.

In setup menu, weapon modes are:
Fixed   No weapon changing
Change  Change weapons with left and right keys while docking.
        If you have layed mine or SDI unit etc it will explode when you
        change to some other weapon.
Piling  Same as change but your weapons will not explode.



WEAPONS AND OTHER DEVICES
=========================

A2 has a very large number of balanced and distinguishable special
weapons and devices that can and will help you beat your enemies:

Pellet Gun:     - This is the regular gun attached to every ship
                - One pellet does only little damage but hundreds will
                  kill

Cloaker:        - A cloaking device will hide you to the secrets of
                  space
                - Be warned that the SDI Unit doesn't rely on visuals
                  but radar

Shield:         - Protects you from most of the projectiles

Rearturret:     - This is a normal Pellet Gun attached to your six
                - Autofire feature by default

Multicannon:    - Shoots a corona of regular pellets around you

AfterBurner:    - Gives you a remarkable shove
                - Manufactured under license from
                  the Earth Alliance InterGalactic Fleet
                - Gathers fuel from the space dust

Rubber Bullets: - An advanced version of the Pellet Gun though not very
                  controllable

Mine:           - A stack of pure TNT floating in the air

Freezer:        - Makes the spines of your enemies chill
                - Seen the end scene of Demolition man?

Atom Weapon:    - Three neutrons orbiting your ship
                - Very deadly on short range but how do you get there?

Remora:         - This hideous tool allows you to attach to other
                  player's ship
                - A weapon of moochers
                - Detach by pressing the special weapon key again

DirtClod:       - Spread scum on your opponents like never before

ElectricCharge: - Discharge batteries and make a sparkling show of might
                - Damage increases exponentially when you load batteries

HeadSpinner:    - Extremely uncomfortable, physiological weapon that
                  disturbs the sense of balance
                - WARNING!!! this may cause vertigo and real headache if
                  used extensively (be warned!)

Joker:          - Now the short-sighted can hit the enemy too

Ghost:          - These supernatural things will spook everybody and
                  everything
                - Who you gonna call... Ghostbusters!

Nucleus:        - Fulfill the vision of horrifying chain reaction with
                  nuclei
                - Activate the explosion with pellets

Marines:        - Little guys armed with machinegun, bazooka or stinger
                  missiles

Napalm:         - This stuff will burn your enemies alive in tight
                  places

Bomb:           - A freefalling nuke is a weapon from the 40's but still
                  very capable

Flame thrower:  - A short range toaster

Laser:          - 'nuff said.

Toxic Dump:     - Greenpeace would kill you for dumping these
                  radioactive waste clouds

Photon Torpedo: - A bunch of pure energy
                - Extremely deadly in experienced hands

Missile:        - A fire-and-forget missile but it ain't foolproof

SDI Unit:       - This nasty little minion will obey you
                - Three modes are: Defend, Attack and Stay
                - Change mode by pressing special weapon button

TimeWarp:       - A wicked device from Dr. Sternreise GmbH that disturbs
                  the time-space continuum
                - In a team play it might be a good idea to raise your
                  buddy from Valhalla with this

SuperGun:       - Nobody knows for sure what this is but it is rumored
                  that this weapon can be obtained only if you are very,
                  very lucky


PLAYING GAME
============

KILL 'EM!

Normal mode:
        The game is too small for all of you.
        1 point for every kill (not team mates).
        After sweeping out the enemy, land on the pads to claim victory.
        3 points and round-won for every surviving partner.
        1 point for every dead partner contributing to the winning team.

DeathMatch mode:
        Fight till a kill limit.
        Respawning at random location.
        1 point for every kill (not team mates).
        2 points and round-won for victorous team members.


COMMAND LINE PARAMETERS
=======================

        -levdir %s      Sets the directory where your levels are to %s
                        (default "lev/") note that you MUST use slashes
                        ("/") instead of backslashes ("\").
                        Example: a2 -levdir c:/games/mylevels/
        -fastmenu       Disables scrolling and zooming letters in the
                        menus.
        -autofire       Enables autofire mode.
        -nosound        No sounds.
        -demomode       Computer autoplay in continuous loop. Settings
                        will be the way you left them last time you
                        exited A2. No statistics gathered in this mode.
        -changekeys     Allows you to change keys. To change back to
                        defaults delete KEYS.CFG file.
        -screenmode     Allows you to change screenmode. All modes up to
                        640x480 with 16 bits per pixel are available.
                        Note that 320x480 is double scanline mode (only
                        every other line drawn)
        -bgdarken       Apply extra darken to background images.
        -doublescanline Uses double scanline mode in all screenmodes.
                        Unfortunately causes some problems with the
                        menus. Speeds up the game a bit. (use not
                        recommended)


BUG REPORTING
=============

If you find a bug and think that we should know about it please send
us email (see the section below). Include detailed information about
what happened and how you did it (if you can reproduce the bug). If you
get a screen similar to the screen capture below please send it to me.
Easiest way to do this is to run the bug.exe program included in the A2
directory. You should get bug?.txt which is a screen capture. Then use
copy and paste to send it to me with e-mail (again please use e-mail if
possible) or print and mail it to me. See CONTACTING THE AUTHORS below.
Also write down info about your computer and A2 build number
(IMPORTANT!).

Screen capture from a bug:
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Page fault at eip=0001eef4, error=0004
eax=00a8d004 ebx=00010c7e ecx=00000000 edx=ffffeefa esi=00000005 edi=fffffead
ebp=00146164 esp=00146148 program=C:\A2\A2.EXE
cs: sel=00af  base=82cb3000  limit=00ffcfff
ds: sel=00b7  base=82cb3000  limit=00ffcfff
es: sel=00b7  base=82cb3000  limit=00ffcfff
fs: sel=00c7  base=00000000  limit=ffffffff
gs: sel=00c7  base=00000000  limit=ffffffff
ss: sel=00b7  base=82cb3000  limit=00ffcfff

Call frame traceback EIPs:
  0x0001eef4
  0x0001f503
  0x00064778
  0x0001ce84
  0x0001e8aa

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------


TROUBLE SHOOTING
================

A2 says "Could't initialize screen mode!"

A2 requires Vesa 2.0 support. See COMPUTER REQUIREMENTS for more
information. You may try with -screenmode parameter.


A2 hangs and returns back to dos prompt when starting level.

This should occure only in shareware version. Someone has propably
modified LEV files which causes a checksum failure. You should get the
original A2 package from http://www.sci.fi/~mips/a2


A2 says "Checksum error for player ?" and one of the players renamed to
"NUL"

One of the player files is corrupted. Only way to fix this is to delete
that player or not use it. Rename the "NUL" player to something else
to get A2 function again.


CONTACTING THE AUTHOR(S)
========================

If you have any questions, don't hesitate to contact us. If possible
send email instead of snailmail (or ringing :)). If you have found a
bug, please report it to us after consulting the BUG REPORTING and
TROUBLESHOOTING section.

email:

        Olli Lyytinen (aka. MIPS)       mips@sci.fi
        Jaakko Lyytinen                 k24193@hkkk.kyyppari.fi

snailmail:

        Olli / Jaakko Lyytinen
        Keh„kukantie 3B
        00720 Helsinki
        Finland


CREDITS
=======

Coding, gfx, sfx, everything:
        Olli Lyytinen (aka. MIPS)       mips@sci.fi
        Jaakko Lyytinen                 k24193@hkkk.kyyppari.fi

Special thanks:
        DJ Delorie              for DJGPP
        Joel H. Hunter          for SoundBlaster library for DJGPP
        Brennan Underwood       for CD audio playing library for DJGPP

        All you who have sent feedback and/or ideas about AUTS

