GENERATING CUSTOM GRAPHICS LEVELS
---------------------------------

Generating your own custom worm levels has been
made relatively easy and fun although you will
need a little knowledge about working in DOS and
perhaps a good flavour for DPAINT (TM) or
PHOTOSHOP (TM).

You have the choice of quickly getting your level
into the game, or spending a little more time and
customising it further through other methods - all
of which are explained here.

This document is in four parts;

(A) BASIC (Getting your custom level in there)
(B) ADDITIONAL EDITING (Setting Wind/Gravity/
    Background values)
(C) EDITING COLOUR RANGES (For Water/Backgrounds)
(D) ADDING YOUR OWN BACKGROUNDS

A Basic Steps;
--------------

1. Digitise/Source/Draw your artwork, ensuring
   that the main graphics screen is EXACTLY
   960x400 in resolution.

2. You must ensure that your picture only uses 80
   colours and these must be the first 80 colours
   in the palette. (Colours 0-79, or 00H to 4FH).
   There are many image processors available that
   will remap the colours for you, such as GRAPHICS
   WORKSHOP (C) Alchemy Mindlabs and shareware
   versions are available from all good Shareware
   resources. Consult your image processor
   documentation with respect to "COLOUR
   REDUCTION" - try different versions with
   dithering on and off to get the best
   results.

3. You must ensure that all areas of your picture
   that are to be transparent in the game are
   filled with colour 0. This is the only area
   that Worms can move and fire.

   Also, try and leave a 32 pixel gap at the top
   of your image as any worms placed here will be
   obscured by the KO bar. This area of the image
   will automatically be cropped by the
   program anyway!

4. Save/Convert your image to ".PCX" format.
   Again, there are many image processors and
   utilities available to help you do this.

5. Use the GFXCON conversion program on the file.
   This utility auto remaps the palette for
   use in the game. (See about changing the
   water colour later in the doc).

6. Place the file (making sure it has a ".PCX"
   suffix) in the WORMS/DATA/CUSTOM/GFX
   directory and load up the game.

7. On the landscape generation screen, press space
   and type the name of the file (no need to type
   ".PCX") and that file should load and
   play. Providing you have followed the
   instructions, you should not have any
   problems.

8. You can list all the custom graphics levels
   present on the disk by going to the OPTIONS,
   LOAD/SAVE OPTIONS and selecting LIST
   CUSTOM FILES.  You can toggle between sample
   sets and custom levels.

Note:
-----
The above procedure is the easiest way to get your
image into the game, but there is quite a
lot more you can do to change the way your level
looks and reacts - and even sounds...

B Additional Editing;
---------------------
".INF" Files

If you look at any of the supplied custom levels
(in DATA/CUSTOM/GFX) then you will notice that
each PCX picture file has a relevent INF file
along with it. This file is a standard text file,
you can read/edit it with a standard text editor,
such as EDIT from DOS or NOTEPAD from Windows.

The .INF file (which should have the same name as
your PCX file) allows you to; For example the
Team17.pcx would have a Team17.inf file.

1) Set the gravity              0 Min
                                1 Med
                                2 Max

2) Set the friction (slide)     0 Min
                                1 Med
                                2 Max

3) Set the wind strength        0 Off
                                1 Min
                                2 Med
                                3 Max


4) Which background to use      0 Default/Normal
                                1 Spiky Mountains
                                2 Alien Style                                 3       Alps Style mountains
                                4 Alps style
                                5 Distant City

5) Which water set to use       0 Default/Normal
                                1 Martian Gloop
                                2 Lava/Fire

6) Set which CD track to play   0 Forest/Ambient
                                1 Snow/Ice
                                2 Hell/Evil
                                3 Mars/Alien
                                4 Desert/Arid
                                5 City/Urban
                                6 Warzone
                                7 Spooky/Graveyard
                                8 Bizarre/Crazy
                                9 Farmyard/Alps
                               10 Znork Music!

The numbers on the top line of the file are
seperated by commas and anything below the line
is ignored. Do not let that stop you typing some
text about how you did it, how to get the best
out of the level and stuff like that - check the
example files that are already on the CD.

If the .PCX file does not have a similar .INF
file, then WORMS assumes default values.

C Editing Colour Ranges;
------------------------

You can change the colour ranges of the water and
the backgrounds by editing the .PCX file AFTER you
have used the GFXCON program. Note: If you edit it
before, the GFXCON program inserts default colours
on re-writing the file!

Water:
         16 Colours, in the palette these are
         ranges 80-95 (50H-5FH). A spread of 1
         colour is usually best.

Background layer 1 (front layer):

         16 Colours, in the palette these are
         ranges 16-31 (10H-1FH). You will have
         to check depending on the chosen
         background graphic, to see what is best
         as some gfx have cities in them etc.

Background layer 2 (back layer);

         47 Colours, in the palette these are
         ranges 129-175 (81H-AFH). Remember that
         the top half of mountain graphics is
         usually the sky.

You can also copy one of the .BK1 and .BK2 sets
(which are background layers) and rename them to
the name of your .PCX file. These will then be
loaded instead without the need to edit the .PCX
file colour ranges.

D Adding Background Graphics;
-----------------------------

A facility for adding your own backgrounds has
been added. You must draw them in the following
sizes and colour-resolutions only;

Background layer 1; 320x200 16 colours (Colour 0
                    is transparent)
Background layer 2; 320x200 48 colours (Colour 0
                    is transparent)
Note: The bottom line of pixels MUST be all the
same colour!

The colours must be in the first 16/48
respectively and the program will automatically
map the colours into the appropriate palette
range in the game.

When done, name the files <name>.BK1 and
<name>.BK2  - the same as your <name>.PCX file
and <name>.INF files.  If .BK1 and .BK2 exist,
they will auto-load, replacing the setting in the
.INF file for background graphics and the colour
range you set for the background layers in your
.PCX file.

And that`s about it... Phew!

If you produce any stunning levels, do not be
afraid to send them to us! Prizes await the best
ones and we`ll put good ones on our site for
all to download!

<For reference, see GFXCON.TXT for using the
conversion utility>

A more detailed user-guide for creating better
Worms backgrounds is available on the Website, as
are many cool backgrounds drawn by Wormsters right
around the globe!

DELUXE PAINT and DPAINT are trademarks of 
Electronic Arts Limited.
PHOTOSHOP is a trademark of Adobe Systems, Inc.

<End of Document>
