TIGER TANK
VERSION 2.0

WRITTEN BY TECK H. TAY
COMPLETED ON 7th JUNE 1992


WHAT IS TIGER TANK ?

This game was initially inspired by memories of a similar game, Tiger
Tank which I played many years ago on an Ohio computer. Back in those
days, this game came on tape and took about 3 minutes to load.

Tiger Tank is an arcade / action game which puts you in a battle field
with enemy tanks. All you have, is your skill and fast reflexes to get
you past each level. The objective of the game is very simple, just shot
anything that moves. Note, unlike Tiger Tank 1.0, the computer's tanks
are much more vicious now. Their sole purpose is to make their way
towards you and they will shoot away walls that are in their way. Once
you are within or near their "sights", they fire endlessly. However,
evading them is not as difficult as you may think. They do have some
shortfalls, and it's up to you to figure out your strategy against them.

FLEXIBILITY

Tiger Tank 2.0 is a very "adjustable" game. This means that there are
many, many settings that you may play around with. Therefore, you may
make this game as challenging and impossible to play as you want, or as
boring and stupid as you want. You may have several configuration files,
but always keep a backup of the original configuration file.

CONTROLS

There are 4 controls for movement and 1 control to fire your gun. The
keys are 4 and 6 to turn left or right, and 8 and 5 to move forward or
reverse. Of course you have the well known space-bar for triggering your gun.

GAME PROPERTIES

The way the game progresses is quite simple. You start at the first
level. Once you have killed all the enemy tanks in that level, you
advance on to the next round where you'll encounter more enemy tanks.
With each new round, you acquire the ability to fire more shots at any
given time, and so does the computer. Also, with each new round,
computer's shells fly faster and computer's tanks also move faster.

By default, you start off with 10 units of armor. With each hit you
receive, your armor goes down by 1 unit. Enemy tanks require only 1 hit
to be killed. However, if they fire shots between themselves and you,
you'll have to neutralize all the shells in the way before getting to
them. Also, at the end of each level, your armor rises by 1 unit.
Obviously the game ends when your armor reaches zero.

THE CONFIGURATION FILE

Because of the way the program was written, there are a few limitations
that you must be aware of. Firstly, the tank program requires the
configuration file in order to work. Also, the values in the file must
fall within certain ranges or else the program may crash. The routines
that read the lines in the file are case sensitive, so make sure you
don't change the case of any parameter in the file. Do not insert any
additional lines anywhere in the configuration file, or insert any
additional spaces between the parameters and their values.

Here is a listing of the default configuration file.

X_Max 80
Y_Max 48
MaxShells 2
MaxEnemyShells 5
BadShellDelay 400
MyShellDelay 50
DelayCycles 700
WallColor 2
GroundColor 7
BadTankColor 0
YourColor 1
MyShellColor 14
BadShellColor 0
DefShields 10
SoundOn 1
FieldDensity 50
NumOfBadTanks 5
AmountOfDamage 1
BadShellInc 5
BadTankInc 5
ShellInc 2
ShieldInc 1
DecDelayCycles 10
DecBadShellDelay 10


VARIABLE                EXPLANATION

X_Max                   the "width" of the battle field
Y_Max                   the "height" of the battle field
MaxShells               the maximum number of shells you may fire at a time
MaxEnemyShells          maximum number of shells the enemy can fire at a time
BadShellDelay           the speed of enemy shells (the bigger the slower)
MyShellDelay            the speed of your shells 
DelayCycles             the speed of computer's turns and moves
WallColor               the color of the walls
GroundColor             the color of the ground
BadTankColor            the color of enemy tanks
YourColor               the color of your tank
MyShellColor            the color of your shell(s)
BadShellColor           the color of computer's tank shell(s)
DefShields              number of armor units you get at the beginning
SoundOn                 determines if there is to be sound or not (1=Yes)
FieldDensity            determines how dense the field would be with walls
NumOfBadTanks           the starting number of enemy tanks
AmountOfDamage          number of armor units you lose each time you're hit
BadShellInc             number of additional enemy shells at each new level
BadTankInc              number of additional enemy tanks at each new level
ShellInc                number of additional shells you get at each new level
ShieldInc               additional shield units you get at each new level
DecDelayCycles          how much faster enemy tanks move at each new level
DecBadShellDelay        how much faster enemy shells move at each new level

VARIABLE                INTENDED RANGE

X_Max                   5 - 80
Y_Max                   5 - 48
MaxShells               1 - 99
MaxEnemyShells          1 - 99
BadShellDelay           0 - 9999
MyShellDelay            0 - 9999
DelayCycles             0 - 999
WallColor               0 - 16
GroundColor             0 - 16
BadTankColor            0 - 16
YourColor               0 - 16
MyShellColor            0 - 16
BadShellColor           0 - 16
DefShields              1 - 100
SoundOn                 0 - 1
FieldDensity            0 - 99
NumOfBadTanks           0 - 100
AmountOfDamage          0 - 100
BadShellInc             0 - 99
BadTankInc              0 - 99
ShellInc                0 - 99
ShieldInc               0 - 99
DecDelayCycles          0 - 99
DecBadShellDelay        0 - 99

PROGRAM SPECIFICATIONS AND REQUIREMENTS

MAIN.EXE        the Tiger Tank 2.0 executable
TANK2.INI       the default configuration file
TANK2.BAT       the batch file that runs Tiger Tank (if you're using DOS)
TT2.BTM		similar to TANK2.BAT but runs under 4DOS (more flexible)
TANK2.DOC       the Microsoft Word 2.0 version of this file
TANK2.TXT       this file
REGISTER.TXT    the registration form

Tiger Tank 2.0 was written with Turbo Pascal 5.5 on an Intel 486 based 
computer. The delay settings in the default config file are optimized 
for an Intel 386 computer running at 25 MHz. Also, you MUST have a VGA
card and monitor on your system as Tiger Tank assumes that you have 50
lines text mode available.

As mentioned earlier, the program needs its configuration file to run. 
The configuration file's filename is passed in to the program as a
parameter, eg : MAIN.EXE MY2NDCFG.FIL

REGISTRATION

Plaease register your copy of Tiger Tank 2.0 if you like it by printing
out REGISTER.TXT and filling it out. Registered users will get a copy of
the source code if requested and will also get a free copy of Tiger
Tank 3.0, as well as any major bug/limitation fixes in Tiger Tank 2.0.
Please include in your registration any suggestions or comments you have
for this version of Tiger Tank. If you have any ideas or features you'll
like to see in Tiger Tank 3.0, please mention them. Your support is 
necessary to keep new and better versions of Tiger Tank.

CURRENTLY PLANNED FEATURES FOR TIGET TANK 3.0

- more "adventure" like approach to the game
- different types of weapons
- multiple types of enemies (not tanks)
- 2 player option


