King's Quest II: Romancing the Stones (VGA Remake)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Version 2.0  (April 2003)
------------------------

==================================
http://www.tierraentertainment.com
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CONTENTS

1. INTRODUCTION
2. SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
3. LOADING THE GAME
4. REPORTING A BUG
5. KNOWN ISSUES
6. FIXED BUGS AND RESOLVED ISSUES LIST
7. TROUBLESHOOTING GUIDE
8. DISCLAIMER


INTRODUCTION
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Thank you for downloading King's Quest 2: Romancing the Stones 
VGA. In 1985, Kings Quest II: Romancing the Throne was 
released by Sierra On-Line as a sequel to its predecessor, Kings
Quest: Quest for the Crown. While having a number of sound
adventure game elements, some feel that it was but an extension
of the first game. At Tierra, we have been striving to make King's
Quest 2 as great as its potential suggested it could be. An extended
plot, fleshed out characters, and increased (more challenging)
game-play have all been painstakingly integrated over many months.
It is our hope that you will now be able to have the greatest experience
possible playing KQII, as we have brought it up to par with other 
games in the series; in particular, KQIV and KQVI. 

The original game's premise has been maintained. But other than 
that, this remake bears little resemblance to its AGI counterpart, 
except on a superficial level. Basically, it's the skeletal story 
outline, with a LOT more emphasis on plot, characters, puzzles and 
a more immersive setting. Every effort has been made to retain the 
fairy tale elements from the original game, though much care has 
been taken to make them less obvious. In KQII: RTS, some real 
connections have been drawn between the characters. This is your 
chance to re-experience the roots of adventure gaming once again 
and keep the spirit alive!

Kings Quest II: Romancing the Stones also contains a fully 
orchestrated musical soundtrack. The downloadable version of the 
game includes this soundtrack in General MIDI format and should 
play using virtually any General MIDI-compliant sound device. 

In addition, Kings Quest II: Romancing the Stones was designed to 
utilize an optional digital soundtrack, which will provide a much 
richer and more realistic listening experience. We highly recommend 
installing the digital soundtrack before playing the game. For more 
information about the KQ2:RTS digital soundtrack, please visit 
http://www.tierraentertainment.com.

For the latest breaking information on both the King's Quest 2 VGA MIDI 
and digital soundtracks, go here:  

http://www.queststudios.com/quest/kq2rts/kq2rts.html

King's Quest 2: Romancing the Stones was created using an adventure 
game creation engine, called Adventure Game Studio (AGS): 

http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk



SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This game is designed to run under the Windows operating system, 
and should run correctly under Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows ME, 
Windows 2000 and Windows XP.

For optimal performance while playing King's Quest 2: RTS, your PC 
must meet the following requirements:

* Video card which supports SVGA display
* 1 MB Video RAM required, 2 Mb recommended
* Pentium or higher processor (233 Mhz or above required) 
* 32 Mb RAM 
* Windows 95, 98, ME, 2000 or XP 
* DirectX 5 or above (DirectX 8.1 recommended)
* Approximately 95 Mb free disk space 
* 100% General MIDI compliant MIDI sound card or module 
(Supports all DirectX-compatible sound and video cards)
* If digital music soundtrack is installed: 
- Any sound card with digital output capabilities and:
- An additional 65Mb free disk space
* If speech pack is installed: 
- An additional 35Mb free disk space 


If your system fails to meet these requirements, you may experience 
slowness and choppy game-play. A Pentium (or equivalent) system, 
above 500Mhz is generally recommended. 

NOTE: If you are playing with the speech pack installed, it is highly 
recommended that you also install the digital music pack for optimal 
game performance.
 


LOADING THE GAME
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Before doing anything else, you should go to the Launcher menu (or 
just run the winsetup.exe program), and ensure that 320x200 screen 
resolution is selected. Also, make sure you have the latest version 
of DirectX installed and that you have selected the appropriate 
choices for Digital Sound (sound effects) and MIDI music in 
accordance with your system's audio hardware.

If you are installing this program on a laptop or a system with an 
LCD monitor, you should uncheck the 'Use flicker free 85Hz display' 
option to prevent the graphics from flickering.

To play the game, run kq2menu.exe, which will load the game launcher 
menu. The launcher menu displays a variety of options, such 
as running the Game, adjusting game settings, reading the game 
manual or visiting the Tierra Website. Click 'Play Game' to start 
the game. Alternatively, you may run KQ2VGA.exe directly from 
the game directory, or access it from the Start Menu/Programs folder.

NOTE: If the game will not load from the launcher menu, you will 
need to load it manually by either going to the folder where the 
game is installed and running the KQ2VGA.exe program or accessing 
it from the Start Menu/Programs folder.

Once up and running, King's Quest 2: RTS plays identically to the 
old VGA Sierra point and click adventure games
(i.e. Quest for Glory VGA, King's Quest V, Space Quest 4).


NOTE: If attempting to run the game gives an error message saying, 
"Unable to Initialize 320x200 mode." (or something similar to this), 
you can change the resolution to 640x400 in the game options (or by 
running the winsetup.exe). Although, if the game runs correctly for 
you in 320x200 mode, please don't change this setting to a higher 
resolution. 

NOTE: King's Quest 2: Romancing the Stones is a very graphically 
intensive game. On some computer systems, you may receive an error 
message upon startup informing you that the game cannot load 
all of the graphics into memory. You can limit the maximum amount 
of memory for the game's sprite cache from the winsetup.exe program. 
Smaller values may make the game run slower, but use less RAM; 
higher values may be faster, but use more RAM. The default value 
that KQ2: RTS uses for sprite cache is 5MB. You should not normally 
need to adjust this setting. However, if you receive an error 
message upon startup, try decreasing the value to 2MB. 

Finally, please view the game manual, which is provided with the 
download, for more details on playing instructions and game 
information. The manual is in HTML format and can be accessed by 
running the menu launcher (kq2menu.exe) and clicking 'Game Manual', 
or by accessing it from the Start Menu/Programs folder.



REPORTING A BUG
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
KQ2: RTS has been thoroughly tested and we feel that it is relatively 
bug-free at this stage. This means that you should be able to play it 
through from beginning to end without encountering any major bugs. 

However, if you do happen to notice something odd, please report it 
in the category of our forums designated "Technical & Bugs forum" at:

http://pub57.ezboard.com/broyalquestforums



KNOWN ISSUES
~~~~~~~~~~~~
The following is a list of game issues that we're currently aware of. 
Most of these are details cannot yet be fixed due to the current 
limitations of AGS or for similar reasons. If you encounter any of these, 
just assume that we already know about them:

- When using the General MIDI soundtrack, the volume level spikes 
between songs.


If the game does happen to seize control from you or it lock up, 
you can press ALT+X or CTRL+ALT+END to close the program and return to 
your Windows desktop.


CHANGES AND BUGS FIXED SINCE KQ2VGA V1.1 (WARNING: CONTAINS MAJOR SPOILERS!)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-Added speech pack support!
-Added the ability to press CTRL+C in the savegame GUI to quickly clear the text box.
-Added an alternate (non-violent) solution to the Wolf/crossroad puzzle and re-arranged points accordingly
-Added points scoring sound to some screens where it was missing
-Fixed a lock up after Enchanter kills Graham and restore/restart/quit box appears
-Fixed a lock up which could occur when player leaves the screen and clicks on the Options menu at the same time
-Fixed a bug which caused Hagatha to talk for too long if she catches Graham in her cave after chanting
-Fixed a bug where the door to the quartz tower could be opened by clicking on the first symbol only.
-Removed the setup option to use 960x600 resolution
-Prevented player from being able to drink youth potion while stuck on bridge
-Prevented player from being able to bring up inventory window when Save and Restore Windows were already on screen
-Prevented Enchanter from Entering Row of 6 stones screen if Death Window is already on screen 
-Music tracks now crossfade
-Multiple sound channels added
-Inventory scrollbar now resets to the top item if you close it, enter a new screen and then open it again
-Changed the wording of the twin lion statue's first poem so that it does not cause a contradiction
-Book title pop-ups will not appear while inventory screen is active in bookcase puzzle screen
-Characters no longer walk directly through each other

Plus a bunch of other minor bug fixes and improvements which aren't listed here as the text file  
that originally contained them accidentally got deleted.


BUGS FIXED SINCE KQ2VGA V1.0 (WARNING: CONTAINS MAJOR SPOILERS!)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-Fixed nasty crash which could occur when saving and replacing savegames.
-Fixed a huge bug that caused the game to freeze-up in random places and 
also caused digital sounds and music to get stuck in a repetitive looping glitch.
-Fixed a bug involving odd symbols and characters overloading the 
savegame listbox.
-Fixed a bug which caused video files not to play on some systems.
-Removed two dead-end situations from the game (forgetting to pick up the cat 
hair and forgetting the combination to the Sharkee King's treasury).
-Ship at start of game will no longer move while the icon bar is visible 
or game is paused.
-Possum crying sound (in forest at night) is no longer heard prematurely.
-Savegame files are now much smaller.
-Added a new-close up image during Graham's confrontation with the 
Enchanter scene.
-Graham must now read the Enchantments book before he is allowed to place any 
ingredients inside the beaker.
-Fixed a bug which Prevented Graham from leaving the ugly duckling's 
pond to the south.
-Fixed a bug when taking baby pumpkin from the merchant that caused the 
game to lock up if any of the save/restore/inventory/options menus were 
open while the timer expired for the merchant to return to his stand.
-Graham can no longer get 'stuck' standing in the pumpkin patch.
-Fixed a lock up in the scene where the werewolf is in grandma's bed
-Fixed a bug where Graham's cloak dissapeared if he was wearing it while 
bending down to look into a log.
-Fixed "Too many screen overlays" error message and crash when Hagatha 
chants her curse.
-Fixed "Too many screen overlays" error message and crash when Hagatha 
looks in the tower room mirror.
-Fixed possible "Too many screen overlays" error message in haystack screen.
-Fixed possible "Too many screen overlays" error message in castle library screen.
-Fixed a bug in the Sharkee realm where restoring the game resulted in 
black patches on the screen.
-Fixed a bug which mistakenly allowed Ctrl+Q to be pressed in the third 
test, thus causing odd results.
-Fixed several bugs which caused on-screen speech to remain visible 
instead of dissapearing if the icon bar, inventory menu, or options 
menus were accessed.
-Fixed a bug where Graham appeared briefly at the bottom of the screen 
when falling off cliffs at plateau or at northern edge of Door of Destiny.
-Fixed bug which allowed player to save while walking out of the town 
library door, thus not being able to walk again upon restoring the game.
-Fixed a lock up that occured when player accessed inventory while wolves run out.
-Fixed various clipping and walk-behind errors.
-Fixed various spelling and grammar errors.


TROUBLESHOOTING GUIDE
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Listed below are some common issues that you may encounter while playing 
KQ2VGA. If you follow the suggested solutions then in most cases you 
should be able to solve the problem.

Please consult the guide below before posting any issues on our technical 
forum to see if the issue you're experiencing can be solved without our 
help.

Q) I have selected the anti-aliasing option in the setup program but 
I do not notice any difference during gameplay.

A) King's Quest 2 VGA does not support anti-aliasing of character 
sprites. Selecting this feature will have no effect on the game.

Q) The game crashes back to the desktop every time I try to save or 
replace a game.

A) This issue is now believed to have been resolved. However, if you do 
experience it, please write down the exact error message you recieve 
(including all numbers) and report it to our technical forum at 
http://pub57.ezboard.com/froyalquestforumsfrm9

Q) The game freezes in random places. I can't move the mouse cursor at 
all and digital music/sound effects get stuck in an endless, repetetive 
glitch that loops over and over. I have to reboot my system to gain 
control of my system again.

This issue is now believed to have been resolved. However, If you do 
continue to get random freezes, first of all please report it to our 
technical forum at http://pub57.ezboard.com/froyalquestforumsfrm9

As a work around, you can also try going to the game setup and changing 
the digital sound driver to "Default WaveOut device". This has been known 
to fix game freezes for some people.

If the game does freeze or lock up on you completely, try pressing ALT+X 
(or CTRL+ALT+END) to shut it down safely and return to the Windows desktop.

Please also make sure that you are running the game in 320x200 or 320x240 
mode.

Q) When I load the game the screen constantly flickers on and off every 
few seconds. I have tried using all different resolutions and checking 
the option for CRT monitors and then unchecking it. But nothing works.

A) There are a number of suggestions to help resolve this issue: 

  1/ Close all other applications before you run the game. 
  2/ Click the "Letterbox resolution" option in the setup program. 
  3/ If all else fails, try downloading the latest drivers for your 
     video card, downloading the latest version of DirectX and 
     lowering your video card's refresh rate.


Q) Why is my MIDI Music Volume so low/high? Even if I set the MIDI volume 
manually in Windows before I start the game it seems to automatically revert 
back again as soon as I run KQ2VGA.

A) If you aren't using the digital music pack and your music volume is too 
low (or if your music is too high), try this:

  1/ Load the game.
  2/ Wait until the KQ2 title screen is displayed and then press ALT+TAB to 
     get back to the Windows desktop.
  3/ Double-click on the little speaker icon in the bottom corner of the screen 
     (in the system tray). You'll have several slider bars. "Wave Out" indicates 
     your systems' digital sound volume level and "Wavetable" or "MIDI" indicates 
     your MIDI music's volume level. Set those to whatever levels you need in 
     order to set the music to the right volume level. 
  4/ Click on the "King's Quest 2" tab on the Windows icon bar to Maximize 
     the game and resume playing again. 

Remember: There are also slider bars on the Options menu in-game... so try 
altering these first and if they do the job, then there's likely no need for 
you to ALT+TAB to Windows and change the settings yourself.

Q) I'm having trouble with the MIDI music feature it says failure to initalize. 
Any suggestions? 

A) This could be that you have another application running in the background that 
has taken the MIDI device for itself and won't let the game have it. Make sure 
you shut down all other programs in the background before running the game. 

If this doesn't work, try changing between the different MIDI setting in the 
setup program before running the game.

If all else fails, then the best solution is just to download the digital music 
pack and forget about the MIDI music.

Q) I'm having trouble with the digital sound feature (sound effects) it says 
failure to initalize.

A) There have been reports of this occuring if the "Play Game" button is clicked 
from the menu launcher. If this is the case for you, try running the game using 
the "Save & run" option from the setup program instead.

If that doesn't work, try selecting a different option for digital sound from 
the setup program.

As a last resort try playing with the "No digital sound" option selected.

Q) I can hear a lot of static in the sound effects or digital music. What's wrong?

A) Some sound cards appear to have trouble with the "Default DirectSound Device" 
setting for digital sound effects. If you hear static, try running the setup program 
again and changing 'digital sound' to the "Default WaveOut Device" option.

Q) Why are the savegame files for KQ2VGA so large? Each one is about 3MB and the 
Sierra ones were only a few kb.

A) They're not anymore. Since version 1.1 of KQ2VGA, you will notice that the 
savegame files have been optimized and are now only a few hundred kb in size, 
rather than 2-3MB each.

Q) I can't see any Video scenes during the game.

A) Make sure that your system is correctly configured to play MPG files. You 
can test this by playing an MPG file in Windows Media Player. If it doesn't work 
in Windows Media player then it is likely that you have a corrupt/bad MPG codec 
which will probably need to be re-installed.

Q) When I try running the game in 320x200 mode, my screen is misaligned. Adjusting 
my monitor controls does not seem to fix this.

A) In some cases, certain video cards may not be able to display 320x200 
resolution correctly. In these cases, please run the setup program and 
click the box next to 'Force alternate letterbox solution' to run the game in 
320x240 instead.



DISCLAIMER
~~~~~~~~~~
Tierra Entertainment makes NO claims of ownership to any of the 
borrowed characters, places, names, themes, situations or events 
in King's Quest 2: Romancing the Stones. King's Quest and all 
related paraphernalia are the copyrights and/or registered 
trademarks of Sierra On-Line. King's Quest 2: Romancing the Throne 
was written and designed (1985) by Roberta Williams and published 
by Sierra On-Line.

King's Quest 2: Romancing the Stones was rewritten and redesigned 
(2002) by Daniel Stacey, and was released by Tierra Entertainment. 
All additional concepts are the unique work of the author. Original 
music copyright 2002 by Tom and Dianne Lewandowski 
(www.QuestStudios.com).

Pentium is a trademark of the Intel Corporation. Windows, Windows 95, 
Windows 98, Windows ME, Windows 2000, and Windows XP are all trademarks 
of the Microsoft Corporation.

THIS GAME IS PROVIDED WITH NO WARRANTY WHATSOEVER. USE THIS GAME AT 
YOUR OWN RISK. NEITHER TIERRA ENTERTAINMENT, NOR THE CREATOR OF THE 
AGS ENGINE CAN BE HELD RESPONSIBLE FOR ANYTHING THAT MAY HAPPEN TO 
YOUR COMPUTER AS A RESULT OF DOWNLOADING, INSTALLING, LOADING, OR 
PLAYING King's Quest 2: Romancing the Stones.

THE King's Quest 2: Romancing the Stones GAME MAY BE DISTRIBUTED 
FREELY, PROVIDING THAT IT REMAINS IN ITS ORIGINAL EXECUTABLE 
FORM (.exe), MAINTAINS ITS ORIGINAL FILENAME, AND CONTAINS ALL 
FILES UNALTERED AND FULLY INTACT. THIS README.TXT FILE AND 
LEGAL DISCLAIMER MUST ACCOMPANY ALL COPIES OF THE GAME. 

NO MONEY WHATSOEVER MAY BE CHARGED OR REQUESTED REGARDING THE 
DISTRIBUTION OF THE King's Quest 2: Romancing the Stones GAME. 

NO MONEY WHATSOEVER MAY BE CHARGED OR REQUESTED REGARDING ANY OF 
THE FILES BUNDLED WITH THE King's Quest 2: Romancing the Stones
GAME. 

NO MONEY WHATSOEVER MAY BE CHARGED OR REQUESTED REGARDING THE 
DISTRIBUTION OF ANY KIND OF ADD-ON PACKS INTENDED FOR USE WITH 
THE King's Quest 2: Romancing the Stones GAME.

THE King's Quest 2: Romancing the Stones GAME IS NOT 
AFFLILIATED WITH SIERRA ENTERTAINMENT (www.sierra.com) IN ANY 
WAY. PLEASE DO NOT CONTACT SIERRA WITH QUESTIONS OR BUG REPORTS 
ABOUT IT. PLEASE DO NOT MAKE POSTS ABOUT THE King's Quest 2: 
Romancing the Stones GAME ON SIERRA'S PUBLIC FORUMS.

2002 TIERRA ENTERTAINMENT