***************************************************************************** CHINESE CHECKERS vers0.44b (FREEWARE) FOR OS/2 WARP Copyright (C) by Miltiadis Mitrakas 1996 email: mmitraka@cs.strath.ac.uk ***************************************************************************** ______________________________________________________________________________ THE AUTHOR: ______________________________________________________________________________ Miltiadis Mitrakas 4th year Student [Computer Science at Strathclyde university in Glasgow] email: mmitraka@cs.strath.ac.uk ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ WHAT CHANGED: ______________________________________________________________________________ Minor changes to the interface as far as the "game setup" window is concerned. Added dialog for sound and animation speed configuration. Also now you can arrange the players in different way, according to the rules of the game. Also added the following hints section... ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ HINTS: ______________________________________________________________________________ If you are not good at this game (like me) avoid playing the Blue Dragon (CPU), he (it) is the best player. Instead play against Cyan Dragon (CPU), but then again do not let him take advantage of your pegs' position because he will do it. Of course the best way to play this game is against a human player. ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ THE RULES: ______________________________________________________________________________ CC2 (Chinese Checkers for OS/2) is an OS/2 implementation of a traditional Chinese game for two to six players. Each player has ten pegs of one color at one starting point of the star. The object of the game is to occupy the star point directly opposite. The first player to accomplish this is a winner. Of course if in the same round more than one players reach the end point all of them are winners. Each player moves in turn, (in this implementation clockwise). A move consists of placing a peg into one of the adjacent holes or jumping over any other one peg into a hole beyond. The direction of the move has to be one of the following: left/right, forward left/right, backward left/right in respect with players position on the board. Only one move is made at a time, except when jumping. Then the player can make any number of jumps in any direction as long as all the moves are consist of jumps. A player can jump their own or their opponents pegs. No pegs are removed from the board during play. ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ THE INTERFACE: ______________________________________________________________________________ When the program starts you can see two windows. The first is the game window and the second is the "Game Setup" window. Using the "Game Setup" window you can choose the number of players you want in the game (two to six players). By clicking the dragons you can toggle between computer player and human player. The only restriction is that at least one of the players should be human. You can also choose the arrangement of the players (according to the rules of the game of course). Four buttons also are visible in this window, one for "quit" (close the application), another equally useful the "play" button. By choosing the "play" button you are 'transferred' to the actual game. The "demo" button will give a set of demostration games. Finally the "setup" button will let you choose the speed of the animation and the sound. The sound can be turned off, use system sounds or custom. The last (custom) is not implemented yet, sorry... Having started a game there are two windows that you should know about. The left window is the "Info" window where you can see the number of the current round and the color of the player who is suppose to play. There is also a "stop" button which stops the game and returns to the "Game Setup" window. The most interesting window is the right one, the "Board" window. When it is your turn to play you see a hand pointer. You choose a ball (of your own color of course) by clicking the left mouse button on it. Clicking the left mouse button on the holes (according to the rules you've read, did you?) you describe your move path. When you have finished you click the right mouse button on the last hole of your move path and the computer takes care of the hard work moving the ball around. You can unselect the ball and the path by just clicking the left mouse button on the selected ball. Finally if any player(s) win the "Congratulation" window opens to congratulate the winner(s). ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ THE PROGRAM: ______________________________________________________________________________ CC2 is a 32Bit, multithreaded Presentation Manager program. Requirements: any machine capable of running OS/2 WARP with 256 colors. The code is full of assertions and if anything goes wrong it exits and hopefully the source of the error will be in the "CC2.LOG" file. This file is always created at the start of the program and if everything is OK at the end of the program will contain the following lines: Log File Name: CC2.LOG - The End - This does not mean that the program is 100% OK. Please read the following for more information... !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ! THIS IS A FREEWARE PROGRAM AND AS SUCH YOU ARE PERMITTED TO DISTRIBUTE IT ! ! WITHOUT CHARGE PROVIDED THAT ALL FILES ARE DISTRIBUTED TOGETHER, AND DUE ! ! COPYRIGHT IS OBSERVED. THIS PROGRAM IS PROVIDED AS IS WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY, ! ! EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR ! ! PURPOSE. ! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ______________________________________________________________________________ HISTORY: ______________________________________________________________________________ Still in the making: _First beta CC20033B was out on July 15 1996 _This is the second beta CC20044B. ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ KNOWN BUGS: ______________________________________________________________________________ I found some and killed them. Now it is your turn, if you find any bug I would be very pleased to hear from you as soon as possible. I would appreciate it if you send me email with the following information: machine specs and video drivers, a small description of the problem and please do not forget the "cc2.log" file (this file is generated every time you run the program). ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ THANKS TO: ______________________________________________________________________________ _Chinese people for creating such an interesting game. _IBM for creating such a great operating system. _Cing Han Chin (testing). _Dimitris Charitos (more testing). _Brian Hall (much more testing) _You for suggestions and comments you will provide in the future. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Fill free to contact me for any comments (good/bad) about the program. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------