HOW TO PLAY BRAIN DRAIN

Brain  Drain is simple to play, but you need a sharp eye and a good vocabulary
to score well. The object of the game is to find at least as many words in the
puzzle  as  the  computer finds. Sounds easy,  but  the computer knows all the
combinations and has a fairly extensive command of the English language.

To  begin a game simply hit [P]. You  will be presented with an entry field in
which to enter your words. Look at the gameboard and find as many words as you
can using these rules:

* A word must be between 3 and 5 characters in length.

*  A  word may be composed of letters  from  squares in any direction, but you
can't use the same square more than once in a single word.

*  All  letters  must  be adjacent to  each  other  on  the game board, either
vertically,  horizontally,  or  diagonally.  The  word  must  be  composed  of
sequentially adjacent letters from the board. For example:

                               ÉÍÍÍËÍÍÍËÍÍÍËÍÍÍ»
                               º A º C º R º L º
                               ÌÍÍÍÎÍÍÍÎÍÍÍÎÍÍ͹
                               º X º U º N º C º
                               ÌÍÍÍÎÍÍÍÎÍÍÍÎÍÍ͹
                               º R º Z º Y º E º
                               ÌÍÍÍÎÍÍÍÎÍÍÍÎÍÍ͹
                               º D º F º W º B º
                               ÈÍÍÍÊÍÍÍÊÍÍÍÊÍÍͼ

You  can spell the word UNCLE with adjacent letters, but sequentially you must
jump  over  the  "C"  to  get to the  "E",  which  violates  a rule. You would
technically be using the "C" twice. The game will notify you if you attempt to
form a word that violates the rules of the game.

Scoring  is  based  on the number of  words  found and the percentage of words
found  in  the puzzle. Both values are used  to  calculate the score so that a
high  score may be obtained either by  playing often and finding lots of words
or  by  being extremely good at finding all  the words in the puzzle. The game
will  keep  a  running account of your  score,  words  you find, and words the
computer finds.

The  computer knows many, many words, but  you will occasionally see a word in
the puzzle that the computer doesn't know. You will be notified if this is the
case, and it does not affect scoring. You can't achieve greater than 100% even
if you happen to know a few words that the computer doesn't.

You will see your current game score as well as your overall score on the main
screen.  Player  scores  may be viewed  using  the [M]enu option and selecting
player rankings either by score or by percentage.

Your sysop may or may not allow you to input new words into the dictionary. If
this  feature is enabled, and you enter a  word that the computer does not yet
know,  you will be asked if you want  to enter this word in the dictionary. Do
your sysop a favor and be SURE the spelling is correct before you save it!

You  may reset your score from the main  [M]enu. This will delete you from the
player  database  and  reset all of your  personal  data. This is handy if you
would  just  like  to try a few  practice  games before really getting down to
business.

Good luck!