ÉÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍ» º Star Quest v3.6 º ÈÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍÍͼ A Multi-Player Space Trading Game for TDBS Copyright 1995 BBS Consultants, Inc. 919-403-9473 Hi, I'm Tom Faulkner, President of BBS Consultants, Inc. and I'm very pleased to have been able to purchase the rights to Star Quest, the first multi-player game for TDBS, from Jeff Johnson. Don't let the version number fool you. With the number of hours that have gone into this upgrade and the significance of the changes, I probably should have called it Star Quest IV v1.0. Because of the heritage of the game; however, I decided to keep the Star Quest III series for a while. If you've followed the evolution of Star Quest from it's first release; then you know it was once a highly popular game. A game that brought large numbers of new subscribers to several hundred bbs around the world. Something when wrong; however. As SysOps and programmers we always want to make a program just a little bit better. When the casino was added to Star Quest with the introduction of version 3.0, the play of the game changed. What happened was that players could win much more money in the casino than they could by actually playing the game. By betting only one credit, players could win the entire pot in craps. The lotto jackpot paid out much more than it took in. Players could bet and win unlimited sums by playing Crystals. To get a new game and repeat the process, a player only had to leave the casino. They could come right back in and do it all over again. The ones who realized this would accumulate vast wealth and large numbers of fighters. They would destroy any player who ventured away from a Star Base. New players were instantly killed and lost interest. Without new players, the super rich also lost interest and the game withered. The casino is still there in version 3.6, but it now has limits. Players can only play each game one time on a visit to a Star Base. Just exiting the Star Base and re-landing won't work -- they have to actually warp to another sector and return. Additionally, the payouts have been lowered considerably. I hope I've struck the fine balance between making the casino interesting yet still force players to actually participate in intergalactic trading. There is a new addition in the casino in that BlackJack has been added. This version of BlackJack was originally coded by Jeanne Nerwinski and was the first TDBS game done by anyone who wasn't a beta tester. It's been around awhile and is still very popular. I selected it based on it's popularity and the difficulty of anyone winning truly large sums of credits. Another area where "improving" Star Quest actually hurt it was in the size of the universe. When first introduced, Star Quest only had 500 sectors. In later versions, that increased to 2000 sectors and some sysops added even more on the theory that more had to be better. The truth is that the excitement of the games comes from player interaction. If the universe is too big, players can hide in empty sectors and avoid any contact with fellow players. That's not how you build a sense of community on your bbs and it's not how you keep players coming back again and again and paying to join. Starting with v3.6, you can limit the size of universe as well as increase it. The default installation only has 125 sectors. You can increase this up to 2000 by simply adding a command line switch. You can even have a "bunny slope" universe for non-members to tease them into joining. Every bbs is different and you'll have to determine the optimum size universe depending on the number of players. Now you can! As the number of players increase, you'll probably want to SLOWLY increase the size. A significant amount of time was also spend in an effort to reduce the system impact and speed up play. Overall, v3.6 should cause about 20% less loading on your CPU. Getting people to join your bbs is what it's all about. That why you purchase enhancements. With v3.6 of Star Quest, I've given you some tools. If you'd like to try a demo, you can download it as STARDEMO.EXE from my bbs (919-383-4905) or from the GW Associates BBS (508-429-8385). It is also "file requestable" to those of you in Fidonet from either 1:3641/220 or 1:322/360. It is also FTPable from gwabbs.com and, lastly, it should be on the eSoft support bbs. If you have any questions, want additional information, or want to purchase it now, feel free to call me at 919-403-9473 during regular working hours, eastern time or call Pete White at GW Associates at 508-429-6227 also eastern time zone. You can also order Star Quest on-line on the GW Associates bbs and get delivery of your copy in a matter of hours. There is special upgrade pricing for anyone who purchased a previous version no matter where they obtained it. Thank you. Tom Faulkner BBS Consultants, Inc.