Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!samsung!umich!sharkey!tygra!dave
From: dave@tygra.UUCP (David Conrad)
Newsgroups: comp.binaries.ibm.pc.d
Subject: Re: Snarf Bugs Me
Message-ID: <1991Feb21.072107.3904@tygra.UUCP>
Date: 21 Feb 91 07:21:07 GMT
References: <1991Feb17.044600.2296@tygra.UUCP> <40790001@hpcvra.cv.hp.com.>
Organization: CAT-TALK Conferencing System, Detroit, MI
Lines: 63

In article <40790001@hpcvra.cv.hp.com.> everett@hpcvra.cv.hp.com. (Everett Kaser) writes:
>I wrote:
>>   (An aside - the editor will let you place two items in the same place,
>>e.g. a ring inside a wall.  Oops.  Also, you don't go to the location set
>>as the destination of a teleporter, but one space beyond in whatever 
>>direction you were moving when you entered the teleporter.)
>
>The editor was not intended to be as "fool" proof as the main game, because
>I figured that people who tried to design their own levels would be a little
>more like a programmer and wouldn't do "silly" things like placing objects on
>top of each other, or placing teleports in such a way that the "hero" came out
>into a wall, etc.  I realize that this was not good "figuring", and I'll be
>putting in some additional checks to try to keep most of these things from
>being allowed.  However, there IS a bug in the editor that sometimes trashes
>the levels, and that's my first priority at this point.
>
Well, I guess I am a little like a programmer, being one :-), but I've
designed a few levels for Lode Runner on my Apple ][+, and in its editor
if you hit a key to place something, it replaces whatever was on that
spot.  So you see, I was used to its operation, and Snarf's level editor
was counterintuitive for me.  Also, I didn't mean placing teleports so
that the hero comes out inside a wall.  The hero does NOT come out on
the space you mark as the `destination' of the teleporter.  He shows up
one space away from there, as if he'd moved again.  E.g. if he enters a
teleporter moving `north', he comes out one space to the north of the
destination.  Hmm, that still doesn't seem clear.  Perhaps a diagram:

              A
              B
           wwwwwww
             wTw

T is a teleporter, w's are walls.  If you want the hero to come out at
point A you must set the destination at point B, not A, to compensate
for the hero's motion.  Since the hero is moving north as he enters the
teleporter, when he arrives at point B he continues to move north one
space to A.  I found this, also, counterintuitive.  When asked for the
destination, I expected the hero to be teleported to the spot I had
selected.  This was easy to compensate for once I discovered it, but
it could have at least been explained in the documentation.

>The only bug that has shown up in the actual running of the game so far is:
>
>If, as you exit the right side of a level, you continue to bang on the
>MOVE-RIGHT key (usually the right cursor), then the next level will be
>displayed and then immediately terminated as if you had exited the right side.
>This has been fixed in version 2.03 along with a minor cosmetic problem in the
>level editor.
>
Ah, yes, we were also bitten by this bug, which was quite annoying, and I
had forgotten to put it in my previous post.  But we never discovered what
was causing it, or, that is, under what circumstances it would occur.
 
I hope you stamp out these bugs quickly.
--
David R. Conrad         | "Please excuse me if I don't quite understand,
sharkey!tygra!dave      | I'm just a stranger in Electric Land."
tygra!dave@uunet.uu.net |     -- Bad Company, "Electric Land"
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