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From: wb1j+@andrew.cmu.edu (William M. Bumgarner)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: Arkanoid
Message-ID: <sXKUuHy00UgX0Oz1Yn@andrew.cmu.edu>
Date: 17 Oct 88 15:15:31 GMT
Organization: Carnegie Mellon
Lines: 55

I have the game...  very, very good.  It is exactly like the arcade game,
too the point of annoyance.  They left the background patterns in, which
is hard on the eyes (no color-- all black/white).  The user interface is
very un-maclike.  But... the animation is extremely smooth, mouse control
is excellent (though a trackball blows the mouse away), sound is digitized,
and the game is fairly challenging.

The WORST part about the game (bad enough that the programmers should have a
gun held to their heads until they fix it), is the stupid copy protections.
1) Arkanoid is distributed with MFS system version 1.1g.
2) It has key disk protection
3) It asks if it wants to install on your hard drive or run from floppy.
4) It disables the programmer's switch completely.

because of the system, you can't boot the distribution disk... you have to boot
from a hard drive or floppy, and then double-click the application on the
distribution disk.  Once done, Arkanoid will ask if you want to install on
your HardDrive.... if you click yes, it will copy only the Arkanoid Data file,
NOT the data loading application (STUPID-- how many beginner's are going to
figure out what the hell is going on with this one??).  It also installs an
invisible file in your root level.

If you then copy the loading application into the same folder with the data
file, you can play the game without the key disk.  BUT, Arkanoid does not
work with system 6.0 (at least, not on a plus-- it may work on a II w/6.0).
I have tried with 6.0.2 (fixed the alternate video page problem)... This
wouldn't be a problem if you could make your own copy of the game on a
bootable floppy and just play from that-- BUT YOU CAN'T!

Beyond that, the game basically crashes the machine when you decide you want
to quit.  I have never had, nor heard of anyone (several people I know have
it), Arkanoid properly _ExitToShell.

It is also buggy... on a Mac II, using any of the playing options will usually
lock up the machine.
There is a way 'around' the copy protection... Bit copy the master disk;
keep track length and synchronize--  The copy won't work as a master. SO...
Write protect your master disk and run Arkanoid from that... when it asks
to install (you may have to write-enable, then use shift-cmd-1 to eject the
disk and write-protect before installing), click that you want to.  The disk
will be ejected, saying it needs to be write-enabled... put in the write-
enabled copy.  That should install ok.  I use this method so that I can
delete Arkanoid when I need the extra space on my drive-- or so that when
my drive crashes (which I manage to do every now and then), I won't be
screwed because I can't install it again.

It's up to you-- the game itself is excellent.  But you have to pay the price
of dealing with a lot of garbage that there is no excuse for.

If the company/programmers had done it right, I would reccommend this game
to everyone.  But as is, I recommend it only to those who can deal with the
various acts of stupidty described above...

b.bum
wb1j+@andrew.cmu.edu