CAR WARS(TM) Cartridge Instructions TI-99/4A ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Programmer: James E. Dramis Book developed and written by: Staff members of the Texas Instruments Education and Communications Center. Copyright @ 1981, Texas Instruments Incorporated Command Module program and data base contents copyright @ 1981, Texas Instruments, Inc. See important warranty information at back of book. INTRODUCTION If you enjoy the excitement of high-speed racing, combined with the challenge of out-maneuvering a canny opponent, this is your kind of game! With Car Wars Solid State Software(TM) Command Module, you pit your speed and skill against the computer's as you try to get your car around the track without getting "crashed" off the field. With the Car Wars Module, you try to: *Score points by clearing as many dots as possible from the lanes. *Avoid the computer's yellow car. *Obtain extra cars by clearing all of the driving lanes on the display. Movement on the screen can be controlled by the Wired Remote Controllers or from the keyboard. GETTING STARTED After you select the module, a demonstration of Car Wars begins. To stop the demonstration, simply press any key and the option selection list appears; or you can wait for the sample game to end and the selection list to appear automatically. To set up your own game, you need to choose the speed of both cars and to select the point in the game when the computer's car will increase its speed. Player/Computer Car Speed: You can choose from three speed options which affect both your car and the computer's. *Creepin' - Cars move slowly. *Fast - Cars move faster. *Flyin' - Cars move fastest. Press 1, 2, or 3 to select the speed of the cars. Computer Car Speed up: During the game, the computer's car automatically doubles its speed. After you select the starting speed of both cars, you choose the point in the game when the computer's car speeds up. You have three options: *Late - The computer's car speeds up after you clear 150 dots from the playing field. *Early - The computer's car speeds up after you clear 120 dots from the playing field. *Look-out! - The computer's car speeds up after you clear 90 dots from the playing field. Press 1, 2, or 3 to select when you want the computer's car to speed up. Note that at any time during the game selection process, you can return to the first option selection group (Player/Computer Car Speed) by pressing BACK. PLAYING THE GAME After you select the game options, the playing field appears, consisting of dots and solid lines representing car lanes. A red car and a yellow car appear in their starting positions at the bottom of the display. You control the red car; the yellow car is controlled by the computer. Two additional player cars appear in the "pit" in the center of the display. To the left of the playing field is a "traffic light" which signals the start of each game. The current score and the best score in the present series of games are displayed just above the traffic signal. You can stop a game at any time and return to the option selection display by pressing BACK. To start a game over with the same options, press REDO. Object of The Game: The object of the game is to clear the dots from the playing field by successfully maneuvering your car through the maze of lanes, without being "crashed" by the yellow computer car. You get three chances to clear the field. The number of cars in the pit show how many chances you have left at any point in the game. To start the game, press any key. The game begins when the traffic light at the left-hand side of the display turns green to signal "Go!" Then the two cars begin moving in opposite directions around the outside driving lane. To maneuver your car around the field to avoid the computer's car, press the arrow keys, [UP ARROW] (E), [LEFT ARROW] (S), [RIGHT ARROW] (D), and [DOWN ARROW] (X). To move your car two lanes over, instead of one, simply hold the key down for a moment (this capability provides a strategic player-advantage because the computer's car can move only one lane at a time). As the game begins, the two cars are traveling at the same speed. The yellow car automatically doubles its speed sometime during the game, depending on the "speed up" level you selected (See "Getting Started"). To accelerate your car, press "Y" (Note that you can also accelerate by pressing ENTER on the TI-99/4 console or the period key on the TI-99/4A console). If you are using the Wired Remote Controllers, move the lever to direct your car, and press the FIRE button to accelerate. Scoring: As you move your car around the field, your object is to clear as many lanes of dots as you can before the computer's car can crash into yours. For each dot cleared in the first round, you receive 10 points. If you successfully clear all the dots without being "crashed", a BONUS message flashes on the display, and bonus points are added to your score. The number of bonus points awarded depends on the type of game you set up, as shown on the chart below. SELECTION/ POINTS CREEPIN' FAST FLYIN' ------------------------------------------------------- LATE 200 400 600 EARLY 400 600 800 LOOK-OUT 600 800 1000 ------------------------------------------------------- Thus, you could receive from 200 bonus points, for a game where you've chosen a car speed of "creepin'" and a computer-car speed-up point of "late", to as much as 1,000 points, if you select a car speed of "flyin'" and a speed-up point of "look-out!" When the bonus scoring is completed, an extra player car is added to the pit (you may receive up to four additional cars). To begin a second round, press any key. The yellow computer car appears in a new starting position. Scoring, bonus points, and additional cars are awarded exactly as in the first round. If you again succeed in clearing all the dots from the field without being crashed, the third round begins with two computer cars simultaneously attempting to crash your car off the field. At the two-computer car level, each dot is worth 20 points; and when a bonus is received, double bonus points are awarded. Should you successfully complete two rounds at this two-computer-car level by clearing all the dots, you can then move on to the three-car level, playing three computer cars simultaneously. At the three-computer-car level, each dot is worth 30 points, and triple bonus points are awarded. The game continues in this way with an additional computer car appearing and more points being awarded after every two rounds. END OF THE GAME The game is over when the computer car crashes all the player cars off the field. The computer flashes your highest score for this session with the module on the display. To play another game with the same options, press REDO. To change the options for the next game, press BACK and the option selection display appears. When you finish playing Car Wars, press QUIT to return to the master title screen.