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— 6K bytes
— 1992-07-03
The Phone Company
© 1992 by
Tobias Eckert
Austr. 17
D-W-6482 Bad Orb
Germany
Fido-Netmail: 2:247/71
Notes on Copyright:
-------------------
'The Phone Company' is FREEWARE.
You are allowed to copy 'The Phone Company' for private purposes, upload it
to your local BBS etc. You are not allowed to enclose 'The Phone Company'
in Public-Domain libraries or other Program libraries (except for Networks)
without the prior, written permission of the author. If you want to sell
'The Phone Company' by other means than by selling Public-Domain-Disks
containing the game, or to give it along with any comercial products like
computer-magazines etc. you need my written permission too. (Normally
there's no problem involved in getting this permission - just send me a
Fido-Netmail and I'll send you a fax).
In any case, you are allowed to copy 'The Phone Company' only when this
file is given along with it.
'The Phone Company' is distributed without any waranty. You use this
program completely at your own risk.
Instructions:
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The Phone Company was in deep trouble. There were many people, who wanted
to get connected to the Net, but the Phone Company only had an limited
amount of wire. Further the country in which these people happened to live
in was not just plain, but full of high mountains, deep rivers, and highly
frequented roads. So the Phone Company decided, that what they really
needed was an expert.
This is, where you get involved. You can help the Phone Company by using
the Landscape-Design program called 'The Phone Company', which can be found
on this disk.
Once you start the program and pass the welcome-text, you will see some
kind of main-menu, where you can choose whether to solve some mind-boggling
phone-problems (Game), or to design some problems (=level) by your own
(Editor).
Rules of the game
-----------------
When you choose to solve problems, you will be asked, which problem you
specifically mean, i.e. which level you want to play. Just enter the
number and the according level will be loaded. (Sorry there are only six
different level on the disk, but I just couldn't think of any more
difficult ones - maybe you can. If so, feel free to send me a disk with
your own levels. If you are not the only one who does so, I will send you
a disk with the level, other people sent me. However, I can't guarantie
that there's anybody who plays this game at all :-).
The playfield ocupies most part of the screen. In the lower half of the
screen some values are displayed. These should tell you, which playfield
you are actually on, and how many wire, dynamite, bridges and tubes you got
left to solve the level. If you are tired of solving this specific level
and want to see another one, just click on the gadget which you think of
expressing your wishes best. When you think you have solved all problems,
click on the gadget 'Test the Net'. You will then get to see, how 'The
Phone Company' tests your work, and being notified, if you did well or not.
How do I play?
--------------
You can lay a wire just by positioning the mousepointer at the desired
position and clicking the left mousebutton. You can retain this wire by
clicking the right button. When laying an wire throughout an mountain, you
automatically use one Unit of Dynamite. Doing so with roads uses an tube,
handling wires on water will use a bridge.
What do all these different colors mean?
----------------------------------------
The specific landscape is represented by these funny colored hexagons on
the screen. The colors mean:
Green - Nothing (Plain grass)
Blue - Water
Brown - Mountains
Gray - Road
Yellow - Wire
Red - Somebody waiting to get connected to the Net
Black - When you notice a black hexagon in any playfield, you should
immidiatly go and visit you optician :-).
How to win
----------
You have solved the level, when you layed the wire to the form, that
everybody is connected to everybody else, that means, that all these red
hexagons are connected to each other by yellow hexagons. To make things
more easy a person is connected to another person, when there is a third
person, who is connected to both of them. For expample: if Mr. Kohl is
connected to Mr. Kraut, and Mr. Kraut is connected to Mr. Meier, Mr.
Kohl is automatically also connected to Mr. Meier.
When you get the impression, that all the people are connected to each
other, just try clicking on 'Test the Net'. When doing so, 'The Phone
Company' will test if you worked properly. If not so, a note will be
displayed in the upper half of the screen, where everything else, the
programmer thought somebody might be interested in, is displayed too.
If you actually solved all the problems, you get lots and lots of points,
where one point is given for a wire you did not use, and two for everything
else nobody wanted (bridges, tubes and dynamite). In order not to increase
your stress-level, I did not build in an time-limit.
How to build level on your own
------------------------------
When you are tired of playing and want to edit some level of your own, just
choose 'Editor' instead of 'Game' in the main menu. In the Editor you can
design the landscape by pressing the left or right mousebutton at the
disired position (just play around a bit). In the lower section of the
screen, you can determine, how many wires, dynamite, tubes and bridges one
can use by solving this level, and which level you're actually editing.
Further there are two gadgets which allow you to load and save playfields.
How to leave...
---------------
You can end every part of the program by clicking on the according
window-closing-gadget.
Advertisement
-------------
If you like 'The Phone Company', you will for sure like my Share-Ware game
'Roll On' too. You can obtain the complete version of 'Roll On' with 21
exciting level, and the complete version of the action game 'Space-Rescue'
for altogether 10$ directly from the author (my adress is listed above).
(When sending a cheque please add 2$ handling charge).
Coming to an end...
-------------------
If you like 'The Phone Company', just send me a funny postcard or a
Fido-Netmail.
Tobias Eckert, 26.4.92