Tremor demo2 README
Welcome to Tremor Demo 2!
-------------------------
tremor homepage:
http://www.interstice.com/tremor
tremor demo2 download:
ftp://ftp.interstice.com/pub/tremor/tremor.demo2.linux.elf.static.bin.tar.gz
Retrieve the tar file. Go to the directory in which you wish to install
the package and untar it with the command:
tar xvfz tremor.demo2.linux.elf.static.bin.tar.gz
Go into the new demo directory:
cd tremor-demo2
There should be two scripts in this directory: demo and netdemo.
demo: Basic demo. Shading off by default. Window size 300x200.
netdemo: This attempts to connect you to the multiplayer Tremor server
so you can see and interact with other Tremor players who
also happen to be connected at the same time.
System Requirements to Run Tremor
---------------------------------
You will need to have about a Pentium 100MHz for the demo to run at any
sort of decent speed. I test on a Pentium 166Mhz which works great.
****Your X display will have to be in 8 bit pseudocolor mode.**** If you
try Tremor and it complains about your display not being in 8 bit mode,
chances are you are running 16 bits and you can change your display to 8
bits temporarily quite easily. Edit your /etc/XF86Config file and replace
the Depth=16 (or whatever) with Depth=8. Then restart X and try again.
The demo does have some sound support, mostly just expletives when you
bump into things, monster harassment, and a sound when the doors open,
so turn your speakers on. You probably need sound driver version 3 for
sound to work right. Do a "cat /dev/sndstat" to check your driver version.
Version 3 is standard with Linux 2.0.
Just type "demo" to try the demo. The first time you invoke the demo
it should ask you if you would mind if the script sent an email to the
Tremor author just saying that you are trying the demo. This is so the
author can get an idea of how many people are running the demo. If you
don't want to do this (or if you aren't on the Internet so can't send
mail), just type "n", otherwise type "y". Then a screen should come up.
Put your mouse cursor in the demo window. Your display colors may be
strange; do not be alarmed. The colors in the Tremor window should be
correct. The Tremor window will be 300x200 pixels, which might be kind
of small. Adjust your X resolution with Ctrl-Alt-Minus as appropriate
for your configuration.
Some fun things to do in the demo:
Start by moving around the room using the usual Quake-style controls
(arrow keys to move, page up and page down to look up and down,
shift to speed up)--but watch out! If you too get close to a certain
area, a 3d-rendered monster will appear and start moving toward you.
Dispatch him with your weapon (fired with the ctrl key) by hitting him
five times. Then walk up the stairs toward the second level. At the top
of the stairs you'll have to leap (with the space bar) to the elevator.
Ride the elevator up, and at the top, jump to the ledge. Make your way
to the door at your left. It will slide open automatically with a swoosh.
Walk into this room. More monsters will appear.
If you see an asterisk (*) in the upper left of the display then your
computer is not keeping up with a 40ms frame rendering time. The code
is all C--no assembly--so it's not quite as fast as it could be.
Here are some of the key functions that work in the demo:
Key Action
--- ------
lt arrrow turn left
rt arrow turn right
up arrow move forward
down arrow move backward
pageup look up
pagedn look dn
spacebar jump
j,k rotate view
shift speed up while moving (use with arrows)
ctrl fire a projective
Q quit
S write a pcx screen snapshot (scrn0, 1, 2, . . . )
f turn off (on) gravity
- turn off (on) collision detection (best to turn off gravity first)
z hold down for jet-pack type thrust
7 turn on shading model 1 (observer is light source)
Note that practically every other key does something cryptic that is
used for testing and development. If things get wigged out, you probably
pressed some bad key accidently. Quit out of the demo and restart.
Command Line Options
--------------------
-x 380 set x resolution to 380 (up to 640 allowed)
-y 240 set y resolution to 240 (up to 480 allowed)
-shade turn on shading model 1 (observer is light source)
Network Play
------------
Invoke "netdemo" to try a network game. In order for this to work you
must be connected to the Internet so that the host "tremor.interstice.com"
is reachable. Try pinging tremor.interstice.com from a terminal window
if you are unsure of this.
Once connected, you may or may not see anything interesting depending
on whether others are connected at the same time. If other players
happen to be connected at that time, you might see them moving about.
You can bring up another Tremor window by invoking netdemo again, but be
aware that each window will run significantly slower than before since
your machine is doing twice the work.
Interested parties are welcome to contact the author at
tremor@interstice.com, or join the Tremor announcement mailing list
by sending email to majordomo@mail.interstice.com with a message body
consisting of the two words: subscribe tremorlist
Have fun!
Rich Drewes
tremor@interstice.com
12/31/1996