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1. Placing Portals No matter what kind of map you are using sometimes you will need to place portals A portal is like a space but stepping onto it will teleport the player to another location When you place the portal you will be asked to select the region to go to the room or the part of the worldmap and then the location Note that this does not create a return portal Portals are one way and if you want a two way path you will have to place a corresponding portal at the other end later If you later change your mind about the destination erase the portal and create a new one Placing Creatures When you place a creature or person you will be prompted for its mobility level Stop will be immobile no matter what happens to it Move will move randomly and Wait will stay in one spot unless attacked at which point it will move freely You will then be asked if you want the creature to have a dialogue be able to talk if spoken to and if so which one You can use an existing one or a blank one and then you can then edit the conversation Refer to the instructions for editing dialogues in the Message Editor section If you later change your mind about the mobility or dialogue erase the creature and create a new one EDIT PEOPLE AND CREATURES Defining your NPCs Non Player Characters All NPCs in the game whether good evil or indifferent are created in this section You may have up to 128 creature definitions The adventure
2. graphic tiles 16x16 pixel images tiled out into a grid ACK was inspired by another much earlier game called Adventure Construction Set by Stuart Smith and published by Electronic Arts Those who were familiar with ACS will notice many conceptual similarities between the two games Ij ti PELI THING EDITOR TERRAIN BHIEH THRU OPAQUE GRAPHIC G E ARD DOOR PORTAL DD MAHY OF THESE TO ADVEHTE NAHE ACTION O HAY DOOR T AR HOSE WHO DON T OWN A TRIGGERED Ev NE li ait TE PASSABLE TO P iT PE REVEALS WHY PASSAGE IS BLOCKED MESSAGE HHEN PASSED Hi DOESH T DISAPPEAR AFTER ITS FIRST USE MESSAGE HHEN BLOCKED BEM HO ONE MAY OWN THIS HESSAGE HHEN EXAMINED m Hoes DISAPPEAR STRUCTURAL STRENGTH EDIT ANOTHER THING REPLACED A gt gh me Pom A p a RES COR TERRAIN amp CREATURES ee E ee T a T a aT at Lt pect art aa ae Bis et plal Ae a BN mieie F PY LA lates aly Eere nk HOH T PLAY EXIT DD MANY THINGS DD ONE THING ICTURE DD CREATURE pre BRICK FLOOR ACK also had other inspirations most notably the Ultima series of games particularly Ultima V and in fact the newest build of ACK v3 includes a large number of enhancements designed to make Utima style games even easier to implement Those who were familiar with ACK v2 will notice that a second set of graphic tiles has been added the darkness effects have been overhauled experience and levels have been implemented
3. DQS Saved Game Dialogue quest tracking file DQT Temporary Saved Game Dialogue quest tracking file ENT Font Data GRP Graphic Tiles GR2 Animation Graphic Tiles ITM Object Data KIT Renaming the MST file to KIT will turn the adventure into a Kit LOG Log file generated during DEBUG mode LMS Long Messages MCO Mapcolor data MCR Macro Data MDX Macro Data MOS Mosaic Data MST Master Adventure Configuration PLY Saved Game PPL Creature Data PSF Extension to Creature Data Sound Numbers RAW Custom sound file Naming format is x Description RAW or x RAW where x is the sound number RGN Map Region Master File RGT Map Region Temp File RGX Map Region Saved Game File SMS Short Messages TPF Temporary Saved Game Wx Map File for Region x XX Saved Game Map File for Region x YX Saved Game Map File for Region x LX Saved Game Map File for Region x Other files that may appear PALETTE BMP 256 color BMP file containing a custom color palette TSKIN BMP BMP file containing custom time of day skin images TALKx BMP BMP file containing dialogue skins generally NPC portraits RMSKIN BMP BMP file used as screen background in room maps WMSKIN BMP BMP file used as screen background in world maps START BMP BMP file used as screen background during character creation SCREEN TMP ACK temp file TXT MESSAGES TXT MACROS TXT etc Exported reports If you find any PMS CMF VOC SND Sx where x is a n
4. Control P View or set a variable Control X Run a macro Control F Toggle Fly Mode walk through obstacles disable step and bump actions see through opaque Control W Warp to a location Debug Mode also enables logging you will find a LOG file in your adventure folder You should disable Debug Mode before you distribute a game the log file can get quite large and the debug mode cheats can break the playability of an adventure or even crash the game The following commands require Cheat Mode and also work in Debug Mode Control Z Toggle Invisible Mode hostile creatures don t react to player Control T Show the current time Control L Show the current location Control H Restore HP and MP Custom Content Pictures Sounds and Skins ACK has support for external content like pictures and sound effects All custom content is called by number and is named as number description For example 307 Intro_ Picture BMP or 7 Cheering RAW The description part is optional If you use a description longer than 6 characters ACK will still see the file but the description will be cut off Note that you may have to restart your ACK session before it can see the new files you copy in You can also choose to leave the description off for example 307 BMP will also work ACK Sound Effects Previous versions of ACK used an assortment of sound formats but as of v3 1 the sound engine has been changed t
5. Passable to if not holding HOVERCRAFT HILL Passable to if not holding HOVERCRAFT MOUNTAIN Obstacle Magic Spells In this example we will set up some spells that require in addition to costing magic points a reagent and have advanced effects one makes the player invisible one allows the player to pass through walls and one dispells an energy field We will need to set up some objects SPICE Misc item this will be the reagent In the examples below the macro refers to it by object number for these examples it will be 65 but your number of course may vary You may even have multiple reagents For the dispell energy field spell DISPELL FIELD Weapon this will never be owned by the player but will be used by the spell Damage 0 Note the damage of 0 this will make it be ineffectual if used against anything else like a creature ENERGY FIELD Obstacle Action play sound no sound We need an action to happen to satisfy the disappear condition but we re using an action that does nothing Trigger attacked by weapon DISPELL FIELD Disappear when action triggered Replaced with eliminate if you re using this stacked onto another terrain in room maps or Replaced with FLOOR if you know what you re using it on in worldmaps DISPELL FIELD Spell Action MACRO 1 2nd Action Allow user to attack with weapon DISPELL FIELD Energy required 10 Then we need to set up the macro Macro 1 1
6. and Douglas Wike and no doubt many others of Origin Systems Finally thanks go to Stuart Smith for creating Adventure Construction Set the original inspiration for ACK User Manual Table of Contents About ACK 2 Getting Started 3 Creating ACK Adventures 8 ACK Editor Modules Overview 9 CONFIGURE ADVENTURE Setting Global Settings 11 IMPORT FILES EXPORT REPORTS Import and Export Game Data 12 EDIT FONT Edit the typeface used by your adventure 13 EDIT GRAPHIC TILES Edit graphics for your terrain items and creatures 13 EDIT OBJECTS ITEMS TERRAIN Manage your terrain weapons items etc 15 EDIT MESSAGES AND DIALOGUE Manage text content for your adventure 19 EDIT MAPS AND REGIONS The Map Editor 22 EDIT PEOPLE AND CREATURES Defining your NPCs Non Player Characters 24 EDIT MACROS The ACK Scripting Language 25 Misc Tips and Tricks 30 Custom Content Pictures Sounds and Skins 38 Appendix A Running ACK in DosBox 40 Appendix B What are all these files in my adventure folder 41 Appendix C Distributing Standalone Adventures 42 Appendix D Game Walkthroughs 43 A A C R L T T L G G U D R U D E B B Xx X I H H S AlT AlT About ACK ACK is a complete system for making your own 80 s style RPG adventure games Games will have an overhead perspective and be mostly key driven You use a top down perspective where all objects around you terrain items creatures are represented by
7. and setting it to 255 will make it last until the player breaks it by one of the actions listed above INVISICO Sets the graphic tile to be used for the player when they are invisible Note that this is overridden by any other temporary condition that would affect the player s appearance like terrain vehicle weapon etc LASTMOV Returns the last direction the player tried to move values 1 4 representing N S E W Useful if you have something like a portal that would behave differently if you entered from different directions HELLO d where d is a dialogue number Allows you to set or check the hello setting on that dialogue which determines how the conversation starts Typical values are 0 for INTRO for someone the player has never spoken to 1 for HELLO for someone the player has already spoken to and 2 or 3 for BEGINQ or ENDQ typically set by BEGINQUEST and ENDQUEST dialogue commands Higher values will load a dialogue into topics H4 H5 etc Numbers and variables can be used interchangably but attempts to set read only items such as SET 5 7 are ignored The editor compiles each line as you enter it so if you enter a unknown command or a syntax that the compiler can t figure out it will delete the line Macro Commands ADVTIME ADVTIME 45 Advances the game time by a number of minutes After the macro completes the hourly macro if used will run however many times it needs in order to catch up AMBIEN
8. determines if you can see through the terrain transparent or if spaces enclosed behind it are hidden from view opaque Opaque squares also block ranged weapons Opaque squares can still be set as passable however GRAPHIC ICON Gc NAME ao ACTION peA TRIGGERED BY ALT T PASSABLE TO P ALT P MESSAGE HHEN BLOCKED EEJ MERS VEE MUEI ELOTT EE Lightsource determines if the square and the squares around it appear lit at night even if ranp EARS ee they are out of the player s circle of illumination STRUCTURAL STRENGTH Ee REPLACED EE SELECT CREATE DELETE Graphic Set the appearance If you select an animation tile Alt G it will animate between the two The Icon graphic for spaces is what a player creature will look like if they are on the space Note also that on non custom spaces and obstacles you can choose a graphic of set later This disables animation but allows you to choose a unique graphic tile each time you place the object on the map note that the graphic tile is chosen from the secondary set Action Performs an Action see the Actions table above Triggered By Determines how the action is triggered PASSING Walking over the spot DROPPING ITEM HERE Dropping specified item on this spot PASSING HOLDING Walking over the spot holding or riding ITEM PASSING REDEEMING Same as HOLDING but item is lost PASSING WITHOUT Walking over the spot WITHOUT Item
9. section in your dosbox conf to mount the folder etc For example C Program Files DOSBox dosbox exe conf C DOSgames ACK ackdosbox conf noconsole c ack In addition to launching the main menu with the c switch you can also launch different editor modules or the play module directly This is done through the ACK utility called ACKMOD For example this one will load the graphic tile editor C Program Files DOSBox dosbox exe conf C DOS ACK dosbox conf noconsole c ackmod g The syntax for the ackmod utility is as follows ACKMOD r advname mouse Run play adventure ACKMOD n Create a new adventure ACKMOD c advname Edit config ACKMOD i advname Import kit ACKMOD f advname Font editor ACKMOD g advname Graphic tile editor ACKMOD o advname Object editor ACKMOD t advname Text message editor ACKMOD m advname Map editor ACKMOD p advname People creature editor ACKMOD x advname macro editor Appendix B What are all these files in my adventure folder ACK File Extensions 1x Temporary Saved Game Map File for Region x 2m Temporary Saved Game Map File for Region x 3X Temporary Saved Game Map File for Region x AX Map File for Region x BMP Custom picture file Naming format is x Description BMP or x BMP where x is the picture number Bx Map File for Region x Cx Map File for Region x DLG Dialogue Data DOC Instructions for the game or kit Text file
10. the combat engine has been improved portal features have been enhanced so moongates can now be implemented music support has been improved wandering monster features have been fixed the conversation system has been brought to an Ultima VI level including portraits and support for externally created pictures including using them as skins has been improved Ultima V South Horth Hest gt Look South Getting Started Installing ACK ACK is bundled with Joshua Lawrence s ACK Launcher that will run via a DOS emulator called DosBox the main ACK menu or any of the individual ACK editors No installation is required simply unzip ACK to a folder of your choice If you are upgrading from an older version of ACK back up your old games out of the ACK GAMES folder replace your ACK folder with the new version and copy your games back in Once you have unzipped ACK to a folder just run the ACK Launcher program ACK Launcher i Just launch ACK Graphic options M Use aspect correction Graphic Scaler Hq3x ALT ENTER toggles fullscreen while running ACK Launch multiple ACK editors in separate windows Pick adventure with Select Adventure button Click buttons below to launch editors Press TAB to save changes in current editor Then switch to another editor window and press TAB to update that window with the changes made in previous editor You may need to use a
11. EXAMINING FAR L ooking at the spot from anywhere on the screen BUMPING Trying to walk into the spot and being blocked BUMPING HOLDING BUMPING REDEEMING BUMPING WITHOUT TAKING ITM FRM HERE Taking specified or any item from this spot EXAMINING NEAR L ooking at the spot from an adjacent spot GATHERING FROM HERE Trying to G et when there is no ITEM ATTACKING Attacking this spot with any weapon or with a specified weapon Passable To For spaces and portals determines what is required to walk onto the space NOTHING Nothing can pass except ranged weapon attacks if the visibility is transparent ANYTHING Anything can pass except vehicles set to require certain conditions ONLY IF HOLDING Only if holding or riding Object ONLY IF REDEEMING Same as HOLDING but item is lost ONLY IF W OUT ITEM Only if NOT holding or riding item ONLY IF W OUT TYPE i e Only if NOT holding any WEAPON IF STRENGTH gt N Only if strength exceeds given value ENERGY DRAIN Only if sufficient ENERGY is given UNBURDENED ONLY Only if player is not overburdened with weight IF VARIABLE A gt N etc Only if specified equation is true ANYTHING AT ALL Anything can pass including all vehicles regardless of settings Message When Blocked Examined Short messages displayed in those situations Disappear Determines what will cause the terrain to disappear if anything The special case is Whi
12. Message 5 you could use this macro 1 LMSG 5 2 TMOSAIC 12 3 WAITKEY 4 STOP To display a BMP picture file There are two commands that will do this PICTURE handles everything automatically and behaves just like the show picture action displays the picture waits for a keypress and then fixes the color palette For more complex customization you may want more control you would then use the SHOWBMP command which simply puts a BMP on the screen and continues If the BMP uses a different palette than ACK you must use a FIXPAL command before the end of the macro to set it back to normal This example simply shows picture 1 waits for a keypress shows picture 2 and waits for a keypress i PICTURE 1 2i PICTURE 2 This example fades the screen to black shows picture 1 shows picture 2 a second later then displays mosaic 5 over it for a second and finally restores the screen back to the way it was before SAVESCR FADEOUT 10 SHOWBMP 1 DELAY 10 SHOWBMP 2 TMOSAIC 5 DELAY 10 CLRSCR FIXPAL 0 LOADSCR e LONO AOURAUNA To make an animated cutscene You can show short movie like scenes by displaying a bunch of mosaics in sequence First draw the mosaics in the Edit Messages and Dialogue section Then make this macro SET F 1 MOSAIC F DELAY 5 SET F F 1 IF F 15 THEN 7 GOTO 2 STOP WUHAN OF WN FE For more examples browse through the CARAVAN adventure that game makes extensive use of macros How t
13. and lower right corners You can have a total of 16 rooms If you want the player to be able to walk from one room to another you can lay them out with overlapping edges and the edge squares will be shared if those squares are passable the player can walk from one room to the next Otherwise you can use portals Once you lay out some empty room shells you will want to edit them Room Editor In the room editor you can name and draw the room The A D keys will paint objects onto the room at the cursor location Alt A through Alt D set the objects used E will erase and L will place creatures The arrow keys will move the cursor around the room LrLrLr LLL 1 0 0 0 1 1 1 1 HHH HHH HH a Geel In room maps everything can be stacked even terrain If an object with an ACTIVATE ALL UNDERNEATH action is placed on top it can trigger all terrain actions in the stack TLL LLL FEFLFLFEFLI HHHHHE Worldmap Layout Editor When you first enter the Worldmap Editor you will be looking at a diagram showing the size of the map and a list of options where you can name the map edit it or set options like map edge settings Map edges can be endless terrain where you can set the type if a space you can walk out to infinity and if a portal you can have the entire edge be a portal to somewhere else Or map edges can be wrap around Note that you do this you may want to cap the north and south edges of the map with some impassable ter
14. custom spaces and custom obstacles MAPSET MAPSET 123 45 6 GRASS Changes the object type at a map location into the object type specified In this example it would turn the existing terrain at 123 45 into 6 grass If a creature is at the spot it will be destroyed Generally you should only use this command to turn one object into another of the same general type terrain into terrain portals into portals items into items Note that you must enter the command just as numbers For example the command mentioned earlier would be typed in as MAPSET 123 45 6 If the third value is a number you can also use variables the macro editor will display the object name just for convenience MAPSETD MAPSETD 123 45 36 Sets the object data at a map location Arguments are the same as SETOBJ three arguments map X map Y and number or variable for the data value Normally only used to set the value used for custom spaces and custom obstacles MAPTAKE MAPTAKE 6 4 0 Opposite of MAPADD removes the top item from a stack Use 0 for the third argument to take any object or specify an object number to take only that object and do nothing if that object is not on top This will remove any object types in rooms but in worldmaps it only takes away item type objects and terrain is ignored Note also that object properties are never checked so replaced by values are irrelevant MOSAIC MOSAIC 6 Displays a Mosaic exa
15. how to get ACK and where to put your game folder into ACK GAMES Alternately there are instructions later in this manual on how to cut down ACK into a standalone game launcher for your game see Appendix C Editor Modules Overview LOAD OR CREATE ADVENTURE CURRENT DIRECTORY C NACKNG ELERE a SELECT A FILE TO LOAD AND PRESS SG SUBDIRECTORIES APPEAR IN BRACKETS ALL NEW GAMES ACKNGAMES SHOULD BE C DIRECTORY gt IN THE ODO ABORT gt VIDEO OPTIONS Mim DAY NIGHT VIEH SIZING DUNE UE UN BUMP SOUND STEP SOUND HIT SOUND me MISS SOUND m DEATH HOURLY KEY Me KEY S Mim STEP Bm MIDNIGHT mm KEY HU mim KEY z 3 Hm SELECT PAGE 1 5 gt sm EXIT IMPORT A FONT IMPORT SOME GRAPHIC TILES IMPORT ANIMATION GRAPHIC TILES IMPORT OBJECTS AND GRAPHICS IMPORT AN ADVENTURE KIT IMPORT KIT FROM ADVENTURE DELETE SAVED GAME FILES EXPORT TXT REPORTS EXIT SELECT SUREBE CJt e 0123496789 ee c gt Pp ABCDEFGHIIJIKLMNOPOQRSTUUHXY2 abcdefgh ijklmnoparstuvuxyz Select Create Adventure Used only if you don t use the ACK Launcher You can create new adventures and select adventures to load here Configure Adventure Certain game wide settings are set here such as text colors Game startup parameters like title screens starting location character choices and starting inventory are also set here Browse through the four pages this modul
16. kit you can create everything from scratch but it is strongly recommended While you re in there you can also pick a different font to use ACK includes seven different fonts or you can copy one from an existing adventure The basic flow of adventure creation is as follows 1 Create yourself a document somewhere where you can keep notes Keep reminders to yourself about the general flow of your storyline Also make notes here about what you are using variables for if you use them with names like A Z and A2 Z2 it s hard to keep them straight otherwise 2 Create the adventure files importing a kit if you want to 3 Make sure you have the basic graphic tiles and objects you ll know you need but don t go crazy with this you may find your game idea evolve as you go and it s easy enough to go back and make more stuff later 4 Start making your basic maps again don t try to finish the job all in one pass just get the basic structure 5 Create the dialogues for the people that are basic to your storyline If you need to create special objects for them such as a key for a dialogue that gives you one then start creating those as you need them 6 Create creatures for those dialogues if needed 7 Go back and populate your map with the basic characters for whom you ve made those dialogues and add more detail to those maps decorations etc 8 Think about quest specific objects keys locked doors etc and start placing th
17. kits will include a number of creatures already made you do not have to create more if you do not wish to Note that you can export a list of all your creatures in the Export Reports module Alignment GOOD creatures will attack EVIL creatures on sight NEUTRAL creatures will ignore others unless attacked EVIL creatures will attack GOOD creatures on sight ANIMAL creatures will attack everything except their own kind The player is of GOOD alignment but treated seperately If the player attacks a NEUTRAL that creature will attack only the player not other GOOD creatures If the player attacks one of his her own alignment the player temporarily becomes a criminal and ALL creatures of that alignment will attack the player until the player goes to another region Invulnerable creatures if you set their max HP to 0 they are treated as invulnerable are handled somewhat differently their alignment determines who they will attack but attacking them will not make them angry For example if you had a plot essential Good NPC you didn t want anyone to be able to kill you could make them invulnerable if the player tried attacking them nothing would happen and the attack would be ignored If the player attacked another Good NPC putting the player in a temporary criminal mode then the invulnerable NPC would attack the player In other words be careful about mixing invulnerable and normal creatures Differences bet
18. line into a command line or to change the command setting press Alt C To change a command into text press AIt T MACRO Runs a macro then returns to the flow of the topic MERCHANT Allows the player to purchase and sell items A merchant can have up to 16 items to sell press A thru P to set these You can also change the exchange rates for how they sell things to you and how they buy things refund from you Regardless of the exchange rates a merchant will not buy back his own wares for a higher price than he sold them for If he sells you a sword for 10 he will never give more than 10 for it even if his exchange rates would ordinarily have him give you 20 for it The prices on items are set from the Object Editor They are also modified by the player s INT ability score be sure to playtest your adventure to make sure that prices are fair SKIN Loads a different dialogue skin BMP or if you use SKIN 0 loads the original one TERMINATE Ends the conversation END TOPIC Ends the topic response ATTACK Ends the conversation and begins to attack a specified alignment GOOD being the player ITEMGIVE Gives a specified item to the player ITEMTAKE Tries to take an item from the player if followed by a yes no question this will be automatically answered by the outcome of the attempt i e if the player does not have the item the no response will be used GOTO Will jump to another topic specified by variable or numb
19. map editor settings that can customize the visibility options if you use them for individual regions Advanced Vehicles Vehicle objects have many options that allow you to fine tune exactly where they can go In this example we will have four vehicles Ship capable of blue water and harbor sailing skiff capable of harbor and rough water travel hovercraft capable of harbor and some land travel jeep capable only of land travel tank capable of land and shallow water travel and helicopter capable of air travel Our vehicle objects would be set up as follows FLATWATER V This never appears to the player but you ll see below how it s used Can go only where needed Counts as itself SHIP Can go only where needed Counts as FLATWATER V SKIFF Can go only where needed Counts as FLATWATER V HOVERCRAFT Can go anywhere player can Counts as BOAT JEEP Can go anywhere player can Counts as itself TANK Can go anywhere player can Counts as SKIFF HELICOPTER Can go anywhere player can Counts as itself Boarding macro SET FLY 1 Exit macro SET FLY 0 And our terrain objects would be set as follows DEEP WATER Passable to SHIP WATER This object will represent calm deep water like harbors and large rivers Passable to FLATWATER V WATER This object will represent shallow rough water like small rivers or coastal areas Passable to SKIFF GRASS Passable to anything FOREST
20. other For example you may want to have the graphic tile editor object editor and map editor all open at once While working on a map you may realize you need a signpost You can switch to the graphic tile editor window draw the new graphic tile and press TAB to immediately save it Then switch to the object editor press TAB to load the new tile set and create your new SIGNPOST object with the new tile Then press TAB again to save the changes to the objects list and switch to the map editor Pressing TAB in the map editor will load any new graphic tiles and objects so you will then be able to start placing your new signpost on the map Video issues ACK runs in a 320x200 video mode and DosBox scales that up to a more readable resolution The default settings scale it up by 3x and perform aspect ratio correction Not all computers will perform the same however so you may wish to experiment The images below show in close up how the aspect and scaler affect the quality of the output SAaBbCco dJdEeFf GE HARI JIK ELl Mimin A A Bb C Co i H e rE HRIi JiK EL eho Normal3x scaler with aspect correction on default Normal 3x scaler without aspect correction AaBbCcD dEeF fGEZ HRI JJK kLIMMNN Hq3x scaler with aspect correction recommended Hq3x scaler without aspect correction Sound issues in testing the Mac version of the launcher Josh found that sound was choppy on the iBook G4 if you encoun
21. sort of playable Ultima fan fiction For more information on the contents of the kits check out the exported reports in each KIT folder OBJECTS TXT Contains a list of all the objects terrain weapons etc CREATURE TXT Contains a list of all the people and creatures MACROS TXT Contains a list of all the macros included in the kit Note the variables that are used by the existing macros so that you don t accidentally use one that is already being used by one of the features already built into the kit Creating ACK Adventures Adre ntu re L reatio ni Kit SMS NOPE ae eum BUIT EXIT To bas Starting a New Adventure First from the ACK main menu go to Select Create Adventure It will normally start you out in the ACK GAMES folder This is the best place to create your adventure Press F3 Now give your adventure an 8 letter name You have just created a folder for your adventure and the basic files needed Now back at the main menu go to Import Files Copy Adventure Press K to import a kit Decide the kit you wish to use HISTORY is good for historic adventures in the 300AD to 1500AD period in Europe Egypt China or Japan MODERN has a variety of modern day and haunted house graphics and objects ULTIMA is of course the kit for creating games that look like Ultima V and has a large number of graphic tiles and objects implemented Choose the kit that is closest to what you want You are not required to use a
22. squares You can have up to 480 tiles in two sets of 240 normal and secondary Normal tiles are used for most things an object or creature s primary appearance the player s icon etc Secondary tiles are used to animate terrain or creatures or for spaces or obstacles that are set in set graphic later mode When you are in the graphic tile editor you are either in Select mode choosing a tile to edit or Edit mode editing a tile Select Mode If the SELECT menu is present use the arrow keys and PgUp PgDn to move Press ENTER to select a graphic tile to edit Pressing F10 will quit Control C and Control P or Control V will copy and paste tiles Edit Mode From here you can move the cursor with the arrow keys The 1 thru 9 keys will draw in different colors and 0 or Space will erase Control C and Control P V will copy and paste just like in Select mode You can also paste pixel by pixel by just hitting P This will replace the current pixel in a tile with the corresponding pixel from the clipboard S SetColors will let you change the 1 thru 9 colors as well as perform some color replacements You can press U to find the color you were sitting on in the graphic tile or press R to replace the color you were sitting on in the tile anywhere it occurs in that tile with the color you have picked in the palette Alt R will do the same but across all tiles use this with caution Finally I gi
23. treasures if you do so you ll be sealed inside Take only the tablet at the far west end then leave again Go back to the boat and back to the priest Tell him tablet He will arrange for your guide Somewhere in the north part of town there s a damsel in distress she explains that bandits are stealing her camels and asks you to take care of them if you do she ll give you a camel and the food you need for your trip Go inside her house and out the back door and kill the camel thieves they re easy and then go back and talk to the woman Go back and find the storage closet with all the bags and other supplies take them and take the scimitar Also board a camel and take it with you Go find the shop and sell a couple of those bags of trading supplies so you can buy food supplies You now have everything you need to leave Egypt Save the game then go out the exit on the east side of town After a cutscene you will be in an encampment under attack by barbarians Pick up the shield there will be other goodies spread around the map and make sure you have your best gear Readied at all times Also make sure to use medicine potions whenever your health gets low You may be encumbered from the supplies you were carrying before if so drop them Walk around the map and kill all the bandits you find Once you have killed the last one you will be told you can return to your hut After a long cutscene you will go to the final mini ga
24. vehicle LOC Player s location Use LOC RG region LOC RM room if applicable LOC X LOC Y X Y location Setting these variables will teleport the player Other game variables VIEW The current un lit view radius Is automatically changed by time of day if enabled or by entering a region TORCHL The current torchlight view radius TORCHD The duration of the current torchlight view radius ICON The graphic tile currently representing the player DAYS HOUR MINUTE Time in the game world in 24 hour time AGGRO The number of visible creatures currently hostile to the player Read only FLY If set to 1 the player will go into fly mode In fly mode only ranged weapons work the player can travel over anything even obstacles and other creatures portals are ignored any walking or bumping action triggers are ignored and opaque settings on terrain are ignored Setting FLY to 0 will turn the mode off Vehicles can use board exit macros that turn FLY on and off if you want to simulate flying vehicles Note that room type regions ignore fly mode INVISDUR If set to a non zero value 1 254 will determine for how many moves the player will go into invis mode In invis mode creatures will not attack the player Attacking talking or boarding exiting a vehicle will break invis mode immediately Note that you should set INVISICO first see below Also note that setting INVISDUR to 0 will turn invis mode off
25. your Then during to use magenta as your grass terrain play that mask and your creature looks like this creature on tile looks like this grass terrain would look like this To enable or disable transparency enter the set color menu in tile editing mode Select the color you want to use as your mask color if you are enabling if you are disabling select any color and then press Alt T SELECT It will ask if you want to use transparency Press N if you are disabling transparency or Y if you are enabling transparency with the selected color If you enable transparency the mask color will appear in the editor with a checkerboard pattern reminding you of its special behavior during play as shown below SELECT Any desired color can be used for transparency including black if you find that easiest but it is a game wide setting and will effect all item creature tiles For terrain tiles as they are never transparent the mask color will be shown as its actual color Note that transparency only shows during play In the editors you will see the mask color instead of the transparency effect Note also that animation does work with transparency both animated creatures and animated terrains However darkened night tiles will not animate when transparency is enabled Finally the only tiles seen are the top item creature and the top terrain If you have a stack of items the middle ones will not peek thro
26. 255 the max the same thing happens again for quadruple damage Once this damage is determined the armor is then factored in for any armor worn there is a chance of it absorbing damage and then an amount of damage it will absorb If all the damage is absorbed the attack becomes a miss HP MP Regeneration and Poison Hit points and magic points will regenerate at the rate of regen rate times ability score divided by 2000 For example if the player s INT is 20 and the regen rate is set at 10 then magic points will regenerate at the rate of one MP every 10 turns If the player is poisoned the poison strength will be spread over 10 turns for example a poison strength of 20 would do 2 damage per turn while a poison strength of 1 would only do 1 damage every 10 turns The HP regen rate of course may counteract part of this Weight and Encumberance Items can have weight settings This limits what a player can carry a player can carry 5x their Strength before they start slowing down Strength scores of 10 20 are considered a typical human range by ACK so assume characters can carry about 50 100 units of weight If the player is in a vehicle however then the vehicle s carrying capacity is used instead this may be more or less than what the player could otherwise carry Creatures are not affected by weight as they do not have Strength values Adventures Included with ACK Adventure Creation Kit includes a few adven
27. ADGAME BMP are present they will be used as skins for those features Appendix A Running ACK in DosBox ACK is a DOS game DOS being the operating system that ran on PCs before Windows and does not run properly on modern PCs without special software an application called DosBox that allows you to emulate a DOS PC The ACK launcher will provide and run DosBox for you if you use Windows or MacOS but if you can t or prefer not to use the ACK launcher you can use your own DosBox installation to run ACK The latest version of DosBox is available from http www dosbox com or http dosbox sourceforge net Many Linux distros also provide DosBox as a downloadable package You will need to modify dosbox conf for ACK to run properly Here are some suggested settings cpu cycles 9000 render scaler hq3x aspect true mixer nosound false rate 22050 blocksize 2048 prebuffer 100 sblaster sbtype sbprol sbbase 220 Leg 9 dma 1 In Windows you can also control how DosBox launches by modifying the DosBox shortcut If you right click your DosBox shortcut and look at the Target you will see something like this C Program Files DOSBox dosbox exe conf C Program Files DOSBox dosbox conf You can make a copy of your DosBox shortcut modify it to use a special dosbox conf file just for ACK use the noconsole switch to disable the separate status window and add a c switch to run ACK assuming you use an autoexec
28. ADVENTURE CREATION KIT v3 2 The Adventure Creation Kit ACK game engine and editor system was designed and programmed by Chris Hopkins Hearty thanks go to Joshua Lawrence for resurrecting interest including my own in ACK by creating and promoting the ACK website for creating the ACK Launcher making ACK available to a wider audience for his help with getting the objects and creatures in the new kits completed and for his extensive beta testing work on the new release of ACK without which the 3 0 version would not have been possible Additional thanks go to Seth Hopkinson for helping me release ACK as freeware several years ago if anyone can find him let me know also to Robb Sherwin for helping to promote ACK and providing space on the Jolt Country forums for the ACK community to Mickey Callahan for beta testing the original release of ACK and to the DosBox team Sjoerd v d Berg Peter Veenstra Ulf Wohlers Tommy Frossman and Dean Beeler for creating an emulation platform that allows a 19 year old game ACK was started in 1989 so parts of this game engine are old enough to vote to run remarkably well on modern computers Thanks also go to Joshua Steele for his Ultima IV tileset a couple of which are used in the kits and to the crew at EUO http swut net euo for creating some additional inspiration on graphic tiles And in the case of the Ultima kit credit for the content goes to Richard Garriot Denis R Loubet Kenneth Arnold
29. Action do nothing Finally here s the macro for this example the object number for CLIMBING GEAR will be 80 Macro 6 1 IF INV 80 0 THEN 5 2 BMSG 1 Select a direction to climb 3 SET B 1 4 STOP 5 BMSG 5 You have no climbing gear Poisonous Swamp Here s a simple example of Ultima style swamp where if you re not wearing swamp boots you will be poisoned The objects SWAMP space Action Run macro 7 Triggered by passing SWAMP BOOTS armor For the example below we will say the object number for the boots will be 116 The macro 1 IF WORN 116 gt O0 THEN4 if wearing swamp boots do nothing 2 IF POISON gt 1 THEN 4 if you re already poisoned worse do nothing 3 SET POISON 1 poison player at rate of 1 HP per 10 turns 4 STOP Ultima Moongates In this example we will be implementing Ultima IV style moongates where there are 8 they all appear on the main world map and they are linked to the phases of two moons The first moon will be represented by variable D and determine the currently active moongate variable E will be the second moon and determine the destination of the moongate D2 is also used to determine how long until the next change of D and so must not be used elsewhere Z2 is being used as a temp variable and can be used as such elsewhere if desired Note that all of this is already set up in the ULTIMA kit the Britannia map included in the kit has fully
30. CK Macro equivalent of a FOR NEXT loop in BASIC ACK Macro And in BASIC 1 SET A 1 FOR Z 1 TO 10 2 2 3 your commands here 3 your commands here 4 4 5 SET BeAr 5 NEXT Z 6 IF Z gt 10 THEN 8 T GOO d 8 STOP Examples of ACK macros To generate a random number for use in a dialogue The dialogue could first do SETV L 2 and SETV U 7 This would set a lower and an upper value Running this macro would then set variable R to a value in the 2 7 range You could then do GOTO R to jump to a topic from 2 to 7 This macro is very flexible and can be used many times in many dialogues because L and U can be set to whatever you want 1 SET U U L 2 SET U U 1 3 SET R RND U 4 SET R RtL To make a weapons trainer Have a dialogue trigger this macro It will increase your weapon skill and set R to if the player had enough money Otherwise it will set R to 0 With a GOTO R the dialogue can then give a response describing the training or a response that tells the player that he can t afford the service Note that the cost is 50 so if the player has more than 49 he must have the 50 Also be careful with the first line IF THENs and GOTOs get renumbered automatically as you insert lines Try inserting all 7 blank lines before typing the macro IF MONEY gt 49 THEN 4 SET R 0 STOP SET R 1 SET MONE Y MONEY 50 SET WSK WSK 20 STOP YUAN OF WN FE To display a title screen If you created Mosaic 12 as a scene to go with Long
31. ERAGE DAMAGE ABSORBED aa m PRICE Armor Type There are 7 types and only one of each type may be worn at a time PE MESSAGE HHEN EXAMINED Armor Coverage Each incoming shot will be checked against each piece of armor this is the percent chance that the armor will absorb damage Damage Absorbed The amount of damage subtracted from the incoming attack Message Short message displayed when the armor is examined Weight Price Determines how heavy the item is and how much it would cost from a merchant Object options Vehicles Graphic Set the appearance Alt graphic determines the player s appearance when using the vehicle za CONSUMED CO MBa Built in Weapon Some vehicles like ships may include cannons the player can fire in NSU MESSAGE WHEN OUT OF FUEL dt MESSAGE WHEN BOARDING MEN addition to their regular attacks MESSAGE WHEN EXAMINED Ew HEIGHT CAPACITY E BOARDING MACRO Ties EXIT MACRO Counts As If you require a certain vehicle to pass a terrain type like water may require Ship this allows you to have other types of boats like Sloop and Brig and Frigate but have them counted as the basic type of Ship when the terrain checks ae ei SELECT CREATE Can Go For ships you don t want them cruising on land so you would set them to go only on terrain that requires them like water Fuel Required If traveling in the vehicle requires an item as fuel set it here and set the ch
32. ETPORT PORTAL TO 1 0 22 33 The keyword PORTAL means the current portal Refer to the section on macro editing for more info on the SETPORT command 22 ook 2 GRASS Finally place the portals on the map You will be prompted to set destinations but these destinations will be ignored because the moongate entry macro will set the new destination as the player enters Terrain Hit Points In addition to using action triggers on objects to trigger an action when attacked you can also make terrain objects have something like hit points where weapons can destroy them build in the ability to attack inanimate objects There are a couple rules First weapons always do standard damage to terrain skill is not factored in Second an attack is all or none it will either destroy the terrain or it will have no effect You set an object with a threshold called Structural strength For example set a chair to a strength of 7 Any weapon that can do a damage of 7 or more will destroy that chair with a single blow Any weapon that does less than 7 damage will never have any effect on that chair When the terrain is destroyed it can simply disappear On room maps it could be part of a stack so this might be no problem On worldmaps it could leave an inconvenient blank spot Another option therefore is to set a Replaced by option When the terrain is destroyed it is removed from the map and replaced with the terrain or ite
33. IF INV 65 gt 0 THEN 5 2 BMSG1 You have no spice 3 SET SUCCESS 0 4 STOP 5 SET INV 65 INV 65 1 6 INVERT the rest of the macro is optional this is just special effects 7 SOUND 50 this assumes you have replaced sound 50 with something suitable 8 PAUSE 5 9 INVERT 10 STOP For the invisibility spell INVISIBILITY Spell Action MACRO 2 2nd Action none Energy required 15 You will also want to make a special graphic tile to represent the player while they are invisible For our example we will use tile 238 The macro for the spell Macro 2 1 IF INV 65 gt 0 THEN 5 2 BMSG1 You have no spice 3 SET SUCCESS 0 4 STOP 5 SET INV 65 INV 65 1 6 INVERT 7 SOUND 50 8 PAUSE 5 9 INVERT 10 SET INVISICO 238 11 SET INVISDUR 20 12 STOP Finally the walk through walls spell note this only works in scrolling worldmap type maps BLINK Spell Action MACRO 3 2nd Action none Energy required 20 The macro for the spell Macro 3 1 IF VEH gt 0 THEN 13 this spell shouldn t be allowed to work if you re on a vehicle if you have vehicles that fly 2 IF INV 65 gt 0 THEN 6 3 BMSG1 You have no spice 4 SET SUCCESS 0 5 STOP 6 SET INV 65 INV 65 1 7 INVERT 8 SOUND 50 9 PAUSE 5 10 INVERT 11 SET FLY 1 12 SET F 4 tune this value if you want the player to have more or fewer steps where they can walk through walls 13 STOP This one will also need a step
34. S TEMPORARY TORCHLIGHT TEMPORARY DAYLIGHT SET HP REGEN SET MP REGEN SET POISON RUN DIALOGUE amount temporary chg amount permanent chg Good Neutral Evil Animal Remove Item from inventory Remove all Item from inv i e Take away all WEAPONS Give 1 Item to player Remove all Item from local map Place Item on map Easy way to kill the player Triggers a stack in RoomMaps good for traps etc weapons that you can t carry Place creature on map Sets the dummy variables Changes the dummy variables Triggers a MACRO Acts as if player pressed an arrow key if player does not press any other key for DELAY seconds DELAY 0 0 is instant Sets distance player can see Gives darkness effect Set to above 16 for normal Sets basic player icon Overridden by Terrain Weapon and Vehicle icon changes Provokes on screen creatures of specified alignment Provides a temporary moderate circle of illumination Provides temporary daytime level illumination Sets a new HP regen rate Sets a new MP regen rate Sets a new Poison HP decay rate Runs the specified dialogue If you want to short cut to a given action in the action selector enter the number Different object types have different configuration options depending on their category Object options Space Obstacle or Portal IT TERRAIN PRESET SPACE MIEH THRU RIGHTSOURCE ALT G Ee Visibility
35. T AMBIENT 60 Plays a sound on the ambient channel a looping sound channel that can be used for ambient noises Sounds on this channel do not mix playing another sound will stop any ambient sound already in play Play sound 0 to stop it BMSG BMSG 7 Shows a Short Message but in the bottom section of the screen Does not wait for a keypress CLRSCR CLRSCR Clears the screen ENDGAME ENDGAME Halts the program EXEC EXEC 4 Executes specified external program from the Exec Table See the later section on external programs FADEOUT FADEOUT 50 Fades the screen to black at the specified speed Can create a nice dramatic effect You can then display whatever you want on the screen but it will be invisible until you make it appear with FADEIN FADEIN FADEIN 50 Fades a black screen back in Use this command after FADEOUT GETADJ GETADJ X Y 12 Prompts the player for a direction and returns the X Y coordinates of the adjacent space in that direction for use with commands like MAPCHK If the player hits ESC then the macro will GOTO the line number specified by the 3 argument or will terminate the macro if that number is 0 GETKEY GETKEY B Gets a keypress and stores the ASCII value of the key uppercase in a variable Arrow keys up down left right return 128 through 131 If the key is any other extended key such as F5 or PgUp then it will return 0 GOTO GOTO 8 or GOTO A Ju
36. This avoids the item dropping problem items dropped onto off map locations simply disappear You can convert the map back to a normal worldmap with Alt W before editing the terrain or you can edit directly by choosing a cell location and then pressing E Worldmap Editor Just like the room editor you paint objects with the A D keys set the objects to paint with Alt A through Alt D erase with E and use L to place creatures There is an extra command Fill which will paint one of the A D terrain types over the whole viewport Regular Fill will just replace any visible squares with the terrain you are currently positioned over Alt F will fill every visible square in the viewport Ew al EN Ga ra fa Unlike editing a room the display scrolls The size of the viewport matches what the player sees during play but you have map coordinates shown at the bottom There is also an extra Wandering Life feature where you can paint a creature that has a random chance to appear in that spot The determination is made when the current 16x16 map chunk is loaded into memory which means that it only happens when the player enters the map or when the player walks a significant distance away and then comes back They will not spontaneously appear right next to the player Note that unlike room maps terrain cannot be stacked and the ACTIVATE ALL UNDERNEATH is not meaningful You can however place items and vehicles onto world maps
37. ain content like open ocean is repeated in order to make a map up to 512x512 Use this map type if you need to cheat and create a map larger than the standard worldmap type allows You can convert back and forth between custom and regular worldmap at any time by pressing Alt C to convert to custom or Alt W to convert back to normal worldmap From the main menu you can add or delete regions edit them or select whether you are editing the default maps or the maps from the currently saved game If you edit a map you will enter either the Room Map Editor or the World Map Editor Both editors have an Alt O Other map options page that includes region configuration such as the option to disable or replace the step macro which if set in the config editor would run on each step the step time controlling how fast the game clock gets incremented and a visibility option which can set how the region handles darkness or view obstructions disabling nighttime darkness for illuminated indoor regions or creating darkness for dark indoor regions like dungeons Macros that run when the player enters and exits the region can also be set here Room Layout Editor When you first enter the Room Editor you will be looking at a plan view showing the layout of all the rooms Before creating any rooms this will be blank You have the option to name the map add or delete rooms and edit rooms When you add rooms you will lay out the upper left
38. an be up to 16x11 These maps allow unrestricted stacking of objects which is one option for triggering complex events For more info look in the Tips and Tricks section Ideally these rooms are well suited for towns or dungeons where transitioning from one discrete space to another is appropriate Worldmap type A single large grid normally up to 240x240 where an 11x11 viewport is shown on the screen and scrolls as you move These maps do not allow stacking of terrain onto terrain though you can place items onto terrain so they don t have the same automation abilities that room maps have However by giving an expansive continuous surface they give a much more outdoors feel Note you can use 256x256 but it will have a notch missing from one corner You can define how map edges are handled whether they are an eee NAME ORE TO EXIT endless field of a certain type of terrain a portal to somewhere else or a wrap around of the Ma EDIT MAP MAE EDIT MAP EDGE ik VIEW MAP UD OTHER ap Custom Worldmap A worldmap mode where the technical workings are more exposed to the user All worldmaps are composed of 16x16 chunks that are loaded in and out of memory as needed Normally these are cleanly arranged in a simple grid but a custom worldmap lets you define exactly where each chunk is used in relation to the whole map Custom maps let you do layouts where the map is an odd shape such as a giant L or T shape or where cert
39. an wear up to seven pieces of armor Armor will absorb a certain amount of damage and has a percent chance of doing so VEHICLE Vehicles can be used to increase your weight capacity and or add additional weapons they are also used to pass terrain you cannot normally pass SPELL SKILL These are inventory items that cannot be picked up or dropped but can be used with the cast command CURRENCY Object 1 is the money of the game and appears under this category Object Actions Objects make extensive use of Actions that can be triggered in many ways for terrain it could be triggered by passing or bumping while for items it may be triggered by using The possible actions are DO NOTHING default action does nothing DISPLAY SHORT MESSAGE display short message in a pop up DISPLAY LONG MESSAGE display long message DISPLAY PICTURE display BMP and wait for a keypress PLAY SOUND EFFECT select sound CHANGE H P M P CHANGE HPmax MPmax STR INT SKILL CHANGE ALIGNMENT TAKE FROM YOU ONE OF TAKE FROM USER ALL ITEM TAKE FROM USER ALL TYPE GIVE TO PERSON ONE OF TAKE ALL THESE FROM AREA PUT ONE OF THIS HERE KILL USER IF NOT HOLDING ACTIVATE ALL UNDERNEATH HIT PLAYER WITH WEAPON LET PLAYER SHOOT WEAPON SUMMON CREATURE SET VARIABLE TO INCREASE DECREASE VARIABLE EXECUTE MACRO MOVE CHARACTER ONE SPACE SET VIEW RANGE TO SET ICON TO PROVOKE NEARBY CREATURE
40. ances of consuming it on each step Messages Sets the short messages shown when the vehicle is out of fuel boarded or examined Weight Capacity Using a vehicle may increase the amount of weight the player can carry Macros You can set macros to run when the player boards and exits You can also have the boarding macro prevent boarding if needed by having it set SUCCESS to 0 Object options Currency Only the graphic appearance and weight can be set for currency of which there can only be one object 1 Map Colors All objects have a map color shown in the upper left corner of the object properties window that can be set with Alt M and will determine the color used to represent that object on a mini map such as in the map editor or with the SHOWMAP macro command EDIT MESSAGES AND DIALOGUE Manage text content for your adventure This editor provides a central place to export to a text file for review or manage the short messages 2 line text messages used frequently through the adventure for responses like you need a key to open this door and the long messages 22 line messages used for books plot advancing text etc You can also export and edit dialogues for creatures NPCs here Mosaics can also be edited here Mosaics are arrangements of graphic tiles that can be displayed by a macro They are good for making cutscenes and having them look consistent with the regular game graphics Short Long Message Edi
41. apons can only attack the four squares directly adjacent to the player Ranged weapons can target any square within the weapon s range A player cannot attack without a weapon Armor Each armor has a type and the character can wear up to one armor piece of each type There are seven types so the player can wear up to seven pieces of armor Armor will absorb a certain amount of damage and has a percent chance of doing so For example a steel helmet may absorb a large amount of damage 20 but only 5 of shots will hit it whereas a beekeeper suit may only absorb a tiny bit of damage 1 but all 100 of shots will hit it Other items that can be in inventory include misc items these can sometimes be Used for effects or are sometimes required for any number of other things and magic spells which can be Cast if the particular ACK game implements a magic system Combat Mechanics When an attack is made it checks for the chance to hit weapon skill up to 100 determines the chance so 50 will hit 50 of the time and 100 will always hit If the attack hits it calculates the damage a random number between and the weapon s damage value For weapon skills over 100 there s a chance for a critical hit Weapon skill minus 100 determines the chance of double damage so 150 minus 100 equals 50 a 50 chance of double damage and 200 minus 100 equals 100 a 100 chance of double damage For weapon skills from 200 to
42. appear on this page If you want to use a BMP picture as a skin in place of the normal in game key list you can select it here You can also select whether the area above the menu is used for a clock or for an image that indicates the approximate time See the section on custom skins for more info Other gameplay options here include whether HP and MP regenerate while resting and whether you want to replace this with a macro whether your adventure is password protected disabling editors and cheatcodes This page also lets you change the version of an adventure Updating an adventure to the latest ACK version will activate certain play features that would otherwise be deactivated for backwards compatibility skins experience leveling and palette colors are handled differently depending on game version Note that this page gives you the option to edit a saved game The saved game being edited is the one in slot 0 the quick save slot I MPORT FILES EXPORT REPORTS Import and Export Game Data This utility is used for copying data in from kits or other adventures and for for exporting reports It can also be used to delete the saved game It is not used for importing custom sounds or BMP pictures those should be placed in the game directory directly because they are not ACK generated content The options at the menu are IMPORT FONT Load a new character set IMPORT SOME GRAPHIC TILES Loads new graphic tiles f
43. be named in a special way They must be named with a star and a number anything from 0 to 255 The GOTO command then can jump to a specific topic GOTO 7 or to one determined by a variable GOTO B would jump to topic 2 if B 2 or topic 1 if B 1 etc With this technique a person could remember talking to you before by setting and using a variable Or it could appear as if other people are talking about you to each other one person could do SET V B 4 and another person could have GOTO B The final option MACRO is rather straightforward it simply runs a macro You could have a macro set a variable to a random number and then use GOTO to jump to that random setting this would give truly random responses Or you could have a macro do things that the other commands can t a trainer might have a macro that increases your weapon skill and charges you some money Someone might demand a certain item from the player and use MACRO and GOTO to determine if they have it and respond accordingly A travel agent might even have a macro that changes the player s map location entirely Note the QA macro command won t work from dialogue macros Small Talk Dialogues Sometimes you want NPCs that just respond by making small talk random lines like Some weather we re having that aren t plot critical but allow you to have extra people running adding to the atmosphere without being mute or requiring the tedious work of creating dialogu
44. ceBar or Del HHHHHHHHHE EEEH EP Err ere You can use the PgUp and PgDn keys to flip through the separate mosaics Control PgUp and Control PgDn will copy the current mosaic to the previous or next mosaic if you are making an animation sequence this makes it easy to copy the current mosaic forward Dialogue Editor SMGMILE GUARD When you enter the dialogue editor you start out editing the list of topics for a dialogue oo Topics determine how the speaker reacts to the player If there is a topic called NAME TEMPLE then asking NAME during conversation will run that topic There are a few preset topics GUARD INTRO is run at the beginning of conversation the first time the player runs it If it exists HELLO is used instead of INTRO on future meetings BYE is run at the end unless there is a TERMINATE command in a topic is run when the player gives an unknown query You can also have topics that can be called by other topics 1 through 255 can be BGM TO EDIT A TOPIC GHB To EXIT called by the GOTO command NAME You may have up to 255 dialogues Each may have up to 40 topics each being as long as you like as long as the entire dialogue is no more than 1000 lines Topics can scroll although you will wait to add WAITKEY commands to longer responses to control where it pauses it will not do so automatically While this is not controlled in the editor dialogues can also have
45. cost from a merchant Magic Points Used For spells determines how much MP to consume Object options Weapon Ranged Weapon Graphic Set the appearance Alt graphic determines the player s appearance when the weapon is readied LN REQUIRED EW CONSUMED ALT A MESSAGE HHEN OUT OF AMMO ME MESSAGE WHEN EXAMINED Ee MESSAGE WHEN EXAMINED EA MAX DAMAGE JU MAX DAMAGE MEN Ammo Required If using the weapon requires another PRICE SOUND EFFECT MEN UND EEFEC item set it here and set the chances of consuming it Messages Short messages displayed when the player has no required ammo or when the weapon is examined Max Damage The normal maximum damage of the weapon Remember that weapon skills over 100 have a chance for extra damage Range Determines how far in squares the weapon can be targeted You can also set whether it is a pinpoint attack targeting a single square or if it has a blast radius from that targeted square or if it is a point blank weapon that fires in a single direction in a stream or cone Sound Effect VOC sound played when the weapon is fired Icon Visual representation of the weapon s attack can be dots or lines or can be tiles from the graphic tile editor Weight Price Determines how heavy the item is and how much it would cost from a merchant Object options Armor Graphic Set the appearance Alt graphic determines the player s appearance when the armor is worn ARMOR COV
46. ctly as shown in the Mosaic editor MUSIC MUSIC 59 Plays a sound on the music channel a looping sound channel that can be used for music The region specific music settings will override this once the character 1s able to walk on the map and sounds on this channel do not mix playing another sound will stop any music sound already in play so it s good for temporary music scores during cutscenes or dialogues Play sound 0 to stop it OFFARMR OFFARMR 2 Turns OFF armor type 1 7 from being counted See USEARMR PAUSE PAUSE 10 Creates a delay measured in 10ths of a second PAUSE 10 would pause for 1 second PAUSEK DELAYK 40 Like PAUSE but allows the player to press a key to interrupt it PICTURE PICTURE 7 Shows a BMP picture silently waits for a keypress and then fixes the palette and clears the screen See the section on custom content for info QA QA PUT ONE OF THIS HERE 67 Queues an Action This is a work around for the fact that macros cannot perform many things that actions can it allows the macro to queue up some actions that will be performed after the macro ends Three important notes here First the line must be entered with the action number not the name For example you must enter QA 24 1 which will then become QA summon creature 1 See the list of object actions in the section on the object editor for the action numbers Note also that this will ONLY work if the mac
47. ds which you can highlight if you choose The plot of many games is driven by searching for and using these keywords for example person 1 tells you after you perform some favor for him go ask person 2 about beef Dialogues can ask yes no questions terminate conversation attack the player give take items run macros perform conditional branching buy sell items and much more Edit Maps and Regions A new adventure does not start with any maps To create and edit maps go to Edit Maps and Regions from the main menu Add a new region you can have up to 99 and choose a type Room or Worldmap For more information read the section on the Map Editor Edit People and Creatures New creatures can be created and existing ones changed in Edit People and Creatures Creatures have an alignment determining who they attack the player is considered good Note that weapons and remains are separate you can have a creature fight with a sword but it won t drop that sword as loot unless it s also specified under remains In addition to dropping remains on the map creatures can also run a macro when they die Edit Macros This is a rudimentary scripting tool that can directly manipulate many ACK features run external programs and run complex lists of actions with loops and conditional branches Macros have access to certain features that aren t available any other way this makes macros very useful for title screens and
48. e Walkthroughs Eventually I d like to replace the bundled adventures with better ones that take advantage of the features of ACK or at least ones that are better balanced for difficulty and playability However since they serve as a passable demonstration of some of what can be done with ACK it s worth having a walk through to speed people through the play content if desired Brigands 1 Enter the town to your southwest Find the mayor follow the road north to the fountain then west to his door and tell him you will HELP He gives you a key to the armory 3 Go through the door to your south to enter the armory and take everything in the room Hit R and ready all the armor and the crossbow Leave out the south door and leave town 4 Go southeast through the mountain pass There s a small fort as soon as you come out of the forest enter and pillage the place there s a magic wand in the armory that will come in handy later and some scrolls that will increase your skills a little bit Make sure to use your healing potions as needed and attack with the flaming oil until you get the wand when enemies are bunched together as it attacks a 3x3 area 5 When you finish there go south and pass around the lake short counter clockwise and enter the castle Pillage the castle try out the wand to gather more potions and gear One room has a silver key so keep searching until you find it 6 Leave the castle and head to the so
49. e creature fly pass over any SPACE terrain Creature Remains This is a stack of items that can be added to the map for items you specify a chance of this happening when the creature is killed Terrain objects can also be used if you want permanent remains but be careful with this These items are not usable to the creature Macros and Experience The Death macro is run when the creature is killed in combat For v3 0 and higher adventures the Touch macro runs when the creature scores a melee hit on the player and setting an EXP value will grant the player the amount of experience whenever one of these creatures is killed Note that it doesn t matter who kills it NPCs killing each other will still give the exp to the player if exp is set You may therefore want to set good creatures to give zero experience EDIT MACROS The ACK Scripting Language Overview The Macro editor is a crude scripting language similar to the BASIC language as it was usually implemented in the 80s The ACK Macro language uses line numbers GOTO s IF THEN statements simple variables and several specialized commands The CARAVAN and BRIGANDS demo adventures both make use of macros You are encouraged to view and experiment with these macros use the EXPORT REPORTS module to dump the macros to a text file for easy reading and then look around the editors to see where the different macros are used Here would be the A
50. e is a catch all for anything not directly manipulated in the other editors Import Files Export Reports Adventure Kits are imported with this utility various features can also be copied from other adventures using this tool The game in progress files can also be deleted here which is a good thing to do to your adventure before distributing it You can also export a full set of reports on messages dialogue objects creatures and configuration Edit Font Allows customizing the current font Note that ACK prompts only use uppercase the only place lowercase will be used is in user created messages and dialogues This means the lowercase characters can be used for other purposes if you wish like runes hieroglyphs etc Before creating a new font check out the font options in the Import Export tool you may find something much closer to what you need Edit Graphic Tiles Everything you see in ACK is represented by a graphic tile you can edit or modify them here You have two sets of 240 tiles so a total of 480 with one set being the normal tiles used by all terrain items creatures and mosaics and the second set being animation tiles used by certain terrain or creatures that toggle between multiple tiles to give an appearance of motion There are 256 colors available for editing tiles you can either use the palette built into ACK or create a custom palette by creating a PALETTE BMP file in your adventure fo
51. econd and third on and off with T if they are both off then the player will not get to choose a character class If you are editing a game in progress there will only be one set of ability scores these are the ability scores of the player PAGE 3 The level progression for the character if you choose to use it can be set here The player starts at level 1 and when reaching the experience milestones for levels 2 10 the player s level is set to the new level and the corresponding macro if any will run Experience is given by creatures being killed the experience for each creature is set in the creature editor or can be granted by macros PAGE 4 Some general configuration for gameplay is found on this page Text colors determine all the colors of text in the editors and adventure Normally 4 6 are highlighted The background of color 0 will determine the general background color color of blank tiles etc The Day Night View Sizing option lets you globally disable the feature where the illuminated view radius changes automatically from daytime to nighttime Note this can be disabled region by region as well in the map editor Other options on this page let you set sounds and certain event macros If no death macro is set gameplay ends when the player dies The extra command allows you to create a new key command but it must use a key that isn t already in use by the normal commands PAGE 5 Miscellaneous options
52. econd moon Note the way it conditionally branches by GOTO moon phase times 2 plus 4 The first two lines and last two lines provide a sanity check if E is outside the 1 8 range the portal will go nowhere 1 IF E lt 1 THEN 22 2 IF E gt 8 THEN 22 J Sel 22 gt Ee 2 4 SET Z2 Z2 4 5 GOTO Z2 6 SETPORT PORTAL TO 1 0 19 27 7 STOP 8 SETPORT PORTAL TO 1 0 31 109 9 STOP 10 SETPORT PORTAL TO 1 0 54 117 11 STOP 12 SETPORT PORTAL TO 1 0 34 12 13 STOP 14 SETPORT PORTAL TO 1 0 119 230 15 STOP 16 SETPORT PORTAL TO 1 0 201 33 17 STOP 18 SETPORT PORTAL TO 1 0 199 88 19 STOP 20 SETPORT PORTAL TO 1 0 173 42 21 STOP 22 SET SUCCESS 0 23 STOP You must edit the macro to use your own SETPORT locations They appear here in order 2 moon phases 1 through 8 and will cause the moongate to send the player to the coordinates specified instead of the coordinates of the portal For example when the second moon is at phase 3 any moongate the player steps into if it s open determined by the 1 moon will take the player to the coordinates in the macro You can find the coordinates in the map editor The first number is the region number The second number is the room number 0 if it s a worldmap type map The third and fourth numbers are the X Y location which you can see in the map editor for example the highlighted location in the picture below is 22 33 If this were in region 1 the SETPORT syntax would be S
53. eleases will be a complete copy of ACK and you should copy out your GAMES folder replace your copy of ACK with the new one then copy your GAMES folder back in ACK Community If you have problems running ACK or discover gameplay bugs where features do not work as they should in certain situations we d like to hear about it As of 2008 the author of ACK Chris Hopkins can be contacted at adventurecreationkit gmail com The author of the ACK Launcher and expert on using ACK in the Mac environment can be reached at jjsonick yahoo com he also runs the website for ACK at http www mozomedia com ack New versions of ACK including PATCH DAT files to update your copy of ACK to the most current version can be found at http www 80sgaming org ack If you want to get in touch with other ACK users you re encouraged to come visit the ACK discussion thread on Robb Sherwin s Jolt Country forums at http www joltcountry com phpBB2 viewforum php f 16 Playing an ACK Adventure Every ACK adventure will play a bit differently some might have no combat at all while some might be primarily hack and slash some might be set in a fantasy world with magic while some might be set in the future However certain elements are common to all ACK adventures such as the keyboard commands Arrow keys move your character about the screen A Attack If you have a weapon ready you will be prompted for where to attack T Talk Prompts interact
54. er She ll ask where you re going say Egypt then Memphis and when she asks you who is taking you say Trajan She ll ask to join say yes Go back and talk to the constable and ask for passage out of Rome He ll also ask where you re going again Memphis He ll give you a scroll that will let you leave town Go back to the town center and south out the exit After a cut scene you will be in Egypt Leave your inn room and find the palace You re looking for a priest in a white robe His name is Janus and he will ask you to retrieve a stone tablet out of one of the pyramids Also talk to the aristocrat Abdul at the throne he will tell you to ask Trajan what you need to do next If you want to skip the running around in the next few steps just say spare Go back to the inn and find Trajan s room it s just south of yours and say ask he tells you to go back and say militia Return to Abdul and say militia he will tell you to find the captain of the guard and ask for weapons Find Akram and ask him about weapons he will tell you to ask Abdul for the spare weapons Ask Abdul about spare he will give you the militia supplies In the northwest part of town on the riverbank there is a dock and a boat Get in the boat and you will be carried across the river Go southwest to find the pyramids One of them has an entrance go inside Don t try stealing any of the
55. er The new topic will have a name from 0 to 255 SETV Will set a variable A Z to a value 0 255 BEGINQUEST Makes the person start using topic BEGINQ instead of INTRO if it exists when greeting the player ENDQUEST Makes the person start using topic ENDQ instead of INTRO if it exists when greeting the player Using Variables and Macros in Dialogues You can use macros in dialogues with the MACRO command To have the dialogue flow determined by a macro use the GOTO command with a variable The variables can be A thru Z When making topics the topics can be 0 thru 255 and a topic that is used when the correct special topic is not found Use the Export MESSAGES TXT feature at the main menu of the message editor to export your dialogue to a text file for troubleshooting How to use Dialogues Since ACK is designed for adventures in clue finding and problem solving the player s interactions with other people and creatures can t be limited just to fights there has to be peaceful interaction as well where the player can converse with others and find information Any person or creature on the map can have a dialogue assigned to them which describes how they will respond to queries and what they will say and do T w T Amor Dit wip i h f The basic idea of a dialogue is simple you type in one word queries or topics If the person has something to say about that topic they will Some standa
56. es and macros to generate random quick responses To make a small talk dialogue just create a text file in the adventure folder TALKxxx TXT where xxx is the dialogue number For example to make dialogue 201 into small talk create a text file called TALK201 TXT and put as many lines into the file as you like Hey how s it going Nice weather we re having Stop me if you ve heard this one a troll and an orc go into a bar What are you looking at Note the slash in the third line this splits the response into two lines the maximum Each time you talk to an NPC with this dialogue it will pick a random line from the text file and use it as a quick response The response will be displayed in the bottom area of the regular screen the screen does not have to clear for small talk dialogues Small talks override regular dialogues if there were a dialogue 201 already it would be ignored in favor of the small talk file EDIT MAPS AND REGIONS The Map Editor Most of your time in making an adventure will be spent here When you have created the objects and creatures you want to place on the map this is where you will actually draw the map and place the objects You may have up to 99 maps There are three types of maps used in ACK Room type Up to 16 separate rooms where the entire room is shown on the screen and does not scroll If room edges overlap the player can walk directly from one to the next Rooms c
57. functional moongates First eight portal objects need to be created They can all be named MOONGATE later but for troubleshooting purposes name them separately MOONGATE 1 portal Passable when D 1 Action run macro use the number of your moongate entry macro see below Triggered by passing Disappear while impassable Replaced with GRASS MOONGATE 2 portal Passable when D 2 Action run macro use the number of your moongate entry macro see below Triggered by passing Disappear while impassable Replaced with GRASS Repeat this for 3 through 8 If you want the moons indicated on the screen in Ultima IV style then two special graphic tiles will need to be created with four moons each one on each quarter of the tile Now some macros are required First the following lines should appear in the INTRO macro to set the moons to a starting point SET E 0 SET D 1 SET D2 1 Next an hourly macro to drive the changes of moon phase In this example the first moon will change every three hours game time hours not real time hours and the second will change every hour SET D2 D2 1 SETE E 1 IF E lt 9 THEN 5 SET Z 1 IF D2 lt 3 THEN 10 SET D2 1 SETD D 1 IF D lt 9 THEN 10 SETD 1 10 SET Z2 955 D 11 QTILE Z2 AT 1 12 SET Z2 955 E 13 QTILE Z2 AT 6 O OANA PWN Next a moongate entry macro that will set the destination of the moongate upon entry based on the phase of the s
58. intro sequences such as in the CARAVAN sample adventure Macros are described in more detail later in this handbook Note you can dump the data from this editor to a text file called MACROS TXT for reference CONFIGURE ADVENTURE Setting Global Settings This is where you decide the universal aspects of your game What special colors does it use What is the title screen What are the player s ability scores Where is the player now etc Always make sure that you set these before trying to play your adventure Settings are divided across four pages PAGE 1 The settings on this page determine how your adventure starts The title sequence is a picture and long message and or a macro If you use a macro you can end it with a SHOWBM P that leaves a picture on the screen that picture will then serve as a background for the game select character creation menu The intro sequence runs only when the player creates a new character and this happens after the player chooses the class name etc Play begins immediately after the intro sequence Other options on this page determine the player s starting inventory time and location and name The game will prompt the player for a name if the name is set to PROMPT anything other than a blank value will show up in the player status but not be changeable PAGE 2 If you are editing the original copy of an adventure then there will be three sets of ability scores You may toggle the s
59. ion with others L Look Gives you the name of whatever you target and if looking at someone else tells you if others are hostile Will use the object open a box etc if you are close enough To use items you can pick up or are already carrying use the Get and Use commands G Get Picks up items if you are close enough D Drop Drops items on the ground in case you no longer need it or it s too heavy to continue carrying U Use Uses items Sometimes used to ready weapons or armor etc if the adventure is set as such R Ready Prepares weapons and armor for use May be done with Use instead if the adventure is set as such C Cast Cast a spell Might be done with Use instead if the adventure is set as such B Board If you find a vehicle or other conveyance like a horse or a boat you can board it with this command X Exit Used to dismount a vehicle you boarded with the Board command I Player Info Inventory Gives you information about your character Space Pass Pass one turn Different ACK games may have other key commands as well for example some games may implement commands like Wait or Search etc Finally there are a few system commands Alt S Saves your game Alt O or F10 Quits the game Asks if you want to save If you re quitting to reload a saved game say no F1 Shows a help screen Alt M Toggles mouse support Alt V or Control V Mutes sound and or music and
60. is even further by using the QTILE macro command to place symbols onto it positions 1 to 6 appear on top of this bar Screen Skins If you set in the configuration editor the menu to use a BMP skin it will use RMSKIN BMP for room maps and WMSKIN BMP for world maps You can also make them region specific by naming them RMSKINx BMP or WMSKINx BMP where x is the region number Try to leave the commands in their normal spots these parts of the screen are hot zones for the mouse pointer Once again you can customize the look of this even further by using the QTILE macro command to place symbols onto it Positions to 6 appear above the menu and 7 12 appear between the gameplay keys and the save quit keys Dialogue Skins Dialogue skins can be used to display a portrait of the person or creature the player is talking to Dialogues can also change the portrait during the conversation if you want to create the illusion of other people interrupting If the game finds a TALKx BMP file where x is the dialogue number then it will use it as a background during the dialogue The skin command in the dialogue editor will change the skin with 0 being the original one that was loaded Startup Character Creation and Saving Loading games The character creation screen will display on top of START BMP Ifa file called ABOUT BMP is present it will show on the menu as an ABOUT THIS GAME option And if SAVEGAME BMP and LO
61. keys speed up slow down combat messages Ability Scores Common to all ACK adventures players have several ability scores that determine combat ability etc Hit Points Also called HP This is the amount of damage that can be sustained before the character is killed Magic Points Also called MP or Energy Used by items spells sometimes as fuel for vehicles etc Strength This controls how much weight the player can carry and how fast the player regenerates hit points Intelligence This controls how fast the player regenerates lost magic points and how merchants deal with the player All of the above numbers max at 255 but typical player starting values are in the 10 20 range Weapon Skill This shows how proficient the character is with short ranged weapons Ranged Weapon Skill Same as weapon skill but used for ranged weapons These skills also max at 255 but typical player starting values are in the 25 75 range Values up to 100 determine the chance of hitting an unarmored creature values over 100 allow the player to do extra damage beyond what the weapon could normally do when attacking creatures Note that strength does not affect weapon damage Inventory Some items in the character s inventory can be readied and will determine combat effectiveness Weapons A character can have one weapon readied The Ready command must be used to switch weapons including between melee weapon and ranged weapon Melee we
62. l ask you to join him instead of Harima say yes and he ll make you a samurai that s good and you get a neat new costume but then order you to go challenge Harima to a duel that s bad Talk to the samurai around town again they ll tell you to seek out a trainer named Jubei Find Jubei he s in a hut in town and have him train you Once you re done ready your new equipment katana armor and helmet and then go back to talk to Harima Not surprisingly Harima doesn t surrender you are sent out to duel him in front of his men Kill him to win the game
63. l prevent a portal from transporting the player if used by the portal in a macro run by an action triggered by passing PORTAL Gives the portal number of the portal that was just stepped on can be used by the SETPORT command for example the command SETPORT PORTAL to perform a last minute destination change for a portal if the portal has a macro that runs when it is stepped on via an action WMUSIC CMUSIC The walking and combat music settings for the current region Player stats HP HPMAX MP MPMAX STR INT WSK and RWSK Player ability scores HREGEN MREGEN POISON Player ability score modifiers ALIGN CRIM Variables that determine what creature alignments will attach the player LEVEL EXP Variables for the player s level and experience Setting the level in a macro will set the experience accordingly based on the table in the config editor MONEY Amount of money the player is carrying INV n Amount of that object the player is carrying in inventory Check the numbers in the Object Editor WORN n Returns 1 if the player is wearing object n it must be armor returns 0 if not If you set this variable it will cause the object to be worn if it s armor and will add it to the player s inventory if needed WEAPON Returns the object number of the currently readied weapon returns 0 if no weapon is readied If you set this variable it will add the object to the player s inventory if needed VEH Player s
64. lder 320x200 256 color Windows BMP format GRAPHIC G NAME N ACTION WN USAGE REQUERES mum CONSUMED j MESSAGE HHEN USED Mim MESSAGE HHEN INOPERATIVE Eg MESSAGE HHEN EXAMINED S DISAPPEAR BH NE DESI INS LINE GR DEL LINE GE HIGHLIGHT all gt TRAAT CEM ef ob a ee ol OE S C ETEA oe ob Oe ae EE INSERT QUESTION MMN RENAME TOPIC His WALL EDIT CREATUR GRAPHIC Tce ANIMATION DEA BOWE ATH Pur Hla E EGE SOUND SOUND R Siew edd oe JEH I CLE ENI GHTS HITH AND hici O GE REMAINS i E 2 gt E Fs DELETE Fo eee FS SELECT CREATE TE TOGGLE D HOURLY MACRO mee a Po pah a pah pah pah SOC ON OT LE UEUN oe oe oe oe oe Edit Objects Items Terrain Everything that isn t alive is an object Objects fall into different categories the category determines what features can be set Catagories are Space Custom Space Obstacle Custom Obstacle and Portal for terrain types and Misc Item Weapon Ranged Weapon Armor Vehicle and Currency for item types See the section on the Object editor for more info Edit Messages and Dialogue Most text content in the game can be edited here Short messages are two line text messages frequently used for quick messages like You open the box Long messages fill the screen they are useful for signs books etc Dialogues are triggered by the Talk command and are interactive they can respond to keywor
65. le impassable this does not actually remove the terrain but makes it appear as its replaced terrain whenever it is currently impassable This can make locked doors appear locked without having to perform otherwise complex scripting The use macro option is the same as if destroyed but allows a macro to run when this happens Structural Strength determines the damage required to destroy the terrain N A can not be destroyed by weapons If you set a value here you can optionally set the Disappear option to use macro to give the object a macro to run when destroyed Replaced If the terrain is destroyed or disappears by other means it will be replaced by the object of your choice Object options Misc Items Spell Skills Graphic For Misc Items sets the appearance Spell Skills have no graphic Action Action performed by using the item or casting the spell if any 2 Action Spells can also perform a 2 action This action can be suppressed by having the primary action call a macro and having the macro setting SUCCESS to 0 Usage Requires If using the item or spell requires another object set it here and set the chances of consuming it Message Short message to be displayed when the object is used inoperative required object missing or when the item is examined Disappear Sets whether the item is consumed on use Weight Price Determines how heavy the item is and how much it would
66. m that you specify You could have the chair replaced by terrain called pile of junk for example Also the terrain can run a macro when it 1s destroyed Wandering monsters This term common in most role playing games refers to random encounters ACK allows you to provide for random encounters by creating wandering life that will sometimes be added to the map when the map section or room is loaded While editing a map the Wandering option allows you to place a wandering monster It will appear in the spot that you are placing it but only sometimes You can decide the creature that might appear and the odds that it might appear when the room or section is loaded Rooms load much more frequently than worldmap chunk sections you will therefore want to tune your odds much lower in room maps but it depends on how your player travels This option allows you to make an unlimited monster supply To make a dangerous countryside place a few of these wandering monsters You can have up to 224 per region Then each time the player enters that area there might be a couple monsters to deal with The player can kill them this time but next time there might be some again Or there might not they are after all random encounters Creatures will not accumulate without limit ACK will not stack creatures so another creature would only be placed if the previous creature moved or died Also worldmaps can only have 254 creatures active per regi
67. macro to include the following lines of code to take the player out of fly mode after several steps Change the line numbers as necessary 1 IF F 0 THEN 8 2 IF F 1 THEN 5 3 SET F F 1 4 GOTO 8 5 SET FLY 0 6 SET F 0 7 GOTO end 8 STOP or the rest of your macro can continue here Levers and traps You may want to have levers that open and close doors for example a dungeon room that when you pull a lever closes off one exit opens another and opens a closet full of monsters By changing triggers and appearances you could also make this a trap instead triggered by stepping on it The object numbers below are examples if yours are different replace the numbers used in the macro Objects required 101 LEVER 1 space or obstacle Graphic tile shows a lever pointing up Passable to nothing Action Run macro Triggered by Bumping Disappear when action triggered Replace with LEVER 2 102 LEVER 2 space or obstacle Graphic tile shows a lever pointing down Passable to nothing Action do nothing 103 SEALED DOOR space Passable to nothing opaque Replace with OPEN DOOR 104 DOOR space Passable to anything opaque Replace with SEALED DOOR 105 OPEN DOOR space Passable to anything transparent And here s the macro 1 SOUND 18 replace sound 18 with something appropriate 2 QA 18 103 replaces all the sealed doors with open doors 3 QA 18 104 replaces all the regular doors
68. me Custom Pictures or Photos BMP Both Actions and Macro scripts can display BMP files They must be saved in Windows format 320x200 256 color The image is displayed by either the SHOW PICTURE action a PICTURE setting in the config for a title or intro picture or the PICTURE and SHOWBMP macro commands Actions can use 255 pictures macros can use up to 64 000 When used in a macro the PICTURE command will do everything for you show a BMP image silently wait for a keypress then clear the screen and reset the color palette If you need more control than this the SHOWBMP command lets you use other commands to do so manually WAITKEY will ask the user to press a key or GETKEY 0 will wait for one without asking or you may use the DELAY command to delay and then show another picture without a keypress like a slideshow You can also use the PAUSEK command to get the best of both worlds delaying for a time period but allowing the user to press a key to hurry it up And if you set the ESCGOTO variable pressing ESC can be handled as well After you finish displaying pictures you can use CLRSCR and then FIXPAL to clean up the display You may want to precede them with a SAVESCR and follow them with a LOADSCR depending on where you are using the macro this allows the macro to leave the screen just as it was when the macro started Custom Skins There are a few places in ACK where custom BMP images can also be used to al
69. me which takes place hundreds of years later in Japan Make your way through the mountain pass maze roughly northeast and you will find a Japanese village You won t be able to talk to anyone however you can t understand them 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 Find another mountain pass maze to the south and you ll find a hut out in the forest with a man named Akechi Talk to Akechi You ll try to have a conversation that won t go anywhere but when you leave he ll give you a dictionary Use the dictionary and then talk to Akechi again you ll be able to understand him now He tells you to return to the city Go back through the mountain pass maze to the city Talk to Harima the guy with the fan and you will end up offering to go over yet another mountain pass and talk to his enemy Ikawa Talk to some of the peasants you ll see that this Harima fellow isn t exactly loved by his people Find the mountain pass that leads to Ikawa s realm it s much bigger than Harima s village and find Ikawa he s on the 3 floor of the castle You may want to save the game before you talk to him Talk to Ikawa He will ask you a series of questions as long as you don t say you want a war and you re on Harima s side at which point he ll have you executed you re okay ideally you should say that you re here for peace and that you re willing to be a hostage He ll then ask you who you represent say caravan He l
70. mps to a new line number in the macro IF IF A 7 THEN 4 or IF A gt 4 THEN 3 If the condition is true then it will GOTO the number IF B lt 6 THEN 7 means If B is less then 6 then goto line 7 Operators are gt lt as well as not equal amp bitwise AND bitwise OR If you don t specify any line number and just say IF A 1 THEN then the following line is treated as the operation to perform if the condition is true Or is skipped if the condition is not true so make sure there is a line afterwards for it to skip to even if it s just STOP LMSG LMSG 5 Displays a long message Does not wait for a keypress LOADSCR LOADSCR Loads the screen that was saved see SAVESCR MACRO MACRO 5 Jumps to the beginning of another macro MAPADD MAPADD X Y I Stacks an item onto a map location The first two arguments are X Y coordinates in the current room or worldmap and the location must be within about 16 spaces of the player The final argument is an object number This command can be used for any object types on room maps but should only be used for items and vehicles on worldmaps because terrain does not stack MAPCHK MAPCHK 13 7 X Looks at a map location and sets a variable with whatever object type it finds there MAPCHKD MAPCHKD 13 7 X Looks at a map location and sets a variable with whatever object data value it finds there Normally only used to inspect the value used for
71. must be done by talking Talk to everyone You will be told several times to seek someone else and ask them questions Bear in mind that some information holds a price the bartender won t tell you anything valuable unless you give him what he wants Talk to everyone you will find all that you need As the game continues you will continue through Rome Egypt and then on to the Orient There will be combat but only when you are attacked Be careful killing the wrong people may make the game impossible to solve and defiance to the wrong person may put you in danger There s a walkthrough at the end of the manual HHH HHHHHHEHHES Kits Included with ACK Adventure Creation Kit includes a few kits to get you started with your game creation HISTORY The History kit is similar to the Caravan adventure and includes many of the same graphic tiles It can also be used as a starting point for a generic fantasy adventure MODERN The Modern kit has graphic tiles and objects to represent modern buildings like houses and offices as well as somewhat less modern buildings that you might still see today like haunted houses ULTIMA The Ultima kit has graphic tiles imported from Ultima V with only minor alterations to coast and river tiles to simplify them somewhat as shown at left The intention is not to perfectly emulate Ultima the ACK engine would be incapable of that feat anyway but rather to provide a kit that would allow creation of a
72. nd where your macro is being called from you should test it in your game to see SAYVAL SAYVAL HP AT 3 23 Displays a value on the screen Lines 1 to 22 are LMSG lines 23 24 are SMSG lines 25 26 are BMSG lines SET SET A 7 or SET MONEY A 7 or SET A B 2 or SET D R 2 Sets the value of a variable SETPORT SETPORT 18 TO 3 0 37 112 or SETPORT 6 TO 4 7 3 4 Sets a portal location Notation is Region Room X Y use room 0 for worldmaps Portal numbers can be found in the map editor by moving the cursor over a portal An example would be a setup where you can get into a taxi tell the driver where you want to go and his dialogue can trigger a macro that will set the exit door to lead to any one of many places See also the PORTAL variable SHOWBMP SHOWBMP 5 Would display a bitmap picture file Similar to the PICTURE command but it doesn t do the housekeeping tasks afterwards so you must use FIXPAL and CLRSCR afterwards before the end of the macro or you may have funky colors FADEIN and FADEOUT can also be used SHOWLOC SHOWLOC Displays You are at X Y at screen bottom SHOWMAP SHOWMAP Shows the local area 48x48 in a tiny window SMSG SMSG 5 Displays a short message in the usual pop up box and waits for a keypress SOUND SOUND 7 Plays a sound effect on the regular sound channel SOUND 0 will stop any playing sounds on this channel All normal sound effects from actions combat bump
73. o play just one format RAW files You can convert other formats such as MP3 and WAV and even VOC files from earlier versions of ACK using the bundled sound conversion tools Sox and LAME ACK includes a simple script for performing these conversions if you are using Windows The script is in the ACK SOUNDS CUSTOM folder Simply rename your source files remove any spaces and give them a name ACK can use like 412 applause WAV and then place the files you want to convert into the in folder Run convert bat and it will create RAW versions of your sounds in the out folder If you are not running Windows and wish to download versions of these third party applications appropriate for your system or just want to learn more about these programs you can go to the following sites SoX for converting just about all formats except MP3 and MIDI to RAW can be found at http sox sourceforge net LAME for converting MP3 to WAV which SoX can then convert to RAW is at http lame sourceforge net Additional tools worth mentioning SynthFont for converting MIDI files to WAV can be found at http www synthfont com and can help you convert MIDI files many music samples for other old games are in this format into a format that SoX can convert to RAW Audacity for editing and recording WAV and MP3 files is at http audacity sourceforge net and is an excellent tool for editing sound samples before converting them to RAW It suppo
74. o use the Macro Editor Press ALT I to insert a line ALT D will delete a line Note that the line numbers of GOTO and IF THEN statements will be renumbered for you although ESCKEY settings will not Press DEL to delete the current line or Control C Control X and Control V to copy cut or paste the current line Press ENTER to edit the current line Use the Up Dn arrow keys to move the pointer The display will scroll ESC will exit the editor saving the current macro Macro Variables General purpose A through Z general purpose variables which may be used however you like The A thru D variables can be used by objects terrain as well A G can hold values of 0 255 and H Z can hold values 0 65534 A2 through Z2 like A through Z but a second set The same value restrictions apply Can only be used in macros RND x returns a random number from 0 to x KEYPRESS returns an ASCII code if a key has been pressed or 0 if no key was pressed Rarely used there are several commands normally used to handle user input ESCKEY setting this variable will make the PAUSEK command act as a GOTO if the ESC key is hit Very useful for cutscenes or intro sequences where you want the player to be able to skip through SUCCESS setting this variable to 0 will cause a spell s 2 action not to cast if used in the spell s first action or will prevent the player from boarding a vehicle if used in the vehicle s boarding macro or wil
75. on In the map editor you will see a W on any square with a wandering monster Moving the cursor over the spot will tell you the type and odds If you press W again when you are already on top of a wandering monster s spot you will delete that wandering monster Running External Programs ACK can run external programs from a macro ACK can even swap itself out of memory and free up a large amount of memory for your external program if you wish If you have a program that will display a picture or an animation or play special sounds you can have ACK call that program as well To run an external program you use the EXEC table from the main menu of the Macro Editor For each EXEC entry you give it the name of the program the command line parameters and a few other options Some have to do with the graphics settings going to and from the external program The SWAP setting determines how ACK will handle memory If you do not swap memory then ACK can pick up the macro right where it left off but memory will be very limited If you do choose to swap you will have most of the base memory free to use but the macro conversation will terminate Debugging Playtesting Adventures The following key commands can be used while playing an adventure They must first be enabled in the configuration editor The following commands require Debug Mode TAB Reload any changed graphic tiles object definitions and creature definitions from disk
76. ose 9 Start populating your maps with enemies or non essential people Create dialogues for some of those if you want look up what small talk dialogues are they can be created much easier for people who have little to say 10 As areas start looking finished use the config editor to start your player in specific locations with specific stuff so you can test tricky areas of content quickly 11 Once you start getting close to being done start thinking about the title and intro sequences check out the TUTORIAL adventure for ideas here 12 Finally set the player starting location and equipment to what it should be at the start of the game and playtest your adventure to make sure the quests all work battles aren t too hard etc Note that you can run multiple editor windows and press the TAB key in each one whenever you want it to re sync up with the others Note also that much of your content creation may be done outside of ACK I use Photoshop to make BMP files and Audacity to make WAV files to convert to RAW audio files You should make a backup copy of your adventure folder from time to time as ACK does not have an Undo feature Copying the adventure is just a matter of copying the adventure folder in your operating system it is not done inside ACK The same applies to distribute your adventure for others to play just copy or ZIP the folder it s under the ACK GAMES folder and share it as needed Make sure they know
77. r to get an at a glance view of your adventure B EDIT FONT Edit the typeface used by your adventure Before spending too much time in the Font editor check out the Import Files module and check out the selection of fonts available there You may find something closer to what you need This utility is used to customize the text font used by your adventure Operation is similar to the graphic tile editor see below except since fonts only have one base color text colors are then defined in the configuration editor you are just turning pixels on 1 9 all act the same and off 0 Note that there are some reserved characters used for displaying arrows the number 10 Pg etc you can customize them but you shouldn t change them Note also that there are lowercase characters available These are only used in your messages and dialogue which you can edit for your adventure This means that if you want to use the lowercase character set for something different runes heiroglyphs etc you can do so EDIT GRAPHIC TILES Edit graphics for your terrain items and creatures All things that you see during normal play terrain treasure weapons creatures people and even yourself are represented by one or more graphic tiles While you may be importing most of your tiles from another adventure or kit it s still a good idea to make a couple of your own to give your adventure originality Graphic Tiles are 16x16 pixel 256 color
78. rain like mountains or you will have a paradox donut map where you can walk north forever Or you may want this the Ultima games for example seemed to love this model Unfortunately you can t use a different portal for each direction and create one huge supermap to do that you will have to have constrictions in the map where it s feasible to place individual portals manually When you press E to edit the map you will select the part of the map to start with and you will enter the Worldmap Editor Custom Worldmap Layout Editor If you are entering a custom worldmap instead of a regular worldmap you start out as a 16x16 worldmap and you can add additional 16x16 cells or chunks to create one large worldmap of an odd shape To place cells on the map use the A key to add more cells then use the arrow keys and the Enter key to place cell numbers on the spreadsheet Note that you can repeat cell numbers if you want but be careful doing so if the player were to drop an item or you were to place an item on one of these repeating cells it becomes part of the cell and would be cloned onto the other cells of the same number A better idea for repeating terrain on custom worldmaps is to leave the cells undefined and set the options for the map edges to endless terrain With this trick you could make a custom map that just had a few cells to edit but appeared like an infinitely large map with vast empty oceans and a couple of tiny islands
79. rd topics for everyone might be name and job If the player types job the person might respond I am a guard You might also make a topic for that person called guard so the player can ask more detail by typing guard This can continue with one topic leading to another or leading the player to ask some other person about a topic This clue hunting can be a large part of your adventure Beyond this however dialogues can do more than just display text Dialogues can ask the player questions they can offer to sell the player items they can prematurely halt the conversation give items set variables trigger attacks jump to topics automatically give random responses and run macros Some of the dialogue commands are self explanatory MERCHANT will give you a menu where you can set what items the person will sell Prices are set in the object editor All merchants will also offer to buy back items at a lower rate VAR MENU is similar with a menu you give settings like Set B to 7 for 15 TERMINATE can end a conversation immediately maybe you had offended the person ATTACK can be used to stop conversing and attack the player if you said something really bad GIVEITEM will simply give the player an item for free just one item with no menu or price SETV will simply set a variable no menu no price The various branching options however aren t quite as straight forward GOTO will jump to another topic The topics must
80. re ACK Launcher folder naming the folder to match your name GAMENAME Make sure your game is in GAMENAME ACK GAMES GAMENAME if it s not already Delete all the folders in the GAMENAME ACK GAMES folder except for your GAMENAME folder delete TUTORIAL BRIGANDS etc Delete the ACK UTIL folder Delete the ACK KITS folder In the ACK folder delete ACK BAT ACK00 EXE and ACK04 EXE through ACK10 EXE leave ACKO1 through ACK03 alone In the top GAMENAME folder delete ACK Launcher exe launcher ico dosbox conf and all the bat files except for r bat Rename r bat to GAMENAME BAT or PLAY BAT or whatever you like Edit ackmod conf in Notepad and change the last line to read ACKMOD r GAMENAME exit Make other DosBox changes to ackmod conf as desired such as scaler normal3x aspect true etc Edit the HLP files in a text editor to change the wording if desired Cut and paste from the documentation as needed Make sure to include a note about requiring DosBox Something in your documentation giving credit to me Chris Hopkins for writing the game engine would be nice too as nothing will indicate that the game is anything but your handiwork at this point If you want to make a standalone Macintosh version it is more complicated Josh Lawrence the author of the ACK launcher has graciously offered to offer help or advice time permitting You can contact him at jjsonick yahoo com Appendix D Gam
81. ro itself is called by an action Macros called other places creature death macros intro macros step macros hourly macros will not be able to queue actions Third these will be called in order there can be up to 16 queued up by the macro but they don t start until the macro ends You can however have the last QA action call another macro although the limit of 16 applies to the entire sequence so this cannot be used to QA beyond that limit QTILE QTILE 960 AT 1 Displays a quarter of a graphic tile at certain locations above below the menu The first number is the tile number Take the original the graphic tile number and multiply it by 4 This would be the first top left quadrant add 1 2 or 3 if you want to use the top right lower left or lower right quadrant The second number AT 1 is the location along the bar and is a number 1 through 6 to go above the menu in the time bar area specifically or 7 through 12 to go in the blank space between the menu and the save quit keys Useful if you want an icon to symbolize something and have it always present Normally used with skins refer to the section on custom time and screen skins SAVESCR SAVESCR Saves the current screen image to a buffer to be redisplayed with LOADSCR The macro processor generally assumes you will leave the screen like you found it so you may need to start your macro with SAVESCR and end it with LOADSCR It depends on what you are doing a
82. rom another ACK adventure IMPORT SECONDARY GRAPHIC TILES Same as above but with the secondary also called animation tile set IMPORT RAW GRAPHIC TILES Imports graphic tiles from certain other games if they store their tiles in a format that ACK can decipher Tiles can be imported from many older Origin games including Ultima 1 the re release Ultimas 3 through 5 and 2400AD Note that if this fails you can also take screenshots and use the Alt B command in the Graphic Tile editor to import from BMP files As of this writing the ACK forums on joltcountry com have a few threads on this subject IMPORT OBJECTS AND GRAPHICS Loads objects and graphic tiles from another adventure IMPORT AN ADVENTURE KIT Loads an entire adventure kit IMPORT KIT FROM ADVENTURE Loads objects creatures tiles and messages from another adventure as if it were a kit DELETE ADVENTURE Delete the game in progress saved game to prepare your adventure to be distributed Note that this deletes all saved game slots EXPORT REPORTS Creates text reports with the contents of all short messages and long messages to MESSAGES TXT dialogues to DIALOGUES TXT macros and exec table entries to MACROS TXT object definitions to OBJECTS TXT creature definitions to CREATURE TXT and game configuration to CONFIG TXT Note that you can t make changes by editing these files you still need ACK to make any changes but they make it much easie
83. rts MP3 files if you provide the lame_enc dll file from LAME above If you do use third party tools for the RAW conversion make sure they are set to encode RAW files as headerless 8 bit signed single channel 11025 Hz These files can be just about any length from a fraction of a second for special effect sounds up to 10 minutes long for music or ambient sounds Sounds are then played in ACK on one of four channels the SOUND MUSIC AMBIENT and SPEECH channels Any or all of these can play sounds simultaneously and each of these have corresponding macro commands The SOUND channel is for non looping sound effects and all actions creature sounds and combat sounds use this channel Sounds on this channel can mix more than one can play simultaneously The MUSIC channel is a looping channel used for in game music and can be set by region in the map editor The AMBIENT channel can be used by macros to play other looping sounds like ambient noises and the SPEECH channel can be used by macros or dialogues to play non looping non mixing playing one will end any other SPEECH sounds currently in play sounds for voice overs Any ACK sound can be used on any channel If you copy custom sounds into your adventure and they are within the 1 99 range allowed by the sound picker selecting sounds for creatures and actions is done through a scrolling list then they will show up in the list as their filename instead of as their default na
84. s how many days have passed in the current game in a new game it would be 0 At the start of each day there is the option of running a macro the DAILY MACRO If you wanted a game with a time limit this macro could check how many days have elapsed and act accordingly The DAY NIGHT VIEW SIZING option can give the player feeling for the passage of time during the day the display will be normal but as night falls the game will announce Night is falling and the distance that the player can see will be a shrinking circle At night the player can only see a short distance At dawn it will say Dawn is breaking and the display will slowly return to normal Use of objects that provide temporary light the TORCHLIGHT and DAYLIGHT actions can increase the view radius b A c L Li G uU R D B x I H Either way you can enable in the Configuration Editor display of an on screen clock or an on screen image showing approximate time of day and this image can be customized see the section on custom skins If you decide to use these options you will need to make a few settings in the Map Editor as well Each map has its own setting for the number of seconds or minutes that will pass during one step For an outdoor map with a large scale try a large setting maybe 5 minutes for an indoor map however the scale is much smaller so 5 or 10 seconds per step might be appropriate i 2 A C L T G U H D E H There are also
85. selection menu before changes willl appear Fa Create Adventure Select Adventure CARAVAN Configure Adventure Edit Objects HE Tile Editor Edit People ie ir Map Editor Edit Messages yo E Import a Kit Edit Macros oe Edit Font Run Adventure Ra ACK Manual Visit ACK Site Troubleshooting and Optimizing From here if you want to use the normal ACK main menu you can click the Go button to load the main ACK application after which you can close the ACK Launcher if you like There are also check boxes for enabling mouse support in ACK which some people may prefer for playing an ACK game although the editors do not take advantage of the mouse and for changing the graphic scaling options see the troubleshooting section below Or you can use the ACK Launcher to directly choose an adventure and play it or run the editors To use the ACK Launcher this way first click Select Adventure to choose one of the adventures in the ACK GAMES folder Or if you want to start work on a new adventure click Create Adventure first then Select Adventure to choose the game you just created After selecting an adventure you can use the editor buttons to launch the individual ACK editors The editors will launch with 2x scaling regardless how you have the options set above so that you can fit more editors on the screen You can run multiple editor windows and press TAB to synchronize them to each
86. skins BMP files that are used as backgrounds for the conversation This allows you to have portraits for the characters the player meets Refer to the BRIGANDS demo adventure for an example Dialogue skin files are named TALKx BMP where x is the dialogue number Dialogues can also manually call other skins and they can be numbered up to 9999 if you want even more control over the portrait to show expressions or to simulate having other characters interrupting or joining the conversation You don t need to match the game palette perfectly in your dialogue skins but at least the text colors and the background color need to match So if your text is white 15 on black 0 then colors 0 and 15 in the BMP color palette need to be black and white or things will look funny If in doubt just make sure your dialogue skins use the same palette Dialogue Topics You can insert or delete lines with Alt I and Alt D You can highlight keywords in a topic to hint to the player that they could ask about that word to continue the thread by pressing F5 To insert a yes no question in the topic press Alt Q The question must be on or before the line The Y line begins the YES response and the N line begins the NO response Questions can also be used with the ITEMTAKE command see the section below Dialogue Commands Dialogue responses may also have commands which can trigger certain events in the conversation To change a
87. sounds creature sounds are played on this channel Sounds on this channel do not loop but they do mix you can have several playing at once over top of each other SPEECH SPEECH 63 Plays a sound on the speech channel a non looping sound channel that can be used for voice overs such as in dialogues Sounds on this channel do not mix playing another sound will stop any speech sound already in play Play sound 0 to stop it STOP STOP Ends the macro TBMP TBMP 306 Like SHOWBMP but the color of the lower left pixel is considered the transparent color for the rest of the image Useful for overlaying one BMP onto another or overlaying special effects if you can match the BMP palette with the game palette Warning it is likely to be slow as it has to loop through each pixel TMOSAIC TMOSAIC 5 Like MOSAIC but blank space is transparent USEARMR USEARMR 2 Turns ON armor type 1 7 See OFFARMR WAITKEY WAITKEY Waits for a keypress It will say PRESS A KEY If you want to wait for a keypress without any screen text use GETKEY 0 Misc Tips and Tricks Darkness and the Game Clock You can enhance the realism and mood of your game by giving a sense of time and or a sense of darkness There are a few ways to do this and you can use any or all of them Most of the settings are in the Configuration Editor The TIME setting is the time of day in 24 hour time The DAYS ELAPSED setting show
88. ter similar problems you may want to try reduce the CPU load see below or experiment with different settings in the dosbox conf file Performance issues If performance is poor either in ACK or on your computer when you run ACK then you can change the CPU load of the DosBox window with the Control F11 and Control F12 keys to decrease increase CPU cycles and the Control F7 and Control F8 keys to decrease increase the frame skip Keyboard issues Macintosh ACK often requires you to press Function keys like F10 to exit an editor On newer Mac laptops the function keys are by default mapped to hardware functions so in that case you will need to hold down Fn F10 You will also need to hold down Fn to use DOSBox s function key controls for instance to slow down cpu cycles you will need to hold down Fn CTRL F11 If you want to use the function keys in ACK and DOSBox without having to hold down Fn launch OS X System Preferences go to the Mouse amp Keyboard menu and check the box that reads Use F1 F12 Keys to control software features Note that after doing this pressing Fn F1 F12 will control hardware features and you can uncheck the box to revert to standard function key behavior at any time Patching and updating ACK If minor bug fixes are released they may be done as a hot fix which includes just a collection of EXE and OVR files to apply a hot fix just replace your existing files with the new ones Major new r
89. ter the appearance of basic game elements often called a skin These skin BMP images must match either the ACK palette if you use the default colors or the palette you set in your PALETTE BMP file If the BMP file has a different palette it will be ignored and you will see funky colors Note also that many of these features require an adventure to be set as v3 0 or higher Not a problem if you re creating a new game as it will be v3 2 The original copies of the SKIN files can be found in the ACK SKINS folder Do not modify the original copies of the files copy them to your adventure folder and modify the copies Palette If you have a PALETTE BMP file in your adventure folder ACK will use the 256 color palette in this file instead of using the default ACK palette Note that it reads only the color table from the metadata of the file it ignores the content of the image entirely So any old image that has the palette you want will do Much of ACK assumes however that colors 0 15 will be the standard 16 DOS colors and especially that 0 will be black so some tweaking may be necessary Time Bar This is a small 58 pixel by 10 pixel bar in the upper right corner of the screen above the key menu showing a different small image depending on time of day This uses the skin file TSKIN BMP You can also make region specific skins by naming the files TSKINx BMP where x is the region number You can customize the look of th
90. tors Short messages are used all over an adventure mostly by objects for example terrain can have a short message used when passage is blocked or when the object is examined SHORT MESSAGE LONG MESSAGE DIALOGUE MOSAIC Y MOSAIC EXPORT MESSAGES TXT Long messages are used in the introduction and title sequences or as needed by objects and macros for ots not an taek example a road sign might use a long message to show the ATC CLEAR MSG ESC QUIT SAVE all g all S SET COLOR Al D DELETE MSG player a large amount of text QUIT healthier EDIT MESSAGE ESC QUIT SAVE R All D DE All AlT S SET COLO LETE MSG Hi After reading the scroll you feel il Editing works the same for each use the arrow keys to move the cursor Alt 0 thru Alt 6 will change the text color colors are defined in the configuration editor Alt C will clear the message and Alt D will delete the message Press ESC to quit and save You can have up to 255 of each message type Mosaic Editor Mosaics can only be used in macros You can have up to 255 mosaics They can be displayed normally MOSAIC x to fill the screen by themselves or transparent to overlay them onto something else like a long message TMOSAIC x The introduction sequence in the CARAVAN adventure was done with macros placing transparent mosaics onto long messages Draw with the A thru G keys Configure each key with Alt A thru AIt G Erase with the Spa
91. tum wine and he tells you to ask around about it Talk to the bar serving girl To talk to her you have to buy a drink for two coins If you ask her about conditum she ll tell you to talk to Remus Go outside follow the road west then north then go west into the shop Talk to Remus and ask him about conditum He ll ask you who told you to ask him say Tela she s the serving girl and then he ll give you a bottle Go back and talk to the bartender and talk to him about conditum then give him the bottle He ll tell you to talk to the soldier outside about his friend Go outside then go west and talk to the guy in blue with the staff Ask him about friend and he ll tell you about his friend Trajan and how you should talk to the constable and have him release Trajan to be your guide Go east then north then east Talk to the guy on the chair ask him about Trajan and guide He ll sign the release that lets you go talk to Trajan Go back to the town center fountain then west then south to the prison Go through the west door then talk to the guy in the north cell Tell him you want him to be your guide Go through the conversation and he ll tell you the plan is to go to Egypt to the city of Memphis and then east from there Now you re ready to talk to Lydia in the bar She s sitting by herself on the north side of the room She ll ask you to buy her a drink you already bought one earli
92. tures to give you an idea of what can be done with the game system TUTORIAL This demo adventure rewritten for ACK 3 2 introduces you to the basic game engine concepts explaining what you are seeing as you go It serves as a sort of tribute to 80 s gaming in general using content from a few of the games that inspired ACK such as Ultima V Adventure Construction Set and 2400AD This adventure is the best example of what the newer version of the ACK engine is capable of doing BRIGANDS An example of a small short adventure only a few regions and people to talk to Mostly combat driven There s a walkthrough at the end of the manual This is a very old adventure it s been part of ACK since version 1 with minimal changes and does not Ms demonstrate the full capabilities of the ACK engine You ou re not yet reddy to comman the ce the wa sion force PRESS A KEY TO CONTINUE dpi CARAVAN An example of a medium sized ACK adventure and one that is more puzzle and conversation driven When you play remember that most of the game is strategic finding clues and solving puzzles If you think with your fists you will not solve the game If you want to know if someone is hostile use the Look command on them and it will tell you The plot of Caravan in short is that you are a Roman citizen who wants to travel east You must first find your way out of the city There is no combat in the early stages of the game everything
93. ugh These tiles will of course look better if as shown above you edge them with a border color to separate them from the background In the examples above black was used as an edge color The tile editor can auto edge tiles while editing the tile press Alt E You will be asked which color to use for the edge color 0 9 from your pen colors and it will then auto draw an edge for that tile EDIT OBJECTS ITEMS TERRAIN Manage your terrain weapons items etc The player will spend all their time walking on two dimensional top view maps which are composed completely of the objects items and terrain which you will create or edit here The adventure kits include the basic objects that you will need but you must make a few of your own if you want to have a unique game Almost all actions and messages that you will see and do in ACK are directly related to these objects Objects have different features depending on their category Object Catagories SPACE Terrain type generally defines a passable square grass tile floor but you can define it to be passable only in certain conditions water locked door or to be impassable table counter Has a Transparent Opaque setting that determines if you can see on the other side of it Space terrain even if impassable will allow ranged weapon shots to pass unless set to opaque SPACE Custom Space instead of having a preset action parameter it will prompt you for one
94. umber or Mx where x is a number files they are files from older versions of ACK and are no longer used They can be deleted Preparing an Adventure for Distribution First in the Configuration Editor make sure that Cheat mode is not set to debug mode Next any Saved Game files should be deleted before distributing an adventure This can be done manually or with the IMPORT FILES module You may also wish to delete any TXT files the reports may contain spoilers and set a password in the configuration editor to disable editing and cheat keys You can then zip up your adventure folder and distribute it You can also distribute your adventure as a standalone program refer to Appendix C Using an Adventure as a Kit To use an adventure as a kit copy the folder to ACK KITS delete all Saved Game and Map files and rename the MST file to KIT Then create a DOC file the length and number of characters per line are very limited use the DOC file from one of the other kits as a template describing the kit Appendix C Distributing Standalone Adventures An ACK adventure can be made into a standalone game in Windows by removing or renaming certain files In this example GAMENAME refers to the name of your adventure replace it with whatever you like oe a a 10 11 12 13 Perform the prep steps in Appendix B setting cheat mode deleting saved game etc Make a copy of the enti
95. utheast part of the map you ll find another fort Enter it and use the silver key to get inside 7 In the west wing talk to the demon and offer to help him with the evil priest that has summoned him He will give you another wand this one is single target but will almost always kill in one hit and is the only weapon that can kill the evil priest Ready the new wand 8 In the east wing kill the evil priest move his corpse pick it up and drop it somewhere else and take and read his book it will give you a keyword to use later 9 Outside join the battle encampment and you will begin the final battle Use the death wand and don t kill the guys in blue they re on your side You re looking to get inside the inner labyrinth of the castle where you need to find the demon king and read him the word from the book you found earlier This will vanquish him and win the game Caravan 10 11 2 13 14 LS 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 29 26 2H 28 29 30 The game starts in Rome Stand next to the box in your house and look at it to open it Take everything from the box Leave then follow the road west then south then east to the town center with the fountain Enter the tavern to the east Talk to the bartender he ll try to sell you a drink for two coins although you can say no Ask him job then price and he ll offer to help you if you get him some condi
96. ves you an Image menu that lets you perform basic transformations flipping rotating and moving Importing from BMP files Pressing Alt B while in Select Mode will replace the currently selected tile with a 16x16 piece taken from a BMP file of your choice Just press Alt B and provide the path and filename to the BMP file you want to use It must be 320x200 256 color and placed somewhere ACK can see it Then move the selector square so that the piece you want to import is completely enclosed Use the arrow keys to move and press ENTER to make the capture If you want to import multiple tiles from the same BMP you can just press ENTER without typing anything at the filename prompt the next time you use Alt B Once you import the tile you will be placed into Edit mode where you can make any required changes You may need to perform color replacements depending on the palette used in the BMP file Or you may change the palette of your adventure by creating a PALETTE BMP file in your adventure folder Note that as of this writing the ACK forums on joltcountry com have a few threads on the subject of importing tiles Tile Transparency As of v3 230 ACK supports transparency for items and creatures This is done by setting a mask color which for items and creatures only will be rendered transparent by the engine and any pixels of the mask color will show the underlying terrain pixels instead For example if you were And
97. ween Creatures and Players Creature ability scores are simplified from player ability scores Creatures do not use STRENGTH INTELLIGENCE or Magic Points ENERGY Creatures do not require ammunition for their weapons Creatures are not affected by ACTIONS They may be affected by some MACROS and by DIALOGUES however Creatures cannot use PORTALS they are stuck in the room or the map they are in They also cannot pass many types of terrain only PASSABLE BY ANYTHING and PASSABLE IF HOLDING with Vehicle will allow a creature to pass Creature Equipment These items determine how the creature attacks and moves but the names of these items are never revealed to the player and the items are not dropped as loot for the player WEAPONS The first weapon is a short range weapon the second is a ranged weapon The creature will prefer the weapon that does more damage If the creature has no weapons and is put into combat it will try to run away ARMOR The armor that protects the creature Only one piece may be used Note Since the names of the items are never given to the player you could use normal weapons for animals VEHICLE This setting determines how the creature can move It can be set to a terrain confining the creature to that terrain or it can be set to an item or vehicle allowing the creature to walk on passable if holding terrain or forbidding passage 1f the vehicle settings forbid it You can also press F here to make th
98. when you place the terrain on the map Useful for things like signs where each one will say something unique but you don t want to have to make 10 different sign objects OBSTACLE Terrain type always impassable wall mountains Always blocks ranged weapon shots OBSTACLE Custom Obstacle prompts for the action parameter when you place it on the map PORTAL Moves the player to a different location when they step on it Any transition except for macros from one map to another or one part of a map to another except for overlapping rooms on a room type map requires portals The destination is set when you place the portal in the map editor MISC ITEM An item that can be carried in a player s inventory but is not a weapon or armor They may be an item with an action when Used they may be an item required elsewhere key ammo or they may be trinkets loot that can be sold to a merchant for cash WEAPON A weapon used to attack adjacent spaces RANGED WEAPON A weapon used to attack non adjacent spaces They have the option of using ammunition and can have different range limits and sound effects They normally attack a single tile but can be set to have a blast radius around the target or to attack point blank from the player in a stream or cone ARMOR An item that can be worn to protect from damage Each armor has a type and the character can wear up to one armor piece of each type There are seven types so the player c
99. with sealed doors In room type maps because you can stack terrain you can create even more interesting effects like having creatures appear in the middle of the room perhaps cutting off the player s retreat Just add this object 106 FLOOR 2 space Make it look and act just like your usual room floor Replace with eliminate In your room place some creatures then place this floor over top of them This will suppress them they won t act move be visible etc until the floor is removed from them Then add this line to your macro 4 QA 18 106 removes the fake floor revealing the creatures You could of course use this trick for more than just creatures anything can be stacked in room type maps so you can also use this trick to reveal items portals other switches etc Assuming you are hiding the other items under the same 106 FLOOR 2 object the macro would not change Mountain Climbing The Ultima kit includes an object called climbing gear that can be used to climb mountains with the custom key command K Klimb Similar to Ultima V Note that it uses the B variable in a way that would prevent you from using it elsewhere Here s how it s done In the Configuration Editor Extra Command 1 key K Extra Command 1 macro 6 The objects required MOUNTAIN space opaque Action Set variable B to 0 Triggered by passing Passable to Variable B gt 0 CLIMBING GEAR misc item

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