- STAR HERITAGE - (C) "Step" creative group, 1995 Storyline: Yuriy Matveev Coding: Sergey Shishlyannikov Graphics: Dmitriy Usmanov Sound: Yuriy Matveev We're proud to present our new project, "Star Heritage"! You are a secret agent of the Central Union of Human Colonies who has suffered a crash on an unknown planet, far from the interstellar routes. The user-friendly interface developed especially for this game ensures comfortable gameplay. The com- mands are entered via a system of menus instead of a text prompt. The control panel is located in the lower third of the screen and consists of several windows with different func- tions. Let's have a closer look at them. The leftmost window displays your main attributes. The five vertical bars rep- resent: H -- Health P -- Power S -- Stamina E -- Experience L -- Level Health is your "life energy". If it falls to zero you will die. Health decreases during long walks and fights. Food, rest, and medicine will help regain Health. Power is a measure of your physical strength and is especially important for close combat affecting the damage that your strikes inflict on your opponent. Power is affected by the same factors as Health. Stamina indicates how easily you can withstand the enemy's blows in com- bat. As with Health, you will lose Stamina during walks and regain it when resting. Experience grows throughout the game. The more you have, the easier you will be able to defeat your opponents and tolerate hardship. Level affects all your other attributes except Experience. The higher your Level the stronger and more enduring you are. A higher level will also make you more powerful in close com- bat. It is incremented when your experience reaches a maximum. Experience and Level can be increased only through the exploration of the game world. The display to the right of the informa- tion window shows the time of day repre- sented by the sun's position in the sky. It can show morning, day, evening, or night. Resting takes a quarter of the day, as does walking from one location to another. The time of day is an impor- tant factor as it affects the behaviour of other game characters. For example, at night people tend to sleep, while predators go hunting. The compass in the centre of the panel will help you travel across the planet by showing the directions you can go from the current location when you decide to move. The right section of the panel is the command menu. It will allow you to explore and interact with the game world by choosing one of the following actions: GO Allows you travel to an adjacent location. The available directions will flash on the compass. Remember that moving between locations takes a quarter of a day. That is, if you leave in the morning then you'll arrive at the next location during the day. If you don't want to go any- where, then choose Cancel. REST will let you partially restore your Health, Stamina, and Power. Remember that constant walking without rest will lead to a quick loss of energy. Be wary of resting for too long though as you may get cold and hun- gry; and there are places where low- ering your guard and resting can be deadly. INVENTORY shows the items you are carry- ing and lets you inspect them. EXAMINE lets you inspect something which is not in your inventory. USE is the most comprehensive command. In the course of the game you'll come across many objects usable in one way or another. For example, to use a door means to enter it. Sometimes you will need to specify a second, indi- rect, object, e.g.: use a key with a door to unlock it. DROP lets you drop an unwanted item on the ground. TAKE allows you to pick up an item. There is a weight limit to how much you can carry, so be selective. TALK is used to communicate with other characters. They may have items or information you need. If the charac- ter is willing to talk, you will be presented a list of phrases to choose from. Type the number of the required phrase to converse. GIVE lets you give an item from your inventory to another character. Use it also to buy or sell things. The menu list concludes with global game commands: MUSIC turns music on/off (128k only). NEW GAME starts a new game. CHANGE COLOR switches between color and black and white modes. Useful with black and white displays. SAVE GAME saves your current progress to the disk. You can do it at any time using one of the four available slots. LOAD GAME loads a previously saved game. Everything above concerned the mode of exploration. The other mode in the game is that of combat. You will enter Combat mode if you attack somebody, or are attacked yourself. When this happens the combat music will play and the word 'Combat!' will appear on the screen. Be ready, for as soon as you press "Select", the fight will begin. In Combat mode, an hourglass divides the panel's right window, with your statis- tics on the left and your opponent's on the right. In each half, Health is shown above the heart icon and the power of a strike above the picture of a fist. The latter will constantly change and you must strike blows when it is at a maxi- mum. The depleting sand in the hourglass measures one combat turn and both you and your enemy will be allowed one strike each per turn. You won't get much time for it, so be quick! The hourglass will keep resetting until one or the other is vanquished. You are now ready to start playing. If you have any questions or comments about the game, please contact us at: 125130, Moscow, PO box 51, "STEP" Creative Group.