Adventure Game Toolkit Editor by Teemu Erämaa. BETA VERSION 1.0 Table of Contents: 1.1 What is this program? 1.12 What do I need to use this program? 1.13 System Requirements 1.2 Starting AGTEDIT at the first time. (For learning program fast). 1.4 Menubar and its contents 1.4.1 Room edit 1.4.2 Creature edit 1.4.3 Noun edit 1.5 List of limits and bugs. 2.0 How the AGTEDIT really works?? 2.5 Trouble shooting 3.0 Version Differences. 4.0 Copyrights and so on... 1.1 WHAT IS THIS PROGRAM? This Program, ADVENTURE GAME TOOLKIT - EDITOR (AGTE), is just a plain editor for helping your way to make your own adventure games with ADVENTURE GAME TOOLKIT (AGT) easily and much much faster! I've tried as much as possible to create fast file-handling system, but on slower machines, that Parsing-routine could take long. You just have to wait. This version was finished on a busy schedule. Next version will be more full of stuff. 1.12 WHAT DO I NEED TO USE THIS PROGRAM? Of course, You NEED to have AGT to compile files that AGTEdit makes because without it, this program is useless. You can get AGT from internet: ftp://ftp.gmd.de/if-archive/programming/agt/ or http://ifarchive.flavorplex.com/if-archive/programming/agt/ You can also check out Mark Welch's site: Http://www.markwelch.com/ This version (Beta 1.0) supports: - "Normal AGT" - Version 1.7 (File extension .DAT) Editor could work on others versions too, but I don't know, because I haven't got a change to try them out. Still, if you have a DIFFERENT version of AGT, this editor MIGHT work, but it would mean that you had to change some things in your .DAT or .AGT file by yourself. 1.13 SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS System requirements: - IBM-compatible computer(286 should be ok, but files may load REALLY slow). - AGT (Adventure Game Toolkit - Program.) - At least 50000 Kb free disk space (+ more, if you have big .DAT files) - About 400K of memory - MS-DOS 3.0 or higher - EDIT.COM for editing descriptions. If you don't have it, rename another text-editor (e.g. QEDIT) to EDIT.COM to the same directory as AGTE is. 1.2 Starting AGTEDIT at the first time. You should know a little bit of AGT's language. If you haven't learned AGT before, you can press F1 in the editor for help. I suggest you to make an extra directory for AGTE and .DAT files!!!! You should have at least these files in your directory: - AGT-EDIT.EXE (The AGTE program) - AGT-EDIT.TXT (Readme file, which you are now reading) - AGTEXTRA.TXT (Readme file, which shows extra about AGTE) - AGTEHELP.TXT (Help file for the program. Press F1 to use!) - EXAMPLE.DAT (Example game for you to try out) ** Make backup copies from the files you are going to edit ** To run AGTE, type command: AGT-EDIT.EXE [FILE.DAT] {/Optional switch} - FILE.DAT is the game you want to edit or create. - Type command AGT-EDIT.EXE /HELP to get more info about switches. At the MENUBAR, there should be commands like FILE, EDIT, VIEW and so on... First, open the EXAMPLE.DAT file. 1.4 MENUBAR AND ITS CONTENTS FILE - NEW (New) - OPEN (To open a file - run by AGT-EDIT.EXE file.dat) - SAVE AS (Save game as.. and compile) - COMPILE/SAVE (Compile or save the game) - DOS SHELL (Dos shell) - EXIT (Exit) EDIT - ROOM (Jumps to room-edit window) - NOUN (Jumps to noun-edit window) - CREATURE (Jumps to creature-edit window) - INTRO (Lets you edit intro file) - VERBS (Lets you edit verb file) - SYNONYMS (Lets you edit synonyms file) VIEW - ADVENTURE MAP (Lets you view adv.map) - ROOMS (You can view your rooms) - CREATURES (You can view your creatures) - NOUNS (You can view your nouns) HELP - HELP - ABOUT (About AGTE) MISC - SEARCH - OPTIONS (Edit values of .DAT file and colors etc..) 1.4.1 ROOM EDIT If you know AGT's language already, this window should be self-explonary. Press + and - to scroll between rooms. Just remind you, that you can use q,w,e,r,a,s,d,f,z,x,c,v keys to move around: q = NORTHWEST w = NORTH e = NORTHEAST r = UP a = WEST s = ENTER d = EAST f = DOWN z = SOUTHWEST x = SOUTH c = SOUTHEAST v = EXIT 1.4.2 CREATURE EDIT If you know AGT's language already, this window should be self-explonary. Press + and - to scroll between creatures. 1.4.3 NOUN EDIT If you know AGT's language already, this window should be self-explonary. Press + and - to scroll between nouns. By pressing [Enter] on PUSHABLE, PULLABLE, TURNABLE and PLAYABLE, you can edit their descriptions. 1.5 LIST OF LIMITS AND BUGS. - The first big thing that is kinda of limit in AGTEDIT is that it changes some of your original .DAT file. For instance all your remarks in the source file could get lost. (If you don't specify a file for them in the MISC - OPTIONS menu) This is because AGTEDIT tries to clean everything unnecessary from the source to work faster. - You can't edit .CMD or .MSG files with AGTE! (Yet) - You shouldn't leave your remarks to your .DAT files like this: ROOM 45(* First hall *) Hall(* Name of the room *) WEST 41(* To outside *) NORTH 56(* To living room *) END_ROOM It is hard for the editor to understand. So I suggest you to put a SPACE BETWEEN NUMBER AND REMARK!! Like this: ROOM 45 (* First hall *) Hall (* Name of the room *) WEST 41 (* To outside *) NORTH 56 (* To living room *) END_ROOM - Some events/bugs *MIGHT* occur to your source file, that will cause misunderstandings with the AGT's compiler (Like that one above ^). You have to fix these problems by yourself directly editing the source.dat. If you find a bug which is really big & annoying, I suggest you to e-mail me, and I'll try to fix the bug for you. **** This version of AGTE is BETA! So, if you have some bug-reports, **** **** ideas for new features or anything else please, mail me! I would **** **** be glad to know what users think about this piece of crap. **** 2.0 HOW THE AGTEDIT REALLY WORKS?? If you want to know more about how agtedit works I've done a special AGTEXTRA.TXT file, where I'll explain most of it. 2.5 TROUBLE SHOOTING Q: {Question} A: {Answer} Q: OH NO! My PC jammed during editing my game! All my data got lost! A: There's one way to get them back. Don't run the AGT-EDIT.EXE yet, or do not destroy directory BINARY, because there are all the temp files. Run AGTE by command AGT-EDIT.EXE /OLDTEMP instead. This will cause the editor to use the old temporary files by not deleting them. Q: Is there a way to edit PLAY_DESCR or PUSH_DESCR and other events?? A: Yes. When in the Noun Editor, press [Enter] on switch PLAYABLE or PUSHABLE. Q: I have some things in my .DAT file, that don't exist in the AGTEditor! Like I have room number 5 lost, even it IS in my GAME.DAT!!! A: You have to check is there too close remarks in your .dat file, or commands like: END ROOM DESCRIPTION or END NOUN. If you find them, fix them to END_ROOM_DESCRIPTION or END_NOUN... Q: When I try to edit descriptions, "Program too big to fit in memory" text flashes in the screen and nothing else happends. A: This is because AGTE tries to open EDIT.COM, but you are low on memory. You must free up some memory to get it working, or edit descriptions from the .DAT file by yourself. Q: This editor is too slow! A: Buy a better computer. (Or try to use /FASTER option) Q: I start the editor by: AGT-EDIT.EXE C:\GAMES\AGT\CAVE.DAT, but when I compile, the result is that I can't find the CAVE.DAT anywhere!!!! A: This is tricky. I try to fix it to the next version... :) DO NOT!!!! DO NOT use other files, than those in the same directory as AGTE is! Otherwise AGTE will delete the original file, when it thinks to delete one in BINARY directory... Q: I get lots of "Bad command or file name" messages. And I can't do much in the editor, like edit descriptions. A: You don't have EDIT.COM program, or your DOS-version is incorrect. Try commands like RD, MD, CD, DEL in your command prompt to get clear of it. 3.0 VERSION DIFFERENCES. This version of AGTE (Beta 1.0) is the first version ever made. So THAT'S why this program is so full of bugs! If you notice annoying bug, and want it go away, e-mail me @ (*e-mail removed*) Next version is probably for the Masters Edition V.1.5 and for the AGT-BIG. 4.0 COPYRIGHTS AND SO ON... This editor is produced by G.A.S.P. Code written by Teemu Erämaa. I used Ian Musgrave's DIR$-function (Thank you Ian). CONTACT THE AUTHOR (Teemu Erämaa) If you want to reach me from some reason (Bugs, help, new features...): - My e-mail address is : *removed* - Post address : *removed* - website : http://teemu.eramaa.fi ****************************** END OF TXT FILE! ******************************