WILDERLAND A Hobbit Environment (c) 2012-2019 by CH wilderland AT aonDOTat CONTENT ======= (0) Legal Info (1) Introduction (2) Game Versions (3) Installing WL (4) Obtaining The Game Files (5) Starting 'Wilderland' (6) Controlling 'Wilderland' (7) The Objects (8) References (0) - Legal Info ================ WILDERLAND is (c) 2012 by CH. You may use/modify it for private use; if you want to distribute a program based on WILDERLAND, please contact the author at wilderland AT aonDOTat "The Hobbit" is (c) Melbourne House, 1982. Written by Veronika Megler and Philip Mitchell. Simple Direct Media Layer library (SDL 1.2) from www.libsdl.org (GNU licence). Z80 emulator based on Marat Fayzullin's work from 2007. Free for non-profit projects (fms.komkon.org). 8x8 charset from ZX Spectrum ROM (c) by Amstrad; use granted for emulators. Makefiles for GCC and GNUtool-chain was written by Valerio Messina (efa@iol.it) YOU ARE NOT ALLOWED TO DISTRIBUTE 'WILDERLAND' TOGETHER WITH HOBBIT BINARIES! (1) - Introduction ================== WILDERLAND (WL) allows you to see what's REALLY going on in this wonderful world created by Veronika Megler and Philip Mitchell in 1982 at Melbourne House. It runs the original game code in a rudimentary Spectrum emulator, while displaying the state of objects and animals, the current positions of the latter, and a log what all the other creatures (NPC) do while Bilbo is in one place. (2) - Game Versions =================== According to an inverview with Philip Mitchell [1] there have been two published versions of "The Hobbit": the initial realease (called V 1.1 for 'vanity' reasons) and a bug-fixed V 1.2, that are easy to identify through the authors' names in the loading screen. Both of these games are available for download on the 'World of Spectrum' web site [3], though they are referenced as V 1.0 and V 1.2 there. The main research object for the author of 'Wilderland' was his own tape version of the game transfered to PC sometimes in the 90ies. With the original tape long gone, it can't be reconstructed, which version this should have been. BUT IT IS CLEAR THAT IT IS NEITHER V 1.0 (1.1) NOR V 1.2. The code differs in a number of aspects from both. Some facts indicate that this so called 'Version OWN' was released between V 1.0 (1.1) and V 1.2, though this has to be researched more thoroughly at a later time. The following game versions are supported in WL: V 1.0 (1.1) V OWN V 1.2 (3) - Installing WL =================== (3.1) - Windows Just unzip all files to a directory. The package includes the source files and a compiled version of WL. There are also a number of support files (loading screen, high-res map, graphics DLL etc.) included. WL was developed with 'Pelles C for Windows, V 6.50.8', Simple Direct Media Layer library (SDL 1.2) from www.libsdl.org (GNU licence), and a Z80 emulator based on Marat Fayzullin's work from 2007 (fms.komkon.org) under Windows XP. (3.2) - Linux In 2019 Valerio Messina (efa@iol.it) from Italy ported WL to Linux. The files are available on the Wilderland homepage, too. WL is the Linux64 executable and WL32 is the Linux32 executable. To build sources on Linux, just run 'make' (make -f Makefile32 on Linux 32bit). (4) - Obtaining the game files ============================== The actual game files (ZX Spectrum binaries) you need to run WL are NOT included in the WL download package for copyright reasons. You may get them from various abandonware websites like 'World of Spectrum' [3]. I hereby explicitly prohibit the distribution of 'Wilderland' together with the Hobbit binaries! Step-by-Step-Instruction: (4.1) Go to http://www.worldofspectrum.org (4.2) Select 'Archive!' - 'Text Adventures' - 'H' - 'Hobbit, The' (4.3) Download 'HobbitTheV1.2.tap.zip' (or 'HobbitTheV1.0.tap.zip') (4.4) Unzip the 'HOBBIT12.TAP' (or 'HOBBIT.TAP') file into the 'TapCon' directory. (4.5) Run 'TapCon.exe' to extract the game binaries. (4.6) Copy 'HOB_V12.bin' (or 'HOB_V10.bin') to the WL directory. (5) - Starting 'Wilderland' =========================== Run WL from the command line with the following command: WL -V10|-OWN|-V12 [-FULLSCREEN] [-MAXSPEED] [-NOSCANLINES] [-SEEDRND] '-V10', '-OWN' or '-V12' selects the game version (if binary is available) -FULLSCREEN runs the game in fullscreen mode (only recommended for screens with 1280 x 1024 pixel native resolution) -MAXSPEED runs the emulator with maximum speed (useful if you just want to see the NPCs roam around). Otherwise the Spectrum speed with an appr. 30 seconds wait cycle is emulated. -NOSCANLINES suppresses the TV-like scanlines in the game window (less authentic but better for the eye!). -SEEDRND. The game uses the Z80 processor's refresh register to generate random numbers. With this option this register is initialized to an arbitrary value to make game play more unpredictable. (6) - Controlling 'Wilderland' ============================== The 'Wilderland' screen is divided into a number of different windows with the following layout: +--------+----------------+-----------+ | | | | | | Game | | | Log | Window | Attribute | | Window | | Window | | +----------------+ | | | Command Window | | +--------+----------------+-----------+ | | | | | Map Window | | | | | +-------------------------------------+ Log Window: shows what's going on in the 'background' of the game (e.g. what the NPC do in their respective rooms) [4]. Game Window: this is an exact representation of the Spectrum's screen while the game is running. Command Window: this is Wilderland's command window. Help information is displayed within or filenames for load/save commands can be entered. Attribute Window: the state of all objects (and animals [including you] which are also objects in the game's context) is displayed here. See section "(7) - The Objects" for a full reference. Map Window: the position of all the animals is indicated in this game map (a high-res version for print-out can be found in the 'Design' directory of WL). Dead animals have an additional '+' attached to their names. When running WL you control two different environments: the game itself and the emulator. !!! THE BASIC PRINCIPLE IS THE FOLLOWING: JUST TYPING GOES TO !!! !!! THE GAME, WHILE CAPS-SHIFTED LETTERS CONTROL THE EMULATOR. !!! (6.1) - Game Control a-z ............... these letters appear in the game's input line . and , ........... full stop and comma are also used for input 0 and BACKSPACE ... are the DELETE keys for the game @ ................. is the 'do-the-last-command-again' key The cursor keys for walking and Shift-0 for clearing the whole input line are not supported. (6.2) - Environment Control H ... Help - A short overview over commands and abbreviations I ... Info - Legal infos on the software are displayed S ... Save - Saves the current state of the game L ... Load - Loads a previous saved game No filename editing is possible in SAVE and LOAD. If you mistyped, just press ENTER and start again. - Be sure to load only V10 games into WL if the emulator is running in V10-mode (the same applies to V12 of course). G ... Go - Jump directly to a specific room. Enter number in hex and press enter (no editing is possible). See the map in the \Design directory for a reference on room numbers. NB: this 'beaming' only transports you, the objects you are holding stay in place (though technically you still possess them)! Q ... Quit - Quits the emulator. If the console window stays on the screen, press another key to close it also. (7) - The Objects ================= The object database is (beside the room and dictionary database) one of the core items of the game. The following information is stored for each object: Object Number: the game's internal object reference number (NPCs are >= 60d). Name: the object's full name (a noun and a maximum of two adjectives). 1L (first location): most objects do only appear in one location, which is referenced here as room number (see game map). Some objectes (eg. doors) are visible from more than one room, in these cases only the first room is indicated. # (number of): how many times the object appears in the game. MO (mother object): if an object is carried or enclosed within another object this object is referenced by its object number (or 0xFF if this is not the case). Vo (volume): the object's volume. Ma (mass): the object's mass. 04 (property with offset +04): currently unknown St (strength): the object's strength (eg. used in fighting) 06 (property with offset +06): currently unknown Attributes (each object has 8 binary attributes associated with it): v: visible A: animal (otherwise it is an object) o: open (otherwise it is closed) *: gives light b: broken (or dead for animals) f: full F: it is a fluid (water, wine) l: locked (8) - References ================ [1] http://www.othermindsmagazine.com/downloads/other-hands-magazine-archive/ Other%20Hands%20Issue%2018.pdf (page 5f) [2] http://www.avventuretestuali.com/interviste/megler-eng [3] http://www.worldofspectrum.org [4] I haven't found out yet, where the spaces go missing... ;-) README.TXT Version 1.08 - 20190915