telefrag.man

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  @!!   @!!!:!   @!!      @!!!:!   @!!!:!   @!@!!@!  @!@!@!@! !@! @!@!@
  !!:   !!:      !!:      !!:      !!:      !!: :!!  !!:  !!! :!!   !!:
   :    : :: ::: : ::.: : : :: :::  :        :   : :  :   : :  :: :: :

How to play:

    Controls:
        Left Arrow:
            Turn Left
        Right Arrow:
            Turn Right
        Up Arrow:
            Move Forward
        Down Arrow:
            Move Backwards

        X Key:
            Strafe Left
        C Key:
            Strafe Right

        Space Bar:
            Shoot Revolver
            Revolver has 6 shots before you must reload.

        V Key:
            Manually Reload

    Pickups:
        Health:
            Refils part of your health. If you run out of health you die
            and must respawn.
        Ammo:
            Refils a few bullets worth of ammo, you'll still have to reload
            however. Run out of these and you're a stitting duck.
        Armor:
            Refils part of your armor. Armor absorbs half of incoming damage.

Map building:

    This section is for people who are interested in making their own Telefrag
    maps.

    Getting started:
        First, you'll need to name your map. For this example, we'll call our
        map 'mymap' (without the quotes).

        Start by building the following directory tree:
            mymap/
            mymap/walls/
            mymap/sprites/

            NOTE: The root directory will determine the name of your map

        Next create the following two files:
            mymap/mymap.data
            mymap/mymap.meta

            NOTE: The file names must match the name of the root directory

            The 'mymap.data' file stores the layout of your map
            The 'mymap.meta' file stores the location of items and spawnpoints

        Now let's make a simple map by editing 'mymap.data':
            1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1
            1,0,0,0,1,0,0,0,1,0,0,0,1
            1,0,2,0,1,0,2,0,1,0,2,0,2
            2,0,2,0,0,0,2,0,0,0,2,0,2
            2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2

            This will create zig-zag style map layout.
            Each number indicates which texture will be used to draw that wall.

            The top left tile is at location (0, 0)

            The number 0 indicates that there is no wall here.
            The perimeter of your map MAY NOT contain the value 0. This
            prevents players from falling off the map.

            All numbers in mymap.data must be positive integers or 0
            The numbers CAN be longer than one digit. The following is valid:

            10,134,512
            132,0,516
            243,123,6

            Maps must be rectangular, each line must contain the same number
            of commas. The map file may only contain the following characters
            "0" "1" "2" "3" "4" "5" "6" "7" "8" "9" "," "\n" The map file may
            not contain spaces and my not have two consecutive commas.

            "1,1,1,1,1" VALID
            "1,1,,11,1" INVALID: ",," Is not valid

        Now for every number used within mymap.data a corresponding wall
        texture must be created:
            Since we used the numbers 1 and 2 (0 empty space, not a wall)
            we will create the follwing two files

            mymap/walls/1.data
            mymap/walls/2.data

            Each of these files contains the texture data that will be used
            by the engine to draw these walls. The textures must be
            rectangular but do not necessarily need to be the same size. The
            Telefrag engine will dynamically scale all textures to the correct
            size in game. Thus, any size texture will work, however 16 by 8 is
            the recommended size.

            ................
            ................
            ..            ..
            ..            ..
            ..            ..
            ..            ..
            ................
            ................

            This is an example wall with a width of 16 and height of 8.
            It is recomended to avoid putting Text on walls since the
            scaling engine will offten distort the text beyond readability.

        Now that we've build and rendered our map, lets add some spawnpoints:
            First we need to edit 'mydata/mydata.meta' since this stores all
            the information about objects contained withing out map

            Entries withing mymap.meta should look like this

            object,pos_x,pos_y,ang

            "object" is a lower case string with no spaces that specifies
            which object the engine should create
            "pos_x" is a positive float that specifies the x-coordinate of
            the object's location
            "pos_y" is a positive float that specifies the y-coordinate of
            the object's location
            "ang" is a positive float between the values of [0, 360) and
            specifies the direction the object is facing. This is an optional
            parameter and will default to 0 when excluded.

            Now, to create a spawn point we use the 'spawn' object and place
            it in the center of the tile (4, 1). If you decide to inclue the
            "ang" property, the player will face that direction when they spawn

            spawn,4.5,1.5

            NOTE: The entry 'spawn,4,1' would create the spawnpoint on the
            top left corner of the tile (4,1). To create the spawnpoint in
            the center of a tile do 'spawn,4.5,1.5' The Telefrag engine will
            NOT let you create an object at an integer position and will
            automatically add 0.5 to any integer pos_x or pos_y entries.

            It's best to specify multiple spawnpoints since the Telefrag
            engine picks one at random when spawning a player. Telefrag will
            always prioritize empty spawn points. The more spawn points you
            have the more players your map can comfortably accomidate.

            At this point you would now be able to load into the map and walk
            around.

        Now lets add some items for our players to pick up:

            We add items to 'mymap/mymap.meta' just like spawnpoints.

            ammo,1.5,1.5
            health,2.5,1.5
            armor,3.5,1.5

            The following object names have special meanings within telefrag:
                "spawn" Players will spawn here and face the same direction as
                the spawn object.
                "player" The object representing a physical player. This is
                reserved by the Telefrag engine and is an invalid entry.
                "ammo" These can picked up by the player and replenish ammo.
                "health" These replenish health.
                "armor" These replenish armor.

            Now that we've added some items we need to create the sprites for
            them. Make the follwing files:
                mymap/sprites/ammo.data
                mymap/sprites/ammo.meta

                mymap/sprites/armor.data
                mymap/sprites/armor.meta

                mymap/sprites/health.data
                mymap/sprites/health.meta

            All of these files have identical layouts, so we'll focus on the
            ammo.data file for now.

            +--------------+
            |   A M M O    |
            +--------------+
            | |""|  ,   ,  |
            | |  | /_\ /_\ |
            | |__| | | | | |
            | |__| |_| |_| |
            +--------------+

            This is an example of an ammo box sprite the you might find within
            the ammo.data file. Again, any spize sprite will work, however
            the size 16 by 8 is recommended

            Next we need to edit the ammo.meta file which contains info about
            how the engine should handle this object.

            xscale,0.5
            yscale,0.5
            voffset,8
            value,6

            "xscale" specifies how wide the sprite should be, if excluded it
            defaults to 1, the width of a wall.
            "yscale" specifies how tall the sprite should be, if excluded it
            defaults to 1, the height of a wall.
            "voffset" specifies the vertical offset of a sprite. If you shrink
            a sprite by 0.5 vertically, it will appear to float in the air. To
            correct this, we shift the sprite down by 8 (the height of the
            sprite).
            "value" this is the most important value and only applies to the
            ammo, health, and armor sprite. It specifies how much the pickup
            refils. Since the player has a revolver, we'll give them an extra
            6 shots.

            Additionall entries:

            trans,X

            This is an optional value that can be used for transparent sprites.
            This entry states that the char "X" should not be drawn and leaves
            a hole in the sprite.

            NOTE: Do not create a sprite titled "spawn.data", spawnpoints are
            a special object and Telefrag will NOT assign a sprite to it.

        Finally we need to create a sprite for the player:
            Make the following files:
                mymap/sprites/player.data
                mymap/sprites/player.meta

            The following is an example of the contents of player.data:

            XXXXXX/"""\
            XXXXXX|@ @|
            XXXXXX\ + /
            XXXXXXX|#|--o
            XXXXXXX|#|XX'
            XXXXXXX|#|
            XXXXXX//X\\
            XXXX_//XXX\\_
            <telefrag-frame>
            XXXXXX/"""\
            XXXXXX|:::|
            XXXXXX\:::/
            XXXXXXX|"|
            XXXXXXX|T|
            XXXXXXX|_|
            XXXXXX//X\\
            XXXX_//XXX\\_

            This is the front and back of a player sprite. It is recomended
            that you create 8 frames for the player, one facing each of the
            8 compas directions: N, NE, E, SE, S, SW, W, NW

            <telefrag-frame>

            Is a special line that denotes the end of one frame and the start
            of another frame. Do not include <telefrag-frame> in the first or
            last line of your file. The start of the first frame and end of
            the last frame is implicit. All of the frames must be the same
            height.

            The X's within this sprite are intended to denote transparancy.
            To indicate this to the Telefrag engine we need to edit the
            player.meta file:

            trans,X

            Now the engine can correctly draw the player.