MISSION: ALIEN TERMINATION THE STORY Following on from Codename Mat, Mat with his new ship Centurion II is continuing his battle against the Myons, now confined to the capture and defence of the Karillium Mines. For nearly one hundred years the Terramya war has raged on. Now battle weary and with resources depleted no side has any hope of outright victory. Karillium is the most precious substance in the universe. It is the bringer of life, from one small pinch a barren desert can be turned to jungle. Without it millions will starve. Near the centre of the galaxy in a cluster of hot blue stars, and far within the Myon zones lies the deep red planet Vesta – deep red with Karillium! Vesta was used to radiation storms, being set in an area of young developing stars, carrying in their wake drifting clouds of cosmic dust. But the shower to fall upon Vesta on 7th June 2231 was far from normal. For within the storm were hidden 500 unmanned attack probes from Earth. The lone manned defender was destroyed where it stood and within one of the shortest battles of the war the great Karillium mines of Vesta fell to the forces from Earth. Under the rules of war only unmanned ships can be used to capture an inhabited planet and only one manned ship (fitted with a teleport) is allowed to defend. YOUR TASK You are Mat, the pilot of Earth’s most advanced combat ship, Centurion II, and you are the sole manned ship holding out as long as possible against the Myon onslaught in order to defend the Energy Grid. The Karillium mines on Vesta get their energy from the star Calest via a grid of satellites. Energy is transferred through each complete row of satellites and the amount transferred is determined by the most damaged satellite in the row. The amount of Karillium mined is directly proportional to the energy transferred by the grid. The longer you hold out the more Karillium will be mined. When all four satellite rows are broken, energy transfer will be zero, life support systems on Vesta will fail, the miners will leave and the game will end. At the end of each attack wave you will have the chance to repair damaged satellites and move others to complete broken rows. Make your moves wisely! You are the only person who can defend the Vesta, however you are totally safe; if your ship is destroyed you will be teleported to safety. LOADING INSTRUCTIONS RUN “MAT2”. If the disk fails to load try again. If the problem persists we will, without delay swap the disk for you. Please send it, with a covering letter, to DOMARK LTD, FREEPOST, LONDON SW20 8BR. GETTING STARTED On loading the game, you become Mat, looking out of Centurion II’s cockpit, ready for action to protect the satellites, by destroying the Myons, which is only possible if your ship is in good operational condition and therefore protected. Select the Defensive Shields (press D) and Safety Mechanism (press F). Set the Target Computer to automatic (press T). If you now turn your screen to the Quadrant Grid Chart (press Q) you will see a grid of 24 satellites. Centurion II is the flashing cross, the Myon ships are the dots which in the first wave are grouped in a fleets of three. If you are within a quadrant which has a Myon fleet in it, your Status will become red (showing that you are in danger of attack). You must counter-attack, which is explained in a moment. If you are not within a Myon occupied quadrant, you may either wait (and familiarise yourself with the controls) whilst the Myons ‘home in’ on you, or Warp towards them (see on). Combat If Status is red, prepare for combat. Turn on the Battle Computer (press B). This will show you the locations of the Myon ships. On the left of the screen is the Range Meter, the red section indicates when the Myon ship is within your main vision, as it approaches the needle will fall. By pressing A, the Battle Computer will switch to each attacking Myon ship, showing you which is nearest. If all the Myon ships are out of the range of the meter, go to top speed (press 5) and then press A continuously until one ship shows that it is nearer to you than the others. Having selected the nearest one, you must manoeuvre until it is in front of you, (it is yellow if it is in front and blue if behind), so rotate the Centurion until the Myon ship is yellow and in the centre of the Battle Computer screen. If a Myon ship is shown in the red section of the range meter, it will be within your main sights and shooting at you, you must therefore enter combat using the fire button to destroy it. However, if the Myon ship is still further enough away from you to be in the green area of the range meter you must maintain at least 30% speed until it nears the red section, when you must assess your ability to combat at cruising speed (30%) or less (decelerate by pressing 1 or 3). Combat at zero speed is not recommended, although it may be worth trying whilst familiarising yourself with the gameplay.You have two weapon types, plasma or laser, lasers use more energy, but you may find them easier at first. (Press E to swap). Once you have destroyed the first ship select the next nearest one (press A) and repeat the attack. Once three ships are destroyed your status may return to yellow (or blue if you have some damage), or stay red if another group of Myons have closed in. If red, attack. If green, damage sustained will have been reported on the information screen on the bottom of the Dash Board. As this is a ‘quiet period’, practice putting your Droids (robotic mechanics) into use by using the Damage Report (press M). You will see a list of your equipment and a percentage next to each. This is the percentage damage inflicted on each system, continue pressing M for further reports. Assess the worst damage or the most important item and put the Droids to use (see on for further instructions). You have two Droids and may use both on one item, or one on two different items. If yellow, practice warping, as this is vital to the game play, especially in later waves. Warp Assuming you choose to warp, you must first select the compass bearing of your travel and your warp factor. The warp controls are explained in the detailed operating instructions. You then warp (press W) and off you go . . . . If you have selected too high a warp factor, you may still be in a warp situation when your status becomes red, and can abort the warp by pressing Cap Shift W. On becoming stationary after your warp check the Quadrant Grid Map (press Q) to ascertain your new position. DETAILED OPERATING INSTRUCTIONS Centurion Controls Keyboard or Joystick may be used. There are many keys to use (in addition to your joystick), which are described below. Direction and Fire: Ion Engines 6. Left } 1. Decelerate 7. Right } Use only when not 2. Accelerate 8. Up } using a Joystick 3. Decelerate to halt 9. Down } 4. Go to cruising combat speed (30%). 0. Fire } 5. Go to full speed – Other Controls: Small Screen Controls: W. Engage warp drive L. Long range scan SHIFT W. Abort warp S. Short range scan D. Defensive shields (on/off) Q. Quadrant chart F. Safety mechanism (on/off) B. Battle computer T. Target computer (Auto/Manual/off) M. Damage reports E. Change weapons (Plasma/laser) A. Change alien being tracked (used for Battle Computer and Target Computer) H. Hold/restart program SHIFT P. Save game SHIFT O. Reload saved game Shields The Centurion has four shields, one each on the front, back, left and right sides. The status (on/off) of the shields is displayed on the right of the control panel. Often a shield will flash on and off when it is damaged, in such a situation you should keep the attackers on the opposite side to the damage, as a hit on this side will result in the destruction of the Centurion. Safety This simply reduces the chance of the destruction of the ship by human error. If the front shield is down it will abort a warp and if a weapon system is overheating it will disable that system. There are situations however where it is best to have safety off! Status Will give one of four states YELLOW No damage and not under attack BLUE System damaged or malfunctioning but not under attack RED Aliens in quadrant FLASHING RED Centurion in danger of imminent destruction. This can be due to one of three situations. 1. Alien in quadrant and one or more shields down. 2. Weapon system overheating and in danger of exploding. 3. Centurion travelling at warp speed with front shield down. (off) Batteries The Centurion has two banks of batteries, one of each side of the ship. These are the ship’s energy store. Energy is used to power the shields, engines, weapons etc. Watch your energy level carefully as it is very dangerous to let it become excessively depleted, and as the batteries take damage the maximum energy will fall. Reactors The Centurion has two nuclear reactors which feed energy to the batteries. As the reactors take damage the speed at which they are recharged will fall. Battle Computer This gives the range of the Myon tracked and it’s position being relative to the Centurion. On the left of the screen is the Range Meter which shows you the distance between the Myon being tracked and the Centurion. As the distance decreases the needle will drop. The Red section indicates that the Myon is within Combat range. A yellow ship indicates that the Myon is in front of the Centurion and a blue ship that it is behind. As you are under attack by a Myon Fleet it could be that the ship you are tracking is not the closest to you. By pressing A the Battle Computer will switch to each of the attacking ships indicating which is nearest and therefore the one to track. When in combat some attack waves of Myons will use cloaking devices that make them invisible, the Battle Computer is the best way of finding and destroying them. Target Computer When operational, sights will appear in your main vision aiding your combat with attacking Myons. There are two operational modes, Automatic or Manual. AUTOMATIC This is best used when being attacked by more than one Myon at a time. When they close in on you, the sights will expand when the nearest Myon is within range of your weapons. (Note: As your weapons only shoot in a forward direction, Myons to either side or behind you will be ignored, even though they may be closer than the one in front.) MANUAL This is best used when being attacked by a single Myon, as the sights will expand only on the one Myon being tracked by the battle computer. It has the advantage that the sights will expand when the Myon is within distance of your weapons, but possibly to one side or behind you; an additional aid to your battle computer and short range scan. Long Range Scan This becomes vital when the Battle Computer is Malfunctioning. This is looking down at the Centurion and the Quadrant it is in, showing Myon ships, plasma bolts and satellites relative to the Centurion (the central point). No indication is given of vertical positioning (although a Myon ship may appear directly in front of you it could be above or beneath its indicated position), however this can be assessed by vertical movement of the Centurion. Short Range Scan This is the same as the long range scan except instead of showing the whole Quadrant it magnifies the space around the Centurion, (when the Long Range shows the Myon Ships to be very close, they will be within the range of the Short Range Scan). This is very useful in helping to avoid being hit when in combat with several Myons. Quadrant Chart This shows the status of the satellite energy grid, the position and number of Myon fleets (showing the number of ships within the fleets) and the position of the Centurion. Satellites start off white, however as they are attacked by the Myons they will take damage and their colour will darken to yellow, cyan, green, magenta, red and then destroyed. Warp Warp engines are used for travel between Quadrants. Before use, the course computer must be programmed with the required distance and angle. Shields must be on before using warp as without them the Centurion can be destroyed in collisions with small dust particles in space whilst travelling at high speeds. The same danger will be faced if the front shield is damaged. Programming Warp When the Quadrant Chart is on the screen the Warp distance and angle can be set. The Warp Factor (distance) is between 0 and 6 (moving from 1 satellite to the next is one warp factor, if moving diagonally remember to allow for the extra distance). The angle is a compass bearing between 0 and 359 degrees. The cursor is moved left and right between the Warp factor and Angle using the cursor keys ← & →. The number overlaid by the cursor can be changed by using the down (↓) key (minus) and the up (↑) key (plus). To scroll through numbers keep key pressed. Damage Report and The Droids The Centurion has two droids which can be commanded to repair damaged systems. However during repair the system being repaired is disabled and will not function. The Damage Report shows the percentage damage taken by each system, which systems are disabled and which systems are being repaired by the droids. A disabled system is indicated by an asterisk to the left of the percentage. To the right of the percentage are two cursor positions which will be filled by Droid 1 (D1) Droid 2 (D2) when selected to repair that system. The cursor can be moved about on the damage reports as follows: ← Left → Right ↑ Up ↓ Down COPY On first column, (left of %) Enable/disable system (Not if Droid repairing) On second column, (just to the right of %) call Droid 1 to repair system On third column, (far right) call Droid 2 to repair system. If a system has failed it will be shown with an asterisk to the left of a percentage of 000. If a Droid has been damaged the other may repair it and whilst (as long as damage is not heavy), the damaged Droid may also continue to repair another system. End of Wave At the end of an attack wave you will have time to repair the Centurion and damaged satellites. Although it is vital to have a functioning ship, it is also important to repair (or move) satellites, as a missing one from a horizontal row of the grid will stop the whole of that row supplying energy to the Karillium mines. When all four rows are broken energy will cease and the game will be over. You are able to move satellites into a broken row with the use of the cursor. As you move to a higher attack waves the Myons will damage the Satellites quicker. Think very carefully about your moves and this may ultimately determine how long you last. SAVING GAME You may save your progress through the game at any point. Follow the saving instructions in the Amstrad Manual and start the cassette player recording on a blank cassette. Then press SHIFT P and saving will start. To load a saved game, you must first of all load the main program then swap cassettes to the one with you saved game. Then with the game playing press SHIFT O, and your saved game will load. ─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────── Published by Domark Ltd., 204 Worple Road, London SW20 8PN. Tel: 01-947 5624. All rights reserved. The contents of this cassette and booklet are copyright and may not be duplicated in any form by mechanical, lithographic, photographic, electronic, or other means.