Castle of Fire - A tribute to the Atari 2600 game, "Dragonfire", by IMAGIC |
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Current Version: 1.2                                                       |
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You are a thief who has traveled to Castle of Fire to achieve where
many Knights have failed;
To steal those evil dragons' treasures!
How high of a score can you get?

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SETUP:
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Extract the files into the same desired folder (WinRAR should
do this by default).
No further setup is required. It is ready as it is.

If you are having trouble viewing this game in the default
resolution (320x240), you can open up the setup program
and switch to 640x480. Although you might see it better,
it may cause the game to run a little slow at times.

There are also filters you can experiment with if you desire
too - that is if your monitor supports it.

You may also play it in a window as opposed to fullscreen (not
recommended at 320x240 resolution).

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Memory Usage:
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Castle of Fire uses the AGS default option for RAM usage (20MB).
If you would like to change this, open up the setup program, at the bottom
click "Advanced". Here you can select how many MBs Castle of Fire will use.

If the game is running a little slow, try the higher options.
Please contact me if this does not help.

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Objective:
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Run, jump and dodge your way across castle bridges
and make your way into the dungeons. You must collect
as many treasures as you can while gaining a highscore.

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Movement and Other Controls:
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Bridges: 
  Use the arrow keys to run left or right.
  Holding DOWN will duck (you can also move while ducking).
  Use the UP arrow or Spacebar to jump (you can duck while in the air for
    last second dodging and you can also move while in the air).

Dungeons:
  Use all four arrow keys to move

ESC key:
  This button will skip the intro cutscenes and skip dialogue.
    
LEFT ALT:
  At different points you will see an exclamation point above your head.
  This indicates that an action can be taken by pressing LEFT ALT.
  This is mostly used to grab on to a ladder.

END key (PAUSE):
  This will pause the game at any point. From this menu you can continue,
  reset the game or quit.
  
  Note: Quitting this way will not save your score.

F12:
  By pressing F12 you may take screenshots if you wish.
  This will promt you and you must type in a name for
  your screenshot.
  They are saved as ".bmp" images in the Castle of Fire game folder.

  Note: The brightness level does not change the output image.

ALT-X: This combination will abort the game and exit immediately.

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Bridges:
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Each bridge takes you into the next dungeon.
There are fireballs on each bridge that are fired from inside.

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Dungeons:
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The dungeons are where the treasures are.
Some dungeons are only enhabited by FireGuys. They roam around freely
trying to protect the dragon's treasures.
A few dungeon floors contain retracting spikes.
Some dungeons contain bridges that move or disappear.
And lastly, there are a few dungeons that have lava pits that
expand and make it tricky to get to the treasures.
Alternate dungeons are enhabited by the evil Dragons.
When you reach "The Point of No Return" every dungeon is a dragon
dungeon!

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The Dragons:
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There are four different levels of dragons.
Each dragon enhabits four dungeons.
1. The Green Dragon
2. The Fearless Double Dragons
3. The Angry White Dragon
4. and the Dreaded Black Dragon

Note: As these dragons move faster, you do too.

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List of Treasures and Points:
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Coins ----------- 10pts
Bronze Jug ------ 15pts
Coin Box -------- 20pts
Helmet ---------- 30pts
Ruby ------------ 50pts
Diamond --------- 60pts
Silver Goblet --- 75pts
Candelabra ------ 100pts
Golden Lamp ----- 300pts
Golden Harp ----- 500pts
Crown ----------- 800pts

Note: You gain 25pts for
every bridge and dungeon you complete.

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Reward Screen:
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Once you have completed all of the rooms you are rewarded with bonus points
and extra lives.
"The Black Dragon isn't finished with you yet!"
You are given the option to continue or Quit.
If you quit, the game ends and you can input your name in the highscores list
if you qualified.
Easter Eggs: Complete it once.


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Game Over & Highscores:
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Once you run out of lives you will be taken to the Game Over screen where
you may type in your name to accompany your score.
If you accidently or intentionally press ESC before or during typing your name,
the name will be written as, "Thief".
Press ENTER to submit you name and ESC when finished looking.

If you'd like, you may go to the AGS Hints & Tips forum (AGS site is at the end of this
ReadMe) and post your highscore in the correct Castle of Fire thread. I will try my best
to keep the list up to date and organized.

Note: Castle of Fire saves your highscores to a file to be loaded next time you play.
      If this file is tampered with, all highscores are reset to default.

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Losing Lives & Safe Points:
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You lose 1 life when:
  *Getting hit by a fireball
  *A dragon's fireballs' blast when it hits the floor.
  *Colliding with FireGuys:
     If you lose a life while in any dungeon that is accompanied
     by FireGuys, you will become temperarily invincible.
     You cannot collect any treasures until your invincibility is over.
  *Stepping on Spikes
  *Falling into holes
  *Stepping in Lava
You are safe while:
  *Behind the castle on the bridges
  *Behind the castle doorways in the dungeons.
     You will also be safe behind the castle doorways
     even if a FireGuy wanders in there.

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Practice Mode:
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Practice Mode was designed to help you in certain stages that you may be having
trouble with completing. There are 5 stages:

Learning the Controls:
  This is exactly what it is named. You can jump around, duck, etc, and get
  used to the controls before being thrown into the game.
Bridge Running:
  This stage places you in a normal bridge scene with two fireballs.
  Here you can practice dodging and making it to the other side.
Jumping Practice:
  Here you can practice jumping over holes in the bridge.
Broken Bridge Ball:
  This is the same as the Jumping Practice stage except with a fireball.
  Here you can practice jumping over the holes while dodging the fireball.
Treasure Raiding:
  This stage places you against the Practice Mode Dragon.
  This dragon is a little more fierce than the Green Dragons. Here you practice
  stealing all of the treasures while avoiding the dragon's fireballs.
Locked Stage:
  You'll notice that undernieth 4 of the stages is a black star.
  After completing each stage perfectly (info is at the start of each) the star
  will turn yellow. When all four stars are yellow, the locked stage will become
  available. 

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Dragonball Gauntlet:
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NOTE: Detailed information is in the "How to Play" section on the title screen...

This is a mini game that allows you to earn points to choose a different constume
during Castle of Fire dungeons (also the Treasure Raiding stage in Practice Mode).

The object of the game is to run down to the lower half of the gauntlet, take the 
dragonball and place it in it's container at the upper half. You have a minute and
a half to do this in while trying not to get hit by fireballs, fireguys, spikes, falling
off the edge or the ball blowing up in your hands.

After picking up the dragonball you have 8 seconds before it blows up. At 3 seconds
the ball will start to blink yellow. At this time, if think you won't make it, you 
may drop the ball by pressing SPACEBAR. Getting hit by the explosion will take
1 point away.

There are 3 different types of power-ups that will become available during the game.
Speed Shoes - increased speed for 5 seconds
Invincibility - invincible for 5 seconds
More time - 20 seconds are added to the gauntlet timer.

For each ball you drop in the container you gain 1 point.

For each time you get hit or fall off the edge, the gauntlet recieves 1 point.

If you stand still too long, it is a penilty of 1 point.

At the end of the game the difference between you and the gauntlet's points will be added 
to your "Earned Points". These points will allow you to choose the costumes.

In the costume select screen you'll notice a charcter by the name, "Seth Reece".
This is the protagonist of my unfinished adventure, "The Legend of Leitor's Edge".

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Additional Songs not by Hammerblade:
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Note: All songs are from NES (Nintendo Entertainment System) games...

Practice Mode Screen:
  Tetris
    Music C
Dragonball Gauntlet title screen:
  Gauntlet
    Song A
Dragonball Gauntlet:
  Wizards & Warriors 2: Ironsword
    Lava Stage
  
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The Brightness Option:
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By default, the brightness is set at 120.

If the game seems too dark or bright you can make adjustments from the title screen
before you play and it will be saved for next time.
The brightness cannot be adjust during windowed mode.

Note: Some systems do not support this option.
If your system does not support this then nothing will result after selecting
the "Brightness" option.
This hasn't been tested on incompatible systems.

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KNOWN BUGS:
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*Thief will face to the left when the game is paused
*While playing Dragonball Gauntlet the Thief will pause while running (stopping completely
        until you press an arrow key again to run).
        This doesn't happen all the time, but garaunteed to happen at least once
        during a game. I'm very sorry, sometimes it happens and you get burned, but
        it seems to be unavoidable at the moment.
        The module I'm using is Rui "Brisby" Pires and Strazer's 'KeyboardMovement'
        v1.01. In Dragonball, the player changes views/speed (ie; holding
        the ball/not holding the ball/have speed shoes or not...) and AGS requires
        that the character be stopped before these commands can take place.
        Rui and I have tried to figure this problem out for some time, but to no avail.
        Hopefully in the future this can be fixed and sorry for the inconvenience.
        It can be very frustrating at times when the charcter just STOPS suddenly.        
*This only happened once so far: I selected a costume (didn't matter which one) and played
        CoF. The dungeon thief was changed to the bridge thief... very odd. Even resetting the
        game didn't do anything.
        BUT, it DID fix itself after quiting completely, returning to windows and
        starting it up again.
*(RARE) I can't seem to replicate this, but (in the ladder levels) after getting off of
        one ladder, as soon as you get on to the other ladder, Thief will be back on the top
        of the ladder he just got off of. Very wierd.
*(RARE) I have experienced this only twice since I started making
        this game. The player has fallen through a bridge without any reason.
        Cannot replicate.
*In the moving bridges dungeon #1, the timing of the bridges is off and shows two bridges
        at once. Sometimes it fixes itself, sometimes not, and sometimes it'll be fine
        when you first enter.
        This does not deter the playability.
*Sometimes a FireGuy will get stuck behind or in a dungeon gate. If this happens be sure
        to be out of it's way when the gate is released.
*You can't adjust the brightness in windowed mode.
*One of the Double Dragons will sometimes "hold" a fireball before shooting.
*And yes, I know, the dragons shoot the fireballs out of their stomach or bum :)
        This is infact NOT a bug, but just something I never took the time to change.

NOTE: If you find any bugs that are not listed here (chances are you might) please feel
      free to let me know via PM on the AGS forums, in the Castle of Fire announcement thread
      (AGS forums) or email me at: twentyeightsnakes@yahoo.com
      Note: The AGS website is listed below.

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Modules Used in Castle of Fire:
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*Pixel-perfect collision detection v1.01
 Original code by GarageGothic, optimised by Radiant and SteveMcCrea, modulised by SSH
*FaceRight2 v1.1 by Lazarus
*Simple Platform Movement v0.1 by Bernie
*8 Direction Movement v0.1 by Bernie
*KeyboardMovement v1.01 by Rui "Brisby" Pires and Strazer
*MultiResponse v1.1 by SSH
*Last but not least, the first appearance of the Hi_Score_Module 1.0 by
 Colin "Colxfile" Everett. The module required to use in conjunction with
 this is monkey_05_06's "EncryptedFile" module. 

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The tool used to create this game was, "Adventure Game Studio" v2.72 by Chris Jones
Later on compiled by AGS v3.0.2
Thank you to Chris Jones for finding the solution to the mysterious slow-down issue.
AGS website: www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk
Castle of Fire (c)2007-2008 Snake Pit Entertainment
If this game was sold to you either off of the internet or in a compilation CD,
you got dooped. This game is freeware and is meant to stay that way.
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The sound effects in Dragonball (and the "fry" sound effect were created with SFXR.
It's a nice little easy-to-use tool:
http://www.cyd.liu.se/~tompe573/hp/project_sfxr.html
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Special Thanks to IMAGIC for creating Dragonfire!
Please look it up and play it, you'll have tons of fun!
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And an EXTRA Special thanks to you for downloading and playing Castle of Fire!
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Versions and Updates List:
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Castle of Fire v1.2 Release Date - 6.24.08
UPDATES since v1.1
-All new Practice Mode - now players can practice their weak points
-All new mini game with costume Select screen for play within Castle of Fire dungeons
-PAUSE (finally got it working)
-Earlier bridges are now easier to pass
-Put some extra lives back into the game
-Treasures are now animated
-When all rooms are completed, the player is rewarded, and can now face the Black
  Dragon over and over again (random music and treasures) instead of being sent all
  the way back to the beginning (so now it's more like Dragonfire)
-When you adjust the game's brightness it now saves itself so you don't have to
  constantly adjust it when launching the game externally or reseting from
  within the game.
-You can now skip the scene when Thief walks up to the door in the intro
-Each line of dialogue is now skippable (takes place of skipping the whole conversation)
-When getting Game Over it now plays the Game Over music instead of the music
  that was playing when you lost your last life
-The Highscore Screen has its own music when being viewed from the title screen
  (unused Hammerblade track from v1.0/1.1)
-Raised the volume of the SFX
-Added "foot stomp" SFX for Dragons
-No longer get killed by spikes while invincible
-Adjusted the walkable area around the entrances and exits of all dungeons
-Changed the first room with FireGuys a bit


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Castle of Fire V1.1 Release Date - 2.12.08
*Bridge scenes are now 60% brighter
*After all rooms are completed, instead of losing their score if they
 decide to stop playing, they are taken to the highscores screen to submit their name.
*The player can now press the UP arrow to jump if they wish
*The player can now jump in the intro room to get a feel of the controls
 before playing.
*No more extra lives until all rooms are completed
*Decreased bonus points after completing all rooms
*Increased difficulty
*Included with the game is the scores.dat file
*Eliminated having to use the mouse when adjusting the brightness
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Castle of Fire V1.0 Release Date - 2.8.08
*Initial Release
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