CHAOSCASTLE - Specific notes about the Macintosh version


INSTALLATION:

 No installation procedure is required. The game can be placed anywhere on a floopy- or harddisk as long as all files from the folder are kept together.

 You can change the game's settings from the game itself using the corresponding menus. Macintosh-specific settings can also be modified with the program 'CCMiscSettings'.


CCMiscSettings
 This is a program which allow you to change the settings of ChaosCastle which are specific to the Macintosh version. It will open the same dialog window than the menu 'Settings/Misc' from ChaosCastle. The reason of this program is that changing these settings may make the game not to run anymore on some Macintosh models, though no problem have been reported yet. If it happens that the game does no longer start, try starting this program (CCMiscSettings) and uncheck every options (which is the safest configuration), and then try ChaosCastle again.
 Here's an explanations of the options:

Optimize for used number of colors
 When checked, the program will try to switch the screen mode to the number of colors used by the game in order to improve the speed of graphics rendering. The program will restore the previous mode before quitting. It is highly recommended to enable this option unless you have a PowerMac or better.

Optimize for 256 colors
 When checked, the program will try to switch the screen mode to 256 colors (even if only 16 colors are used by the game) in order to improve the speed of graphics rendering. This will not improve the speed as much as the option 'optimize for used number of colors' when only 16 colors are needed, but it still gives an improvement if your Macintosh does not support 16 color mode. This option will increase the memory usage of the game.

If both the above options are checked, the program will first try to switch to the used number of colors (16 in simple color mode, 256 in 2-Layer color mode), and then to 256 colors if the first try failed.

Allow drawing over the menu bar
 If your Macintosh exactly displays 640x480 pixels and you set the game's size to 2 (which also yields a size of 640x480), the menu bar will cover a small part of the game's window; by checking this option, the program will try to remove the menu bar during the game so the whole screen is used for the game.

Full screen
 When enabled, the game will blacken the whole screen so the Finder is no longer visible during the game.

Use 3D sound
 When enabled, the new functions of the Soundmanager 3.2 are used to automatically generate the stereo, doppler-effect, distance attenuation and so on. When disabled, these effects are generated using the standard functions, which are less efficient. This option can only be enabled on a PowerMac with the Soundmanager 3.2 or better.

Headphones
 Enable it if you are using headphones instead of speakers. This is only usefull when 3D sound are used.

Speaker angle
 When 3D sound are used and you are using stereo speakers, set this value to the angle formed from you by the left and right speaker. This value is used to correctly generate the cross-cancellation effect.

Sound boost
 Allow you to set the average volume of the sound effects. 4 is the default volume. This value is combined with the current settings of the Control Panel.


IMPLEMENTATION NOTES

The Macintosh version of ChaosCastle has been edited, tested, compiled and linked with the Modula-2 development kit MacMeth from ETH Zrich.
Macintosh models tested are:
Mac Quadra 604, Mac IIsi, Mac SE, Mac Centris, Mac Classic, Mac Performa, Shapeshifter Mac, PowerMac 603, 604 and G3.


KNOWN BUGS

With some version of system 7, the program does not correctly restore the Finder's colors when it is brought to the back. First select the 'File/Hide' menu to avoid this problem; select this menu again to continue the game.

Some keyboards sometimes do not properly tell the system when a key is released. If a key gets 'locked' (and that the player moves in the corresponding direction without you do anything), press and release this key again, or release everything and hit the [5]-key to unlock all keys. Pressing the key corresponding to the opposite direction has no effect.

The Appearance manager from the MacOS 8.6 control panel has an option to automatically smooth every fonts. This option is not compatible with the color model of ChaosCastle. Thus, when activated, some weird colors may show up arround the texts in ChaosCastle. This is only visual: the game will run correctly.

The program may animate the Finder's colors during startup but this won't cause any damage.

1 Layer and 2 Layer modes sometimes use different backgrounds. When switching from one mode to the other inside a level, the backgrounds are not changed appropriatly until the next level.

Joysticks are not supported on the Macintosh version of the game.
