README file for Atomic Tanks 
============================================

What is Atomic Tanks?
========================

Atomic Tanks is a game in which you control an overly-powerful
tank and attempt to blow up other highly powerful tanks. Players
get to select a number of weapons and defensive items and then
attack each other in a turn-based manner. The last tank standing
is the winner.



How to I get/install Atomic Tanks?
===================================

To gain a copy of Atomic Tanks, go to our
website at http://atanks.sourceforge.net
Click on the "Download" link and select the
latest version of Atanks.

Note: If you have a pre-compiled (binary) copy
of Atomic Tanks, you will need the Allegro graphic
package. See http://allegro.cc/
Also, if you are going to compile/build Atomic Tanks
from source code, you will need the Allegro development
package. These packages can be found at
http://allegro.cc/files/
Please also note, those of you running Linux can
usually get Allegro packages through your distribution's
package manager. These packages are named (at least on Fedora)
"allegro" and "allegro-devel" respectively. Debian
uses, I think, "allegro" and "allegro-dev".


If you are using a pre-built, binary copy of Atomic Tanks,
please see the next section on running the game. Next
we will cover compiling from source.


To compile Atomic Tanks, please make sure you have
the Allegro libraries installed (see above). Next,
open a command console (shell) and move into the
directory containing the Atomic Tanks package.
This file will probably be named "atanks-5.6.tar.gz".
Then run the following commands:

tar zxf atanks-6.0.tar.gz
cd atanks-6.0

Now it depends on your preferences:

Default linux installation.
The Binary goes to: /usr/games/bin
The data files go to: /usr/share/games/atanks

make
make install

Linux User installation, where everything stays in
the atanks folder:

make

Windows User installation where everything stays in
the atanks folder:

make winuser

OSX User installation where everything stays in
the atanks folder:

make osxuser
(BSD or OS X users may wish to use "gmake osxuser" instead.)

For people compiling on Ubuntu (or one of Ubuntu's children distributions)
please compile with

make ubuntu

Now we can get to running the game. If you encounter
an error while running "make", then please see the
last section of this document, which covers reporting
bugs.





How do I run Atomic Tanks?
====================================

You can run the atanks file by typing "./atanks"
from a command line, or double-clicking the file
in a file browser. Atomic Tanks tries to use
reasonable defaults, so there is rarely a need to
use the command-line options. However, Atomic Tanks
supports the following options:

./atanks -h   (Print list of credits, command-line options and exit.)
./atanks -fs  (Run the game using the entire screen. Full screen mode.)
./atanks --windowed  (Run the game in a window. This is the default).
./atanks --nosound  (Run the game without sound. Sound is on by default.)
./atanks --noname   (Do not display player names over the tanks.)
./atanks --width <number>  (Run the game in a window with a set width in pixels.)
./atanks --tall <number>  (Run the game in a window with a set height in pixels.)
./atanks --datadir <data directory>  (Path to the directory with Atank's data files.)
./atanks --depth <number>  (Sets pixel depth. Use either 16 or 32 here.)
./atanks --noconfig   (Resets all config options back to defaults.)
./atanks --nonetwork  (Prevents atanks from setting up a server.)
./atanks --nobackground  (Does not display the green menu background. May prevent crashes on 64-bit.)
./atanks --nothread   (Stops threads for running in the background.)
./atanks --thread     (Enabled use of threads to speed up things.)

Most of these options can be used together, with the exception of "-fs"
for full screen mode. Simply running "./atanks" is the same as running
Atomic Tanks with the following options:
./atanks --windowed --width 800 --tall 600 --datadir . depth 32

Please note that as of version 4.3, threads are disabled by default. Use
the "--thread" flag to enable background threads.



How do I go about creating a player for myself?
================================================

when you first run Atomic Tanks, the first thing you'll need to
do is create a player/tank for youself. Click on the "Players"
button and click "Create New". Enter the name you want and
pick the colour you'd like your tank to be. That's all you'll
need to do. Click the "Okay" button. Then click the
"Back" button and, most importantly, click "Play"!

Once you click play, you'll have a chance to select which
tanks you'll be playing against. You can get anywhere from 2
to 10 tanks on the playing field at one time. Don't forget
to select yourself!

The next screen gives you a chance to buy weapons and defensive
items. There is no perfect combination, so experiment a little.
You can buy an item (assuming you have enough funds) by
left-clicking on the item. To sell the item, right-click on
the item. When you've completed your selection, click "Done".

The final screen you'll see is where the action takes place!
Use the left and right arrow buttons on your keyboard to
aim your tank's gun. The up and down arrow keys adjust the
speed (power) of the shot. The space bar fires the tanks gun. If
you want to change which weapon you will be using, press the
TAB button or the BACKSPACE button. The round is over when 
there is one tank left standing.





Keyboard Controls
=========================================

Atomic Tanks tries to be keybaord friendly and much of
the tank's controls require the keyboard. Here is a quick
over-view of which keys do what:

SPACEBAR -- Fires weapons and selects/toggles menu items.
ENTER -- Is similar to pressing the OK button on a menu.
UP/DOWN arrows -- Adjusts tank power and cycles through menu items. Scrolls on the buying screen.
LEFT/RIGHT arrows -- Aim the tank's gun. Also buys and sells on the buying screen or adjusts values in menus.
ESC -- Cancel out of a menu.

F10 -- Tells the computer to take over your tank for the remainder of the round.
       Also saves games when on the buying screen.

V, v -- The "v" key controls the volume during matches. Pressing lower-case "v"
        decreases the volume and upper-case "V" increases the volume.

~    -- Show/hide the scoreboard during rounds.




How to play a game over a network?
=========================================

Atomic Tanks has just introduced network play and it is still a bit rough.
However, if you'd like to try playing this way, here are a new points to help
you along.

Playing over a network requires two or more people. One person must be the Host
and the other person is the Client. If you are hosting the game, make sure
you have networking enabled. To check this, go into the Options menu and select
the Network option. Make sure "Networking" is set to "On". If it was "Off", then change it to "On" and then exit Atanks and re-start the game. Congratulations, you're now running a Host. You can continue to play as you normally would from this point. Clients will connect to your game and take over computer-controled tanks. To connect to you the Clients will need your IP address. To get this, visit the website whatismyip.com.

For clients, to connect to a host, you'll need to first get the IP address of your Host. Once you have that, go to the Option menu and select the Network option. Change the box marked "Server Address" to match the IP address of your Host. Then return to the main menu and click the button labled Network Game. Atanks will then try to connect to the server and introduce you to the game.

Things are still a bit flakey on the Client side. Hopefully it will improve as time goes on.

If the Client cannot connect to the Host, there are a few possible problems. Perhaps there is a firewall in the way? Maybe the Host is using a non-default port number. Perhaps the Client side just isn't working well enough yet. If you run into problems, please let us know about them on the forum.

When you're playing a game (as the client) you'll notice the various tanks
some in four different colours. The Jedi Team is marked in Green, the
Sith are marked as Purple, Neutral tanks are Blue and the player's
tank is indicated with Red. Hopefully this will prevent you from shooting
your team mates.



Known issues
=========================================

There are some known issues which players should be aware of. We
are trying to fix these, but in the mean time, it's best to know they
exist and how to work around them. The issues are, in no particular order.

1. Changing the game's language and then going into the Players menu
will cause weird text to display and may cause problems. If you change the
game's language, it's best to Quit the game fro mthe main menu and then
start Atanks again.

2. The default sound driver doesn't work on Ubuntu Linux and its related
distributions. If sound isn't working for you, go into the Options menu,
select Sound. Make sure Sound is turned on and that the Sound Driver is
switched from AutoDetect to OSS. Then return to the main menu, Quit and
then re-start the game. If this doesn't resolve the issue, then Quit the
game and delete all of the files and folders in your computer's /tmp
folder with the name "pulse".

3. The client side of the network games is buggy. We're working on that.





Where do I report bugs or send requests?
=========================================

Atomic Tanks is a great game, but it isn't perfect.
We, the developers, are always trying to improve the
experience our game brings to you. If you have
a problem with installing or playing Atomic Tanks,
please let us know. Mail me at jessefrgsmith@yahoo.ca 
We encourage you to give your feedback. Please give
as many details as possible so we can help you.

