THE SPECTRUM GAME DATABASE

DARKSTAR

PUBLISHER
Design Design

AUTHOR
programmed by Simon (Psi) Brattell, Neil (Mott) Mottershead and
Gwaham, all from Design Design.

YEAR
1985

DESCRIPTION

CONTROLS

INSTRUCTIONS

LOADING INSTRUCTIONS
Set up the Spectrum as detailed in the manual and load with LOAD "".
Dark Star will now load and auto run. Please note Dark Star is a very long
program and will take 5 minutes to load.

PLAYING THE GAME
The Dark Star galaxy is divided into a 16 * 16 grid of sectors in the
galactic plain.
The LIAR's battle computer generates a real time display on your screen
which shows all activity in your immediate vicinity. As well as showing enemy
ships and their missiles, this display will also show energy concentrations and
Warp Gates to hyperspace. Energy concentrations are shown as pulsating blue
squares; flying through these will enable LIAR to increase its supply of shield
energy. Energy used to operate the ship's navigation and weaponry systems is
generated by an internal energy source. The deflector screens will draw a large
amount of energy if hit by an enemy missile.
LIAR's weaponry is of the fixed mount type, aimed by manoeuvring the ship.
The point towards which LIAR is flying is marked on the display by the cursor.
This is moved by using the up, down, left & right keys, while LIAR's velocity
is altered using accelerate and decelerate. Pressing a fire key will release a
burst of plasma bolts in the direction LIAR is flying, destroying any enemy
ship or missile on that line.
Enemy ships will fire on the LIAR by prediction, so it is essential not to
fly on the same course or speed for any length of time. The best way to avoid
missiles being to rapidly change your velocity.
Moving from one sector to another requires you to make a transition to
hyperspace. This is done by first finding a set of Warp Gates, which your
battle computer sees and displays as four yellow squares changing shape as the
Gates open and close, and then flying LIAR into one of these whilst it is open.
The four gates are arranged in a North, South, East, West fashion such that you
can select the direction you wish to move within the grid, by flying through
the appropriate gate. If the LIAR is in a sector at the edge of the grid one of
the gates will be missing, or two if LIAR is in a corner sector.
The route through hyperspace is mapped out as a rectangular tunnel, down
which you must guide the LIAR. Travelling outside of this tunnel puts a heavy
load on your screens and uses much energy, so accurate flying is essential.
The Dark Star galaxy has planets in it. These can be investigated further by
flying down onto their surfaces. This is achieved by flying directly up to a
planet, as if on a collision course.
Your computer will then carry out a re-entry manoeuvre during which your screen
will blank for an instant, as your sensors are blinded by the 'Liar' using its
momentum to smash through the planetory shielding.
The surface of a planet occupied by enemy forces will be defended by
anti-aircraft weaponry, raised above the surface on towers. These can be
disabled by firing on the towers, which will collapse when hit. Certain areas
on the planet are defended by force shields which will damage the 'Liar' if
flawn through.
There are, however, holes in these fields which your computer will detect and
display as rectangles. If you fly through these, its energy will be lost. The
enemy bases on the planets are hidden in the center of a ring of defences, and
are themselves protected by three towers. These bases generate the planetory
defence shields, which must be rendered inoperative, by destroying all the
bases on a planet, before the 'Liar' can return to space.
Without the velocity attainable in space, the 'Liar' can never build up the
momentum required to pass through these shields, so if you elect to go down
onto a planet you cannot escape again until all the bases on it are destroyed.
This feature can, however, be disabled from within the game options menus.
Pressing '1' whilst on the surface of a planet will cause your computer to
display a tactical map of the surface, showing defences, bases and fuel dumps.
The 'Liar's' position and direction are denoted on the map by a white arrow.
There is also an arrow displayed on the main screen to show 'Liar's' direction
in respect to the map. Bases are shown as concentric rectangulars, defences as
shaded areas (density shows difficulty), fuel dumps as blue dots and spaceports
as magenta rectangles.
You may leave the planet's surface and return to space by flying with maximum
speed and maximum climb at the same time, though only after all the enemy bases
have been destroyed.
Fuel dumps on the surface will consist of a number of energy concentrations.
These are held in force fields generated by the surrounding towers. To gain
extra energy guide your ship through these as you would in space, but beware of
the towers: they are armed and will fire on you.
Enemy spaceports are defended by both towers and enemy ships. They are fairly
difficult targets, but it is not necessary to destroy these before leaving the
planet.

THE OBJECT OF THE GAME
The object of Dark Star is to liberate your galaxy from domination by the Evil
Lord's tyrannical Empire. To achive your aim you must wipe out all the enemy's
military centres on the planets within your galaxy. (These are shown in green
on the Tactical Sector Map.) The game difficulty setting will determine the
degree to which the Empire has extended its sphere of influence through the
galaxy.

CONTROLS
Dark Star has a fully user defineable game control system, which is explained
by the incorporated screen instructions; please note that the program will
select keyboard control or joystick control automatically, depending on which
menu was first used. Under joystick control, the accelerate and decelerate
controls will remain on the keyboard as defined by the user.
We do not recommend use of joysticks in playing Dark Star.
All aspects of the game are open to user control, including the display
format, and can be altered by use of the highly flexible, menu driven front end.
The keys "1" and "0" cannot be defined by the user. Those that are used in
the game are as follows:-
1 Causes the display to switch between visual and tactical displays. On
the surface of a planet, this will show the arrangement of defences as
detailed above. Whilst the Liar is in space the tactical display will
show a map of all the two hundred and fifty six sectors withing the
galaxy, though your battle computer will only mark those sectors
containing enemy planets. The type of defence employed on a given
planet is also marked occording to the displayed key.
The Liar's position within the galaxy is shown by a flashing square
surrounding the sector it is located in.
3 & 4 When pressed together will cause the Liar to self-destruct, aborting
the game and returning to the main menu or high score table on the
next key press.

FEATURES:-
Universe
Stopwatch Mode
Full 3 Dimensional, 2 Million Way Movement
Colour Vector Graphics
Full Range of Sound Effects
Full Screen Playing Area
Continuous Error Free Operation
600k of Source
Does not feature:-
Materialisations
Sprites
Unused Ram
Stupid Scenario
Magic Rings

WARNING
Do not expect pirated copies of this tape to load correctly.
Dark Star was written and conceived by Simon Brattel over a period of six
months in 1984. The program is not another boring arcade copy!
The second program on the Dark Side tape "SPECTACLE" will not run unless
several passwords are entered correctly.
The passwords will be released in the near future, in one of our adverts.
Meanwhile keep guessing! - Is this the first reviewer-proof program?

Part two of the trilogy "Forbiden Planet" will be available when the programmer
recovers.

Written at a secret software establishment (somewhere in Simons bedroom).

These programs, documentation and artwork are copyright
(c) 1984 by DESIGN DESIGN Software.

CHEATS
One high score table consisted of the lyrics to a song. This
song gave away the password to an encrypted program also supplied
with Dark Star. The song was "Everyone's A Nervous Wreck", from
the Supertramp album "Breakfast In America". The password
"Everyone's A Nervous Wreck" had to be typed exactly - even the
apostrophe. It was released to the general world through CRASH
magazine, who DesDes quite liked, unlike Computer & Video Games,
who DesDes despised. As you will see from reading Spectacle!


SEQUELS/PREQUELS
The sequel to Dark Star was called Forbidden Planet.

INLAY CARD TEXT
If it moves, shoot it.
If it doesn't move - shoot it anyway.
If it's sqaure - fly through it.


SCORES RECEIVED

URL
ftp.dcc.uchile.cl/pub/OS/sinclair/snapshots/d/darkstar.zip

GENERAL FACTS

NOTES
Design Design are/were one of the weirdest Software houses. If
their games had one fault, it was that they were just too damn
slick. Dark Star is a prime example. The programming involved
was so slick and fast, the graphics would slide past you before
you;d even realsed what was going on. It did have the wildest
front end however, keys could be pressed that weren't supposed
to be pressed, to get hidden options, and woe betide anybody who
tried to print the high scores without a printer attached...

The High scores were always a good read - there were generally
three/four different high scores randomly chosen when the game
loaded. Should you get on a Dark Starhigh score table, try
typing any of the following:

Design Design software
Invasion of the body snatchas
Rommels Revenge
Computer and Video Games
(and many more!)