POWBALL readme.txt

Copyright © 1995-2000 by Anthony Hamilton 


Contents
~~~~~~~~
Introduction 
Minimum Requirements 
Recommended Set-up 
Command-Line Options 
Trouble-Shooting 
License and Legal Information 
Contacting POW Productions 


Introduction 
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Powball is based on an old game concept which has been re-created many times
before. You'll find this incarnation to have much better playability, action,
strategy, sound and graphics than any other. 

The basic idea is to hit a ball with your paddle and knock away bricks until
the screen is cleared, whilst trying to keep at least one ball on the screen.
But what better introduction can there be other than to dive right in and
start playing. So, whadya waitin' for? 


Minimum Requirements 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
80386. 
DOS 5. 
640K RAM (with about 523K free). 
VGA adaptor with minimum 256K RAM. 
3 Megabytes of free disk space. 


Recommended Set-up
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Powball works best when running in pure DOS mode. This means when it is
running without windows in the background. To do this you have to shut down
windows and choose the "Restart in MS-DOS mode" option.


Command-line Options 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The following options may be used when you run this game from the DOS prompt:

-setSound
Executes the set-up menu. Same as running SETUP.BAT. 

-nopause
Doesn't wait for a key at initialisation if no errors occur. 

-config FILESPEC
Specifies an alternate path and filename for the configuration file. Use the
setSound option with this option to change the sound settings. This is
useful if you wanted to run Powball from CD-ROM. Example: POWBALL -config
C:\POWCFG\POWBALL.CFG -setSound 


Trouble-shooting 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Before you do anything else, read the initialisation screen carefully. Then
read the following points. It is most likely that a problem you are having
is a result of your computer being incorrectly configured. Contact us only
if you think there is a problem with this game and supply as much information
as you can. 

Not enough memory:
Insert a blank floppy disk into your floppy disk drive and run MAKEBOOT.BAT.
This utility will create a boot disk that will free up memory so that you can
run Powball properly. 

No sound under Windows:
In order for Powball to run smoothly under Windows, run POWBALL.PIF. 

Some keys don't work when others are pressed:
This is a hardware problem with some keyboards that can only handle a limited
number of keys at the same time. Either redefine the keys (use shift, ctrl
and alt preferably) or use a keyboard that doesn't have this limitation. 

Poor sound quality:
The Gravis Ultrasound is by far the best quality sound card for this game. If
you don't have this hardware and experience poor quality sound, try using the
high quality sound options and reducing the number of sound fx channels
within the set-up. 

Erratic animation and disk access:
If you're not using disk caching software, it is highly recommended that you
DO! Without it, your system is not taking advantage of advanced software that
will improve the performance of your machine and will improve the life of
your hard-drive. 


License and Legal Information 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Powball was originally released to the public as shareware on the 22nd of
August 1996, and subsequently re-released by Spectrum Pacific Publishing and
Webfoot Games on the the 3rd of June 1997. Now on the 5th of July 2000
Powball is released as Freeware; this means it is free to play and distribute
at your leisure but the license agreements remain. Please do not buy this
game from any publisher because the authors no longer get any royalties. If
you see this game on sale please inform me. 

To keep things nice and simple, this product remains the copyright of Anthony
Hamilton. It may not be sold for profit. There is no warranty, which means if
you break your leg while playing this game, the author is not responsible or
liable for any damages. So you play the game at your own risk. So do take
great care when whacking them balls! 


Contacting POW Productions 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Post:
POW Productions
43 Holcombe Crescent
Ipswich
IP2 9QL
United Kingdom 

e-mail: 
powball@w3.to 

Please visit the official Powball web site for patches and other great stuff:

http://powball.w3.to