games/competition96/picket/1req.txt

T H E   L A N D   B E Y O N D   T H E   P I C K E T   F E N C E

(C) September 1996 by Martin Oehm, Version 1.0

Welcome to 'The Land beyond the Picket Fence', a text-adventure entered into
the Second Annual IF Competition of 1996. Before starting the action, make
sure you have all the files you need to play the game.

These files belong to the text-adventure 'Picket Fence':

  PICKET.EXE     Programme (TP 5.5)
  PICKET.DAT     Text file for descriptions of rooms, objects etc.

These two files are necessary to play the game and must be in the directory
from which the game is run. I advise creating a separate directory for
'Picket Fence', e.g. MD C:\PICKET. It is possible to run the game from disk,
but it is *much* faster from the hard disk drive. Further, you should have
received the following files:

  HANDBOOK.DOC   Brief instructions for use with DOS-Editor
  README.NOW     This file
  PICKET.SOL     Walkthrough (Don't use until seriously stuck!)

These files are just documentation and are not needed to play. To run the
programme, just enter the directory with the PICKET.* files and type PICKET
from the DOS prompt.

It is advisable to skip through the documentation in the HANBOOK.DOC, even if
it may not provide new information to experienced adventure veterans. One
should know the custom commands, though:

  RESTART         starts the game over
  QUIT            leaves the game
  RESTORE or *R   restores a previously saved game
  SAVE or *S      saves a game
  BRIEF, VERBOSE  switches to brief or verbose text mode
  NOTIFY          turn notification of score changes on/off
  STATUS          turn status line at the top of the screen on/off
  INFO            general release information
  HINT            get a hint from the programme
  UNDO            allows you to undo the last command (and only the last!)

In the unlikely event of the programme reacting unexpectedly, the programme
may be interrupted by pressing Ctrl-C or Ctrl-Break respectively. The author
is not liable for any problems caused.

This game is provided as Freeware, i.e. you may use and distribute it freely
(and only freely!) as long as none of the programme nor the documentation is
modified in any way. The game may not be sold except for a small fee to pay
the data media. The programme is *not* in the Public Domain.

Have fun with your copy of 'The Land beyond the Picket Fence' and vote!


Dreis-Tiefenbach, Germany, in September 1996

Martin Oehm
<oehm@diogenes.fb5.uni-siegen.de>