Adventurama

Those your class, visit your guild, then go out for the kills.

===================Adventurama Ver 1.1=================

by Ron Forte

Welcome to "Adventurama", the hot new game for Kyle's Quest 3.2

from the creator of "Have Guitar, Will Travel."

Both Pilot and WindowsCE versions are available for this level.

It has been extensively tested on the Palm Pilot Pro (TM) OS 2.0,

and should be compatible with all later Pilot versions.

Please note that the WindowsCE version has NOT been tested, as

I have no intention of either personally testing my level on a

CE device, or ever owning a CE device.

===============Notes from the Author===============

This is my second effort at designing a level for Kyle's Quest.

For this level, my concept was to create an adventure which pushed

the limits of the Kyle's Quest engine, but is still fun to play.

Whereas my first level was very "linear" in nature, i.e. get to

point A, then B then C and so on, I wanted this adventure to

offer as much freedom for the player to "explore" as possible.

The danger in this, of course, is creating a game that has little

or no focus or direction. I hope I've successfully avoided that

through the use of Adventurama's guild system.

My plan from the beginning was to take the concept of "guilds" in

Kyle's Quest to the N'th degree. I wanted to offer the players the

freedom to develop the character as they wish. That's why

Adventurama has 12 distinct "classes" or paths which you may

follow. Depending on which Guild the player joins, one can aquire

a greater or smaller range of spells and weaponry. Those

experienced in Fantasy Role-playing games will get the idea fairly

easily: Priest types will have more and better healing spells;

Wizard types will have a broader range of offensive spells, and

Fighter types will have access to better Weapons and Armor. More

detail on that in a bit... but first:

====================Introduction===========================

"You are Foley, slacker extroidinaire. After years of grubbing

off of your parents, you finally get the boot out of the house by

dear old dad. Not fancying the idea of being ridiculed by your

friends and neighbors, you decide to begin your new 'independent'

life far from home, in the foreign 'land beyond the great

mountains'. You've heard stories about the wealth of opportunities

as well as the perils there, so you decide to take a chance and

become a stranger in a strange land. Your objective: prove that

you're not the loser your father thinks you are."

That's it, folks, that's the setup. I'll let the game itself tell

the rest of the story.... There won't be any "spoilers" here,

because I don't want to ruin the fun, and frankly, I'm a bit too

lazy to lay everything out for everyone in a complete walk-through.

However, especially for those of you new to the idea of "classes"

and "guilds", here is a brief description of the guild system in

"Adventurama":

==========Guilds========

When you begin the game, there are four main guilds you may join.

Admission to each guild requires passing some sort of "test". The

characters in the game will explain the quests to you, but the

four guilds and their features are:

Warrior: Your basic fighter. Good selection of weapons and armor,

and not a spell to speak of.

Rogue: A common street thug. Gets decent armor, and some pretty

good special weapons as well. Also can use some minor

defensive and stealth spells.

Priest: Not exactly the "turn the other cheek" type you might be

expecting. Good weapons, good armor, good defensive

spells, an offensive spell or two, and the very very

valuable use of healing spellls.

Mage: Poor weapons, poor armor and no use of healing spells. But

offensive spells that are guaranteed to wreak havoc upon

opposing creatures.

But no-siree, it doesn't stop there! At a certain point in the

game, you will graduate to one of the 12 "elite" guilds. This is

where you can really start kicking butt. Essentially, each of the

four main guilds can promote you to one of its three elite

guilds. (After passing another test of course.) Here are the

elite guilds associated with the four primary ones:

======================

(Warrior)

Knight: A Warrior on steroids. Still no spells, but the focus on

Strengh, Agility and HP and greater selection of deadly

weapons and armor makes the Knight the best pure fighter

in the bunch. Knights have the benefit of being able to

train in more than one Lawful Castle.

Paladin: A Warrior who fights for the church. Paladins get access

to most of the same spells as Priests, with some of their

own, and they also have great armor and powerful weapons.

Their focus on spells makes them inferior fighers to

Knights, however.

Ranger: The Woodsman. Rangers are excellent at fighting, and have

good weapons and armor, as well as a wide array of all

types of spells.

======================================

(Rogue)

Thief: Sneaky, sneaky, sneaky. Great stealth spells, access to

good healing, and some deadly weaponry make the Thief a

pretty darn good survivor in a dangerous land.

Bard: The featured class of the hero in "Have Guitar, Will

Travel", the musical bard is really a pretty well-rounded

character. He can cast some low-level spells of all types,

and has some offensive ones of his own that are pretty,

um... rocking! And some of the musical weapons from

"Guitar" are also available.

Ninja: Ninjas are cool! They get some minor offensive, stealth

and healing spells, some deadly weapons that only the

martial artists have available, and they can aquire the

virtually limitless ability to use their hands and feet as

deadly weapons.

=============================

(Priest)

Druid: Rather than following God directly, Druids worship God

through nature. Besides the healing spells they aquired

as Priests, the elite Druids also can channel the forces

of nature into some heavy-duty offensive, defensive and

stealth spells.

Healer: Healers, well...heal. Learning just a handful of

offensive and defensive spells, the healers' specialty

is their use of the most effective healing spells bar

none.

Bishop: A Priest on steroids. Bishops get a little bit more of

every talent of the Priests.

==============================================

(Mage)

Mystic: I named this guild "Mystic" because "Illusionist" is too

many letters for the KQ Engine to handle. A mystic has

better stealth and defensive spells than anyone else, and

also has one or two healing spells.

Warlock: Warlocks are evil, man. Evil in a good way, I mean.

They just may be the most diverse of all the spellcasters,

having some truly deadly offensive AND good healing

spells.

Wizard: What happens when a Mage takes 'roids? You guessed it!

The only spells Wizards are lacking in is healing, but

other than that, nobody can touch their spellcasting

power. I also like to call them "combat mages".

Oh, please note: Membership in more than one primary and one elite

guild is forbidden and physically impossible. (I already fixed this

bug once!)

So, that's all of the guilds... The main reason I've included

these brief descriptions is to help you players decide which type of

character you'd like to play in order to complete Adventurama.

Hopefully, it will entice you to play through more than once;

Believe me, choose a different class, and you'll find that much of

your experience will be quite different. The game does include a

few critical choices during your adventure; Why not try something

different the second time around?

======Spell System=====

Just some notes about how Adventurama's spells operate. Spells in

Adventurama DO NOT improve with use or "level up". Once you

aquire a spell, it stays at the same level of effectiveness.

Part of the challenge in Adventurama is in aquiring more powerful

items AND spells as you go along. Also, while spellcaster's

guilds can teach you a few of the minor spells, most spells

need to be learned via spell scrolls which must be found or

purchased. This is a play balance thing for the most part;

I realized while playtesting that joining one of the

spellcasting guilds would cause an extreme surplus of gold,

since the better and more expensive weapons and armor are

not available to members of those guilds. So, when you finally

get into the Wizard's Guild, be prepared to shell out a comparable

amount of cash for that "Invisibility" spell to what a Knight

would pay for his "Mithril Armor". Again, just a game mechanics

thing: Hopefully, it'll keep you from being too rich or too poor.

===========Helpful Tips=====================

1) Try to talk to everyone, especially those suspiciously standing

alone. Most people are shy and don't want to

be bothered, but you never know when you might run into someone

who has an important quest or piece of info. for you.

2) Read carefully!!! When someone directs you to a person or

place, remember it or jot down the name or location. They might not

repeat it!

3) This goes for nearly every adventure game you play. SAVE

OFTEN!!! In the event of your untimely death, or worse, in the

event that you forgot tip #2 and missed an important direction,

it would behoove you to restart from your last saved position.

4) Be cautious! There's usually no real need to walk

boldly forward in a Northerly direction with the intention of

plowing over everything in your path. Stop and stroll through

the towns; read the notices in your local guild; and chat

with some of the local Peasants. There are lots of cool mini-

quests you can go on in order to gain experience, money and items.

Don't worry about finding the main "plot"... it will likely find

you!

5) Please direct any questions or bugs to [email protected], or

post on the KQ message board. I promise to be responsive. Not

responsible, but responsive.

6) Oh yeah, Adventurama is HUGE!!! -Over 380k!!! Overkill?

Probably. And it may not seem so big considering the amount of

time it might take you to finish the adventure. But, keep in

mind that when you finish the game once, you will have only

experienced a small portion of the world of Adventurama. As I

said before, try it again; do things differently!

Enjoy the game that is "Adventurama"! Please feel free to contact

me with any questions, comments, suggestions, or praises. Yeah,

most importantly the praises! :-)

-Ron

[email protected]

www.earthtogod.com

=====================Version updates==========================

1.1 (May 5, 1999): Fixed bug preventing completion of Wizard's guild

initiation quest. A few minor dialog and item bugs as well. Also

fixed a bug that allowed admission to more than one primary guild.

Fixed bug that had prevented Ninjas from obtaining important mission.

Fixed a MAJOR bug that was not allowing a critical encounter to fire:

ALL 3 endings now reachable!

--------------------------------------------------------------

Legal mumbo-jumbo: (c) 1999 Ron Forte. All rights reserved.

This level is intended for use in conjunction with the Kyle's

Quest (TM) game engine. It may be freely distributed by any

means, provided that no monetary transactions occur in association

with this product. The author asks that appropriate credit be

given to Ron Forte and EarthToGod.com for design of the game

wherever possible, though it is not a legal obligation.

In the event that any party seeks to earn a

profit through the use or distribution of this product, the

offending parties will be immediately damned to an eternity

of listening to Leif Garret songs. Have a nice day.