TEMPORAL WAVE STUDIOS

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MONSTERLAND

Monsterland is a textmode shooter which optimally runs in full-screen textmode.
It was created by my cousin and I in 1996.

(P)review #1.
Review #2.
YouTube gameplay video.

Download here.

Press tilda ~ key to switch to the preferred screen mode (40x25).

Due to limitations of my DOS programming, the first, simple set of controls used ESDF to move and cursor or keypad keys to shoot in 4 directions.
If you started shooting a weapon with continuous fire, like a chaingun or flamethrower, then you need to press A to stop shooting.
A also serves as "DUCK", and you can use it to duck incoming rockets - but you can't move while ducking.
keys 123456789 select current weapon.

There are 10 keys (portrayed as % of 10 colors on the right bottom) which open 10 colored doors throughout the game.
11th type of door doesnt require a key.

There are various items like big and small ammo boxes, which one is which you can figure out by picking them up. When you pick up a yellow "number", you get that weapon.


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The item system:

You can carry 4 items at a time, which are portrayed on the right bottom.
When you run out of space, you start dropping items when you pick up new ones.
To select an item, you use F1-F4 keys.
To use it, press SPACE.

Some important item interactions:

To make a Boat: Come to a Tree, use the Axe item on it.
To cross a body of Water: Come to Water, select Boat item,
attempt to go INTO the direction you need to cross, (i.e. if river is to your left, press S because its the "left" key), and press SPACE to use the Boat.

Any monster can be killed with an Axe if you get close enough.
I don't know if this is a disbalance flaw, but we didn't usually use the Axe for this purpose.

Boots (look like letter K because B was taken for Boat), allow you to walk through Swamp (looks like letter V) without being hurt, for a limited amount of steps.
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Misc. tips:

Portals: When you see a shimmering thing with a black space in the middle, it is a portal. Portals work exactly like they did in Hexen.
You can travel from one map to another and revisit previous maps, where everything will stay the same way you left it.

Breakable wall: If a wall is gray, you can shoot a ROCKET into it with rocket launcher and break it. Important on level 12.

You can push a monster or even a couple of monsters out of your way, at the expense of being hurt by them as you do it.

Given how this is a textmode game, fire spread was difficult and wasn't implemented.However, bullets from the hitscan weapons can go through several monsters at once.
I.E. if you have 3 red M's which are low on health, and get very close with double-shotgun, you can kill them all in one shot.

Double shotgun's range expires quickly so at more than 10 spaces it becomes unusable.
Shotgun has a much higher range but much weaker punch.

Be careful around accumulations of Trees, they can cause a burst of chain explosions from a nearby Barrel that you shot, or fire from flamethrower.

Flamethrower: Move from side to side while using it, otherwise it wont cause much damage.

END OF GAME: Once you got to the level with the flamethrower boss and the insane rocket subbossess and killed them all, you can pat yourself on the back.
The end-game cutscene from DOS version was not ported for technical reasons.

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Tanks:

When you get into a Tank, you can rotae the turret with 4 and 6 keys on keypad (i think), and use keypad 8 (or space, I dont recall) to blast in the selection direction.
Tank uses ammunition from the weapons 1 to 4 so make sure to select one before firing.
Tank can also run over monsters, but eventually it will start smoking and blow up. You may or may not survive depending on your own actions, not random damage. This game has no random damage.

To get out of Tank press INSERT(0) (or space, I dont recall) on the keypad. I think.
You can also invoke the sequence of alternate control method below to do that.

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Alternate control method:

If you press the mouse buttons in this sequence:

RIGHT DOWN
LEFT DOWN
RIGHT UP
LEFT UP

You will see a cursor appear around Player.
This activated the secondary control method.

Now you can move and fire at the same time, and don't have to press A to stop firing continuous-fire weapons.
Firing is done with mouse of course.
While in TANK, old method is still used due to fixed turret rotation speed.
You will need to reactivate the alternate method when you get out of Tank.
In fact it can be used TO get out of Tank, i think.

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Multiplayer:

The DOS version had modem play, Windows version listens on port 5029, TCP/IP.

This game is stable in cooperative 2-player multiplayer over LAN. I’ve yet to make it work acceptably over WAN, but I’ve done this successfully before.

When you get inside a tank in 2-player mode, one player drives and another player controls turret.
The player that got into Tank first can open and close the hatch for second player by pressing Keypad 2 (Down). I think.

Tanks however are underused in this game IMO and are more for a novelty value.

You SHOULD be able to press F11 to see your partner's view during coop.
Don't remember if thats the key.

Saving and loading works just fine in multiplayer, but only one of the players is allowed to use F6/F7 keys to actually do it.
When he does it, it saves/loads on both ends.

The @ item. Resurrection potion from the early days of Monsterland.
I have no idea why we left it in, but if one player dies in multiplayer then another player can come near the spot of his death and resuscitate him using this item.
This item only lies on map 1 at this point. You can edit it into other maps if the game is too hard.
Unlike pressing SPACE upon death, having this item used on you preserves all the stuff you've been carrying.

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Demo:

If you leave it running in main menu, it will play a demo.

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Custom maps/scripting:

You can make your own map by modifying maps using "MD" tool.
As you may notice some maps have looping lightning effects, traps which cause walls to close or complete darkness (which can only be illuminated by weapon fire), etc.

That is accomplished by primitive scripting, for which I have no documentation.
It is a messy "language" if you could call it that, that can be seen at the end of several map files that use it.

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Technical problems:

Q: Game crashes when you enter a portal ?
A: Make sure you uncompressed the original archive with a program that preserves empty folders.

Q: Will this run on Windows NT 4.0 ?
A: Possibly, but untested.

Q: When I die in singleplayer mode, and then press Space, the game quits.
A: That is me fixing a bug from 1996 code. There’s a tiny wee bit of file access violation that I haven’t gotten my hands on so I eliminated the circumstance which causes it. For now.

In multiplayer coop, the game will not quit and you will respawn at player start point.
Also, if instead of Space you press F7 to load, the game will not quit in singleplayer mode either.