Infestation manual
INFESTATION Some of mates (aliens that is) have taken a liking to the mining colony Alpha II and have killed all the miners, and have planted loads of eggs in the colony. The eggs will soon hatch to form an invincible alien army that will destroy all life! So, mug that you are, you have volunteered to go bug hunting. Yes, you, KAL SOLAR have won the trip of a lifetime!! A one way trip to an airless rock floating in the back of beyond, just stuffed full of hostile aliens!! Enough of the plot, let's get on with the important stuff... Keys: F1 Open/close door or grating F2 Enter/exit terminal F3 Take off/put on helmet F5 Toggle tactical/recon mode F6 Reset positioning F7 Drop cyanide gas F8 Turn suit's systems on/off F10 Toggle crawling/standing up HELP Toggle pause ESC (whilst paused) exit to main menu TAB Toggle sound on/off (following keys on keypad only) 1 Navigation computer 2 Status computer 3 Inventory 4 Life support systems 5 Scratch pad 6 Atmosphere analysis 7 Avionics (following keys are cursors) UP MMU active/go up in elevator DOWN MMU inactive/go down in elevator Within the colony there are various doors seperating different areas. F1 will open or close a door if you are facing it and are quite close. The doors enclose horizontal elevator/airlocks; e.g. an airlock which moves along a level instead of up/down levels. When you find a blueprint of a level, the flashing arrows show the routes of these airlocks. There are some elevators- these you need an elevator card for. The card can be found in the ventilation shafts, so you've got quite a lot of searching to do! You need the screwdriver to be able to open the grating which leads to the ventilation shafts. Once you've got the card, find the elevator and then you can get on with your mission- enter the elevator, close the door and use the cursor keys up and down to move the elevator up/down levels. Then open the door and go forth... The terminals are computers with varying functions. The first one you will find is near a radar base on the surface of Alpha II. When facing the two flashing panels on the terminal, press F2 and you enter the terminal. The first terminal you meet will request your name for security clearance. Type in KAL SOLAR and you will see TRANSPORTER ACTIVATED at the bottom of the screen. Now exit with F2 and go to... The transporter. This looks a bit like a head from certain angles and has an overhanging hook at the front. It's pretty big and close to the first terminal so you can't miss it! Just walk into the centre of it and you will be transported down to the colony. Within the colony, transporters look quite a bit different. Anyone who has seen Star Trek will recognise them instantly! When you've been transported to the colony, walk forward a bit and then turn around to see what I mean. Notice that there are two transporters- and both have arrows at the bottom. The one with an arrow pointing away from the transporter is the one you've just come out of. The other one is the one you should enter if you want to use that transporter. Now, you're inside the colony so you can take off your helmet. F3 will do that. NEVER take your helmet off on the surface, as there is no atmosphere! In fact, you should check the atmosphere before you ever take your helmet off. Key 6 on the keypad will tell you what you want to know- bear in mind that Earth's atmosphere is near enough 76% Nitrogen, 21% Oxygen- so anything close to that is breathable. Unfortunately, with your helmet off, you have no access to your suit's systems like firing etc. So what's the point in taking your helmet off at all? Because it saves precious Oxygen! Your suit has a limited supply, so whenever you can, breathe the air around you! Tactical mode is the default mode you start in, with all your weaponry ready to be used. Recon mode only seems to have one use- holding down fire and a direction changes the position you view the world from, so you can line up on a target before firing. Then switch back to tactical to fire. Other than that, I have no idea what use recon mode is. F6 will reset your positioning if you get lost, and don't know what the hell way you're facing. Cyanide. Lovely stuff! Yep, this is a real friendly way to let the neighbours know that you're home! Cyanide gas will kill anything in a matter of seconds. It's primary use is to dispose of the alien eggs. Cyanide will not affect the various droids in the colony or on the surface, nor will it affect the surface dwelling insects- they live in a vacuum so have no use for gases anyway. Bear in mind that you shouldn't take your helmet off anywhere near the spot where you dropped a cyanide canister!! Turning the suit's systems off when you don't need them will conserve battery power. This will be vital! For a closer view of the ground, F10 can get you crawling in the dirt, and standing up once you're happy with dirty knees. You can only enter the ventilation shafts if you are crawling. Saving/loading/formatting a blank disk is done from the main menu. If during a game you want to save your position, press HELP, then press ESC. Now wait for the main menu to appear, and select SAVE POSITION (you may have to format a blank disk first). Then RESUME GAME to carry on. Later, you can use PLAY FROM SAVED POSITION to resume where you saved earlier. The navigation computer shows your co-ordinates and bearing- this will be useful for the map you will almost certainly have to make. The colony is not a small place!! Some terminals also have level blueprints which show a basic map of the level. It makes good sense to carefully copy each blueprint to a piece of graph paper. It will take time, but it will be seriously useful!! The status computer shows things like Alien eggs left, kills, time etc. The inventory shows the items you are carrying and how many cyanide canisters you have left. The life support systems show just how well or badly you are standing up to the strain. The scratch pad doesn't seem to be actually necessary. You could use it to note down things before saving a game- e.g. where you are, what you have just done or are about to do, etc. Other than that, I think it's just a nice little gimmick. Atmosphere analysis I've already mentioned, apart from the radiation level- keep away from excessive radiation as it will kill you. Avionics shows the state of your MMU (Manned Manoeuvring Unit). The three bars on the right are: F Fuel remaining V Velocity A Altitude The T bar on the left is a standard attitude indicator. The controls of the MMU are not immediately obvious: (joystick) FIRE Thrust forward Left Bank left Right Bank right Up Incline up (climb) Down Incline down (dive) The MMU is provided for faster travel and for avoiding ground based nasties. Your suit's helmet display shows oxygen status in the two bottles at top left, battery level in the 'T' shaped collection of dots at bottom right and radiation dose to the left of that. If you run out of oxygen you suffocate and die. If the battery level reaches zero, the suit's systems become inactive - so you have no means of defence or anything. If you accumulate too high a radiation dose, you die. The various objects in the game can be seen on the INTERROGATE OBJECTS screen accessible from the main menu- take note of the descriptions! By the way, there is at least one part of the colony that has no lighting, so you may have to find a way of rectifying that... infra red... get the idea?
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