6PackMan User's Manual

Disclaimer and System Requirements

First off, let me make a couple of disclaimers to thin out some of the flames that are sure to be directed my way:

This game was developed by my friends and I as a fun diversion, with the intent of making a game that was fun and challenging and had no redeeming social value whatsoever. What that means is if the content of the game offends you, or if you don't like 2D platform games, or whatever other whining you feel like doing, you can cuss and yell until your lungs collapse, and we won't even pretend to give a flying fuck in a rolling donut. That being said we want people to enjoy the game, so if you find a bug or if you have some constructive feedback or whatever, we'd be glad to hear it.
This game is a fuckin' memory hog. It wants lots of RAM. Hell, it eats RAM for lunch. The reason for this is that the textures we use are very high resolution, and it also wants a really huge high resolution framebuffer. If you have an older video card, you may not be able to run this game. While it may seem excessive for a platform game to require a really burly video card, but we took fairly liberal advantage of hardware alpha blending and all that stuff, so that's the rub. It shouldn't be too much of a problem because most new systems come with more than enough video ram and texture bandwidth to pull it off.
Cards we've seen this game run OK on:
- nVidia TnT2
- Matrox G450
- nVidia GeForce 256 DDR
- nVidia Geforce2
Basicly we're shooting for something that supports hardware alpha blending, 32 bit frame buffers, and has at least 16 (but really should be 32) meg of video memory, and sits on an AGP bus. The game also requires DirectX 8.1 or higher.
We've all got day jobs, and this is totally a for-fun project. We're giving it away for free for people to download, but tech support is not something we have too much time for, I'm sorry to say.

If you find that the game is running too slowly, graphical/physics glitches occur, or the game speed is inconsistant, you can force the game to run in Low Resolution mode by invoking it with the -lowres switch:
6packman -lowres

This should free up some CPU and memory resources for other parts of the game.

Story and Introduction

Our story starts as our hero (Six Pack Man) breaks out of the county jail where he's been locked away for Disorderly Conduct, General Hooliganry, and Leaning with Intent to Fall. All he wants to do is get back home to his humble abandoned warehouse flat (the Home For Wayward Punk Rockers) to have a brew and relax, but unfortunately the city is overrun with lowlives such as cops, neo-nazis, demons, mobsters, and many others nasties, all of which would as soon curb stomp our hero as go fishing.

In order to make it back home, our hero must successfully traverse three areas of the city, first the seedy business district, full of trash and unfriendly thugs (cops). Second, the reeking sewers, full of biohazardous slime and demons from the underworld. Third and finally, he must survive the ratty warehouse district and all its "charm". Much practice will be needed to master these challenges, but I assure you it's entirely possible.

Controls

Left Arrow or Joystick Left moves the character to the left.
Right Arrow or Joystick Right moves the character to the right.
Spacebar or Joystick Button One causes the character to jump.
Enter or Joystick Button Two uses the "spring shoes" or whatever special item you carry.
Escape quits the game.

Gameplay

The gameplay is fairly simple. What you do is run and jump through the boards to collect items, dodge hazards, kill or avoid enemies, and mainly try to get the hell out of there. The main thing to keep in mind is that there is a pattern to everything, and most of the time you will be able to figure the pattern out by observation (and maybe a little trial and error). There are some places where timing and speed are the most important attributes, and there are others where patience and observation will see you through. The real trick is to decide when to be patient and when to rush in like a maniac.

You will probably notice the PacMan sort of theme, in that most of the enemies are made to look like ghosts (as if anybody really knows what the fuck a ghost looks like), and the main character looks like a punked out little yellow sphere. This is not some random concept we just pulled out of our backside, it's a nod to a very wonderful and addictive game for the old Amiga 500 computer. This game is called "platman" and can be downloaded from aminet. It runs best on a good ol' PAL Amiga 500, but for those of us in the states, it can also be run on UAE (the Ultimate Amiga Emulator) .

Items:	Most items in the game just get you points (an interresting thing to note is that the same item is not always worth the same number of points. An item that is normally not worth much may be much more valuable if it's in a difficult to reach place), however there are several special items that have some other function in the game. Here is a short list of those items: This is your "power pellet". Drink a 40 and you can curb-stomp the monsters for a limited time. This is a more advanced "power pellet". You can collect this item, and then use it later by pressing the special button (joystick button 2). "Save keys to open doors..." (hasn't somebody said that before) =:-). Spring Shoes: Use the special button to jump extra high. Aim your jump well though, 'cause it's a one shot deal. This item is worth quite a few points, but is it worth it considering the side effects?
Monsters:	Drink 40's and kill th' bastards. The cops. The cthulu-children of the deep. The fascists. The plain ol' creepy ghosts. The junkies. The slimy mutants from the sewers. The mob. The demons. The toxic fish.
Hazards:	Use your head. Beware of these hazards. Don't set yourself on fire. Duh. Don't fall in the toxic waste. Lava Baaaaad... Faulty wiring, beware. Don't get spiked.

Credits

Programming Lars Friend
Music and Sound Effects Ian Michael
Title Screens and Rendered Stills Eavan Chambliss
Sprites and Tiles Morgan Allerton-Minnis -an Anonymous Contributor- Asa Fox Lars Friend John Guttridge Ken Hill
Photography Lucas Madar
Level Design and Layout Morgan Allerton-Minnis -an Anonymous Contributor- Asa Fox Lars Friend John Guttridge Ken Hill
General Inspiration John Hardie (the author of PlatMan)

Six Pack Man themesong lyrics

Here are the lyrics to Ian's kick-ass 6packman themesong:

I saw sixpackman walkin' down the street
We drank some beers and started brawlin' in the heat
I took my shot and then was laid out in the grass
He had no legs but he kicked my fuckin' ass

Chorus:
Six Pack Man!
Six Pack Man!
Six Pack Man!

We wandered 'round looking for the walking dead
I drank too much and started fallin' on my head
Then the cops came and they started kickin' ass
He had no feet but that sixpackman he was fast