Beetle - Colin Gooch (ZX Computing-June/July 84-Page 51) There are no bugs in this game! Up to four players can take part in Colin Gooch's realistic dice game. Many traditional games have made their way from boards, cards, pen and paper into the computer screen, some successfully and some not. This is one of the successful transplants. For those of you who have missed the delights of this game in it's original incarnation, the idea is to throw a dice and build up a "beetle" according to the numbers thrown. The computer displays teh cards and the stages of the Beetle as it is drawn and a clever routine is used to simulate dice throwing. Instead of just saying "You threw 3", or whatever (a very suspicious format to non-computer - expert players) a dice is displayed which "rolls" until the player removes his finger from the key. This gives a realistic feel to the game. When less than four players take part then the computer joins in. It is a mean opponent, and I can't spot any sneaky programming which gives it an ad- vantage! You must have a 6 to start and this draws the body, 5 draws the head and ot- her numbers provide antenna, legs, eyes, etc. As you will gather, this is a game where luck is the important factor, but it makes a nice relaxing change from saving the world from aliens, or wrestling with some logical computer generated problem. VARIABLES USED A$,B$,C$ Dice spots. D$,E$ Dice frame. P$(N) Players' names. S$ Spectrum control, Play or Not. N$,Z$ Temporary variables (line inputs) A(X) Accumulated totals. B(X,Y) Beetles. Count Control variable in dice. D Dice value. FF Dice control variable. N FOR/NEXT loops. PL Number of players. T Turn number. V(X) Value of score. X,Y,P,I Variables to set up title page. THE LINES 1000-1020 Introduction, initialisation and inputs. 1030-1060 Main control loop, including checks. 1180-1320 Endgame routine. 1340-1600 Subroutines to print out beetle parts. 1610-1810 Start - get inputs on player details. 1820-1960 Initialise variables and dice graphics. 1970-2090 Dice throwing routine. 2100 Miscellaneous drawing title page etc. An interesting point to note in this program is the use of the hi-res graphic drawing routines. Unlike many other programs, only one UDG is used - the disc pip (graphic A). ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ TYPE: Traditional (Dice Game) COMMENT: This info file was typed by Michael Bruhn Downloaded from: Desert Island Disks -- http://www.image.dk/~frankie/ Maintained by: Michael Bruhn -- frankie@image.dk