**>> SPYNET BULLETIN **>> EARTHDATE 93.01.03 **>> AN H-by-A SERVICE **>> Compiled by Hazed plus a team of specialist newsdroids **>> <> your news and gossip and get paid good groats! **>> FEDTERM!! As promised in last week's news, FedTerm, the new multimedia front- end program for Federation, was released last week. FedTerm has many features designed to enhance your gameplay. Scrollback allows you to look back through the text buffer, while still receiving the game's output. Output can be saved to disk, or sent directly to a printer. You can direct different kinds of text sent by the game to separate windows, or display it in another colour - for example, when spying on another player, or when receiving trading prices from an exchange. Trading prices can also be accompanied by icons of the commodity. Your persona's stats and ship's status are displayed in a bar graph, which is updated every time new information is received from the game. The risk of running out of fuel in space is no more, provided you keep an eye on the display! You can also see at a glance if your character needs to visit a bar for some food. FedTerm has programmable function-keys, and a fully-featured scripting language. The multimedia aspects of FedTerm let you display pictures and play sounds - you specify how they will be displayed, and which word received from the game will trigger them. You can exchange picture and sound files with other players, and key them to their persona - so when your friend says "Hi" your computer plays a sample of their voice saying "Hi", and displays their picture. FedTerm requires an IBM PC or compatible (640K memory), an EGA or better display, and if you wish to use the sound facilities a Soundblaster card. The Amiga version of FedTerm will be available shortly. **>>>> THE FEDTERM LIBRARY A new library on the main Fed page (220) contains the FedTerm program and associated files. (The library is currently option 6 on the menu, but it will shortly be changing to option 3 so Aladdin can use the library.) The main FedTerm file contains a text version of the manual, explaining all its features. A small number of pictures and sounds are packed up with FedTerm, and more are available from the library. Fed players have already started providing their own sounds and picture files and we will be reporting each week on new additions to the library. Here is a brief list of the files currently available in the FedTerm library: 2 FEDTERM.ZIP (Bella) FedTerm itself! 3 FEDLIB.TXT (Hazed) Guidelines on uploading files to the FedTerm library 4 BETA.ZIP (Bella) Upgrade of FedTerm, for beta-testers 5 WPMANUAL.ZIP (Bella) Word Perfect version of the FedTerm manual 6 PKUNZIP.EXE (Bella) Unpacker for ZIP files 7 PKXARC.EXE (Bella) Unpacker for ARC files 8 SFX1.ZIP (Bella) Collection of sound effects including sliding door, communicator noise, applause, fanfare, clang etc 9 GIF2FED.ZIP (Bella) Convert pictures from GIF format to FedTerm's format 10 WHAM.ZIP (Bella) Windows sound editor 11 BOCHI.ZIP (Bochiman) Sound to use with planet Hell 12 LITTLEB.ZIP (Bochiman) Another sound to use with planet Hell 13 HELLPLAN.ZIP (Bochiman) Yet another sound to use with planet Hell 14 WINZIP32.ZIP (Bochiman) Unpacker for Windows 15 LHARC213.EXE (Bochiman) Self-unzipping version of LHArc 2.13 16 VEDIT-2.EXE (Occy) Files for Soundblaster Pro, including drivers 17 DRINK.ZIP (Spindleman) Sound of someone pouring a drink, and letting it fizz We should mention that the trading icons contained in FedTerm were provided by Condor. Bella says "Thanx, Condor!" **>>>> GENIE DAYTIME RATES CHANGE IS PERMANENT! As an experiment, GEnie introduced Hot Summer Days and lowered the rates for using the system during prime time. The experiment was a success, and the change has become permanent. Prime time usage of GEnie now costs $12.50 per hour ($16.00 in Canada) for speeds up to 2400. **>>>> PAINT MARCIA! Marcia would like to hold a "Paint Marcia" competition, so anyone who would like to tickle her important little places with a paintbrush should start thinking up a colour scheme to match her hair. Oh... hang on... no, that's not right. The competition is to paint a graphic of Marcia, to use in FedTerm. Marcia is offering a prize of one hour's Gift of Time, and will also give groats to anyone who enters. If you are interested, contact her for details. **>>>> A BRIEF HISTORY OF AVALON Or, Where the Devil Has it Been? As reported by a Knewsdroid Errant sometimes mistaken for a Lampshade. Ah, Avalon. The very name conjures forth images of high priests of various gods, damsels in distress, and knights in shining armor. War- weary kings litter countless castles, their knights dispatched on impossible quests. After a jump through the interstellar link, such a scene would be pleasant indeed. Unfortunately, all that Aeron found was a space station and more asteroids than can be easily counted on two hands and three feet. Not satisfied with what she found, Aeron embarked on a tortuous journey through radioactive archives to discover the true secret behind Avalon Station and its sordid past. When, with a light heart and high hopes she disappeared through an unknown link sometime early last year and vanished, some lost hope and resigned her to her unknown fate. Without leadership, Avalon fell into disarray and passed out of the memories of women (and men and ah...whatever that blob in the corner calls itself). But wait! This is no sad tale of forgotten lands, this is a tale of the undiscovered country rediscovered! Recently, Aeron popped out of the interstellar link and back into the bars and nightclubs of the Federation. Prematurely grey from the experience and badly in need of a pizza, she wandered into a dimly lit, low gravity bar on Avalon Station one evening. Not Mars, not even the cool green hills of earth, but Avalon Station. Once more returned from the not-quite-dead, Avalon is struggling (or, perhaps more accurately, straggling) into the interstellar scene. Alas, this is a tale also of forgotten memories, for when Aeron reappeared the Raven was on autopilot and Aeron was passed out in the pilot's chair from a farewell party wherever she had been the night before. Unfortunately, after a few too many after having several more too many, she forgot where she had been. Perhaps, with a stout heart and quick brain, someone else can follow in her footsteps and find out how that stunning drink was mixed. **>>>> SANTA'S TRIVIA CONTEST A packed crowd last night watched in fascination as Santa Claus made his final appearance this year, hosting a trivia contest. Santa asked 50 questions, mostly about space, some about other aspects of science, and a few wierd ones thrown in for luck. Two prizes were on offer: a day's free Fed play to the contestants who came first and second. To ensure the evening was truly trivial, Santa asked such questions as: What colour is a yak's milk? (You'll have to ask Marcia the answer to that question). Krell was far and away the winner of the contest, beatiing all the others to the correct answer 22 times. Second place was a tie between Marcia and Satriani. Since they couldn't share the prize, Santa asked them both to tell him a joke, and awarded the prize to the person who made him laugh the most. Marcia's joke was amusing and elicted a chuckle and a score of 17 on the laugh-o-meter, but Satriani's joke made Santa fall off his chair laughing and scored 22 on the laugh-o-meter. So Krell and Satriani both win a day's free Fed. Congratulations, and commiserations to all those who didn't win, but who had a great deal of fun trying! **>>>> ODDBALL IS MEMBER OF THE MONTH! Krell made us promise not to make any jokes about Oddball being this month's Member. Spoilsport! So all we will say is that Oddball is the Member of the Month in the MPGames RT, and file 2398 in the MPGames library gives his life history. **>>>> 1993 CALENDAR With the dawn of another new year, it's time to hang a new calendar in the H-by-A office, and we've managed to obtain the only copy in the universe of the Fed Hunks and Stunners calendar. Flipping through it, we find that Mr. January is Oxcart, posing naked except for a small piece of pink spandex hiding his particulars. Ms. April is Freya, wielding an egg-beater and looking amazingly sexy. May shows us Marcia, on her knees waiting for someone to - erm - well waiting for something, anyhow. July has Hazed, wearing nothing but a pair of black leather thigh- length boots, with which she is grinding the face of a serf into the ground. Mr. September is Oddball, trying very hard to look like a Chippendale, and ending up more like a Chipmunk. Ms. October is Bella - an enormous expanse of green flesh fills the picture. Finally, Mr. December is Santa Claus, his red fur robe opened to reveal just what he has to give to good little girls! **>>>> SCANDALOUS STUFF Galauriel and Cyrfox had a tryst recently, and heated the Cantina up to boiling point. Sparks were flying so fiercely that the Galactic Administration had to send in the fire brigade to prevent a serious accident. Total seems determined to increase his irritation quotient with all his fellow Fedders. He's into massive and constant spying, then sending incessant tightbeams with inane commentary on what he is seeing! Blackbush, mistress of the ship Silky (subtle or what!) is giving Marcia a run for the money (possible literally) by attempting to drag every available man (or equivalent) into Sam's for a tete a tete. Marcia would like to catagorically deny that Destiny and she have anything going, despite what the comm traffic sounds like when they are both on. She goes on to say, 'Oh... and the orgy in Topper's pub? Wasn't a proper orgy ... there were only four of us there (you need at least 5 for a proper orgy). Hmm, though I guess you could say that Zippy is a very close duchy, almost incestuous, at times. I mean, when the duke and 3 of his planet owners get together - Ooops, I think I've said too much, already!' **>>>> PLANETS AND DUCHIES Aeron's planet, Avalon, which returned last week after a long absence, has decided to join a duchy. Can you guess which one? Yes, that's right, she's joined Zippy! Tristesse (Duchy of Scratchwood) is now a mining world, and Muse (Scratchwood again) has advanced to Industrial. **>>>> SPYNET REVIEW This week's new Captains are Cicero, Dunsel, Toto, Astra, Terminator and Matt. Well done! The Adventurers are Kritz and Cicero. Pixel was promoted to Merchant, and bought himself a company: Pixelplex. Trista was promoted to thane, and Mirth to Industrialist. **>>CONTACTS The following information will appear at the end of every News Bulletin, so you don't have to read it if you already know it. In the event of a problem or question, you can: * talk to Hazed or Bella in the game * leave a <> message in the game log * <> a message to Hazed or Bella * send GEnie mail with the Federation Feedback option from the main menu Federation has a multimedia front end program, FedTerm, available in the Fed library (option 6 on the main Fed page). You can order a copy of the unexpurgated printed Idiot's Guide to Federation by typing ORDER at any GEnie menu. Cost - a mere $12.95. (New edition will be available shortly!) Federation has several categories in the new MPGames RT. To get there, type M1045,1 from any menu prompt and SET category 13 (for information, instructions, questions and answers) or 14 (for general chat and discussions). The Federation Leader in the bulletin board is Krell (Mail ID: K.HILLYER). There are also private categories for Explorers, run by Krell, and for the Conclave run by Oddball (Mail ID: D.STALZLE). The MPGames RT also has a Federation library in the files area, Library 5. Library 18 holds the Federation News Archives. **>> BULLETIN ENDS