LINE NOISE News from Chez Diesel 4 April, 1989 BLOODBATH! Today's new version of the game not only contained the code that promoted Hawk and Pugwash, but made many other changes - most of them to fighting. This is quite appropriate, since Fed has been somewhat violent recently; not only has the beastly Captain Crapto been firing at anyone silly enough to stray into his sector, but Hawk (who up to now has been a gentle old man) has been displaying homicidal tendencies; going after Omi whenever he gets the chance; and even killing Sevrina! Even the lower orders have been equipping themselves with weapons and cruising the spaceways looking for blood! The long-awaited command is here at last, which will add to the number of holes being blown in ships. Typing will target your weapons on your hapless victim, causing your ship to fire on them whenever you enter the sector they are in (but not when they enter your sector.) on its own will tell you who your ship is targetted to, and followed by anything else will turn the targetting computer off again. Ship descriptions will no longer be wiped out when your ship gets damaged, or repaired. No more gruyere cheeses sitting about on the landing pads! There will be a substantial reward for anyone lucky enough to kill Pegasus - but since he has just been made even more immensely powerful, it will probably take the co- operation of four or five kamikazes to claim it! The possibilities of spybeams getting hit in a fight will be halved - a great relief to those fed up with seeing 2 megs-worth of equipment reduced to molten metal. But just to make fighting a little trickier, your computers will be hit more often - and if you run out of fuel your lasers won't fire! To compensate for all the extra mayhem that is bound to result, the risk of you blundering into that big shiny mirror that's been left unattended near Venus has been reduced. Not only has it had lights put on it (thus concurring with the Galactic Administration's Road Traffic and Spaceways Act Section IV Sub-section C Clause 2), so you should be able to see it before you hit it, but just in case you don't slam your breaks on in time you won't go through it, because it is now only accessible by typing . Typing <>>... erm... perhaps '>' is a little clearer... will repeat any text you have typed into your input buffer. Handy for those using terminals with no separate input/output windows, whose typing can disappear as it scrolls up the screen. The real date and time will now appear on the review, as well as the Stardate. In addition, you won't have to tell Fed your terminal before reading the review; in will take the information out of your persona file (new players will be given a bog-standard 33). The data files have been restored to the DNI computer, with many entries extended and some new ones. On reaching your 1,000th game you will receive a 'congratulations' message, but there are no prizes on offer. The next un-official Fed meet will take place in Oxford at the end of April - see the bulletins in SpyNet for details. It will be the first out-of-London meet so I hope you will be able to drag yourselves into the depths of the countryside to indulge your appetites. The obnoxious Captain Crapto has lost his position as Public Enemy No 1. That privilege now goes to Maniac (and not for the first time). But his crime on this occasion has incensed even non-Fed players! GM magazine recently published a review of Fed which was extremely scathing, but from the tone of the review it would seem that the 'journalist' only visited two locations in the game, and only talked to one player - Maniac. Apart from this being a very sloppy way to review a game, it just HAD to be Maniac, didn't it? He hasn't played Fed for many months, and when he did play he was extremely incompetent and not very much liked, so he is hardly the best person to give an accurate picture of the game - in fact, he slagged it off something rotten. Not only did he get his facts wrong (only to be expected from such a dickhead) but he gave a totally distorted view of the atmosphere of the game, claiming that The Conclave conspired to kill lower players off and stop them advancing in the game. Anyone who has played Fed for more than a few hours will realise what complete and utter bullshit this is. It is incredibly difficult to kill a player dead-dead (unless they have neglected to insure themselves, in which case they only have themselves to blame); and the very nature of the game is such that alliances between players are not stable, so it is absurd to suggest that it is far more likely to be their colleagues they want to screw up! However, I am sure The Conclave would be willing to make an exception in Maniac's case. He has just signed his own death warrant! In future, magazines that wish to review the game will be given their own account so they can actually PLAY the game. Newsfield, publishers of many magazines including Zzap 64 and The Games Machine have been trying the game out, and seem to be having fun. C&VG has been sited briefly in Fed Data Space, and there are rumours that Tony Bridges, the most famous adventure reviewer of them all, will be appearing soon. These reviews, which will hopefully be more favourable than GM's, should lead to new players. Fed has been really busy in the last month but there is plenty of room for improvement. The proposed TTY access to Compunet will bring a new market sector of subscribers onto the net, and thus into Fed Data Space; this is being tested at the moment and will be available soon. Business here in Chez Diesel can only get better!