JKobo v 1.0.0

JKobo is a port of the game XKobo to Java.  The principle of the game is to
shoot everything that moves and then shoot everything that's left.  The game
is so simple that no further instructions are really required.	The syntax of
the game is as follows:

    JKobo [-doublesize] [-quadsize] [-cheat] [-language lang] [-country cntry]
	  [-variant var] [-wait XXX]

The "doublesize" and "quadsize" flags increase the game's size appropriately.
This also increases the game's resources appropriately.  For these larger
sizes, the sprites used in this game were not redrawn but are merely scaled
using Java's scaling algorithms.  Therefore, at larger game sizes, the
sprites can become somewhat pixellated.  At larger sizes, the game takes
longer to create its playing area.  There can be a considerable lag between
game and stage starts.	You can verify its working with a CPU meter.  When
creating a new playing area, the CPU meter will peg at 100 percent.  This
game may become too slow (and therefore unplayable) at larger sizes.  Your
only recurse then is to move down a size where possible.  Here are the
results of testing on my machine (166MHz Pentium, 96MB mem, Java 1.1.6)
    normal     - Very responsive
    doublesize - Noticably slower but playable.  Can slow done when there
		 are many missiles flying.
    quadsize   - Too slow for my tastes.

The "cheat" flag gives you an infinite number of ships.

The "language", "country", and "variant" flags allow you to play in the
language of your choice.  This is a shooting game so there isn't much
text but what text there is should be language dependent.  If you choose
to play in another language, make sure that the appropriate properties
file is present in the application directory.  Otherwise, the game will
default to the _JKobo_en_US properties.  I have not included any other
language properties files but provided _JKobo.properties file lists all
the text messages which must be translated.

The "wait" flag changes the duration of the timer thread.  The minimum
duration is the default duration of 30 milliseconds.  If this is too
fast, it can be increased with this flag.

XKobo is distributed under the GNU General Public License.  Therefore,
JKobo is also distributed under this same license.  I did not want to
release the source code but it seems like I should.  My reluctance is
not because I want to make money off this project.  I ported this game
to learn and test Java.  Therefore this is my first attempt at writing
a Java program.  Also I am not a programmer by trade.  Frankly I
didn't want the world to see how crappy my source code is.  Therefore
if you have any comments about my source code, be kind.

This program is released as beerware.  If you find this program enjoyable
and you see me at a bar, buy me a beer.


INSTALLATION:

This game must reside on a filesystem capable of handling long filenames.
Unzip this file into a directory and type the following on the command line:

java JKobo


KNOWN BUGS:

1.  If the game is not responding to keypresses, restarting the game
    usually solves the problem.
2.  If the text of the original screen is missing/incorrect, restarting
    usually solves the problem.


Jake Wetzel
jawetzel@alum.mit.edu

