mccarthy@gomets.enet.dec.com (Mike McCarthy) (11/03/90)
-- Does anyone have any information on Harpoon or Indy 500 for the Amiga? I notice that they have been released in the past few days. Hard disk supported? Copy protection? Thanks for any information, Mike ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Mike McCarthy | Digital Equipent Corp. Giants in '90... | ARPAnet: mccarthy@gomets.enet.dec.com It could happen | Usenet : ...!decwrl!gomets.enet.dec.com!mccarthy -----------------------------------------------------------------------
orovner@sdcc13.ucsd.edu (Oleg Rovner) (11/04/90)
Harpoon review: Great game IF you are a wargamer. I am and Harpoon has managed to drive me away from F-19 Stealth Fighter (I am also a flight simulator fanatic :-). The very extensive databaseof units is great and well worth the money by itself. The game is propgrammed right: a1000,500,2000,2500,3000 compatible, HD installable, no copy protection. Performance on my machine (a500, 2 floppies, 2.5 megs of RAM, 1 meg chip) is somewhat sluggish but speeds up if I copy everything to RAM (leaving 350k free on my system while the game is running). The box says 1 meg required, but the game managed to crash on my friend's 2000 with 1 meg, so I would say that Harpoon would be much happier with 1+ Megabytes of RAM. If anyone wants a wargame review of HARPOON (i.e. Realism, gameplay, playability) feel free to mail me. Regards, OR -- ----------------------bite here----------------- "The bomb squad X-rayed the radio and determined it was only a radio" -San Diego Union. _____________________stop biting________________
felixh@headcrash.Berkeley.EDU (Felix Hack) (11/05/90)
I agree with the review of Harpoon. It is for serious aficionados of modern naval warfare and really represents the way this kind of situation should be played, i.e. with a computer to do the tedious work and handle limited intelligence. I hacked around on the SimCan games Grey Seas Grey Skies and their Fleet series some time ago (Atari ST versions) using a sector editor to fix mistakes in the data files, change systems as new data became available, and so on. I'm happy to have succeeded in doing so with Harpoon. When I noticed that the game used the 'old' data annex from the boardgame, I wanted to fix it up. Using NewZap I have figured out the formats for the weapons and sensors (at least most of the info, stuff like speed, range, accuracy, and so on). I also found how platforms have sensor information coded. I did this over the last 24 hours and have already totally redone ASW stuff. Sonars in the new data annex are very different (much weaker) than in the previous edition (represented in the computer game). I've made all the modifications. I've also checked the torpedo data and found it largely accurate, though I did replace the generic Tigerfish with its Mk2 version. I took out some sonars and inserted others, mostly to benefit the Soviets because they require more sonars in the platforms of the GIUK battleset than are actually provided. For example, the MF Hull sonar is now split into the ship's Bull Horn and the Sub's Shark Fin sonars (they differ slightly in active detection probabilities). Anyway, if people are interested I could post a message describing the data layout. Now to the problems: I run the game on an Amiga 2500/20 with 1 Meg Chip Ram, 2 Megs 32-bit RAM, and 2 Megs 16-bit RAM. When I run Harpoon out of hard disk or Ram disk I get crashes almost automatically whenever I try to examine weapons systems on platforms during a game. I also experience crashes when animations are starting, it looks like graphics garbage is 'sprayed' across the screen and the program often GURUs right away. This last problem looks like random memory trashing. I've already posted on GEnie mentioning these bugs to Three-Sixty. I had hoped we wouldn't see these sorts of bugs, but I also know what the real-world limitations are when doing such a large and complicated piece of software. I also lobbied for a weapon/sensor/platform editor, mostly to let players update them as new information becomes available. I take it a scenario creator is also planned. I also told them I most wanted to see a 640-400 screen option, as well as head-to-head modem play. If you buy the game and feel the same way I do about these and other concerns about the game, please let Three-Sixty know. We're just now joining the computer Harpoon club; IBM types have been in for a year and Mac types will be in soon. It's going to be great fun.
manes@vger.nsu.edu (11/07/90)
I would love a review from another player of Harpoon. I have spent some time with the game and can't decide if I like it. Perhaps furhter play is in order! > ----------------------bite here----------------- > "The bomb squad X-rayed the radio and determined it was only a > radio" -San Diego Union. > _____________________stop biting________________ -mark= +--------+ ================================================== | \/ | Mark D. Manes "Mr. AmigaVision" | /\ \/ | manes@vger.nsu.edu | / | (804) 683-2532 "Make up your own mind! - AMIGA" +--------+ ==================================================