Scenario

Inside the human body, a constant war rages between invading virus cells and the body's own defence mechanisms. Most of the time the body easily repels these marauders, but just occasionally a stronger - mutant - strain of virus appears putting the body's own defences under threat of being overwhelmed.

When this happens we use artificial mechanisms to protect the body and Vaxine puts you in control of the newest devices. The invading cells appear and gradually bond together until they are strong enough to attack certain key body cells. If the invaders are not eliminated before they latch onto these calls, they will not only destroy them but also use the constituent parts to make more of them- selves. If all of these key body cells were to be destroyed, life could no longer be supported, and - inevitably - the game would be over. By attacking the invaders with colour coded anti-bodies, the player can eliminate them and even use their proteins to make more antibodies in just the same way that the invaders use body cell mather. Futhermore, the player can send out DNA STANDARS which find an enemy cell, attach to it and then wait for the enemy calls to bond together before destroying all of the enemy calls. As the game progresses the invasion force grows stronger; how long before life can no longer be maintained? Vaxine has an infinite number of increasingly difficult levels in which reflex, skill and strategy are the only resources which allow the survival of the host.

How To Play

Before every game, a menu appears to allow you to set up the game as you prefer. Use the joystick/mouse/cursor keys (PC) to select your controller, difficulty level and preferred shot type - inertia or no inertia. Shots fired with inertia have your speed of motion forward, backward, left and right imparted to them. Shots without inertia will fly straight forward. The choice is yours. Players who have never played Vaxine before, can use PRACTICE mode.

Here, the enemy cells never attack your bases, so there is no time pressure. Use this mode to practice moving and firing until you are skilled enough to try the main game. Players who have mastered the first few rounds may prefer to select ADVANCED mode which starts the game off at level 10. (Atari STE owners can also use the opening menu to select a specially enhanced mode colour and better sound effect. Curious ST owners should note however that selecting this mode will crash a conventional ST.)

Vaxine starts on a checkerboard grid, upon which the whole game takes piace. It is easiest to move around this grid using a mouse , but you can use a joystick if you prefer. The object of the game is to survive each level by destroying all enemy cells which apear, before they bond together and destroy aa your base cells. The game ends if all your bases are destroyed, or if one of your three ammo streams reaches zero. To destroy enemy cells, shoot of them using the left mouse/fire button; BUT - you will only destroy a cell if you hit it with a shot of the some colour. How do you know which colour shot you are about to fire? Look at the ammo readout at the top of the screen:it shows how many shots of the currenfly selected colour your have left.It changes colour when you change shot, by clicking the right mouse button/SPACE BAR. You have three different shot colour to choose from.

Status Line

At the top of the screen are a number of items that provide assential information. On the top left is your score. In the centre is the ammo bar descibed above and to the right are two numbers. The first of three shows the number of enemy cells in the currenfly selected colour which are on the grid. The second shows the total number(all three colours of bases remaining. (you begin with nine).

Ammo Recharging

If you shot an enemy cell with the wrong colour shot. It will not be destroyed end will continue its evil business. However, the resulting energy reaction creates a star which bounces on the spot three times before disappearing. If you shoot this star you will gain more ammo - Eight shots if shot with the same colour cell, only three shots if shot with a diffent colour cell. Nothing comes free though; if the star disappears without being shot you will lose five shots of that colour. If you fall low on ammo in the middle of the level you must recharges your ammo level in this way; if any one of your ammo levels fall to zero, then you cannot possible defend your bases properly and the game is automatically over.

The Star Tree

To make life slightly easier on the ammo front, there is a short "grace" period of the start of every level. This is shown by a timer at the top right of the screen counting down to zero. Immediately in front of your is a star tree - a source of free ammo to help you through the level. Just pick off the stars one by one. Remember that as soon as the timer reaches zero, the "grace" period is over and the bad guys will start to appear.

The Enemy Cells

Nasty, evil things with only one aim in life: to bond together in groups of three or more, seek out one of your perfectly innocent base cells and suck the life from them to make more of their own kind. Try to destroy enemy cells before they even join together: they're harder to hit when they are joined by strings and even harder to hit when bouncing around one of your bases just prior to destroying it. To help you know what they are up to behind your back, we've included sampled sound effects to warn you whenever they:- Materialise (a raising siren sound), Join together (a slurp sound) or attack one of your bases (a low resonance sweep sound).

As well as the normal enemy cells, later levels feature two additional species: the Hatcher appears as three differently coloured cells bonded together. When any one of them is shot, the whole thing splits up into a whole mess of individual cells. Worse still, if you haven't located and destroyed a Hatcher after a period of time, it explodes of its own accord and makes even more cells than if it had been shot. Spitters will also appear if you take to long finishing a level. No sneaky waiting there's only one enemy cell left and racking up the points by continuously making stars. Spitters, as the name suggests, roam the grid, spitting out new enemy cells from time to time. The longer you take, the more appear and the more enemy cells each one of them will produce.

Psychic Radar

Another useful way of locating enemy cells is with the radar function. Periodically you will see a wold appear on the grid ahead of you. This message is an indicator of the direction -(ahead, back, left or right) of the closest cell whose colour matches the shot type you are using. This particular radar system aslo assumes that there are times when you wan't want to be bothered with it, for example when you are battling with an eight-ball cluster.

So, it only shows up when it thinks you are lost. It decides this by seeing how long it's been since you last moved the mouse/joystick/pressed a key, so if you need any help wait for a second or so and if will appear.

The Portal

When moving around the grid, every so often you will see solid black slabs emerge from the ground (or retract back into the ground). These are portals. If you move through a portal, when you emerge on the other side everything will have frozen. You can move around the grid freely, but all of the enemy cells, stars, fragments of explosion and so on, are suspended in mid air.

This state of affairs continues until either the timer reaches zero or you fire a shot. This is so that if things are going badly wrong somewhere. You can use a portal to suspend the action until you've located the trouble spot. Naturally there's a price to be paid for this. Every time you use the portal the enemy cells get meaner, as if the action had been shifted up a level. So if you use a portal twice on level three, the aggression of the enemy cells will be that of level five.

DNA Strings

Another weapon which can be used in the fight against disease and destruction in the DNA STRAND. Hold down the right button/spacebar and press the left button/fire. With every press, a shot is fired attached by elastic to the previous one. If you pause too long, or let go of the right button/Spacebar the sting of cells you have fired will be released and wander off around the grid.

The advantage of these strands is that they appear to the enemy as "one of their own". Every up. There are two disadvantages: the first is that they cost five times as much as normal shots (ie. five units gone from the ammo readout). The second is that they have no intelligence of their own; they merely wait to be approached by an enemy cell. So you must decide when, it is worth launching them.

Saved Again

Through the miracles of modern science, your job has been made slightly easier by virtue of the fact that at the beginning of every fifth level, all of your bases are restored and you will have the opportunity to increase your ammo levels in the "Shooting Stars" sequence. In this bonus level dozens of ammo-storing stars swirl on to the screen in front of you. Get as many of them as you can (with the same colour shot preferably, for maximum ammo top-up) and then continue on...

Game Controls

P - Toggle Pause, ESCAPE - Quit Game
F10 - Return to Dos (PC only)

Scoring

Each enemy ball ... 250 points
Each ball in cluster ... 500 points
Star shot with same colour ... 80 points and eight extra shots
Star shot with different colour ... 30 points and three extra shots
Hatcher ... 1000 points
Spitter ... 2000 points
Bonus for each remaining base after every level ... 100 points per base

Playing Tips

1. Levels one and two are relatively easy because there are only a few enemy cells - not enough to attack your bases. The Spitters will not appear for a long time. Use these levels to practice moving around the grid and shooting accurately.
2. Spitter are very difficult to shoot because they stay on the ground and in the time it takes to line one up and destroy it, several balls could have been released. On the higher levels they appear more quickly and in greater numbers. Time, is of the essence.
3. When enemy cells attack a base, you have a few seconds to try and destroy them. You have only got to hit one of them, and all of the others disperse back onto the grid as individual cells.
4. Further in the game, your ammo levels will become crucial. So on the early levels it is worth amassing as much ammo as possible.
5. A level will not end until your last shot has disappeared. This feature can be exploited to shoot any stars remaining on the star tree at the end of a level.