KILLER CARS
by Richard Kipp
for TRS-80 Model 1 Level 2
published in Softside magazine (Vol. 5, No. 6 - March 1982)
http://www.kippnet.net/KC/KC.htm

There is a popular videogame called Tank in which two players are given
identical armed vehicles and must destroy the opponent's tank while
avoiding the opponent's weapon. Killer Cars takes this idea further by
improving the simulation to make it more realistic.
  In Killer Cars, the two players each design their own vehicles adding or
subtracting parts to improve their chances of defeating their opponent.
Each player decides how large the engine will be; whether it will have
enough power or best conserve fuel. Should the vehicle have armour, and
how much? Should oil be carried to create oil slicks? There are machine
guns, cannons, and even lasers that can be mounted on your tank. You can
be sneaky and carry radio-controlled land mines, aggressively mount a ram,
or hide behind powerful force shields.
  After designing your vehicle, it is sent into battle with the tank your
opponent built. For safety's sake, the tanks are unmanned vehicles that
are controlled by on-board computers. Each player may program his vehicle
by sending it a radio message consisting of ten commands. The commands
that can be executed by your tank's computer are:

    L - turns tank 45 degrees Left.
    R - turns tank 45 degrees Right.
    0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 - moves your tank forwards that number of metres (or
        as many as your motor's power allows).
    M - fire Machine guns (ALL guns fire forwards).
    C - fire Cannon (if you have one).
    B - fire laser Beams.
    O - drop Oil slick.
    S - turn on force Shield.
    X - turn off force shield.
    D - Drop radio-ignited land mines.
    E - send the radio signal which Explodes all mines dropped so far.
    ANY other symbol - tank does nothing.

When entering the commands, you should NOT push ENTER after each command.
If you do make a mistake, it can't be corrected by pushing the back-arrow
key. Instead, when you input 10 keystrokes and the computer asks
"ALRIGHT?" type "N".
  This program can be easily altered and added to. New commands can be
placed between lines 800 and 1000. Play time can be extended by setting
TE(1) and TE(2) to 4000 during a break at the "HOW MANY HORSEPOWER TO
DRIVES?" prompt. By changing the data in lines 1005 through 1180, a new
playing field can be created. Ideas can be found as near as the closest
James Bond spy movie. Until the next time we "bump" into each other, good
fighting!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Lines 60 and 90:
 As originally published, the game would not run on 32K or 48K machines.
  These problems have been fixed by the addition of line 6 and changes to
  lines 60 and 90.
Line 642:
 as printed:
  IFPEEK(Y+61)=46ORPEEK(Y+62)=46ORPEEK(Y+63)=46 THENPP(K)=PP(K)+61:Z=RND(100):IFRM=0ANDSS(K)=0THENPD(K)=PD(K)-Z
 corrected to:
  IFPEEK(Y+61)=46ORPEEK(Y+62)=46ORPEEK(Y+63)=46 THENPP(K)=PP(K)+61:Z=RND(100):IFRM(K)=0ANDSS(K)=0THENPD(K)=PD(K)-Z
Line 4510:
 as printed:
  IFTD(K)=1 IFPEEK(Y-63)=35ORPEEK(Y-62)=35ORPEEK(Y-61)=35THENPRINT@PP(K)-63,"
 corrected to:
  IFTD(K)=1 IFPEEK(Y-63)=35ORPEEK(Y-62)=35ORPEEK(Y-61)=35THENPRINT@PP(K)-63," ";
