Liquid War 5 game options

Main menu

• The Play button, starts the game.
• The Map button, sends you to the Map menu.
• The Teams button, sends you to the Teams menu.
• The Options button, sends you to the Options menu.
• The About button, displays a short message about Liquid War.

Map menu

• A frame.
• A texture for walls.
• A texture for the zone where fighters are allowed to move.

• Moving a slider.
• Clicking on a + or a - button.
• Typing a number.

The frame

The textures

Teams menu

To activate a team, that is to say to add this team to the list of the teams which are playing, you have to click on one of the 12 colored buttons of this team. Then the zone representing the team should be colored whith the color you just clicked on.

To disable a team, just click on the dark button which is on the left of the 12 colored buttons.

You can toggle the Human/Cpu mode by clicking one the button which displays this info. If you read Human, it means that the team will be controled by a player, but if you read Cpu, it means that the computer will handle this team. And he will do it poorly, so remember that Liquid War is basically a multiplayer game, and that this cpu control is dedicated to beginners only.

Below the 12 colored buttons, there are four buttons which allow you to choose your keys. Click on one of these buttons and then press the key you want to define. Joystick movements and buttons are considered as keys. You can disable the joystick with the button which is at the bottom left of the menu. Mouse input is also possible, and mouse movements are considered as keys too. To define mouse control, click on the button associated to the direction you want to control, and then move the mouse. Then the button should display something like M->. Mouse sensibility can be set with the little slider at the bottom right of the menu.

Options menu

• The Graphics button, sens you to the Graphics menu.
• The Sound button, sends you to the Sound menu.
• The Rules button, sends you to the Rules menu.

Graphics menu

The Brightness slider allows you to set the brightness of the game.

The Menu res slider allows you to set the resolution used by the menus. There are currently 5 possible values:

• 320x240
• 400x300
• 640x480
• 800x600
• 1024x768

The Game res slider allows you to set the resolution used during the game. The allowed values are the same than those for the menus. I recommend that you don't use resolution higher than 400x300, unless you have a 80786 running a 1GHz.

Page flipping can be toggled. If you want to know wether page flipping should be enabled or not, run the game with the page flipping turned on, and press F5 then F6. This way you will be able to know the number of frames per second with and without the page flipping. You can also press F7 or F8, and you will get the percentage of time your computer spends to on calculate or on display the level. Then it is up to you to decide wether you keep this option or not. The main disavantage of turning page flipping off is that the info bar and the battlefield can look rahter ugly if they overlap. But if you turn page flipping on you will not easily reach the 166 frames per second I sometimes get on small levels with my K6-225. I personnaly always turn page flipping off.

The viewport size defines how much of your screen will be used by the battlefield.

• If you set the slider on its left position, the batllefield will not be stectched at all. Or if is strechted, it will be by a x2 or a x4 factor. So this is the mode wich allows the fastest display.
• If you set the slider ont its right position, the game will run in fullscreen mode.
• With all the other positions of the slider, the battlefield will keep its general proportions but it will be stretched.

Waves menu

There are 4 different types of waves, each of them being defined by:

• An Ampli parameter, to define how big the waves have to be.
• A Number parameter, to define how many waves should be displayed at the same time.
• A Speed parameter, to define how fast the waves should move.

The wave effects can be toggled during the game by pressing the F4 key.

Sound menu

• Sfx: sets the volume of all the sfx sounds, thats to say'the sounds you hear when the game starts, when you loose etc...
• Click: sets the volume of the click, this nasty noise you hear each time your press on a button.
• Game water: sets the volume of the blop blop blop sounds which are played continuously while you are playing.
• Menu water: the same thing than Game water except that it concerns the sounds played while your are choosing options.

Rules menu

The Cursor speed slider controls the speed of your cursor.

• If it is set on the left, the cursor goes at the same speed than the fighters.
• If it is centered, the cursor goes twice faster than the fighters.
• If it is set on the right, the speed of the cursor is multiplicated by 3.

The Army size slider controls the amount of fighters there will be on the battlefield. The position of the slider reflects the amount of fighters of all the teams together. If there are 4 teams, then each player will have half as many fighters than if there had only been 2 teams.

The Time slider controls the time limit. The game will stop after this time is elapsed. You can pause the game by pressing the F3 key.

By the way, an info bar can display the time left while you are playing. This info bar can be toggled during the game by pressing the F1 key, and you can change its location by pressing the F2 key. It also displays how many fighters there are in each team.

Advanced menu

The Attack slider sets the agressivity of the fighters. If it is set on the right, fighters eat each other very fast. If it is set on the left, it takes ages to fighters to change teams.

The Defense slider sets the capacity that the fighters have to regenerate themselves. The more it is on the right, the faster fighters regenerate.

The New health slider sets the health of the fighters which have just changed teams. The more it is on the left, the weaker these fighters will be.

The Winner help slider controls a parameter which causes fighters to attack with various strength depending on how many fighters belong to their team. Not very clear... Let's just say that:

• If this slider is set on the right, the more fighters you have in your team, the more aggressive they will become.
• If it is centered, all the fighters of every team will always attack with the same strength.
• If it is set on the left, the less fighters you have, the stronger they will be. In this mode, games usually never end.

The Cpu strength parameter never makes the computer more intelligent than a monkey. But if you set it on the right, it advantages the machine outrageously and fighters controlled by the cpu will be really strong. So to get rid of them you'll definitely need to be clever. Again and again, don't forget that Liquid War was conceived as a multiplayer game and that playing against the computer is not really an interesting thing to do.