WARP(6) | Games Manual | WARP(6) |
warp - a real-time space war game
warp [options]
Warp is a real-time space war game that requires skill and quick thinking. "Real-time" in this context means that the enemies keep moving (and shooting) even if you don't. A unique feature of warp is that blast propagates; it is unhealthy to remain near things that are in the process of blowing up. If a given universe is above a critical density it may chain react. Scoring is like many popular arcade games--there are multiple waves which get harder and harder as you go along. Nobody has ever maxed out the scoreboard without cheating.
Unlike many space-war games, warp is not simply a shooting gallery. Along with phasers and photon torpedoes, you have tractor beams and a cloaking device. Skill in navigation is important. It helps to be schizophrenic, because you must manage an Enterprise and a Base simultaneously. And enemies do not simply shoot back. You can get tailed, absorbed, snuck up upon, hemmed in, rammed, loved to death, reprimanded for destroying civilized life, dragged around, robbed, damaged and eaten. And if you should happen to get bored by the enemies (a trifle unlikely), you can always watch the interesting star patterns. In fact, you'll have to, since your tactics will depend upon what kind of universe you find yourself in.
Warp is played in a double wraparound universe, i.e. the bottom is connected to the top, and the right is connected to the left. You need a crt with random cursor addressing and at least 24 lines by 80 columns. For more information about about how to play, simply run warp and say "y" when it asks if you want to see the instructions. There is also a single-page command summary that you can get while playing by typing a "?".
Command line options include:
<keystroke-sequence> <whitespace> <canonical-keystroke-sequence>
You may use certain % interpolations and ^<letter> control characters. For possible % interpolations see warp.h. Sequences in the canonical-keystroke-sequence bounded by ^(...^) are subject to reinterpretation via the keymap. This file has two major uses. First, you can set up your commands to use any kind of prefix key your terminal might have, or change the key bindings in any other way you choose. Second, you can define arbitrary macros, such as this:
# define Corbamite maneuver = DDllllll
Larry Wall <lwall@sdcrdcf.UUCP>
~/.fullname, if full names aren't in /etc/passwd
Generally self-documenting, as they say.
Addicting. At the end of a wave, all you have to do to keep going is hit a space. You see the message "Hit space to continue" and automatically hit space. About 2 seconds later you remember you wanted to go home, but by then it's too late to escape without penalty.
You can't kill a backgrounded warp process directly, because it is running setuid. You have to use the killer built in to warp.
Now that there is a space amoeba, there ought to be tribbles. But it might be too much trouble...