vintage_systems:tesseract []

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**Beyond the Tesseract**

//An abstract text adventure by David Lo//

**HOW TO PLAY**

Connect to the [[AT&T 3B2 1000-70]] and type 'tess'

**Scenario**:
  You have reached the final part of your mission.  You have gained access
  to the complex, and all but the last procedure has been performed.  Now
  comes a time of waiting, in which you must search for the hidden 12-word
  message that will aid you at the final step.  But what choice will you
  make when that time comes?
  
  The scenario for the adventure is meant to be vague.  Once the adventure has
  been completed, the scenario will hopefully become clear.
  
**Instructions**:
  This adventure recognizes the standard commands for moving (N,E,S,W),
  taking inventory (I), maninpulating objects (GET, DROP, LOOK), and
  saving games (SAVE, LOAD), as well as many others.  Use 2-word 'verb noun'
  commands, such as 'use stack' or 'get all'.  Only the first four letters
  of each word are significant.  The adventure recognizes about 200 words,
  so if one word doesn't work, try another.
  
  The game also accepts an argument of -f at run-time for fast start-up.
  This skips the title screen, scenario and instructions.  Very useful
  for people at lower baud rates.
  
**Notes**:
  The "stack" is an acroynym for Space Time Activated Continuum Key.
  You will find this object very useful.
  
  This adventure is abstract and a bit on the technical side.  Detail
  knowledge of the technical background is not necessary, although it will
  make the adventure more enjoyable.
  
  There is no carry limit, and no death traps.  The map of the adventure can
  be draw on a grid.  All it takes is a little experimenting to put all the
  subsets of locations together "logically".
  
**History**:
  Version    Date        Machine        Language         # Lines
  
  1.0        Jun. 1983   16K TRS-80     Level II BASIC   350
  2.0        Sep. 1988   IBM-XT clone   Turbo C 1.5      2500
  2.0p       Nov. 1988       "          dlc,msc,qc
                         Sun-3          pcc,gcc
  
  Tesseract Version 2.0 is my first MS-DOS adventure and an exercise in
  learning C.  Since this is a direct port of the old BASIC version, it may be
  smaller than some other adventures, and some of the coding might not be too
  clean.  For the C version, appropriate changes were made to the data
  structures, additions and small changes made to some of the puzzles, and the
  ending expanded.
  
  The very first adventure that I wrote was in 1982, titled "Hall of the
  Mountain King" (find the Crystal of Light).  Tesseract Version 1.0 was the
  second of the three TRS-80 BASIC adventures that I wrote in a two month
  adventure-frenzy during the summer of 1983.  The first was "Project Triad"
  (defuse the bomb on the space station), and the third was "Codename
  Intrepid" (deliver a package to another agent).
  
  The first release was version 2.0 in Oct. 1988, in binary form over Usenet.
  This release (2.0p) is the portable source version designed to work with
  compilers other than Turbo C.  -- Dennis Lo.
  
**References**:
  The following books and reference works were used at one time or another
  as a source of information and/or inspiration:
  
    The Beauty of Fractals.
    The Fontana Dictionary of Modern Thought.
    The Fractal Geometry of Nature.
    Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid.
    The Heritage Illustrated Dictionary Of the English Language.
    Mathematics: The New Golden Age.
    The New Lexicon Webster's Dictionary, Encyclopedic Edition.
    The Penguin Dictionary of Science, Fifth Edition.
    Roget's International Thesaurus.
    The Science of Fractal Images.
    The VNR Concise Encyclopedia of Mathematics.
    The World of M.C. Escher.

**SCREENSHOTS**

{{:vintage_systems:tess1.png?400|}}

{{:vintage_systems:tess2.png?400|}}