
         IF YOU ARE UPGRADING FROM A VERSION PRIOR TO 3.0 PLEASE READ
                           THE README FILE FIRST!

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                               Rancho Nevada
                       CONDENSED Documentation 4.03

                 Program and Documentation by Gerald T. Albion

                      (C) 1992,1996 Whirlwind Software
                             ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

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DISCLAIMER: Gerald T. Albion and Whirlwind Software assume absolutely no
responsibility for the consequences, direct or indirect, of your
possession or execution of this program.  This product is guaranteed
only to exist.  No other warranty is expressed nor implied.  By
executing RANCHO.EXE you indicate that you agree to these terms.

Rancho Nevada is a work of interactive fiction.  Any similarity between
characters depicted in Rancho Nevada and any person or persons living or
deceased is purely coincidental.

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THIS PRODUCT IS SHAREWARE.  You are granted a limited license to
evaluate this product for a period of thirty days.  If you continue to
use this product after thirty days, you are required to register the
product or discontinue using it.  See the registration form at the end
of this file.  The shareware version of Rancho Nevada is not "crippled"
in any way.
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SCENARIO:

        This game is a sort of multi-player text adventure, set in a
huge "guest ranch" somewhere in Nevada.  Players move from room to room
looking for, well, a good time.  The object of the game is to succeed in
as many encounters with other players as possible.  In the X-Rated
version, the encounters are sexual encounters; in the PG-Rated version,
you're just looking for a good time.  Each time you succeed, you are
given experience points which allow you to advance your "level."  The
first player to reach level 100 (or whatever level you set) wins the
game.

        IF YOU DOWNLOADED THIS FILE FROM A BBS OR FROM THE INTERNET,
                   THEN YOU HAVE THE PG-RATED VERSION!

        Of course the game isn't just as simple as that.  Players have a
number of avenues with which to advance themselves.  In brief, here are
a few of the features players will encounter:

        - "Toy" Shoppes (a.k.a. Sex Shoppes in the X-Rated version).
          Players buy items which will increase their chances of success
          here.

        - ATMs.  Players deposit and withdraw cash from these machines.

        - Pay Phones.  Players can send public or private messages using
          these.

        - Bars/lounges.  There are drinking contests here in which users
          can make extra cash.  Of course, in the PG-Rated version, we
          just have soda drinking contests.

        - Audiovisual Terminals.  Users watch instructional videos on
          these and increase their character's statistics.

        - Computer Terminals.  Players can use these to get information
          about other players.

        - Jacuzzis.  Use these to relax and, with a little luck, recover
          some of that spent libido.  A little relaxation will do you
          good...

        - The Hall of Fun, a.k.a. Virginkillers Row.  A 200-door
          corridor with a (sometimes) willing virgin(X-Rated) or
          partier(PG-Rated) behind each one. Fabulous cash prizes to be
          won...

        - Slot Machines.  The one-armed bandit is one of three ways to
          gamble your money away in Rancho Nevada...

        In addition to these features, which are always where you expect
        them when you need them, players can randomly encounter a
        multitude of other strange happenings... like running into an
        ex-boyfriend... hacking into a bank... playing a shell game...
        finding money and better toys... and the list goes on!

        As is the case on most BBSes, most players are likely to be
male, leading to an unwanted bias.  To alleviate this problem, the game
lets you create "employees" which are automated players.  Like regular
players, employees develop as the game progresses, and some will become
quite challenging.

        The game terminates when a player reaches the level you have
selected as the "WinLevel" in RANCHO.CFG.  When this happens, the user
is given a congratulatory message, her/his name appears as "last game's
champion" in the welcome screen, and all users (except the employees)
are deleted.

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INSTALLING THE GAME:

        Rancho Nevada supports DORINFO1.DEF and PCBOARD.SYS type door
info files.  By default, DORINFO1.DEF is used, however PCBOARD.SYS can
be selected instead with the -C command line switch.  DOOR.SYS and
CALLINFO.BBS are also supported.

        Although the door has its own proprietary file locking system, it
is highly recommended that SHARE be loaded when running Rancho Nevada in a
multitasking environment.  Rancho Nevada is DesqView aware and has been
tested extensively under that system.

        The door no longer requires a FOSSIL for communications support.
No FOSSIL is included with this program but such drivers are available on
many BBSes.  If you are running Maximus, RemoteAccess, Opus, SuperBBS,
QuickBBS, FrontDoor, or BinkleyTerm then you are almost certainly already
running a FOSSIL driver and you don't need to concern yourself with this.
If you don't have a FOSSIL, please refer to the PORT and NOFOSSIL keywords
in RANCHO.CFG.

        Here is a sample batch file to call the game:

        @echo off
        c:
        cd\doors\rancho
        rancho
        del dorinfo1.def
        cd\max
        exit

        The above sample file assumes a standard modem and a Maximus
xtern_dos external program shell.  Refer to your own BBS's documentation
for details on setting up doors under your specific software.

        If you are running a multitasking system, or if you have a lot
of TSRs and device drivers running, you may get a Runtime Error 203.
This means that there is not enough free memory to run Rancho Nevada.
If this happens to you, there are a few things you can try.

                - Try removing one or more TSR/driver.

                - Try loading your drivers and TSRs "high"

                - Try allocating more memory to your task (I have tested
                  RN standalone in tasks as small as 228k)

                - Try an errorlevel-type drop instead of a shell-type
                  drop to the door.  Maximus supports this kind of drop;
                  your software may or may not.  Consult your BBS
                  instructions.

                  ____________________________________________
       __________|   SOLUTION TO AN ANNOYING PROBLEM........  |__________
      |                                                                  |
      | Some sysops have reported to me that users are unable to play    |
      | after midnight due to an out-of-turns objection by the game.  I  |
      | have been unable to duplicate this problem on my own BBS and can |
      | find no renegade code which would cause this.  However, I can    |
      | offer a quick 'n' dirty solution.  Set up a midnight event in    |
      | your BBS or mailer software (you probably already have one).  In |
      | the event, among its other functions, include a DOS command to   |
      | delete Rancho.MKR.                                               |
      |                                                                  |
      | Example:                                                         |
      |                                                                  |
      | DEL C:\DOORS\RANCHO\RANCHO.MKR                                   |
      |                                                                  |
      | The Rancho.MKR file contains the date of the last play.  If it   |
      | is different from the current date, or if it doesn't exist       |
      | (which is the whole point of deleting it nightly) Rancho invokes |
      | its own daily maintenance which, among other things, zeroes      |
      | everyone's turns for the day so they can play again.             |
      |__________________________________________________________________|


        The program has several Command Line Switches which affect the
door's operation as well as allowing you to run sysop functions.

        In brief, here they are:

                -B: Use DOOR.SYS instead of DORINFO1.DEF

                -C: Use PCBOARD.SYS instead of DORINFO1.DEF

                -I: Use CALLINFO.BBS instead of DORINFO1.DEF

                -F: The DORINFO method supports multiple nodes by using
                    different DORINFO filenames for each node.  By
                    default, Rancho uses DORINFO1.DEF (i.e. node 1).  To
                    specify a node other than 1, use the -F command line
                    parameter.

                    Examples:

                    RANCHO.EXE -F5   ; will use DORINFO5.DEF
                    RANCHO.EXE -F69  ; will use DORINF69.DEF

                -E : Invokes the User Editor.

                -L : This switch should be used when you have a
                     high-speed modem and your FOSSIL's baud rate is
                     locked.

                -M : Compiles the "maze" file MAZE.CTL into a form
                     readable by the game.  You have to run RANCHO.EXE
                     with the -M parameter every time you make changes
                     to the "maze" or game layout.  When the maze is
                     compiled, the program exits.

                -P : "Pays" the "employees."  Normally "employees" are
                     given an allowance every night.  If you find that
                     most players are not making any money from
                     employees, then you should run the game with this
                     parameter so they they are paid every time the game
                     is invoked by a user.

                -R : Normally players must "recover" until the next day
                     when someone else has successfully seduced them.
                     This switch forces the game to "recover" all
                     players immediately.

                -A : "Ambulates" the "employees".  Basically this switch
                     causes the game to move the employees (without
                     paying or advancing them).  This feature is FAR
                     faster than the same one on a comparable adult
                     "fantasy" game I could mention.

                -* : This will cause RN to reset the game, without
                     deleting the employees.

                -D : This specifies an alternate path for the door drop
                     file.  Example: RANCHO.EXE -Dc:\pcboard\

There are several .ASC and .ANS files which are used throughout the game
for informative purposes.  They may contain embedded special codes.  The
embedded code language syntax is beyond the scope of this document, but
within the context of the provided files they should be fairly
self-evident.

The syntax used in the MAZE.CTL and RANCHO.CFG files is detailed in the
samples of those files provided.

Rancho Nevada has been tested on 286 through to Pentium computers under
DesqView, MS-DOS 5.0, and 6.22, Windows 95 and 4DOS 4.0, and with
Maximus-CBCS 2.00 and 2.01wb, under X00 and BNU.
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REGISTRATION:

        See REGISTER.DOC.




Questions, comments, and feature requests can be left to me on my BBS:

        Tommy's Holiday Camp BBS
        BBS Line: +1 250 361 4549
        Fidonet : 1:340/26
        Internet: tommy@tommys.spydernet.com
        WWW     : www.vvv.com/~tommy

You can acquire the latest version of the PG-Rated version of Rancho Nevada
by the following means:

        World Wide Web  : http://www.vvv.com/~tommy
        Fidonet Request : Magic name RANCHO at 1:340/26
        Download        : THC BBS, +1 250 361 4549, area 9
        Email Responder : rancho@tommys.spydernet.com

        (The Email responder address above will automatically reply to
        any email to it with a UUEncoded copy of the current version of
        Rancho Nevada in several emailed pieces.)

Whirlwind Software acknowledges ownership of all trademarks mentioned
herein by their respective owners.

