WHAT IS CROSSFIRE? This is a multiplayer graphical arcade and adventure game made for the X-Windows environment. It runs on a client/server model. The client runs with X11, GTK, or SDL within a gtk window. It has certain flavours from other games, especially Gauntlet (TM) and Nethack/Moria. Any number of players can move around in their own window, finding and using items and battle monsters. They can choose to cooperate or compete in the same "world". REQUIREMENTS For UNIX, X-windows and an ANSI C compiler to compile this game. A window system is not needed if you don't want to compile the map editor. For Windows 9x, you need Visual C++ (or some other ANSI C compiler that can read ".dsw"-files). COMPILING Crossfire has been known to compile on a wide variety of systems. It should compile and most all ANSI C and Posix compliant systems. To get directions on compilation for UNIX/LINUX, read the INSTALL file. For Win9x, read INSTALL_WIN32.txt. USAGE Crossfire runs on a client/server model. You will also need the client to play. You can either connect to a server someone else has set up, or run your own server and connect to that. The client package has information for connecting to servers. To run your own server, you need to make the crossfire binaries and install them, and then run the crossfire program. This now creates a server which you/other people can connect to. The map files will need to get downloaded and installed for the server to run properly. If you plan to run a long term server, you should use one of the scripts provided that will re-run crossfire if it dies for some reason. MAILING LIST For the latest subscription for crossfire mailing lists, go to: http://crossfire.real-time.com/Website_Index/Mailing_Lists/mailing_lists.jhtml From there you should be able to subscribe/unsubscribe any of the mailing lists. The mailing lists based off the ifi.uio.no host are being discontinued. An archive of old messages can be found at http://www.real-time.com/maillists/rte/crossfire FTP SITES FTP-sites where you can look for the latest versions are: ftp://ftp.sourceforge.net/pub/sourceforge/crossfire ftp://ftp.real-time.com/pub/games/crossfire Changes made since the latest release can be found at the CVS repository. Information on anonymous CVS access as the download CVS snapshots and browsing the repository can be found at: http://sourceforge.net/cvs/?group_id=13833 If you are looking for a windows/NT client, look at: http://mids.student.utwente.nl/%7Emichtoen/crossfire/ WEB SITES: The following web addresses have crossfire information that you may find useful: http://crossfire.real-time.com/ real-time is the main crossfire site. REPORTING BUGS First, check the INSTALL file for common problems, and see if yours is mentioned. The mailing list is where present development work and bugs are typically discussed. If you want to know what is happening with crossfire, join the list and please ask there. I will likely delete mail messages of the following sort: 1) Bug reports of failed installation when the installation instructions were not followed. 2) Bug reports that contain so little information that it tells me nothing more than the fact that there is a bug. 3) Bugs in which the solution has already been answered in the INSTALL file. When reporting bugs, make sure you include the following: o What version of crossfire did you use? o What type of computer did you use? o What release of the operating system did it have? o What windowing system are you using (Ie, openwindows, X11R6, etc) o What compiler (and its version) did you use (ie, gcc, acc, etc)? o Which flags did you give it? o If the bug happens when compiling crossfire, send an EXACT copy of the compiler line, as well as the errors it puts out. Sending bugs of the sort 'it failed with a line like ...' doesn't help any. o If the bug happened while running crossfire: - Include any output before to the bug. - Give a description of what you did before the bug occured. The better detailed the description, the better chance I have of figuring out where the bug happened, or how I can recreate the bug. o If you managed to compile Crossfire, include the output of "crossfire -o". Lack of any of this information in a bug report can make that bug report useless. Also, if you have a bug, make sure you are using the latest version. If you report a bug that has since been fixed, you are not likely to get any help. Further debugging informatiion can be found at http://crossfire.real-time.com/debugging_tips.html Mail the bug report to crossfire-devel@listserv.real-time.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ SUBMITTING PATCHES: See the doc/programming_guide file. PUBLIC SERVERS: The best way to find a server to play is to run the client. It will contact the metaserver and present a list to choose from. You can also see a list at http://crossfire.real-time.com/metaserver/ COPYRIGHT Don't get scared by the below, it's included just for "safety" reasons 8) (Don't want anyone to start selling the game) Copyright (C) 2000 Mark Wedel Copyright (C) 1992 Frank Tore Johansen This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version. This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details. You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA. The author can be reached via e-mail to mwedel@scruz.net