NIGHTHAWK(6)

NAME
nighthawk 4.x

SYNOPSIS
nighthawk [options]

DESCRIPTION
This is a restored arcade game written in the 1990s for Unix/XWindows systems. It has been ported to OpenGL and OpenAL for maximum portability. See README file in archive distribution for more info.

NIGHTHAWK - PARADROID CHAPTER II - THE RESCUE FROM VEGA
The Earth forces have ambushed an enemy fleet transporting captured Earth vessels bound for Vega (Codenamed the "Nighthawk" fleet). While crews were boarding these ships for repairs, surviving Vegarian crew destroyed each ship's warp core. This has made the ships very radioactive, causing many of the droids on board these ships to go 'rogue'. Our last contact with the crew indicated heavy loss of life. All attempts at contact or rescue have proved futile. We can only fear the worst... However, we have depatched a Class 002 Paradroid. Improved over the 001 class, the 002 will teleport to each ship and annihilate all droids.

GAME PLAY
"It isn't enough to regain your fleet in galactic space, and then having to deal with the sticky mess of containing your sabotaged droids. Who would have thought? Mmmm. This is bound to make any Commander roll his eyes and slowly face palm. Luckily we have 00x class droids to deal with situations like these. I'm so glad we packed them!". The mission is simple: Board each ship of the Nighthawk fleet and slate all droids. Continue until all of the ships of the Nighthawk fleet are clear. You start out on each ship, as a 002 Paradroid. In the original game, you controlled a 001 Influence device. They differ in the way they control their hosts. The 001 droid was basically a helmet that fitted over the host droid's head, and could control it for a certain length of time. The 002 droid however actually transfers its firmware over to the new host, effectively 'becoming' it, and destroying the old host it occupied. There are good and bad points to this. The good point is that you can occupy the host droid for an unlimited length of time, the bad point is that you are stuck with the new host's weaponry, speed and shields.

OPTIONS
Nighthawk game options
 -h or -?         Display this help info.
 -f <Fleet name>  Start at a given fleet.
 -c <Ship name>   Start at a given ship.
Specifying a shipname with -c will mean any score you get will not be added to the scoring table.

KEY SUMMARY
 cursor keys    - move
 NumPad keys    - move
 left click     - fire
 right click    - panic fire
 space          - activate (lift, computer)
 t or Enter     - toggle transfer mode
 c              - Cascade mode (similar to transfer mode, but persistent)
 f              - display of Frames per Second.
 g              - Mouse grab function (stops mouse pointer leaving game)
 h or p         - Key cheat sheet/pause.
 s              - display status
 p              - pause
 q              - quit

MOVEMENT
Use the cursor keys to move around each map. To open a door, either shoot it (see below) or move into it. Doors will close again after a short time. To move around the ship, you must use the lifts (these look like squares with a cross through them, you normally start on one). To use a lift, move over it and press space. A map of the ship will appear, showing all the lifts and a turning square which represents your droid. Press up or down to the level you want to go to, and then press space to exit the lift.

ATTACKING
To shoot, click the left mouse button at the target you are aiming at. A right mouse click does a burst fire which fires shots in all directions. The spin speed of a droid indicates how charged the shields of the droid are. At full spin, the droid is fully charged. When a droid has less than 1/4 shields green lights flash, and when they have less than 1/8 shields red lights flashes instead. To recharge shields, move over a recharging point (they have swirly bits in them) and press space. This will use points off your score until you are recharged.

TRANSFERRING
You won't get far in Nighthawk unless you learn to transfer to different droids. To transfer to a different droid, press "t" or "c" (white lights will start flashing and you will be unable to shoot) then click on a nearby droid (even one on the other side of a wall). The two droids will "negotiate" (what a euphemism !) to see which one lives. During negotiations, neither droid can shoot. During the negotiations a bar will appear - the green part represents your droid and the blue bar represents the enemy droid. The relative amounts of these bars will change as the droids battle each other. When the bar has turned one color, that droid wins. The negotiation will be broken off if the two droids move too far apart. As a general rule, don't negotiate with a droid that is more than two classes above you - e.g if you are in a 423, negotiating with a 606 is okay, but a 713 will probably kill you.

STATUS
Pressing "s" will display the number of shields you have left and the number of droids left on the ship (assuming headsup is on). When something interesting happens, a status message will appear. Here are some:
 shields=10 You have 10 shields left.
 droids=9/64 9 droids alive on floor. 64 alive droids on ship.
 002 d 107 002 droid destroyed 107 droid.
 002 h 423(8) 002 droid hit 423 droid (who now has 8 shields left).
 600 captured Started negotiating with 600 droid.
 lost contact Stopped negotiations (droids move too far apart).
 boost! Shields are recharging/recharged (when over a powerbay).

COMPUTERS
To find out information about your droid, go to a computer in the wall and press space. Use the cursor keys to look at different droids, you can find out:
 Type - Droid number
 Name - Title of the droid
 Entry - "Negotiation" skills
 Height - In metres
 Weight - In kilograms
 Brain - Intelligence of the droid
 Arm - Weapon type (armament)
 Shield - Shield strength
 Speed - How fast the droid can move
 Attack - Aggressiveness of the droid

SCORING
  Recharging shields - Charging is one for one against score. ie: You charge
                       10 points, 10 points are deducted from your score.
  Hit droid - Entry level
  Destroyed droid - 50 x entry level
  Transferring - 100 x entry level As it can be seen, you get more points for transferring than firing/destroying a droid. If you cause cross fire with other droids, those count as points to your score.

WEAPON TYPES
	                 Speed  Damage
	Linarite         8      4
	Crocoite-Benzol  10     10
	Uvarovite        12     20
	Tiger-Eye Quartz 9      50

DROID TYPES

0xx - Prototype Class
    These droids are a prototype/experimental class that vary in function considerably. Approach with caution.

1xx - Cleaning Droids
    Mindless, slow, low shielded, unarmed droids that clean the ships. Harmless.

2xx - Logistic/Servant Droids
    Again, brainless droids that do various tasks. These type can vary in shield and strength. This class is harmless as well.

3xx - Messenger Droids
    Mindless, but very fast. Low shield rating, and are not armed.

4xx - Maintenance Droids
    Designed to repair the ships. Vary in shield and speed ratings. Sometimes armed.

5xx - Medical Droids
    These droids have a high entry level, and are difficult to crack. All of them are armed, but are not hostile. However, they will shoot at any droids that attack them.

6xx - Sentinel Droids
    These droids 'guard' certain important areas of the ships like lifts, power bays and other droids. They vary in shield rating, speed and fire power, but all are armed and will attack. Approach with caution.

7xx - Battle Droids
    This class of droid 'hunts'. When confronted, any will attack. They vary in speed, shield rating and weaponry, but all are extremely dangerous.

8xx - Crew Droids
    These are armed droids that control the ship. These like the 5xx class are not hostile, but will become hostile to any droids that attack them. 8xx's are armed with Uvarovite lasers, and pack a rather powerful wallop.

9xx - Command Cyborgs
    Each ship will have one of these. They command the ships. Extremely armed, extremely shielded, often very fast, and very deadly.

THE NIGHTHAWK FLEET
	Ship          Type               Difficulty
	-------------------------------------------
	Haldeck       Fleet Support      Very easy
	Seafarer      Cargo Vessel       Moderate
	Anoyle        Attack Frigate     Difficult
	Esperence     Battle Cruiser     Tricky/Very difficult
	Ophukus       Medical Frigate    Moderate (lots of 5xx's)
	Mearkat       Scout Ship         Tricky/Difficult
	Friendship    Destroyer Class    Tricky/Difficult (6xx's)
	Discovery     Scientific Frigate Difficult (lots of 8xx's)
	Zaxon         Battle Cruiser     Tricky/Very difficult (7xx's)
	Tobruk        Flag Ship          EXTREMELY difficult
To start at a particular ship, run nighthawk like this:
    nighthawk -c <ship name> Note that the high score table will treat this as cheating.

GAME TIPS
If possible, create 'friendly fire'. This is very easy to do. Get in between any two armed droids. If one fires at you, simply duck at the last moment (if not, then just shoot at one). Their laser fire will/should/hopefully hit the other droid. The other droid will then fire back at the droid that accidently attacked it. When the attacking droid is hit, it will fire back at the droid firing at it....hence a shoot out will occur. The result is either two destroyed droids, or one left with a reduced shield. Another good thing about friendly fire is that it's an excellent distraction. Any 6xx,7xx, 9xx droids involved in one, won't be concerned with you at all; they will be too busy blowing away their mate. Always duck for cover when fired upon, and when you shoot a droid fitted with weapons, be ready to duck for cover. Don't just take it. Armed droids will always return fire immediately with an equal or greater rate. Get into the habit of firing a 4-6 round volley, then ducking behind a wall, door, storage unit... or even another droid. 261's are excellent to hide behind. These droids are industrial cargo movers. Being heavy machinery, they have a very high shield rating and can buffer many laser blows. Medical Droids (5xx series) are another good example. Medical droids are armed but passive. They won't attack anyone unless fired upon. When an attack droid is firing at you, duck behind a medical droid. If the attacking droid hits the medic, then the medic will fire (one shot) back at the attacking droid (yet another 'friendly fire' example). The 599 Surgeon droids are fitted with the powerful Uvarovite lasers, and will cheerfully waste any minor class 6xx's or 7xx's that accidently attack it. This game requires lots of lateral thinking. Simply blasting everything in sight is not going to get you very far (maybe the first and second ship if you're lucky). You have to rely on transferring to higher order droids in order to conquer droids with more fire power than yourself or to go through walls. You have to shoot smart. Hostile droids will always attack with an equal or greater rate. With "head-on" shoot outs (that most newbies will tend to do), it's only a matter of who has the bigger shields and lasers who will win. Some droids are simply too risky to confront, like 799's, and 9xx's. It's far better to transfer to them through a wall (where you can't get shot at). In Ship "Zaxon" you are forced to confront 7xx's head on as there are so many of them (good luck with that ;). On some ships, be selective with which droids to destroy. You may need to transfer back through a wall in order to return to the place you started. (Game tip: In the Hull of SS Esperence, leave the 368 droid till last. This droid goes from one end of the Hull to the other, and you are able to transfer (through the wall) back to the other sections of the ship if you have forgotten to kill droids in those areas). As a general rule, if a 6xx is shooting at you, don't shoot back, instead duck for cover, even if you sustain some hits doing it. Don't stand your ground and fire back. However, with 7xx's & 9xx's, because of their unpredictable behaviour and rapid fire power, the above tactic may not work. Nb/ there is a systematic "knack" to completing the levels.

CONTACTS
Sourceforge/git Admin, curation, PR, bug reports:
   Eric Gillespie (brickviking, DrSmokey)
   Christchurch, New Zealand
   Email: viking667@users.sourceforge.net
   Web: https://night-hawk.sourceforge.net
   project: https://www.sourceforge.net/projects/night-hawk Author:
   Jason Nunn (JsNO)
   Adelaide, South Australia
   Email: jsno8192@gmail.com
   Web: http://users.on.net/~jsno Music Author:
   Vincent Voois
   The Netherlands
   Web: https://www.vincentvoois.com

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
  Eric Gillespie........ Testing and support.
  Vincent Voois......... Music.
  Adrian Bridgett....... 1.x debugging, edited instructions.
  Rafael Laboissiere.... Cascade mode.
  Tanel Kulaots......... Level continuance.
  Nelson Minar.......... Small code mods in 2.2.
  Wolfgang Scherer...... Code, autoconfig/automake scripts.
  Eero Tamminen......... Created this manual.
  giantclambake......... 4.0 Testing, suggestions, feedback, proof reading.