Welcome to Wizard-Thief-Fighter!

===========================
  ABOUT
===========================

Wizard-Thief-Fighter was written in seven days, as part of
the Seven Day Roguelike Challenge.

    Three companions, three quests.  Will any succeed?

    Wizard-Thief-Fighter is close to a traditional roguelike.  However,
    rather than following a single adventurer on their quest, you are
    following a trio!

    In the spirit of "Puss in Boots: The Last Wish"; these three
    adventurers are bound by a common quest and a common map; even
    though the world they see is entirely different.  

    Swap world views with [S] or the [F2], [F3] and [F4] keys.  The
    world will rebuild to reflect who is in the lead, letting you work
    together or apart as you wish.

    Barring bugs, each walkable tile corresponds to a tile on the
    other maps.  And I've sacrificed enough on the coding altars that
    there should be no bugs.

===========================
  HOW TO START
===========================

If you are a windows user, run it from windows/wtf.exe.

If you are a linux user, run it from linux/wtf.sh.
You may need to install SDL2.

If you are a source diver, go into the src directory.
Look for BUILD.TXT files to try and guide you, there is one 
for linux at least.

===========================
  HOW TO PLAY
===========================

Wizard-Thief-Fighter is at its core a very traditional
roguelike.  Players of Nethack will find themselves at home.

In game help provides key lists and some generic roguelike guidance,
hit [F1] to access this.

The [Esc] option menu has some configurations; such as using pop-up 
menus, that might appeal to more modern aesthetics.

===========================
  CUSTOMIZING 
===========================

If you don't like the default font, you can change it!  This is a bit
tricky as the font file has two copies in the high-ascii positions,
if you use another TCOD font you'll have to likely edit it.

Go to the windows directory and replace chimera.png with another font
compatible with The Doryen Library.  There is a large_chimera.png
you can try for a larger font.

Text-to-Speech and console output are possible.  Edit the .cfg file
to turn these on.

The text to speach on Windows runs off the built-in library.  You can
change the voice using the Windows speach settings.  Fine grain
control can be had by editing the mage.cfg file.  You can also disable
attempting to connect to the Windows TTS service entirely in the .cfg
file - this may be necessary when Microsoft breaks this service some
day.

On Linux, pipe the output of the program to your favorite speach
synthesizer.  espeak and festival are options I know
./wtf.sh | espeak
./wtf.sh | festival --tts
but I don't know of something that will properly be pre-empted by the
console stream commands.

On Windows console output is lost by default - you can attach a
console via the wtf.cfg if your display tech needs one.

===========================
  GAME DESIGN MESSAGE
===========================

The surprisingly good movie "Puss in Boots: The Last Wish" had an
interesting dynamic.  A magic treasure map led the companions to
the MacGuffin they sought; but the world itself re-built depending on
who held the map.

This idea of having three worlds that are tied-yet-not-tied struck a
chord so I decided to explore it in this 7DRL.  Each world I wanted to
feel different; so each gets its own font and map generator.
Likewise, each adventurer represents a tradtional roguelike class,
resulting in the eponymous Wizard-Thief-Fighter triple.

There was some interesting technical challenges building bijections
between three different map generators.  The goal was to build a
topological isomorphism with the topology defined by the 4-way
walkable distance metric.  Clearly, given the arbitrary dungeon
generators, this isn't possible in a strict sense.  My solution is a
primarily greedy algorithm.  I also decided to induce an orientation
bias to keep mapped patches with the same North direction.  I've
learned from Jacob's Matrix how disorienting violating that can be.
The greedy method means that mappings are well defined near the stairs
but often becomes arbitrary farther down the halls.  This results in
interesting world-scumming options to try to escape battle; but in
good roguelike sense there is equal chance you bring a new foe into
range.  Or have them wander into your otherwise locked room!

Observant players will quickly notice that items collapse their
identity when picked up.  This then lets the player world-scum found
items; effectively tripling the chance of getting key items.
Provided, of course, the player keeps all adventurers alive!

Having three adventurers share the same map means there is an
interesting question of how to distribute XP.  Do you focus on one,
using others as mere mules?  Or try to balance across the set?

And then, there is the end.  If you do defeat He Who Cannot Be
Spelled that carries the final quest item; which adventurer will you
pick to ascend with it?  Perhaps only one lives; so the choice is
clear.  But otherwise, who gets the item?  Can you find a
friendship-is-magic solution for everyone to win?

===========================
  CREDITS
===========================

This is a Seven Day Roguelike.  It was written in a 168 hour time
frame.  Hopefully it doesn't feel like that was the case, however.

Wizard-Thief-Fighter is written by Jeff Lait and uses The
Doryen Library for graphical output.  

You can contact Jeff Lait at: jmlait [snail] gmail [dot] com.

===========================
  FINAL IMPORTANT NOTE
===========================

Have fun!
