STARTING GAME

Batch files are no longer used. To start the game, type “PAC” from the DOS command line or double click on the pac.exe file name from Windows. If you receive an out of memory error or low memory warning and are in DOS, configure your autoexec.bat and config.sys to provide 634K of memory. If in Windows, try remarking out all lines in the autoexec.bat and config.sys and the program should run fine. RUNNING GAME

Once the introductory screen and credits have finished, the player will be in the main screen. From here, he may choose to play a new game, a saved game or view the VCR. Once he has finished with which ever he chooses, he will return to this screen. To exit the game, he should hit the escape key, while in this screen.

TYPES OF GAMES

The player may now choose to play a game against the computer opponent by selecting Japanese Computer or Allied Computer. He may watch the computer play by itself, by selecting Both Computer. He may play a hot seat game against another human by selecting Both Human. He may also play an email game with another human by selecting Secure PBEM. If he chooses to watch a VCR replay, the balance and game type buttons are ignored.

SECURE PBEM GAMES

Should the player choose to play a secure PBEM game, he should select the desired scenario and balance and Secure PBEM. He will be asked for a password. He must remember this password for the duration of the game. If he is player one, when he selects End Turn, he will be asked for a slot in which the game is to be saved. The game will then save and return to the main screen. He should send the game files associated with that slot to his opponent. When player two starts the scenario sent to him, he will be asked for a password, as well. When player two selects End Turn, he should send the files back to player one, for resolution. Player one will then be asked for a slot in which to save the VCR replay file. This file will end with the extension “. VCR”. It can be any slot, including the game slot. The turn will then resolve and player one will be asked for a slot in which to save the game. Once saved, he will be returned to the main screen. He will then need to send the game files and the VCR file to player two. If a player tries to load a secure PBEM file as anything other than Secure PBEM Game or tries to load a normal file as a Secure PBEM game, he will receive an error message and be returned to the main screen. The secure PBEM files are encrypted and cannot be read by the normal file routines or by 3rd party editors. Replaying a resolution in s secure PBEM game will always produce the same results. Basically, you can't cheat in a secure PBEM game and you do not have to worry about your opponent cheating, even by accident. The program will prompt the player when he needs to save the game and when he should send the files to his opponent.

VCR FILES

The “. VCR” file is a file containing all the orders that have been given by both players and a copy of the random seed for that turn. When replayed, a player will see the same thing the player who executed the turn saw on his screen. The same air attacks, naval movement combats and combat results. VCR files are only created in Secure PBEM games and in current form will not reproduce the combat resolution for the turn properly, if any command on either side is under full or operational computer control. This is because computer controlled commands do not follow the orders given by a player and recorded in the VCR file. Once the first player gains access to the first orders screen, all commands and all subs are assigned to human control. After that, in secure PBEM games these cannot be changed to computer control. The battle report still works, in addition to the new VCR.

BUGS FIXED

Destroyers and destroyer escorts, which begin the turn in Los Angeles and participate in the routine convoy phase, as anti-submarine escorts, should no longer end up in Calcutta.

Merchant ships and tankers should no longer disappear from ports and end up in Calcutta, Los Angeles and Tokyo after the routine convoy phase.

Japanese resources should no longer underflow to 4 billion, when they are reduced to zero. This bug made allowed the Japanese player to never run out of resources. The correction will make capture of resource rich bases very important in the early game, as lack of resources will hinder development of heavy industry.

Japanese cruisers and destroyers and British destroyers that have been sunk should no longer be available a couple turns later to the computer opponent. This bug allowed the computer opponent to pick ships from the dead pile, if it needed a ship of that type and none were available.

Land Based Units receiving replacements should now continue to receive them until they are at full strength. A bug caused units to stop receiving them when current strength + 20 exceeded maximum.

The routine that repaired aircraft rounded the number of aircraft, which could be repaired down, which meant that if only one plane was damaged, it could not be repaired. Now, if only one plane in a group is damaged, it may be repaired.

Exiting some screens by pressing ESC would sometimes cause a game lock up or unusual results. These have been corrected.

GAME CHANGES

The way replenishment fleets are handled has changed. They will now travel to the fleet they are ordered to replenish and, if movement allows, move back to where they started. This will prevent players from creating a replenishment fleet and a transport fleet, then transferring the ships from the transport fleet into the replenishment fleet and refueling an empty fleet at a base some distance away. The player could repeat the process and move all land based unit and war ships from any base between Hawaii to Calcutta during the orders phase of one turn and with no chance of submarine or aircraft interception.

The computer opponent is no longer given a to hit advantage in air-to-air combat, when playing a human player.

The computer opponent is no longer given an advantage in naval combat, when playing a human player.

The computer opponent is no longer given an advantage in bombing missions, when playing a human player.

The computer opponent is no longer given an anti-aircraft advantage, when playing a human player.

When groups not under human control make air strikes, the delay is no longer set to zero. This allows the player to play one command against the computer opponent and still see resolution of all combat.

Players may now choose not to upgrade aircraft when the automatic upgrade routine selects newer aircraft. Whenever a group is eligible for aircraft upgrade, the player will be asked if he wants to change the planes. If he says yes, the planes are exchanged normally. If he says no, the planes are not upgraded and a toggle is set, so that the player will not be asked again. Once that toggle is set, the player will not be asked again for the rest of the war. If the player decides he wants to manually upgrade the aircraft, he may do so. Once he manually upgrades them, the toggle is reset and the next time the aircraft become eligible for upgrade he will be asked, again. Manually upgrading aircraft no longer causes all the planes in the group to become damaged. Groups under computer control for a side under human control will query, before upgrading. Note that since upgrades occur at the end of resolution for the turn, player two, in a secure PBEM game would never have the chance to verify upgrades, and so no automatic upgrades are made in this type of game. All upgrades must be player initiated and manual in secure PBEM games.

When a player manually upgrades an air group to a new type of plane, the planes no longer become damaged. The computer opponent does not have its aircraft damaged when upgrading and fair is fair.

The sea paths, which controlled the paths fleets took from one base to another, have been removed. All fleets now have access to all ocean hexes. The computer opponent has been recoded to utilize this. Fleets will now tend to take a much more direct course to their destination.

Japanese tankers need no longer be in any special port, to be used by the routine oil collection routine.

British ships will only be withdrawn from service in the Pacific on the first week of each month, which will make operational planning with these ships possible.

There are now separate flags for Australia, Britain, Holland, United States of America, China and Japan.

A number of new aircraft types and icons have been added.

A number of new ship classes and ship icons have been added.

The map art has been reworked and improved.

The data base files, which contain information on aircraft, ships, bases and land-based units, have all been overhauled. Corrections and changes have been made.

Bombers will no longer drop their bombs into the sea and attack patrol craft with machine guns. They will now bomb the PC like any other ship. Because of the size and speed of a PC, they will be hit less often than larger, slower ships.

The strategy used by the computer opponent has been reworked. This makes defense in the Central Pacific and the British bases in the Far East much more important than before, because the computer opponent will now sometimes use a very aggressive strategy.

When the computer player is Japanese, tankers are now rounded up and sent to Nagoya on a regular basis.

MBT and Mosquito Boats automatically upgrade weapons in middle of 1942 and 1943.

Allied 1.1” guns are now upgraded to 40mm during around December 1942.

The Nisshin and Mizuho are now withdrawn from service and upgraded to CVL, if now already sunk, in early 1943.

A land march path between Port Moresby and Milne Bay ahs been created.

A new button, "Other Campaigns" has been added to the main screen. This button evokes a screen from which the player may choose new campaigns released by Matrix Games or produced by end users. [The campaigns should be saved games that have been renamed, "OBC_A" through "OBC_J" and should have an associated ".MD" file. It may include a comment file, such as "OBC_A.CMT", which might have the name of the campaign and the author. This is just a text file, with the extension changed to ".cmt" and may be up to 60 characters long and should end with a chr$13. To do this, use a text editor, not a word processor and hit ENTER at the end of the text. If the comment file is found, the data will be displayed on the other campaign screen. The version 2.0 release of the game has no other campaigns with it and the player will see an "a - not found" type message for all these campaigns. Matrix Games will be releasing "Other Campaigns" 'a' through 'e'. The 'f' through 'h' campaigns are for third parties and end users. 

EDITOR

An excellent editor for the database files has been included with the product. Rich Dionne authored this editor.

UNIT CHANGES

The following land based units are now transferred from one command to the other automatically:

JAPANESE

65th Inf Bgd to 17th Army, in Jan of 1943

Naha SBF to 32nd Army, in March of 1944

36th Canadian Inf Div to CenPac, in Jan 1945

3rd Australian Inf Div to SoPac, in Jan 1944

5th Australian Inf Div to SWPac, in Jan 1943

11th Australian Inf Div to SWPac, in Jan 1943

11th Australian Inf Bgd to SoPac, in Jan 1944

23rd Australian Inf Div to SoPac, in Jan 1944

1st Australian Armored Bgd to SWPac, in Jan 1943

17th Ind Inf Div to British 14th Army, in May 1942

20th Ind Inf Div to British 14th Army, in May 1942

23rd Ind Inf Div to British 14th Army, in May 1942

26th Ind Inf Div to British 14th Army, in May 1942

Here are the aircraft upgrades that have changed from the original release of the game:

USAAF

P-35 upgrades to P-39

unit #56 to unit #20

P-36 upgrades to P-39

unit #19 to unit #20

P-39 upgrades to P-38F

unit #20 to unit #22

P-38F upgrades to P-38J

unit #22 to unit #23

P-40E upgrades to P-40N

unit #21 to unit #55

P-40N upgrades to P-51

unit #55 to unit #25

B-18 upgrades to B-25

unit #37 to unit #40

B-17E upgrades to B-24

unit #42 to unit #43

B-24 upgrades to B-29

unit #43 to unit #44

A-20 upgrades to A-26

unit #38 to unit #39