NAME

games − UNIX games

DESCRIPTION

The UNIX terminal-based games and their manual pages aren’t included in this release of the NeXT software.  In lieu of these, the /NextDeveloper/Demos directory contains a number of NeXTstep applications that you might want to try.  These are described below. 

THE NEXT DEMO PROGRAMS

The demos in /NextDeveloper/Demos are designed to give aspiring programmers a taste of what’s truly possible with the NeXT Computer.  If you’re interested in science, music, art, signal processing, games, animation, timing, optics, PostScript, chaos, electronics, chess, and so on, you’ll find something compelling in this collection of demos. 

Note that these demo programs aren’t generally maintained and usually don’t come with sources, although the source code for some demos is available in the directory /NextDeveloper/Examples. 

GAMES AND DIVERSIONS MASQUERADING AS NEXT DEMO PROGRAMS

This section describes a few of the entertainment-oriented NeXT demos in /NextDeveloper/Demos.  For information about other demos, see the README files in that directory. 

Billiards:  A dynamical collision model.  A certain realism is obtained through floating-point dynamical loops, sound effects, and animation.  The animation is made possible through the PostScript composite operator and timed entries. 

BreakApp:  A game program with a resizable playing field, very clean sound, and efficient animation.  Note the delicacy of the sound and graphics design.  A fine example of aesthetic programming of the NeXT Computer.  Source code is provided in the /NextDeveloper/Examples directory. 

Chess:  A front-end to gnuchess, in the NeXT style.  This program plays a fairly powerful game.  You can set many preferences (including computer basal strength), bring up time clocks, and so on.  There’s a stylish three-dimensional board, or, if you prefer textbook format, you can bring up a two-dimensional board whose pieces are done in a picturesque Adobe Cheq Font.  If you’re interested in GNU sources or interface modifications, contact NeXT Computer, Inc. on matters of release policy. 

Ensemble:  An interactive music performance application.  It allows you to read standard MIDI files and orchestrate them, or perform music from a MIDI keyboard using a MIDI interface connected to a serial port.  Also a music example, this application illustrates effective use of many Music Kit objects. 

ScorePlayer:  A player of scorefiles, which consist of Music Kit notes and parameter information.  The music this demo makes has never been heard before in this kind of workstation.  DSP-generated sounds are computed in real time, directed by the instructions in a scorefile. 

Stealth:  A flight simulator.  The plane is actually being governed by correct laws of aerodynamics.  There are lots of interesting interface features that have been implemented by an interface expert.  The author of this program actually flies planes and holds programming seminars as well.  Many tricks of rapid PostScript depth graphics went into this simulator. 

NeXT Computer, Inc.  —  October 2, 1990