Sinclair User


The Illustrator
By Gilsoft
Spectrum 48K

 
Published in Sinclair User #37

The Illustrator

THE revolution in DIY adventuring begun by The Quill continues. Now you can add the icing to the cake and use The illustrator to create location graphics which will give extra atmosphere and polish to your games.

This new utility program is specifically designed to be used in conjunction with The Quill.

Once the main menu appears your first task is to load the adventure database you have created on The Quill. Doing this initialises the drawing program and gives it the necessary information about the number of possible locations required.

The Illustrator

If you have a previously prepared or unfinished graphics file those too are loaded. Again, a demo set is provided. Selecting graphics mode on the main menu then allows you to get down to the serious business of art. You can print the current pictures to the screen or amend them - this instruction is also used to start from scratch.

You're off. Two cursors are shown: the base cursor indicates where your current line is to be drawn from and the 'rubber cursor' can be easily moved around the screen to show the end point of the line.

The cursors are controlled by eight conveniently placed keys. Other single key instructions allow you to move the cursors to new points for separate bits of the drawing. Using this programming mode you can reduce a complex picture to a short series of key presses.

As with The Quill you will need to work carefully through the manual before you begin but there is a step- by-step demonstration which will convince you the program is highly user-friendly. All the processes demand no knowledge of programming - you will only need to be logical in your approach.

When you have finished all you need to do is save your database and graphics files. After that you can simply LOAD "" and auto-run your graphic adventure.

Richard Price

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