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I've decided to change the status of a program from commercial distribution to free. As a user of the TGC forums, you are among the first on the planet to know of this.

Easy Tank COMMBAT is an adaption of the COMBAT cartridge that was part of the original ATARI® VCS bundle. Enjoy robust two player tank battles using two separate computers linked through ANY network connection (including dialup to dialup). In addition 5 levels of AI will provide you excellent training opponents and there is a 2 player retro console mode if you have a gameport joystick. You'll also have to provide your own helmet.

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Quick online (internet) startup instructions.

If you are on dialup and running the program in full screen, then you need to make a note of your IP address which is shown as the program starts. If you are running in a window then your IP address will be displayed on the window bar.

If you are connected through broadband and your local IP address is different than the one that is exposed on the internet, then you probably already know not to use the IP information displayed by Easy Tank COMMBAT and hopefully know where to find out your correct IP. As I have never had a broadband connection, you are on your own there.

One of the combatants is the host and the other will be the guest. The guest will need the IP address of the host to connect.

The initial screen displays a turned off ATARI® 2600. This the COMMBAT skin, the 2D component of Easy Tank COMMBAT. Press the S key to swap skins to Easy Tank, the 3D component.

On the Easy Tank options screen use the up/down arrow keys to select the CONNECTION option then use the left/right arrow keys to select INTERNET. Then press the enter key to begin the connection process.

If guest: Use the arrow keys to highlight (and the enter key to select) the
ENTER HOST IP ADDRESS button. Using the keyboard, enter your opponent's IP address into the program to make the connection.

If host: Use the arrow keys to highlight (and the enter key to select) the
ACCEPT CONNECTION button and then wait for the incoming connection.

The round battle starts when you hear the bell. Your tank is operated with the arrow keys. Forward, Back, Spin left, Spin right. Space bar fires the cannon. Review the battle control guide for other features.

At the end of any round you can hit the enter key to activate a chat message typing buffer.
After typing a line of chat text, hit the enter key to send it to your opponent. Repeat as needed for additional messages. The host controls the game restart.

Just to make things easier... For broadband users, access [href]www.whatsmyip.com[/href] to get the OUTSIDE ip...

Thanks for that excellent tip Somaliano!


COMMBAT [2D]

If you have an older system just hanging around doing nothing, this program provides an excellent reason to fire it up and connect. ETC only requires DirectX 8.1 and a 16 MB 3D graphics card. It should run on over 86% of systems running Windows.

My "low end" test system had a Cyrix 366 MHz processor with 32 MB of system RAM operating under Windows 98 OE using a 32MB TNT2 Vanta video card. On that system in 3D I got 21-29 FPS for multiplayer, 2 player console or solo against the red AI. However that same system only ran ~9 FPS against the green AI. Methinks the Cyrix does not like a lot of floating point calculations.

ETC will detect if the frame rate of a connected machine is under 30 and the game will operate at the lower speed with a displayed notification to the faster machine's user.

For those of you with friends who do not have internet access at home, but have a computer, modem and phone line, then they may be interested. Do drop them a copy.