Z00 Gas

(To run, type 'make zoogas'.)


WELCOME TO YOUR NEW JOB

Hi, welcome to your first day as keeper at the Rock-Paper-Scissors zoo!
There are three types of animal here: reds, greens and blues.
Reds eat greens eat blues eat reds.
Munch munch munch munch munch.

There's not much to do; just maintain the cage enclosures.
They're built out of this cheap cement that degrades really fast.
You can use this cement spray (S) to repair'em, but watch your stocks (upper right).
To use the spray, just mouseover where you want to repair and press S (or click).

You have a few other tools, too:
If the animals get out of hand, use the acid spray (D). Kinda cruel though.
They like the perfume (F), but don't use it outside the cages: it stinks up the place.
Keep your hands off the mutator gas (G), that ain't for newbies like you!

You can track your population balances down the bottom of the screen.
Tools are on the right. Watch your diversity score and don't let any critters go extinct!

OK, I'm off to lunch. Catch ya later!
---STAN THE MAN, HEAD ZOOKEEPER


[Underneath Stan's note is a vinyl-bound folder]

   ---++ FORMAL CODE OF ETHICS ++---
        ROCK-PAPER-SCISSORS ZOO

As zoo's resident keeper/bioengineer, your goal is to maintain a diverse zoo population.
You have several tools to do this, delivered by pressing the following keys (using the mouse to target):

S - cement spray
D - death spray (acid)
F - fecundity (perfume)
G - mutator gas

Your reserve stocks of these gases are shown to the right of the board.
Your population charts are shown under the board.
Your diversity score is shown as a number (bottom right) and a grey bar (bottom).
The higher your score, the faster your sprays and gases will be restocked.
(Your highest diversity score is also shown.)

Things to try:
- maintain the cage walls
- use cement spray to build a new cage enclosure from scratch
- isolate a single species inside a cage
- mutate the population of a cage
- build two cages with a common wall
- break down the wall with corrosive gas (or just let the wall decay)
- just go crazy and spray cement everywhere, creating a loosely-connected set of patches
- use mutator gas all over the patches
- trap perfume and mutator gas in the walls
- can you get a stable 3-cycle inside a cage?

There is a cheat code, but you'll have to guess it!
(Or look in the source code. All sorts of fun can be had by tweaking the game parameters, too.)