omega(6)

💖 omega — the manual, but make it bestie 💖

okay so real talk, this is the Games Manual page for omega(6) and I am obsessed with it, so let's get into it 🦋

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✨ NAME ✨

omega — a hack-style game, but with quests. yes, actual quests. slay 💅

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🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

omega [save file]

that's it. that's the whole vibe. one optional argument and she's off ✨

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👑 DESCRIPTION 👑

okay bestie, listen. omega is a complex rogue-style game of dungeon exploration, and here's the thing that makes her different from every other dungeon crawler out there: there are a number of ways to "win", and which one you get depends on all the various actions you took during play. main character energy, honestly 🎀

the ways you can get your name on the hiscore board include:

• becoming the highest ranked head of a guild, sect, college, etc. 👑
• gaining the most points, which get figured from your possessions and your experience 🔥

the game (via the oracle, iykyk) may impose some structure on your exploration — but bestie, you do not have to follow all of the oracle's advice. she's giving suggestions, not commands 💅

and yes, before you ask: there is a "total winner" status. periodt. 🏆

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🫶 the save file situation 🫶

if the save file is not specified, omega gives the player the choice of either:

1. generating a random character, or
2. playing themselves — which means doing a short quiz to determine an approximation of their abilities 📝

if the save file is given, omega will restore that save file, and if that works, the save file gets deleted. bye bye 👋

⚠️ heads up: some installations of omega compress the save file, using either compress(1) or gzip(1). if that's the case for you, and you have a save file that is uncompressed — and yes, such files are generated by omega if it receives a signal during play, for example — you can compress it (with compress(1) or gzip(1)) and remove the .Z or .gz extension. alternatively, you may simply run with the uncompressed save file. this will not affect the game in any way, it just takes more disk space between games 🙈

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🧚 how it actually plays 🧚

omega offers a richness of playing detail that goes way beyond a simple game like rogue. however — and this is important — the majority of gameplay is very similar to rogue, hack, ultrarogue, larn, and other such games. so if you know those, you already know the vibe 💜

here's the legend, bestie:

• the player is represented by the highlighted "@" symbol 👑
• objects and terrain features are represented by non-alphabetic symbols
• monsters are represented by the various upper and lower case letters
• other humans are represented by a non-highlighted "@"

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🌈 the actual world 🌈

omega currently consists of a countryside, and sited in that countryside you'll find:

• a city 🏙️
• various villages 🏘️
• several dungeons 🕳️
• some "special" sites, such as the temples of the various priesthoods 🛕

the game starts in the city of Rampart, where all the guilds have their headquarters. iconic 🎀

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🧠 dungeon memory (the important bit) 🧠

as a dungeon is explored, all generated levels are saved in memory. but — and this is the catch — only one dungeon is "remembered" at a time. so if you enter two dungeons, the first one will be forgotten. (don't panic, it'll be regenerated should you wish to enter it again ✨)

however — and this is the plot twist — if a dungeon is "completed", this fact will be remembered. basically that means the unique monster at the bottom will not be regenerated if you've already killed it. ate. 💀🔥

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🔗 SEE ALSO 🔗

• compress(1)
• gzip(1)
• nethack(6)

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💜 AUTHOR 💜

Laurence Brothers 🫶

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and that's the whole page, bestie!! this one came out of the Games Manual, it's omega(6), and the author credit goes to Laurence Brothers. go forth and get your name on that hiscore board, you absolute icon 👑✨💖