From sos@oz.plymouth.edu Thu Aug 25 19:32:15 1994
From: sos@oz.plymouth.edu (Steffan O'Sullivan)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc,rec.games.design,rec.games.board
Subject: REVIEW: Adventure Writer for Windows
Followup-To: rec.games.design
Date: 24 Aug 1994 21:08:31 -0400
Organization: Plymouth State College, Plymouth, NH
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: oz.plymouth.edu
Keywords: Map-making utility

Just back from GenCon, first of a number of planned reviews of things I
bought there.  Note follow-up set to rec.games.design.

Review of Adventure Writer for Windows Software

Primarily a map-making software for RPGs or Board Games.

HARDWARE Needed - anything that will run Windows, mouse.  Supports
color monitor & printer, but will work with B/W.

COMPONENTS: 3.5" double-density disk, brief docco.  (5.25" disk
available on request.)

INSTALLATION: customizable, requires from 500 to 900K space, depending
on if you want to load the samples and utilities.  (One of the samples
is a map that shows every icon in every color - or grayscale, if you
don't have color - combination.  A very useful inclusion to the
program.)  Add-on packs are available that use another ~300K each or
so.  Installation was effortless and had no bugs.

EASE OF USE: Very easy.  I made it do almost everything it can do
without having to look at the docco.  This is the program's
strongpoint.  I had sat down at a booth at GenCon with Campaign
Cartographer (CC) for 20 minutes and couldn't make it do anything
without having to refer to the docco.  This program is the opposite -
extremely easy to use, but that's because it's much more limited in
what it can do than CC.

DOCCO: very brief, but covers all the bases except what the files on
the disk mean.  (I like to know, as I'm a compulsive hard-drive
cleaner.  Do I need all these files?  The docco should tell me, and it
doesn't.)

WHAT IT DOES: Adventure Writer for Windows (AWW) is primarily a
map-making program.  Unlike CC, which is freeform, AWW is limited to a
square or hex grid.  (I'll call a generic square or hex a space.) You
can print the map with or without the space lines showing, but the
resulting map still looks quite a bit like a square or hex map,
especially if you use colors or gray scales, which fill the space.

However, it does that fairly effortlessly.  It includes a basic
collection of icons to put into spaces, ranging from a compass rose to
the four Aristotelean elements, eight indoor icons such as doors,
walls, stairs, etc., eight outdoor icons such as hills, mountains,
trees, swamp, castles, villages, etc., and four space icons such as
stars, asteroids and space stations.  There are also "dressing" icons -
slain warrior, debris, encounter symbol (rather nice-looking sword),
pentagram, etc.

You can also enter text into a space and number the spaces
automatically, but the printout of the text and numbers is very
disappointing.  The icons and space lines themselves print cleanly even
on my dot-matrix, but the text looks lousy, frankly.  Fortunately, you
can repress the text and numbers at printing, while still leaving the
map labelled in the file.  This allows for either a GM-only map, or,
for board game mock-ups, designer's notes.

AWW supports a large number of add-ons: Great Outdoors (the only one I
bought), Natural Caverns, Catacombs, Possessions & Accessories, Legions
of the Damned, various symbols for Air, sea, modern forces, and
Medieval weapons.  Each add-on costs $15 to $20, depending on the
number of icons included.

PRINTING: Pretty good quality, except as noted above (text and
numbers).  Also, if you don't want a grid, you can't really use any
colors or gray scales - just symbols.  It prints in three different
sizes: roughly 1/4", roughly 1/2" and roughly 1".  Unfortunately, for
hexes this is measured corner to corner across rather than line to
line.  This means the program is going to create very non-standard
hexes as far as wargames are concerned.  Those figures should be across
>from parallel line to line, rather than corner to corner.  This means
that for a wargame prototype mapmaker, you are effectively limited to
the largest size hex it can make, unless you enlarge with a
photocopier.  This is a shame, because it means you have to waste more
paper printing the larger hexes when something a tad smaller would
actually do you better.

PERFORMANCE: I bought the program for making playtest versions of a map
for a board game I'm designing.  I'll discuss that in a paragraph or
so.

First, I'll talk about AWW as an RPG tool.  I don't intend to use it as
such, simply because I can make maps freehand for RPGs that serve the
purpose as well as I need them to.  I even enjoy it.  This program
would be adequate for indoor diagramming with the squares option, but
rather stilted and limited for outdoor RPG mapping due to the
constraints of needing to use only a square or hex grid.  True, you can
turn the grid off so it doesn't show, but it still has a gridded look
to it.  I have to admit I wouldn't use CC for RPG mapping either,
primarily because it's much harder to do than simply drawing, but the
results aren't that much better than drawing.  You *could* use AWW for
RPG mapping outdoors - it's certainly easy to use - but it would give a
fairly rigid look to the world.  It would work fine for indoor,
square-based rooms and corridors, however.  The number of icons
included is adequate for most needs.

As a board game design tool: this is what I bought it for.  I want to
make geomorphic maps, fooling around with them until I'm happy with the
way they look.  I had been simply using colored markers to fill in
blank hex sheets, but those look clunky.  I did not expect AWW to give
me finished, production-quality maps (good thing, too!), but simply
playtest and even blindtest copies of maps.

Does it do that?  Well . . . mostly.  Since I don't have a color
printer, I would have to either use the gray scale system or color the
hexes in with the markers when it's done.  The latter is a bit of a
pain - I'm doing that already, so why should I spend money on this
program?

The problem is that the gray scales are very limited in their uses.
You can really only have about four different ones before you can't
easily distinguish them.  So you really do need to color at least part
of the map spaces.  I've found that printing everything in a white
background is best, and then just adding a touch of color - filling in
the foliage, or a mountain shape, or some turquoise around the swamp
grasses.  This gives a map that has enough color to be pleasing to the
eye, but much easier to color than filling in every space all the way.
It also produces clear symbols for each hex:  mountain, hill, wooded
hill, forest, light wood, town, etc.  So it's passable in this regard.

However, there is a real problem with the program from a wargame design
standpoint: rivers, streams, roads, transportation lines.  There aren't
any.  Currently, you'd have to make a river a full hex wide (filled
with water) in order to have rivers.  There is no way to mark along hex
edges in this program - a serious omission.  Likewise, there is no way
to denote roads, trails, railroads, political boundaries, etc.  You can
draw all of these things in afterwards easily enough, but it's rather
frustrating.  It wouldn't be hard to add these things, one would
think.  They should be there.

One other major flaw in the program is the lack of an UNDO function.
There is one available, but it only works for text, oddly enough.  I
found it extremely frustrating the first time I accidentally globally
placed one specific symbol into every space on the map, and the Undo
didn't undo it . . .

Of the fifty icons in the Great Outdoor add-on pack I bought for map
making, there are really only about eight to ten icons I use.  But I
have to admit these are fairly useful - there is no wooded hills icon
in the main set, only in this set, for example.  But some of the icons
are "muddy" - that is, not very clear and distinct from other symbols.
I think the designer was trying to be artistic rather than clear, and
my priorities, as far as board game map reading is concerned, must be
with clear first, then make it pretty within that limit.

All in all, I have to give this program a grade of C.  It works, and
I'll use it, but it could be a *lot* better.  It's easy to use - I'll
give it that - but it's very limited in its utility.  I *will* use
mine, but only because I already own it, and can't afford another.
Besides, I didn't see one at GenCon that would be any better for
wargame map mock-ups - if anyone knows of any, please let me know!

Adventure Writer for Windows, from Digital Alchemy: $30.  
Information: 314-447-8250        Ordering: 800-566-MAPS

I have no link with Digital Alchemy at all.


-- 
  Steffan O'Sullivan      sos@oz.plymouth.edu    Plymouth, NH, USA
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"Weary not thyself to be rich ... For riches certainly make them-
selves wings like an eagle that flieth toward heaven." Proverbs 23:4-5