tuxkart(6)

NAME

TuxKart - 3D GoKart racing game

SYNOPSIS

tuxkart

DESCRIPTION

tuxkart is an arcade-style game where driving faster than

your opponents will do the trick. You're taking the role of Tux,

the Linux mascot, steering its go-kart around various courses,

racing against computer-controlled vehicles.

The main window that opens on startup provides buttons and

sliders to select the next track to race on, as well as the num

ber of laps to go. Rumour has it that hitting the button la

belled Start Game will in fact start the game. In the race, you

can either use a joystick, or the keyboard for steering.

During the race, several goodies can make your life easier

while other gadgets shall give you a really tough ride. Go for

the arrow shaped red and black zipper patches on the track, as

they boost your cart onwards. Red herring not only taste good,

some of them also hide nice powerups. Beware the green herring,

though. They're yucky and only slow you down. The golden and sil

very-blue herring on the other hand make for a fine appetizer.

Eat enough of them, and the next red herring might yield not only

one, but up to five powerups at once. Note that bad things happen

at once, while the good things (well, good for you...) need to be

activated. Here's the list of available extras:

Goodies

Missiles

Unguided but fast. If they hit anything, they ex

plode impressively. The effect on a cart is to stop it dead, so

it has to accelerate again.

Homing missiles

Slower than the regular kind, but they track the

nearest kart and are quite hard to shake off.

Fuzzy blobs

Even slower still - a kart can outrun them quite

easily. They ricochet off the sides of the track and only explode

when they hit a cart.

Magnets

If you activate a magnet then it hangs around for

about 15 seconds. If anyone comes within about 20 meters, you'll

be pulled towards them and end up glued to their tail until the

magnet 'expires'. Great for catching up with someone - hopeless

for passing them.

Portable Zippers

These are just like the zipper patches on the track

itself. They give you sudden acceleration and temporarily in

crease the top speed of your cart.

Badies

Parachute

This pops out the back of your cart and slows you

down a little for a few seconds only. Enough to drop you back one

place if it's a close race though.

Anvil Gets dragged behind your cart on a rope for an even

shorter amount of time than the parachute, but the drag effect is

much stronger. Your cart hardly moves at all.

CONTROLS

Joystick Left/Right or Key Left/Right

Steer.

Joystick Button 1 or Key Up

Accelerate.

Joystick Button 2 or Key Down

Brake.

Joystick Button 3 or Key f or Key Enter

Use a special item (if you've collected one).

Joystick Button 4 or Key d

Ask to be rescued by Tinytux.

Joystick Button 5 or Key a

Pop a wheelie--makes you go really fast, but you'll

be unable to steer.

Joystick Button 6 or Key s

Jump.

Key Space

Pop up or hide the menu bar.

Key r Restart the race.

Key p Pause the race.

Key x or Key ESC

End the race.

Key w Toggle wireframe view.

Key z Gather some statistics.

KNOWN BUGS

No drive-with-the-mouse support.

Slow performance on CPUs less than ~450MHz.

No way to return to title screen at end of race.

You always play as Tux - there is no way to change play

ers.

After you cross the finish line, if someone overtakes you,

your

final position changes!

No "Ready, Steady, Go!" sequence.

The computer players get confused and 'stuck' on tracks

that self-intersect (eg figure-8 shaped tracks). The lap counter

and current player positions are also screwed up on those kinds

of tracks.

If you (or one of the computer players) goes off the edge

of the track, or calls for rescue then Tinytux doesn't always

manage to put you back onto the track correctly. If this happens,

you may need to type r to restart the race.

Several Mesa lighting bugs are shown up particularly badly

in this game.

Sometimes you can be pushed through a solid object if you

are hit by another player when in contact with the surface.

ENVIRONMENT

MESA_GLX_FX

If this environment variable is set, the game's

resolution will switch from the default 640x480 to 320x240. This

is mostly of interest if you have a Voodoo-1/2 graphics card and

usually set this variable to fullscreen.

TUXKART_DATADIR

Path to the location of game data. Usually you

don't have to mess with this variable.

TUXKART_TRACKLIST

Path to the location of track data. Usually you

don't have to mess with this variable.

AUTHOR

This manual page was written by Daniel Kobras <kobras@de

bian.org>, for the Debian GNU/Linux system (but may be used by

others). It is based on information available from tuxkart's

website at http://tuxkart.sourceforge.net

November 15, 2001

TUXKART(6)