Meritous Gaiden

Original game by Lancer-X/ASCEAI

Item randomizer and Archipelago integration by KewlioMZX

Story

Five generations after the Orcus Dome incident, a new facility called the Atlas Dome is built below the surface of the moon. There, unknown research takes place, led by a man known only as "Berserker".

However, as of recently, strange events have been occurring, which seem to threaten the fabric of reality itself. Thus, PSI user VIRTUE travels to the secretive Atlas Dome in search of answers.

Installation

Run Meritous-ap.exe after extraction and everything should work correctly.

If the game is too difficult for you, you can play in 'Training mode' for a far more sombre gaming experience.

Basic Controls

Key	Description
Arrow keys	Move around. To walk through doors, simply walk up to them and push against them.
Space	Charge your PSI circuit for attacking.
C	A certain artifact will be enabled while this key is held.
Tab	View the map (you can then use the arrow keys to scroll around the map).
Enter	Activate a trigger tile that you are standing on. Enter is also used for various other things, such as for reading in-game dialogue.
P	Pause the game.
H	View the help file.
Escape	Exit the game.

Some controllers may be supported, but there is currently no guarantee that this support will work.

Item Randomizer & Archipelago Multiworld

This game comes equipped with an item randomizer which is also compatible with Archipelago Multiworld. For players who have played the original ("vanilla") version of MERITOUS, you will notice that PSI Enhancement tiles have been replaced with item cache tiles. Each one of these may contain any sort of item, including artifacts, PSI enhancements, crystals, or, in the case of a multiworld, items for other players.

meritous-ap.json

Currently, in order to configure the randomizer, meritous-ap.json must be modified to suit your playing environment. The values are as follows:

Key	Definition
ap-enable	Enables the Archipelago multiworld client. If it is not enabled, or if this file is missing, the local randomizer will be used. Default: false
server	The server to which the Archipelago client will connect. May be a domain name or IP address. Default: archipelago.gg
port	The port to which the Archipelago client will connect. Default: 38281
password	If applicable, the password to use to connect to the Archpelago instance. If one is used, provide it within quotation marks. If not, omit this value or provide null without quotation marks. Default: null (no password will be used)
slotname	The slot name to connect to. This would be your player name, as provided in the configuration file (YAML) for this Archipelago session. No default (must be provided if AP is enabled)

In a future update, for ease of use, this process will be moved into in-game menus.

YAML configuration file

The player configuration file (also known as YAML) will determine the generation parameters for the game. To obtain one, refer to either the official Archipelago settings page for this game, or the unofficial Archipelago Settings Tool for more advanced options, including the option to randomize which game will be played.

Building Meritous

Generally, Meritous Gaiden should be built as a 32-bit executable. Under Windows, it is recommended to use MSYS MinGW x86. Meritous Gaiden depends on the following libraries:

• SDL 1.2
  • SDL-image
  • SDL-mixer
• zlib
• libpng

In addition, under Windows, the Winsock library is required for the Archipelago client component to work, and windres is recommended to compile the RC file.

Acknowledgements

Thanks to Lancer-X's beta testers: Quasar, Terryn and Wervyn, for their hard work in assisting him in keeping Meritous fairly stable.

Thanks to Kewlio's beta testers: MazukiTskiven, alwaysontreble, and the Archipelago community in general, for continuing support in this endeavor.