In the 1st alien encounter. I can't DO anything.

Fire does nothing, I can set frequency colors until I die, but the game does not progress.

The encounter does not start.

The PDf manual and guide are useless as they tell you nothing about the HOW of combat, only that you can do specific things, totally worthless.

Hi,

Maybe this will help:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2VQUQ7Zo6U

Cheers,

Surtur

A simple mistake might be not to notice, that the first encounter automatically pauses the game. Have you tried SPACEBAR to unpause to proceed? Otherwise it sounds like the game crasehd.

CoffeeMan is correct - I think that's the likely culprit :)

We pause the first encounter to allow a chance for players to examine BattleStation and read the Hints before proceeding.

Did pressing Spacebar solve the issue?