Turbo - a 3D Racing Game

[lord_mike]

Here's another update.

 

I'd love some feedback or suggestions on the day/night changes, especially with my color choices.

 

 

Mikey likes! The only problem is if you play long enough the one level the opposing cars become invisible... that does add to the difficulty. The rain is cool. The colors are great, IMO. The daytime reminds me of the bright, humid haze during a hot summer. I like that the game isn't too hard, but maybe it's too easy.... one thought I had would be that instead of lowering the damage limit (which might ruin the "fun" aspect of the game by dying to quickly or easily).... have some gas stations that wouldn't have repairs available.. just gas... or maybe as the game goes on, have the gas stations become less and less frequent. I guess increasing the amount of damage per bump later in the game would also work. I know you've mentioned these thoughts in the past.

 

Just some random thoughts. This game is fantastic and lots of fun to play! You should consider asking Albert about getting it sold on cartridge here at AA.

 

Thanks,

 

Mike

[+Atarius Maximus]

Here's another update.

 

I'd love some feedback or suggestions on the day/night changes, especially with my color choices.

 

 

Mikey likes! The only problem is if you play long enough the one level the opposing cars become invisible... that does add to the difficulty. The rain is cool. The colors are great, IMO. The daytime reminds me of the bright, humid haze during a hot summer. I like that the game isn't too hard, but maybe it's too easy.... one thought I had would be that instead of lowering the damage limit (which might ruin the "fun" aspect of the game by dying to quickly or easily).... have some gas stations that wouldn't have repairs available.. just gas... or maybe as the game goes on, have the gas stations become less and less frequent. I guess increasing the amount of damage per bump later in the game would also work. I know you've mentioned these thoughts in the past.

 

Just some random thoughts. This game is fantastic and lots of fun to play! You should consider asking Albert about getting it sold on cartridge here at AA.

 

Thanks,

 

Mike

 

I've had much more free time that I thought this week, I've been able to work on this almost every day. I made some significant behind the scenes changes today. I've got the code moved around about as well as I can, it's divided up fairly evenly between the four 4k banks. I'm now using over 14k of the 16k romsize.

 

Here are the changes:

 

1. I added a tunnel animation sequence. You'll now briefly drive through a tunnel during the nighttime drive. I did lots of code cleanup to squeeze this in...bank four is now just about stuffed full of graphics, only 196 bytes free.

2. Traffic patterns were changed to be more random as the game progresses.

3. The code is now in place for 8 distinct day/night progressions that can all be different. They're all the same now. After 8 days have passed, it starts over at day 1.

4. The workbench at the gas station now shows "closed" if your car has only minor damage. It will still repair your car if you touch it though, that's a feature that still needs to be worked on.

5. There is now a "press fire" sprite on the title screen. Why? I was only using 5 sprites, I had an extra for that screen. Still no flicker with that addition.

 

@Mike... I don't see the problem with the invisible cars that you noted. I'm using a current version of Stella for Windows, and I can see the cars on every level. The levels progress by how many times you've refilled your gas tank. Could you tell me how many pitstops you've made before you notice the invisible cars? That will help me locate which section of code I need to tweak the colors on.

 

You should consider asking Albert about getting it sold on cartridge here at AA.

 

If I ever get this game done how I like it, I may propose that to Al. You never know...

 

Thanks!

 

Steve

turbo24.txt

turbo24.txt.bin

[lord_mike]

 

@Mike... I don't see the problem with the invisible cars that you noted. I'm using a current version of Stella for Windows, and I can see the cars on every level. The levels progress by how many times you've refilled your gas tank. Could you tell me how many pitstops you've made before you notice the invisible cars? That will help me locate which section of code I need to tweak the colors on.

 

 

 

I think the problem is fixed now.. I went over 30 pit stops without it happening. The problem was that the cars remained grey while the screen lightened and they became invisible.

 

The tunnel is WAAAAY cool!!

 

Thanks,

 

Mike

[Gorf]

Looking really good AM.

 

Edited April 19, 2007 by Gorf

[+Atarius Maximus]

Thanks for the compliments Mike & Gorf. I always had that tunnel in mind from the beginning - I'm glad I was able to make it work. I made a few minor changes this morning, I'm going to be busy the rest of the day. They're all related to adding some difficulty options to the game.

 

B/W switch

- color mode - oncoming traffic moves at normal speed

- b/w mode - oncoming traffic will move twice as fast

Left Difficulty switch

- B - normal damage

- A - your car takes 3 times as much damage with each hit. This definitely encourages defensive driving.

Right Difficulty switch

- B - Normal Workbench operation

- A - Workbench will only be open when you are VERY low on gasoline. You'll have to time it just right.

 

Hint: time how long it takes for you to run out of gas when you get down to one bar left. When there is one bar on the screen, you'll have to wait about 1/2 the time it takes before you run out. This definitely adds a level of challenge - timing is everything!

 

The workbench will always be closed when your car has minor damage, which translates to right before the first time your car changes color.

 

EDIT - I made one minor change - the score graphics were changed. This post has been updated with the latest binary, although the file name (turbo25.txt.bin) did not change, as there was no change to the source code for the game.

 

 

 

Steve

turbo25.txt

turbo25.txt.bin

Edited April 25, 2007 by Atarius Maximus

[+Atarius Maximus]

No real changes to the game this time, I just added a new titlescreen using the same technique I used in the Drag Racing game. I added some additional comments to the source code as well.

turbo28.txt

turbo28.txt.bin

[MagMax667]

Sorry for resurecting an old topic, but after playing through Cave In I had to hunt down some of Atarius Maximus' other games and, like Cave In, this game is absolutely extraordinary. There seems to be a stigma around here on batari BASIC games, but this and Cave In are proof that bB can deliver games of the highest quality. If this game was ever put on cart, I'd DEFINITELY buy it, without hesitation.

 

Wonderful job, Steve!

[+Atarius Maximus]

Sorry for resurecting an old topic, but after playing through Cave In I had to hunt down some of Atarius Maximus' other games and, like Cave In, this game is absolutely extraordinary. There seems to be a stigma around here on batari BASIC games, but this and Cave In are proof that bB can deliver games of the highest quality. If this game was ever put on cart, I'd DEFINITELY buy it, without hesitation.

 

Wonderful job, Steve!

 

Thank you very much for the kind words. This is one of the games that I made that I still like to play myself on occasion. I never proposed a cart release to Al on this one, I was never happy with the amount of flicker in the game, and that the colors on the sprites aren't quite right (the left and right side color of the car sprites sometimes don't match). I think it's just a problem in the multisprite kernel - I couldn't figure out how to fix it.

 

Steve

Edited August 10, 2007 by Atarius Maximus

[gambler172]

Hi Steve

Your game is good as it is.Plays really well.I would buy a cart too.But i would prefer to see your Adventure game on cart.This could become one of the biggest and best games for the 2600.

greetings Walter

[yuppicide]

I am not a fan of driving games, my Dad was though. This game is amazing! I didn't read the whole thread, just some of it in the start. The graphics are great! I love how you actually go through a tunnel at one point giving the person something different to look at for awhile... same with the pitstop.

 

The only thing things I think it could use would be title screen music if possible, curved roads ala Night Driver or Enduro and lastly.. something to make the game end.

 

Does it end? I just keep going and going.. filling up on gas and repairing and I've yet to have a game end on me. There is a spot you can sit just off to the right of the car that comes down the middle. Cars hardly come on the right side of the road. You can sit in this spot and dodge the few cars that do come right very easily and go top speed down the road.

 

Oh, would be nice if there is an "intermission" once in awhile to get a quick break of the joystick. Sort of like how I think Enduro had breaks in between levels.

 

Still fantastic game and definately worth putting on cartridge if you ask me.

[CurtisP]

I'd like to try reworking this game using the single sprite kernal, as i think I could keep most of the functionality and have no flicker. Plus I'd like to see how small I can make it.

[smartkitten26]

Is there going to be a newer version anytime soon?

[smartkitten26]

If your still working on this, then i might have an idea for you, you could make

the sun get higher every time the backround gets lighter, and also maybe you could

make the backround a little more blue because it looks like ice when it's daytime. And you should make the scenery in the back change every couple minutes (and the playfield colors)

Edited August 17, 2009 by Nati

[+Atarius Maximus]

Is there going to be a newer version anytime soon?

 

Probably not, I wasn't planning on working on this game any more.

 

If your still working on this, then i might have an idea for you, you could make

the sun get higher every time the backround gets lighter, and also maybe you could

make the backround a little more blue because it looks like ice when it's daytime. And you should make the scenery in the back change every couple minutes (and the playfield colors)

 

Thanks very much for the suggestions, but I'm done with this game. I may attempt a new driving game from scratch in the future, they've always been my favorite.

 

Steve