I'm thinking about making a Fantasy Role Playing game for the Atari 2600

[Cador]

Here's some background on my technical knowledge:

 

-I read the Stella programmer's guide about ten years ago. So I think I understand the capabilities and the limitations of the TIA.

-I know 6502 machine language fairly well.

 

Most of my games programming has been done on the Commodore VIC-20. My most well known homebrew game for that platform is "Realms of Quest III". Here are some links about the game:

 

http://sleepingeleph...opic.php?t=3368

http://realmsofquest.blogspot.com

 

 

Now, I'm not expecting to be able to pull off an Ultima or Wizardry-style game on my first Atari 2600 game. And since the Atari 2600 doesn't have a save game feature, the scope of the game will be modest (instead of a 6 character party, it will involve a solo player character). I'm thinking of the following features:

 

-A dungeon crawler where the 3D wireframe graphics drawn by the 2 missiles, ball, and the horizontal lines will be drawn by the playfield

-use the 2 sprites to display wandering monsters, water fountains, thrones, pits and other elements that can be shown in the dungeon

-in-context game music (different tunes for when you're in the castle, in the dungeon, fighting a monster, and fighting a boss, etc)

-proceduarlly-generated dungeons based on a random number seed. So the game would be different every time.

-I'd like to be able to make use of text. I'm thinking of using the 48 pixel routine to display the following information:

 

----------------------------------

STR 18 DEX 18

INT 18 CON 18

WIS 18 CHA 18

 

LEVEL 99

EXP 99999

GOLD 99999

 

HP 999/999

SP 999/999

 

SWORD+99

ARMOR+99

SHIELD+99

POTIONS 99

----------------------------------

 

How difficult would it be to display the preceding on it's own separate screen?

 

I'm just at the thinking stage right now. But I'm also hoping to spur discussion on the feasibility of actually making such a game for the Atari 2600.

Edited January 9, 2013 by Cador

[GroovyBee]

You can use a device called a SaveKey that fits in the other player's joystick port for game saves. If you search the forums you should be able to find information on it and a set of routines to access it too. If you make the cart using a Melody board then it is possible to save data on that too. You'll need to write some code (or borrow it - the Chetiry game does it) that runs on the ARM processor on the Melody PCB to do that.

 

Good luck with your project!