Stun Runner 87 Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 Hi guys: Hmm... Maybe I'm not understanding this correctly, but wouldn't bitmapped mode for this type of game take *more* Maria time? Now you're writing information *each scan line* instead of each zone? Sorry if that seems like a stupid question, but the only work I've done with this mode is my demo of Battlezone. (Not sure what happened with the quoting function up there.) Yes, but it doesn't have a character mode where the objects are, I do (for the mountains). I always figured that's why the 'box' isn't around the playfield like the arcade version. Man its good to see you. This reminds me of when Michael Jordan came back to the NBA from baseball in 1995 http://www.mgnfivestarcinema.com/wp-content/uploads/Bill-Murray-What-About-Bob-2.gif Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PacManPlus Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 Hi Guys: Thanks as always You are all too cool. Bitmap mode would use less maria time than character mode since maria is only fetching the graphics and not the character codes and their graphics. Now it might take more rom/ram space or cpu time to make them depending on how it is done. I hope I don't seem too stupid, but I'm trying to wrap my head around this. In my Battlezone demo, I used 320A mode with Bitmap mode, only to draw lines (which ended up being to slow anyway) I guess I can't follow using it any other way. How would you get the sprites to render other than filling the DL like normal? Count me in too - Pal release? All of the games that I've created in the last two years auto-detect NTSC or PAL. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
YANDMAN Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 Holy crap this is awesome, so exciting as a huge defender fan. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NIKON Posted April 26, 2015 Author Share Posted April 26, 2015 Arcade Defender uses a 6809 chip as the CPU...after digging on the net I discovered that the 6809 chip has the ability to combine two 8 bit registers into a 16 bit output. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_6809 From what I have read about MARIA..it does not have this capability..arcade duplication may not be possible for the 7800 but it can come close. Just wanted to say that Bob will try to get as close to arcade as he can but the hardware is going to be the choke point. Note: If I am wrong about any of this let me know Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gambler172 Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 Hi Bob great work greetings Walter Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tep392 Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 Hi Guys: Thanks as always You are all too cool. I hope I don't seem too stupid, but I'm trying to wrap my head around this. In my Battlezone demo, I used 320A mode with Bitmap mode, only to draw lines (which ended up being to slow anyway) I guess I can't follow using it any other way. How would you get the sprites to render other than filling the DL like normal? All of the games that I've created in the last two years auto-detect NTSC or PAL. I think you would need to use 160 mode to use a bit-map. That would take about 270 Maria cycles per line. Don't know if that leaves enough for the enemies/ship or if there would be enough CPU time to draw the landscape/explosions/ship blasts. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AtariLeaf Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 Me want!!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaynz Posted April 26, 2015 Share Posted April 26, 2015 Hmm.. I was thinking of adopting a bitmap approach to the scanner - but I think the the char-set would be too big to fit in memory for all the positions. I do remember some versions of Defender and Stargate having the enemies completely disappear when you're destroyed - so that your explosion could be more glorious. (Hit, blink, boom.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Goochman Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 You could always use the Atari excuse for the 2600 version. The ships weapon is so powerful that when fired the ship temporarily disappears..or something to that effect Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
potatohead Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 Yeah, I remember thinking, "WTF??" when I first saw that. Was kind of funny and weird. After looking the video over again, this effort looks like it's going to play well. One thing I'm hoping for is real collisions, not just "blast the whole scan line" ones, like we've got on the 8 bit version. Having that in the game makes it a lot harder, and there is a definite "feel" to blasting through a pile of landers, bombers, etc... in a crowded space that might come through just fine on this one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Random Terrain Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 I ain't understamd Y thier is a prablam. I thawt tha 7900 cood desplay millioms of sprights? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NIKON Posted April 27, 2015 Author Share Posted April 27, 2015 I ain't understamd Y thier is a prablam. I thawt tha 7900 cood desplay millioms of sprights? Lawd Geeesus Lawd Geesus..whats us gunna do whats us gunna do???? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaynz Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 Nikon... BIRTH THAT BABY! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NIKON Posted April 27, 2015 Author Share Posted April 27, 2015 Nikon... BIRTH THAT BABY! BWAAHAHAHAHA Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
potatohead Posted April 27, 2015 Share Posted April 27, 2015 Totally. The original did have a 6809 and nice hardware. So far, this one looks like it will play well. That is what matters on this title. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PacManPlus Posted May 3, 2015 Share Posted May 3, 2015 The scanner issues have been kicking my a$$. But, I just thought of an idea today. Being that I'm now using the $6000-$7FFF area for additional RAM, I think I can make the scanner area a long sprite whose shape is updated dynamically every frame. I need to try this theory out and see how it performs. As it stands now, there will be no terrain in it (like the NES version). I had to make some compromises, and I understand why they did that. ... 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaynz Posted May 3, 2015 Share Posted May 3, 2015 A direct video write for the scanner is out of the question, then? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PacManPlus Posted May 24, 2015 Share Posted May 24, 2015 (edited) Ok - I have good news and bad news. Good News - I have the scanner working Bad News - We already have slowdown, and I haven't even done the enemy shots yet. Here's the latest. Remember, ProSystem no longer works with this bin, since I added cart RAM *EDIT* - forgot to remove scanner blip after player shoots enemy. Fixed now. Defender.A78 Defender.BIN Edited May 24, 2015 by PacManPlus 10 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+DrVenkman Posted May 24, 2015 Share Posted May 24, 2015 Looks great to me, Bob. I'll definitely buy this one on a cart if and when ... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jaynz Posted May 24, 2015 Share Posted May 24, 2015 Remember, ProSystem no longer works with this bin, since I added cart RAM *laments* Yeah, ProSystem hasn't been updated in ages, probably time for me to go to MESS anyway... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+-^CrossBow^- Posted May 24, 2015 Share Posted May 24, 2015 I was using mess, but then suddenly out of the blue I no longer had Pokey audio from the emulator anymore? TIA sound and everything else was great...but no pokey. So I went back to Prosystem. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+DrVenkman Posted May 24, 2015 Share Posted May 24, 2015 *laments* Yeah, ProSystem hasn't been updated in ages, probably time for me to go to MESS anyway... Agreed on the lament, for a couple reasons: first, OpenEmu for OS X is the easiest, most fully-featured "do it all" package out there, but the 7800 emulator is based on ProSystem. Second, the only 7800 emulator that I know of for ARM (and hence, my RPi 2 running EmulationStation) is ProSystem. I wish I was a real coder - ProSystem is open source. It would be nice if it could be updated to include newer features. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PacManPlus Posted May 24, 2015 Share Posted May 24, 2015 (edited) A user here actually updated ProSystem to include HSC support (and a few other things), but then refused to release the source or the executable. Kind of goes against the whole 'open source' thing. Nice guy, huh? Edited May 24, 2015 by PacManPlus Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+DrVenkman Posted May 24, 2015 Share Posted May 24, 2015 (edited) A user here actually updated ProSystem to include HSC support (and a few other things), but then refused to release the source or the executable. Kind of goes against the whole 'open source' thing. Nice guy, huh? Whoa. That's actually a violation of the GPL if were to release an executable without his changes to the source, I think. Time to sic Richard Stallman on 'em! If he just kept the updates to himself, though, I guess he's just being a selfish jerk. Edited May 24, 2015 by DrVenkman Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CPUWIZ Posted May 24, 2015 Share Posted May 24, 2015 Bob, it just occurred to me, you may as well go for bankswitching, my RAM boards only take 32pin EPROM's. And go for broke and use the whole $4000-$7FFF area. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Like us on Facebook
Follow us on Twitter
AtariAge on Instagram
Watch us on YouTube
Chat on Discord
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.