How to easily design screenmaps in Super IRG modes

[Synthpopalooza]

I have been working on a project, helping to design screens and fonts for a game using the Super IRG mode. In so doing, I have come across a system to design Atari screen maps in this mode (and other ICE modes).

 

The ingredients:

 

* Turbo BASIC

 

* The digibody tile editor, which is here: http://digibody.com/rpg/tilemap.php

 

* RECOIL library: http://sourceforge.net/projects/recoil/?source=typ_redirect

 

* Your favorite graphic editing software

 

* ICE font editor, which is here: http://atariage.com/forums/topic/189778-interlaced-character-editor-10-wins-4th-place-in-abbuc-contest/?hl=%2Bice+%2Babbuc&do=findComment&comment=2689837

 

* A custom converter written in TurboBASIC called CONVTXT.TUR which is in a zip file at the end of this post.

 

The first step, is to design the font in ICE and save the .ICE file.

 

Next, go to the RECOIL utility, and load the ICE file. You get this screen:

 

 

You will notice 4 iterations of the font. The top two are the normal and inverse iterations of the font. The bottom two, only come into play if you double-buffer the screen. This gets you the 15th color (PF2+PF3, here magenta) but at a tradeoff of more memory usage and more flicker. For most purposes, the first 128 characters in the PNG are all that's needed.

 

Do File: Save As, and save it as a PNG

 

Next, go into your favorite picture editor, and double the size of the PNG. This is necessary in order to make sure the aspect ratio is right for the editor.

 

Next, go to the Digibody editor on the web. There is a function to load a PNG as a tilemap (the button to load the PNG is on the top right) ... open the PNG you saved. You will get something like this:

 

 

You can now draw, using the first 128 characters of the map. Be sure to draw only in the top 40x24 window. When you are finished, save a .TXT file from the editor. Here, I marked off the screen borders using a magenta block from the third range of characters. Do not use any characters outside the normal and inverse range on the screen, or it will throw an error when you convert it to an Atari screen map.

 

The txt file is saved in an ASCII format, the tile numbers, each seperated by commas, with a ctrl-J after each line.

 

Run the CONVTXT.TUR converter, then plug in the filename of the .TXT file, and the output .SCR file! That's it!

 

The accompanying ZIP file has the converter, ICE file, source .TXT file and atari .SCR file, plus a display program TREES4.TUR. To run this, it will be looking for all the files on the H: drive. You will need to change this if you want them to load from a different location.

 

 

This method is done in Super IRG, but will work for all currently supported ICE modes (including CIN and PCIN, amongst others).

trees4a.zip

Edited December 10, 2015 by Synthpopalooza