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Atarius Maximus

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Atarius Maximus last won the day on October 15 2023

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About Atarius Maximus

  • Birthday 10/17/1970

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    10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1));
  • Gender
    Male
  • Location
    St. Louis, Missouri USA
  • Interests
    Atari 2600, 7800 and Commodore 64.

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  1. See the previous post for details on this release. This fixes the issue with trying to switch back and forth between the paddle and joystick within the drone bomber game. In this version, once you select the paddle it's set for that session of drone bomber - deactivating it will reset to the Drone Patrol main menu and automatically revert back to joystick control. drone_patrol_v81_RC3.a78 drone_patrol_v81_RC3.bin
  2. This version makes another difficulty change. On the easy and standard difficulty levels, the second stealth plane that moved from left to right was removed from Boss 8. I also added paddle support to the Drone Bomber game. Playing with a paddle makes the game SO much more fun! On the Drone Bomber menu, you'll see a new option available that displays "activate paddle". Press the fire button on that option and it will change to "paddle active". After the screen displays "paddle active", it will display a message that you must exit the game in order to re-activate the joystick. If you press the paddle button while you're on the "paddle active" menu option, the game will reset to the Drone Patrol main menu and re-enable the joystick (the same as choosing the "exit" option). Once the menu says "paddle active" unplug the joystick and plug in the paddles. The menu will now be navigable by spinning the paddle to get to the different options (start, exit, instructions, and controller selection). Spin it until you see "start game" to start. This unfortunately ruins the game's couch compliance, but it's worth getting up for! Note that the instructions screen itself once loaded is not navigable with the paddle, you'll only be able to view and exit from the first page. Also, the menu option that's visible on-screen is based on the hardware location of the paddle wheel. It might immediately move to a different menu option when you plug in the paddle, and when the game ends the first menu option you see will be based on wherever your paddle is located in its rotation. You might see any of the four options first. When you exit Drone Bomber to the main menu of the game, the joystick is automatically re-enabled. Because of the addition of paddle control the game as it was previously was much too easy. I ramped up the difficulty to accommodate the paddle controls by increasing the speed progression, changing the movement pattern of the enemy mega-drone that drops the bombs, adding two additional levels, and reducing the size of the drones. This makes the game a lot more fun with the paddle, but as a consequence makes it much more difficult with the joystick. Now that it's in-place, I highly recommend playing Drone Bomber with the paddle controller, although you can use either. Drone Bomber been tested on real hardware and works as expected, although it was only about 10 minutes of testing. On the technical side, in order to accommodate paddle control I had to relocate the plotsprite4 code as I was out of space in the 7800basic reserved area. That immediately broke the Music Player, which I've fixed. I'm hoping it didn't mess anything else up, but it shouldn't have. I will need to do some more testing of the main game just to make sure. Edit: The next post has the latest update that fixed I bug I found in this release.
  3. Watching Home Run Baseball on ZPH, it was obvious pretty quick that I had the joystick controls reversed for defense on the 2 Player game. This fixes that. I'd never played on real hardware, and playing with A7800 in emulation it didn't occur to me that it was reversed. home_run_baseball_v0.2.a78 home_run_baseball_v0.2.bin
  4. Thank you! That was my favorite variation too. I didn't create any variations in this version of the game. I just chose the options I liked best, including the pitch that you can control.
  5. Thanks James, but keep in mind that Baseball Dice really isn’t a game yet… you press the fire button, watch the dice roll results, and then see the incorrect results on the screen. That’s about it.
  6. I love baseball. Last summer I started writing another game based on baseball dice. I made some good progress, but the game logic is broken. This game does not work as intended. I thought I'd share it anyway as maybe sharing it will inspire me to continue to work on it. This game is really rather pointless in that you just press the button to roll the dice and see what happens. The screen is intended to simply display what you would otherwise have just written down on paper if you were playing an actual game of baseball dice. It was a fun project that I just never completed. Baseball Dice Rules: baseball_dice_v0.1.a78 baseball_dice_v0.1.bin gfx_bbdice.zip baseball_dice_v0.1.bas
  7. Thanks Guys. This game could be improved and expanded in many different directions, I'm going to have to think about what I might want to do with it. Maybe nothing, I'll just have to wait for some inspiration. I'm going to go ahead and share the source code and graphics for this game as the goal with this one was just to have fun and share the results. gfx_homerun.zip home_run_baseball_v0.1.bas
  8. This game was designed to be similar to Home Run for the 2600. It's not exactly the same but it's pretty close. Why clone a game that was mostly unloved? I played the two player version of this game so much with my Dad as a kid and we loved it. So much fun, so many memories. It makes me smile just seeing it on the screen. I haven't played it enough to make sure everything is perfect, and I know the sound effects need work, but the game is perfectly playable as it is now. You can play against the computer or start a 2 player game. This was a fun side project I started a few weeks ago as I was also finishing up with Drone Patrol. I may work on this some more as time goes on but I thought it would be fun to share it in its current state. v0.2 Fixes the reversed joystick controls in the 2 player game. home_run_baseball_v0.2.a78home_run_baseball_v0.2.bin home_run_baseball_v0.1.a78 home_run_baseball_v0.1.bin
  9. This version fixes the spelling errors in the mission briefing and the high score bug that was identified in the ZPH broadcast. drone_patrol_v0.78_RC2.a78 drone_patrol_v0.78_RC2.bin
  10. Phoenix was also a favorite of mine, one of my friends had the 2600 cart when I was young. It looks great Mike!
  11. Thanks for playing Drone Patrol last night, James! I now know of a few changes that need to be made, and it was great watching someone else play. There are a few spelling errors in the mission briefing and a high score bug in the easter egg mini-game, and those are easy fixes. They'll be corrected in the next update. As promised attached is the ZeroPage Homebrew logo source code and graphics I used for the special version of the game used on the ZPH broadcast. Anyone is welcome to use this for a future project, I just thought it would be cool to add for the show. It won't be in the final release of the game. zeropage_logo.tar zeropage_logo.a78
  12. I'll probably pick one up eventually, but I really don't need one. They are currently $129.99 USD on Amazon. I'd probably jump on one if it ever drops below $80, even if it's just as a display piece.
  13. I just thought I'd clear this up, I found this thread in a search when I was looking for my original post. Drag Race is a graphical hack of Activision's Dragster that I posted on the AA forums in April 2003, the original thread is here. It's otherwise identical to Dragster. I didn't know that it was going to be included. Also, AA User KevinMos3 updated my hack in 2009 and filled in the cars with solid colors. You can find that thread here.
  14. A few minor bugfixes in this version. I'm ready to call this Release Candidate 1. drone_patrol_v77_RC1.a78 drone_patrol_v77_RC1.bin
  15. For anyone that might be struggling a little bit with the game's difficulty, I threw together some gameplay hints and tips based on how I play the game. Minimize your time in the air to clear a level faster Level progression is based on the number of points you score. You reach the first boss after reaching 5,000 points, the second at 10,000 points, and every boss after that in 10,000 point increments. I try and focus the most on the bottom row of enemies as they will give you the most points, and the faster you score points the faster you'll get to the next boss. Minimizing the amount of time you're in the air will increase your chances of clearing the level and getting to the boss, so move fast and target the higher value enemies first. Always know where the medical vehicle is The medical vehicle will appear on all three rows at the bottom, and it changes rows when it reaches the far side of the screen. Know where it is, and focus your attention on the other rows when it's present. Hitting it with your laser quickly depletes your shield. I generally avoid trying to make "close call" shots near it. Focus your attention on key areas of the screen It's a fast paced game and there's a lot going on at once, so knowing where to focus your attention can make a big difference. I rarely look at the status bar or the scrolling text when I'm playing. Having an AtariVox plugged in will help here, as it will notify you when you're low on shield power or laser power. Most of the time I'm only looking at the crosshair and the drone & missiles with my peripheral vision. Time the missiles I will keep track of the missiles and time my up & down movement accordingly. When they pass you in the early levels, for example, you have about 5 seconds to track and shoot enemies before they are a danger again. If you know you have a few seconds of safe time, you can focus purely on placing the crosshair and making accurate shots. Don't scroll too far If you scroll too far to the right, the laser cannon will appear at the top of the city. It has a deadly beam and it's hard to avoid it when you're frantically trying to take out tanks and soldiers. Scroll a bit in other direction until it goes back offscreen. Limit your left and right movement and it will stay safely off-screen. Don't be afraid to take a hit Getting hit head on by a missile can cost you a lot of shield, however getting hit by a falling bomb does much less damage. If you're low on shield power you'll want to be careful to avoid all hits, but if you're doing well, don't worry as much about the bomber plane. Also, there's no harm in finishing a level with very little shield power remaining, you will receive a full shield recharge every time you clear a level and beat that level's boss. Don't forget the smart bomb! Especially in the later levels, you can use the smart bomb to clear all of the enemies at the bottom of the screen AND receive all the points for them as if you'd destroyed them with your laser. If you're really close to the boss and low on shield power, using a bomb can put you over the edge in points to clear the level and get to the boss. That's really what it's intended use is. You only get three per mission, so use them wisely. Activate it with the right fire button. You can quickly view how close you are to the next boss with the progress bar at the top of the screen. Boss Battles Some boss battles have a safe zone that you can hover in and never get hit. Find those spots! A few of the bosses are also designed to require a little patience - constantly swooping in will result in a quick death. Don't rush it! Remember that in boss battles your laser power is unlimited, however your shield cannot be recharged once the battle starts. Some of the bosses also follow pretty predictable patterns, if you find a safe zone and watch for a bit you might find a way to take it out a little easier. Also, in an earlier post I shared some password cheat codes. You can practice or test your skills on each boss with a password, although only on the easy difficulty level. The real challenge awaits you in a full playthrough.
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