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Star Castle RC1


cd-w

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Star Castle is basically feature complete now, so here is the first release candidate for testing.

 

blogentry-6563-0-62808200-1334229708_thumb.png

 

Please note that you must upgrade to the latest Stella 3.6.1

 

The main changes this time are:

  • New sound effects by LS_Dracon
  • Title screen music by Kulor
  • High score table (will only work on Harmony cart)
  • Improved collision detection
  • Different ring colours on each wave

During the game, the following can be changed:

  • Pressing SELECT will skip to the next wave (this is for testing and will be removed in the final version).
  • Setting the LEFT DIFFICULTY to A will cause the ring segments to be destroyed with 1 hit (instead of 2).
  • Setting the RIGHT DIFFICULTY to A will cause the ship to be destroyed by the rings (instead of bouncing off).

I'm still trying to figure out the Harmony CU bankswitching format - I'll post up a Harmony version once this is done.

 

Please let me know if anything is broken, buggy, or just plain annoying!

 

Thanks,

Chris

 

starRC1.bin

starRC1_src.zip

 

EDIT: Harmony version now available. Make sure that you have BIOS 1.05 on your Harmony cart, then unzip and drop the starRC1.cu file onto your SD card. Note that the high score table is not stored to flash in this version, so it will be deleted when you switch off your Atari.

 

starRC1_harmony.zip

 

EDIT2: Alternative ring colours version: star_altcols.zip

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Ah, so it does. The inner ring was solid when I noticed that so I didn't realize it was filled in by expanding outward.

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I like the mines as "dots."

(Would be good for high difficulty)

Looks great on RF television!

 

Changes made in:

bank2.asm

 

; Set Missile Size <-- should be Ball ???? Size

lda #%00000000 ; [24] + 2

sta CTRLPF ; [26] + 3

 

MineData

DC.B %10000010

DC.B %10000000

 

Anyone object to the darker ring colors?? (NTSC television... the old colors look fine in Stella.)

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I just tried it on a 2nd 14 inch television.

Should have tested on 2 sets before makiing suggestions!

It's not as washed out, and the darker colors are too dark.

Settle in the middle? (Unless anyone else gives their opinion.)

 

One thing I did change and liked on both sets: TextCols0 to NTSC $88 (Darker makes it look more like vectors with the "B" frame dots showing more - I don't really see the B-frame dots with the bright blue.)

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I just tried this with the latest version of Stella. It plays fine, but the graphics are very flickery to the point of being blurry and the text hard to read. Am I missing a specific setting or something I need to set?

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It's 30Hz flicker. Try pressing Alt-p to turn on the phosphor effect. And if possible, use OpenGL rendering and turn on vsync.

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Enable phosphor effect. Launch the game, hit the Tab key, then Game Properties, Display, and Use Phosphor = Yes.

 

Or use the keyboard shortcut. ;)

 

But going through the menus will make it stick so you don't have to re-enable it every time you launch the game.

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ok. That did it. Thanks.

 

Really nice work on the game Cd-W. Star Castle was always one of my favorites.

 

Any chance for a Fortress of Narzod port? :D

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How about making the screen taller? Or do you need that space for computing? In that case, if you tell me, which code is consuming most CPU time, I could have a look at it.

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The game is stealing some of the scan-lines from the display as the ring rotation and collision detection calculations require a lot of cycles.

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Now that the other starcastle project is probably going to become available at a reasonable cost to us. What is going to happen with this version?

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The enemy can shot through the two outer rings. It seems that only a gap of the inner ring is required.The arcade doesn't do that.

 

I mentioned this in a previous thread - I recall there wasn't enough time to do the necessary calculations to make that work, so the compromise was just having it shoot through the inner one.

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Thomas is doing a great job at optimising my code, so the next version should be even closer to the arcade.

 

The plan is to release it as a regular home-brew title through the AA store.

 

Chris

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Thomas is doing a great job at optimising my code, so the next version should be even closer to the arcade.

 

That's what I like most about the homebrew scene - the collaborative nature of it.

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To make it look more like the arcade?

 

Yep. Purely aesthetics. It would also make the explosion look better, since the core would be the correct color.

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Just wanted to comment on how much fun this is to play! Great job - I actually like it better than the arcade! Amazing title screen (great job Nathan) and arcade feel, great graphics and sounds. Haven't played Atari in a long time but played this one for an hour solid. :) Managed to get to Wave 8 and 13,200 pts - very challenging and addicting... great job!

 

Can't wait to buy this one on cart - great job cd-w! :)

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This game will be a definite purchase for me. Will there be a label contest? I think a fresh perspective on the artwork would help set this one apart from the other Star Castle. Even though my entries weren't chosen, I had a lot of fun with the Boulder Dash contest and I'm itching to do more. :)

 

Also, any ideas on how to get this to work on the Cuttle Cart II? Is it a matter of copying and modifying the FA.BNK file or is it a bit more involved than that?

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This game will be a definite purchase for me. Will there be a label contest? I think a fresh perspective on the artwork would help set this one apart from the other Star Castle. Even though my entries weren't chosen, I had a lot of fun with the Boulder Dash contest and I'm itching to do more. :)

 

Also, any ideas on how to get this to work on the Cuttle Cart II? Is it a matter of copying and modifying the FA.BNK file or is it a bit more involved than that?

 

DaveD and Nathan are working on the label for Star Castle already. They did a great job for Juno First, and so I didn't feel that a contest was necessary. The FA.BNK file will not work for Star Castle. A new FA2.BNK scheme would need to be created, but I don't know how easy this would be, and I no longer have a CC2 to test.

 

Chris

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