Jump to content

Leaderboard

Popular Content

Showing content with the highest reputation on 07/09/2020 in all areas

  1. http://www.virtualdub.org/beta/Altirra-4.00-test5.zip http://www.virtualdub.org/beta/Altirra-4.00-test5-src.zip Started out with a simple idea, trying to collapse the majority of the presets into a common template-based generator so it's easier to set up all of the different kinds of controllers Altirra supports without having to add zillions of presets. However, in the process this also exposed a bunch of bugs in the input system. Might be some new bugs introduced, but hopefully it is Better(tm). Templated input map presets can now be generated via System > Input > Preset > Create from Template. This allows generating a preset for any combination of controller port, controller, input source, and absolute/relative mode. As usual these maps can be edited after creation. The intent is to eventually replace the majority of the existing hardcoded presets and whittle down the default list a bit. Normalized use of Left/Right/Up/Down as aliases for normal and inverted Axis0 and Axis1 inputs. This was supported for only some controller types and now also works for mice, trackballs, paddles, and 5200 controllers. Fixed bug where the joystick trigger would get held down for the rest of the session after using an input map with a light gun or pen, even after turning it off. Standardized some controller names to be of the form "Controller Name (CXcode)." Built-in presets are not renamed yet. Mouse input now has a signed input mode, basically emulating an analog stick with the screen. It's in there right now just so that absolute mode input maps generate reasonably for mouse input, but in the future I might make the screen area configurable and visible. Made some adjustments to relative mouse speeds so that they're more consistent with button/D-pad and analog stick bindings with the same speed settings, and fixed relative bindings of analog sticks so that the acceleration setting on the binding works. This means that existing input maps in relative mode may be faster and slower than they used to be and require readjustment, but now 'speed 5' should be reasonable speed in more cases. Tablet controllers had their Left/Right relative inputs flipped. Fixed a bug in the input manager that prevented digital mappings with the same target from being tracked properly as a group. The result was that if you bound two keys to the same target and pressed both keys at the same time, the target trigger would release with the first key-up instead of the second as intended. This improves operation of double-bound diagonals in numpad-based input maps as now the stick won't return to center while keys are still held down. Fixed a nasty bug where accidentally dragging a profile in the profile editor could create a parent loop in the profile system and prevent that profile from loading or saving global settings. The visible result of this was that the profile would not load or save any settings unless it was set to store those settings locally. This is is now blocked in the UI and the settings code. In the new template generator, the tablets bind to the secondary button for toggling "off tablet", which is a bit weird but required by prominent tablet painting programs that use button-off-screen to access the menu. There is an issue that you can't see where the stylus is without the mouse pointer -- not sure how to solve this, might require drawing a tablet and pen somewhere on screen. I have an idea of what might have caused the Defender ML false positive, the new call to RegisterRawInputDevice(). This is apparently used by some trojans for keylogging, even though it has lots of other uses and in this case is being used for the mouse. We'll see if test5 trips another false positive, and if it does, I might have to try to rewrite the code because I don't want to go through whitelisting for every test release. Obfuscating it from the antivirus would be an absurd thing to have to do, though.
    10 points
  2. Man, some sad responses in this thread we've had to hide. Just move along if you feel you must expose your homophobia, it will not be tolerated on AtariAge. ..Al
    7 points
  3. And here some experimetal stuff Or name it beep without a beeper? Or just another demonstration of Pulse Width programming with POKEY in RMT ...
    6 points
  4. I don't think @SmittyB is being negative, he's simply trying to illuminate the reality of the situation. Programming a complete game with high production values can take, without any exaggeration, hundreds of hours of the programmers time. That's before we count any extra time for things like sound, graphics, music. This is why 7800 & 2600 programmers will tend to work on projects that appeal to them and that they choose to work on. This is why it's hard to come along and say "we should make X game" and get any traction. If you are very very lucky and that appeals to a programmer then great! however 999,999 times out of 1,000,000 that won't happen. As Smitty said, take the opportunity to learn some new skills. For the Atari 7800, 7800Basic is accessible and easy to pick up and it's very powerful. If you add AtariDevStudio to that as your environment then you have pretty much everything you need to start to learn to code. I did that a couple of years ago with Batari Basic on the 2600. It's immensely rewarding and super fun. I also think the 7800 could host a very credible bowling game. Good luck with your quest to find a programmer!
    6 points
  5. https://slickdeals.net/f/14181287-atari-vault-pc-mac-linux-digital-download-0-99?src=frontpage LOL, $1.00.
    6 points
  6. After trying out a new editor that I have been working on Vorticon suggested that I open a topic for the benefit of the greater group. Somebody may find it useful. The ability to copy files and lines and paste them into a new composite file is pretty handy or cut a file up into separate files. It uses key commands for editing and the command line for saving and getting files. DIR and CAT commands are available within the editor because I have a good memory but it's short. ED99-40 column Beta Release 1.1 40 column multi-file editor Changes: V1.1 built on "new and improved" Camel99 Kernel (thanks Tursi) Fixed problem: SAMS card was not initialized on startup. Worked on Classic99 failed on real hardware. Clipboard uses the upper end of SAMS memory so 511 lines can be copied. Fixed the ED99CONFIG file to use DSK1. to find the font to load. Four font files have been included with the release. Feature Additions FCNT 4 (break) will stop file loading. The partial file will be in SAMS memory. Use PURGE if you don't want to keep it FCNT 4 (break) will stop file save. The partial file will be written to disk. CTRL A will copy entire file to clipboard. CTRL P will paste entire file to the END of the current file. (Insert can be too slow at this time) Number of lines in clipboard is displayed on lower right side of editing window PRINT command prints the active file to any DSR enabled device. Examples: PRINT PIO PRINT RS232.BA=9600 PRINT CLIP (Classic99 only) Limitations File size is still limited to 511 lines Inserting to the top of a large file is still slow due to the simple internal data structure. Future 80 Column version and SAMS memory are not playing together nicely. Not sure why yet. Single level undo/redo Document user level editor commands for DSK1.ED99CONFIG Bugs from Vorticon's Beta test Pressing <ENTER> after the first line inputted moves the line down and the cursor is positioned above it. It is not possible to enter text below that first line. Is this a feature or a bug? Pasting with Ctrl-P pastes the contents of the clipboard after the End of File marker and adds yet another End of File marker. I would have thought that the pasted text will appear just above the EOF marker... This should be fixed now. (off by one error...) Below are the contents of the readme file. By the magic of Classic99, in the ED99 command line I typed PRINT CLIP and pasted this into the browser. Pretty cool. README for ED99 Editor Brian Fox July 2, 2020 ED99-40 is a text editor for the TI-99 COMPUTER It requires the Editor/Assembler cartridge. Starting ED99-40 - To start the program select menu option 5 - Place the ED99-40 files on a disk and place it or mount it as DSK1. - At the RUN PROGRAM FILE prompt type: DSK1.ED99-40 ============================= There are 10 files in this package: README.TXT (this file) ED99-40, ED99-41, ED99-42 The 3 binary files of the editor. ED99CONFIG A DV80 text file with editor commands to setup the editor the way you want it . *Type EDIT DSK1.ED99CONFIG to alter the file. ED99DOC A simple list of the key commands and text commands that control the editor FONT FILES - FONT0230 Default font loaded at start up - FONTEDT1 Same font use by EDIT40 V3 of the TI E/A editor - TI99FONT The standard font used by TI99 BASIC - FONT004 Alternative font with correct descending lower case letter Contact info: I am commonly available on Atariage.com in TI-99 development forum as theBF. ED9940.DSK.zip
    5 points
  7. Week 10 Gold Medal Pick By ZilchSr River Raid CLARIFICATION: No use of CHEATS, emulation advantages, bugs, cart frying or other variables that gives you an unfair advantage in this HSC. Please assume you have to follow the game difficulty and mode for the playing week/s. There cannot be any game enhancements or favorite settings to play in the 2600 HSC, unless you are given authorization to do so by your humble yet strict MODERATOR! Vocelli River Raid Released By: Activision Left Difficulty: B Right Difficulty: B Game Mode: Game 1 Post your scores right here in this thread, and we will add them to the list. Remember to play the game with the recommended game mode and difficulty settings as shown above so that your scores will be consistent with everyone else. The deadline for posting scores is Midnight (EST) the evening of July 19, 2020 Bonus 1: Extra Plane Bonus After you crash the game pauses and lets you get a breather. Take a pic! NOW! Hopefully you have some extra lives! 5 Extra lives = 2 Bonus Points 6 Extra lives = 3 Bonus Points 7 Extra Lives = 4 Bonus Points 8+ Extra Lives = 5 Bonus Points! MUST TAKE PIC AFTER A CRASH! Bonus 2: BEAT ZilchSr for +3 Extra Bonus Points! If ZilchSr gets 1st place… He will get +3 Bonus Points! River Raid Scores 649790 - ZilchSr (+50) (+3) 176380 - Evandro (+49) 145980 - TRB_MetroidTeam (+48) 125480 - Vocelli (+47) 115300 - Deteacher(+46) 106920 - OyamaFamily (+45) 99180 - PatLarocque (+44) 98700 - GBAG (+43) 89880 - SkippyBCoyote (+42) 88870 - McCallister (+41) 85030 - Nads (+40) 68380 - JacobZu7Zu7 (+39) 66750 - JasonAtari (+38) 61450 - LaurenTyler (+37) 56130 - DrMooCowz (+36) 51060 - CapitanClassic (+35) 49280 - AlNafuur (+34) 45990 - Keilbaca (+33) 44110 - MisterVCS (+32) 43910 - MoisesTuseto (+31) 43480 - RogerPoco (+30) 43440 - AGB (+29) 40860 - AtariWarlord (+28) 39130 - Cwieland (+27) 39050 - ClassicGamer (+26) 37620 - RoadRunner (+25) 32340 - TheActivisionary (+24) 29850 - Scrabbler (+23) 28980 - 5x7 (+22) 27950 - AtariPanmanFan (+21) 27260 - RedMiller (+20) 25940 - FakeCortex (+19) 25590 - MnagiaBoy (+18) 24840 - IsaiahAustin (+17) 23130 - GType (+16) 19140 - RGC (+15) 17720 - BugCatcher (+14) 17620 - Nester (+13) 17440 - Atari_Warlord (+12) 14970 - RetroRob (+11) 14910 - Atarian7 (+10) 14170 - Mchetzel (+9) 12630 - JBlenkle (+8) River Raid Lives Bonus 8 - ZilchSr (+5) 6 - OyamaFamily (+3) 6 - Evandro (+3) 6 - PatLarocque (+3) 6 - TRB_MetroidTeam (+3) 5 - Deteacher (+2) 5 - Vocelli (+2) 5 - JacobZu7Zu7 (+2) 5 - GBAG (+2) Overall Standings Remember the TOP 32 will qualify for the Medal Bracket Challenge at the end of the season! 560 ZilchSr 500 McCallister 494 Deteacher 473 OyamaFamily 454 Nads 445 TheActivisionary 438 GBAG 437 Capitain Classic 432 PatLarocque 428 Vocelli 424 RogerPoco 420 JasonAtari 418 JacobZu7Zu7 415 SkippyBCoyote 401 Evandro 398 Keilbaca 379 FakeCortex 356 MoisesTuseto 322 IsaiahAustin 314 TRB_MetroidTeam 306 AtariWarlord 297 Dr Moocowz 282 LaurenTyler 277 CwieLand 274 AtariPacmanFan 267 5x7 261 SBAZ 229 ClassicGamer 226 Atarian7 221 Scrabbler 209 MisterVCS 207 Nester 204 AGB 202 RedMiller 200 Gtype 199 Jaden 198 Mchetzel 194 Lord Innit 185 Atari_Warlord 170 Toiletunes 133 Roadrunner 132 NovaStar 127 Gorfy 123 RGC 120 RetroRob 110 AustinBlair 100 RetroBreakout 85 Troff 81 AlNafuur 80 Jblenkle 71 JetSet 70 AlasdairCampbell 61 Magmavision2k 61 MangiaBoy 47 KianSurfs 45 BugCatcher 44 ClassicGMR 40 MrBubble 39 KaeruY 34 WickeyColumbus 21 HankReardon 18 Spriggy 15 MikeBloke 12 DarQMassacres 11 DarthCloud 5 AsteroidZ 2 AtariUCLA24 2 CaptainKiwi 2 PjeDivision Season 10 will have: ~ Silver Medal winner pick from Deteacher ~ Bronze Medal winner pick from LaurenTyler ~ Paper Madal winner pick from OldManG ~ Several Request weeks or Special Weeks ~ HomeBrew Weeks ~ Several Request weeks or Special Weeks ~ Paddle Weeks ~ Beat the leader weeks This Season will last about 23 weeks and have 25+ Games The TOP 32 will qualify for the Medal Bracket Challenge which will include a special Paper Medal Bracket Knockout Tourney.
    5 points
  8. Here's an Atari 2600 stack for pridemonth. Let's continue to encourage inclusiveness. I'm just showing off this stack of games I own while showing support for some friends out there. ?
    5 points
  9. Stargate...incredible game for the Atari 2600!
    5 points
  10. Yes I think the 7800 can do a really good bowling game, no I don't think you'll find anyone to make it for you, even if you paid them. I don't want to be too negative but these sorts of things never go anywhere as anyone who would be willing to put the effort in is already neck deep I their own projects. I would strongly encourage you to take this as an opportunity to learn to code for the 7800. Again I don't want to be too negative, but for an example of what I mean see how far this Pac-Land port has gotten in 10 months.
    5 points
  11. The ANTIC Interview #387 with Claudia Cohl, Editor-in-Chief of Family Computing Magazine, inspired me to go through my back issues of the magazine. I found a game on page 86-87 of the March 1985 issue called "Epidemic!" by SSI that invokes the idea of the Coronavirus. Has anyone played it before? "Epidemic!" is available on AtariMania: http://www.atarimania.com/game-atari-400-800-xl-xe-epidemic_1859.html Here are a few screenshots of the game: Here is the front and back of the box: As with all SSI games, the manuals is lengthy at 20 pages. Here is the Family Computing review of Epidemic! ---------------------------------------- Epidemic! (Review from "Family Computing" magazine, March 1985) Hardware Requirements: Reviewed on IBM PC. Also for Apple II series. Atari Home Computers, IBM PCjr. Manufacturer: Strategic Simulations Price: S34.95 It's rare to find a strategy game that is easy to play, takes only a short time to finish, and is good enough to demand instant re-starting after a run-through, but Epidemic!, from Strategic Simulations, is just that. You (and as many advisers as you can muster) are the just-appointed international task force assembled to halt, analyze, and hopefully cure a space-borne plague roaring across Earth. Armed with a variety of weapons, you can temporarily arrest it, sometimes slow it, and, under extreme conditions, resort to a nuclear option and destroy entire subcontinents to stop the disease from eradicating the human race. This is a pure strategy game, playable on four different skill levels. Although we preferred to play it with a group of people, it's designed for solitaire gaming and is an excellent way of passing an hour or two. At each turn (a day in computer time) you can take only a limited number of steps towards eliminating the epidemic. Should you shoot down a plague-bearing meteor which your radar says is hurtling towards an unaffected region? Try to cure a barely-hit area? Obliterate a nearly destroyed zone? Or perform any of the other operations which will mean life or death to tens of millions of people? It's actually just like a Grade B science-fiction movie (you know, one of those with actors who speak English without moving their mouths). It's also one heck of a game, suitable for ages 12 and over, a real brain-teaser that play-testers went wild over. (For an added twist, assign each player several countries/areas as his or her "responsibility." They're the only ones who can push the button to kill their own people. This makes the nuclear option all the more realistic and less likely to be used.) ---------------------------------------- Atarimania (and the game manual) claim that "Epidemic!" was released in 1982. I find it strange that it was reviewed in March of 1985. Does anyone have any memories of this game? Has anyone played it? How about recently? It might be one to revisit in this era of Covid-19, if only for a little diversion. I'd love to see a video review of this game given the context of the world right now. Adam
    4 points
  12. Wow, I didn't know about that....song. It would be less hilarious if it was made to be a troll, lol. Some other fun facts about "Atari" ...whoredlicensed out their beloved name to some hotel design group ...crowdscammed people on the "Gameband" gaming watch ...also ran a bizarre crowdfunding run for Roller Coaster Tycoon where they praised themselves over generating $2bn in revenues, but were begging for money, and they admitted that they had the right to use the money for things that had nothing to do with game development. ...made the ridiculous claim that only they could make "Haunted House" games ...didn't know anything about their Tacobox, looked like morons in front of a journalist asking questions, then tried to paint the journalist as a troll ...releases schlock versions of their existing IP, where it would have been better to just leave the IP in peace ...allegedly didn't pay contestants who appeared on their short-lived, but aired game shows (gathered evidence on that some hundred pages back in this thread ) If Atari was an RPG character with a world reputation score, it'd definitely be in the negatives.
    4 points
  13. 105,480! I don't think I've ever cracked 100K on this before.
    4 points
  14. We have no choice, he can't turn back... from posting another classic commercial. Enjoy!
    4 points
  15. This is 100% the problem. And it is a pity, since almost every title they create has serious potential to be great. I am not sure of course, but to have your stuff tested well you need other people, and more important: you have to trust other people. If you main problem is that you can not trust other people, you can not let anyone else into your project, you do not dare to share your games with beta testers who test your game on real hardware (both PAL and NTSC) ... well then you have to do it all by yourself. And when you are the designer/coder you'll always have your share of blind spots, so while you think everything works great, a real beta tester will force the game into flaws or worse. For me it is simple: I will never buy any V61 title ever again as long as it is this buggy on cart only. There are so many other and much better titles. Most of the time even free, or much cheaper. So why even bother?
    4 points
  16. Well, Ok. I'll let it go, but for this week, ZilchSr, you are relegated to my fifth Best Friend, tho that's usually a "group" I don't have numbers on. Bite Me. Sheesh. (anyone taking this too seriously doesn't know me well, I swear, but I still had to say something...) Friggin River Raid? There are hundreds and hundreds of 2600 games, and you are making us play River Raid... I guess that's what I get for Checkers... A little more seriously-I do have a new patch connection, that is willing to work with me, and River Raid is one I don't have, that he has available to me-wasn't a priority before, but I bet I purchase it before this week is up, so Thanks for that! But not thanks for River Raid. Again. Bite Me. *Edit* Lol, the bonus points... Not that anyone will do it, but Vocelli, you might want to consider also awarding that to anyone tying him, because... You can't do better than perfect!!!
    4 points
  17. Yes it is. One version of the source code (the "teaser edition") is up here: http://spacepatrol.info/src/ jzIntv's examples folder has the full edition now. I started developing it before AS1600 even had macro support! I'm not sure if jzIntv even had full MOB support yet. I still used Carl's emulator for some testing, and the Intellicart for other test. I wrote the first code for it approximately 20 years ago, sometime in late 2000 or early 2001, IIRC. The oldest documentation I have was the initial engine brainstorm from Aug 6, 2000. I know I showed the first tech demo at PhillyClassic 2001, and it was already a few months old by then. There's a lot of code in it that's older now than many (most?) of the original 125 were at the time I first wrote it.
    4 points
  18. Another member "disgusted" by "Gay pride" has been removed. Who's next? ..Al
    4 points
  19. I'm not against that
    4 points
  20. I was playing around with this again, and been trying to wrap my mind around how I could fade out a screen. In the NES game, there is an area that smoothly darkens the screen to blackness, and lights back up when a torch enemy appears (albeit faster and smoother than what I had come up with). I gave up trying to work color stack, as it just doesn't seem very doable with a scrolling screen. My solution was to use an array and read one gram from the stage bitmaps and OR it against a dithered fade pattern, and once every stage gram is redefined, I advance to another more aggressive pattern. I thought it was kind of cool, so I attached the binary and config file if anyone wanted to check it out. If you press 7 on controller 2, it will turn off the cycling. 8 will set the screen to fade out, 9 will set the screen to fade in. mm2test14.binmm2test14.cfg
    4 points
  21. Well let's look at some facts: "Atari" was Infogrames so they're just operating with a shell name. "Atari" used Scam-de-gogo to push their console/PC and it turned into a dumpster fire. "Atari" sues just about anyone who uses their joystick design, Pong, Breakout, etc. "Atari" has given others the royal screw-job by stealing/not paying. "Atari" spent $50K for a corporate song that was a complete turd. "Atari" is distributing some worthless, Bitcoin-ish currency and hopes people will fall for it. "Atari" must not like tacos. (Probably other things "Atari" has done or will do in the future...feel free to to add any others.) So I would say....very disreputable.
    4 points
  22. Stuff like sprite flicker because of multiplexing hardware sprites, or soft-sprite character cell cutouts, I have no issue. But one game showed random electronic garbage on the screen when the player went from one screen to the next because the game didn't manage the display list properly. Another had stutters and hiccups in the background music because the author was lazy and disabled the vertical blank interrupt at certain times, which also disabled the music player. These issues were bugs plain and simple. Programming experts here gave the author simple ways to solve these fit-and-finish issues and he refused to do so. And programming glitches like those are still OK if it's a homebrew game you're giving away, but if you're putting it on a cartridge, claiming it's profressionally made, and asking $40 for it, for me that's a non-starter.
    4 points
  23. The box is a bit beat up with shelf wear on the spine and the edges but was able to get this FCTVVO BIN on the cheap thanks to a late west coast listing.
    4 points
  24. Stay home if you want. You can find me at the bar.
    4 points
  25. 4 points
  26. Go onto ANY other forum, especially automotive ones, and post a question that has been asked a few dozen times in 2 days, without searching first and see what response you get. Most forums will just boot you for it. Expecting a little razzing or being told "please use the search" isn't that harsh. Coming into a forum and talking shit to members with 15 to 20 years tenure also will not earn you any friends. Maybe take these "subtle hints" and calm down a bit.
    4 points
  27. Let me explain things a little bit better.... The reason we're not planning to make any more Phoenix is quite simple actually Toby is the one who's assembling all consoles (and our games as well mind you) and he's getting quite overwhelmed by this process. Assembling over 500 consoles at one time is not a small task and it is very time consuming We might be a company (as small as we are), but remember this is still homebrew stuff and guys have their day job,familly, and life in general to take care of. There's also our game development, we want to keep bringing to games to the community, and since we're doing games for multi platforms, again this is time consuming So we can't do that many things at the same time, and let's face it, we're not going to sell 500 000 Phoenix Heck, not even close to 5000 units! Now, if Coleco Holdings ask us, let's say.... in 6 months if we could manufacture of batch of Phoenix, EXCLUSIVELY for them, we would do it? NO, we won't! Are we going to make more Phoenix available on our website in the future? Who knows, we might be... But for now, the answer is simply no
    4 points
  28. #Atari8bit Hello, everyone. I've been busy with a move to a new house, and getting not only my house set up, but putting IRATA.ONLINE back on-line in the new house, as well as getting my lab set up. Everything is mostly set up at this point, and I've resumed both my day job and work on IRATA.ONLINE and #FujiNet. The rest of this post deals with #FujiNet. I have had to get a couple of purchases with the funds that have come in from Patreon, thanks to all that have contributed: * My development laptop (TMA-1) is suffering from thermal battery expansion which has warped my case. $250 from the Patreon was used to submit a warranty service request for on-site service to replace both my battery (which is four years out of warranty) and the bottom battery cover which has been damaged. This will happen in the next few days, as soon as my Dell representative confirms my on-site appointment. * My capture device which was being used to record all the various #FujiNet videos has died, and I decided to replace it with a proper capture device that can plug into my RetroTink 2X upscaler, an Elgato HD 60 S+, for $216 all in. I am in the process of continuing on N: development. The code is now self-relocatable, thanks to the ultd example provided by Jon Halliday (@flashjazzcat), the N: code now runs successfully under SpartaDOS, and is smaller than the ACTION! based relocator, as well as being more efficient. At this point, N: needs: * An implementation of BINARY LOAD for both MyDOS and SpartaDOS. * Make ?DIR work in SpartaDOS * Implement directory listing for WEBDAV (HTTP/S) * Implement the rest of 8.3 to long filename translation. This is difficult because we need to implement a sort of filename cache. * (maybe) deal with the fact that SpartaDOS upper-cases ALL CP input. grrr. Furthermore, N: also needs functional XML and JSON parsers that we can embed and interface to. This is, by and large, the last 20% of N: development, which will take a significant chunk of time, along with debugging every possible combination of DOS/DUP that can use the N: device. More to come, but I wanted to give everybody an update over the last two weeks! -Thom
    4 points
  29. OK, just thought I'd have a cider or two and ramble a bit about what's going on. My initial plan was to write Space Invaders totally with FastBasic in Antic mode 4. After studying the game a little I realised I'd need assembler for the missiles, so that was plan 'A' = as much done with FastBasic and the missiles in assembler. Plan 'A' = I wrote the Invaders codes and it was working great, but when I added the player tank I started to skip frames. This was not because of FB lacking speed, but my poor coding logic. So I had to rewrite the code, or I could just dive in and do the main game fully in assembler. Plan 'B' = I'm doing the main game loop in assembler with all the intro screens and initialization in FB. Everything was working fine but I got sick of the hassle of assembler so a few days back I wrote the intro screens in FB - worked great. Now back to assembler and it's a pain, the way I'm working is fine for small bits of code but a pain now that I need to start tweeking a larger program split into 6 chunks. Time for a new plan... Plan 'C' = I'd written the assembler in chunks, the main gameloop in FB was basically 6 USR calls to the individual assembler bits, fine tuning them with my current system was getting painfully slow. So, I downloaded WUSDN and spent the last 2 days transferring everything over. No FastBasic anymore, I'm doing it all in assembler. I just want to give two pieces of advice to anyone wanting to start a project in assembler. First, do it - assembler really isn't as difficult as you may think. Second - for the love of God! put comments in your code. Debugging 2000 lines of assembler without a single comment is not fun. As for the game itself, it's coming along nicely. Everything is in place (invaders, missiles, player, saucer, scoring). There's adjustments and tweeking to be done, and I need to add code for a 2nd player, but everything is working as expected - should definitly have a beta out before the end of the month.
    4 points
  30. Is that the eagerly awaited new issue of Atari Age Magazine™?
    3 points
  31. Hi Tix, No it's all good I was referring to around the time it was released. It was 12 years ago now!
    3 points
  32. Said author also claimed multiple times he could not hear the stutter in the music. Seriously?
    3 points
  33. it is really simple, either there will be act file i could convert and recompile core files, or not, and it won't get done someone has to do it currently used pallete is called laoo.act and comes from atari800win emulator as it was agreed among users in Poland to be most representative for computers we had, but then another graphics artist came and said he dislike it and wanted his own pallette inside instead i don't want to argue over shades of blue, red or any other color - i can compile in any palette, but its up to you guys to come up with one that majority agrees on and it is in act file format this is all i can do
    3 points
  34. Cheering Flying Edit: I should have put there the original c64 sprites for comparison.. ok in next batch !
    3 points
  35. yeah I was going to add it in on the snt at some point
    3 points
  36. You could get an original Playstation and Iron Soldier 3.
    3 points
  37. I have managed to make a PAL version that does interlacing and displays correctly on my TV - no colour artifacts/errors. I'm curious to see if this works on other PAL TVs. Use the right difficulty switch to change back and forth between interlaced/non-interlaced. If you have a PAL setup, could you please test and indicate results - does the interlaced display look OK for you? chess3E+20200709PALi.bin
    3 points
  38. Hang tight... ROM sales coming soon. We are almost sold out of BGSB (CIB) and the SS2 boards selling with it.
    3 points
  39. I can name a couple of people, but they are the delusional "There's still gold in there them hills" type...
    3 points
  40. I was scanning a Beyond Castle Wolfenstein manual that @Gearhead Lu sent me to preserve. I noticed in the manual, that they had this statement: Would be fun to send them $10 to see what happens. Although, because of technology that people could not have possibly predicted in 1985 when this title was released, I can tell where that letter would go today: If someone has a blog, podcast or youtube channel that they were looking for a topic for, contacting these guys to see if they ever get any mail for Muse Software, might be fun...
    3 points
  41. Quick Score (Advanced) This is an advanced feature and it's use may vary depending on the type of game you are creating. This is one shared to me by @RevEng and allows you to update your score display without having to continually render the output with plotchars/plotvalue each frame, which can be quite costly to your display time. In effect we end up modifying already-plotted DL objects (by baking the object into our screen with a "savescreen") from RAM. Some further general information about this type of process is available in Mike's 7800basic, under the hood post. Update An additional example has been added which caters for doublewide on mode where characters as 8 pixels wide (2x4) rather than the standard 4 pixels. Thanks again to Mike for the required changes. Configuration For a six-digit display we create some RAM variables (scoreText vars) to store the score digits and then use the textdata parameter in the plotchars command to draw those into our display (starting at the first variable). The scoreVar variables are used to split the score into bytes allowing us to quickly update the RAM store. rem vars dim scoreText0 = var0 dim scoreText1 = var1 dim scoreText2 = var2 dim scoreText3 = var3 dim scoreText4 = var4 dim scoreText5 = var5 dim scoreVar0 = score0 dim scoreVar1 = score0+1 dim scoreVar2 = score0+2 InitialiseScreen clearscreen rem bake score display into buffer plotchars '1up' 1 20 0 3 plotchars scoreText0 0 12 1 6 savescreen return Once your display is configured it's a matter of copying the score in the RAM variables either every frame (recommended) or as the score is updated. Depending on whether you are using standard or doublewide character modes, use one of the following: Standard character mode (4 pixel characters) UpdateScore rem replace chars with score scoreText5 = scoreVar2&$0F scoreText4 = scoreVar2/16 scoreText3 = scoreVar1&$0F scoreText2 = scoreVar1/16 scoreText1 = scoreVar0&$0F scoreText0 = scoreVar0/16 return Doublewide character mode (8 pixel characters - 2x4) UpdateScore rem replace chars with score scoreText5 = (scoreVar2&$0F)*2 scoreText4 = (scoreVar2/16)*2 scoreText3 = (scoreVar1&$0F)*2 scoreText2 = (scoreVar1/16)*2 scoreText1 = (scoreVar0&$0F)*2 scoreText0 = (scoreVar0/16)*2 return Updating the score To change the score you just update your score0 variable as per normal: score0 = score0 + 250 Full examples The following attachment contains a fully working examples: QuickScore.zip QuickScore_DoubleWide.zip PLOTCHARS command plotchars textdata palette_# x y [chars|extrawide] textdata - RAM, ROM or literal string 'message' to plot onto the screen palette_# - index of palette (0-7) x - x screen co-ordinate y - y line (zone) co-ordinate chars (optional) - number of characters to display extrawide (optional) - display chars twice the width of the character size
    3 points
  42. The Atari 2600 version of Kool-Aid Man is alot better than the Intellivision version
    3 points
  43. Tall Sprites Continuing on from the sprite animation, tall sprites work effectively the same (with some minor changes as you will see) but allow you to automatically display sprites much larger than your base zone-height (8 or 16 pixels) taking away a lot of complexity. The key changes here is setting the tallsprite flag and then when plotting the sprite confirming the zone-height of your sprite and calculating an offset to the start of the next frame. All of these are very simple into implement. Update (7800basic v0.16 onwards) From this version onwards you no longer need to calculate the offset to the next frame as 7800basic now does this for you! If you wish to keep compatibility with your existing source but utilise newer versions of 7800basic, add the following line to the configuration at the top of your source: set deprecated frameheight Configuring tall sprites To use tallsprites all you need to do is activate the setting in your configuration at the top of your source. This will inform 7800basic to join all incgraphic images greater than the zone-height together. set tallsprite on Example 1 (7800basic v0.15 or earlier) The additional change over our base animation is determining the frame animation offset. To do this we need to know how tall our sprite is in relation to the number of zones we have configured. In our example below we have set an 8 zone-height and our sprite is 24 pixels high - thus our count is 24/8 = 3. So to calculate our offset we need to multiply the current frameIndex by 3 and in the plotsprite function set frame property to our offset and set the count property to 3 (the number of actual sprites that make up our image). set zoneheight 8 set tallsprite on rem vars dim frameIndex = var0.var1 dim frameAnimationOffset = var2 rem increment frame (speed) frameIndex = frameIndex + 0.20 : if frameIndex > 5 then frameIndex = 0 rem calculate next frame offset frameAnimationOffset = frameIndex*3 rem draw plotsprite frame0 0 70 88 frameAnimationOffset 3 Full example The following attachment contains a fully working example: tallsprite.zip Example 2 (7800basic v0.16 or later) As we no longer need to calculate the frame offset, the process is simplified: set zoneheight 8 set tallsprite on rem vars dim frameIndex = var0.var1 rem increment frame (speed) frameIndex = frameIndex + 0.20 : if frameIndex > 5 then frameIndex = 0 rem draw plotsprite frame0 0 70 88 frameIndex Full example The following attachment contains a fully working example: tallsprite_new.zip Dev Notes When using tallsprites the height of your sprite should always follow the expected zone-height boundaries. So for a zone-height of 8 your sprite height should follow 8,16,24,32 etc pixels whilst for a 16 zone-height sprite 16,32,48,64 pixels etc As with standard height sprites when using the frame property in plotsprite you must ensure all frames within that animation exist in the same GFX Block otherwise the animation will display the incorrect frame One way to determine if the tallsprite feature is active is to review your GFX Block allocations in the compile log. Each tallsprite imported will be tagged with the _tallsprite_xx allocation. PLOTSPRITE command plotsprite sprite_graphic palette_# x y [frame] [tallheight] sprite_graphic - name of the included graphic palette_# - index of palette (0-7) x - x screen co-ordinate y - y screen co-ordinate frame (optional) - index of the frame to display tallheight (optional) - number of zones each tallsprite occupies
    3 points
  44. I found and solved the problem!! Windows 10 blocks opening ,chm files because of the general risk involved in opening downloaded random .chm files. I right-clicked the file, opened properties and checked the "unblock" box. It now display/prints normally.
    3 points
  45. And I for one, would like to thank you for this. I always wanted a CV, but never got around to getting one. Then you guys come along and provide one with HDMI and a 2600 core too. Thanks again.?
    3 points
  46. I am suspecting there are a few factors here. One would be that Tin Giant feels it has a strong case and expects to win, so then why settle? Which leads right into the second point. Looking at past Atari lawsuits they seem to offer considerably less then what is owed by them and expect that this offer will be taken rather then dragging things out though court. If Tin Giant expects to win, I doubt they would settle for a partial payment on what is owned. Might as well go for the full amount, plus Atari paying the court costs. I think Atari has pulled this scam once too often, and this time Wyatt is not playing along with them.
    3 points
  47. Kool-Aid Man: 37,000 Picnic: 6,940 Frogs: 28 I see I forgot to play Checkers! I used to be pretty good at that (or so I thought) so we'll see...
    3 points
×
×
  • Create New...