Starcat

Hi ! Yes, it is a JagCD title. Regards,Lars.

Hi folks ! to Paolo: Thanks a lot. The engine is variable. It could run on BJL, from cart space or from CD. The game I'm doing however will be CD based. Cart and BJL solutions have MUCH too little memory. It could be seen as a mix of the typical lucas arts graphic adventure games with inventory, items to combine, people to talk to etc and a mix of myst. So it is (of course) not realtime, you move from location to location like in myst. But it differs from myst in that way that it has a lot more adventure elements. Regards, Lars.

Hi Clint ! Thanks. The game runs at 320x240 16-bit like most other jag games out there. Regards, Lars.

Hi ! Thanks for the kind words. Star Alliance is still in development. Star Alliance and Eerievale are both in development at the same time. Depending on my ideas either the first or the second gets more time. Thanks. I created the whole project alone so far. All graphics and code are done by myself. Yes, that's right. I also coded an editor (on PC) for use with the adventure engine, to make it as easy as possible to create adventure games for the Jaguar. Regards, Lars.

Hi folks ! As you might know, yesterday on 22th November 2003, euro jagfest 2003 took place. It was probably the best euro jagfest so far. With over 30 visitors it also was the euro jagfest with most visitors. On this euro jagfest a new game that is in development by Starcat Developments was demonstrated for the very first time. It is a horror graphic adventure game called 'Eerievale'. Check out the Eerievale homepage http://www.starcat-dev.de/eerievale for details and screenshots. Most of the game engine is already finished, but the actual game development is at an very early (but playable) tate. Have fun checking out the site. Regards, Lars.

Hi folks ! I just wanted to send another post, before I leave the house to go to ejagfest 2003. Have fun, everbody. Regards, Lars.

Hi folks ! Euro Jag Fest 2003 is this saturday. Begin is 8 o'clock in the moring. More details on the ejagfest page. http://www.e-jagfest.de Regards, Lars.

Hi folks ! Based on the advice of a few people who are interested in ejagfest, I'm now also announcing Euro Jag Fest 2003 on this forum. Not only Jag Fans but also Lynx fans and developers are very welcome to attend. More details on the e-jagfest page. http://www.e-jagfest.de Regards, Lars.

Hi ! Yes, Justclaws who is also visiting ejagfest said he'd take a video camera with him to shoot a cool video. And I'll be sure to take many pictures as well Regards, Lars.

Hi folks ! I don't remember ever seeing a survey about how many jag fans actually own a JagCD and a CD Bypass of some sort. So if you own a JagCD with CD Bypass or are thinking about getting both soon, post in this thread. This might also be interesting for JagCD developers to see how many people are actually able to play new Jag games. So I'll start... I own two JagCDs and have CD bypass with the help of my alpine. (Cdbypass binary) Regards, Lars.

Hi folks ! Just wanted to remind the people who are interesting in attending e-jagfest 2k3 that it will take place in 16 days. Preorders are already possible for some time. Check out the ejagfest page for details. http://www.e-jagfest.de Regards, Lars.

Hi ! Hey ! That's not fair !! ... Why should aliens get it for free ?! Why not predators ? Regards, Lars.

Hi lais ! The problem is not I am showing the soundtrack, but the musician is showing it. I have only the right to use the soundtrack in the game, but I do not own it or have the right to release any tracks of it even if it's just to demontrate it on jag fest uk. However I can ask the musician if he releases some kind of preview version or so for jagfest uk for example. It's like I stated before not possible for me to attend Micro JagFest Uk myself. Regards, Lars.

Hi Guys ! Look at my stuff on ebay... I'm selling these items, to get some money to finance my jaguar projects. (Jag dev is expensive, remember ?) The first item on my list is a VERY rare prototype of Soul Star and the second item is a VERY rare 3DO FZ-10 video cartridge. (tried to sell it a while back, but the buyer changed his mind ) http://cgi6.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewS...&sort=3&rows=25 Note about soul star: Peter of this forum contacted me some days ago asking if my version was identical with a version that several others here seem to have. He said their version crashed in the 2nd level. If that's true, my version is different, as I could play without any crash during the game. I have to admit that I never played very far, but there are at leat 4-5 playable levels. Have fun checking these out and have fun bidding... Regards, Lars.

Hi ! Sorry to burst your bubble... "Stormworks Interactive" was just one person actually. eXtreme-rush. Sadly he had the bad habit to announce a project as soon as he had an idea... When I started Jag dev I used to "work" with him a bit. However I did most work and he just announced the projects without even telling me. The problem was that neither me, nor him had ANY coding experience back then. After I saw that he announced and promoted the projects without even asking or mentioning me, I soon jumped off the train and started to learn and develop on my own. It's actually a VERY long story, but to sum it up shortly, he never got very far in jag dev. He didn't even learn the basics of 68k coding properly and he just got his "demos" done by cutting and pasting existing codes or asking others. However there is a point where you can't take code by others and have to do something yourself and that was where he failed. His projects never got far. "Hard Corps" was one of those. He announced it as a "contra" clone and he said he came up with the name... Funny however if you look at the genesis version being called "Contra: Hardcorps" So I guess you can figure how much he came up with on his own. Arkanna was another story... He said he wanted to do it "myst like" however he only used the standard atari bpeg example. the graphics were created using the duke nukem 3D "build" editor... So basically duke nukem levels created and grabbed using the screenshot option to get graphics for "his" game (which is not allowed by 3Drealms btw... the maps and graphics created with those tools had to be free, but I guess he didn't know or care about that) The problem with his game was that it would never be possible the way he planned. Everybody who did some jag coding knows why... He just pasted the bpeg code into one file and checked the pad for directions... so no engine was coded just hard coded "press left, display picture 1". Of course you can never create a real game that way. Back then CD dev wasn't possible and even with bpeg it would be impossible to make that a full game on cart. He also had a few other things in the works... including a space shooter called "zero" (to my surprise he came up with that shooter idea shortly after I showed him my jdc invader (working title of star alliance) project. Coincidence ? Possibly but I think it's unlikely It never got beyond a buggy title screen. As you can see this is a VERY long story. To sum it up shortly... He gave up and started Jag dev several times (sold his dev stuff and bought it again a few times) DURING his projects. His final effort was a "pong" demo, which never worked (black screen). According to the text file, the demo was "playable except collision not being implemented" and that he was "not sure if it works on your system, I'm not even sure if it will work on my system when I try it again" So basically a non working binary of a demo that was supposed to let you move an object. Ok, ok. Enough of this. I do not want to bash anybody. Maybe he wanted to do real jaguar development, but simply didn't get it done. And I think he was too fast with annoucing his projects and forgot that he couldn't even program at that time. A very common mistake. But at least there is one good thing about all this... It's a good lesson for new Jag developers. Jag dev should be taken very serious, otherwise you might end up giving it all up as well. Whatever people think or say, game development is VERY difficult. I think nobody can create a good game from scratch without having done games before without spending enough time learning and developing. However it finnally ended with him leaving the Jag scene 1-2 years ago and ultimately with his website being pulled off the web because he didn't pay for hosting anymore. So you can be sure, the story is over. Regards, Lars.

Hi ! Like I said, I'm not sure if I can come yet. Actually it's unlikely. Plane tickets aren't so expensive anymore that's right. However if I would visit a Jag fest I also would want to take all my dev stuff with me and that would not be possible in a plane... Or at least it would be much too expensive Anyway. I'll have to see if I find a better way though... Regards, Lars.

Hi MegaData ! Cool, in that case, if you get something cool done that you think is worth it, I'll be happy to see it in a few years maybe. Ok, however if you decide to stop working on TRF, you should really sell the code back to Curt or somebody else who can do something with it or publish it on the net or somewhere else for everybody to see. Regards, Lars.

Hi ! With BJL you can also develop full Jaguar CD games, that take the whole CD. Actually my projects could also be done with BJL. To answer your other questions... Top Down games are possible of course. Everything polygon based is difficult though and needs very good knowledge of 3D engines and assembler programming. Regards, Lars.

Hi ! That's exactly what I don't understand either.. Why are so many people so obsessed trying to finish stuff, that was abandoned years ago by their original teams ? The important thing is the gameplay, a game that is fun to play. Who on earth cares about the names ?! You don't have fun with the name of a game, but with the game. What Carl did, was something different. The projects he picked up had a good chance being finished and actually got finished. And he had the abilities to do it and also was allowed to publish those. I think all this stuff with finishing existing projects, may it be Native or TRF or whatever, is just that they are unable to actually create something on their own. They seem to need these popular names to get publicity. But what all these projects have in common is the little or no chance to get finished. Native for example, was an really impressive demo, which would have made a top must have jaguar game. However without the original team it can never become this. Duranik (the original native developers) are what made Native something special. It was their ideas that made the game great. Nobody else could ever finish it like they could have done it. So what's the point of trying to finish it then ? If somebody wants to use the code, fine. Duranik declared Native to be free to everybody who wants to "play" with the code. But the only reason to actually call the game somebody else creates "Native" is because he can't come up with a name or he just wants the publicity connected to the name. You could just as well do a completely new game and give it a new name. Same is true for TRF. It's too incomplete to finish it (actually even the chances of finishing Native are a lot better than finishing TRF). If MegaData was actually able to make a 2D fighter on the Jag, why didn't he do that already ? He got his hardware and the tools about the same time as I did, about 4 years ago. So why didn't he just do a 2D fighter from scratch ? MegaData this is NOT supposed to be an attack or so, just answer this simple question: Why didn't you just code a 2D fighter from scratch instead of doing nothing for four years ?! In that time you could have finished a 2D fighter easily if you were able to. Regards, Lars.

It's great to see your interest in Atari Jaguar development. Every new Jaguar coder is something good and a step into the right direction. The main language that is used to program Jaguar programs is Assembler. So if you already know assembler it's quite easy to lern the Motorola 68000 (CPU of the Jag) assembler and later learn the custom RISC assemblers. There is also an option to use C on the Jaguar, however I recommend using Assembler. It's most common and most Jag coders will be able to help you with questions in that case. Actually it was the official dev kit that was used to create all official Jaguar games. Jaguar CD games were created with a special Jaguar CD unit connected to an Atari Falcon home computer. However there are many more options to create programs for the Jaguar these days. There are several possible ways: Either a hobby solution: BJL (available as Cartridge in the form of Protector SE or as modification to the Jaguar itself) JUGS (available as Cartridge in the form of Battlesphere / Battlesphere Gold) Or a professional dev kit: Alpine Board Personally I would suggest you get Protector SE. It includes BJL and CD Bypass as well as SaveGame memory for CD games. BJL has the advantage that it's cheap, is easy to use, and fast. It's limited to the internal Jaguar RAM (2MB). Alpine Boards also make cartridge development possible, but it's very expensive $350-$550 depending on where you buy it. CD games can be created with both alpines and BJL, if you have a cd bypass binary or cd bypass cart (included in protector se). The cheapest and way of choice for you is this I think: -Protector SE -BJL Cable (needs to be built, Stone of the forum can probably help you with that) -Jaguar Unit -Jaguar CD Unit (optional) -Starcat Development CD ( http://www.starcat-dev.de/products.php , contains all the tools, source codes, docs etc that you need to get started, including the Starcat Developments Jaguar Library, which makes Jag coding a lot easier for beginners.) Exactly. Yes, that's me. They probably mean the Starcat Developments CD, to be more specific the Jaguar Library I was talking about up there. If you have any more questions, feel free to contact me. Regards, Lars.

Hi Dragonforce ! Once you're actively doing Jag dev and releasing something cool you will be on my name list Regards, Lars.

Hi ! Wow... This is a LOT too read Thanks jaysmith2000 for your support :-) Ok MegaData, are you somehow trying to be a cheap copy of Thunderbird now ? Because you have just attacked me without reason. Just to tell you, I never intended to attack you. It was just a few neutral questions and assumptions. Still you attacked me. >Are you implying that I could not create a 2D fighter on my own? Hmm, so far there were tons of people announcing stuff, who never showed anything and ultimately gave up... what do you learn from this ? It's not as easy as it looks. Playing developer is nice, but the jag scene is not the right playground. >The "professional" coders stopped development on TRF because the Jag went belly up. Of course that's just normal. They are a company, they want to make money, the jag died, so they went to PSX, to create games they could get money for. >You have a strange sense of professionalism, by the way. >They would be defined as amatures in my book from my first contact with them to present day. Coders who did very good Jaguar code, as well as tons of games in the past for tons of systems, including Tempest for PSX and Saturn. Which were both great games, and many others. Before trying to make their efforts smaller YOU should do a game first. If you didn't even finish one game that was a success, how can you dare to make their tons of successful games on tons of systems bad ? >You were one of the "friendly" people who tried to pry the game out of my hands as soon as I announced that I had it in my possession. HA HA HA HA.... I never wanted TRF from you. I don't recall what e-mails I wrote you in 99 or so. But once had a flash cart myself and I know TRF. As I said, the game itself is very incomplete and only interesting for developers to learn from. >I have every reason to believe that no one in the community can be trusted. HA HA HA HA HA.... This is an even better joke ! >I have every right to be paranoid. You cannot prove me wrong. Well, I have to agree with you, you are REALLY paranoid. >Anything? Are you quite serious? I guess so >Have you played the game at a JagFest? >That was my doing. >I've been selling games and hardware at great prices since 1999. Oh, what a great deed for the Jag scene, selling software and hardware ? There are many other atari dealers and while I don't know your prizes, I never heard anybody mention you, so I assume it wasn't really THAT cheap. I know many great atari dealers and I don't think I've missed anything not doing business with you. >Remember the AirCars and Catboxes that were under $100? Yes, but never seen then in your store. I got my CatBox for under $100 new, but that was in a Shop in Germany :-) >I've been a HUGE Jaguar fan and a great supporter and supplier of the Atari Jaguar. Great supporter ?!! What do you think you are ? You sold stuff, oh what great support. Does selling stuff give the jag scene more games ? NO. People like Curt, Glenn, Carl, Duranik, Matthias, Justclaws, Force Design, Sinister Developments, myself and so many others are great supporters, because they actually did something great. They made new and essential Jaguar information and even games in the case of Carl available to the scene. They opened whole new dimensions for hobby development and Jag fans will be more than happy about that as soon as some more new Jaguar CD games are finished. > I have been helpful to a great deal of fans. Everybody on this forum who ever answered an question is helpful in a way. >I have obtained all the hardware and software required to create a game. >Do I really need to prove myself after having this source code for all of one month? HA HA HA.... What should THAT mean ?! The code, hardware, software and stuff is WORTHLESS to the scene as long as you don't get anything done with it or give it to others who can do something with it. Do you know how many people I helped getting started in the Jag coding, who even had alpines and all the docs and who ultimately gave up, because it was too difficult ?! Create something great, finish TRF if you think you can. After THAT you don't need to prove yourself. >Where is Lars' game? He's had longer than one month to work on it. I do not need to prove myself. I do more than enough to support the Jag. I work on games, I helped many developers getting started. I wrote examples to help new developers, I made the dev manual available to everybody, I was first to make all the docs, tools, sources etc. available on my site. I did Euro Jag Fests together with others... The list of things that I did is long. What did YOU do except making money off your sales ?! To answer your question: Star Alliance is in the works. At least I DO something. And my projects that I announce WILL be finished. >Are you going to ask OMC Games what they've done on Native? >Not showing anything until you release it is the smart thing to do. If you don't show anything, you should also be clever enough to shut your mouth until you have something to show. >If I've learned anything, it's that it always takes longer than you expect to reach your next goal. That's true. I announced Star Alliance on ejagfest 2001, I expected it wouldn't take long anymore. But even now it takes long, but at least I don't talk about it day and night and make fans curious about something they might (in the case of TRF) never get. >If I need any kind of help, there are people I can contact, but I am fully capable of creating a game on the Atari Jaguar by myself. Fine, why don't you just do it ?! I will believe it when I see it. Talking is easy, show that you can do something and STOP JUST TALKING ABOUT IT. Regards, Lars.

Hi folks ! I didn't really want to post in this thread, but this is getting ridiculous.... MegaData... I remember when you gut your dev kit in 99 I think and you were asking me for the dev software back then. That's four years ago. I don't know if you started learning Jag coding since then or if you have just been waiting for the TRF source code, but you could just as well have used that time to learn coding a write a 2D Jag fighter on your own. If you are unable to program a 2D fighter on the Jag (or program jaguar in general) that's ok and understandable. There are only few Jag coders out there. But if you can't do a 2D fighter for the Jag from scratch on your own, how do you think you could finish a 2D fighter professional jag coders started and ultimately abandoned ? Besides, even if you ignore all the license and coding issues, there are a few important things you forgot. 1) The binary is already 4MB, so you would have to port the whole game to CD, which might mean huge code changes or in the worst case a whole new engine that needs to be written. 2) The characters in the game were created using motion capturing from what I've read... How do you plan to get the money to buy the equipment and actors to do more moves and motion capture those to put them into the game ? Same is true for all graphics and sounds that need to be added to make it a full game. I understand your point that you paid money for the license and the hardware, but I also understand the point of the others. You're not the only one who paid money for it. There are many others out there who also bought a flash cart with TRF on it or paid for the binary of TRF. Now that they are trying to sell them again, because they need money maybe, you're trying to forbid that ? Or even say that you will not continue and not give the source out to anybody if somebody sells his flash cart ?! Sorry, but I have to agree with the others that is indeed childish. I think what Curt did for the Jag scene lately is really great. Thanks a lot Curt. Curt was so great and kind to offer you the source code, instead of asking ebay prices for it and now you say you will keep the code to yourself and keep it locked away from others who might actually learn something from it or get something done with it ?! That's not fair and it's not helping the Jag scene at all, it's harming the Jag scene. If everybody did that, the jag scene would be dead since 97, because no development would ever have been possible since atari quit if everybody kept all their stuff to themselves. Jaguar development should be a hobby. And it's essential for the scene to share as much information and help each other as much as possible. To be honest I don't think the game can ever be finished, even by professional developers, because it's too incomplete (in every way) and it wouldn't be worth the effort. It would be a lot easier to create a new fighting game from scratch. However even if the game can't be finished jag coders could learn from it. Regards, Lars.

Hi Nick ! That's great ! Although I won't be able to attend the show. Seems like November will be the month of the Jaguar this year :-) Euro Jag Fest 2003 will be on 22th November 2003 and now Micro JagFest UK on 30th November 2003. :-) Regards, Lars.

Hi Dragonforce ! Yes, it's a small book. But it's more than enough to figure out the basics of 68000 coding. And it's a lot better than the book that I started with. Just give it a try. besides, the book was very cheap, and for that price it's really great. But after you have read that book and you still don't understand enough, you can still ask me, other coders or get a better book. I learned 68k coding by reading a 68k book (not the one I recommended you) a bit. I didn't read very much in it though, because it was written much more complicated that I thought first. It was quite confusing and difficult for somebody who has never programmed assembler. Besides some of the basics I learned almost everything by actually experimenting with source codes and talking to other coders. I think no book can beat what you can learn by your own experience. Example: Back in the days of Doom, the engine seemed like rocket science, today you can read about it in many books. Reading about it isn't difficult, but coming up with a new idea on your own, that's difficult and that's where you can learn most. Regards, Lars.