Zach

I have an idea for how to do that, but I'm not sure if it'll work or not. Could you flicker between this: And this: To get this? (This is just a rough pass at a 48 pixel version.) Could the 48 pixel sprite on top of the PF achieve the effect without flickering?

Back on topic, I'm glad to see a homebrew in a top 10 list. Congratulations, Thomas.

The flickering playfield is hardly noticeable on a real TV (mine at least), and is about a jillion times better than Mousetrap.

I hope the scanline count is lower than Air Raid.

I look forward to seeing it. So far I've gone as high as level 12.

The Ladybug sprites look great. (No surprise ) I've been thinking a lot about large bitmaps myself lately. The usual width is 48 pixels, but it's not hard to extend that to 50. With some color-related caveats, you can extend to 51 too. Furthermore I've been toying with an idea that might enable a 52 pixel bitmap. From the artist's point of view, would 4 extra pixels be useful?

Oh my. I might not want to buy homebrews with a clear case anymore.

Judging by their positions, I'd guess the ball is the left yellow border, and the last two pixels of the PF make up the right one.

This has the potential to become a great game. And yes, I prefer the 6+2 bricks too.

Nice work, John. I haven't figured out the details yet, but I've got an idea how it works. Are you using STA, STX, STY, and SAX?

Could be done. If you are going to redo the art, you might as well start from scratch and completely avoid copyright issues. However for nostalgia reasons, I'd rather not do a tank game unless it's Combat. As for the chess variants. I'll keep them in mind.

I figure there is enough interest and talent out there that someone will pick it up. They are welcome to use my alternate board as long as they give due credit. That board will be tricky though, it takes 5 player color changes, 5 player shape changes, and 6 PF/BK color changes per line. It could very well require extended memory. (If you use extended RAM and have some extra cycles, it would be nice to add a 6th sprite to the left of the board for vertical text.)

I'm pleasantly surprised to see growing interest in this project, since this thread was dormant for a while at the beginning. Chess is #6 on my to-do list. When I need a break from my current projects, I might get the cursor working. BTW I don't think it's worth worrying about the repetition rule.

Well written, indeed.

I don't know about you, but I find that controllers are not fun to organize. If new paddles could be backwards-compatible, that's great. Otherwise it would be difficult to convince me to acquire another controller with more cables to get tangled.

Retro game fan? I'm not so sure if they call ET's graphics "crummy".

Shall we make this a pinned message?

Boba shot Mace? I thought he was still a child when Mace was killed. And didn't that happen before Episode 4? ps. Welcome to AtariAge. I'm sure you'll be able to learn your way around here.

I'm afraid the 12 hour drive would be too much. Hope you all have fun!

This is close to what I'd like to know. My kernel writes #%11010000 to PF0, so the first 4 pixels of the screen are PF and the next 4 are BK. I wonder if the HMOVE line would show up in this instance? A screenshot and binary of the homebrew in question can be found at my blog. If anyone has the means and interest to test on a FB2, please let us know how it looks. If you see an extra blue stripe on the left, that means the HMOVE's are absent.

Wow. I had no idea Ladybug was so endeared. Having just looked at screenshots, I thought it was just another Pac-Man/Mousetrap/Lock 'n Chase variant. The reaction on this thread has encouraged me to take another look.

Is this the "yet to be announced project" that Manuel mentioned in the Ladybug - 2600 thread?

Can anyone explain why Pitfall! on the FB2 displays the HMOVE blanks and other games don't? More importantly, can I choose to turn on the blanks in my homebrew kernel?

Never? Nah, just not in a while. I played MAME quite a bit in the late 90's. Since I started collecting Atari and other consoles, I've owned more games than I have time to play and emulation has been low priority. Now I have a reason to get MAME again. To keep up with others' homebrews. Thanks for the links, Chris.

As far as I can see, the fastest way to get the Helium Heroes score is to play "A" on the easy levels and "B" on the tougher ones. It's not cheating either; the manual specifically states that you can move the difficulty switch during a game.