EricBall

320 modes are a "double res" version of the 160 modes. Although 2 pixels are displayed, positioning is still on the 160 pixel boundaries. The actual colors are controlled by a combination of the write mode and the read mode. See gcc1702b_maria_specs or https://sites.google.com/site/atari7800wiki/graphics-modes and https://sites.google.com/site/atari7800wiki/graphics-modes/palette-sprite-bits for the gory details.

The volatile keyword is typically used to flag variables / addresses which can be changed by something other than the CPU (i.e. shared RAM) or a variable / address where a read doesn't return the most recently written value (e.g. a memory-mapped PIA). It basically tells the compiler "you can't cache this value in a register, always read/write to RAM".

Up here in Ontario there was a major ice storm just before Christmas. Lots of damage to trees and power lines; both because of the trees falling on them and the ice itself. Some people were without power for weeks. (I was lucky, I only lost power for an hour or two.) How long you were out depended upon what the problem was. Stuff which affected whole neighborhoods & communities was fixed first (especially if it also affected a hospital). But if a tree pulled the wires away from where they entered your house then it took much, much longer.

The 7800 has a 13 color palette from 256 shades. As stated, the palette registers can be updated mid-screen as well. (Note: the registers are not buffered, so it's recommended to update the registers after STA WSYNC to avoid changing them in the middle of the row.) How sprite data relates to which palette registers are used depends on the current read & write modes. You probably could do some kind of intelligent flicker routine to handle cases with either a large number of sprites (especially with a tile background). Just keep track of which sprites haven't been displayed, and add them to the display list before the ones which haven't been displayed.

I'll have to agree with you that contest-023-ultra-scsicide-5-cart.jpg is my favorite (although maybe with some tweaks to the text... Perhaps the layout from 6 with the picture from 5.)

Congrats! It's always great to be recognized.

Yeah, I was thinking about it later and prioritization is great for the highest priority sprite, but much worse for the rest of the sprites. Although it would be great to have the player/Otto flicker less than the rest of the sprites, I'm not sure it's easily do-able in a general case.

It took a couple of tries, but I've figured out how to re-add the priority for the lowered numbered sprites: list SHOWN_LIST, NOTSHOWN_LIST, FLICKERLIST = {0..MAX_SPRITES} loop i from 0 to MAX_SPRITES SHOWN_LIST = {} NOTSHOWN_LIST = {} x = FLICKERLIST[i] if sprite[x] is active can we draw with player0? yes - draw it & add X to SHOWN_LIST no - can we draw with player 1? yes - draw it & add X to SHOWN_LIST no - add X to NOT_SHOWN_LIST else add X to NOT_SHOWN_LIST endif FLICKERLIST = NOT_SHOWN_LIST + SHOWN_LIST endloop i loop i from MAX_SPRITES downto 2 if FLICKERLIST[i] < FLICKERLIST[i-1] swap( FLICKERLIST[i], FLICKERLIST[i-1] ) endif endloop i three sprites on line: FL = 0,1,2 -> SL = 0,1 NSL = 2 -> FL = 2,0,1 -> 0,2,1 FL = 0,2,1 -> SL = 0,2 NSL = 1 -> FL = 1,0,2 -> 0,1,2 four sprites on line: FL = 0,1,2,3 -> SL = 0,1 NSL = 2,3 -> FL = 2,3,0,1 -> 0,2,3,1 FL = 0,2,3,1 -> SL = 0,2 NSL = 3,1 -> FL = 3,1,0,2 -> 0,3,1,2 FL = 0,3,1,2 -> SL = 0,3 NSL = 1,2 -> FL = 1,2,0,3 -> 0,1,2,3

IIRC Manuel (CyberGoth) discovered a single pass through a bubble-sort routine had some good anti-flicker properties for StarFire. (This was back in the StellaList days...)

You have a good point. And I think that kind of "bait and switch" will cause problems for the industry in the future. OTOH, I stopped playing Force Unleashed near the end because the difficulty level went way up.

You guys have proven my point. Because the game is "free to play" you object to paying $$ for additional content. And while "pay to win" does exist, there are mamy other "monetization" methods.

Although I don't program games for a living, I visit gamasutra.com daily. A common topic in many articles is "free-to-play", from philosophical treatises to in-depth tutorials on how to best convince players to pay-up. Personally I think "free to play" is killing the industry (Nintendo being the current whipping boy) because it disrupts the most direct feedback loop between the creators and the players. You see, IMHO players should be paying for content, because this is what the programmers (and other artists) are creating. Subscription based games are the best example of this as part of the monthly fee can be used to fund content creation - which makes the players want to continue paying the subscription. Sequels are a more drawn out form of the same thing. If enough people bought the first game, then a sequel gets made for people to spend more money on. But FTP doesn't work like that. It uses "free" to entice as many people as possible to play the game. But then it turns around and tries to find ways to get players to pay as much money as possible. But the players don't want to pay - they are in the "why pay when you can have it for free" mindset. Furthermore, because the players often aren't paying for content, the creator's effort goes into finding ways to improve & optimize squeezing money out of players. And in some cases all players (whether they are paying or not) are costing the creators money in server rentals & bandwidth. Meanwhile, traditional payment games and companies (e.g. Nintendo) are suffering because buyers have access to large amounts of free content.

I have a clock in my shower (actually a carabiner watch around the handle) to encourage me not to stay in the shower for too long. (Better than my previous way, which was to stay until the hot water ran out...)

Regarding the missing .1 subchannels; I suspect they existed during the original transition but have since been discontinued. And rather than renumber the subchannels (thus making viewers go through a rescan to get the new VC to PC mapping), they just left the .1 subchannel unused.

http://arstechnica.com/apple/2014/01/report-apple-tv-successor-with-revamped-os-coming-in-first-half-of-2014/ Reading the article this morning I had the question - could an Kinect device make it possible to play touchscreen style games on your home TV? The problem is the two aren't equivalent. A touchscreen gives visual position feedback and an actual touch input. While a Kinect is a "zero button mouse". The list of existing Kinect games doesn't include ports of most popular touchscreen games like Fruit Ninja and Cut The Rope. That's not to say it couldn't be done, but it would take a significant amount of development. Apple would need to also provide a default control system for unmodified iPad games. Maybe a "ghost image" of the player's hands (representing two fingers) and some way to change from "not-pressed" to "pressed". (Open versus closed hand maybe?) In other Apple news, a Belgian computer store put up (and then took down) a page which suggested an update to the Mac Mini will be coming in February. I hope so, I just got (for $100 +$50 shipping +$25 duty) a Mac version of the classic IBM buckling spring keyboard. http://pckeyboard.com/page/category/SpacesaverM

http://arstechnica.com/apple/2014/01/report-apple-tv-successor-with-revamped-os-coming-in-first-half-of-2014/

http://gamasutra.com/blogs/ChipSineni/20140120/208948/Nintendos_future_shouldnt_be_focused_on_Smartphones.php points out simply releasing old titles on mobile systems isn't a big revenue stream (based on Sonic) and suggests Nintendo should partner with Valve to provide content for the new Steam OS. http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2014/01/nintendo-mobile/ also notes the cost of games are a big issue.

Yep, Nintendo is taking a beating (although both the 3DS and WiiU have sold better than the Virtual Boy). Hopefully they have a good-sized war chest from the Wii & DS. But the real question is what do they do now as their current strategy doesn't seem to be working. IMHO the real challenge for Nintendo (and a lot of other traditional video game companies) is what people are willing to pay for games. I'm not sure how much longer traditional $50+ games can continue to survive (much less thrive). But I doubt lower price points (i.e. $10 much less $0.99 or "free-to-play") can support traditional game development either. That being said, Nintendo has characters with huge brand recognition (although the Mario games seem to be a wearing thin). But even making games for other platforms will probably not bring in the revenue.

Yes 64kbps would be ~24 hours. 64kbps is fine for mono recordings, but it wouldn't hurt to go up to 128kbps.

A normal audio CD (playable in any CD player) is 74-80 minutes. However, with MP3 compression a data CD could store much, much more. e.g. 700MB would be ~12 hours at 128kbps

I just recently changed jobs / companies. Some things I did: 1. Check out "What Color is Your Parachute" from your local library. Even if you aren't able to complete the exercises yourself, there's a lot of battle-hardened insight also in there. (Like the pyramid which shows how traditional want-ads are about the worst way to find a job.) 2. Consider hiring a "Career Coach" (coachfederation.org has an RFP process) For me it helped identify some of my key skills, attributes, etc and confirmed I'm well suited to the kind of work I do (advanced technical support). I also got a rework of my resume and cover letter. 3. Network, network, network. LinkedIn is a great place to start (and it works even if you don't pay). I got my current job via an automated LinkedIn job posting suggestion. But I think a big kicker was an ex-coworker was working at the same company - so I bcc'd him on my application so he could put in the good word for me. I also got an interview with another company which started with my LinkedIn profile being a search result for their recruiter. My Dad got one of his jobs (years ago) because a 2nd cousin got his resume in front of a VP.

In the opening scene there seems to be a vertical pan between the SD and HD. In the SD more of the calendar and window are visible, but in the HD the bottom of the chair legs are visible. Maybe a different frame. For an SD to HD conversion horror story look at Babylon 5. The live action sequences were shot on film in widescreen (although I think at 30 fps), but all of the CGI work (including green screen) was rendered in 4:3 480i (for NTSC broadcast). The film survived but all of the CGI files were lost. When SciFi got it they retelecined the film in 16:9 HD. But rather than preserve the 4:3 framing all of the scenes with CGI were cropped to 16:9 (360i) then upconverted to a blurry mess. Unfortunately, that's the version which was put on DVD rather than the OAR.

Ars Technica has provided an overview of the various Steam Boxen shown at CES. While some of the boxes are small, the price tags certainly aren't. Ars also has a review of the Steam controller - it seems mapping the analog control pads to simple keypresses is less than perfect in practice.

Dunno about stupid, but you are certainly creative. And while you are currently finding the O2 frustrating, you have accomplished more programming than 99.999% of the population of the world. However, it does seem that you lack a basic understanding of assembly language programming. When you are programming at that level, the computer / console does exactly what you tell it to do. So if it's not working, it is because you haven't given it the correct instructions. I'd recommend spending some quality time with assembly language manuals and tutorials. Hopefully at some point the lightbulb will go on in your head and it will all start making sense.

On Monday I played several hours of Minecraft - started a new world but then got bored mining. I declared I was done with Minecraft, but last night I played another couple of hours (another new world). So I'm obviously not quite done yet. A couple of non-standard things I've determined: Boats are cool in the early game. It only takes 5 planks (plus a crafting table) to build, so all you need is a source of wood and you're sailing. They make crossing water much, much easier. And spending the night on the water is very low risk. Even if a hostile mob tries to reach you, you can sail much faster than you can run so they can't catch you. The only risk is crashing (especially into the invisible wall which surrounds the PS3 map). A 1x2 mineshaft is the quickest & easiest way to reach Y=11 (diamond depth). Put torches & blocks of dirt every 5 blocks for light & fall protection. A 1x3 mineshaft with a plunge pool at the bottom may provide quicker descents, but it requires more effort to build and iron for buckets. In my last game (and the start of this one), I'd remove any gravel & dirt I discovered while mining. I'm now going to try a new tactic with a spiral mining pattern I've created and leave any non-ores alone.