beoran

Well, I put an hour in making a real pal version with changed colors and everything. The colors don't match exactly, but should be playable. It works on an emulator, but I don't know if it will on the real system. I have uploaded it to GitHub, the web service I use to keep my source code. Look here: http://github.com/beoran/eruta/tree/master/tool/ature Especially the file ature.bas.pal.bin is what you need. http://github.com/beoran/eruta/blob/master/tool/ature/ature.bas.pal.bin?raw=true New versions will always appear here. Or take the attached file it's the same for now. I hope that that will satisfy people here. But if it bugs out on the real console, someone else will have to fix it as I don't have the knowledge. B. ature.bas.pal.bin

Dear Yuppicide, Great work you and Coco (the illustrator) did on making these carts. Looks like first published version of my game will be a success! Kind Regards, B.

Dear Atari_afternoon, I'm focusing on another huge game project for PC now, so for the forseeable future I don't have time to work on Ature and make a PAL version. But if, say, 15 or more ask me, I'll probably make a PAL version. If you really can't wait for that, the game comes with full source code and can be compiled to a PAL version and modified to make it work by yourself or anyone else who knows how to. So sorry to keep you waiting, but I hope you can understand my priorities. Kind Regards, B.

Dear Philsan, I'm glad you enjoyed the game. I hope you'll tell others about it so they can also enjoy it. As for Batari v1.1, the new kernal looks very powerful, but it would probably require too much changes to the game to make good use of it. Also, now I'm trying to focus on my very long term game project for PC, so most likely, barring other people taking it up, Ature will stay as it is. As for my name, I'd rather be known under the name Beoran for various reasons. Besides, Beoran is the name I gave myself. In that, it is actually more "real" than the name of my ancestors or even the one my parents gave me. So please name my game Ature_2010_Beoran_NTSC.bin or similar.

Dear Johnny Boy, Thank you for the praise! I agree a trailer would be nice. However, I'm not very good at editing movies yet, so it probably won't be for anytime soon. Any help there would be appreciated. :]

Animan, Glad to hear you like it. Yuppicide is working on putting this on cartridge. No one else proposed to make a label yet, so your design would be very welcome.

Dear eegad, I'm glad you're enjoying the game. If possible, please help spread the word. I think there are still many people who'd enjoy the game but don't know it exists.

You're welcome! Perhaps it's because I programmed the game, but it seems the game is much easier for me than it is for you? So I hope my hint section in the blog is helping you out.

Well said, Herbarius, I agree balance is key! Though I agree with Joel that C++ should be avoided.

Ok, that's cool, and I'm cool with it too. Gotta stop saying cool before I freeze.

Once I've started a game projects on another other forums where hundreds of people weighed in with comments, but the amount of people actually willing to contribute in a meaningful way dwindled quickly to one (me), so the project withered away. Such communal project tend to be unsucessful because too many cooks spoil the broth, and those with the most difficult to implement ideas are also those who are least willing to actually help you out. It's my experience that for a game project, it's best to wait until you have something playable. Ideally, you should even wait until you you think the game is almost completely done. Which probably means you're about halfway there in reality, due to all the bug fixes and fine-tuning you'll still have to do. I released my Atari 2600 game Ature when I thought it was almost finished, which turned out to still need quite a bit of improvement from the feedback I got. The main reason I think it's best to do it like that is that it's difficult to see whether a game will be fun or not just by looking at it's ideas, until you actually implement (most of) it. If you just launch an idea, or a game that is barely playable, you'll get a lot of unhelpful comments. As I said before, too many cooks spoil the broth, certainly for home brew games! Finally, I think it's very annoying to announce you are "working" on a game, but not give us anything to play with! We're here to make games, or play games, but not to be your personal cheer leaders. If you are unsure about your ideas or approach before the game is anywhere near completion, it might be best to ask a few people if they care to be individual beta testers for you.

KeviMos, Thanks for pointing out those errors. I updated my blog page with the hints to correct them and explain the hint that I garbled. I also changed into an ordered numbered list so it's easier to refer to one of hints. I'm perfectly fine with you reformatting and redistributing the hints and the manual, on the Xbox or any other platform. If you read the License in the manual, it states you can do such thing. However, even though you don't have to, I would like to ask of anyone who redistributes my game to also include all the original files that are in the zip file I posted here as well, in case anyone is curious about the game's sources or documentation, or wants to improve on either of them. I'd also like this to avoid people downloading the manual and then not being able to find the game. It's easier if everything you need is included in one zip file, or other similar archive if that's anyway possible on the Xbox platform. As for emulator users on the Xbox... I'm not an MS fan so I don't care too much. But to quote ADOM: "Sages wise and mystics flighty, even they must wonder."

KevinMos3, Thanks for your explanation. It's indeed not a bad place to level up quickly! As to the other people who play the game but get killed rapidly: Swordfighting is a dangerous matter,so don't just rush in. Keep your distance as much possible, keeping the range of your sword into mind. It's indeed a good idea to keep your sword sticking out so you get the benefit of the first strike, and it also helps judging your range. At first, try to fight foes that don't shoot at you, or the Ikaza's Footsoldier and the Big Black Bog Bass KevinMos3 suggested. As for foes that do shoot at you, like most bosses, look very carefully how they can shoot. A diagonal approach is the safest, but as you can't strike diagonally, you may need to step in and time your attacks carefully. Foes can only shoot one arrow at you at the time, so as long as the arrow you dodges is still on the screen, it's safe to make a strike. You can practice dealing with shooting foes by fighting the Blue Bloom or the Crabby Crab foes west and south of your house. Oh, and I also still have some problems beating the bosses myself, as it would be boring for me if the game was too easy for myself. Level up a lot, look well at how and from what point they are shooting, and try to hit them from an angle where they cannot shoot you. And if you explore the game enough, you can find a way to collect the Numen Shield, which will make you invulnerable to enemy arrows, and which will help you defeat some of the harder bosses. Maybe I really need to write a walkthrough, though, or perhaps, a "hints" page, for the more difficult puzzles. Edit: Here it is: http://ature.wordpress.com/hints/ Edit: And I uploaded a video to youtube. Sorry for the low quality:

Some good ideas there. So, I already started a tiny wordpress blog abut Ature here: http://ature.wordpress.com/ Perhaps the next step would be to release a trailer of Ature, on Youtube, when I have the time to make a video of it.

Dear Atari_afternoon, It would indeed be a good idea to publicize my game a bit more, but I have no clue which forums or web sites might be best for me to publish such a summary at. So if you or anyone else could please suggest the best avenues for letting other people know about my game, it would be most welcome.

Dear Arjak, Glad to hear you're enjoying. The boss on the beach is and optional and difficult to beat one, you can figure out other ways to beat it too. Anyway, if you like the game, please share it and spread the word. I think many more people would enjoy this game if only they knew about it.

Thanks for this bug report. I have been able to verify it. But, I don't have a clue as to what may be causing it. I checked all code and it seems like nothing is wrong. Anyway, I'll do my best to try and solve this if possible. Edit: I've tried various things to workaround this bug, but I can't seem to find what might be causing it. So I think it's either a bug in batari basic, or I'm not using it correctly somehow.

Well, in FF12, I kind of enjoyed the gambit system, but hey, I'm a programmer, so I enjoyed programming my characters's actions like this. The storyline of FF12 was a bit weak and not very memorable, but the big, and rather open world with a lot of secrets to uncover made up for that in my mind. Admitted, it's less fun than most of its predecessors. But all in all, there's more fun to be had in FF12 than in FF13.

True, some games force me to upgrade my firmware. Then I just have to accept it. But I don't need on-line play, at least not for now, so that's why I avoid it.

I don't trust these firmware updates, which I why my consoles are staying offline. Who knows what else they'll be taking away from us?

Yet another Wiimote addon. Blargh. The Wii motion plus is in essence a hardware patch for the lack of precision of the original wiimote, and should have been in the wiimote from the get-go. This vitality meter is just a gimmick for Wii fit style games. I hope it flops terribly to teach them a lesson.

I hadn't heard about both the Move and the Kinect, but now I checked it out, I think that Microsoft and Sony have decided that the want a piece of the cake of the casual and sports game market that Nintendo has opened up with the Wii and it's Wiimote. Nintendo was very crafty in that they packaged such a controller with their Wii from the get-go, which is the only way to make such a gimmick work. But their two competitors will find out it's too late for them. None of this is new technology, I remember similar motion detecting controllers, or the eye toy being available for the PS2. Those were not very popular, and would only sell well together with a game that used the controller in question. Furthermore, all these these motion-based controllers are niece for sports and dance games, and perhaps for FPS games, but for other genres, and especially for lengthy games, they are more a bother causing pain in the arms, rather than being useful. Certainly for action/adventures or RPG, a classic controller is easier, more comfortable in use, and can be kept resting in my lap, so my arms don't get tired. In other words, I both hope that they will fail. And I also think that they will fail if past trends persist.

It's probably well known that since around the 1995, most professional game reviewers aren't really objective, because the publishers supply them with free games in advance of the release (and other benefits). Better ignore the score of most professional reviews and focus on user reviews in stead. I'd only trust pro reviewers who buy their own games and reviews them after they have been released officially.

KevinMos, Thank you for testing that for me, as I didn't test it myself actually. I'm glad you liked the changes I made.

108 Stars, I'm glad you like the game. I was inspired a bit by Zelda, but also by the Seiken Densetu series. And a new version of the game is out, look at the top of this thread.