ZeroPage Homebrew

Thank you for the info, while playing I've noticed a number of deaths due to the eaten ghost getting me. I just played the Pico-8 version again and it appears to go to the furthest side away from it. This is an easy fix and will be updated in the next posted version. Thank you for all your calculations! This will be a big help in dialing down the speeds as I really like the Pico-8 speed of play. This is something I'll probably change for the 2600 version, I feel the game definitely needs to get harder over time or it will get repetitive. I'm not really keen on the Pico-8 colours and will continue on with trying to replicate the arcade colours. I plan on rotating through all four ghosts as the levels progress so having the colour chart you provided is extremely handy! Thank you so much! - James

Thank you so much Glenn! Lots of bugs to be fixed and tons of great updates are coming soon! - James

ZeroPage Homebrew has the Exclusive World Premiere of Impossible Mission on tomorrow's ZPH stream LIVE on Twitch! Hope you can join us! Tue Apr 2, 2024 | LIVE @ 12PM PT | 3PM ET | 7PM GMT WATCH LIVE: https://twitch.tv/zeropagehomebrew/ WATCH LATER: https://youtube.com/zeropagehomebrew/ Games: Impossible Mission (2024 Exclusive World Premiere | Lynx) by Gisberto Rondinella @Nop90

ZeroPage Homebrew has the Exclusive World Premiere of Impossible Mission on tomorrow's ZPH stream LIVE on Twitch! Hope you can join us! Tue Apr 2, 2024 | LIVE @ 12PM PT | 3PM ET | 7PM GMT WATCH LIVE: https://twitch.tv/zeropagehomebrew/ WATCH LATER: https://youtube.com/zeropagehomebrew/ Games: Impossible Mission (2024 Exclusive World Premiere | Lynx) by Gisberto Rondinella @Nop90

Added to WIP: Pac-Line (A8 Port) by Victor Parada @vitoco | Video Only (20240331) No Public Binary | Listing Updated: Apr 1, 2024

Here's our scores from today's ZPH livestream. Very happy with the scores we got! 🙂 - James ZeroPage Homebrew (Tanya): 142 ZeroPage Homebrew (James): 167

ZeroPage Homebrew is playing Scooternia for the 2024 Lynx High Score Club: Round 2 on today's ZPH stream LIVE on Twitch! Hope you can join us! Sun Mar 31, 2024 | LIVE @ 5:30PM PT | 8:30PM ET | 12:30AM GMT+1Day WATCH LIVE: https://twitch.tv/zeropagehomebrew/ WATCH LATER: https://youtube.com/zeropagehomebrew/ Games: Scooternia (2023 | Lynx) by Alex Hiza @LordKraken

ZeroPage Homebrew is playing Scooternia for the 2024 Lynx High Score Club: Round 2 on today's ZPH stream LIVE on Twitch! Hope you can join us! Sun Mar 31, 2024 | LIVE @ 5:30PM PT | 8:30PM ET | 12:30AM GMT+1Day WATCH LIVE: https://twitch.tv/zeropagehomebrew/ WATCH LATER: https://youtube.com/zeropagehomebrew/ Games: Scooternia (2023 | Lynx) by Alex Hiza @LordKraken

There were a couple of people who thought that as well! Luckily I released it on Mar 29th so in fact the game is real! 🙂 Thank you so much Bomberman! I'll be sure to make a PAL version, I'll add it to my to-do list! Thank you so much John, glad you enjoy it! Can't wait to add all the extra to it that I have planned. The Pico-8 game is really well made, glad I ran across it! Thank you for sharing the game with your family, I'm so happy to hear they all enjoyed it! I'll definitely be adding a high score feature that can also be saved on the AtariVox/SaveKey/PlusCart! - James

Moved to Physical Release: Flippets (4K) by Leonardo Santiago @Leonardo Santiago | WIP Binary (20240109) | Declared Complete: 20240329 | Physical Release: Mar 29, 2024 (Pre-Order) / Unknown (Shipping) | Listing Updated: Mar 31, 2024

Added to WIP: Agent Wander (A8) by Jacob Copsey / devshinedotcom | WIP Binary (20240331) | Listing Updated: Mar 31, 2024

Thanks for the info! I've removed the duplicate entry. 🙂 Thanks for the heads up on that one, added! - James

Updated WIP: Drone Patrol by Steve Engelhardt @Atarius Maximus / JAM @H3xaFli6ht (Music) | WIP Binary (20240329) PLAY ON JS7800 | Listing Updated: Mar 30, 2024

Tanya also suggested that for a non-infringing version of the game, great minds think alike! 🙂 I'll wait until it's completely done and then make an alternate cat version of the game! - James

Added to Completed: Coarse Blade (16K) by Ketil Ronne @Magovinna | Final Binary (20240329) | Declared Complete: Mar 29, 2024 | Listing Updated: Mar 30, 2024 Updated WIP: Stellar Drive Mars (32K) by Mirsad Sarajlic @kikipdph | WIP Demo Binary (20240329) | Listing Updated: Mar 30, 2024

I'd be ashamed if I wasn't able to get the certification on my own game! 🙂 Some games you run across and instantly recognize how well they'd work on the 2600. Luckily It shouldn't be too hard to implement better power pellet management. A complete rearrangement and streamlining of the code is next on the list alongside fixing the couple of bugs I have. Thank you for all the suggestions! After reading them I was thinking about what things could be added to the game, while at the same time keeping it under the 4K size. I definitely like the ghosts changing colours and had that thought as well, it's such an easy thing to implement and takes very little extra space. I was also mulling over the two player version of the game and I think I found a great way to do it. I'll think some more about how it will work but I will be adding it to the to-do list. There will be fruit added to the game, like in the Pico-8 version, which will be quite a few bonus points and also teach me about learning flicker code. Looking forward to working on the game some more soon! - James

Thank you so much, I'm amazed to hear that there weren't any more bugs found! I had Tanya testing the game for initial speed vs. how fast the game gets as the levels increase so she was a big help! Thank you so much, hopefully people enjoy playing the game as much as I do! I knew it was the perfect game for me to make as my first one as soon as I started playing the Pico-8 version, it was almost tailor made for the 2600! Hope to see you create your own game in the future! Exactly! Why not bring this fun game over to our neck of the woods. I figured it would only be a matter of time before it landed on the Atari 2600, might as well be me doing it! Funny enough, every port of the original game the Pico-8 one was based off of IS a one button game. One button to start, one button to turn. I enjoyed the left and right controls of the Pico-8 version so I stuck to those controls. It sure is! Glad to hear no more bugs were found! I pretty much expected you to destroy my score, it was only a matter of time. 🙂 When I add in the fruit to the game, there will be even more opportunities for higher scores! You're very welcome, enjoy the game! Thank you so much! I really wanted to program in ASM to understand what makes the 2600 tick, plus I was comfortable enough with the language to give it a go. I'll definitely be in touch when I'm ready to add the PlusROM HSC code in. It should be in the next couple of weeks as I'll probably be adding the local highscore code in very soon. I don't think I'll be displaying the HSC table in the game as I want to try to keep the whole thing under 4K but if the code isn't too big, I might give it a go. 🙂 Thank you so much! I'm very happy to add another Pac-Man game to the 2600 library in addition to Todd Frye's game! - James

Great start! I knew you'd be able to get something going really quick. It's going to make a fun 10-liner! Thank you so much, I'm super happy with how it turned out! - James

Thank you so much Steve! I also think it's very easy to pick up and play with a big fun factor! Thank you so much Matt! You can't believe how worried I was that someone else was going to post a 2600 version of the game in the middle of my development! Thank you so much Dion! That would make for a really fun thing to include in one of the streams. I'll probably do that once I'm finished with all the things I want to include in the game. Great idea! - James

You figured it out before the reveal, good guess! Looks like I gave away too much in my descriptions. 😉 Good call! Just updated the ghost graphics to this, looks a lot better. 🙂 Thanks for the suggestion, it'll be part of the next release of the game. 20240329 Build: ✓ Updated Ghost Eye Graphics <- Thanks @vitoco - James

Added to WIP: Pac-Line 2600 (4K Port) by James Earl O'Brien @ZeroPage Homebrew | WIP Binary (20240328) | Listing Updated: Mar 29, 2024

Pac-Line 2600 This is my first homebrew game and what better system to make it for than my favourite, the Atari 2600! My game is a port of Pac-Line for the Pico-8 by Sizescape in turn is a port of Paku Paku by Kenta Cho. When I ran across the game on my Pico-8 handheld I knew that this was the perfect game to game for my first homebrew, it was both fun and perfectly suited for the system. Please let me know what you think and if you encounter any bugs that aren't listed below! 🙂 For more detailed information on how the game is progressing you can check out my development thread in the ZPH club section of the forums. - James Download Newest Version (WIP): 20240410-Pac-Line 2600.bin OLDER VERSIONS: Top 5 Scores (20240408/20240410 Build): 7290 @e1will [ref] 7052 @ZeroPage Homebrew (James) [ref] 3995 @ZeroPage Homebrew (Tanya) [ref] 2968 The New Retro Show [ref] 2219 Tim's Tiny Arcade [ref] Objective: Get the high score by eating dots, power ups, fruit (PENDING) and scared ghosts! Points: Dot & Power Pellet - 1 Point x Level Ghost - 10 Points x Level Fruit - 20 Points x Level (PENDING) Gameplay: You can wrap around the edges of the maze, but the ghosts can't Collect the power up so you can eat the ghost Get to the next level by eating all the dots. Every level increases the ghosts speed and decreases the length of time they're scared Every eight levels you'll progress through the ghosts (Blinky, Pinky, Inky, Clyde) Tips: As the levels gets higher be sure to eat the middle dots as soon as you can Sometimes it's quicker to eat the scared ghost by wrapping around the level Known Bugs To Fix: NONE! To Do: High Score (with AtariVox and PlusCart support) Flicker Code for the Fruit Fruit Bonus Items (Possibly Multicoloured) Two-Player Mode Implement attract screen, possibly with AI player Flash "Fire To Start" message Update sounds, and possibly music, closer to arcade Level Number On Screen PAL Version Credits: James Earl O'Brien: Code, Graphics, Sound Thank You To: Philip Blackman @splendidnut: 48px score kernel Andrew Davie @Andrew Davie & Darrell Spice Jr. @SpiceWare: Programming Tutorials Stella Team: Stella The amazing Atari Homebrew Community!

It's the last day to get this done as tomorrow is the reveal day! I've just implemented sound into the game. Is it good sound? No. Is it good-enough-for-now-sound? Yes! It's just a very basic sound engine that I can improve upon later as I progress with the game. It gives enough feedback to what's happening on the screen. When you do something good, there's a good sound. When you do something bad, there's a bad sound! 🙂 I'll continue to work on the game until tonight as I still need to fix the score kernel. It's kind of doing what I want, it's almost there, but it's not displaying quite right. I'll have to step through the code to see where it's going wrong but I think I can fix it in time for tomorrow. I also would like to change one of the hardware based collisions to a software based one. I think I can do it fairly easily but we'll see, there are two very different data tables that need to be compared. It's not the end of the world if I can't get that implemented in time for tomorrow. - James UPDATE 1: Added more difficulty with level advancement. UPDATE 2: Implemented a very important gameplay element of "Warning Condition" UPDATE 3: Added the final touches to the enemy animation. Got the score working and learned all about BCD. Improved the font for the score now that I can see it! Game is FULLY ready to show tomorrow but I'd like to polish up a few things in the time I have tonight. 20240328 Build: ✓ Improved Score Font ✓ Display Score ✓ Final Animation of Enemy ✓ Implemented Warning Condition ✓ More difficulty with level advancement ✓ Basic Sound

Updated WIP: Drone Patrol by Steve Engelhardt @Atarius Maximus / JAM @H3xaFli6ht (Music) | WIP Binary (20240328) PLAY ON JS7800 | Listing Updated: Mar 28, 2024

ZeroPage Homebrew has the Exclusive World Premiere of ZPH's Secret New Atari 2600 Homebrew on tomorrow's ZPH stream LIVE on Twitch! Hope you can join us! THE DAY HAS ARRIVED! Tomorrow we have the EXCLUSIVE WORLD PREMIERE of the very first Atari 2600 homebrew made by the host of ZPH! James has been working on the game for the last month and is ready to reveal this early WIP of his brand new port! What could it be? Make sure you tune in for this stream, see you LIVE in the Twitch chat! Fri Mar 29, 2024 | LIVE @ 12PM PT | 3PM ET | 7PM GMT WATCH LIVE: https://twitch.tv/zeropagehomebrew/ WATCH LATER: https://youtube.com/zeropagehomebrew/ Games: Secret Homebrew from ZPH (2024 Exclusive World Premiere WIP | 2600) by James Earl O'Brien @ZeroPage Homebrew Coarse Blade (2024 Exclusive World Premiere Final | 2600) by Ketil Ronne @Magovinna Easter (2024 Final | 7800) by Karri Kaksonen @karri