Lost Dragon
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Posts posted by Lost Dragon
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On 10/30/2020 at 12:17 AM, pjedavison said:Haha, thank you. I do my best to play my role assigned at birth: that of bumbling British nerd.
I suspect this was an early ST title for a lot of people. Microdeal were big supporters of the ST in its early days, and they put out some really great stuff!
Going off memory, didn't they or at least some of their coders, cut their teeth on the Sinclair QL before jumping in on the ST?.
Anywho, delighted i have found your threads, off to check out your videos.
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4 hours ago, agradeneu said:How are those related to Jaguar?
This thread was created by Jagginguk to promote the GTW BOOK, his O. P:
The Bitmap Books people that do amazing quality books have a new one coming out that looks like it will have some things of interest in it for us Atari fans. It is all about the most famous games that were never made and features 80 games and is over 600 pages. I can swear for the quality of these guys books as their Atari 2600/7800 book is a thing of beauty so there is no reason to think that this one will not be amazing too. It mentions on the promo page that some of the games covered are:
Deathwatch (Atari Jaguar)
Green Lantern (Atari ST, Commodore Amiga, SEGA Mega Drive and Super Nintendo)
Solar Jetman (Amstrad CPC, Atari ST, Commodore 64, Commodore Amiga 500 and ZX Spectrum 128K)
Rolling Thunder (Atari Lynx)
and if you look inside the promo pages for the book there is even more Atari stuff in their too.
I have no affiliation with the guys who make these books but just thought it may be of interest to some of us on here. They really do the most amazing quality books, I bought the Atari 2600/7800 one and am hoping this one will be equally as good when I have the spare money to order one once I am back at work.
https://www.bitmapbooks.co.uk/products/the-games-that-werent?mc_cid=5d7195898b&mc_eid=877f041afd
I have been using this thread as the general updates/bonus content Frank has been adding to the GTW site ever since the GTW Book was released, over the course of a good few weeks now.
Frank's put content out relating to the A8 and ST, as well as Atari Arcade titles.
Lost Games are something of a niche subject, i didn't feel it was worth having a seperate thread for the bonus content being put up for anyone who was interested.
Thread title might have caused some confusion it seems.
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The origins of Lynx Daemonsgate :
https://www.gamesthatwerent.com/2020/12/nightbreed-rpg/
The C64 code was reused for the Lynx version of Daemonsgate.
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On 12/11/2020 at 5:32 AM, Gamemoose said:Talking about time, back in I want to say the late late 80's/early 90's that the talk was "number of levels". I remember reviews going gaga over Super Mario World for having 90 odd levels. Now it's seems like hours along with achievements, loots, etc. is the new measuring stick of being "worthwhile".
It does not seem all that long ago reviewers were openly talking of knocking points off a title at review because it didn't feature any kind of online multi-player mode.
Modern reviews feel like more of a checklist of expected features, rather than a means of helping a consumer decide if the game is worth their time and money.
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1 hour ago, DJ Clae said:Yeah, one would hope for something more general and less biased from a mainstream, non-gaming news source like Forbes.
You don't think Altered Beast on the Genesis was at least a decent arcade port for it's time?
Better than the ST and Amiga ports, yes, but not something for myself that had that much impact.
But then like i never went much on the Arcade original.
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Pity Tynesoft never tried anything like this on the A8:
The BBC/Electron version doesn't look half bad:
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13 hours ago, abbotkinneydude said:I'd reach out to @Jetboot Jack
For now, all we have is a 7800 screenshot glued onto an XEGS setup.
This actually originated from press material provided by ATARI UK at the ATARI SHOW of April 1987 taking place at the Novotel Hammersmith.
It leaked in Pokey! issue #3 (Summer 1987, French language).
I wonder who was responsible for the mock up imagery?
I always enjoyed talking to industry folk about the P. R shots that appeared in the press at the time and finding out if screens were created deliberately in order to give the press /marketing something to run with or if the press had been told these were just mock-up screens, but reported on them as fakes.
Adam Caveman on the Atari and C64 was another we tried to find more on, but the guy who could of answered just couldn't be found, even by his own work colleagues.
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7 hours ago, KidGameR186496 said:Jesuschrist! What platform wasn't Putty Squad planned for? Seriously...
On a related note, I finally talked with Frank about Gotcha! for the Atari Jaguar. He told me that he approached Jonathan Court about the game but Jonathan went silent afterwards. That doesn't surprise me, knowing that Jon works at Creative Assembly and he might be very busy right now but here's hoping Frank manages to unearth more about Jaguar Gotcha! in the future than I could...
That's not been an uncommon occurrence sadly over the years.
In the short time i have known Frank, he has talked of contact with the likes of Bob Armour and Susan Mcbride suddenly ending, emails go unanswered there's not much you can do in these situations.
We had a set of interview questions sat awaiting replies from Frank Cohen, regarding the C64 and A8, Frank was very polite, apologetic, said he would get around to answering them, it never happened and we never heard anything more.
If your looking into a game multiple people worked on, you can try alternative sources, but when it's things like Jaguar Gotcha!, all your eggs are literally in one basket.
You did sterling work getting Bobby Earl to talk (briefly) about Jaguar Toki...
That was a great asset to the community.
I believe Frank had approached him and had no reply.
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On 12/5/2020 at 7:10 PM, IntelliMission said:It loks like Forbes is not particularly impressed with the Series X either:
Forbes: Why The Xbox Series X Is 2020’s Biggest Gaming Disappointment
He's a bit off with his argument for my tastes..
Sonic the Hedgehog was smooth, colorful, responsive, and performed better than any other 2D platformer. Crash Bandicoot on the PS1 was a debut of real-feel 3D. Medal of Honor: Frontline was an indelible hail of bullets and fear as your stormed Omaha Beach on D-Day. Motorstorm on the PS3 had the most realistic graphics I’d ever seen in a racing game. Even RESOGUN proved how incredible and beautiful the PS4 was.
He uses Sonic as an example of an early generation Genesis title, how impressed was he by likes of Super Thunderblade and Altered Beast?
MOH:Frontline i found very disspointing on PS2, loved the original on PS1, but the A. I in particular felt very dumb in Frontline and i was gutted the Xbox recieved Frontline, not Allied Assault.
I went through a stage of buying new platforms on day one, only to find they had their fair share of weak launch titles and I had to wait months for the real killer apps to arrive.
The Sega Mega CD
Atari Jaguar
Sony Playstation 2.
The Atari ST didn't tempt me until Dungeon Master and Starglider II..
The N64 not until Perfect Dark..
I don't see this generation being any different.
It's very early days for both systems.
The author has been very selective in his argument and the article feels like click bait.
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1 hour ago, zzip said:Apple II has a version too, and that system has no hardware sprites!
I went back and reviewed the Apple II and C64 versions for ideas on how the Atari version might be done.
Most of the events in Cali Games have a single character on screen. This means you could combine all the Atari Players and missiles to create a super sprite with extra colors.
Surfing- It looks like the this event could be done in the Atari 5-color character mode, with a wide player (or two) for the surfboard, and the rest of the P/M graphics to render the surfer.
Half-Pipe- 5-color character mode BG, possibly with DLIs for some extra color in spots, all PMs render the athlete/board. The score bubbles don't need to be so fancy.
Skating- 5-color mode with fine scrolling, again all PMs for the skater
Hacky Sack- You could maybe throw DLIs on the sprite to give different shirt/pants and hair color. You could also use DLI to split the sprite vertically so that flair like the seagulls could fly across the top of the screen, and not affect the player. A single player could be used for the hacky sack.
BMX- this might be the biggest challenge since the Bike is so wide. Either the Bike would need to be rendered with wider P/Ms, or render it smaller on screen.
Now you probably won't get all the detail of the C64 version using these techniques, but you should end up with something in between Apple II and C64
Having had zero Apple II experience, i looked up California Games on YT.
Very impressive.
Lacking in detail in places, but not to the point it's an issue, if an Atari coding team could of matched this, it'd been a very impressive addition to the library.
Thanks for opening my eyes to what the Apple II had to offer as well.
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2 hours ago, MrFish said:You're putting Panther in the same class as Green Beret?
😊 Only in terms of they were both games i had first on the XL, then i picked up again on the C64.
Then of course there are games like Thrust... 😂
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Always fantastic to see documents like this being freely shared, it's another missing jigsaw piece with regards to missing A8 titles.
I loved California Games on the C64, but i do wonder just how well it could of been done on the Atari hardware given the PMG limitations.
Things like Panther (even with clever use of the hardware), Green Beret etc, simply didn't work out quite as well.
And as and 800XL owner at the time, before moving onto the C64, it was frustrating seeing games written for the 48K user base, understandable why it was done from a commercial viewpoint, but still 😭
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The April 1991 Issue of Generation 4 has a 2 page exclusive on the Panther, seemingly based on a fax from Atari Entertainment.
Just highlighting these issues of Gen 4 as part of the historical reporting on European Press coverage.
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The February March 1989 issue of Generation 4 Magazine gave a few lines of text in amongst the news of the Konix Multisystem aka Slipstream and Sega Mega Drive, to the 16-Bit ST Console.
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On 11/30/2020 at 12:01 AM, pacman000 said:Probably just faulty old memories.
I expect so, it's asking a lot of folks to accurately account for events so long ago, but he should allow for that when others are asked, rather than just openly question their version of events.
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#Meant to add..
I realise Gary Johnson was probably out by a few years, when he talks of coin-op conversions for the ST, but i always show the exchanges as they come to me.
And given the number of years passed, a margin of error is totally understandable.
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I pulled the above 2 posts from Wayback machine, old Assember thread on the Panther.
Wanted to add the misc info for historical purposes.
Memory was jogged after listening to the Antic interviews with Rob Zybdel, where he suddenly has NO recollection of any ST Console (Project Robin) or Panther...
Just states Jaguar was the Console..
Lynx was before it Rob.
Found it strange he was quick to dismiss a claim Todd made about 2600 Pac-Man:
"Tod's changed a lot over the years. Tod's now denying stories that I don't know, man... He's saying he never asked for more than 4K for Pac-Man. I know that's not true, Tod. I was there when you did."Yet is changing stories himself.🤔-
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Text from EDGE, issue 120, p48..Inside Llamasoft feature.
Jeff Minter talking about the Panther:
'...So when the Panther started to happen, I was well known at Atari UK, and there was at least 1 person at Atari US who also knew me,so I was approached to work on the system-and has often been my weakness-my love of getting onto new,cutting-edge hardware prevailed.'
'Panther didn't last long since it was already being eclipsed by the much more powerful Jaguar that was already in development within Atari.'
'I got involved fairly early on at the time the Beta hardware was 1st available for developers.
Panther was quite a nice machine, definitely superior to the MegaDrive that was current at the time,and better in some respects than the SNES, too..
It was a pretty nice sprite- based system-you could manipulate the sprites on the fly for some interesting effects and it had a nice Ensoniq soundchip,better than anything else out there on console at the time.'I was intending to do a space game, with some Star Raider-y aspects-galactic maps, space shootouts-and some scrolly shooty sections were you went down to planets.There was going to be some strategic aspect in there too, influenced by Ian M Banks Culture novels, which I was quite heavily into at the time.
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I coded up various demos on the Panther-sprite warping, scrolly planet stuff (one of them had masses of leaping antelopes in it, if I remember correctly) and such,but before anything really started to come together into a game the plug got pulled on Panther...'
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From my email chat with Missile Command (ST) Graphics Artist, Gary Johnson:
"I did work with Rob Zdybel back in the day of the years 86 to 89. But not really on any old
Atari Coin-ops to convert. We worked on newer games for the Panther. At this time
I don't remember what they were, because I only did this for a short time till I moved on.
Though back in the years of 81 and 83 I did art of other coin-op games for conversion
for the Atari ST. Rob was not one the programmers during that time.
I hope this helps.
Gary"-
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Atari ST A to Z: Exploring the ST's library of games
in Atari ST/TT/Falcon Computers
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Just subscribed to your channel.
The only thing i remember about this one, is some war or words spat between one of the team, Kevin Bulmer and Darryl Still of Atari UK at the time, over the Atari Falcon.
Bulmer saying something about not supporting the Falcon, as Atari UK had yet to send his to him, Still saying it was sat at Atari UK waiting for Bulmer to pay for it?