Sporadic

No more news at present unfortunately. We've all been too busy with other things and life in general.

Hi and welcome! Sorry this is going to be brief as it's a flying visit from me. The X and y coordinates are in 16.16 fixed point integer format. Therefore if you just view the number, it will be very large. You have a few options; 1. Shift the number right by 16 (eg. xpos>>16) 2. Use the other property sprite[].x_ (This auto shifts the number for you) The bin2asc stuff..... We might have just forgotten to update that part of the docs for the new command. But yeah, down shift the number and use rapPrintInt

The main key for me was to not rush. Don't fire engines on all cylinders and expect to stay in control. Take your time, sit back relax, get a feel for the controls, learn to drift, let gravity do the work for you, use the pro pad L/R thrusters and the auto-centre button to straighten up. There's nothing quite like drifting sideways through a tunnel just blipping the engines to keep altitude.

JagStudio 1.1 has been released! We are now feature complete with Raptor 2.0.20. If you already have JagStudio installed, then to upgrade; - Backup your existing JagStudio folder. - Extract the new zip. - Copy the new JagStudio folder over the top of your existing one. (Obviously this will undo any changes you might have made to the example projects, but you can always copy those from your bakup). Head on over to https://jagstudio.reboot-games.com for the download, online docs and details. 1.1 Change log; * Added Angle calculation and direction vector. See example BASIC project 'calcangle' * Added Collision List. See example BASIC project "collisionlist". * Added Z-Sorting for Sprites based on a sprite property. See example BASIC project "zsort". * Added New "fader" BASIC project. Example on how to do CLUT fades. * Added Clock functions. See new clocktest project (BASIC). * Added Raptor Sprite Shift. Eg. rapSpriteShift(xshift, yshift, sprBug1, 3) - See project "spriteshift" (BASIC). * Added Dynamic object scale - See project "shootbang" (BASIC). * Added Simplified version of zeroPlaySample. Now you just pass the start and end addresses - the length and rounding are worked out for you. Eg. zeroPlay(channel,start_address, end_address, frequency, params). * Added Simple way to stop sound on a channel when using Zero player. Rather than the old way of calling zeroPlaySample with 0's. Eg. zeroClearChannel(channel) * Updated All documentation with some further clarity and the new functions. * Fixed BCX Print generating a \n * Fixed Fix build.bat so it creates a <projectname>.s in the build folder for C projects. * Fixed Fix build.bat so it can send ABS files to the JagGD. * Fixed Fix comment in object template for scale max to 228. * Fixed xdivs, xdivu, xmuls, xmulu where sometimes they would use an address register and fail compilation. Have fun and happy coding!

If working from the only released Checkered Flag source code, there's other things to fix too. Such as the missing horizons (although CJ helped extract those and they are in the programming thread, I think), all the random missing 3D hills/mountains (seems like the coords for the Normals are messed up), the rain overlay killing performance (unlike the final release). When having a mess around months ago, I did change the chase camera to more directly follow the car instead of lerping (and taking ages to track the turn speed). That did seem to help a bit in my opinion. Without gaining any performance, it's always going to be painful to drive. Taking the AI and collision routines out (and various other things) didn't really help performance. I even removed most scenery from a track so it had less to draw. It needs a deeper dive to find out where it's losing frames. It's one of those games I really want to like so at some point I'll probably keep poking at it, even just out of curiosity.

Ahh the possibility of hindsight. It's a great thing. It's easy to say now how prices changed over a few years. Perhaps at the time when planning in advance what your last shot might be at releasing a console, you wouldn't want to take too many gambles. This whole topic is hyperthetical, it should be easy to suggest opinion on what Atari could have done at the time without talking down to each other. Aside from any obvious wacky suggestions, there is no right answer. My opinion? It's fun to think "what if" but at the end of the day I don't really give a f***. We probably would have just received countless FMV shovelware titles with no actual gameplay. I enjoyed what we were given at the time and I'm still enjoying it to this day. I certainly never thought I'd be creating content for it.

That's a tough one to answer without knowing more details. I'd say it totally depends what game you are making. There isn't really a right answer here, all sizes have their benefits and weaknesses. You might find that you just have to pick a size and try it. If it doesn't play well, or looks wierd then try another size.

My new DPADs arrived this week for my repro-pro controllers. Thoughts so far? They feel great! I was also quite surprised at how raised these are to the stock dpads but it works. Controls in general just felt tighter and more precise. Thanks again @Bratwurst, great job ?

Simple puzzle games can be a good starter. It helps get you up to speed on the gameplay logic and coding logic. They tend to be (not always) slow paced and can have relatively simple graphics etc. So can ease you into things without worrying about performance, complex logic or fancy graphics etc

I also get that issue when running PAL. If I switch the console to NTSC then the sync is fine. But yeah, PAL is hit n miss.

Nope , that's me ?

Also make sure the path to your graphic is correct and that you don't have it open in another program (in case of file locks). I don't think this will be the issue, but also try a different name instead of SPRITE_ALU. Perhaps try spr_alu in assets and rapinit

Hi and thanks for the feedback! It doesn't have a release date yet and will still be quite a while. I do want to start posting more updates/videos as it progresses though.

Cheers! The horizon is a balancing act between visuals and performance. It's dancing close to the max frame time already. Changing over to the lateral road movement has used up my last round of performance gains. I'm always tweaking and trying to improve performance though (hence partly why the game is taking the time it is) and expanding the road is always on the list.

While I appreciate anyone wanting to create graphics for my games, as I said previously, don't create any artwork unless I've requested it. There's colour and size restrictions, not to mention style. I don't want anyone wasting their time making things I won't use.

Nitrous has had a small but significant update. Something I have been wanting to reinstate into Nitrous for years now is the lateral road movement. I took it out long ago for performance reasons. I am now at a point where I have been able to add it back in and iron out any performance penalties. The outcome? The game feels much more immersive and fun to drive!

There's 2 left a centre and 2 right frames. But that's "borrowed" vehicle graphics at present, not final. As you say, it doesn't use those as skid anims. Just as perspective based on the cars position. So it could be fun to animate a couple more frames in there when skidding as you suggested. But it'll come down to memory available at the end of the day.

The 3 clouds are independent objects that can be adjusted for each stage.

I am cheating and just rotating the single screen image, hence it wrapping instantly. If storage and memory permit, I will extend some of the backdrops so they don't wrap as soon.

The vehicle graphics aren't finalised yet so this is a valid point I can experiment with

No I didn't mean remove it. You'll be able to stop the panel screenshake effect though. But I'm wrestling with frametime here, fullscreen won't be viable I feel.

If you're talking about the UI panel screenshake, I'm planning on adding a strength option for that and allow it to be disabled.

Hi all, here's a little mini update on Nitrous. All GFX, SFX, track layouts/length and general design are still work in progress. Quick video to show a few of the new features; - Screen shake on jumps. - New HUD. - New larger full colour horizons. - Fuel gauge to show distance to stage end. - Nitrous flames. Slipstream to replenish the Nitrous tank. - Other things have also been completed but aren't shown yet in the video.