Working on a new game

[Working on a new game]

- IMO the player falls a bit too fast but moves too slow horizontally.

Heh, personally I thought it was the other way around. The gravity is actually a bit weaker in demo #4 though.

- while the player isn't moving horizontally, you should disable or change the animation.

Yeah, I've been meaning to redo the animation entirely.... drawing is hard though

BTW: I noticed the game is 4K now.

And I've already used up most of it

[Working on a new game]

Ok, I've been working hardly on Fall Down, and I think it's approaching a point where it might actually be fun to play (well... sort of). So I have a new version for everyone to try out....

 

New stuff:

 

Gradius-style powerups - you can collect little squares and press the fire button to apply them. Currently using 1 gives you a short speed boost, 2 digs a hole in the platform beneath you, 3 gives a longer speed boost, and 4 swaps your position with the other player (in 2 player mode).

 

An AI player. Currently it's not very smart - it doesn't go after the powerups, though it does use them when it gets in trouble.

 

A title screen, with the high score shown on it. Select changes game modes (1 player, 1 player vs. AI, 2 player) and fire starts the game.

 

Jumping. Really the only use for it now is to grab powerups, though I have some plans...

 

X-acceleration. Well, everyone seemed to like this in Alex's game, so why not...

 

And lastly.... some bugs. The guy's feet can disappear at the bottom of the screen sometimes. I think I could maybe fix this one, but it would be a lot of work for something that only shows up rarely. Thoughts?

fd_31jul04.zip

[My 1st Atari 2600 game (Man Goes Down)]

Hello again

 

The power-ups make things a bit more fun I think, compared to the version you posted before. This is really a game that punishes greed...

 

Would it be possible to have a power-up that let you wrap around the edges? Also the Joust idea sounds fun

[Working on a new game]

Just so Alex can't have all the attention, I've put together an update.

 

Unfortunately my hard drive is dying, so I didn't get as much stuff into this one as I would have liked. Still no title screen, alternate game modes, AI players, etc.

 

What I have done is put in a whole new scoring system - the idea is that the platforms are 'captured' by either player, giving one point each time. When a platform is captured, it changes color to match the player that got it, which looks nice I think.

 

Also the platforms have color gradients now.

fd_11jul04.zip

[Working on a new game]

Aaron:  I like your 2 player mode.  1 player vs. CPU would also be pretty cool - any chance of this?

Yeah, I've been hoping to get to that eventually. I don't think it would be too hard... all it would do is go left or right towards the nearest hole, though if I add jumping it might complicate things.

 

Right now I'm thinking of having a game mode where the players block each other, so jumping would become important... it'd probably be simpler than putting in obstacles at least.

[Working on a new game]

I have an updated version with a second player. It needed a little more trickery than I thought... still, it works and all. Also I improved the graphics a little.

 

Obviously it needs some work still... the second player can't die yet, and the scores really should be independent.

 

Alex - Go Down is pretty cool. The collectibles combined with the player's acceleration are a nice touch. Your sprites look a lot better than mine

 

Nathan - Things to jump over would be kind of fun I think. I'm not sure how I'd fit them into the current kernel though.

fd_30jun04.zip

[Working on a new game]

 

 

You might want to submit this to the Minigame Compo.

Oops, already submitted for the Spectrum but I think that's okay. You might want to read the rules as I haven't read them yet.

 

Hey, now there's a coincidence - I was the author of the original FallDown Forever on the TI-86 Anyway, I don't see anything in the rules about different authors doing the same game, so I'll submit it eventually.

 

I think I've figured out a way to get both players on the screen now, though there's still the problem of actually writing it...

[Working on a new game]

Hello AA forum people.

 

For the past couple weeks, it's been my life-long dream to write an Atari 2600 game, and thanks to Andrew Davie's excellent tutorial I actually have something that kind-of works. It's a recreation of an old TI game called Fall Down - playing it is pretty simple, you just keep falling for as long as you can.

 

I just picked the colors at random, so it probably looks awful... though I think it animates reasonably well at least.

 

I'd like to add a simultaneous 2-player mode (hence the second score counter), but have run into technical problems... I'd need to either move to a 2-scanline kernel or show the players on alternating frames. Or maybe I could use a symmetric playfield instead. Any thoughts on this? Or on the game in general?

fd_24jun04.zip