Ben_Larson

I think the 'freemium' model would work the best if anyone was going to attempt this: i.e. give away the original ROM for free, then have a deluxe version which can be acquired for a small donation. I doubt a donation model by itself would be very effective - if, on the other hand, there was something additional that the person would get for their donation, then I think that would be a stronger motivator to donate. Maybe this deluxe ROM could also have an additional title screen with the person's name or something - thus deterring piracy and also giving them a bit of personalization at the same time.

Very impressive. Kinda reminds me of Berzerk except better (that might be sacrilege to certain people around here but oh well. ). The title screen is also really cool IMO and a nice usage of the system's strengths... Ben

Well I have to give credit where it is due and say that none of the music would have been possible without the frequency and waveform guide written by Eckhard Stolberg . The 2600 music guide by Paul Slocum was also very helpful Basically what Eckhard did (and this was like 10 years ago now judging by the date in the file) was list all of the notes possible using each waveform on the Atari 2600, as well as how out of tune each note is relative to one another. Using this I was able to choose notes that were relatively in-tune and rule out ones that would sound terrible or weren't available at all. Interesting side fact: I actually came up with the melodies on a guitar first, and then 'ported' them to the Atari - in some cases I then had to change stuff around because the notes needed weren't available (or were badly out of tune).

Interesting... ALL I've used for playtesting on the real hardware has been a control pad. So maybe I should test using an actual joystick. Well it's fairly straightforward:

No. That's why I actually added the 3 difficulty levels, to at least give it some replayability. I do have a little Java desktop app I wrote that I used to create the screens (it would have taken forever otherwise). At some point I do plan to release that in case someone wants to make a hack or create a map of their own... Yea - that's why I was going to add the 'continue' screen to make that a little clearer. What's the hardest part do you think - the jumping itself, the enemies, or the not being able to find items and progress? Ben

New beta version. Changes since the last beta version: * Fixed graphics bug when jumping off a ladder * Fixed sound effect bug when in a room w/ more than 1 object * Added new sound effects (getting an object or key, opening a door, activating save point, and getting hit by an enemy) I'm thinking about adding a 'Game over - Continue/Quit' screen. Other than that I think I might be finished... *lnocks on wood* Ben Panky_the_Panda_1.0_Beta4.bin

I kinda see where you guys are coming from, but in reality what Curt is doing is not *that* much different than what homebrew authors do. He's also having to work with the technical challenges of the system to create something, only he's creating hardware instead of software. The main problem I see is that the homebrew (software) market is already small as it is - the homebrew market for the add-on is, of course, going to be even smaller. Now if there was some way to write games that could autodetect the expanded capabilities in software and work in an expanded or non-expanded system, that seems like it would solve that problem though...

The SMS was pretty god awful IMO. But at least it didn't look like it got rejected from the Fisher-Price factory like the even-worse-looking SG-1000. The Bally Astrocade is pretty ugly too - kinda looks like what you'd get if an original 2600 and a Master System mated...

At least it died finely with it's honor intact instead of a shameful death...

Too late! So where can I apply for a refund? I'd like my attention back please. P.S. I love the new death animation. edit: I made a map of the game. It's zipped so if people don't want to see it, they won't have to. This map exposes hidden places and areas affected by items. I don't know if there are more hidden areas, but all the ones needed to complete the game are shown. It does not tell you in what order you need to find the keys or items, so a little figuring out is left to the player. I also don't tell you which items you need to use to activate certain things. That's easy enough to figure out and I didn't want to completely ruin the experience. If you don't mind some spoilers, then download, unzip, and enjoy the map. If you want to find your own way around the game, then by all means DO NOT open this map. Items shown on the map: Winged boots Cleated boots Whistle (or would that be a recorder or flute?) Candle Bible All Keys Woah, nice map. I think this might make you the second person to beat the game after me, assuming you did beat the game and didn't disassemble the code (which is probably be harder than just beating the game anyway ) Here's some info/hints I intend to put in the manual about the items, for those of you who don't want to ruin it completely by looking at the map. And for those of you who are super-purists who don't want to know ANYTHING, I've hidden this text

Who HASN'T?

Ok, the version I just posted earlier has a dumb bug that allows you to select the spikey boots even if you don't actually have them (during the falling-off-the-screen sequence after getting hit), so here's a new NEW version that fixes that. PAY NO ATTENTION TO THAT PREVIOUS VERSION. Panky_the_Panda_1.0_Beta3.bin

Here's a new beta version. Changes since the last one are: * Added a death sequence when you hit an enemy, spikes, etc. * Fixed screen roll issues when entering some rooms * Tested on real hardware (thanks to my new Harmony cart) and tweaked all the colors to make text more readable, reduce color bleed, etc, on real TVs. Interesting side note: I don't know if this goes for all 7800s, but both my 4-switch and 2600Jr. seem to have much more vibrant output with less color-bleed than either of my 7800s... I want to add some more sound effects but I'm literally completely out of RAM so I will have to look into the feasability of that... Panky_the_Panda_1.0_Beta2.bin

Well they thought about it. Thing is, for starters, the US isn't a signatory to the International Convention on Video Game Whistles. Second, it's easy to say now with the benefit of hindsight that someone should have levied fines on Atari or something, but you have to remember, this was all during the S&L crisis back in the States. Nobody in Europe wanted to exacerbate the economic crisis across the pond and possibly start a trade war over Atari's stubborn whistle intransigence, and of course US regulators had their own hands full at the time...

Ok. I just want to point out that I, for one, was already aware of the whistle gap, like, a while ago, and that the latest homebrew I've been working on has a whistle in it. So... YOU'RE WELCOME. ok it's acutally a flute. sue me.

Yea, I kinda feel that the Beatles are maybe a little overrated as well, although maybe I just need to listen to them more - I dunno. To be honest, I don't really own any of their albums - although I am in the process of borrowing some stuff from my father in law. After I complete my review maybe I can give a more balanced answer. Who is this Jesus guy?

Here's an even newer version. I did a couple play-throughs myself and changed a few parts which I thought were kind of unfair in terms of jumping challenges and lack of save points. There's still a bunch of secrets in the game that you need to discover in order to finish it, so it may still be kind of unfair without a manual and/or hints (especially based on modern gaming standards). I guess I would like some feedback in that regard - i.e. how hard it is to find things and discover items, secret rooms, and how use items. I'm calling this one beta 1, since I think new feature development is pretty much done at this point. Ben Panky1.0Beta1.bin

Ok new version. I added the final ending sequence (which will remain secret of course), and 3 levels of difficulty for replayability purposes: normal, hard, and impossible. Normal gives you the normal 3 lives, whereas hard gives you 2, and impossible 1, for those of you who enjoy punishment and throwing controllers across the room. This addition of the difficulty selection means that I had to remove the game subtitle from the title screen... so I think that should please those of you who don't like the title. Of course... the backstory and game subtitle are still part of the official Panky the Panda canon, though, since retconning the storyline is obviously impossible at this late stage in the game. But yea... hopefully this compromise will suit everyone. So I think everything is about done now except I need to change some things around so that sound effects work right in every room. Feel free to provide any additional feedback... pp.bin

I think this is maybe the most impressive thing I've ever seen on the Atari 2600. Thomas, I assume you're using the extra RAM of the M-network scheme to draw the wireframe, right? Also how are you doing all the transformation math?

Thanks clearing that up But how do the ghosts decide who to chase? Whoever has the most ghost aggro?

Making a game like SMB or Zelda is probably hundreds of man hours of work, minimum - that's I think the main reason there aren't more such homebrews for the NES. It's a multi-year commitment, minimum, if you're working alone. Here's some other NES homebrews you might have missed though. I think many of these are incomplete, but some of them are very professional: http://bobrost.com/nes/games.php

The 7 year anniversary of this thread is approaching on the 15th BTW. I'm sure Inky already knew that, though.

Hey guys, I decided to utilize the additional ROM space to do some in-game music, so I've been feverishly composing. Here's a new version with the music as well as some sound effects. You won't actually hear all of the songs (3 of them in total) unless you make some progress in the game, so here's another binary which just plays the songs and allows you to cycle through them by pressing select. The songs are pretty simple, but I still had to utilize Eckhard Stolberg's 'Atari 2600 VCS sound frequency and waveform guide' pretty heavily (along with my guitar). As you may be aware, the 2600 has notoriously weird sound pitch generation and the 'notes' (if you even want to call them that) are all over the place in terms of frequency and fitting into any sort of 12-note western music scale and not sounding terribly off-key. In fact if I didn't know any better I'd say the 2600's music capabilities might be better suited to play Arabic music or something... Anyway, enjoy... pp.bin songdemo.bin

Hmm I think I will check this out this year. Somehow I missed it last year - I think I was out of town or something...

I doubt Nolan will come back here and read this thread, but here's my question anyway: Steve Wozniak claims in his book that he basically offered the Apple II design to Atari via Al Alcorn but was told that Atari was too busy with the video game market to do it. Is that true and do you remember Al or anyone else ever mentioning it?