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KevKelley

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Posts posted by KevKelley

  4. Posted

    10 hours ago, KaeruYojimbo said:

    I still haven't made the game that was the idea that got me wanting to learn to make an Atari 2600 game. I'm still building my way up to it. With each game I make I learn something new and get more confident in my abilities. And experimenting with things while learning has led to ideas I never would have had if I had just jumped in and tried to tackle my original idea from the start (and probably prevented a lot of frustration).

    This is what happened to me. I had my original idea. But in my attempt to learn using test programs, those programs took over but I learned a lot. Now looking at my first program I realize I have a lot of work to do but am excited because my original idea feels easier. 

     

    For me I found it easy to pick one small task for the day (since I generally would work on my lunch break) and then try to complete it. I'd do a lot of trial and error to see just how everything worked and make notes. Then later on if look at it with new eyes to see if I can accomplish the same goal better. And when I'm not working on it in reading the forums. Lots of great ideas!

  6. Posted

    When I first got started, after playing around with what I learned from the Tinkernut video and the initial readings on Random Terrain's page, I decided I would make the game I had wanted to make for years, which was ambitious for a beginner. As I continued I wound up changing and adapting my idea to something I could program and if I couldn't I practiced making little programs or injecting snippets of code to see how it worked. 

     

    It was a long and arduous process and I am still learning but I am miles away from where I started and I can now make little games if I choose to putz around for an afternoon on my computer.

     

    I think all the people on this forum have great, sound advice and a lot of experience to learn from. Don't get discouraged!

    • Like 2

  7. Posted

    I updated the binary in the first post.

     

    This includes that little fix regarding the missile heights in Trolley Volley when they disappear. 

     

    While testing I also came across an issue with the obstacles when leaving the Bonus screen.  I reset the coordinates of missile1 after the bonus but when the obstacles are present in the main game this would effectively push them off screen.  I put in a simple check and found a couple redundancies but it works now.  I may look to see if there is a better way, as the bonus reset was in two banks and I have to check to see if I did this for any particular reason or just a result of forgetting.

     

    I am still looking at alterations to the speed of Dock Boy.  I did have it speed up momentarily over 1000 points but saw it stopped shortly after.  I think I accidentally screwed up on the range, as I originally wanted it to speed up after 1000 points and remain.

     

    I have another issue regarding the bonus screen that I may or may not try to hammer out, as space is very limited, and from some testing I found the pacing getting closer to what I think is good.  The walking slower when touching the jack helps a lot.

     

    I also saw the scanlines jump by one or two.  It seems to only happen when moving down and not as often as it once had, but I noticed it was occurring more when I had the conveyor belt speed up. I haven't looked at what @CapitanClassic mentioned a couple posts back but that may help.  I just haven't had a chance to look to deeply into things just yet, hence minor fixes and test playing.

    • Like 1

  8. Posted

    What got me started was I stumbled across the Tinkernut video and that got me a basic idea of the structure of the game and then over the last couple years I had been working on things trying to learn some of the finer points. I still get lost with some of the more complicated ideas but many have helped me along the way... 

     

    The forums are great.

  9. Posted

    @Armscar Coder I am excited to see that you are making physical carts. The artwork looks great! Your game and the inspiration behind it were very personal and touching. I share sentiments with some of the others and had not expected a copy to be free. Whatever you decide is up to you but as others have said, thank you for sharing such a solid and genuine game!

     

    Looking forward to seeing more!

     

  10. Posted

    I was working on changing some of the values.  My observations with moving slower when collision with the pallet jack seemed to get things closer to where I was aiming.  I still have only tested using my computer but I have found that by the time the bonus round becomes accessible, the timer is pretty low so if you do not go into the bonus round, you would run the risk of losing a life.  I may improve the amount of time awarded if it seems you will eventually lose a life no matter what. My goal is to get it to where if you keep moving, grabbing boxes and filling bays, it would be a delicate balance but it is almost there.

     

    Plus, if I keep the slow movement from collision with the jack, I can free up about 40 bytes in the first bank, which may open up some options.

    • Like 1

  11. Posted

    I like the art but there is something about those classic covers. I was having a hard time figuring out what I wanted for mine and it is hard because, in my opinion, you have to reconcile the age of the hardware with everything else.  

     

    When I look at things like video games or board games, my choice is sometimes influenced by these considerations. Would a 1970s game look good with 2020 style artwork? 

     

    I do think your cover captures it all very well.

    • Like 1

  12. Posted

    I usually work on the games on my lunch but recently there have been restrictions on number of people in offices or breakrooms so it is harder for me to set up my laptop for an hour or so. 

  13. Posted

    A couple of the things I am looking at are:

     

    tweaking the timer (still)

    moving setting selections on titlescreen and switches

    possibly adding a little 2nd player functionality to the main game (kind of like the Trash Mania: Remix option)

    maybe add door instead of fire button to access mini games

     

    Some space is very limited so I will see how much I have when I move things around.

  15. Posted

    It has been a really busy month so I had barely had time to work on anything.  My work had experienced its annual inventory process so that was time consuming (maybe inspirational for another game? lol).  There had also been pandemic related inconveniences that have impacted my programming time but I had finally gotten a chance to play around with the code.  I kept the invisible bay doors as I really liked playing with it and plan on swapping it with the jack randomizer bay on the titlescreen but I didn't have the time. I tweaked the timer a bit after a bay is filled to see how that works with pacing, as before it seemed like it was the timer never really diminished. I still have to tweak the bonus from the bonus round but kept it so far if the changes to the timer balance things out a bit, making the bonus round a bit of a reward, especially when things speed up.

     

    I also caught the last ZPH episode and I loved Trashmania: Remix and I kind of saw some similarities in gameplay to Crossdock and apparently some of you did too.  I really enjoyed some of the elements and liked how the player got slower when he picked up trash and got me thinking.  I changed Crossdock to where when you touch the pallet jack you move slower to attempt balancing out the game some more.  As things speed up it is possible to mow down boxes with the pallet jack so this can help calm things down a bit.  It also makes it a little easier to load the corner bays.  I just did a simple collision detection line so I am not sure if I want it to act any different but I want to test it on something other then my computer keyboard, but it did seem promising.  

     

    Anyway, I thought I would add the update in the first post.  I'll continue to test out gameplay and hope to work on it some more in the coming weeks.

    • Like 2

  17. Posted

    I haven't checked to see if it is socketed, as I have read to try reinserting it. It looks as if it happened to sprites as well as characters - the image with the dolphin may be more difficult to notice but as the dolphin swims in the area you can see the effect below.

     

    I am not to familiar with the C64 too much (I only play around with it every once and a while) but I'll have to take it apart to see what's going on. Hope it is an easy fix.

     

    Curious. Is there an alternative to the VIC-II? I only see pulled chips online. 

  18. Posted

    It's been a while since unpowered up the C64. I immediately noticed some issues. I thought it might have been the cable I have so that I can use modern televisions so I tried an RF adapter too but it still persisted. I am not sure if this would be a bad or dying chip or something else. I had replaced the SID chip with a SWIN Sid Ultimate a couple years ago and I don't recall these glitches to exist then.

     

    It seems to only impact halfway down the screen.

     

    Here is what they look like:

     

    IMG_20200801_210433.jpg

    IMG_20200801_205751.jpg

    IMG_20200801_205543.jpg

  21. Posted

    That was the only thing that slowed me down - lack of real time editing. But it was still real easy and the colors horizontal and vertical bars to show where your note is was very helpful. I still need to play around with it some more, as the setup makes it ideal for the type of music I want to make.

     

    My kids loved the music it made too and I plan on putting it in their hands to see what they make.

  23. Posted

    Just got a chance to play with it real fast before bed.  In just a few minutes I was able to make a fun little loop.  Seeing how quick and easy it was to make something with a beat and simple rhythm, this can definitely be of some value in the near future!

     

    While I find the other audio tools cool, there always seemed to be a steep (or maybe steep to me) learning curve to get something good out of it.  The tools are great but I always seemed to have a hard time making something other then some little beeps and boops.  This was fun and I cannot wait to make more with this when I have more time and will love to see if this is updated further, although I think it is amazing as is right now!

     

    Here was a the quick loop I put together -  I plugged it into one of my WIPs just to hear it with a graphic on the screen in Stella.

     

     

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