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Omegamatrix

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Posts posted by Omegamatrix

  1. Posted

    Hello CatPix, if you can please post a picture of the menu screen. Also, does it play a tune? Actually a video would be even better.

     

    Without seeing it I am guessing it is the existing menu screen we have dumped before. However there are at least 3 variants of it and only 2 have been dumped. I am curious if this is a 4th variant.

    • Like 1

  3. Posted

    On 2/4/2020 at 4:13 PM, bogax said:

      

        tay
    and #%000000111
    tax
    tya
    lsr
    lsr
    lsr
    tay
    lda dis_solid,y
    and  number_to_bit,x
    rts

     

    If dis_solid is the byte array stored in ram, and that number_to_bit is a rom table, then interchanging X and Y in this routine will save one byte. This is because the LDA dis_solid,Y will compile to Absolute,Y mode which is 3 bytes. LDA dis_solid,x can use Zeropage,X mode which is only 2 bytes. So:

      

        tax
    and #%000000111
    tay
    txa
    lsr
    lsr
    lsr
    tax
    lda dis_solid,X
    and number_to_bit,Y
    rts

     

    • Like 2

  5. Posted

    Hello James, I have some discussion for the awards, and how it pertained to Venture Reloaded.

     

    A year ago I started creating Venture Reloaded with a goal of having a finished game ready for the awards competition. Venture Reloaded was originally a homebrew which was developed to the point of having a Treasure Screen and a new Goblin Room screen. At that stage it was apparent that I would not be able to finish the game in time for the competition. I made a difficult choice to change course and do a hack instead, because it allowed me to finish the game in time and reach my goal.

     

    A lot of people have made comparisons of Venture Reloaded to a homebrew. Let me say this. Venture Reloaded is a hack. It was always be a hack, and there should be no discussion that it is not a hack. Please understand this though. Hacks can be great. They can be things that people enjoy, and they can transform a game's experience. Hacks can certainly reach the quality level of homebrews. It is even possible for hacks to be in a conversation about some of the best releases of the year. Overall hacks are still games, and from a games perspective they should be part of any awards ceremony that celebrates the very best of games for the year.

     

    Quite honestly, I have poured my heart and soul into creating Venture Reloaded. Words can not describe my disappointment of learning at the end of November that the Hacks category was not only removed, but that my game would not be allowed to compete in any category. That information would have been most useful back in March. That would have given me a chance to make Plan C whatever that might have been. Still though, I could not help but wonder why hacks were not allowed in categories like best graphics, best music, best packaging, and so on... These categories seem like natural fits.

     

    For Venture Reloaded let me say this. If a game is compelling enough to be an instant must-buy at release, but can not enter a competition that celebrates the best of games for the year, than something is broken. I am proud of my game. Hey, it is the only port of Venture that has scaling rooms, and that's on the 2600 of all systems! The music too is pretty good for TIA and it was challenging. I spent weeks just on that part. It would have been great if Venture Reloaded had been allowed to compete in best graphics and best music. It would have been amazing if Venture Reloaded had been allowed to compete in an unconditional game of the year. It wouldn't have won, but that would've felt right. The quality of this game is there. This is not a simple 5 minute hack. This is literally hundreds and hundreds of hours of work. This is my blood, sweat, and tears. I worked harder on this than anything else I've ever done on the 2600, and I've done a lot. I feel this has raised the bar for hacks. It deserved a chance. That's all one can wish for.

     

    Now though… I'm just trying to move on. I've been angry and upset at this for so long that its made me sick. It's ironic when something created for a purpose is not allowed to fulfill that purpose. I just have to accept that Venture Reloaded will never have a Hack of the Year distinction as voted for by the people, because there was none. When people look back to the best of lists for 2600 games for 2019, this game is missing. It's almost like vaporware, and this feels awfully, awfully bad.

     

    Hacks have always been a staple of AtariAge ever since its inception, were featured in Stan's Awards, and were on the ZPH awards last year. Unlike demos there is no other place that is covering them or picking them for awards, and certainly none at the level of ZPH, which is the premier event of the year. Removing them was completely unexpected and finding out at the end of the year came quite frankly as a blindside.

     

    Honestly though, I mean no hostility here. I am not posting this to crap on the awards. If any of this is coming out harsh than I apologize, truly. I am trying offer feedback as best as I can. It's just really hard to find the right words with how everything went down, and I'm doing my best. I sincerely hope you put hacks back in for next year. They should belong. Venture Reloaded is done and gone, but I hope that I've made the case for hacks having inclusion.

     

    The awards show itself is great, and is the premier event of Atari games awards. You and your team did a great job this year, truly. It was very professional. I feel these awards deserve games like Venture Reloaded just as much as games like Venture Reloaded deserve to be a part of the awards. I believe a path forward does exist, and it can be a beautiful one, which only gets better.

     

    Thank you for reading. Please give it some thought.
    Jeff
     

    • Like 4

  6. Posted

    On 1/31/2020 at 8:57 PM, Andrew Davie said:

    It's a bit ironic really. To put the "good" moves first is a good idea, because it reduces the search tree. But to know which moves are "good" is the whole point of the search tree - you traverse it to find the "good" moves. If you already know which are "good" then why do you search the tree?  And the answer is, you don't know which is the "best" "good" move - you only have an idea of what might be "good". And sometimes, all the "good" moves are in fact "bad".  

    Searching for good moves sounds a little bit of like a chicken before egg, or egg before chicken kind of thing, eh?

     

    I read you post twice to try and absorb it all. Sorting absolutely makes sense to have a better chance of hitting the best solution early on. Loved the talk of logic deciding how to prune the branches. 

  7. Posted

    From your response I'm still not sure if you are swapping files or not, but basically you do need to replace both "DPCplus_kernel.asm" and "score_graphics.asm" with the versions that I put in post 96 otherwise it won't work. The instructions for usage are in post 96 as well as post 97.

  8. Posted

    1 hour ago, Lillapojkenpåön said:

    I just remembered that I tried to add the extra letters in a dpc+ project a couple years ago, but the score graphics ends up in bank 1, that only has a couple bytes free, so I could only fit one letter 😁 maybe it has shrunk by now but I don't think so.

    I haven't looked at this in six years, but the way you described the problem makes me think you didn't replace the "DPCplus_kernel.asm" file with the one in my zip file, or maybe you didn't use the switches. Doing so you should be able to use the extra digits without any space penalties. I carved a lot of bytes out of the DPC+ kernel and that is the one in the zip file.

    • Like 1

  10. Posted

    Yeah, Albert's founding partner in crime was Alex, and it's his picture that I notice is always on my milk carton when I sit down to enjoy the latest batch of AA boxed releases.

     

    Realizing now that Alex H is also gone makes me think the situation might be much worse than we thought... Its gotta be someone flipping through the white pages to randomly pick out Alexes. Speaking of which, has anyone heard from alex_79 lately?

    • Haha 2

  13. Posted

    1 hour ago, ZeroPage Homebrew said:

    Next year we have plans to introduce more categories with possibilities such as ARM vs non-ARM or Ports vs. Original or even maybe an additional size category.

    What is your provision for handling ports that are just loosely based? While most ports are trying to be arcade perfect there will be some that deviate quite a bit adding a whole bunch or original context which may take the game in a whole new direction. I think it is important to recognize that. It may still end up being all the same category but new ideas should be somehow recognized for what they are especially if it fundamentally changing some of the game play elements.

  14. Posted

    1 minute ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

    I am not sure if the Atari could have handled that back then, but I am very sure that such a cart would never have been profitable. A 486DX2-66 was around $500 for the CPU alone.

    Not sure about the profitably, but I equate that point to saying one can not use certain programming tricks or techniques in a 4K game that were unknown back in the day. It becomes rather speculative when we are now in 2020 and building games with a whole pile of knowledge.

  15. Posted

    1 hour ago, batari said:

    I hope he doesn't categorize ARM games in their own category unless there is also an unconditional "best game" category as well.

    An unconditional best game category is a great idea. No holds barred, just let the people have their choice.

     

    To me unconditional is just that. It implies that it doesn't matter how the game is constructed for this category and anything goes. It absolutely does not mean it has to be the only best game category, but it should exist and could ease the tension on both sides of the debate.

    • Like 1

  16. Posted

    15 minutes ago, RevEng said:

    I'll make you eat those words!

    When I get to the cartridges I chew every bit before I swallow every byte. Sometimes I even eat the bit rot too. I am wondering if Al can start making shells out of compressed sticky rice though. It might be a new thing... just need a little hot sauce packet included in the box.

    • Haha 1

  17. Posted

    2 hours ago, RevEng said:

    I wish seemo would be widely recognized for the wildly original designer he is, but it is what it is.

    I have to say, Seemo was the first person I thought of when I heard about the Lifetime Achievement Award. The creativity flows very strongly in that one, and the imagination and execution are in such sync that it is uncanny.

     

    Seemo just does his own thing for the sheer joy of it. Whether people get it or not doesn't seem to bother him. He just keeps going to a beat all his own. He has my upmost respect, and I feel he doesn't at all get the credit that he deserves for the great work he does. His stuff seems to slide under the radar because it does not quite hit that mainstream popularity vibe. Again though, he just keeps going on and creating like none of that maters. I have great respect for that man.

     

     

    • Like 4

  18. Posted

    11 minutes ago, AW127 said:

     

    And this would be only necessary in certain areas. When it comes to things like the box, labeling, manual, stickers, posters and all that stuff around the game, of course ALL Atari-2600 or even ALL new games (i dont now how it is in the moment in this area?) can and should be in the same competition. No one here has an advantage from the beginning on then, so it does not matter.

     

    I absolutely agree that packaging has nothing to do with how the game is built, and every game from every category should be included there.

     

    However, I have heard ARM game boxes taste better. Myself I tend to stick to eating instructions only as I am a Manualtarian. We might need to break the packing category down further by "most digestible".

    • Like 1
    • Haha 2

  20. Posted

    I don't think there is a magical mixture of votes that will somehow scale how games should be judged for the better. After all every vote should count, but saying some votes are more important than others is just not right and borderline discriminatory.

     

    That being said it does sound like James is considering taking ARM games into their own category. This might be a step in the right direction, but it's a slippery slope. It's very clear none of us can agree on where the boundaries of categories should be. That introduces problems of what to do with new bankswitching schemes, games with extra ram, games that are not programmed in 6502 assembly, and whatever else "enhances" a game. There are grey areas everywhere.

     

     

    • Like 2

  21. Posted

    Listen, I know you are all worried about the ARM processor. I am here to tell you the real danger is the LEG processor (Lethal Energetic Gamemaker).

     

    @Albert clones 49 to 72 had these chips embedded in them. Now I am not saying that they are fully cyborg, but the impact was undeniable. Literally hundreds of Galagon's were being produced at a rate that just wasn't... human. It was almost as if these things were self replicating. It got so bad the store was shut down with a sign that Albert was on vacation. Which Albert? We know there are several of them working 24/7. Honestly I think it's a decoy and they are building an army. I am seriously thinking of digging up my floor to build a shelter, except that it is concrete. So I got to re-think this whole thing...

    • Like 1
    • Haha 4

  24. Posted

    2 hours ago, NinjaWarrior said:

    I missed out gettiing this Game a few years ago at Dimple, When they got in a Crap ton of VCS Carts

     

    But, Why does it hold it Value, I know it's a Good Game, I got it on my Wii..Play it though StellaWii

     

     

    If you ever get the chance than try my trackball version. It's a game changing experience.

     

    I also created the start up intro screen, so that you know it takes place A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away....

    • Like 4
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