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tjb

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Posts posted by tjb

  2. Posted

    I know that this is an a2600 forum...I haven't seem Albert and co stock anything for the Atari 8bit....it's still an atari isn't it

     

    Perhaps Albert will rectify that next year and can experience the great service that you peeps seem to be experiencing

     

    I notice though the AA mainly and only deals with software and printed matter, what about getting into hardware...or even better as AA is one of the leading if not the leading Atari related websites or atari related forums, why not offer an 'eBay' alike service...but also covering 'non' atari product as well

     

    Part of the problem is that there just isn't that many homebrews being developed for the 8-bit. At least that's the way it seems.

     

    tjb

  4. Posted

    Help! I've been working on porting my Rasteroids game to the 5200 and I can't seem to read the joystick correctly. In order to read the horizontal position I'm using the shadow register for POT0 ($0011) and that seems to work fine. I was expecting to be able to read the shadow register for POT1 ($0012) to get the vertical position but it doesn't seem to change when the stick is moved. Any ideas or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

     

    Thanks,

    tjb

  10. Posted

    I have both and personally I like the 800XL better. To me the keyboard has a much better feel and I prefer a top-loading cartridge port. The cartridge port on the 65XE is at the back of the machine. It's less convenient and more importantly, less stable. In my experience moving the machine while a cartridge is plugged in to the back can cause the cartridge to become loose usually frying (temporarily) the cart. Other than that they are pretty much the same. The only other difference I can think of is the built in BASIC. I believe the 65XE has the final revision C whereas the 800XL might have the buggy revision B. I'm sure someone will chime in and verify or correct me on this.

     

    That's my 2 cents.

     

    -tjb

  12. Posted

    Having the ship's velocity not affected by impacting objects kinda makes things easy.

     

    I think a destructive shield would probably be more hazardous to the player - a large asteroid could theoretically break into 3 or 4 pieces which would be a surefire cause of mayhem.

     

    Right now the ship's velocity is impacted if the ship happens to be moving at the time. It's possible to bounce back and forth between Asteroids. I'm wondering if the ship should be knocked back (so to speak) when an object strikes it and it's not moving.

     

    -tjb

  13. Posted

    Progress has slowed considerably since real life has intervened. I’ve had to do more programming for a living than usual so I haven’t much time to devote to the project. That said, I have just about finalized the shield behavior. The plan is to have everything the ship encounters – asteroids, alien bullets, even the alien – bounce off the shield. There will be a power up that will enable a “destructive shield” which will cause asteroids to take damage or be destroyed (in the case of the smallest ones) upon contact. The alien will also be destroyed (with points awarded) and alien bullets will simply explode harmlessly. The destructive shield will remain in effect until the current ship is destroyed. Other power ups will include a bonus ship, more shield time, bonus points, and maybe double point values (until the current ship is destroyed). I also want to put more challenges as well. I’m thinking of having a comet which cannot be destroyed but whose course may be changed with several bullet hits. I’m also considering adding the “death star” hexagon that breaks apart ala Asteroids Deluxe if I have enough memory for the sprites necessary.

     

    Besides the shield I’ve been working on organizing the code to make it ROMable. Anyway, here’s a video that shows the current state of the shield. Note how the alien bullets bounce off the shield. Also, the shield time is temporarily infinite to facilitate testing.

     

    -tjb

     

    rast10192006.zip

  18. Posted

    Tjb...

     

    If there is a 5200 homebrew/hack that isn't getting attention from AtariAge... something must be wrong. I'm interested in ALL new titles that will be available for the 5200, and love it when homebrew and hack programmers work on the 5200 platform.

     

    Will you be releasing a ROM image to demo the game... and will it be available in ROM format in the final release?

     

    Yes on both counts. There will also be an 8-bit cart release as well.

     

    -tjb

  19. Posted

    I don't know if you are aware of this or not but I am currently working on an Asteroids clone for the Atari 5200/8-bit entitled "Rasteroids". The basic game is pretty much finished and I am currently looking into adding some power ups, an aliens-only "wave", etc. It's done in Graphics 8/Antic Mode F so it doesn't have the nice colors of the 7800 version. I have an on-going post about it under the Atari 5200 / 8-bit Programming forum if you're interested. I'd be interested in hearing any ideas you have on game enhancements. I've attached a video so that you can get some idea of what it looks like. I'll post a more recent one later as this one only shows the use of hyperspace and not the shield. On the 5200 version I plan to take advantage of the joystick to allow you to use shield, hyperspace, and flip at any time. Currently the 8-bit version uses the space bar (like Defender) to activate Hyperspace while the Shield is activated by pulling back on the stick. I'd like to publish it in time for Christmas but so far I've gotten very little response from AtariAge. Let me know what you think.

     

    Thanks,

    tjb

     

     

     

    rast09162006.zip

     

    Wow the game looks really good so far,nice job.

    I don't mean to nitpick but the ufo ships do seem to be moving just a tad too fast,I mean it looks hard just to get a fix on them because theyre gone before you know it. Everything else looks damn fine so far,amazing job.

     

    I know I would pick a cart up should it ever become available. Hope it works out. C'mon Atari Age,get the ball rolling here. :ponder:

     

    Thanks for the kind words and encouragement. I assume you're referring to the smaller alien ship. I need to slow it down a bit. The idea was that the smaller one would be faster and a better shot than its larger counterpart.

     

    -tjb

  20. Posted

    I don't know if you are aware of this or not but I am currently working on an Asteroids clone for the Atari 5200/8-bit entitled "Rasteroids". The basic game is pretty much finished and I am currently looking into adding some power ups, an aliens-only "wave", etc. It's done in Graphics 8/Antic Mode F so it doesn't have the nice colors of the 7800 version. I have an on-going post about it under the Atari 5200 / 8-bit Programming forum if you're interested. I'd be interested in hearing any ideas you have on game enhancements. I've attached a video so that you can get some idea of what it looks like. I'll post a more recent one later as this one only shows the use of hyperspace and not the shield. On the 5200 version I plan to take advantage of the joystick to allow you to use shield, hyperspace, and flip at any time. Currently the 8-bit version uses the space bar (like Defender) to activate Hyperspace while the Shield is activated by pulling back on the stick. I'd like to publish it in time for Christmas but so far I've gotten very little response from AtariAge. Let me know what you think.

     

    Thanks,

    tjb

     

     

     

    rast09162006.zip

  21. Posted · Edited by tjb

    Ok, I just received a couple of these puppies from a vendor on Ebay for $12.95 each (plus shipping of course). I opened one up and it is a complete copy of the original CX-40! I played a few games with it briefly and my first impression is that it's great! The price might be considered a little high but its still $7 cheaper than Best Electronics and B & C Computervisions.

     

    -tjb

    post-8855-1159312616_thumb.jpg

    post-8855-1159312638_thumb.jpg

    post-8855-1159312671_thumb.jpg

    post-8855-1159312719_thumb.jpg

  22. Posted

    Check out it link... http://cgi.ebay.com/2-NEW-JOYSTICK-CONTROL...1QQcmdZViewItem

     

    There's a slew of these on eBay. The auction states "JUST MANUFACTURED NEW 3RD PARTY ATARI 2600 JOYSTICKS." Any idea who is making these and if they can be purchased outside of eBay? If anyone has bought one, how durable are they? My guess is these are low quality knock-offs, but would love to be wrong. Any chance these are leftovers from the run of Flashback 2 systems?

     

    The "buy it now" price really isn't bad considering Best Electronics charges $20 and B & C ComputerVisions $19.95 for a CX-40 joystick. They look just like the CX-40. Have you sent the seller a question asking who the manufacturer is?

     

    -tjb

  23. Posted

    I think there is interest, I'm actually disappointed there isn't more coding for the 5200 done since its an 800 with a different memory mapping and its got just as many coding tools as the 2600, just needs more interested coders.

     

     

    What we need to see are several ports never available -

     

    Adventure on the 5200 (yes I know we have ADV2 coming....)

    Yars' Revenge

    Caverns of Mars

     

    and there are a TON of others just begging to be done on the 5200.

     

     

    Nice board CPU!

     

     

     

    Curt

     

     

    I agree that there doesn't seem to be much interest in 5200 development compared to 2600 development. For what its worth I'm trying to do my part. I'm currently working on an Asteroids clone for the 5200 and home computers. Here's a short video:

     

    rast09162006.zip

     

    Getting back to the cart, I for one could use the extra memory for sprite data among other things. I could create enough Asteroid frames to smoothly rotate the Asteroids. Great work!

     

    -tjb

  24. Posted

    It seems like the Atari crowd is more active in the homebrew scene.

     

    CSDB currently lists 918 Homebrew game releases and 133 WIP games.

     

    This is my favourite project right now: Eye of the Beholder I C64

     

    Maybe they can't compete with the activities of the Atari crowd, but there's impressive C64 projects to be found as well I think.

     

    Wow, evidently there is alot going on in the C64 homebrew scene. I just didn't know where to look! I've been looking for the Commodore equivilent to AtariAge for some time. I've asked Commodore specific questions but usually get little or no response. Could it be because I'm asking on an Atari site? :)

     

     

    -tjb

  25. Posted

    Latest Progress:

     

    The shield position is now adjusted properly as the ship rotates. Also, rather than causing the ship to bounce off Asteroids, the shield now damages large and medium Asteroids and destroys small ones. You are only allowed to deploy the shield for a few seconds. There is now a bar under the available ships area that shows how much shield time is left. Shield time is recharged for each reserve ship. The ship's thrust is now working properly. The rest of the changes are mostly minor tweaks. Asteroid size is now taken into account when an Asteroid nears a screen edge.

     

    The next major task is sound. As usual I've attached a video. I even remembered to turn off artifacting this time... :D I can't wait to finish this so I can go on to other Atari 8-bit projects.

     

    -tjb

     

    rast09012006.zip

    And what are you planning to do past Asteroids? :-)

     

    I'd like to try my hand at producing at least one or two more clones of Vector-based games. Someone mentioned Space Duel earlier. That would be cool. I'd also like to do a clone of Armor Attack (Vectrex). Aside from that I've always wanted a version of Rampart for the 8-bits. The list goes on...

     

    -tjb

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