Can anyone convert Smurfs Rescue in Gargamel Castle 2600 to 5200 or 7800?

[AtariHacker]

Because the Graphics are better for either ANTIC (5200) or MARIA (7800), I wonder if Someone will make a conversion of my favorite game: Smurfs in Gargamel's Castle (and Many others - At least those with the source extracted by DISTELLA)

 

Is there a Good way to convert the Extracted 2600 game source code made from DISTELLA to either the 5200 or 7800,

and also create a Graphics editor/converter for those converted with 2600 to 5200 or 7800?

 

-Atarihacker

Edited August 31, 2007 by AtariHacker

[+batari]

Is there a Good way to convert the Extracted 2600 game source code made from DISTELLA to either the 5200 or 7800,

and also create a Graphics editor/converter for those converted with 2600 to 5200 or 7800?

No.

[AtariHacker]

At least there must be a 6502 ASM to BASIC converter, so I can port it to MANY systems easily with code modifications!

 

If there is a 6502 ASM to Basic converter, then post it here. Please.

[+batari]

At least there must be a 6502 ASM to BASIC converter

Nope.

 

I know I'm sounding a little terse here, so I'll offer a little insight.

 

There really is no useful common ground between the TIA and the ANTIC or MARIA, and assembly language can't be usefully converted to a high-level language that will run well on a system of the same era.

[JamesD]

Even if you disassemble the original game you may not be able to use much of the game logic.

The way the 2600 works is so different that you'll pretty much be designing a game from scratch that plays similar to the original.

[Kurt_Woloch]

I don't see it that harsh. The game logic surely could be lifted from the 2600 version, but only to the extent that it's still determining which object should be on screen and where it should move next. But everything else probably would have to be vastly different since the architecture, though somewhat similar, is quite different.

The question here is if you want to have a 1:1 conversion or if you want to update the graphics. For the background graphics, it probably wouldn't even be avoidable to update them since the 5200 simply has got a higher resolution than just 40 pixels across in 2 colors. For the foreground objects, well, you could keep the graphics as they are, but that would mean you're using only half of the available players, that is, the smurf and enemies could probably look much prettier on the 5200 than it does on the 2600. Anyway, the "kernel" part would have to be rewritten completely, as far as I see it.

For the 7800, well, it depends on what you want to achieve. Without graphics updates, a conversion would make no sense since the 7800 already plays 2600 games. Other than that, the same applies as for the 5200, except for the fact that it would be even harder to keep the graphics as they are... as far as I know, the 7800 doesn't support color-striped, but essentially 1-color objects. On the other hand, you could keep the sound routines the same for the 7800.

[Jess Ragan]

I guess the real question is this... why bother? Smurf was only a decent game, not a great one... and a straight port to the Atari 5200 wouldn't be impressive at all. If you insist on making a 5200 version of the game, you might as well start from scratch.

[Mark2008]

I guess the real question is this... why bother? Smurf was only a decent game, not a great one... and a straight port to the Atari 5200 wouldn't be impressive at all. If you insist on making a 5200 version of the game, you might as well start from scratch.

 

It's not that I don't agree about some of these games not needing any ports :-)

 

But considering that most 2600 games weren't all that complex, starting from scratch isn't a huge issue.

 

Actually this particular game, is not only also a Colecovision game, but also one of the best Colecovision games ever made.

At least according to the number of times the ROM is downloaded....its right up there in the top 5.

 

I would think one would lift the graphics from the Colecovision version...and write the logic from scratch, and...that would be the quickest path to the game.

 

I don't know why, in this day and age, one would'nt just play the colecovision version, however. Die hard atari fan, I guess.

 

In which case, you need to port it to the Jaguar, and redo the graphics completely...

[Crazy Climber]

Because the Graphics are better for either

Just buy a Coleco

[Nukey Shay]

Agreed. It's already higher res on the CV.

 

Although coded routines could be lifted and ported from 1 system to another would be possible (i.e. Space Shuttle), the majority of the program would still need to be designed from scratch. And if you are doing that, it might be easier to redo the entire thing (the routines were coded with the smaller resources of the 2600 in mind...no need to limit yourself). The result would invariably lead to tighter code that doesn't need to follow the 2600's method to accomplish the same things.

 

And an asm to Basic converter is just nonsense. Higher-level languages cannot accomplish what can be done in asm.

[Vic George 2K3]

Atari Hacker is the only voice wanting for a 5200 or 7800 Smurf Rescue conversion? Heck, I would want to see this game get converted to those systems as well.

 

And yes, a Jaguar conversion would be nice. Even if it resembles something like the SNES Smurfs game.

Edited January 16, 2008 by Vic George 2K3