Galaga for 8-bits?

[popmilo]

Here's a quick reformat that'd fit on NTSC:

 

galaga ntsc.png

 

looking good ! Better than 7800 version imho.

 

It would probably be quickest and most doable to do it like that (simple multicolor mode, hand pixelated to look similar to original as much as it can).

 

I've remembered what 2600 does often to get more colors - change color per scanline. Here is small test of how it could look like (simple hires, 256x200 screen, one color per line):

 

I like how third enemy type turned out (blue-yellow bee). Head is clearly visible and wings and antennas also look good.

 

ps. It's not Atari colors, it's probably not even 100% possible in real game but maybe gives you some ideas

 

[José Pereira]

@MrFish can you explain in your wich are PFs and PMGs? I can't get some there and perhaps best you post a real size [336x240] screen .png saved from the emulator.

Thanks.

Edited December 22, 2016 by José Pereira

[+Stephen]

Here's a quick reformat that'd fit on NTSC:

 

galaga ntsc.png

 

Please make it so!

[+MrFish]

@MrFish can you explain in your wich are PFs and PMGs? I can't get some there and perhaps best you post a real size [336x240] screen .png saved from the emulator.

Thanks.

 

Actually, I'm not using any P/M's there; I just let the DLI's fall wherever on conversion. I was more concerned with the shapes than what color would be used where.

 

Most likely the white would not be possible on the bugs (but they look fine without it), and you'd use white PM's for the ship and score, as I show below.

 

 

[+MrFish]

You also would have to change the blue to red for the beam -- if you want to have blue/green as the 4th/5th color.

 

So something like this:

 

 

[+MrFish]

Forgot to make room for the captured fighter. Shortened the beam a little too, and brought back the blue using a "false background". It will force you to either use widescreen or P/M's to mask (if not using widescreen).

 

 

[José Pereira]

I am here also with your picture and yes the only way is to use blue and cyan as PF2 and PF3.

To get more vertical scanlines to play the panel must be at the right and for me it seems 40Bytes wide screen mode is enough.

I am also seeing some videos of many versions and there is something you have wrong that is our ship can't be 11pixels because it's too wide compared to the enemys. In all they're all almost the same width. The problem I am trying now is to have our ship similar as possible and good looking but with 9pixels wide.

It also has to be because then we'll use 1Player+1Missile for one ship and leave 3+3 for the sides panel that with DLIs we can then have it in different colours down the screen.

And about number of ships/lives aren't maximum display on the right panel also 3?

Only thing is that on the bottom on our ship scanline we can't have the panel with PMGs, at least 2Players+2Missiles must be for the playing area when we have the 2ships together.

Edited December 23, 2016 by José Pereira

[José Pereira]

Here you have it...

@MrFish is using yours and I got the PMGs in a way that I think it can work:

 

It uses PM0 for our ship on the playing areaand PM1PM2/PM3 are in the panel on "GALAGA", scores numbers and the 3 ships lightest gray.

 

About PFs they are:

BAK: black (00);

PF0: yellow (EE);

PF1: red (26);

PF2: cyan (9A);

PF3: blue (76);

 

While PMGs distributed like I said are on the ships lightest gray (0C), "GALAGA" (B6) or (c6) or any other green you think better.

 

Only thing that needs to be cleverly think is when the waves have PF2_cyan ships passing/overlaping PF3_blue ones.

The ships has the PMs overlay but that doesn't seems a problem as the ones on the playing area only move horizontally and when transported they move vertically.

 

 

P.s.- Didn't bother to distribute/polute all screen with lots of stars. Too much work and this is more than enough ...

Edited December 23, 2016 by José Pereira

[José Pereira]

Better to have the large ship on the bottom using PF3_blue because the transport lines are in PF2_cyan:

 

[+MrFish]

Well, you can slice and dice it plenty of ways. But what I have posted above will work with a false background and widescreen.

The 4 PM's are shown here. The ship PM's are double width and the beam and score panel are quad.

Yellow is the background and black gets painted over it. You punch holes in the black to allow the PM's to be displayed where you want them.

 

 

 

No, you're wrong: the fighter ship is the same width as the large enemy sprite and they're both wider than the other sprites,

as shown in this shot from the NES version, which uses the arcade sprites nearly verbatim.

 

Edited December 23, 2016 by MrFish

[+MrFish]

Better to have the large ship on the bottom using PF3_blue because the transport lines are in PF2_cyan:

Galaga on A8.png

 

 

There's no choice of what color the large enemy will be when laying down the beam.

It stays turquoise until shot the first time, then changes to blue/purple. Next shot kills it.

[+MrFish]

Should probably keep the score panel as small as possible, to allow the most room for gameplay:

 

 

[+MrFish]

Added some color to the score panel and thickened up the border on the logo:

 

 

Edited December 23, 2016 by MrFish

[Bryan]

Remember that a score panel on the side restricts what you can do on those lines (it must share colors and/or PMGs with the rest of the line).

 

I wrote some Galaga stuff a while back and it's all saved somewhere. The trick is to come up with an engine that can handle all the movement and color with minimal unwanted artifacts. No matter how you do it it's going to be complicated but I had a strategy for it that I'd love to try someday.

[+MrFish]

Remember that a score panel on the side restricts what you can do on those lines (it must share colors and/or PMGs with the rest of the line).

 

All the color changes are coming from 4 players. The DLI color changes within them aren't really a necessity, just something to consider.

 

 

Edited December 23, 2016 by MrFish

[+MrFish]

I put the starfield back in and a couple of other things:

 

Edited December 24, 2016 by MrFish

[+MrFish]

Another option for creating the white of the player's ship(s) at the bottom is to set a DLI that changes yellow to white just for the ships portion of the screen.

 

The other sprites would turn white when (if) they got down that far. But, I think it would hardly be noticed, since they're exiting the playfield at that point, and the player's focus is turning to the upper portion of the playfield (unless he collides with one, in which case it wouldn't matter anyway -- boom!).

 

This would free up 3 players (and missiles -- 30 pixels at full res) to be used for the score panel, which means widescreen mode wouldn't be necessary anymore (for the method I'm employing) -- and neither the CPU overhead.

Edited December 24, 2016 by MrFish

[Rybags]

You need more space under the player's ship so that you can see if bees are looping around you.

 

I've probably said before but the NES version seems by far the best and most authentic recreation on old home systems - of course disregard more modern recreations which tend to be emulation or close simulation of the actual hardware used.

If I had knowledge of how the NES video hardware worked, then trust me I would have attempted to convert this over to VBXE as an early project.

[+MrFish]

You need more space under the player's ship so that you can see if bees are looping around you.

 

Good point, but I don't think it would affect gameplay much to have the enemy loop a little sooner. As long as a few pixels were still showing of the enemy, the player should still be aware. So I don't think the ship would need moving forward, although moving it a few pixels forward wouldn't be such a big deal either.

 

It would, however, mean that the enemies would be in the "white" area of the possible DLI (that I spoke of above) for longer.

Edited December 24, 2016 by MrFish

[+Stephen]

I put the starfield back in and a couple of other things:

 

galaga.png

Well just that static shot is more than I thought we'd ever see.

[Tezz]

It looks like several of us here have been thinking about Galaga. I had been studying the arcade code and hardware earlier in the year considering a faithful conversion. The first time I saw Galaga in the arcade in the early eighties was during a family holiday in Belgium, I spent a lot of time and money playing the game over that fortnight. Like a lot of people it's a very dear classic to me.

[+MrFish]

Well just that static shot is more than I thought we'd ever see.

 

I'm gonna convert a frame of each of the two explosions and put them in, when I've got a few spare hours here.

 

 

I had been studying the arcade code and hardware earlier in the year considering a faithful conversion.

 

It looks like there has been some disassembly work on the arcade version done, and also this of the 7800 version: 7800 Galaga Disassembly

[Tezz]

It looks like there has been some disassembly work on the arcade version done, and also this of the 7800 version: 7800 Galaga Disassembly

I've got a complete disassembly for the 3 cpus and sourcecode for the emulation of the Namco WSG. The Namco 54xx hasn't been detailed anywhere that I found at the time, Mame uses samples there instead for example but that's not a problem. I was thinking about possibly a pic32 based cart but I feel that would be a bit of a cop out and not a true Atari conversion. It would be fun to work on that though.

[+MrFish]

I've got a complete disassembly for the 3 cpus and sourcecode for the emulation of the Namco WSG. The Namco 54xx hasn't been detailed anywhere that I found at the time, Mame uses samples there instead for example but that's not a problem. I was thinking about possibly a pic32 based cart but I feel that would be a bit of a cop out and not a true Atari conversion. It would be fun to work on that though.

 

Yeah, those are the ones I found when searching a while ago. Good someone's gone to the trouble thus far.

 

The PIC would be the easier route to go and would make a lot of people happy. I wouldn't mind seeing how well it could do myself, but I'd always be more interested in a stock version.

[+MrFish]

Moved the ship and related graphics up 8 pixels and added the two explosion types: