What's so fun about Adventure after beating it?

[Kittenmommy]

Thanks. Joe made it look all shiny for me a few years back. (It's good luck to make a cat smile, right?)

 

Absolutely!

 

I think the only way to get a dragon into the Secret Message Room (I'm stickin' to the 1982 semantics, dammit)

 

LOL, you give me courage to do the same!

 

I am hopelessly unhip to the lingo. I called my games "tapes" for God's sake!

 

is to subject it to a "bug" that makes it wrap funny. Yeah...lucid explanation, isn't it?

 

I could swear that I've had one follow me in there while chasing me. But maybe I'm remembering wrong.

[Nukey Shay]

The wrap bug is probably unrelated. The "ball" sprite (your character) uses other end-of-screen markers than the 8-bit sprites have (because 8-bit sprites are assumed to be wider than the 1-bit ball). Waiting near a right screen edge while a dragon chases you will cause the collision detection to automatically "bite" when the sprites collide. This collision takes place before it's boundry is reached, but the action resets it's horizontal location to match yours. On the next frame, the program recognises that it's past the boundry, and resets it to the edge on the next screen. The dragon's direction would not be changed (because you are not on that screen)...so it continues to move in the same direction unless it interacts with another object.

 

Another wraparound trick is to allow the bat to move objects beyond the end-of-screen boundry. Just let it continually swap 2 objects as it flies to the right until the dropped object begins to appear on both sides of the screen. Colliding with the object on the right edge will cause it to be carried far away from the ball sprite.

[Kittenmommy]

The wrap bug is probably unrelated. The "ball" sprite (your character) uses other end-of-screen markers than the 8-bit sprites have (because 8-bit sprites are assumed to be wider than the 1-bit ball). Waiting near a right screen edge while a dragon chases you will cause the collision detection to automatically "bite" when the sprites collide. This collision takes place before it's boundry is reached, but the action resets it's horizontal location to match yours. On the next frame, the program recognises that it's past the boundry, and resets it to the edge on the next screen. The dragon's direction would not be changed (because you are not on that screen)...so it continues to move in the same direction unless it interacts with another object.

 

Another wraparound trick is to allow the bat to move objects beyond the end-of-screen boundry. Just let it continually swap 2 objects as it flies to the right until the dropped object begins to appear on both sides of the screen. Colliding with the object on the right edge will cause it to be carried far away from the ball sprite.

 

WHAT.

 

Warren Robinett, is that you??

[accousticguitar]

The wrap bug is probably unrelated. The "ball" sprite (your character) uses other end-of-screen markers than the 8-bit sprites have (because 8-bit sprites are assumed to be wider than the 1-bit ball). Waiting near a right screen edge while a dragon chases you will cause the collision detection to automatically "bite" when the sprites collide. This collision takes place before it's boundry is reached, but the action resets it's horizontal location to match yours. On the next frame, the program recognises that it's past the boundry, and resets it to the edge on the next screen. The dragon's direction would not be changed (because you are not on that screen)...so it continues to move in the same direction unless it interacts with another object.

When running from dragons I usually run left.

Another wraparound trick is to allow the bat to move objects beyond the end-of-screen boundry. Just let it continually swap 2 objects as it flies to the right until the dropped object begins to appear on both sides of the screen. Colliding with the object on the right edge will cause it to be carried far away from the ball sprite.

I find this one to be a nuisance.

[Shannon]

You can use tilde (~) in Stella to examine the room numbers chosen for the objects. Here's a list of the objects mapped to ram:

 

Dot = $A1 (not randomized)

Red dragon = $A4

Yellow dragon = $A9

Green dragon = $AE

Magnet = $B3

Sword = $B6

Chalise = $B9

Bridge = $BC

Yellow key = $BF

White key = $C2

Black key = $C5

Bat = $CB

 

In Stella, you could force a value of $11 to the above ram locations to make the given object "warp" to the yellow castle's courtyard should you experience the glitch in emulation.

Ahh some cool cheats to add to Z26 when I get around to it.

[TROGDOR]

If only the maps changed every time you play it...

 

Maybe Trogdor needs to be pushed to finish Hunt The Wumpus.

Indeed.

[Chris++]

I've been playing MisAdventure Revised (that's how I spell it, dammit) pretty constantly, of course. It appears that the chalice has been rendered a mere decoration, which makes sense due to the new "treasure"; but what's the little cross for? I can't figure it out. (If there are rules in some thread that I should've noticed, please inform.)

 

Also, in such a huge kingdom, being able to trap the bat somewhere is important. I can't find anywhere to do this. Where can he be forced into a screen-wrap/locked in/etc.? Please tell me this hasn't been made impossible due to the new screen layout.

[accousticguitar]

I've been playing MisAdventure Revised (that's how I spell it, dammit) pretty constantly, of course. It appears that the chalice has been rendered a mere decoration, which makes sense due to the new "treasure"; but what's the little cross for? I can't figure it out. (If there are rules in some thread that I should've noticed, please inform.)

 

Also, in such a huge kingdom, being able to trap the bat somewhere is important. I can't find anywhere to do this. Where can he be forced into a screen-wrap/locked in/etc.? Please tell me this hasn't been made impossible due to the new screen layout.

Just pack the cross around for a while. You'll figure out what it does. There is a "special place" where you can trap the bat.

[Nukey Shay]

There's a number of places where 2 or more screens are successive. But also a number of places where room links are "unstable" (where you flip to different screens that do not join the first if you try to go back). There's at least 1 screen that can remove objects from the game entirely (going sideways from the green castle is joined to the game selection screen...in which there is no escape since it only links to itself in each direction).

 

Try playing around with this if you want spoilers:

MisAdRev_no_collisions_.zip

Edited June 14, 2008 by Nukey Shay

[accousticguitar]

No collisions? That's cheating!

 

Yep, Nukey found the bat trap.

[Nukey Shay]

BTW your room gfx data is crossing pages for some of them (this causes the slight pixel skew on the left side when displaying those screens). Easily avoided in the assembly file by rearranging data so that none of them do.

[accousticguitar]

I'm not sure what "crossing pages" means or how to fix it. I'm actually not that technically minded. I'm not sure how I got this far (lots of trial and error I think).

[Nukey Shay]

Think of a block of ROM memory...the 4k contents of a single "bank" in an 8k game. This 4k is divided into 16 pages, each 256 bytes long. Page crossing occurs when something is defined in 2 pages rather than 1. This can lead to errors in the display kernal, because loading data beyond a page break adds a machine cycle difference between data that does not cross the boundry...it takes the loading instruction just a little longer than it's supposed to whenever it occurs.

 

To fix it in an assembly file, just keep a maximum of 256 bytes in each page. Some people use the ALIGN 256 instruction for Dasm. I just use ORG's...as in:

 

	ORG $1500
RORG $D500

;256 bytes of data

ORG $1600
RORG $D600

;256 bytes of data

;...etc

 

You need to rearrange room gfx tables so that they always fit between the ORG's. Adventure uses 21 bytes to define each of it's screens...so you can fit 12 screens in each page with 4 bytes left over (these 4 bytes can be used for small data tables, or data that does not matter if it crosses a page - i.e. stuff not used in the display).

[yorgle]

There's a number of places where 2 or more screens are successive. But also a number of places where room links are "unstable" (where you flip to different screens that do not join the first if you try to go back). There's at least 1 screen that can remove objects from the game entirely (going sideways from the green castle is joined to the game selection screen...in which there is no escape since it only links to itself in each direction).

 

Try playing around with this if you want spoilers:

 

As I recall, I screwed up part of the blue maze so that when you leave the black castle, you jump down a screen or two. Not sure if anyone has fixed that yet. The "unstable" links in the forests were intentional-- to simulate getting lost in the woods. There is actually a way to get into the number room, but once you are in it, you can't escape. That was an intentional trap. As for the data tables crossing page boundaries, that too was something I just never got around to fixing. Seems some of these glitches were carried foreward in later versions.

 

The Chalice is just a decoration (made from Warren Robinett's name sprite). If the Atari had just a wee more RAM, I could have done something with it. Glad folks are enjoying this.

[Nukey Shay]

There are ways of squeezing more ram out of the program. Some variables really only require less than a full byte to hold their states...so they could be "merged" with others of the same ilk. I didn't do this in the 8k template to keep the assembly file flexible. Castle gates, for example, only need 1 bit or ram for each: 0 = open, 1 = closed. But the game uses additional bits to provide the rolling effect...with all the bits turned on if it is not in flux. So what you end up with is a variable that requires 5 bits of ram in this case. The other 3 could be used for something else.

[Chris++]

Awesome. Thanks for the help! In case this is a valuable tip for anyone/for the curiosity of the master coders here/etc.: After playing around obsessively, I've found that the bat can (also) be trapped inside the first room of the Gold Castle, if he's flying straight from left to right -- as long as you leave before he gets the chance to change direction, and you quickly lock the gate behind you.

 

Greatest hack ever made. Thanks, you guys.

[accousticguitar]

Think of a block of ROM memory...the 4k contents of a single "bank" in an 8k game. This 4k is divided into 16 pages, each 256 bytes long. Page crossing occurs when something is defined in 2 pages rather than 1. This can lead to errors in the display kernal, because loading data beyond a page break adds a machine cycle difference between data that does not cross the boundry...it takes the loading instruction just a little longer than it's supposed to whenever it occurs.

That kind of makes sense to me. I will have to look at the code for Missadventure and see what I can figure out.

As I recall, I screwed up part of the blue maze so that when you leave the black castle, you jump down a screen or two. Not sure if anyone has fixed that yet. The "unstable" links in the forests were intentional-- to simulate getting lost in the woods. There is actually a way to get into the number room, but once you are in it, you can't escape. That was an intentional trap. As for the data tables crossing page boundaries, that too was something I just never got around to fixing. Seems some of these glitches were carried foreward in later versions.

I changed the one in the blue maze and I believe there was one below the blue maze that I changed as well, but I probably added in a few when I was trying to make the bat and dragons move more freely about the kingdom. I didn't know about the trap in the number room. I might have inadvertently messed it up. I tried to keep the woods so that you could still get lost in them. I didn't know what to do about the page boundaries getting crossed but I figured it didn't affect the game play so I didn't worry about it too much.

[accousticguitar]

Awesome. Thanks for the help! In case this is a valuable tip for anyone/for the curiosity of the master coders here/etc.: After playing around obsessively, I've found that the bat can (also) be trapped inside the first room of the Gold Castle, if he's flying straight from left to right -- as long as you leave before he gets the chance to change direction, and you quickly lock the gate behind you.

 

Greatest hack ever made. Thanks, you guys.

I would think the bat could be locked in any castle, but I'd have to look at the code to be sure.

[GameboyReviewer]

I think he means that when the game started you could enter a number (like 17, for example) and everytime you played game number 17, the objects would be in the same place (except for the ones the bat moved around, of course). If you didn't want to play that particular game any more, just pick a new number and get a new game.

 

Adventure was one of the best atari games ever made

[Shannon]

I used to use the same method as Inky to trap the bat as well.

[7800Lover]

I always viewed Adventure with a sense of wonder. That and the fact that the game 3 variation is random each time. I wish more games were random like that.

[Shannon]

Slightly off topic. But I remember one game I had "bounty hunter" for the game cube. It pretty much had all the characters, etc in the same place so if you timed it perfectly you could go thru and pretty much do everything the same exact way. Problem was if you moved too fast some characters wouldn't be in the right place, or end up in a ditch somewhere, etc.

 

Boy that gave me a headache. Frustrated the heck out of me!!

[Kittenmommy]

Adventure was one of the best atari games ever made

 

Yes, this.

[ulij20]

During randomization, all objects are allowed a minimal screen number of #1 (the 3-exit screen area below the yellow castle). All objects begin at their game2 assigned locations prior to being shuffled.

 

Highest possible random screen numbers allowed by randomization:

 

Yellow key : 29 (anywhere in the kingdom and castles)

 

White key : 22 (inside yellow/black castles or in the rest of the kingdom -except- the black castle's entry room or a couple of rooms near the catacombs)

 

Black key : 18 (inside the yellow castle, 2 screens of the white castle, or in most of the rest of the kingdom)

 

 

 

An unfinishable game would therefore either be where...

 

The Black key is inside the yellow castle, the white key is inside the black castle, AND the yellow key is inside the white castle...e.g. all 3 keys in alternate castles.

 

...or...

 

The Black key is inside the white castle and the white key is inside the black castle.

 

...or...

 

The yellow key is in it's own castle.

The second scenario is impossible, since the Black Key can only appear in the White Castle in Game 2. In Game 3, it cannot appear in the Black Castle or White Castle, or the rooms east of the Catacombs (the ones that replace the dark mazes in Level 1). It can appear in the light blue entrance room.

 

I have found the first scenario one time. All I could find in the game was the bat carrying the magnet. In this one, the Black key was obviously inside the Gold Castle, the White Key was somewhere in the Black Castle, and the Gold Key could have either been in the White Castle or the Black Castle, since it can appear anywhere, even in its own castle, which was stated as scenario 3. That scenario happens with several different games.

 

There is another game that would be unsolvable if, upon finding that the chalice wasn't in the Black Castle, you locked the bat in there and locked the Black Key inside (which can be done by dropping the key over the gate as it's closing). Because in that game, both the bridge AND the chalice are in the secret room of the white castle. That means that you need the bat to win the game, by releasing him in the white castle and having him pick up the Chalice (Careful, though; Rhindle is in there guarding the Chalice and Rhindle is hot on the bat's heels (or should I say wings) as he emerges with the Chalice (so you might want to bring a sword along).

[accousticguitar]

There is another game that would be unsolvable if, upon finding that the chalice wasn't in the Black Castle, you locked the bat in there and locked the Black Key inside (which can be done by dropping the key over the gate as it's closing). Because in that game, both the bridge AND the chalice are in the secret room of the white castle. That means that you need the bat to win the game, by releasing him in the white castle and having him pick up the Chalice (Careful, though; Rhindle is in there guarding the Chalice and Rhindle is hot on the bat's heels (or should I say wings) as he emerges with the Chalice (so you might want to bring a sword along).

I think Nukey was talking about games that are not winnable due to the setup given the player when the game starts. In other words, programming error.