What features make a homebrew purchase worthwhile for you?

[Chainclaw]

There are a pile of those polish features that can be added to a homebrew game to make it worth purchasing. In fact, without a few of them, people get offended that someone has the audacity to try and charge for their game.

 

So what polish features can you guys think of that can be added to most any game?

 

What are your feelings on various polish features? Must haves? Nice to haves? Makes the game worse?

 

Here's what I can think of. I don't really have opinions on a lot of them.

 

Sound - I made my first pair of games without sound, and realized that was a mistake afterward. Sound adds a lot to the overall quality of a game, and seems entirely necessary for the purchase of a game. Missing a sound effect (having a player firing sound effect, but not having an enemy hit sound effect) can hurt the game a lot.

 

Visible hit response on multi-hit enemies - For games with combat, sometimes enemies take more than one shot to kill. I've found that when an enemy flashes, or something else helps make the game feel a bit more polished.

 

Title screen - Don't really have a strong opinion on this.

 

Multi-color sprites - Adds a lot to making the game feel like some TLC was put into it.

 

Color / BW Switching - Seems completely unnecessary, what kind of crazy person has a black and white TV, plays the Atari, and buys new Atari homebrews off of the internet?

 

Pause feature - Seems like a decent use of the color / BW switch.

 

Difficulty switches - No idea on the value-add of this feature. Seems like it could be nice for people who find the first five or ten minutes of the game too easy to jump forward.

 

Reset switch - Unless I'm wrong, turning off the Atari and turning it back on does not damage the system or cartridge. So is there demand for a reset feature?

 

Game switch - Sort of implies toggling between different game types / game modes / variations. No strong opinions on this.

 

Post-game functionality - The usual feature seems to be something along the lines of, once the player runs out of lives, leave the score up until the player presses the button, and then restart the game. Something like this is important to me.

 

What are your thoughts on this subject?

[+Random Terrain]

Reset switch - Unless I'm wrong, turning off the Atari and turning it back on does not damage the system or cartridge. So is there demand for a reset feature?

A game must reset if the player hits Reset. Leaving that out would be idiotic.

 

What bothers me is when a game will not start when the fire button is pressed. Any game released after May of 1982 should start using the fire button. That doesn't mean that you shouldn't allow the player to start using the Reset Switch. It should be the player's choice. And when the game ends, the player should be able to play again by pressing the fire button or the Reset Switch. It should never be one or the other. Give the player the ability to use whichever one they want.

[Shawn]

I buy a homebrew if I like the graphics and the gameplay. Sounds simple enough but I'm a pretty picky guy.

[Emehr]

Nice graphics, animation, and gameplay will get my dollar. I'm less picky on sound as long as it's not grating. Add in a snazzy label and it's a done deal.

 

Off-topic: Hey Shawn, what song did you sing with Kenny Rogers? One of my favorites of his is 'Just Dropped In'. It wasn't 'Islands in the Stream' was it?

[[d2f]Iggy*SJB]

Graphics and gameplay.

 

My favorite homebrew is Beef Drop(I lucked out and got the Pokey version used)... the graphics are SAWEET, and the gameplay is even better. The sounds are spot on, and really finish the game off.

[Chainclaw]

I'm trying to get at the features at the point where the graphics and gameplay are more or less done. The extra stuff after that.

 

I know it usually takes longer to put in than it took to build the rest of the game, but it's worth it. I figure once the game is done and on carts, it's done. No one wants to buy an Atari cartridge and see a better version released a few months later. Also, the Atari is over 30 years old at this point, so there isn't any hurry to finish the game.

 

I figure a lot of polish for a finished homebrew title is in the "there is no excuse not to" category, and I'm curious what sort of polish people want and expect for an Atari game.

 

I am far from finished with my current project, but I've made myself a task / feature list to make sure I am making progress, and I would love to get the polish features onto that list.

[Shawn]

Nice graphics, animation, and gameplay will get my dollar. I'm less picky on sound as long as it's not grating. Add in a snazzy label and it's a done deal.

 

Off-topic: Hey Shawn, what song did you sing with Kenny Rogers? One of my favorites of his is 'Just Dropped In'. It wasn't 'Islands in the Stream' was it?

 

12 days of Xmas is what we did. "Just Dropped In" is my second favorite Kenny Rogers song, #1 for me is "Lady".

Edited December 6, 2008 by Shawn Sr.

[mos6507]

For 2600 homebrews, I like AtariVox support. That's not always feasible if it's a 2-player game, but where possible, I want that.

[Shawn]

For 2600 homebrews, I like AtariVox support. That's not always feasible if it's a 2-player game, but where possible, I want that.

 

Maybe the AtariVox needs a 2.0 with a DB9 on the end of it?

[kirin jensen]

Definitely agree with using the fire button to start the game.

 

Take a cue from Imagic. As the game progresses, the enemies should change, to give us an incentive to play further.

 

A big no-no as far as I'm concerned: having a lengthy intro of your next man after the last one died. This is one of the only things that drives me apeshit about the otherwise excellent Ladybug. I'm in my gaming groove. DON'T SLOW ME DOWN.

 

A small point, but important. If the enemies blow up a musical tone or series of tones (for multiple enemies) works for me. Save the ugly "blat" sounds for when my ship blows up.

[Chainclaw]

A small point, but important. If the enemies blow up a musical tone or series of tones (for multiple enemies) works for me. Save the ugly "blat" sounds for when my ship blows up.

 

This reminds me of one of the features in my game.

 

One of my theories on game design is, it almost always makes your game better if you can integrate sound effects and actions to the beat of the music. Sort of turning a game into a music video in a lot of ways. It applies more to modern games than Atari games, but I still think it can be used to interesting effect on the Atari.

 

The way I've built the sound / music in my current project is, I'm using both audio tracks for music. One of them is the equivalent to drums, the other is the melody. when an action is requested (such as firing the player's weapon), the action does not occur until the game sees that a new note is starting to play in the melody, and then the action happens. The sound effect for the action overwrites the note in the melody. For games on modern systems, with more complicated music and usually delays built into most actions anyways, the delay can be almost unnoticeable. For my project, it ends up rewarding you if you are paying attention to the music as you play the game.

 

If you are familiar with Q Entertainment's work, specifically Rez, they are my inspiration for this. If you've played Rez, everything happens to the beat of the music. For a more recent title, check out Space Invaders Extreme.

 

Although the biggest issue I'm running into with this write now is writing the music for the Atari. So far my interface is typing this directly into Wordpad, which is dumb, and tough to build something that sounds good.

 data musicSample1Volume
 8,  8,  8,  8, 10, 10,  0,  0,  8,  8,  8,  8,  0,  0,  0,  0,  8,  8,  8,  8, 10, 10,  0,  0,  8,  8,  8,  8,  0,  0,  0,  0,
end
data musicSample1Control
 6,  6,  6,  6,  3,  3,  0,  0,  6,  6,  6,  6,  0,  0,  0,  0,  6,  6,  6,  6,  3,  3,  0,  0,  6,  6,  6,  6,  0,  0,  0,  0,  
end
data musicSample1Frequency
14, 14, 14, 14, 24, 24,  0,  0, 14, 14, 14, 14,  0,  0,  0,  0, 14, 14, 14, 14, 24, 24,  0,  0, 14, 14, 14, 14,  0,  0,  0,  0, 
end

data musicSample2Volume
12, 12,  0,  0,  0,  0, 12, 12,  0,  0,  0,  0, 12, 12,  0,  0,  0,  0,  0,  0, 12, 12, 12, 12,  0,  0, 12, 12,  0,  0,  0,  0,
end
data musicSample2Control
12, 12,  0,  0,  0,  0, 12, 12,  0,  0,  0,  0, 12, 12,  0,  0,  0,  0,  0,  0, 12, 12, 12, 12,  0,  0, 12, 12,  0,  0,  0,  0,  
end
data musicSample2Frequency
12, 12,  0,  0,  0,  0, 12, 12,  0,  0,  0,  0, 12, 12,  0,  0,  0,  0,  0,  0, 16, 16, 16, 16,  0,  0, 16, 16,  0,  0,  0,  0, 
end

[potatohead]

I like all of these things.

 

My main motivator for buying is either to reward some serious technical innovation, or because I know I'll want to play the game and show it off. What features get us there is arbitrary really.

 

+1 for paddle games too. I like paddle games.

[Artlover]

There are a pile of those polish features that can be added to a homebrew game to make it worth purchasing.

 

Sound - I made my first pair of games without sound, and realized that was a mistake afterward. Sound adds a lot to the overall quality of a game, and seems entirely necessary for the purchase of a game. Missing a sound effect (having a player firing sound effect, but not having an enemy hit sound effect) can hurt the game a lot.

Yes, sound is important. Even if it's just a beep or click. Interactivity. Something to let you know you are doing something, something to give you an indication that things are going on.

 

Visible hit response on multi-hit enemies - For games with combat, sometimes enemies take more than one shot to kill. I've found that when an enemy flashes, or something else helps make the game feel a bit more polished.

Yes. Again, it's part of interactivity. It lets you know you're doing and acomplishing something.

 

Title screen - Don't really have a strong opinion on this.

In what context? An entire seperate title screen or a simple overlay on top of the game field. I don't think a big fancy title screen persay is important, but the game should atleast identify itself in someway. Even if that is just having the name of the game displayed where the score is or something (toggling back and fourth between title and last score) when the game is not playing.

 

Multi-color sprites - Adds a lot to making the game feel like some TLC was put into it.

Yes or maybe no. This is somewhat determined by the nature of the game, as well as what platform you are talking about. Monochrome sprites work just fine on many a 2600 game. Sometimes you just don't need anything more. Sometimes you don't have a choice.

 

Color / BW Switching - Seems completely unnecessary, what kind of crazy person has a black and white TV, plays the Atari, and buys new Atari homebrews off of the internet?

No. It was a stupid useless feature even back in the 70's when lots of people used B&W TV's. B&W TV's are already capable of displaying a color source. It just really didn't help or matter in my opinion. However, the switch can be utilized as an extra input of the game in other ways.

 

Pause feature - Seems like a decent use of the color / BW switch.

Yes, pausing is kind of important. Even in the old days, it was an annoyance to many that you couldn't. Sometimes I have to stop to pee, or get a drink, or eat dinner, or answer the phone, or walk the dog. One can not expect me to be commited to playing non stop in once I start the game.

 

Difficulty switches - No idea on the value-add of this feature. Seems like it could be nice for people who find the first five or ten minutes of the game too easy to jump forward.

Their value is the same as on modern games. Novice, Easy, Hard, Expert, etc... Their value is a tactical difference in various aspect of the game. A condition that changes thing like how enemies move, how many there are, how easy to kill, how your player moves/acts, etc...

 

Of course you can also ignore them as difficulty and just use them as alternate game inputs as well. Tho that makes it a little harder for people not using a 6 switcher to play.

 

Reset switch - Unless I'm wrong, turning off the Atari and turning it back on does not damage the system or cartridge. So is there demand for a reset feature?

Yes. It's there for a reason. Use it. Imagine if you had to power cycle your Xbox or PS2 or something every time you wanted to end a game.

 

Game switch - Sort of implies toggling between different game types / game modes / variations. No strong opinions on this.

Well, if your game is going to have different modes/variations, then obviously you should use it. Otherwise you end up with stupidity like Time Pilot.

 

Post-game functionality - The usual feature seems to be something along the lines of, once the player runs out of lives, leave the score up until the player presses the button, and then restart the game. Something like this is important to me.

Alot of people think like this, and while I understand why, I personally don't like it.

 

If you in a fast paced game doing a lot of button mashing, it's all to easy to die and start a new game without wanting to. I'd accept this only if there is a death sequence that puts some time between loosing your last man and returning to title/demo mode. But if the game just ends abruptly, it's a sucky feature.

 

What are your thoughts on this subject?

I guess the important thing is to remember there is a line between polish and fluff. To much polish is no better then not enough. Even more so if a focus is put on polish over game play. Game play is ultimatly the goal, polish it as much as possible within that context. Don't compromise game play for polish.

 

Also, why limit this query only to polish features of the code. There are other issues at play in the end.

 

Things like labels, boxes, instructions and things can make a final product more attractive to some prospective buyers and can effect the value for which you can demand.

 

On the other hand, those things aren't important to everyone and can in some cases can/will cause someone to not buy it. Emulation camp coes to mind. Despite owning most classic consoles and computers, they are all packed up, and just too much trouble to bother with. If the only option I have to get a new release is having to buy a physcial native format product that I can not readily use, then I'm not buying it because I won't beable to use it. Now a cost reduced rom only option that I can use in an emulator on the otherhand would be quite welcome.

[Chainclaw]

Thanks for the input! A lot of good stuff in there to think about. Especially the part about restarting the game with the action button can lead to missing your high score. I'll have to think of a good way to handle that.

 

Right now I'm thinking only about in-game polish because right now I'm making the task list for my game. Although the other stuff is good to bring up because I'm sure this board and this topic will still be here if I finish the project.

[+Random Terrain]

Post-game functionality - The usual feature seems to be something along the lines of, once the player runs out of lives, leave the score up until the player presses the button, and then restart the game. Something like this is important to me.

A lot of people think like this, and while I understand why, I personally don't like it.

 

If you're in a fast paced game doing a lot of button mashing, it's all to easy to die and start a new game without wanting to. I'd accept this only if there is a death sequence that puts some time between loosing your last man and returning to title/demo mode. But if the game just ends abruptly, it's a sucky feature.

That's why you should have some type of short game over sequence that makes sure the player can't restart by accident. The player will still be able to restart using the fire button, but only when he or she wants to.

[DEBRO]

I like seeing the standards set by Atari in 1987 used. There are situations where they can't be followed but I like to see them where they can.

[Albert]

I like seeing the standards set by Atari in 1987 used. There are situations where they can't be followed but I like to see them where they can.

Huh, I've never seen that document before, very interesting. Are there earlier versions of this document, or is the first version? If so, a bit late in coming, eh?

 

Edit: The first paragraph does reference "previous standards" documents, so it would be interesting to see those as well and how these standards changed over the years..

 

..Al

[Chainclaw]

I like seeing the standards set by Atari in 1987 used. There are situations where they can't be followed but I like to see them where they can.

 

Lots of good info in there. It would be great if someone were to build a modern version of that, with all the homebrew getting written nowadays.

[roland p]

I like seeing the standards set by Atari in 1987 used. There are situations where they can't be followed but I like to see them where they can.

That's a nice document.

I would be nice if someone could create a template for homebrew games. With labels: 'insert title here', 'insert game code here', etc. Then you would not have to invent it every time you create a new game. And we would have a nice recognisable theme.

[A Sprite]

There are a pile of those polish features that can be added to a homebrew game to make it worth purchasing. In fact, without a few of them, people get offended that someone has the audacity to try and charge for their game.

 

So what polish features can you guys think of that can be added to most any game?

 

What are your feelings on various polish features? Must haves? Nice to haves? Makes the game worse?

 

Here's what I can think of. I don't really have opinions on a lot of them.

 

Sound - I made my first pair of games without sound, and realized that was a mistake afterward. Sound adds a lot to the overall quality of a game, and seems entirely necessary for the purchase of a game. Missing a sound effect (having a player firing sound effect, but not having an enemy hit sound effect) can hurt the game a lot.

 

Visible hit response on multi-hit enemies - For games with combat, sometimes enemies take more than one shot to kill. I've found that when an enemy flashes, or something else helps make the game feel a bit more polished.

 

Title screen - Don't really have a strong opinion on this.

 

Multi-color sprites - Adds a lot to making the game feel like some TLC was put into it.

 

Color / BW Switching - Seems completely unnecessary, what kind of crazy person has a black and white TV, plays the Atari, and buys new Atari homebrews off of the internet?

 

Pause feature - Seems like a decent use of the color / BW switch.

 

Difficulty switches - No idea on the value-add of this feature. Seems like it could be nice for people who find the first five or ten minutes of the game too easy to jump forward.

 

Reset switch - Unless I'm wrong, turning off the Atari and turning it back on does not damage the system or cartridge. So is there demand for a reset feature?

 

Game switch - Sort of implies toggling between different game types / game modes / variations. No strong opinions on this.

 

Post-game functionality - The usual feature seems to be something along the lines of, once the player runs out of lives, leave the score up until the player presses the button, and then restart the game. Something like this is important to me.

 

What are your thoughts on this subject?

 

You've nailed most of them.

 

I'd add only: a sense of style. Knowing your color wheel takes the presentation past polish and into a unique artform.

 

Neutral grays are the worst offense. They're a dead space: They don't exist in nature, or blend well with other colors. They look like a Windows error message.

 

Don't be afraid to use highlights - orange/gold/yellow seems to catch fire when placed near a vivid blue/violet combination or a dark green.

 

Sure, it seems shallow, but it's the reason why Demon Attack on the 2600 still turns retro snobs into graphics whores over 25 years later. You've been given a big box of crayons - play with them a little.

[jrok]

Sure, it seems shallow, but it's the reason why Demon Attack on the 2600 still turns retro snobs into graphics whores over 25 years later. You've been given a big box of crayons - play with them a little.

 

I totally agree. In fact, I think I wrote something similar about Demon Attack and its ingenius use of color in my AA blog. Since the A2600 graphics capabilities are so spartan, I think use of color becomes incredibly important. And in Demon Attack, not only was the use of color aesthetically pleasing, but it served the gameplay mechanics as a sort of visual cue for progress. As you progressed through the game, you didn't have to "count levels"; it was like your eye would almost subliminally track colors and shapes that your brain would use to gauge your performance. For that reason, I still believe that Demon Attack was graphically superior to most RGB-raster arcade shooters of that day, including some of my all-time favorites like "Galaga."

 

Great point!

Jarod.

Edited December 11, 2008 by jrok

[Thorsten Günther]

Color / BW Switching - Seems completely unnecessary, what kind of crazy person has a black and white TV, plays the Atari, and buys new Atari homebrews off of the internet?

No. It was a stupid useless feature even back in the 70's when lots of people used B&W TV's. B&W TV's are already capable of displaying a color source. It just really didn't help or matter in my opinion. However, the switch can be utilized as an extra input of the game in other ways.

Pause feature - Seems like a decent use of the color / BW switch.

Yes, pausing is kind of important. Even in the old days, it was an annoyance to many that you couldn't. Sometimes I have to stop to pee, or get a drink, or eat dinner, or answer the phone, or walk the dog. One can not expect me to be commited to playing non stop in once I start the game.

Another very intelligent use of this switch is to change between NTSC and PAL mode, several of the more recent homebrews in the AtariAge store use it that way. In fact if I am not mistaken, it can serve as both in one cartridge (when switching on the machine it may serve for NTSC/PAL purposes and during gameplay as a pause feature). Would be a PITA for the owners of a 2800/SVAII though, for these have this switch on their underside.

 

Difficulty switches - No idea on the value-add of this feature. Seems like it could be nice for people who find the first five or ten minutes of the game too easy to jump forward.

 

Their value is the same as on modern games. Novice, Easy, Hard, Expert, etc... Their value is a tactical difference in various aspect of the game. A condition that changes thing like how enemies move, how many there are, how easy to kill, how your player moves/acts, etc...

This function can as well be achieved by the game selection switch. I guess that's why these switches got smaller and more inaccessible with every re-issue of the 2600.

 

 

Thorsten

Edited December 28, 2008 by Thorsten Günther

[+selgus]

I like seeing the standards set by Atari in 1987 used. There are situations where they can't be followed but I like to see them where they can.

That's a nice document.

I would be nice if someone could create a template for homebrew games. With labels: 'insert title here', 'insert game code here', etc. Then you would not have to invent it every time you create a new game. And we would have a nice recognisable theme.

 

I had thought about this when I started working on the 2600, but the problem is, that is not how you really write 2600 games. Each game is very different, where you are going check switches, reading game controllers, how that links into the gameplay, etc.

 

There may be a way to factor out some small standard routines that could be called, but I don't believe we would get to a template, like you suggest.

 

My engine has some basic functionality, but lots of the tricks of getting it in the proper amount of cycles along with saving code space, means doing game logic in the kernel. Or maybe this is just me.

--Selgus

[roland p]

I like seeing the standards set by Atari in 1987 used. There are situations where they can't be followed but I like to see them where they can.

That's a nice document.

I would be nice if someone could create a template for homebrew games. With labels: 'insert title here', 'insert game code here', etc. Then you would not have to invent it every time you create a new game. And we would have a nice recognisable theme.

 

I had thought about this when I started working on the 2600, but the problem is, that is not how you really write 2600 games. Each game is very different, where you are going check switches, reading game controllers, how that links into the gameplay, etc.

 

There may be a way to factor out some small standard routines that could be called, but I don't believe we would get to a template, like you suggest.

 

My engine has some basic functionality, but lots of the tricks of getting it in the proper amount of cycles along with saving code space, means doing game logic in the kernel. Or maybe this is just me.

--Selgus

 

Well I'm not sure too . But the thing I was thinking about wasn't really a template (altough I said so...), but something more like a macro. The macro makes the code which handles the tv-sync signals, and the main menu. You can pass pointers to the macro, to routines that must be run during vblank, and pointers to the game-kernel, which generates the 288 tv lines, so when the the player hits start, the game-kernel can start too. I have the feeling that, with a few trade-offs (stack space) you can come a long way.

 

It's like implementing an interface in an object oriented language. You could implement an interface called 'GameModel'. Then you could reuse an existing object called 'AtariGame' with the constructor: AtariGame(GameModel arg0);

 

I hope this makes some sense

[+selgus]

Well I'm not sure too . But the thing I was thinking about wasn't really a template (altough I said so...), but something more like a macro. The macro makes the code which handles the tv-sync signals, and the main menu. You can pass pointers to the macro, to routines that must be run during vblank, and pointers to the game-kernel, which generates the 288 tv lines, so when the the player hits start, the game-kernel can start too. I have the feeling that, with a few trade-offs (stack space) you can come a long way.

 

Actually that is a lot like how I am doing 2600 work currently. I created a whole bunch of macros that abstract the concept, while also trying to optimize the cycle counts and code size.

 

But I believe I am derailing this thread, as it is about what features you would want in a homebrew you would purchase. For me, I am trying to make something that wow's the user. Didn't think it could be done on a 2600. That is in terms of game play (i.e. challenging without being impossible), fun to play over and over again, polish, eye-candy (see how far I can push the 30 year old hardware) and sound that enhancing the experience.

 

Because of the game I am currently working on, I am also looking into doing a primitive peer-to-peer connection between two 2600's (though I am not sure how useful this would be to anyone besides myself).

--Selgus