Gridrunner - final round Pt. 3

[Heaven/TQA]

ok... started to link the stuff together and to see if the loading works...

 

attachted a WIP linking intro and title screen together... I can not add yet the game itself as superpacker does not let me to include the game file as it needs to much ORG segments... so I will use the "oldschool" method and simple append the file via dos later...

 

Llamasoft Logo converted by STE'86

Music by Miker

Title Screen by Tezz

 

and this works in PAL only as I will finish the PAL version first. for NTSC I need to check if Tezz can adapt the title screen for less scanlines and less DLIs because in combination with Miker's music the screen flickers...

 

Would be good if you could check if this works on real hardware, too.

gridrunner_intro.xex

[_Fandal_]

ok... started to link the stuff together and to see if the loading works...

 

attachted a WIP linking intro and title screen together... I can not add yet the game itself as superpacker does not let me to include the game file as it needs to much ORG segments... so I will use the "oldschool" method and simple append the file via dos later...

 

Llamasoft Logo converted by STE'86

Music by Miker

Title Screen by Tezz

 

and this works in PAL only as I will finish the PAL version first. for NTSC I need to check if Tezz can adapt the title screen for less scanlines and less DLIs because in combination with Miker's music the screen flickers...

 

Would be good if you could check if this works on real hardware, too.

 

I've just tested it on real PAL HW. Check the screenshot. Antic is in troubles.

 

F.

[miker]

It seems that one line is too much in DL. I remember the same effect during linking Bash! on Forever.

[Heaven/TQA]

ok. Tezz needs to fix the G2f...

[Heaven/TQA]

as demo coder I would say... yeah... I made it possible... color bars in the "real" borders... or "I opened the borders"...

[Tezz]

I've had a quick look now, it is the last row in mode2 making the dl too long, I'll sort it now and pm it to you Heaven.

I've been writing kernels most of this week, cycle counting isn't so much fun the 2600 guys must have a lot of patience!

 

ok, quick fix is now sent.

Edited March 13, 2010 by Tezz

[Heaven/TQA]

ok. just small notice to you guys...

 

I finally upgraded to Parallels 5 and running Windows 7 now seamless in parallel with my iMac so it is possible that I will finish Gridrunner over easter in the next couple of days. I need Windows for converting the G2F stuff and the RMT music files so I can integrate them into my IDE on Mac... that was one reason for the slowed development cycle. But now it is fixed.

 

So stay tuned.

[Tezz]

cool Did you know that Gridrunner featured in the latest Micro Mart magazine here?

[Heaven/TQA]

oops? no? I am not aware off?

[Heaven/TQA]

finally I managed to get the sample conversion right with Sox (I missed a damned library) plus my own sample conversion routine was buggy...

 

but any ideas how I can improve the quality?

gridrunner.xex

[Rybags]

What's the sample rate... sounds like it's 2,000/second or something.

 

Also, don't necessarily trust emulation to give a good representation - real hardware is best to test sample playback.

 

Can't seem to get it to work on my 800XL... just shows a black screen without any sound or anything.

[Heaven/TQA]

basicly it is using this conversion to 4bit nibbles (converted into Turbo Basic)

 

void main(int c, char **v)
;	{
;		FILE *in, *out;
;		unsigned char b, o;
;
;		out = fopen("sound.vic", "w");
;
;		if((in = fopen(v[1], "r"))) {
;			while(!feof(in)) {
;				b = fgetc(in);
;				o = b & 240;
;				b = fgetc(in);
;				o |= b >> 4;
;				if (o) fputc(o, out);
;			}
;			fclose(in);
;		}
;
;		fclose(out);

 

and with this Sox:

[Rybags]

Can you upload the original sound?

[+GroovyBee]

;				if (o) fputc(o, out);

Any particular reason why you are ignoring silence?

[Heaven/TQA]

0 C=0
1 FOR I=32768 TO 32768+8253 STEP 2
2 A=PEEK(I)
3 B=A&240
4 PRINT hex$(A)
5 A=PEEK(I+1)DIV16
6 BB=A&$0F
7 POKE 24576+C,B!BB
8 C=C+1
10 NEXT I

 

that is my simple converter.

gridrunn.wav.zip

[Heaven/TQA]

What's the sample rate... sounds like it's 2,000/second or something.

 

Also, don't necessarily trust emulation to give a good representation - real hardware is best to test sample playback.

 

Can't seem to get it to work on my 800XL... just shows a black screen without any sound or anything.

 

oh... haven't tested it yet on real hardware... in Emu it runs fine and plays the sample... in the older version you hear the "gunners" sound at the beginning... so same sample rate 4000KHz... but mine sounds worser than the one with the gun sound which was already converted for using on A8 (but not by me).

[Rybags]

I suspect your input data is signed, so you'd be getting a resultant waveform on the Atari that's not quite what it should be.

 

Better way to convert samples:

 

First off, have them as unsigned 8-bit raw data.

 

And if you're downsampling, e.g. going from 16,000 to 4,000 samples/sec, it's a good idea to do averaging.

 

In a simple program, you can just grab 4 samples then average the value and use that as basis for each nybble to output... of course there's more "professional" ways but it's a reasonable way to do it.

Edited April 10, 2010 by Rybags

[Heaven/TQA]

I let Sox decide regarding the input format?

[Rybags]

You've got VBIs enabled...

 

it sounds a llittle bit clearer if you disable them - wait for the sample to start then C D40E 0 in the emu and continue.

[Rybags]

gridrunn.mp3

 

That's how it sounds in Audacity resampled to 4,000 per second.

 

So I guess you could call that a "better than best" case scenario for the Atari (the samples are still 16-bit).

 

 

Just a sec... I noticed your only using about half the available amplitude. You should always normalize samples before converting. So, in effect you have 4-bit samples but are only using 3 bits worth of the precision most of the time.