Cube Snakes Homebrew accomplish

[SnakeCubes]

Hello AtariAge members,

 

I am new in this forum and the first I have to say is that my English is not very good. My name ist Marco and I am 25 years old. As I was a child my dream was to accomplish my own game, so I have planned my own game project. It's done now, but I can't release it, because I am not good at programming. I am from Germany, so the best thing would be, if there's someone in this forum I could explain the whole game project in German. And of course I need somone who could program this little nice game.

 

The goal of "Cube Snakes" is to surround the enemy snakes. The whole idea and modes (wich are many!) are explained on my project-blog. But it's only in german, so now you get why it's so hard to explain it in here.

 

I hope there will be somone who could help me accomplish it and of course someone who could make an artwork for the cartridge.

 

Here's one Mode that is planned. It's Called "Enemy Sighted!". The robot-monster you can see in the picture can move per round and you have to evade him. "Cube Snakes" is a round-based dice-game.

 

Game Title: Cube Snakes

Players: 1-4

Genre: Strategy

 

Greetings,

Marco.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

I wonder how long it will take until...

[SnakeCubes]

I wonder how long it will take until...

 

Until what?

 

Sincerly,

Marco.

[+Random Terrain]

I hope there will be someone who could help me accomplish it and of course someone who could make an artwork for the cartridge.

Have you tried batari Basic:

 

http://www.atariage.com/forums/forum/65-batari-basic/

 

http://www.randomterrain.com/atari-2600-memories-batari-basic-commands.html

 

 

Here is a page about Visual batari Basic (VbB) which wraps itself around batari Basic:

 

http://www.randomterrain.com/atari-2600-memories-batari-basic-vbb.html

 

VbB has a lot of useful tools and makes the whole game making process a lot easier. I couldn't get anything done without it.

[LS_Dracon]

Until someone post it:

 

to-all-non-programmer-idea-peddlers

 

Good luck with your project anyway

Edited June 29, 2010 by LS_Dracon

[SnakeCubes]

Until someone post it:

 

to-all-non-programmer-idea-peddlers

 

Good luck with your project anyway

 

Thank you very much for this information. I could try to explain the whole game, so there maybe is a chance to program it anyway. In the first screenshot you can see a grid playing-field. There are 4 colored blocks in each corner of the field. Those are the player's snakes where they start of. Player 1 (black) starts the game and have to roll a normal 6-way dice. So if the dice shows off a 4 for example, player 1 (black) can move 4 quadratic fields forward.

This is the main rule you did play the normal game mode in "Cube Snakes". So it's round-based. After you roll the dice and move your snake, the next player starts to play and do the same.

 

So, your main goal in this game is to reach the enemy snakes and surround them, till they can't move anymore. The last player who is still alive with his own snake, wins the match. I hope my English is ok and all of you could understand it.

Edited June 29, 2010 by SnakeCubes

[SnakeCubes]

The Flame God Mode in "Cube Snakes" is a choosable mode in this game you can play up to 4 players. In the middle of the playing field there is a "flame cube". It will be played like the normal playing rule. But if you rolled the dice and moved your snake, you have to move the flame too. If the flame reach one players snake, he loose. So, it's really hard and fast, so there's a new rule in this mode. You can delete your snakes cubes. An example: Your rolled the dice and it shows 4. Your snake has a lentgh of 6 cubes already, so you can move forward again or go 4 steps back, so you snake is now only 2 cubes long. The flame must go on, you can't make it go backwards like you snake. You can only delete your snake cube 4 times, so you should save your backward-moves for the later game.

 

Sincerly,

Marco.

[LS_Dracon]

Ok let me try to help you.

 

1 - Wich platform have you in mind to convert this game? Atari 2600? PC?

2 - Do you know something about programming?

 

If you want to code this game to Atari 2600, all snakes should use 1 shared color, with tricks you can draw 2 colors, alternating lines. The enemies can be made by quad size players.

 

Usually, people that start with Batari basic have quick results to show.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

You really want to make a round based game? Why not use the advantage of the game console and make it action paced?

[SnakeCubes]

Ok let me try to help you.

 

1 - Wich platform have you in mind to convert this game? Atari 2600? PC?

2 - Do you know something about programming?

 

If you want to code this game to Atari 2600, all snakes should use 1 shared color, with tricks you can draw 2 colors, alternating lines. The enemies can be made by quad size players.

 

Usually, people that start with Batari basic have quick results to show.

 

Thanks for you posting LS_Dracon. The game should be for the Atari 2600 system.

I have no clue how to programming a game or something like this, so there is no chance for me to accomplish it.

 

I tried to make some simple things with Q-Basic when I was 13 years old. Nothing more.

 

Sincerly,

Marco.

[SnakeCubes]

You really want to make a round based game? Why not use the advantage of the game console and make it action paced?

 

Hello Thomas,

 

the game concept of "Cube Snakes" is round-based and it can't be an action-paced game. If theres a chance to make the concept

action paced, I would be thankful if you could explain me how to realize it like this.

 

Sincerly,

Marco.

[SnakeCubes]

You really want to make a round based game? Why not use the advantage of the game console and make it action paced?

 

I got a new idea to make this game project action-paced and not round based. It could be playable like "Tape Worm" for the Atari 2600. Only up to 4 players, who have to surround the enemy snakes. And the

same for the "Flame God" mode in this game. Like in Tape Worm, the snakes and the flame are moving. The flame is moving randomly, so you never know, where the flames are going.

 

Sincerly,

Marco.

[LS_Dracon]

For start, search information about Atari 2600 hardware, there alot of info in this forum.

You need to know what is possible to do using atari 2600 graphics.

Your grid uses about 126 RAM bytes to draw one "snake" using playfield pixels, it need 4 snakes, 504 bytes to track the information.

The limit of Atari 2600 is 128 bytes, even with bankswitch to get 128 more bytes, it's still 256 bytes.

Edited June 29, 2010 by LS_Dracon

[jrok]

The Flame God Mode in "Cube Snakes" is a choosable mode in this game you can play up to 4 players. In the middle of the playing field there is a "flame cube". It will be played like the normal playing rule. But if you rolled the dice and moved your snake, you have to move the flame too. If the flame reach one players snake, he loose. So, it's really hard and fast, so there's a new rule in this mode. You can delete your snakes cubes. An example: Your rolled the dice and it shows 4. Your snake has a lentgh of 6 cubes already, so you can move forward again or go 4 steps back, so you snake is now only 2 cubes long. The flame must go on, you can't make it go backwards like you snake. You can only delete your snake cube 4 times, so you should save your backward-moves for the later game.

 

Sincerly,

Marco.

 

Another idea for a Game Mode:

 

"Knight Rider" Mode

 

1) Change the snakes into locks of David Hasselhoff's hair.

2) When one hair surrounds another, K.I.T.T. engages his Turbo Boost and rockets across the screen.

3) Driving Level

4) Michael Knight Beat'em'up Level

5) Boss Battle!

 

After someone codes all of that, you can just sit back and watch the profits roll in!

 

Seriously, though, why do you want to write this for Atari 2600? It is a tremendously difficult system to program for. You'd probably be better off just learning your way around the Flash IDE and coding it in Actionscript 2.0 (which is a bit more forgiving for newcomers). Or even writing it as a Java Applet. Or in C++. Or as a regular board game. It actually might make an interesting board game.