Ideas on how to improve/complete a couple of old Vectrex games I started

[gorf68]

Hello I've recently been looking over a couple of Vectrex games I started a few years ago but left, and it made me want to re-do a Vectrex project.

I was thinking about tidying up the RetroDevolved program or possibly finishing the other one; the idea for which was loosly based on a level of the 'Twister Mother of Harlots' game for the ZX Spectrum...

 

 

I'd appreciate it if anyone could have a look and let me know what you think of the ideas so far. Give me some sugestions about what can be changed or added to make them better... or let me know if I should just dump the ideas and start again!

No brand-new idea pitches though please...

 

 

 

Oh, you can find the assembly files here: http://garrysgamingb...g-projects.html

 

I'm not precious about these, so feel free to pull the code to bits if you want. They were both early efforts but I think the 'Twister' one may have had some legs...

 

 

I've noticed people seem to be sharing .bin files here and not the assembly code.

Would it be easier if I shared a couple of .bin's?

Edited October 25, 2012 by gorf68

[gliptitude]

Hey really cool to see more interest in Vectrex development. I saw your post in the "Vextrex Idea" thread, and you quoted an old post I made about starting a new thread for Vectrex game ideas. I will do that shortly, and post in the old thread when I have done so.

 

Very busy at the moment, so I haven't looked at your projects yet. I will try to do that this evening. I do think it's cool that you put your assembly out there, so people can actually see the program. But I suppose .bin's would be easier for some people to look at on an emulator.

 

Also I quickly looked up the Atic-Attack game you mentioned in the other thread. (Never heard of it, never played any Spectrum games). I don't know of anything like it that has been made for Vectrex and it looks like a great candidate for adaptation (or even better - just the inspiration for a NEW game, with similar features). ... It actually has a couple things in common with the Vectrex game design I have been working on ('flip-screen' levels and overhead perspective views), although mine is a totally different sort of game (arcade shooter). (I see in your post here 'no brand-new idea pitches please', so i will hush now).

 

I look forward to checking out your stuff later!

[gorf68]

Hello gliptitude, and thanks for taking a look...

Don't expect too much though. As I said all the stuff up on the blog were early programming experiments that I primarily use to get used to programming the Vectrex.

 

I think an Atic-Attack 'type' game may be on the cards. It was a simple but addictive little game on the Spectrum.

I still think there’s the seeds of a good idea in the 3d tunnel type ‘twister’ game idea... although I haven’t done much in the code put up on my blog.

[gliptitude]

ok i will try not to expect too much. ... But I am interested in what you said in the brainstorming thread, about how easy it was for you to get started. I'm pretty sure it would be a lot of fun for me to see 'what is easy for you to do'. ... I've been quite excited to just be able to draw my own sprites and display them on Vectrex.

 

Downloaded your .asm files from your blog last night. Still need to transfer to my PC and see if I can get them to play.

 

The link you had for a .rar file with compiler and everything included, did not work for me. Did not link to a download.

[gliptitude]

ok, i guess i don't know what to do with .asm files.

 

... When I view them in notepad, the text scrolls to the left, rather than down. It's a dozen or more lines long, but each line is like 5+ pages wide. Is it supposed to be like this?

 

With the Vectorzoa sprite tester template I have, the .asm files proceed like a list, sequentially from top to bottom. I can't really understand their contents, but I can still sort of go through it in a semi-logical way, edit a few simple things like the title and music in the header. Also with that it's already set up to compile a ROM, which I guess entails more files than just the one .asm. (two separate .asm for the sprite tester program, AS09.exe, DOS compiler shortcut, Vectrex.I, (sprite tester).I and (sprite tester).LST)

 

How do I make a .bin or playable rom out of your asm? (please assume i know nothing about programming and very very little about computing)

[Richard H.]

I still think there’s the seeds of a good idea in the 3d tunnel type

 

I always thought the flying part of http://youtu.be/fJwxNJl_XzY

would work well on the Vectrex.

Edited October 18, 2012 by Richard H.

[+Gemintronic]

Sorry to scrape so close to a new game pitch, but.. what about turning VTwist into more of a Zoom! type game?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVM_OxJNN0M

Edited October 18, 2012 by theloon

[gorf68]

ok, i guess i don't know what to do with .asm files. ... When I view them in notepad, the text scrolls to the left, rather than down. It's a dozen or more lines long, but each line is like 5+ pages wide. Is it supposed to be like this?

Strange that! It defenetly isn't supposed to be like that.

I put these links up some time ago, so I’ll have to heck on what happened to the .RAR file and the .ASM files should all have fairly short lines of code with comments.

I’ve no idea why they didn’t format properly in Notepad.

These files may have been opened and re-saved with Dreamweaver or Visual Studio, but none of these editors should have made the code look like what you described!

Did you try using another editor?

 

 

I can’t do it from work, but I’ll try and put some new .ASM and .BIN files up tonight or over the weekend.

 

To compile and run the .ASM files I used the AS09 compiler and the VECX emulator.

 

E.g.

1. Make a test folder to hold the files.

2. Download the AS09.EXE compiler, and put it in the test folder

3. Then download the VECX.EXE emulator, and put it in the same folder

4. Next you need to download any standard VECTREX.I file, and put it in the folder

5. Now open up a command prompt window and go to the test directory

6. Type: AS09 –i vtwist.asm (return) to compile the .ASM

7. This will make a vtwist.bin file in the same folder

8. Then type: vecx –c vtwist.bin (return) to run the .BIN file in the emulator

9. you should now see the code running.

 

It’s not complicated, really just running two commands (a compile and a run) from the DOS/Command prompt.

A quick Google should find all the programs easy enough.

Maybe I should make all the required files available from the Blog page for quickness.

 

You can find a VECTREX.I file in most Vectrex code download sites: this is just a list of useful/standard Vectrex ROM routines and memory locations.

Both this file and the AS09 compiler can be found in the code download for the rather good ‘Vectrex Thrust’ game: available at - http://www.emix8.org

 

All the code for these games is held in one single file. So you only need the VECTREX.I and the .asm file to compile.

Edited October 19, 2012 by gorf68

[gorf68]

Sorry to scrape so close to a new game pitch, but.. what about turning VTwist into more of a Zoom! type game?

Thanks, that could work, and it is the type of comment I was looking for...

Edited October 19, 2012 by gorf68

[gliptitude]

still haven't managed to compile these. I am failing.

 

i was able to view the .asm code properly by using a different text editor.

 

i don't have any experience with Command Prompt or any of this. Compile and Run and &ndash don't seem to be recognizable commands.

 

Using some other commands from a list on wiki I was able to produce .LST files, whatever that is. ... I do notice one thing I did produced hundreds of errors "mnemonic not recognized".

 

ready made .bin's would be nice, but I also really want to learn how to do this.

[gorf68]

OK, haven't had a chance to update this yet... But I will put some .bin files on the blog page and link them here.

[gorf68]

Hopefully these bin file will run ok...

 

For running the .BIN files:

http://free.7host01....garryg/vecx.exe

http://free.7host01....rryg/retdev.bin

http://free.7host01....rryg/vtwist.bin

 

 

For compiling the .ASM files:

http://free.7host01....garryg/AS09.EXE

http://free.7host01....arryg/VECTREX.I

Edited October 23, 2012 by gorf68

[gliptitude]

Hey, played these two .bin's you posted. Pretty cool.

 

I really like the title 'Retro Devolved'. (eh Edit: i just realized retro Evolve was already a Geometry Wars title though)... The directional shooting is fun, but maybe too difficult and confusing the way the vectrex fire buttons are oriented. ... Perhaps you could use the joystick for shooting, and then use the buttons like old arcade style (like Asteroids) 1.rotate left, 2. rotate right, 3. thrust. ... That might seem pretty obscure by today's standards, but several existing Vectrex shooters have the option to play this way, without the joystick. Having a game that worked that way but then actually used the stick for directional firing, would be a pretty outrageous experiment.

 

Vtwist looks quite awesome on an emulator. When I had seen the still images I didn't realize that the two grids were actually moving. It's a really cool effect, and great use of vector graphics. On the emulator (i used ParaJVE) the zooming 2D rectangles look really cool too. ... I understand it's a demo at this point, and i suppose the control scheme is still evolving, so don't feel a need to comment on that. ... My only real complaint is that Spike is in it. I have to admit that he annoys me much less in your game (seeing only the back of him), but I personally just don't like the Spike character.

 

... I also flashed both of these games to my VecFlash cart, to test on an actual Vectrex. Both worked and were functional, but both experienced a lot of distortion. The distortion in vtwist was most disappointing, since it looked so amazing on the emulator. On Vectrex the grids were not lined up. The moving lines didn't match the border lines. They all either fell far short of the border, or extended far beyond the border. ... Not sure why this happens. I know it's an old machine, and each one is a little bit different. But a majority of the finished games don't experience these problems to this extent. I believe I've heard that the Vectrex programmers have numerous tricks for avoiding graphical distortion, but I don't personally have any knowledge of them.

 

Very encouraging efforts in my opinion. I hope you stick with it.

Edited October 24, 2012 by gliptitude

[gorf68]

Thanks for looking and taking the time to reply so fully, gliptitude...

 

I thought there may be some problems with the vtwist one on a real Vectrex.

This is why I need to get myself a programmable cartridge!

I’m not using the standard drawing routines with this. I’m simply drawing the lines and scaling them up on every Z-axis cycle. There’s some arithmetic function in there that the Vectrex may not like.

Do you think it would be best if the player character were animated and smooth scrolled around the grid under joystick control?

I think there’s also a slightly more worked-on version of this somewhere, so I will try to look that out before having a look at the real-Vectrex problems.

Would you possibly be able to post something to let me see how bad it is on the real hardware? No problem if you can’t!

 

The quad-directional shooting in ‘VecWars Retro-Devolved’ was meant to allow you to shoot in any direction, whilst moving completely independently in another direction. (Sort of like 'Smash-TV' or 'Robotron')

So do you think this didn’t work, or is to confusing? Or is it simply down to the button layout?

What did you think of the collision detection? The ‘laser’ gun effect is quite powerful, but the hit-box of the enemy’s is quite small (as is the player’s).

 

 

I’m not sure where to go in improving this, while keeping my original idea.

I see what you mean about the shooting though, although I’m not sure the ‘shoot in the direction you are facing,' or the 'hold down a button and strafe,' options will work better.

Of the two I’d lean towards the ‘strafe’ option... Although this may make it too difficult to actually hit anything, and would mean your ship is ether standing still whilst shooting, or it would be mooving in the closest (Up, Down, Left, Right) direction to that in which you are shooting!

 

 

 

What do you think?

Anybody else have an opinion on this?

Edited October 24, 2012 by gorf68

[gliptitude]

Yeah I'll take a picture for you or maybe even video of vtwist later. No problem. I love talking about this stuff, and like I said before, it's exciting to me that you were able to 'get started so easily'.

 

retdev:

 

Yes, it was "simply down to the button layout", which you have no control over. The collision detection was imperfect, but I wasn't really taking much account of that since these are just demos and early efforts. Of course working out all of the touch and feel of everything would be a huge part of what makes it a good game.

 

Not sure if we are on the same page with the controller issues. (Also maybe I'm really imposing my own idea here, and it's not useful for you.) ..But when I hear 'strafe' I think dashing side to side. But maybe that's just the word you were using for what I was already talking about, which was rather STEERING with two buttons. I understand that moving and directional shooting are intended to be independent of eachother in your game. The problem is that on Vectrex you don't have a sensible button layout that would correspond with (4) different directions (like SNES, DS, PS etc), but rather the 4 buttons are all in a straight line. It's not insanely difficult to play your game the way it is, but it's just not as satisfying as it would be with a more appropriate control pad/button layout, which you just are never going to have access to on Vectrex (unless you expect everyone to pay another $50 for a moded controller, such as recycledgamers' vectrex snes pad, and then custom map the buttons to his button layout).

 

My idea was a workaround that may or may not really be workable (might just be even more awkward and too difficult to play, as well as difficult to program). But I was saying that ship movement would be controlled with the vectrex buttons (3 of them - 2 for steering and one for 'gas'), rather than the joystick. You wouldn't have to shoot in the direction you were moving. You would independently fire in the desired direction by pushing the joystick in that direction. ... Potentially even reverse everything so that the controller was held upside down, so that shooting was done with the right hand. ... I suppose this would really be too much for one person to do (playing the game), as it really takes 2 hands to handle the four buttons themselves in 'stickless' arcade games that work this way (Asteroids etc).

 

I guess another big problem would be that you would need to be able to see visually which direction the ship was pointing in if a steering system was used, and it would be silly looking for the shooting to be going in a different direction (like coming out of the side of the ship). Perhaps a more complex ship sprite would work, where the ship pointed in one direction to indicate movement, but then a (rotating) gun was drawn on top, to point where you were shooting. ... Again maybe we're really getting into a different game at this point. A Geometry Wars clone is worthwhile if you enjoy it I think, but maybe not a game that is really streamlined for Vectrex as is. ... I think directional shooting has been a dream of many, and perhaps someone will produce a dual stick Vectrex controller at some point. Fury Unlimited recently put out two new spinner controllers, so it's not out of the question.

 

vtwist:

 

Yes I would definitely prefer to control the character movement with the joystick, and move freely and smoothly side to side and forward and back. Perhaps one of the buttons could be used for shifting between the upper and lower grids.

 

Not sure if you are set on it being a character (rather than a vehicle) or if there is shooting to be involved, or what these 2D rectangles are. I think it's really an awesome template though with the two scrolling grids. I actually specifically like that this floor and ceiling only incompletely represent the 3D environment, (rather than a completely resolved and enclosed tube or corridor). I think it is totally effective, novel and visually dynamic. In my mind the scrolling grids are the starting point for this game, and a valid one. You just need to figure out what you want them to represent, and what a fun game would be to apply them too.

 

The perspective view floor/ceiling grid would be quite suitable I think for a Space Harrier type game, where the character was flying around the entire space in between the grids, rather than walking on the surface. But also with the way you are using it now, I think it could be awesome for a shooter, still based on traversing the floor/ceiling, with a button to 'reverse gravity', then the ship sort of slowly animates a 180 spin as it drifts from the floor to the ceiling. ... Probably if it were a ship rather than a character, you'd want to change the scale, make the ship much smaller than Spike and also possibly reproportion the grids to create a wider and deeper space.

 

I'm not sure what your skills and interests encompass, or how you go about your work. But I am coming from a design perspective (no programming abilities), and would be happy to work on some graphics and forward them to you. I'm set up to make vector sprites in V-Model, a program which was made for outputing Vectrex coded graphics. I've been working on a Vectrex game for about 6 months, with a mock-up overlay, and made videos of ArtMaster animations demonstrating how it would play. I'll direct you to the videos if you are interested to see what i do.

 

But whatever your ideas are for Vtwist, I don't see how you can go wrong with these scrolling grids. As long as you resolve all the graphical and gameplay issues, it will be a really cool game.

 

Richard H, who posted earlier in this thread, produces Vectrex flash carts. He sells for $85. VecFlash is out of production, but he may have his newer SD card based cart in stock. Not sure if this is the 'programmable cartridge' you really want, but it will play your .bin's on Vectrex.

Edited October 25, 2012 by gliptitude

[gorf68]

RetDev:

 

I got what you were saying about the control method after I posted the reply. I actually tried the 'asteroids' (rotate right/left and thrust) type of ship control in a very early version of this, but it proved practically impossible to avoid being hit!

 

I can smooth out the hit-box and movement issues, but it's the shooting that is the main problem here. I think I want to stick to the four fixed shooting positions, as anything else brakes away from my original idea a bit too much.

I was thinking of maybe having a 'gun' revolve around your ship, maybe with it flashing as it goes past the top, right, bottom, and left. Then having the player press a single fire button at any of the 'flash points' to fire the gun.

 

Hay... maybe I should call the game 'VecWars: Flash Point!'

 

 

 

Vtwist:

 

I was already thinking about adding the 'rotational jump – 180 spin' thing to go from bottom to top and back before you mentioned it!

I also have to put some animation into the main character.

 

I initially thought of this more as a collect-em-up rather than a shooter.

The 2D rectangles are walls; they will kill you if you hit one. If it doesn't slow down the processing too much I intend to make them 3D rectangles!

 

Running out of time, or hitting an enemy (wall or floating), three times will result in game over.

There are 'egg-timers' on the latest version and collecting these will increase your remaining time – prolonging the game and increasing your score: as long as you don't get killed.

 

I was just going to have scoring as a 'how long can you last' thing, but any suggestions are welcome. Shooting enemies could be added to increase the score, but I'm not sure if this would make it too easy?

 

 

 

I'd be interested in people's reactions as to whether or not people would play this when these additions are made, and the problems smoothed out?

[gorf68]

Oh, by the way, gliptitude

 

I‘d be happy to have a look at your graphics stuff. Maybe I could be of some help in getting them moving/interacting a bit

[gliptitude]

 

gorf68

 

 

Posted Today, 7:24 AM

Oh, by the way, gliptitude

 

I‘d be happy to have a look at your graphics stuff. Maybe I could be of some help in getting them moving/interacting a bit

 

That would be awesome! I will send you a PM with some links soon. Also, I took some videos of your games and I will include links to those too, once I get them uploaded (had to use my iPad to get decent quality video, and I don't have WiFi home, which is necessary for getting anything off the iPad).

 

I think I already mentioned that I have a programmer committed for my game, but that he is an insanely busy guy and not really available to start working on our project at this time. But of course I am very anxious to see things get started, and I see no conflict with yourself chipping in for an early experiment. Probably I will show you a large volume of what I am trying to do, and see if there are particular things that you would be most inclined to play around with. .. There is a lot there i think for you to choose from, although I suppose there is some stuff that would seem more a priority and logical starting point. But any contribution from yourself would be greatly appreciated!

 

Attached an image of vtwist here to hold you over until i get the videos up. It is just a still taken from the (crappy) video that I am able to get onto my laptop at home. The video stuck on my iPad is a bit better quality. ... I tried to choose an image here that showed the display problems at their worst. I believe the big triangle at the bottom was a graphical glitch, like the charging enemy had just exited the top of the screen. You'll see more clearly when I get the video for you. .. Might even have that up before you read this message.

 

... A last word with the VecWars controls - after I last posted comments on this I was playing your vtwist game again, which uses the buttons rather than the stick to control movement, and actually made me think it might not be as difficult as I formerly thought to do this in VecWars. I know you just said that you already tried this and that it was too difficult. But orienting it similarly to your Vtwist controls, where there is one button in between the 'left' and 'right' buttons, is really a pretty intuitive set-up (and different from the Asteroids type already discussed, which has side by side turning buttons for your left hand, and then shoot/thrust buttons for your right hand). ... If you could tolerate slowing the game down a bit, or making it slightly less hectic (fewer enemies) I think it might be viable.

 

...It would just be super awesome to have true directional shooting in a Vectrex game, and I don't think it's ever been done before.

 

... Heh, you might notice that I like to analyze things and I tend to go on and on. I'll try to limit myself though and hope not to waste your time.

[ilovethevectrex]

this is a random question (i cant seem to find any info about this anywhere on the internet) how are vectrex homebrews made? i understand that they are made on a computer, but what software? how are they then transfered to the vectrex?

[gliptitude]

this is a random question (i cant seem to find any info about this anywhere on the internet) how are vectrex homebrews made? i understand that they are made on a computer, but what software? how are they then transfered to the vectrex?

 

It is not something that I have the ability to do, but basically from what I understand so far -

 

You write the program in a TEXT EDITOR, such as Notepad in Windows. It's just text, and you first produce a text file. The program is written in a language called ASSEMBLY, which is NOT a higher level language like C or HTML. In addition to knowledge of the mnemonics unique to Assembly language programming, you also need to get to know the Vectrex system, and what is stored in it and available for you to use in your game.

 

There is a free program called V-Model, which you can use to draw your graphics. This program will turn your drawing into Vectrex-ready code (in the form of a text file), which you can copy and use in your own program.

 

The Vectrex system information is stored in a separate file, which you can easily download on the internet. You use this vectrex system file (VECTREX.I), your own program text file (renamed manually to be an .asm file) and an Assembly language compiler utility (AS09.exe) to compile a binary file with your computer's command line interface (such as Command Prompt).

 

... This .bin file is a playable game rom that you can test on a Vectrex emulator.

 

To play on Vectrex immediately you generally need a writable cartridge, something made to use on Vectrex, which you first plug into a port on your computer using a cable, and put your ROM on to it. Then you unplug it from your computer and put it in your Vectrex. If you want other people to play your game, there are a lot of people who have one of these, and can easily play if you give them the file.

 

If your game is good enough or if you are motivated enough to produce a dedicated cartridge for others to buy and play, there are some people who can do that for you for a fee. (John Dondzilla / Classicgamecreations.com) will make a Vectrex cartridge of any Vectrex game he has the rights to make for $15 each.

 

Many Vectrex home-brew-programmers solder their own cartridge pcb's (the electronic element inside of the cartridge shell). I have no idea how this is done, or how unique the contents of the pcb are for each game.

 

I mainly tried to answer this question because I myself have been trying figure this out for a long time. Anyone who really knows should correct me. Just trying to explain to a novice, which I never see done. Everything I read on the subject presumes a lot of knowledge that novices don't have.

Edited October 26, 2012 by gliptitude

[gorf68]

Gliptitude is basically right, but it's always best to do it yourself.The following steps will compile and run a Vectrex program on a PC:1) First make a new folder on your computer, and call it VECTEMP.This is where you will put all the files you will be making and downloading.2) Next you need to put some assembly language code into a plain-text file using a text editor:To do this you can copy and past the following text into an editor and save it as VECTEST.ASM in your VECTEMP directory.

;***************************************************************************; DEFINE SECTION;***************************************************************************Intensity_5F EQU $F2A5 ; BIOS Intensity routinePrint_Str_d EQU $F37A ; BIOS print routineWait_Recal EQU $F192 ; BIOS recalibrationmusic1 EQU $FD0D ; address of a (BIOS ROM) ; music; start of vectrex memory with cartridge name... ORG 0;***************************************************************************; HEADER SECTION;*************************************************************************** DB "g GCE 1998", $80 ; 'g' is copyright sign DW music1 ; music from the rom DB $F8, $50, $20, -$56 ; height, width, rel y, rel x ; (from 0,0) DB "HELLO WORLD PROG 1",$80; some game information, ; ending with $80 DB 0 ; end of game header;***************************************************************************; CODE SECTION;***************************************************************************; here the cartridge program starts offmain: JSR Wait_Recal ; Vectrex BIOS recalibration JSR Intensity_5F ; Sets the intensity of the ; vector beam to $5f LDU #hello_world_string ; address of string LDA #$10 ; Text position relative Y LDB #-$50 ; Text position relative X JSR Print_Str_d ; Vectrex BIOS print routine BRA main ; and repeat forever;***************************************************************************; DATA SECTION;***************************************************************************hello_world_string: DB "HELLO WORLD" ; only capital letters DB $80 ; $80 is end of string;*************************************************************************** END main;***************************************************************************

(On windows you can use notepad to do this)3) You can optionally Download the VECTREX.I file: http://free.7host01....arryg/VECTREX.I and save it in your VECTEMP directory.This is another simple text file that holds all the Vectrex ROM memory locations. It is used with (included in) a Vectrex .ASM file to provide a ‘library reference’ of sorts for the ROM routines that are hard-burnt into the Vectrex system.The simple example program used here doesn’t use this library though.4) Then download an assembler program: http://free.7host01....garryg/AS09.EXE and put it in the VECTEMP directory.This takes the text in the VECTEST.ASM file and converts in to a binary ‘machine code’ file.5) The last download is the emulator program: http://free.7host01....arryg/VECTREX.I save this in the same place as the other files.You should now have a VECTEMP directory holding the following files:VECTEST.ASM – Your source assembly code file.VECTREX.I – The library routine addresses file. (if you want it)AS09.EXE – The assembler executable program.VECX.EXE – A Vectrex emulator program.Open a command prompt:6) Next you need to open a command prompt and point it at your VECTEMP directory. You are going to use this prompt to compile and run the assembly program.At the command prompt:

• Type: CD directory-path/ VECTEMP {and hut the return key} – Where directory-path is the folder location on your PC.
   
  
• Type: AS09 –i VECTEST.ASM {and hut the return key}– This will compile your code.
  

You should now have a VECTEST.BIN file in the VECTEMP folder.

• Type: VECX –c VECTEST.BIN {and hut the return key}– This will run the compiled BIN file on the emulator.
  

And that’s how you do it!

Edited October 26, 2012 by gorf68

[gorf68]

I’ve just had an idea! Instead of rotating the ship with the buttons, how about rotating the gun's fire position around the ship with two buttons, and having the button in the middle of them the fire?

It would mean I would have to re-look at the hit routines; otherwise it would make it extremely easy to just sweep the laser around the ship and wipe out everything on the screen. I think a more concentrated fire approach would work better with this though.

 

What does anyone else think? 4 directional shooting or complete 360%

 

 

Also do you think it would work better if the simple clustered ‘swarm’ enemy types were much more spread out when they are generated?

Edited October 26, 2012 by gorf68

[gliptitude]

I think your new control idea would work really nicely. I still think it would be incredible fun to push the joystick to fire, but your way I think would really make a lot more sense. MOVING in only 4 directions in this game, would seem like much less of a handicap than SHOOTING in only 4. Also, naturally whichever one is controlled by the stick is going to be the easier and more intuitive one to do. Being able move and dodge quickly would really be mandatory, for this game not to be incredibly frustrating. ... If some players are not very good at moving the gun, they could still leave it in one position and move the ship around the screen for a while.

 

Spreading the enemies out would also be an improvement I think, or have some variety maybe that they begin clustered, but eventually stray in calculated ways, and maybe at a variety of different speeds. Maybe not random, but sort of have a pattern as a group.

 

I suspect that sound effects would make the collisions seem less glitchy.

Edited October 26, 2012 by gliptitude

[gorf68]

I haven’t got much work done on VECWARS yet, but I have managed to add a few things to the VTWIST game, now ‘provisionally titled ‘Spike and the angry vortex bird.’ It’s got lives and a basic scoring and hit-routine now, as well as the ‘boss’ screen up and, almost, running. It still isn’t working right on a real Vectrex though.

 

My blog-page should be updated with the new bin’s soon.

[gliptitude]

(( EDITED POST ))

 

I haven’t got much work done on VECWARS yet, but I have managed to add a few things to the VTWIST game, now ‘provisionally titled ‘Spike and the angry vortex bird.’ It’s got lives and a basic scoring and hit-routine now, as well as the ‘boss’ screen up and, almost, running. It still isn’t working right on a real Vectrex though.

 

My blog-page should be updated with the new bin’s soon.

 

Glad to hear you've worked more on VTWIST, that was definitely my favorite among them. I'd love to try it out again when you put a new revision out there.

 

I've read recently that the notion of "sprites" is problematic in vector graphics (not just because there are not pixels but also) because a large part of the programming is manipulating how things display, frame rate etc., and getting it to work. ... So maybe you are already deeply immersed in this process. I guess it is fundamental to all Vectrex programming.

 

If you haven't read Christopher Tumber's account of programming VFrogger, you might find it helpful. I just read it, but it will hopefully be more useful to you. He explains his process of attaining some goals with the display of his game, eliminating distortion, optimization etc.:

 

http://vectrexmuseum.com/share/coder/DIS/CHRIS/VFROGGER/SOURCE/PROGGER.TXT

Edited December 9, 2012 by gliptitude