Venture: A Poll for the Atari Community

[Kjmann]

We have a dilemma. Some People have said that the game is not difficult enough.

 

We have put in a challenger mode for the game but we are running out of space in the 32k cart. (the Cart must be 32k or less to do a 5200 release)

 

So we have a choice:

 

A) leave the game the way it is and not add a new Map or new rooms to the game which will keep the standard mode for the purists out there.

 

OR

 

B) we can dump the Standard Mode and make this game a more challenging Venture (Pun intended) overall with a new map, new baddies and new obstacles.

 

Vote using the Poll here. I won’t answer comments or questions in public here.

[Goochman]

Tough question....................any way to release a 64k cart for the computer series with all the goodies?

 

Im also not 100% sure on what you are saying - are you indicating that we are voting on to release:

 

1. Standard Adventure with the harder challenge mode - no additions

or

2. Just the challenge mode along with extra levels - normal Venture is not provided?

 

I guess I would vote for normal venture with the difficulty ramped up a bit more (faster monsters) from the get go.

 

It would be nice if the 8bit version could be on a bigger cart with more goodies

[+Philsan]

Limit a game's memory size, the same error Atari made back then when C64 (with stock 64KB) came out...

[fernando marrin]

what about Steve's 64 kb magacart boards ?

[mimo]

Screw the 5200, do the full monty for the xl/xe

[scobb]

Would fix the bug, make a little harder but stay true to the arcade!

[peteym5]

The noted bugs were fixed and will be fixed when we are able to build more cartridges. I did make it harder while staying true to the arcade. Venture can optionally play the standard Arcade / COLECO style with everything pretty much in the same place. The Challenger mode is in the options. Adds more monsters and does a few other things. Challenger mode uses all the same data and programming, Just certain flags turn things off when playing normally.

 

The game is geared to run on any 8-bit machine, just uses the first 16K for screen graphics and variables. Only locations used are the NMI and IRQ vectors at the top of the memory map on 64K+ RAM machines. It adjusts if there is 48K or less [ no RAM under ROM] by using the OS NMI routine instead of the one I load in RAM. The RAM NMI is less CPU intensive, helps the sprites to be completely drawn, and halts frames if the VBI is not complete. I did it this way so it is easier to port over to a 5200 version. I am aware the 5200 need different joystick read logic and some of the registers are relocated.