+Random Terrain Posted July 28, 2013 Share Posted July 28, 2013 Does anybody remember how to make Stella use the mouse as a paddle? Changing the controller under Game Properties does nothing. Devices and Ports under Input Settings seems to be set correctly and I closed Stella and loaded the game again. There must be another hidden step that I'm forgetting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted July 28, 2013 Share Posted July 28, 2013 I don't think the game reads the paddles yet 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omegamatrix Posted July 28, 2013 Author Share Posted July 28, 2013 This looks amazing! Can't wait to see how it progresses. Thank you, Wickey! Did you ever work out the "2 or 3" bug where some systems will occasionally display different numbers of sprites? I posted a video a while back showing how the transition can occur even on the same system due to changing latency with thermal fluctuations, so whatever code caused the initial sprite glitch ought to be avoided. Hopefully you worked this out. This fortunately doesn't affect the kernel I wrote. That being said I bought a Gemini recently and it has some thermal effects that kicks in after a few minutes. These Gemini specific glitches I can not correct. I'm not sure if it is just my Gemini either. I found lots of games were not 100% compatible with it so I'm not too worried about it. Does anybody remember how to make Stella use the mouse as a paddle? Changing the controller under Game Properties does nothing. Devices and Ports under Input Settings seems to be set correctly and I closed Stella and loaded the game again. There must be another hidden step that I'm forgetting. I don't think the game reads the paddles yet No controls yet. Still got quite a few things to do. Basically I'm working from the top of the screen down. The next major task is writing collisions for the balloons and jumpers. I'm doing the hardest parts of the code first so that everything picks up speed at the end. I want to get over the major humps and see the finish line. Drawing the balloons should have been the hardest part of the whole game. Today though I'm going to start laying out what will go in each bank. I'm expanding it to 32K SC with only 2 banks are being used right now. So far ram is really good, and the SC is just a reserve for another feature if it comes about. Rom is abundant. Cycles are okay for now. While I got lots of features that I want to implement, one of the things you might like RT is that I plan having the balloons randomly choose the left or right direction when the row regenerates. This is in response to the VideoGameCritic's original complaint that the action in Circus Atari always seemed to gravitate to the right. I've never noticed that myself, but I thought with random choosing of directions it might help to change that. Anyhow, lots to do before we get there, and not too much time. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Random Terrain Posted July 28, 2013 Share Posted July 28, 2013 I don't think the game reads the paddles yet No controls yet. Still got quite a few things to do. Basically I'm working from the top of the screen down. The next major task is writing collisions for the balloons and jumpers. I'm doing the hardest parts of the code first so that everything picks up speed at the end. I want to get over the major humps and see the finish line. Drawing the balloons should have been the hardest part of the whole game. Thanks. Now I can stop trying to figure out why my copy of Stella is broken. While I got lots of features that I want to implement, one of the things you might like RT is that I plan having the balloons randomly choose the left or right direction when the row regenerates. This is in response to the VideoGameCritic's original complaint that the action in Circus Atari always seemed to gravitate to the right. I've never noticed that myself, but I thought with random choosing of directions it might help to change that. Anyhow, lots to do before we get there, and not too much time. That will be nice. If you have the time and space, you could also create 3 to 5 death animations that play randomly (but never the same one twice in a row) when the player dies. One might spurt blood, another might twitch, another might twitch and spurt blood, another might just be a puddle of goo that spreads out to the left and right, and so on. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omegamatrix Posted August 26, 2013 Author Share Posted August 26, 2013 I worked on CAA a little bit today, and decided to skip the collisions right now. In this build we start to see the beginnings of being able to draw a death sequence. At the bottom of the screen P0 is used to draw the cart wheels as well as the man on the see-saw. The ball is used to make up the see-saw, and P1 is used to draw the jumper, who in this case went splat. Since P1 doesn't share it's color with anything else in that area of the screen we can start drawing a little carnage. Maybe next weekend I'll work on the wheel animations (I want them to spin for a while when you move), and some death sequences before moving on. In the meantime you can control the see-saw with a joystick (no paddles yet). Use the fire button to switch the see-saw direction, and as a bonus the select switch will change the direction of the middle row of balloons so that you can see what it looks like when they all move in the same direction. I found it mesmerizing ha ha. I also changed up the middle row animation a little bit. CAA_082513.zip 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iesposta Posted August 26, 2013 Share Posted August 26, 2013 The Select switch, when they move in the same direction = THE FINEST PARALLAX SCROLLING on the 2600 to date! Make little mountain tops, and color the background the same as the sprite starting just below in three darkening shades of brown. Sell it on cart as Desert Train (looking out the window). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LS_Dracon Posted August 26, 2013 Share Posted August 26, 2013 Nice game is coming, already better graphics than the arcade version, which is impressive for Atari 2600. Keep up the good work. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omegamatrix Posted August 27, 2013 Author Share Posted August 27, 2013 Thanks guys!! Did anyone tried it on real hardware yet? How does it look? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LS_Dracon Posted August 27, 2013 Share Posted August 27, 2013 (edited) Tested and run fine. I have some suggestions about colors. You're using values as $x4 for the balloons, it's too dark! I recommend bright values like $x8 or even $xA, like the balloon cord. I did some test about color flicker and I know more bright means more perceptible flicker, but luminance 4 still too dark. I think up to $xC need to be avoided, for the flicker. Also reduce a bit the bright for the players, something for $0A, it's a black background, the characters are distinctive enough. So increasing the bright for the balloons and reducing for the players, trying to nullify the flicker perception. Dead character uses white $0A, I think it looks good. The platform using 1 scanline resolution doesn't looks good, I'll send my suggestion. You can even make the platform with player 1 graphics, for something more detailed. Edited August 27, 2013 by LS_Dracon 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omegamatrix Posted August 28, 2013 Author Share Posted August 28, 2013 These are all good suggetions, thank you! I am going to implement those platforms and see how they look. I could probably draw them out of GRP1 in double or quad size, and then do a quick cycle 74 hmove. I also have both missiles available if need be. There will eventually be two tiers of platforms and the moving obstacles below the balloons. I'm also thinking of having dropping power-ups, and maybe multiple jumpers. For right now I am going to try an push through a much simpler limited kernel and re-write/write in everything later. Basically in the kernel after drawing the balloons I'm just going to read the paddles, reload some ram for the score, and draw the jumper. Once it's working I will continue by jumping the player and checking for collisions with the see-saw. After that I will start writing the balloon collisions and see how that goes. With the colors,ultimately I am thinking of having a brightness option in the option screen (which isn't built yet). You're right they are intentionally dark to reduce the flicker. However there are a lot of things to consider such as different types of TV's and whether the game is being played in a windowless darker room or a bright sun-filled room. It's probably best to give an option to increase/decrease the brightness and flicker instead of locking the game in. Originally I was going to give an option for choosing your own background color and balloon color, but decided to go with a black background since the very bottom of the screen (with the see-saw) is difficult to hide the HMOVE lines. I thought about using PF0, colored black, on the right side to even out the HMOVE lines but felt the black bars would still stick out like a sore thumb on the colored background. Here is a demo I made if you're interested. Use the color/BW switch to see the color grid, the joystick moves the cursor around the grid, and fire selects the color and toggles to the next item (screen, top balloon, middle balloon, bottom balloon): CAA_040613(colorSwitch).zip Back to CAA, one interesting thing about the kernel is that it has the ability to interlace colored balloons on the same row. I don't now how to implement something fun with it, but I would like to write it into a game variation somehow. It's kinda unfair to make the player go after certain colors if they really only have control over the seesaw, but some interesting effects could be done. I suppose I could pulsate the colors, or strobe them down the row faster then the balloon is moving. CAA_082713.bin Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+SpiceWare Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 I really like the interlace colored balloons. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iesposta Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 He said balloon directions were going to change randomly at the start I like that! Are the balloon colors going to change are they going to be fixed? What are your favorite grouping of three colors? I like RGB, red and green and blue. There's the patriotic red white and blue. Black and blue and red haha Purple pink and yellow? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omegamatrix Posted August 28, 2013 Author Share Posted August 28, 2013 I really like the interlace colored balloons. Cool! I like them too, even though I am color blind and not really sure of how they look. I do also love that I opened this game up to everyone really early in development too. You get valuable feedback that way. The temptation is always not to tell anyone about your game until it's almost done, because you never know if it will get done, and sometimes you feel pressured to get it done. In the end it really does pay off to make it all public. Did anyone like the Harmony homage? I fixed the screen bounce from the 082513 build. It should be correct in the 082713 build. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omegamatrix Posted August 28, 2013 Author Share Posted August 28, 2013 Are the balloon colors going to change are they going to be fixed? Everything is open at this point. Right now I am continuing with core stuff, and then we'll all work on making this game fun. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omegamatrix Posted August 28, 2013 Author Share Posted August 28, 2013 I did a quick build with the platforms. To me it looks naturally like the see saw should slide under the platform (due to it's shape), but I can't wedge it more than 2 pixels as a hmove bar will come on the next line to move the ball to the right. I will keep thinking about this. I suppose I could make it kiddy-corner to the middle line of the platform. There is also the issue of colors as I'm using PF0 still and the ball. However moving them on the same line would be as simple as using SCORE mode since GRP0 is not drawn for a few lines yet. I'm only concerned about the left side as the HMOVE lines are the obstacle. Anyhow I'm rambling at this point and it's time for bed. CAA_082713B.bin For now I'm just using the missles to make part of the middle line of the platform. It seemed convenient for this demo. Finally the touching of the kiddy-corner is better represented by a picture. This is what I mean: You can see the tip of the teeter-totter touches the tip of the middle line of the platform. The HMOVE bar can still follow on the preceding line and not cover up the teeter-totter this way. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PFL Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 I tried the ROM on my PAL Jr and I couldn't get the game started. One man was stuck in the balloons and I could move the see saw back and forward but that was it. Not sure what's happening... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+SpiceWare Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 I couldn't get the game started. You're missing out, it's a blast! Just kidding It's not yet playable, this is just a demo to show off the incredible Display Kernel that Omegamatrix wrote. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LS_Dracon Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 (edited) Originally I was going to give an option for choosing your own background color and balloon color, but decided to go with a black background since the very bottom of the screen (with the see-saw) is difficult to hide the HMOVE lines. I thought about using PF0, colored black, on the right side to even out the HMOVE lines but felt the black bars would still stick out like a sore thumb on the colored background. Here is a demo I made if you're interested. Use the color/BW switch to see the color grid, the joystick moves the cursor around the grid, and fire selects the color and toggles to the next item (screen, top balloon, middle balloon, bottom balloon): CAA_040613(colorSwitch).png This demo would be interesting but it doesn't work here... All I can change is the background color, pressing fire just increase the bright of background, it's not toggling, tried with player 2 fire button too and nothing. If you send me a demo that just changes the balloon colors (perhaps moving up/down to select balloon row, the player indicate the current row, and left / right to change the luminance. I'll be able to make some test in real hardware and send the feedback to you. For now I'm just using the missles to make part of the middle line of the platform. It seemed convenient for this demo. Finally the touching of the kiddy-corner is better represented by a picture. This is what I mean: Good enough! About balloons colors, seems right to me, I think the original had a row of yellow balloons, (I'll check soon) but they looks fine as it. The problem is the brightness but not so long. Edited August 28, 2013 by LS_Dracon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+SpiceWare Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 I think what I like most about the alternating balloon colors is it reinforces the idea that you're "at the circus" 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iesposta Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 I love the 6 colors balloon demo, though the bottom brown one looks literally like crap because it is brown. Also I guess I'm used to 30Hz flicker because is doesn't necessarily flash, but the brightness is greatly dimmed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PFL Posted August 28, 2013 Share Posted August 28, 2013 You're missing out, it's a blast! Just kidding It's not yet playable, this is just a demo to show off the incredible Display Kernel that Omegamatrix wrote. That'll explain it then. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omegamatrix Posted August 28, 2013 Author Share Posted August 28, 2013 On my cell. Color picker demo does work. It might be select switch you use. Maybe not firebutton. Been a long time. I don't have it here. I still like to keep black background. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LS_Dracon Posted August 29, 2013 Share Posted August 29, 2013 (edited) Yes, select switch. Tested on real hardware and $x8 looks better for the balloons in a black background. I also like most alternating balloon colors. Edited August 29, 2013 by LS_Dracon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Omegamatrix Posted September 2, 2013 Author Share Posted September 2, 2013 Today's builds: CAA_090113.bin CAA_090113(PAL60).bin 1) Brightened balloons to $x8 values. - Got rid of brown balloon. I choose some colors that seem distinguishable on my TV. 2) Darkened player slightly to $xC value. 3) Adjusted platform so middle row touches tip of see-saw. - Added a cycle 74 hmove special case for a flipped see-saw, on far left edge. - Changed middle row of platform so it uses M0, M1 is no longer used. 4) Implemented one paddle (just controls the see-saw, no jumper yet). - Adjusted paddle range so it is as has a little leeway left and right after maximum and minimum samples. This means you can keep turning it for a bit before it hits the end. - Tested with Atari paddles, and a Gemini controller. - Sampling is done every line for fine precision, kernel never gets busy enough to have to sample every 2nd line. - Added some smoothing code so that bouncing plus or minus 1 value is simply ignored. 5) Fixed a timing glitch on intro splash no one seems to have found 6) Fixed a glitch in when the balloons change direction, if they are not all being displayed. Please try this on real hardware and give feedback on color brightness and paddle smoothness. I'm really interested in what kind of TV (LED, plasma, CRT, etc...) you have, and whether you are in a bright or dark room. Is the flicker too much? The values used for the paddles are displayed bottom right. You can sometimes see the numbers bouncing while the see-saw remains stationary. If your paddles are really dirty or have a big deadband then this smoothing algorithm won't help... you'll just have to clean your paddles. Up next is writing a skip draw all the way down the screen for the jumper. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iesposta Posted September 2, 2013 Share Posted September 2, 2013 Harmony tested LCD 47" S-Video. Brighter balloons: better Filcker: barely noticeable Splash screen: mind = blown Gemini (cleaned) controller: 100% Old C64 Paddles (dirty): 90% 16:9 widescreen ratio: A big Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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