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TI Scramble - Scramble clone


Asmusr

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* Get rid of the speech.

It doesn't add any value to the game. I read it was used for entermaintent while the map is unpacking, but perhaps there's a better way to handle that.

 

I agree that It doesn't add any value, but it removes the feeling that the game might have crashed (try commenting out the line 'BL @TALK' in the source code). Any suggestions? It cannot be interrupt driven and I don't have any letters available.

 

The tile below the fuel bar is a flag for the number of rounds completed. It's also in the arcade game. Unfortunately I don't have a tile with a black background available.

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Not design wise, but perhaps you could still speedup the decompress a little by running it from scratchpad memory ?


1. Copy scratchpad memory to 32K RAM

2. Copy decompress to scratchpad and run it from there

3. Recover scratchpad memory from 32K RAM and move on


Dunno how much it'll bring you, but could be worth a try.

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Absolutely fantastic. I wish you could go back in time and plant this as the seed for the level of quality for 99/4A games. ;-)

 

To help with the decompress on an F18A system you might consider:

 

1. Use the scroll registers for scrolling which would give you more time to decompress.

2. Use the GPU to decompress.

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* [EDIT] Add a demo mode. Pretty much just start the game, but do not read game keys. The ship should crash after being hit by the 6th rocket.

I think the arcade game behaved like that as well.

 

This version includes a demo. I planned to include this all along, but it slipped off my to-do list.

 

[Edit: just noticed that the intro doesn't loop after the demo, this will be fixed]

 

I don't think there's any way around that the level change takes time. In addition to unpacking the map it also scrolls and uploads 8 x 112 characters to the VDP and does several other things.

 

Marc has reported that missiles appear out of nowhere at the end of level one. Has anyone else seen this?

tiscramble-beta3.zip

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I agree that It doesn't add any value, but it removes the feeling that the game might have crashed (try commenting out the line 'BL @TALK' in the source code). Any suggestions? It cannot be interrupt driven and I don't have any letters available.

 

 

Not really sure any of this would fit into your game or the style...

 

To let people know some of my programs were processing I use a spinning cursor. In one of my game attempts (incomplete so far) I used a similar routine to spin some of the primary characters while everything initialized, then added a "warp" sound and stopped the spinning when the next screen was ready.

 

My favorite effect to play around with was a "C64-like" rotating color, vertical border, achieved by quickly rotating the screen color using VWTR. Varying the delay between color change and selecting the color weighting all played into the look and feel. If I recall correctly, setting the tile background colors to transparent will let the rotating colors bleed through characters, too. Or maybe it was foreground? I was trying to create a demo and never had the time to get far with it. Not sure I tested this in bitmap mode, though.

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This version includes a demo. I planned to include this all along, but it slipped off my to-do list.

 

I don't think there's any way around that the level change takes time. In addition to unpacking the map it also scrolls and uploads 8 x 112 characters to the VDP and does several other things.

 

Marc has reported that missiles appear out of nowhere at the end of level one. Has anyone else seen this?

There is no definite pattern as to when it happens. Usually (but not always) at the transition from level 1 to 2.....

 

Your changes are much appreciated. Much more enjoyable. If you could figure out a way to eliminate that pause then it would be perfect ;-).....

 

If that is not possible then could you make it so that the bullets and bombs that are currently flying before the level change do not disappear when the transition is made ? You can't really set up a lot of times because your set up shots evaporate.....

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A short intro music, then only sound effects. How does it sound on your MESS?

 

What I think are supposed to be the speech patterns sound like bursts of static. Besides that, I think it works for 90%, but the last note of the "fire" sound seems to stick. Oddly enough, the pitch is different after each shot, which seems strange to me, but might be very logical for the one who wrote the code :).

 

Hope this helps,

 

Danny

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Only if you port Princess Quest to the TI :).

 

Seriously, I wouldn't have a clue. How much ROM space is possible?

 

If I'm not mistaken up to 32kb, but I don't know if that requires paging. The biggest constraint is the rather limited 1kb of RAM the system has.

 

That said, I would _love_ to see Princess Quest on the TI, so if nanochess takes up your challenge I'd say go for it!! ;)

Edited by TheMole
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What I think are supposed to be the speech patterns sound like bursts of static.

What MESS version are you using? The recent versions have a flawless speech output.

 

Besides that, I think it works for 90%, but the last note of the "fire" sound seems to stick.

This is also true for the recent MESS versions. I can imagine that this is due to an improper sound chip emulation with lost bytes, and I have to take a closer look. It would be easier for me if Rasmus can strip off all other code and just keep the sound routine that triggers this behavior.

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What MESS version are you using? The recent versions have a flawless speech output.

 

 

This is also true for the recent MESS versions. I can imagine that this is due to an improper sound chip emulation with lost bytes, and I have to take a closer look. It would be easier for me if Rasmus can strip off all other code and just keep the sound routine that triggers this behavior.

 

The speech also works fine for me. I will try to isolate the sound code tonight.

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What MESS version are you using? The recent versions have a flawless speech output.

 

 

This is also true for the recent MESS versions. I can imagine that this is due to an improper sound chip emulation with lost bytes, and I have to take a closer look. It would be easier for me if Rasmus can strip off all other code and just keep the sound routine that triggers this behavior.

I am running 149 on OSX. Haven't tried any other speech using games yet...

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0.149 should work; it is pretty new. Try the following:

 

- Direct speech by running Parsec

- Vocabulary speech by running Extended Basic and using CALL SAY

- Text-to-speech by running Terminal Emulator 2, enter BASIC, type OPEN #1:"SPEECH",OUTPUT and then PRINT #1:"HELLO"

 

If you run MESS from a shell (command line), check whether the emulator returns with "Average speed: 100%".

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Only if you port Princess Quest to the TI :)

A challenge! :), well, I've to admit I don't have a clue of 9900 processor...

 

Seriously, I wouldn't have a clue. How much ROM space is possible?

32K without paging, upto 512K with Megacart. 1K of RAM, or 24/32K if you use Super Game Module.

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A challenge! :), well, I've to admit I don't have a clue of 9900 processor...

 

I can only say: pretty please, with sugar on top! If there's one thing the TI needs to prove it can be a real gaming machine at least on par with it's contemporaries it is a selection of nice side-scrolling platformers.

 

I'll commit to buying the cartridge right now, if I have to ;)

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This is also true for the recent MESS versions. I can imagine that this is due to an improper sound chip emulation with lost bytes, and I have to take a closer look. It would be easier for me if Rasmus can strip off all other code and just keep the sound routine that triggers this behavior.

 

It's strange, when I isolated the sound code everything sounded perfectly fine. But if you put a watch point on >8400 in the game you will hear an awful high pitched sound after the first few bytes of the music are written. This is the sound list:

 

 

SNDMUS BYTE 3,>92,>88,>16,1 * D#3
               BYTE 1,>90,2
               BYTE 1,>92,2
               BYTE 1,>94,5
               BYTE 1,>96,5 <-- Around here (>96) it already sounds wrong
               BYTE 1,>98,5
               BYTE 1,>9F,10 * Pause 2
               BYTE 1,>91,1 * D#3
               BYTE 1,>90,2
               BYTE 1,>92,2
               ...
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Yep, coding the 9900 is closer to the 68000 than the Z80 (or 6502) - in my opinion. That might feel nicer, more simple and/or quicker. Several challenges arise though. More complicated architecture (TI-99/4A). 256 bytes of CPU RAM opposed to 1K, unless you demand the 32K RAM Expansion add-on to be present. Wait-states and prefetch throughout. 8K of cartridge ROM opposed to 32K (guess you can bank-switch with both systems). Add GROM (almost slow ROM through a port like VDP) but then not (GROM hasn't really been supported in cartridge format since TI did it on their own way-back). 16 bit is nice (even some 32 bit ops) but might come in as an overhead porting and dealing with other on-board chips - also consider multiplexing (done automatically but at a cost). I guess Z80 might even go as far as being on par when doing 16 bit operations (optimized and in content). Z80 will be faster at 8 bit (at least consider wait-states in Expansion RAM and cartridge ROM).

I guess you will probably have to go beyond barebone - opposed to what you'd do with the ColecoVision.

 

:)

Edited by sometimes99er
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