WIP- Space Taxi

[+ZeroPage Homebrew]

ZeroPage Homebrew is playing Space Taxi on tomorrow's ZPH stream LIVE on Twitch, hope you can join us!

 

Mon Apr 3, 2023 | LIVE @ 6PM PT | 9PM ET | 1AM GMT

WATCH LIVE: https://www.twitch.tv/zeropagehomebrew/
WATCH LATER: https://youtube.com/zeropagehomebrew/

 

Games:

• Space Taxi (2023 WIP | 2600) by Jeff Haber @Just Jeff
• Berry Fun! (2023 WIP | 2600) by Mike Littau @littaum
• Beyond Parsec (2023 WIP | 2600) by Grocer Games / Kevin Kelley @KevKelley
• Carrot Kingdom (2021 | 2600) by Joseph Nesbella @Jinroh

(WATCH AT 1080P60 FOR BEST QUALITY)

 

[Bomberman94]

As I’m a big fan of Space Taxi: any chance for a PAL release in parallel to the NTSC version? Thanks you so much 🥹

[Just Jeff]

On 4/9/2023 at 3:56 PM, Bomberman94 said:

As I’m a big fan of Space Taxi: any chance for a PAL release in parallel to the NTSC version? Thanks you so much 🥹

Well I just don't know..  Its the kind of thing I'll just have to put off thinking about until things are more complete.  Its a really big project!

[Just Jeff]

Hello!!  Sorry its been a while..   Had to focus on training for some races, a car accident, and work..

 

Just wondering if anyone has any better ideas for playing digital voice nybbles inside the kernel.  I have few methods here and I suppose all could be used. 

 

Assume that enough sound nybbles (~50) have all been set up in RAM prior to the start of the kernel and that a new nybble will have to be stored in AUDV1 about every 4 lines, but misses and variations probably wouldn't be too noticeable if they happen.

 

Straight forward player: 

BasicNybblePlayer:	;Uses 15 cycles and A and X registers
      tya         ;2 2	Use scan line index to drive the player
      lsr         ;2 4	Multiply by 4 so new nybble is loaded every 4 lines
      lsr         ;2 6
      tax         ;2 8
      lda RAM,x   ;4 12	Load the new (or existing)
      sta AUDV1   ;3 15 Even though this may get stored every line, it will only change every 4 lines

 

Hijack the DoDraw:

;Saves 8 cycles over separate player/DoDraw routines. Doesn't update nybble if taxi is present on line.  Probably not very noticeable
;Taxi graphics must be padded with an additional zero line to clear GRP0 since zero is no longer loaded in A.

SilentDoDraw:
      lda #Player0_HEIGHT-1   ;2 2
      dcp Player0Draw         ;5 7
      tya                     ;2 9 Use scan line index. Moved here to balance cycles.  Does not affect carry flag
      bcc .Playnibble         ;2/3 11/12
.DoDrawGrp0c                  ;0 11
      lda (Player0Ptr),y      ;5 16
      sta GRP0                ;3 19
      SLEEP 3                 ;3 22
      jmp .SkipNybble          ;3 25
.Playnibble ;12
      ;tya         ;Moved up to balance cycles
      lsr         ;2 4	Multiply by 4 so new nybble is loaded every 4 lines
      lsr         ;2 6
      tax         ;2 8
      lda RAM,x   ;4 12	Load the new (or existing)
      sta AUDV1   ;3 15 Even though this may get stored every line, it will only change every 4 lines
.SkipNybble

 

Taxi disappears during speech (saves one more cycle (9) and sound isn't interrupted on those lines.  One additional byte of RAM needed.

CheckSpeechDoDraw:
      lda RAMPlayer0_HEIGHT-1 ;3 3  Either has the true height of the taxi, or a negative number indicating speech is playing
      bmi Speak               ;2/3 5/6
      dcp Player0Draw         ;5 10
      bcs .DoDrawGrp0c        ;2/3 12/13
      lda #0
      .byte $2C 
.DoDrawGrp0c                  ;0 13
      lda (Player0Ptr),y      ;5 18
      sta GRP0                ;3 21
      jmp DoneSpeak           ;3 24

Speak:
      tya         ;2 2	Use scan line index to drive the player
      lsr         ;2 4	Multiply by 4 so new nybble is loaded every 4 lines
      lsr         ;2 6
      tax         ;2 8
      lda RAM,x   ;4 12	Load the new (or existing)
      sta AUDV1   ;3 15 Even though this may get stored every line, it will only change every 4 lines
      SLEEP 3     ;3 24
DoneSpeak

 

 

Thanks!

-Jeff

 

 

 

[Just Jeff]

Hello!

 

Here's the WIP .bin that will be displayed at the AtariAge booth in Portland next weekend.  Enjoy!

 

-Jeff

SpaceTaxi.asm.bin

Edited October 7, 2023 by Just Jeff

[Dionoid]

Wow, very impressive!!!!

Also that full-with title screen is amazing. 

 

Atari 2600 title screen:

Original Commodore 64 title screen:

 

That shows some amazing TIA black-belt skills.

 

Edited October 7, 2023 by Dionoid

[KevKelley]

Wow that looks great 

[CrazyChris]

I would like to be able to restart the game by pressing the fire button.

[Just Jeff]

On 10/7/2023 at 3:21 PM, Dionoid said:

Wow, very impressive!!!!

Also that full-with title screen is amazing. 

 

Atari 2600 title screen:

Original Commodore 64 title screen:

 

That shows some amazing TIA black-belt skills.

 

 

Thanks!  I did it a few years ago when I was still learning 6502 and Stella.  The effort to make that friggin' bottom thruster look PETSCII..:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited October 9, 2023 by Just Jeff

[+ZeroPage Homebrew]

ZeroPage Homebrew is playing Space Taxi on tomorrow's ZPH stream LIVE on Twitch, hope you can join us!

 

Tue Oct 10, 2023 | LIVE @ 6PM PT | 9PM ET | 1AM GMT+1Day

WATCH LIVE: https://www.twitch.tv/zeropagehomebrew/
WATCH LATER: https://youtube.com/zeropagehomebrew/

 

Games:

• Slicks Racing (2023 Exclusive World Premiere | 2600) by Vojta Nedvěd @nooly (Programming & Music) / Petr 'raist' Šťastný  (Graphics)
• Space Taxi (2023 WIP Update | 2600) by Jeff Haber @Just Jeff

[+-^CrossBow^-]

On 10/7/2023 at 10:23 AM, Just Jeff said:

Hello!

 

Here's the WIP .bin that will be displayed at the AtariAge booth in Portland next weekend.  Enjoy!

 

-Jeff

SpaceTaxi.asm.bin 64 kB · 30 downloads

I was trying this newest .bin last night on my 7800 and wasn't able to get it working for me properly. 

 

What was happening was similar to what we saw when Jame's was getting some odd graphical glitching that was causing the taxi to immediately register a collision detect and crashing it. But I didn't see any graphical issues taking place in my case. Here are some more details...

 

I'm playing on an A1 model 7800 using my Uno cart with the UCA FW load on it. 

 

At first it was playing fine but then after I got the third person to their platform and then tried to pick up the 4th, as soon as I landed on the platform, the game reset itself back to the title screen? I then tried to play again and it started to do the crash reset back to title screen as soon as I would try and descend to the first platform to pick up the first passenger? Just did that over and over. I then found out while this was going on, that if I placed my difficulty swiches from Right (Where they were sitting at the time) to the Left, that I was able to now get past the 1st screen and could pick up the passenger and go up. But then as soon as I got to about 1/3 of the way down from the top on the second screen, it reset again back to title and kept doing this over and over.

 

Power cycling my 7800 did NOT correct this issue and it continued to behave this way from then on. So yeah... I'm basically not able to get any further than maybe a few passengers (at first) before it starts to crash and reset itself back to the title screen.

 

My UNO is the only cartridge I have that I think can play this game. I have an older Harmony and it just gives a file load error when trying to run the .bin and the BBPro 7800 adapter doesn't seem to support this file size or banking system yet either as it just gives a scrambled screen when trying to load.

 

[Just Jeff]

On 10/8/2023 at 9:49 AM, CrazyChris said:

I would like to be able to restart the game by pressing the fire button.

If you hit the left fire button (F on your keyboard) it will restart.

[+-^CrossBow^-]

Okay... so quick update on this. I was mistaken in my earlier comment about the game not working on my main console. That wasn't the case it is actually my lab test 7800 that is an A3 unit that the game was glitching up on me with. My actual main 7800 is an A1 series and the current build seems to load up and play find from my UNO. So yeah...just doesn't seem to want to work properly on my A3 7800 console.

 

[Just Jeff]

On 10/11/2023 at 9:36 AM, -^CrossBow^- said:

I was trying this newest .bin last night on my 7800 and wasn't able to get it working for me properly. 

 

What was happening was similar to what we saw when Jame's was getting some odd graphical glitching that was causing the taxi to immediately register a collision detect and crashing it. But I didn't see any graphical issues taking place in my case. Here are some more details...

 

I'm playing on an A1 model 7800 using my Uno cart with the UCA FW load on it. 

 

At first it was playing fine but then after I got the third person to their platform and then tried to pick up the 4th, as soon as I landed on the platform, the game reset itself back to the title screen? I then tried to play again and it started to do the crash reset back to title screen as soon as I would try and descend to the first platform to pick up the first passenger? Just did that over and over. I then found out while this was going on, that if I placed my difficulty swiches from Right (Where they were sitting at the time) to the Left, that I was able to now get past the 1st screen and could pick up the passenger and go up. But then as soon as I got to about 1/3 of the way down from the top on the second screen, it reset again back to title and kept doing this over and over.

 

Power cycling my 7800 did NOT correct this issue and it continued to behave this way from then on. So yeah... I'm basically not able to get any further than maybe a few passengers (at first) before it starts to crash and reset itself back to the title screen.

 

My UNO is the only cartridge I have that I think can play this game. I have an older Harmony and it just gives a file load error when trying to run the .bin and the BBPro 7800 adapter doesn't seem to support this file size or banking system yet either as it just gives a scrambled screen when trying to load.

 

 

So I had a similar conversation with James @ZeroPage Homebrew just prior to the show.  I believe I might have fixed it in the attached .bin but I don't have any way to test because I use Plus and Harmony on a 2600.  Please give it a shot and let me know.  I also did a quick and dirty test of a voice volume fix.  Please let me know if its louder now.

 

Thanks!

-Jeff

 

SpaceTaxi.asm.bin

[Bomberman94]

Wow what a great game (played last build via PlusCart) and even though it is only NTSC version on my PAL Atari, it played just fine (just wrong colors). Only thing I would wish is a little animation when passenger moves - that all, everything’s else is superb! This one must have a cartridge release please and maybe you can say how many different levels you will include? You can easily increase variation with lesser fuel or others colors etc. With this version I heard the voice for the first time - it is a flashback to my C64 time many years ago 🥹

[Just Jeff]

On 10/13/2023 at 2:45 PM, Bomberman94 said:

Wow what a great game (played last build via PlusCart) and even though it is only NTSC version on my PAL Atari, it played just fine (just wrong colors). Only thing I would wish is a little animation when passenger moves - that all, everything’s else is superb! This one must have a cartridge release please and maybe you can say how many different levels you will include? You can easily increase variation with lesser fuel or others colors etc. With this version I heard the voice for the first time - it is a flashback to my C64 time many years ago 🥹

Thanks!

 

Yeah I'll be animating the passenger at some point.  I've always liked the C64 passenger's attitude when boarding and exiting.  I'll see if I can do that using only ten dots!  

 

PAL- maybe.  But if I do, it would be after almost everything else.

 

Everything for the cartridge has been arranged.  The rights have been squared away with the IP owner and with Albert's assistance who would, of course, be publishing it.

 

I'm targeting 24 levels.  I don't think I'll need to reduce anything to do that.  And FYSA, I haven't made any effort on the background graphics yet really.  I just put some quick and dirty graphics in there so you can recognize which screen you're on, and so I can write the tables, etc that make the game work in general.  So, for example, Short and Sweet screen will have the candy cane, gumdrops (maybe Starburst Fruit Chews if I can't round them off), candy cane border, the lollypop's resolution will be doubled.  Taxi Pong will have a bouncing ball, net, more paddle detail, etc.  Taxi Trainer and Cactus aren't even close yet.  In fact, those are the pads for Teleports screen.  I just threw it in there so I could fill in tables and address them.   Its tempting to do the graphics stuff now, but... bigger, boring, universal stuff first.

 

Yeah I'm doing the voice the hard way.  I don't like using modern hardware.  It's just not my thing.  I always have this "Could they have done this?" goal that guides me.

 

Anyway, coincidentally..  I intend to work on the passenger kernel band today because the voice code doesn't fit in it and so contributes to the poor voice quality.  So maybe while I'm in there, I'll look into animation.

 

Finally..  I've been training for a marathon and it's prevented me from working on this for the most part.  But the peak training is done and the marathon is two weeks from today, after which I should have a lot more time for development!

 

-Jeff

[Thomas Jentzsch]

5 hours ago, Just Jeff said:

PAL- maybe.  But if I do, it would be after almost everything else.

PAL-60 should be very easy to do.

[Just Jeff]

On 10/15/2023 at 2:32 PM, Thomas Jentzsch said:

PAL-60 should be very easy to do.

OK I'll look into it..

[Just Jeff]

On 10/13/2023 at 2:45 PM, Bomberman94 said:

Wow what a great game (played last build via PlusCart) and even though it is only NTSC version on my PAL Atari, it played just fine (just wrong colors). Only thing I would wish is a little animation when passenger moves - that all, everything’s else is superb! This one must have a cartridge release please and maybe you can say how many different levels you will include? You can easily increase variation with lesser fuel or others colors etc. With this version I heard the voice for the first time - it is a flashback to my C64 time many years ago 🥹

 

OK The passenger animation is done and he's quite sassy now..  Additionally, I wrote the fuel code so you are now able to get gas.  While I was at it, I replaced some of the placeholder graphics in that part of the kernel as you can see below.  A rare opportunity to have one pad on the horizon immediately above another- because fuel pads never have passengers that use a moving GRP1.  The other likely case where this may be possible will be when the upper pad is either pad 1 or pad 4 since they can be drawn with missiles/ball sometimes (Coincidentally we're at pad 4 here, but I could not use that technique).  Note: the fuel can can be drawn this way as well as with playfield and one missile/ball.  .bin attached

 

 

SpaceTaxi.asm.bin

Edited October 30, 2023 by Just Jeff

[Stechmann]

This looks super cool. Would you consider adding a 2 player mode?