PeteE Posted April 30, 2017 Share Posted April 30, 2017 Here it is! This is the game I've been working on the past couple months, that I showed off at Fest West '17 earlier today. I wanted something to learn assembly by porting a NES classic to the TI99/4a. I'm using graphics mode 1 with almost all 256 tile patterns used. The graphics were done in Magellan. The assembly is compiled using RalphB's excellent xdt99 tools. The music was imported using NSFImport and FamiTracker which can export the music notes to a text file, which I then converted to bytes to play on the sound chip. I used Classic99 for testing during development, and its very valuable debugger. When writing assembly I have to step through it in the debugger the first time to figure out why it doesn't work right. I got to try it on actual iron for the first time today thanks to iKarith and Airshack, and discovered that it worked fine on the F18A but there were graphical glitches on the stock VDP chip. Turns out I was reading from the VDP too quickly and putting a NOP between the address and the read fixed it (just like the E/A manual says to do.) The game is a work in progress: all the secret entrances are exposed, all the caves are empty, there are no enemies or items yet, the dungeons shouldn't be caves (but I have the dungeon tileset drawn already) but it is possible to explore all 16x8 screens and swing your sword at rocks and stuff. A joystick is optional, can use WASD to move and Enter is attack. The rom is 32k (4 banks) and has no expansion requirements. I would have been so happy to play something like this back in the 80's. legend_8.bin 25 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opry99er Posted April 30, 2017 Share Posted April 30, 2017 Sh** Biscuit!!!!! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeteE Posted April 30, 2017 Author Share Posted April 30, 2017 I almost forgot the plot! Princess Matilda has tasked you with collecting the 8 pieces of the TI-force of wisdom, in order to defeat the evil wizard Ganrom. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+jedimatt42 Posted April 30, 2017 Share Posted April 30, 2017 I didn't hear the music at Fest West, or didn't recognize that it wasn't just in my head... That sounds really nice! -M@ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+eebuckeye Posted April 30, 2017 Share Posted April 30, 2017 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ElectricLab Posted April 30, 2017 Share Posted April 30, 2017 I'm really looking forward to this one! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Retrospect Posted April 30, 2017 Share Posted April 30, 2017 This is really good. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ti99iuc Posted April 30, 2017 Share Posted April 30, 2017 Very nice great ! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kl99 Posted April 30, 2017 Share Posted April 30, 2017 You achieved a lot already. Respect! I specially like the colourful attack effect. 8 pieces of TI-Force of Wisdom? I wonder what they are? Let me guess... use Gpl go 16 bit all the way don't get into a price war with Commodore Or do you mean GanROM in relation to GROM? haha 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sparkdrummer Posted April 30, 2017 Share Posted April 30, 2017 PeteE- We are very happy to be able to play this game today (soon), thanks to you! It does this old TI farts heart good to see all you "kids" pushing our computer relic to higher and higher heights. Who'da thunk it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sometimes99er Posted April 30, 2017 Share Posted April 30, 2017 I got to try it on actual iron for the first time today thanks to iKarith and Airshack, and discovered that it worked fine on the F18A but there were graphical glitches on the stock VDP chip. Turns out I was reading from the VDP too quickly and putting a NOP between the address and the read fixed it (just like the E/A manual says to do.) Okay. That's one to remember. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeteE Posted April 30, 2017 Author Share Posted April 30, 2017 I didn't hear the music at Fest West, or didn't recognize that it wasn't just in my head... That sounds really nice! I probably forgot to turn the volume back up after talking to somebody,,, I hear the music and especially sound effects in my head ALL THE TIME and I haven't even implemented sound effects. 8 pieces of TI-Force of Wisdom? I wonder what they are? Let me guess... ... Or do you mean GanROM in relation to GROM? haha The TI-force will be a sprite in the shape of Texas. And GanROM? I totally did not think of that. *Yoink* 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+adamantyr Posted April 30, 2017 Share Posted April 30, 2017 I can't wait to play it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Asmusr Posted April 30, 2017 Share Posted April 30, 2017 Looks great. Are you storing the map as metatiles? Is the map changing while you play the game, and if so, how will you save the changes when the map is in ROM? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeteE Posted April 30, 2017 Author Share Posted April 30, 2017 Are you storing the map as metatiles? Is the map changing while you play the game, and if so, how will you save the changes when the map is in ROM? The map does use 2x2 character metatiles, but has another level of indirection: each screen is composed of 16 vertical strips of 11 metatiles. As it turns out the LoZ game designers only used 234 different strips in the entire overworld map, so the strip index will fit into a byte - only 16 bytes per screen! There are 16 x 8 screens in the map, so the screens take 2048 bytes, the strips take 2574 bytes, and the metatile definitions 412 bytes. Altogether about 5KB which fits in one bank with room left over for code to decode the screens and scroll them in each direction. The map is designed to permanently change as you play (finding secret caves by burning trees or bombing walls) so I expect I'll have to save the game state to disk, or have the option to enter a long password. The number of gems, keys, bombs, max hearts, and items acquired would also be stored. (I wish it were possible to save a game on the SD card in a FlashROM or FinalGROM) 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeBo Posted May 1, 2017 Share Posted May 1, 2017 Hotly anticipated just doesn't cut it! (and go for state saving instead of passwords...most of us have some kind of storage medium, and there something nostalgically "tactile" about saving and loading from disc (or tape), that typing in a password doesn't quite duplicate (of course, I never owned an NES era gaming console where passwords were the method to load your position) Just my 2¢ though... it's obvious that, left to your own devices, you're going to create something that will be quite brilliant. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Opry99er Posted May 1, 2017 Share Posted May 1, 2017 I remember Faxanadu passwords on the NES... GEEEEEEEEEEEZ, that was hardcore. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+InsaneMultitasker Posted May 1, 2017 Share Posted May 1, 2017 Very cool! I made the "mistake" of listening to the music. One time through was all it took for my brain to get hooked; it's been stuck on auto-repeat all morning! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthew180 Posted May 1, 2017 Share Posted May 1, 2017 FYI, the enhanced color modes of the F18A (2-bit and 3-bit color) were modeled after the NES. If you use some of the F18A's enhanced features then you can use the pattern data from the NES directly. You would also get the tile attributes which give you tile x,y flip, priority over sprites, transparency, and better palette control (might save you some pattern data). 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeteE Posted May 1, 2017 Author Share Posted May 1, 2017 Thanks for all your kind words. I chose VDP graphics mode 1 to limit the scope of my first project, but may look into converting it to F18A at some point. I'm not opposed to sharing the source code, if someone wanted to help with the F18A port. Matthew180, I want to thank you for your assembly tutorial thread, it was immensely helpful in getting up to speed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthew180 Posted May 1, 2017 Share Posted May 1, 2017 You're welcome, I'm glad you got some value out of the assembly thread. It is not as complete as I would like, and the forum format can make it hard to find the latest information, but it works for now I suppose. Please post questions or comments, it is nice to keep new programming active in the forum and hopefully inspires others to give it a try. Personally I'm more of a tools provider than a game developer, but someone might take you up on helping with the code. I'm happy to offer F18A support, code snippets, etc., just ask (there is an F18A thread for exactly that). Actually "porting" to the F18A is really not that hard. If you want a dual-mode game, the F18A is not hard to detect. To me it seems that having an F18A and non-F18A version might be easier, but all the games I have seen that use the F18A are single versions that detect the F18A and enable the enhancements if it is found. So maybe that is easier. I'm sure someone will chime in on this. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Schmitzi Posted May 4, 2017 Share Posted May 4, 2017 wow, this are great maps and great graphics !! One question for my ´categories´: How is the genre of this games usually named ? Is it Jump&Run, Adventure, Quest ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sometimes99er Posted May 4, 2017 Share Posted May 4, 2017 One question for my ´categories´: How is the genre of this games usually named ? Is it Jump&Run, Adventure, Quest ? Action-adventure !? ref.: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Legend_of_Zelda https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Action-adventure_game 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Loguidice Posted May 4, 2017 Share Posted May 4, 2017 Yeah, although it's something miscategorized as an RPG, I'd definitely put it in the action-adventure category. It's actually quite difficult to put many games - especially modern games - into neat genre boxes, because they embody multiple elements of what would typically be found in single games. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Willsy Posted May 4, 2017 Share Posted May 4, 2017 Sigh... just imagine if the TI had games like this back in the day. It would have been no. 1 no doubt. Commodore 64? Pah! I suppose it's the tools that really make this kind of thing possible today. Back in the day we'd have rudimentary tools running on the machine itself and a pencil and some squared paper and a notebook! When I were a lad...! 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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