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You guys can thank UniWarS for this one... (Galaxian?)


PacManPlus

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So my next step as far as double POKEY goes, is to do a demo of the background hum (which will be double 16-bit $Cx mod 3) and the swoop.  Then, when the double POKEY music code becomes viable, it may be possible to add this to the game.  So that, for instance, in setups where only single POKEY is detected, the program is then instructed to play only the standard 4 channel 8-bit sounds on the $450 POKEY. 

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11 hours ago, Synthpopalooza said:

One more note:  Only this, the second alien death, the swoops, and the background hums would need to be redone for double POKEY mode. 

Not that my humble opinion matters much here, but I'm hopeful we avoid dual-Pokey here.  My DS emulator can barely handle one pokey - (plus TIA for a total of six channels of sound) :)

Making the port require dual-Pokeys will make an already niche group of enthusiasts slightly smaller as they might not have the ability to play it properly. 

Unless the game will automagically handle both Pokey and Dual-Pokey ... in which case go for it :) 
 

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2 hours ago, Synthpopalooza said:

So my next step as far as double POKEY goes, is to do a demo of the background hum (which will be double 16-bit $Cx mod 3) and the swoop.  Then, when the double POKEY music code becomes viable, it may be possible to add this to the game.  So that, for instance, in setups where only single POKEY is detected, the program is then instructed to play only the standard 4 channel 8-bit sounds on the $450 POKEY. 

While indeed a neat experiment - making this game double pokey would render it unplayable for 99% of 7800 fans, and unreleaseable.

 

Not trying to be pushy - but maybe get a playable version of the game finished first?

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2 hours ago, John Stamos Mullet said:

While indeed a neat experiment - making this game double pokey would render it unplayable for 99% of 7800 fans, and unreleaseable.

 

Not trying to be pushy - but maybe get a playable version of the game finished first?

 

I agree. It's a little much when there is more posts in regards to sound samples in this thread now than those from the author about the actual game.

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I should also point out that the double POKEY code, as functional on the A8, addresses channels $00 to $07 in the channel table.  For situations where only a single POKEY is detected, the code will be able to then just play the standard 4 channel single POKEY sounds using $04 to $07 (the POKEY @$450).

 

But anyway ... what we have done so far, is great.  Just thinking out loud ... 

Edited by Synthpopalooza
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On 1/19/2021 at 8:29 PM, PacManPlus said:

Speaking of sounds, I've added some of both Pokey and TIA sounds.  It should auto-detect a Pokey, but only on the real thing.  Neither of the emulators I use (A7800, and sometimes ProSystem) detect it correctly, but it's the one I used for Pac320, so I know it works.

It displays "POKEY NOT FOUND" in Argon... If you can spin a build with the proper bits set in the A78 header, I can try it again.

 

What does your pokey detection code look like? Maybe we'd want to support/detect that as well (as the header bit). @ZihuaCode

 

Is there harm to an emulator *always* having the chip present?

 

 

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3 hours ago, bhall408 said:

It displays "POKEY NOT FOUND" in Argon... If you can spin a build with the proper bits set in the A78 header, I can try it again.

 

What does your pokey detection code look like? Maybe we'd want to support/detect that as well (as the header bit). @ZihuaCode

 

Is there harm to an emulator *always* having the chip present?

Which .a78 binary are you checking with? I haven't had any luck with the one with md5 hash 8137c820ccd9eb7a677287b44b50083a, which I edited the header of to indicate pokeys at $450 and $4000 (should cover the bases, attached)

I did have a look at the sound effect .asm files, but I couldn't locate anything that looked like it was doing detection.

Galaxian P450_P4000.A78

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Hey guys!

 

I'll be getting back to this now that everything is completed (I moved workstations at the same time the floor was being done).

 

@Synthpopalooza - yes, please - no dual pokey in this one... :(

 

I have an idea on how to handle the 'escorts' point value for the flagship so that is my next thing to tackle.

How does the point value work?  I know that if the flag ship has 2 escorts and you shoot them first you get 800 points, and if the flagship is alone you get 150...

But what about the 200 and 300 point values?  One of them I imagine is for the flagship and 1 escort...

 

Thanks guys,

Bob 

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28 minutes ago, PacManPlus said:

I have an idea on how to handle the 'escorts' point value for the flagship so that is my next thing to tackle.

 

How does the point value work?  I know that if the flag ship has 2 escorts and you shoot them first you get 800 points, and if the flagship is alone you get 150...

But what about the 200 and 300 point values?  One of them I imagine is for the flagship and 1 escort...

 

IIRC, the 200-point value is awarded if you shoot the flagship without hitting either of the two red ships escorting it; 300 points is given for one escort plus the flagship.  I think the next value is 800 points (killing all three ships), which should cover all scenarios.  When I have some time later today, I'll fire up MAME and see what it has to say for itself ;)

 

Oh, and glad to see you're back :D

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8 hours ago, Synthpopalooza said:

Hopefully my Dragonfly arrived today so I can test this out ...

 

Agreed on the double POKEY.  Tho I am still gonna work on that engine.  :) A future project of mine will make good use of it.

 

Great but that doesn't mean anything to this game. Your music is great don't get me wrong, but you totally try and take over any thread you can with it. It's really unbecoming and in very poor form.

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On 1/20/2021 at 2:12 PM, Synthpopalooza said:

So a question:  How do you detect POKEY?

 

Reason being:  Just for curiosity sake, I want to do up some double POKEY examples of the alien deaths and swoops.  When we do finally get a double POKEY version of your code for the dragonfly, one could have the program look for second POKEY at $440, then enable double POKEY sounds in the game.

 

 

 

What's all of this about with this Dragonfly dilly-o? [kidding]. The XBoard did Dual POKEY like in the early 00s. And 128K RAM. Had it taken a PIA, it would've been the XM before the XM was the XM. :)  We probably still wouldn't have had MIDI Maze ported though since it still hasn't even arrived on the Lynx to this day, much to Bob Brodie's chagrin.

 

This is an exciting thread. Impressive work all around!

 

 

 

Edit: I just had an insane thought. Dual POKEY, TIA, YM2151, and an AtariVox all working together. That's like 19 voices. And I didn't even say Quad POKEY or the Bupchip. That's like Atari Games post 1984 coin-op audio fare minus a dedicated 6502 just to manage the sound chip orgy. Granted, the AtariVox sounds more like a Votrax than a TI speech chip, but still!

Edited by Lynxpro
Insanity and more caffeine
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Eeek.  I already forgot that I found the commented disassembly of Galaxian arcade...  maybe I should just look at that for the point values :ponder: 

 

Thank you for the well wishes.  The new floor turned out great!  I actually changed workstations at the same time, so I'm still in the process of loading the new one up.  Don't even have sound yet :( 

Edited by PacManPlus
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... So here's something I didn't know about Galaxian (looking through the commented disassembly)...  If a Flagship attacks the player alone (no escorts) and makes it past the player off the bottom of the screen, it has 'escaped' the level and shows up on the next one.  So you can have up to 4 flagships on the next level (I tried missing 4 single flagships, thinking there might be 6 on the next screen, but only 4 showed up).

 

All these years, I never knew that.

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I'm just leaving this here as a reminder to myself:

- Modify the sound driver to check a specific sound index (the background drone).  If equal, check the number of aliens left in the flock. Use that number for the number of frames for each sound of the drone.  This way, the drone will get automatically faster with the number of aliens left without making a bunch of separate speed sounds.  If zero, no drone.  Possibly divide by 2 (or 4) if too long.

 

@Synthpopalooza - I may have to ask you to modify some of your sounds to match the number of channels the TIA uses (so everything can stay the same regardless of which chip is used).  The player explosion is an example.  I only use one channel for that.  It doesn't matter *which* channel, just the total number of channels each sound uses. (please)

Edited by PacManPlus
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The only sound which uses 16-bit is the opening tune.  I can modify that easily though any note below A#4 won't play.

 

The drone also uses 2 channels, as does the ship firing.  For firing, just use the noise channel.

 

The others (alien death and dive) I originally designed as 8-bit single channel sounds.

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