New game adaptations

[complicated]

Paranoid,

 

I would suggest doing an adaption of the game Judge Dredd. Quite good game in my opinion.

 

Since you can never trust the quality of Atarimania files i will share my original .SCP backup.

judge_dredd.zip

[ParanoidLittleMan]

Exterminate

Hammer Boy

Jahangir Khan Squash

 

[masteries]

HammerBoy and his frenzy music,

 

a game that is possible to implement as an old LCD handheld

 

Thanks!

Edited June 16, 2022 by masteries

[darwinmac]

@ParanoidLittleMan - I doubt you are looking for adaptations to do. However, if you are interested, it would be great if one was completed for Micro League Baseball II. There is a thread where you were involved in 2016, but it appears the adaptation was never completed. I checked your website, but I did not find it there.

 

For its time, it was a great baseball simulation. I realize baseball is not a popular sport in Europe, but I remember playing this game a lot back in the 1980s.

 

Bob C

 

PS: I really appreciate the work you did on Hardball to bring back the sound.

[ParanoidLittleMan]

Yes, I looked that Micro League Baseball for ST in 2016 . It has common problem as many ST games, mostly from 80-es - using some outdated, even weird OS function calls, tests for some obsolete parameters, and like. And common error is using AES calls without real need - by games not using GEM actually. That means that game needs more RAM for work, can not start from usual AUTO folder ... Just because they did not know TOS good enough, and did not look how to solve simple things - like reading mouse with GEMDOS functions ... 

Luckily, with later developed HAGE it will be easier to solve M.L. Baseball, so I will deal with it soon ..

At moment some unexpected problems with nice looking Wonderland - Magnetic Scrolls, same system as recently done by me their compilation, but from some reason launcher works not from AUTO when installed to hard disk, all in one folder, so I can not use same TOS in RAM version, but one with GEM - again more RAM needed without real reason (game works from AUTO when start from floppy, but then need disk swaps  ...

[darwinmac]

@ParanoidLittleMan - That sounds good. I appreciate all of your effort in adapting these games. 
 

Bob C

[ParanoidLittleMan]

Adventures of Robin Hood - isometry looks good, even in Sherwood ?

Micro League Baseball - it's not that I don't like to deal with not so European sport sims. This just needs plenty of time to even start. Manual included.

Gridiron! would call it Indian rugby ?

Wonderland massive (4 floppy) adv. from experts, with nice graphic.

[masteries]

Last time I tested the game Eliminator, in a 4 MB STE with TOS 1.06; keyboard or gamepad does not respond.

 

I tried it two times, with the same result.

[ParanoidLittleMan]

Can we stay at topic here please ? Problems with older adaptations pls. report in e-mail, with all relevant details. That includes storage, used driver SW, resident SW active ... Is there floppy drive or some HW floppy emulator ...  Eliminator worked by me very well on STE, Mega STE, any TOS .

 

Here should focus on new adaptations. And that Micro League Baseball will need lot of consultations yet, far from being complete - just one example .

[darwinmac]

I know it is not done yet, but thank you for working on Micro League Baseball II. 

 

Bob C

[ParanoidLittleMan]

10 hours ago, darwinmac said:

I know it is not done yet, but thank you for working on Micro League Baseball II. 

 

Bob C

Not finished, but some test would be very useful - it is playable as from only first floppy. Those who played it should see is all OK.  Then can go on harder part with other 2 disk implementation ..  I really don't have time to test in details so much games .

[.mad.]

6 hours ago, masteries said:

Last time I tested the game Eliminator, in a 4 MB STE with TOS 1.06; keyboard or gamepad does not respond.

 

I tried it two times, with the same result.

Same result for me.

It does work in Steem STE 2.05 and Hatari STF 1.04 with 4MB (min).

Edited June 23, 2022 by .mad.

[darwinmac]

3 hours ago, ParanoidLittleMan said:

Not finished, but some test would be very useful - it is playable as from only first floppy. Those who played it should see is all OK.  Then can go on harder part with other 2 disk implementation ..  I really don't have time to test in details so much games .

I have downloaded the version you have on your website. I understand you need our help to do the testing. I am very familiar with this game. I hope to have time this weekend to try it out. 
 

Bob C

[ParanoidLittleMan]

23 hours ago, .mad. said:

Same result for me.

It does work in Steem STE 2.05 and Hatari STF 1.04 with 4MB (min).

I updated text on DL page and README.TXT . As in some other ones, game don't like key, button press, mouse movement during title screen/music. Need just to wait few seconds (by some much more), and menu will appear, with working controls. It seems that with aging of computers it may be more frequent problem.

RAM requirement is actually 512 KB min for simple play, or 1 MB min with GAMEX. Of course it is possible only with low RAM usage - so no resident SW, hard disk driver set with large buffers, and like.  Hints: http://atari.8bitchip.info/GamexUsage.html

 

[.mad.]

Hi Peter,

 

As most of your adaptations have a loading screen taken from a cover scan.

The user is more likley to press a key or mouse button to skip it.

Thus breaking the control in games that have code like Eliminator.

 

While i guess that problem will only be in a few games.

 

if it's possible?

maybe remove the first loading screen or clear the key buffer before the game is run.

 

if that's not as simple as it sounds, due to various TOS method.

it's a good idea is to add text on your trainer screen not to press a key.

very few people read readme.txt. ;)

 

Keep up the good work!

[ParanoidLittleMan]

There is check for released keys when abort cover scan displaying. Also, there is keyboard buffer clearing before game start. Really no need to come with such basic ideas. Or, if you think that you are so good in this, why not do some games self ?

Then, if user simply delete or rename picture file (*.PCH, *.HST  usually) it will skip whole displaying and aborting process.

And actually it works fine in all regular TOS versions. Little less good in EmuTOS, but that's their fault, and little TOS DOC fault.

The usual problem is not so good IKBD code, sometimes not so good MFP code. Again, not so good Atari DOCs to blame, beside programmers.

And for the latest time: I don't care about those who don't read README!.TXT !  Maybe should put there exclamation mark really ?

There is much more than this case in normal case ..

[.mad.]

unfortunately, i wouldn't have the first clue about doing that code myself.

 

however deleting the pic was a really good idea.

thanks! ?

 

[darwinmac]

23 hours ago, darwinmac said:

I have downloaded the version you have on your website. I understand you need our help to do the testing. I am very familiar with this game. I hope to have time this weekend to try it out. 
 

Bob C

I have played the game a bit. One immediate problem I see is the keyboard is very sensitive. I have renamed the pictures so I only have to press the space bar once. I was concerned that multiple key presses to skip the graphics might have been a problem. 
 

However, if I attempt to use the keyboard (instead of the mouse) for selecting a new game and selecting the teams, MLBB will duplicate my last key press. 
 

For example, if I select the letter for the visiting team and tell MLBB it will be run by the computer, MLBB will remember the C and select that team as the home team. I can see the mouse pointer flash as if it is still processing key presses. 
 

If I select the game options and teams by using the mouse, the key press problem does not occur. I do not see the key press problem when playing the game. 
 

I do not have original ST hardware anymore. I used both Hatari and my MiST with the latest ST core. I saw the problem in both situations. 
 

Setup:

Mega STE

4MB RAM

TOS 2.06

PP hard disk driver (2011 version - later version is too slow when using my hard disk image)

 

Bob C

[darwinmac]

I ran into another problem when playing MLBB. Both times I played a game, the game stopped with the following message on the scoreboard:

 

XYZZY doesn’t work

 

Then, all of the players (except for the hitter) run off the field. 

I assume this was a copy protection put into the game to try to stop cracking. 

Bob C

 

[ParanoidLittleMan]

Thanx Darwinmac.  I noticed keyboard repeat with emulator and with Mega STE, STE . That has nothing with picture load before game - happened too before I made those files . Just not really good code of game. Will try to set sysvar for no keyboard repeat - would be simple fix, or will need more ...

Delayed protection is not rare case, maybe that's main change in version II ? ?  I will need to play it longer, obviously ..

 

[darwinmac]

9 hours ago, ParanoidLittleMan said:

Thanx Darwinmac.  I noticed keyboard repeat with emulator and with Mega STE, STE . That has nothing with picture load before game - happened too before I made those files . Just not really good code of game. Will try to set sysvar for no keyboard repeat - would be simple fix, or will need more ...

Delayed protection is not rare case, maybe that's main change in version II ? ?  I will need to play it longer, obviously ..

 

@ParanoidLittleMan - I noticed the same thing when I renamed the picture files. I was just taking a wild guess.

 

I did get the "XYZZY Doesn't Work" error when running with EmuTOS (I know how you feel about it). I ran one game completely with TOS 2.06. However, I am concerned that it is still a delayed protection that needs to be removed.

 

If you need more help testing, I am very familiar with this game. It brings back a lot of memories. I forgot about the changes they made for the ST version versus the 8-bit versions of the game. They made actual game improvements along with improving the graphics.

 

Bob C

[darwinmac]

I have seen the “XYZZY doesn’t work” message multiple times in both EmuTOS and TOS 2.06. Therefore, I assume it is another layer of copy protection that needs to be removed. 
 

I have had great fun playing this game again on the ST. 
 

Bob C

[ParanoidLittleMan]

I agree, most likely some delayed copy protection. But I can not go in it this days, it will need some longer playing, I guess.

[TheNameOfTheGame]

On 1/7/2022 at 3:07 AM, ParanoidLittleMan said:

I started with Psygnosis Barbarian 2 before Palace version. But it is hard case, needs to play first levels thru, because some delayed protections. So, it went aside, waiting better times .

 

 

Hi Peter, were you able to look at this game any further?

 

 

P.S. and maybe Shadow Dancer as well?

Edited June 28, 2022 by TheNameOfTheGame

[ParanoidLittleMan]

I will look Shadow Dancer this days. Probably easier case than Barb2 Psyg. Really not for some extensive playing in this mad heat .