new sideproject started.... another arcade conversion!

[Sheddy]

quote:

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now DLIs work in the kernel routine...

(well...i switch for speed reasons the complete ROM OS off...so thats why i had to modify the kernel routine for DLIs as well... thanx Fox for help!!! )

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The OS also steals your precious RAM!

 

[ 05-03-2002: Message edited by: Sheddy ]

[Heaven/TQA]

short update:

 

as we have a press conference @ e3 i am heavy in preparation phase for that...that's the reason why it is not developed further, right now.

 

the sprite engine works now with 1 sprite and the engine was written flexible enough to port it for other sprites as well... right now it just deals with "shots"... but without crashing or garbage on screen...

 

hve...

 

ps. does anybody knows a "military theme" prefarable from the SAP archive which i can use as music???

[Heaven/TQA]

just to bring the topic up...

 

i am back from e3...really tired...but will soon start to code more on timepilot...

 

btw. still need a suggestion for the military theme

[Heaven/TQA]

the sprite bug is fixed. the rotation is smooth now. run it in atari800win and press f7 for fast emulation. you will see that the sprite is rotated smooth.

 

new archive with source & demo ATR is online. just download the zip.

http://www.s-direktnet.de/homepages/k_nadj.../timepilot.html

[Heaven/TQA]

just another short update (hmmm...i am quite productive today... )

 

the clouds are now converted and implemented. when you download the archive you recognize "time3.asx" & "time3.atr" which has now the clouds implemented...

 

they are copied directly to vram. there are just dummy sprite routines implemented (except the "shots" routine which will be stay there for a while... and the player routine)

 

next steps will be

 

a) shifting routine for sprites so they can be positioned on every xposition

b) core sprite engine

c) test routine to move the clouds

 

once the clouds are moving the rest sprite stuff is a piece of cake as it does not matter if we are moving clouds or jets or helicopters...

 

(have a look on the screenshot previous page...you there see now the clouds or have a look on my website)

 

cheers,

 

hve

[Heaven/TQA]

core sprite engine implemented...

 

download the zip archive now... it contains time4.atr which moves around 8 clouds. they just move in 4 pixel steps but the core engine works... i just have to pre shift the sprites than they will move smooth...

 

check it out...

 

i don't work with double buffering so i have really be carefull when drawing/erasing the sprites... otherwise you don't see anything and you search 2 hours for a non existing bug except the wait_vbl statement was not on the correct position...

 

hve

 

ps. excellent...1:30pm...i have to stand up in 5 hours...

[Heaven/TQA]

the sprites are definitly too big...

 

try to open 2 emulator sessions one with timepilot version 4 and one with zoneranger. zoneranger most sprites are 8x8 or 12x16 ones... timepilot are at least 16x16 and go up to 32x16 and 48x32...

 

far too big for atari... so i try to squeeze all sprites to 50% x-size and 100% y size...maybe they look still ok...

 

the sprite engine likes more to draw vertical than horizontal...

 

hve

[Sheddy]

Just an obvious suggestion I know, but rather than make them much smaller, why not have slightly fewer clouds? Is the problem that you're running out of cycles in 1 vblank?

[Heaven/TQA]

sheddy, i know what you mean but the clouds right now are standing for sprites in general. most of the timepilot sprites have at least the size of the clouds...

 

the engine runs out of cycle time per frame... how many sprites can you draw in space harrier?

 

remember...i have no double buffering...maybe it must be done more clever, f.e. draw 50% sprites in frame 1, wait for refresh, draw rest 50% in frame 2 to minimze flickering...

 

hve

[Sheddy]

I hadn't realised quite how big all the objects actually were...you're doing well so far on the speed of the sprites.

 

Some tricky decisions for the screen drawing then...maybe other people have some good ideas?

 

I think your idea for drawing and clearing different bits on different frames could work, but you must be careful never to leave one erased between frames. Also, if it had to drop below 25/30 fps you might start to notice it was updating only a few objects at a time.

 

My gut instinct has always been when things take longer than a frame, you need to double (or triple) buffer. I know why you would want to avoid that, as there'd be quite a few extra overheads (and you'd need an extra version of the sprite engine for each screen, if you want to keep that zone ranger speed)

 

I never benchmarked space harrier draw engine properly. Sprite numbers are meaningless when they're all different sizes. Normally it's happy chugging along at 15/17 fps with not too much going on. A couple of full size objects slows it down though. I had 32 trees going with an average of 6-8 fps on an early test (I haven't any super fast code, just most of the time the objects are small)

 

 

Don't give up. It just might take longer than you think to get something you're happy with. If I'd known how much time I'd be wasting.........

 

[ 06-05-2002: Message edited by: Sheddy ]

[oky2000]

Why not copy the C64 rip-off by Kingsoft called Space Pilot? Suffers some slow down but still a good copy.

 

Every machine deserves a good Time Pilot