Rob Mitchell Posted December 21, 2003 Share Posted December 21, 2003 Thomas Jentzsch and I wish to announce a hack that we have been working on jointly .. A hack of Spacewar to make it resemble the PDP Spacewar! Changes: Smaller ships More thrust required for velocity/momentum Smaller missiles Limited travel of missiles. Slower velocity of missiles (which are subject to gravity) Sun gravity increased >3x over original game. Outer space is Black New retro player colors. Game matrix still applies as the game format has not been changed from the original 1978 Spacewar. Try game 5 with a friend .. quite a challenge! Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA pdpspacewar.zip Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nukey Shay Posted December 21, 2003 Share Posted December 21, 2003 Hehe..."orbiting" works Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Mitchell Posted December 21, 2003 Author Share Posted December 21, 2003 Hehe..."orbiting" works Yes! You can get some cool orbiting effects .. like fire backwards and have your shot orbit around the opposite direction! Or be traveling at a great speed and fire backwards and see your missile hardly move! Thomas and I were talking about how the original programmer included alot of PDP Spacewar features in his code .. but marketing people probably made him tweak it into an action thrust, turn and shooter game. This hack really rocks. Maybe with a few more changes .. like player collision which still needs to be done .. this BIN could be released on a cart. Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ATARI TROLL Posted December 21, 2003 Share Posted December 21, 2003 I wish we could all see this one played on That 70s show while all of them are stoned in the basement scenes. LOL-I love the effects on this one! Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nukey Shay Posted December 21, 2003 Share Posted December 21, 2003 What do the difficulty switches do? Ever consider having them make a player susceptible to his own shots in "A"...or invulnerable to the star in "B"? Any possibility of changing the "death" animation to be seperating expanding debris (perhaps small bits so that they match up no matter the direction that the ship is in)? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StanJr Posted December 22, 2003 Share Posted December 22, 2003 what does PDP stand for? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Mitchell Posted December 22, 2003 Author Share Posted December 22, 2003 What do the difficulty switches do? Ever consider having them make a player susceptible to his own shots in "A"...or invulnerable to the star in "B"? Any possibility of changing the "death" animation to be seperating expanding debris (perhaps small bits so that they match up no matter the direction that the ship is in)? This hack was just changing some parameters to make it play more like the 1962 PDP Spacewar which inspired it. The difficulty switches do not do anything .. as the time of missile life is now limited. Well maybe they still work with the docking games. what does PDP stand for? I really do not know what PDP stands for .. just that it was the mainframe computer that many universities used though the 1960s and all were running various versions of Spacewar in the evenings. That's where Nolan got a taste of video gaming .. and a vision of the future! Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted December 22, 2003 Share Posted December 22, 2003 what does PDP stand for? PDP stands for Programmed Data Processors, which is what DEC (Digital Equipment Corporation) was calling their computers at the time. The PDP-1 was their first computer, but the PDP-11 series is probably the most widely known model. ..Al Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StanJr Posted December 22, 2003 Share Posted December 22, 2003 Thanks, Albert and Rob. That explains it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ubersaurus Posted December 28, 2003 Share Posted December 28, 2003 I don't know how this passed me by until now, but that's awesome. I declare this to be the best hack ever once complete. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Mitchell Posted December 30, 2003 Author Share Posted December 30, 2003 I don't know how this passed me by until now, but that's awesome. I declare this to be the best hack ever once complete. I agree 100% PDP Space War is awesome .. especially with 2 of the Starplex 5 button controllers! Rob Mitchell Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ubersaurus Posted March 9, 2004 Share Posted March 9, 2004 Bump. Hack still rocks I'm gonna have to get my friend over to try it, as he's a spacewar aficiondo as well. We had some epic battles on a PDP Java emulator, but the keyboard is too cramped to use...so this should be fun. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+Atarius Maximus Posted March 10, 2004 Share Posted March 10, 2004 WOW! How did I miss this one? I Must have been too busy buying Christmas presents! Great work guys. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curt Vendel Posted March 10, 2004 Share Posted March 10, 2004 Any chance this will make it into cartridge form for sale??? Maybe at PC5??? Curt Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted March 10, 2004 Share Posted March 10, 2004 Any chance this will make it into cartridge form for sale??? Maybe at PC5??? Too early, its not 100% complete yet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Curt Vendel Posted March 11, 2004 Share Posted March 11, 2004 Then stopping reading the message boards and get back to work... chop chop!!! Curt Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted March 11, 2004 Share Posted March 11, 2004 Then stopping reading the message boards and get back to work... chop chop!!! No, YOU (everybody!) stop posting so I don't have to read that much. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Mitchell Posted March 13, 2004 Author Share Posted March 13, 2004 If PDP Spacewar is released on cart .. I hope that the label has a 1960s look to it. Maybe a pic of the original game screen .. and some 1960s blocky lettering font (similar to the numbers at the bottom of personal checks). Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Mitchell Posted July 15, 2004 Author Share Posted July 15, 2004 If PDP Spacewar is released on cart .. I hope that the label has a 1960s look to it. Maybe a pic of the original game screen .. and some 1960s blocky lettering font (similar to the numbers at the bottom of personal checks). I've been told that the 1960s script is called Winchester font. Thomas: Any possibility you could work out the collison detection of the two ships running into eachother and reset to starting position without incrementing the score? If the gravity were tweaked just a bit greater it would be finished! Other suggestions? If the green ship were a little more greener? Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted July 16, 2004 Share Posted July 16, 2004 Any possibility you could work out the collison detection of the two ships running into eachother and reset to starting position without incrementing the score? If the gravity were tweaked just a bit greater it would be finished! Other suggestions? Just coming back from holiday. Give me some time to check my other projects, please. If the green ship were a little more greener? I'll try, but it will also get a bit darker then. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ubersaurus Posted October 1, 2004 Share Posted October 1, 2004 Bumpo....any progress? I'd kill to do some Spacewar as it should be. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted October 1, 2004 Share Posted October 1, 2004 Bumpo....any progress? I'd kill to do some Spacewar as it should be. Sorry, too many projects on my list. At least I got rid of three last weekend (Minigames Compo) and currently only have one almost completed minor task which is already almost finished. But I won't promise anything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NE146 Posted October 1, 2004 Share Posted October 1, 2004 HOLY SHIT HOW DID I MISS THIS!?!? This sounds awesome! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cybergoth Posted October 1, 2004 Share Posted October 1, 2004 Hi there! and currently only have one almost completed minor task which is already almost finished Ah fine, so the Asteroids reverse-engineering is finally coming? Greetings, Manuel Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted October 1, 2004 Share Posted October 1, 2004 Ah fine, so the Asteroids reverse-engineering is finally coming? Hm, maybe Dennis wants to finish what I got already? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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