_Fandal_ Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 Yeah, here it is - simple 1kB game for MiniGame Compo 2004. Last year there were just two games for Atari 800 (from 63 entries overall) so I hope this summer will be much better for us!!! F. astro_road.zip Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
emkay Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 Nice little game. Let's see how much A8 entries will be there this year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 Yeah, here it is - simple 1kB game for MiniGame Compo 2004. I haven't been able to play it yet, but it reminds at a NES submission of last year called Galaxy Patrol. But that one was 4K. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cybergoth Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 Hi there! Cool, looking forward to try this tonight! Say, would you please be so kind and repost your message in the "Homebrew" forum? I made a sticky thread there to capture all Atari related Mini Game events Greetings, Manuel Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_Fandal_ Posted June 21, 2004 Author Share Posted June 21, 2004 Hi there! Cool, looking forward to try this tonight! Say, would you please be so kind and repost your message in the "Homebrew" forum? I made a sticky thread there to capture all Atari related Mini Game events Greetings, Manuel Done. F. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
raster/c.p.u. Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 Good game! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_Fandal_ Posted June 21, 2004 Author Share Posted June 21, 2004 Yeah, here it is - simple 1kB game for MiniGame Compo 2004. I haven't been able to play it yet, but it reminds at a NES submission of last year called Galaxy Patrol. But that one was 4K. Hmm.. It seems you're right. It looks similar... F. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schmutzpuppe Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 Cool, I hope there will be more entries this year. Unfortunately I haven't had much time so I am not able to do more than a slightly enhanced Superfly version but I am not sure if I will submit it because of Thomas great interpretation (Cave 1k). On the other hand I would be one more Atari 8bit entry... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cybergoth Posted June 21, 2004 Share Posted June 21, 2004 Hi there! Hmm.. It seems you're right. It looks similar... I wouldn't worry that much. It looks much better than the NES game, and it also has more gameplay, as the NES variant didn't give you shields. Also the NES variant was 4K and yours offers more in 1K only. One suggestion I'd have would be slowly increasing the scrollspeed (fractional adding). In exchange the shield could slowly recharge. I think it'll do good in the contest. Main problem last year IMHO wasn't the quality of the Atari entries, but a Commodore biased audience. If there were more Atari fans voting, I'm sure "our" entries would've received a fairer judgement. Maybe this year... Greetings, Manuel Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heaven/TQA Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 i'll force me to take part as well... case studies already made....hope to fit everything into 4k... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 Hmm.. It seems you're right. It looks similar... Don't worry too much. If it plays good enough nobody will complain. And if it is better than last year's NES submission and fits into just 1K, then being able to compare might even be an advantage for you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_Fandal_ Posted June 22, 2004 Author Share Posted June 22, 2004 Hi there! Hmm.. It seems you're right. It looks similar... One suggestion I'd have would be slowly increasing the scrollspeed (fractional adding). In exchange the shield could slowly recharge. Greetings, Manuel Well, I was thinking about some improvements too, but I don't have any free bytes left. First working version was 1024+80 bytes long so I had to make a lot of (sometimes brutal) optimalizations and now I'm almost out of ideas where to find some extra bytes... BTW, are packers allowed in MiniGame Compo? F. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 Well, I was thinking about some improvements too, but I don't have any free bytes left. First working version was 1024+80 bytes long so I had to make a lot of (sometimes brutal) optimalizations and now I'm almost out of ideas where to find some extra bytes... Well, if you post the source, I am sure someone will still find a few bytes for you. BTW, are packers allowed in MiniGame Compo? Yes. There even was a discussion about the best choice in the BBS. Though due to the overhead, they are not very effective for 1K submissions. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heaven/TQA Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 well our Taquart Flashpacker has less than 128bytes depack routine... you can give it a try... it's on my website as far as i can remember... and would perfectly for your atari800 game... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heaven/TQA Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 * Depack routine for FlashPack 2.1 * By Fox of Taquart, 5th May 1997 * Average speed: 30 kB/sec * 4 bytes on page 0 ff equ $fc bt equ $fd ad equ $fe * Do not start routine here!!! dep1 tax beq ret lda #$7f dep2 bcc *+3 inx inx sta ad dep3 lda (ad),y put sta $8080,y iny bne dep4 inc ad+1 inc put+2 dep4 dex bne dep3 asl bt bne dep7 asl ff bne dep5 * Routine starts here! start equ * * sei * inc $d40e * lda #$fe * sta $d301 sec jsr get rol @ sta ff dep5 lda #1 bcc dep6 jsr get rol @ dep6 sta bt dep7 jsr get ldx #1 bcc put lsr @ bne dep2 jsr get bcs dep1 tay jsr get sta ad+1 sta put+2 bcc dep7 ! * Set address of packed data here! * (or make your own "get" routine) get lda $ffff inc get+1 bne ret inc get+2 ret rts *exit inc $d301 * lsr $d40e * cli * rts end of code If you want disable ROM while depacking, just un-remark some lines (I bet you know which) and replace "beq ret" with "beq exit". It is useful if you want to have some data in RAM under ROM. If you have any questions, just contact me. Fox sends greetz to all of coders! [/code] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_Fandal_ Posted June 22, 2004 Author Share Posted June 22, 2004 well our Taquart Flashpacker has less than 128bytes depack routine... you can give it a try... it's on my website as far as i can remember... and would perfectly for your atari800 game... OK. I'll try it. Thanx. F. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heaven/TQA Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 just tried it... you gain unbelievable net 1 byte.... in flashpack 2.1... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 OK. I'll try it. Thanx. You should also try XIP which was especially written for very small (~1K) files. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_Fandal_ Posted June 22, 2004 Author Share Posted June 22, 2004 just tried it... you gain unbelievable net 1 byte.... in flashpack 2.1... Yeah, I tried some packers too and it seems packing so small file will not be very effective. May be XIP will help me but I'm affraid the only way is to find some holes in my code... F. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
_Fandal_ Posted June 22, 2004 Author Share Posted June 22, 2004 Hi there! Hmm.. It seems you're right. It looks similar... One suggestion I'd have would be slowly increasing the scrollspeed (fractional adding). In exchange the shield could slowly recharge. Greetings, Manuel Well... Here is test version with increasing number of meteors. May be it is changing too quickly but the result is clean (in my opinion). Sooner or later this game becomes absolutely unplayable. And I hate unplayable games so much!!! So I think I'll not make any changes on it any more. Astro Road will be simply test of your attention and patience. F. astro_road__test_.zip Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 I like the 2nd version a bit better. BTW: The screen flickers up and down when using Atari800Win. Any idea what might be the reason? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DEBRO Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 BTW: The screen flickers up and down when using Atari800Win. Any idea what might be the reason? It seems to be written for the PAL A8. Switch your setting to PAL50. How about changing the VBLANK routine so the game is playable via NTSC or PAL. I haven't looked at the code so I assume this is where the problem is. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DEBRO Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 I just played this game and it reminds me of Ski! that was published in COMPUTE! Magazine One thing they did to encourage the player to move up is the score would increase faster. Also when the player moved up the game would scroll faster for increased difficulty. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted June 22, 2004 Share Posted June 22, 2004 It seems to be written for the PAL A8. Switch your setting to PAL50. Thanks, that helped. @_Fandal_: Don't forget to mention that when submitting. Or submit a 60Hz version too. That one would look better on emulators anyway. Especially on my 60Hz LCD. I just played this game and it reminds me of Ski! that was published in COMPUTE! Magazine Looks like you've memorized each and every issue. One thing they did to encourage the player to move up is the score would increase faster. Also when the player moved up the game would scroll faster for increased difficulty. That's the problem with 1K games, you have to make compromises. Each and every feature requires some valueable byte and you run short of them very fast. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DEBRO Posted June 23, 2004 Share Posted June 23, 2004 I just played this game and it reminds me of Ski! that was published in COMPUTE! Magazine Looks like you've memorized each and every issue. Actually I've been transcribing a book for Kevin Savetz for a while now and this game is in there. Now that one of my transcribing projects is nearly complete I'll start back on this one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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