I found a video my wife shot of our basement arcade a year or so ago. Pole Position was giving me some trouble at the time so the screen is a blank raster. I moved a few more games down there since then and will make another video this week of my current setup.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVvBUWFPKgoArcade Tour 11/16/2009 below:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwACFWJ59cU
It's been forever since I have done any work on this project, but I had some time last night and changed the title screen a little bit. Not much else has been changed, but I'm getting some free time here and there, so hope to work on it some moreNew9_8_09.bin
It's been a while since I have done any coding. I have added some rudimentary collision detection for the badies. The bombs they drop can destroy the Rover, but you can shoot them as well. The collision detection is not quite right yet though. As you destroy the group of three badies, one of three new badies will reappear. The object is to collect the minerals and send them up to the Amospheric processor in order to "build the planet" As you send more minerals the processor converts them t
I had a little time so I added some badies that lurk below the mineral collection vehicle. I don't have any collision detection yet, but plan to have it as soon as I can.
New3_19_09.bin
Had a couple of minutes, so I changed the code to make the movements left and right continuous. This is supposed to encourage exploration of different screens left and right. You can change direction as before, but you will continue to move in one direction unless you change direction or put on the brakes (down on controller). Different screen only consist of different minerals and various mountains.
New12_31_08.bin
Had a few minutes today so I added a "colorful" explosion when you run out of fuel. Also added a fuel leak if the Rover gets struck by a meteor. Fun factor is not there for game play, but it's still fun coding it so I will continue as time permits. Maybe something fun will develop.
New12_29_08.bin
I've added some momentum and friction to the left and right movements. It increases the difficulty of stopping in front of the mineral pit and not falling in. I'm not sure if I like it, but I'll keep it in for a while. I still can't get the smooth starfield movement that I want. I'm going back to school in a couple of weeks to finish my degree, so updates will probably be even less than they have been.
New12_17_08.bin
I loaded Planet Builder on my Kroc Cart and the starfield does not have the smooth movement that I want. Not sure where the problem is. Here is my Main Screen kernal where I call the subroutine DrawStars. I use LDA StarTable,Y to turn off and on idividual stars. Any insight into this problem would be appreciated. I'm using FILL_NOPs at Line 777 to pad the code
MainScreen SUBROUTINE
JSR SixDigitDisplay
;Ship Movement
;--SwitchDraw
; TopLine == top line of sprite
; BottomL
I tried to simulate a parallax effect by moving Stars slower than Mountains and foreground sprites faster than mountains.
Effect can only be seen in MESS.
New11_7_08.bin
Another minor update here.
Bad guy on landing screen does a cool looking controlled morphing rotation thanks to Spiceware
Graphics cleaned up a bit and frame rates a bit more stable.
To get bonus point match the mineral in the hole to the mineral on the RCV
New10_27_08.bin
Added color to Ship ... looks psychedelic
New9_27_08.bin
A little different look. I'm thinking that matching the shape that's in the storage area of the ship with the mineral extracted would improve the atmosphere. If you picked up the wrong mineral you would be penalized.
New9_27_08.bin
I've added a couple of elements to the game. After landing on the planet you must retrieve and send 7 minerals to the mother ship to build the planets atmosphere. When the atmosphere has changed from black through reds to blue your ship will blast off to dock with the mother ship. After successful docking you proceed to land on the next planet.
New9_24_08.bin
New9_25_08_slow.bin
New9_25_08_borg.bin
New9_25_08_test.bin
Cleaned up graphics a little on RCV screen
New9_26
It's been a while again since I made an entry, but I added some meteors. The meteors don't have any collision detection yet, but they look kinda cool. The star background only shows on the mess emulator.
Still need more game-play elements as it's a little boring.
New7_09_08.bin
I added collision detection for the hole. You have to inch up and lower your Rover's bucket to mine the mineral deposit. Apparently, all the minerals on this planet are partially submerged in a dangerous hyper gravity hole that causes immediate destruction if touched.
New5_30.bin
I've made a couple more minor changes. Not sure where this is going, but I'm having fun doing it.
A hole appears randomly with a small mineral above it. The idea is to lower the crane to pick up one of seven different minerals without falling into the hole. After picking up the mineral you must transport it up before picking up another. As you travel you can jump over the hole and avoid falling in. There is no collision detection for the hole yet so you really can't fall in. Landing sequence
I've made a couple of minor changes. The mineral glows when it is avialable for pickup. After pickup the Rover glows to indicate it is ready to transport the deposit up to the orbiting atmospheric processor. I also added a progress bar for the Atmospheric Pressure.
New4_24.bin
It's been quite a while since I posted progress on "Planet Builder" ... work seems to get in the way of fun. The planetary processing station orbiting above now combines two sprites to make one. It looks kinda like a bus in the sky ... I need to make something much better looking. The planetary collection Rover can only transport up the mineral for processing after it has been collected. A new mineral becomes available for collection only after the collected mineral has been transported. Graph
Been quite a while since I posted anything as I have not had much time for coding. This update shows a starfield in the Title screen, landing sequence and the main screen. Effect only shows up in MESS as I am using missile 1 and Cosmic Ark trick for effect.
New12_28.bin
In keeping with the theme I have attempted to animate the Planet Builders Resource Collection Vehicle (RCV). I used 6 frames of animation for the tank tread movement and 1 frame for the boom mounted collector. Also added some randomly placed minerals, although I have not added the appropriate sprites for them yet. Game is not playable and frame rates are not consistent. Any suggestions for better RCV animation sprites are welcome.
New11_28.bin
RCV Animation below is slightly improved
I haven't really worked much on this lately, but I had a couple of thoughts on game play.
The premise is that you are a Terra former and land on this barren planet to create an atmosphere.
You cruise around looking for raw materials to beam up to the automated atmospheric processors flying overhead.
You must match the raw material with the correct processor or it will explode. The planet begins to form an atmosphere and some land based atmospheric domes as you process more correct raw mat
I didn't like the original code for the Big Dipper so I used a standard delay loop. It saves space but it does not give the same effect. Here is the first bin which shows a fairly good depiction of the Big Dipper.
BackStars8_8_07.bin
Here is the alternate code ... saves space but doesn't look as good.
;Show Big Dipper
LDA #2 ;used to enable missile
LDX #7 ;Number of stars
BigDipperLoop
LDY StarTable,X ;get delay for loop (star placement)
STA WSYNC ;always start loop at sa
I wanted to add some stars to the background so I utilized the trick from Cosmic Ark. I then started messing around with the other missile and came up with the Big Dipper. I'm using a different base program for testing as I got tired of going through the landing sequence every time I wanted to check my progress. The positioning code for the stars is pretty kludgey right now, so I'm trying to come up with something more efficient.
Background Stars
BackStars.bin
Different Backgrou
I'm a rookie programmer, but I think it may be fun to document a new game as it develops. I was looking at a Popular Science magazine cover and saw a picture of a moon buggy prospecting for valuable minerals. Sounded like a game to me. Probably a little too much like Moon Patrol, but seems like it may be fun.
I used Space Battle as a shell to insert some new code to simulate a buggy cruising around the moon. I utilized some code samples to allow the scrolling playfield to be "perfectl
Like us on Facebook
Follow us on Twitter
AtariAge on Instagram
Watch us on YouTube
Chat on Discord