Shawn Jefferson
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Posts posted by Shawn Jefferson
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Here's beta3... a few small bugs fixed and I decided to add some things to the game (don't worry, classic mode still available.) At this point I have added the Tavern and the Guild to the town level. More detail here:
http://atariage.com/forums/blog/18/entry-12569-beta3-added-two-buildings-to-the-town/
I wonder especially how the Guild might affect game play. Currently you have to be level 3 or higher to join, and it also costs 1000 gold, although a character less than level 3 is unlikely to have enough gold to join anyhow, so maybe that's an artificial constraint that doesn't add anything.
Still requires VBXE... haven't started the 40-column conversion, still planning what needs to be changed.
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Off topc: I have one of those first things he made in the video, it's called the Game Gripper, a gaming keyboard overlay for the Nokia N900. Works great.
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With cc65, you need to remember that there are only 6 bytes of register variables (really zeropage locations that are saved and restored depending on which ones your functions use-and this adds overhead to your function too!), but since you are using static local variables, the others that don't get fit as register are in BSS (ie. given a static location, and not on the C stack), which usually makes the code faster and smaller. In Ilmenit's code anyway.
In any project that isn't trivial, you will optimize your function variables appropriately, using register where appropriate and also just allocating your own zeropage variables also.
Also, as you've pointed out, printf family of functions are quite large... for obvious reasons I think (compatibility, portability, flexibility, etc...) Also, file I/O is also quite large with cc65 and is sometimes better to roll your own unless you are looking for portability, IMO.
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In another thread Curt Vendel was talking about making a "top half" case for the 1200XL. I imagine a system like:
1200XL bottom and top case (essentially a white rectangle in XL style), with either a repurposed 600XL as the keyboard and maybe even joystick ports, or a PC keyboard in XL styling (where to find something like that?) with a Transkey-II or similar interface. That would be sweet. Lots of room for upgrades in the 1200XL case.
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Release the utility?
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TV out would have been a good thing back then, but a flashable multicart, probably not since it's arguably only use would be piracy (then, not now.)
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Oh I see what you mean by that. Thanks!
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nope, it's for 4-directional joystick only (it's written on the web page).
4 directional, or actually 8?
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I just remembered Heart of Africa. I ways wondered why that didn't make it to the atari when seven cities of gold seemed like such a good fit.
Economics I guess.
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Hey Shawn, I have tested some settings, but the result isn't really nice on the LCD and Emulators.
I think it would look more acceptable on a CRT. I'll take a screenshot of my 1084 later, after finishing my working day.
Greetings, Mario
That looks a lot better than any of my attempts. I'm thinking this picture is not really suitable to the Atari. Too bad, I was hoping to have a "title" screen for my Moria project.
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Altirra supports CA65 debug symbols too.
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Who cares?
Emkay cares, he's always speaking about how people aren't using these techniques, how no music creation tool is capable of doing it, how the tunes being created with the existing tools don't sound "correct."
His PoKey techniques are very interesting. Rescaling problems are not easy for emkay. But IF the notes themselves are relatively dissonant, then automatically the interesting PoKey techniques are useless???
The techniques may be interesting, no doubt (I just don't know enough about Pokey to say one way or another.) But when you are trying to convince others to use these techniques but you can't seem to make them work to make music.... well, you see the issue there?
PS. I also have been around long enough to know that it's probably futile to argue about any of this. Emkay's writing comes across as his methods are the only way to make music on the Atari sound good, and the majority here can't hear what he does I guess.
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First off, I'm not a musician either.
This has been going on for quite some time. Emkay makes comments like:
I released the loader at that state, because of starting a discussion. In RMT it is a heavy time consuming task, to have melodic parts sound "correct".
Unfortunately, the term "correct" is difficult to reconcile with the evidence that we hear. The tunes being done by others in RMT and other tools, sound pretty good to my ears. If someone asked me if they were music I would say yes. The tunes that have been done by emkay are almost always, with some notable exceptions, not what I would call music.
Now, if you are trying to use and demonstrate new techniques, that's fine, but it's going to be a tough sell to get other people to use those techniques if they (apparently) aren't useful in making "music." Probably a lot of the issues are communication and language. Using terms like "correct" melodic parts and then pointing to a tune as the solution that is very obviously not what most would call music is definitely part of the issue, in my opinion. I suspect (and hope) that is mostly down to a communication problem.
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I'd be tempted to brute force it.
I was typing out a long explanation... but basically, I'd just run two loops checking one list against the other... if the lists aren't two large it might not be too slow. If they are large, you would need to start optimizing by pre-sorting, removing duplicates, etc...
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I've been attempting to convert this picture.
Without much luck, mostly the results are pretty bad. Anyone else want to take a shot at it?
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Why don't you forget about how many copies you will sell and do games you enjoy programming.
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I can vouch for Farb. I just sent him a bunch of disks and got them back on good order. However I don't see how he could guarantee anything with 30 year old media.
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double post
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Hi Shawn.
It's great to see such progress in development, i'm really curious about joystick support. I tested Moria some time ago in Altirra, but would it be possible to compile the game as xex file, or in a way allowing to run it on real hardware (without Atarimax cart, eg using Side's SDX)?
Thank you and keep up the good work. It's really cool project and last item from your todo list: "look at adding graphics" is making it even more interesting
.Unfortunately, it's not going to see any release that doesn't involve a cartridge format. The problem is that the game is too big. It was never designed to run in 64k, and trying to squeeze it down would mean changing the game from Moria into just a "rogue-like", and we already have those on the Atari.
Currently there is:
~ 24k for the cave itself
~ 14k for the monster tables
~ 24k for the object tables
~ 20k for the spell tables and other assorted tables/information
~ 50 x 8k banks with code (quite a bit of duplicated code to cut down bank switching)
oh, and the C runtime, some data and variables and all the banking functions and game save code is in RAM.
To squeeze it all in, I'm cheating. I'm using VBXE for the 80 column mode, and I'm using it's ability to overlay 32k of its ram at $4000. All the data is in VBXE ram and I'm banking that in depending if I'm accessing the cave, monster data, object data or spell/assorted data. Then all code is running out of the cartridge at $A000-BFFF with quite a bit of banking going on.
I do think it's possible to cut the game down slightly so that it runs with an Atarimax cartridge and extended memory ($4000-7FFF), without the VBXE. You can see that this will probably involve cutting some of the objects from the game (how many broken daggers do you need anyway?
), and probably making the cave smaller too. -
It's definitely for 80 columns... and extra memory. It's more difficult than it first appears to go from aacii to graphics with this game. Quite a bit needs to be changed.
At this point my to do list:
- finish the port
- convert to 40 columns and extended memory (losing some game elements due to lack of memory)
- look at adding graphics
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Write that high level stuff in C with cc65? Call that binary blob and your tables are in memory where you want them. Should be faster than basic and easier too.
That said, I don't know if cc65 has those routines you are looking for, never had a reason to use them before. I'm assuming you don't need FP either but want INTs?
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Atari Moria v55 beta2:
- added joystick control (joystick is only read if at least two vblanks have passed, which seems to provide the right feel.) Joystick button can be used for most any key prompts. Joystick button and direction digs a tunnel.
- fixed a few bugs, many are probably still there (report them if you see any!)
- added a pause at startup to get better randomization.
- added creating items to wizard mode (you'll need the source, or some of the information on Moria websites to do this properly.)
- added a player structure display to wizard mode (Ctrl-C), to aid in debugging.
- added the rest '*' command to rest until healed and mana restored
The game is playable and should even be able to be completed in the state it's in. It seems to work well with CPU accelerators (in Altirra anyway!)
PS. My hat's off to anyone who takes an original game or port and brings it past the finish line. Play testing and bug hunting at the 80%-90% done mark is absolutely not fun. Especially a game like Moria that can take hundreds of hours to finish, with so many items, monsters, and spells.
Game Requirements:
- VBXE
- AtariMax 8mb flashcart (currently old style banking, bank 127 active at boot.)
- 64k (uses RAM under the OS)
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Life is just too busy to mess around with technology for the sake of messing with the tech. I use the technology that I need to do what I need or want to do. I don't chase the latest thing and I generally could care less for the new "corporate product" that everyone feels they need to stand in line for the day it's released.
That said, I like technology that puts me in control and isnt overly consumer-ized. My day job is technology based and fairly fast moving so I guess I get my fill there (IT Security.)
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RockBall is Real, not vaporware! Here's what I have so far...
in Atari 8-Bit Computers
Posted
In another thread we were talking about reality versus game play and I think "sounds in space" is definitely one of those things where game play should be chosen over realistic simulation.