phillip_roberts
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Posts posted by phillip_roberts
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19 minutes ago, Karl G said:
People are just having fun with this because that is the nature of this topic, but here's some serious advice:
1) I wouldn't post any more about what you may or may not do for a Knight Rider project until you have at least some small amount of working code
2) If you DO end up with some actual working code, start your own topic for your own game. I think some of the long time members might find it off-putting to find something actually playable appear in this topic.
1.) I only stated that IF I were to, NOT that I was going to.
2.) If anything comes out of this, anything at all relative to the contrary I myself will be pleasantly surprised. But, again - it's all in fun. 😉
15 minutes ago, Crazy Climber said:Impossible? maybe...maybe so...but if it doesn't at bare minimum utilize the star Raiders controller (mounted into optional molded steering whee accessory) then I'm not interested in even listening to what you are proposing 😄
Star Raiders wasn't a bad game at all.
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3 hours ago, Crazy Climber said:
Nah dude, at this point is HAS to be everything @HardWork promised us or nothing at all. Some generic driver in batari basic with the knight rider name slapped on it will simply not do 😆
HardWork promised an impossible feat based on his lack of knowledge of the 2600 & his non existent programming abilities. IF I end up doing this, I won't promise everything that the nutcase exclaimed he'd put into the "game".
1 hour ago, RevEng said:How about a knight rider pac-man clone? You know that's what the suits would have asked for, back in the day.
Here's my earlier comment, which matches your sentiment. I'm quoting it for easy access to the HardWork design docs...
Pac-Man?! nope. The HardWork design docs are all over the place & nearly gave me a headache trying to decipher what in the hell he was actually wanting to do.
1 hour ago, Cafeman said:“ Brought to you by Kinko’s “
Kinkos should & would have absolutely nothing to do with this, at all. PERIOD.
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14 hours ago, frogstar_robot said:
Sounds great. Hope you can work in beepy renditions of musical cues from the show.
However, any ActualWork you do for a Knight Rider game won't stop us anticipating the pure awesome of a game that is the product of HardWork.
IF I do decide to tackle this project.
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I am considering taking on this project. I do have experience coding in 6502 assembly & have taken the time to learn to program for the 2600. I did develop a moving background(within a six month period) back in 2021, I intended on programming a "driving" game but did not go any further & just used what I had created as a "learning tool".
However, IF I were to tackle this project: I would program it in batari basic, all the fancy bells & whistles that "HardWork" spouted all those years ago would not be included, as far as licensing goes - applicable agreements could be reached & I would have no projected release date(nor would I make one up for arguments sake).
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I fail to understand how this upgrade will even combat today's standard machines as in terms of graphics, sound, quality operation, etc. We have no working prototype being demonstrated for the general public, plus - Commodore International & USA both cease to exist, but the remaining IP holders would get their cut of profit if any is made at all from this 'project'.
If this does take off & it succeeds, then more power to the people putting this together.
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As much as I'd like to see a smooth scrolling Sonic game on the 2600, I feel that the limitations imposed by drawing levels almost exclusively out of player/missile/ball graphics are too restrictive. It would take forever to design decent levels, and even then I fear that the result wouldn't be as fun to play as a Sonic game should be.
Right now I'm trying to work on something more suited to the 2600, that embraces the graphical limitations of the console instead of trying to get around them. I'm trying to make the most out of what the TIA has to offer, without having to resort to excessively complex tricks. Hopefully this will be good practice for when I finally decide to work on something more ambitious.
After looking at the various screenshots & sprite demos.. there is nothing that proper time, planning, & dedication can do to a project on the VCS. The system itself is not limited, only the developer. PERIOD. The cartridge could hold a 6 bit project & would operate fine. Your television is a large portion of it & considering today's television sets - the power behind them with the VCS system outbeats today's 'interactive film players' that we call, Consoles. Again, NOTHING is entirely impossible.. only if you limit yourself in what you set to showcase, especially on the VCS.
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It depends on the mood I am in & where I am at in production.
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Yes, anything is possible if you just use the power of make-believe.
If you don't have any faith in a product such as the VCS 2600 that is still going strong in the gaming world, then WHY do you contribute your opinions to this board? People still buy games for the system. I get that many homebrew developers are just in it for fun & that's cool but if you are 'selling' these things as well, then look to market your product & at least make the most out of what you can get for your labor.
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Reality check... two of my hacks have been among the more popular cartridges in the AtariAge store over the last 15 years, but even combined, the "profit", by which I mean my gross revenue, amounted to well under $1000, putting my hourly rate for hacking far below minimum wage (if I'd taken cash, but for the majority of it I took AA store credit to pay it forward). Actual "profit", as in net income, was well below zero, and people writing games from scratch will spend far more time at it and thus come out further in the hole.
But I didn't do my hacks or demos for profit and neither do most Atari 2600 coders. We're doing it for fun, and hiring a lawyer to negotiate a contract isn't fun... trust me. If you're putting together business plans for your VCS projects, you're doing it wrong. Really, really wrong. I assume that's why companies like Ebivision no longer exist today. It doesn't matter how underserved a market is if it's too small to cover expenses.
That's why most of us would rather ask forgiveness than permission. What kind of damages could they get? They send a C&D, another demake goes away (unless you're smart enough to release your source so that others might continue it in a non-infringing way) and that's the end of it. Even if you jumped through all the hoops, all you've achieved is working for a company for below minimum wage. If I have to beg someone for something before I start a project, I'm going to either work around them or not do the project. I'm not going to change Pac-Man into a fish or Mario into a raccoon or come up with yet another Flappy Bird/Man Goes Down or whatever. I'm going to sit it out.
As soon as hobbyists start treating the hobby like a business, I get disenchanted. This is why I find the current state of Atari homebrew, and threads like this, so dismaying. You are not going to get rich or even make any significant money at all. So just GPL your damn code already and stop pretending your hobby is your job.
Such rage in this post. If the Commodore 64 can make it's comeback like it is, I am certain that even through the years that homebrew development has been going on which has been since 1976, mind you.. I can see people making a swift profit off of their VCS 2600 creations. Again, if they own the rights to what they make AND they have a stellar backing & support.. should be fine. It may be a hobby for some & for some it could be more than that, again.. everyone has a career aside from this stuff & I am sure of that but the possibility of extra income or something more than that is always good to shoot for.
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If I can add into this discussion:
All points made were on spot, but I want to add that IF you decide to venture down the road of making a game based on a TV program or Movie.. you should get the written consent of the copyright owners themselves & have some kind of an outline to give to them to showcase your game's outline & so forth. Once production is completed & the game has been tested.. from a legal standpoint you'd have to split profit between you & the copyright holder(s). I would say take 30% profit & give the remaining 70% to the copyright holder(s). Other than that, you should be good to go from that aspect.
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Here's one example: I made a crappy Atari 2600 game that was originally a failed example program using batari Basic, Other people put it on cart, did the manual, box art, cart art, and so on. Out of the roughly 200 people in the world who still buy Atari 2600 homebrew carts, it probably sold less than 100 copies and that's including the Limited Edition that was sold before it was in the AtariAge store, so don't plan on getting rich.
I honestly believe that the VCS 2600 should be the only game system in existence to this day & I the reason say that is because today's games are all about high quality graphics & lack any decent if not sensible game play. If you can at least draw decently & program it to do what you want it to & it works, then it should sell. With that aside, I don't plan to make it rich IF I were to ever decide to develop a game for the VCS 2600 as I would leave all that up the consumer. The consumer sees the VCS 2600 as a box that allows two dots & a line, based on today's generation of consoles however what I have seen come out of the homebrew in recent years shows me that the developers of that timeframe basically rushed to put out their product rather than carefully designing it, knowing that yes they believed they had very little 'memory' to work with which would come to light that they were wrong, again from what I have seen in the past few years with homebrew projects.
I see that you changed your post. If you create something original, you don't have to worry about anything. But if you are looking to get your name in the news and sell more carts than you normally would, you either get permission from a big company so you can legally create an Atari 2600 version of their famous game or you do it without asking and hope they won't hear about it and sue your pants off.
I know all that & no I would not do any de-makes of any of today's 'games' or should I say 'interactive films'.
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How does one sell their creation for the VCS, without legal repercussion?
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The Knight Rider 2600 project
in Atari 2600
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"To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme. No great and enduring volume can ever be written on the flea, though many there be who have tried it." - Ishmael (Moby Dick)