Ature, my homebrew action adventure game for Atari 2600.

[beoran]

I've almost completed a new homebrew action adventure game for the Atari 2600, named "Ature". After some discussion on the programming forum, I thought I'd release it here for you all to try. Currently there's only an NTSC version for playing on an emulator, ature.bas.bin, a pal version will only be considered if there is enough demand. The zip file also contains the source code, and a full manual in pdf and openoffice format (www.openoffice.org). All comments are welcome, but I hope you'll all enjoy it.

 

Kind Regards,

 

B.

 

Edit: if anyone wants to design a label for this game, that would be nice, too. So let's start a label contest.

 

Edit: ature_20100709.zip is a new version with some small bugs fixed, and more of a challenge if you reset the game after winning, depending on your achievements.

ature_20100708.zip

ature_20100709.zip

Edited July 9, 2010 by beoran

[TrekMD]

This looks cool. Thanks for sharing!

[yuppicide]

I can't express how nice of a game this is.

 

You go around killing things and collecting stuff and beating up bosses.

 

The map is pretty big.. some of the puzzles are challenging on what I need to do next.

 

If nobody else sees this through making it's way to cart, I will.

[Atari_afternoon]

I am proud to be one of the first happy ones to have seen it being developed. Beoran has created a great game!!

[gambler172]

Hi Beo

Yes,it is really good.Maybe Al from Atariage,could take it into the shop?????

greetings Walter

[TrekMD]

It definitely deserves to be on a cart. I hope it does happen.

[beoran]

Gambler and TrekMD,

 

Thanks for the kudos. I hope you enjoy the game.

 

Personally, I'm not going to invest any money in a cart release of this game. I didn't have any monetary goals, I just made the game for my own pleasure, and in the hope that some other people would enjoy it. But since this game is licensed under the Zlib license, anyone can make a cart out of the game if they like, as long as they credit me. I think Yuppicide will probably be the most likely candidate for doing this if no one else volunteers.

[108 Stars]

Hey, this is pretty awesome! Zelda 2600 if you will! Really nice.

[yuppicide]

I'm hoping Al will display it at the CGE2010 booth. It's worthy if you ask me.

[beoran]

108 Stars,

 

I'm glad you like the game. I was inspired a bit by Zelda, but also by the Seiken Densetu series.

 

And a new version of the game is out, look at the top of this thread.

[KevinMos3]

I just played through the latest binary. Thanks for implementing those changes we talked about. It works great and is exactly what I had in mind. Two thumbs up for that! :thumbsup:

[beoran]

KevinMos,

 

Thank you for testing that for me, as I didn't test it myself actually.

I'm glad you liked the changes I made.

[KevinMos3]

Ok, I have a bug to report. This is not due to the recent changes, it's been there for the past several versions and I forgot to mention it before. Sorry about that.

 

After beating the game two or three times, (meaning you're now working on playing through your third or fourth time in a row), your health acts buggy. It will show no health and sometimes flash one unit of health. You still have some health as far as I can tell, but it's just not showing. Then, if you beat the game again it will crash without showing the end game screen, (or maybe it just crashes before I notice the end game screen), and go to the title screen. From there it's like starting the game fresh. I didn't try playing all the way through again after that. I should do that later.

 

What I did in older versions to get this issue:

• I first saw this the night I was playing on real hardware and played through several times. If I remember right, it would happen about the third or fourth time playing after going to the end game screen. I don't remember if it would ever crash to the title screen though. This was before you added music, so it's been around for several versions.

 

What I did in the current version to get this issue:

• I first played through and collected all items as normal. Once at the end game screen, I reset and played through purposely collecting only the Numen Sword. (I did this so I would have more items to collect after beating the game). After getting to the end game screen, I reset and continued collecting the remaining items (this again confirms that your recent changes work great). I went to the end game screen again and after hitting reset, this is where the health bug appeared. I continued playing and after beating the game with the health bug, the game crashed to the title screen.

[beoran]

Thanks for this bug report. I have been able to verify it. But, I don't have a clue as to what may be causing it. I checked all code and it seems like nothing is wrong. Anyway, I'll do my best to try and solve this if possible.

 

Edit: I've tried various things to workaround this bug, but I can't seem to find what might be causing it. So I think it's either a bug in batari basic, or I'm not using it correctly somehow.

Edited July 12, 2010 by beoran

[yuppicide]

How about just making the game end when you finish? I still haven't beaten the game. I'm gonna go play again now.

 

EDIT: Nice so far. I think you sped things up which is nice. I still can't figure out how to get any items or defeat any of the big bosses.

Edited August 5, 2010 by yuppicide

[Devin]

Wow. It looks exceptional so far!

 

Is there any plans to make it so you become temporary invincible after taking a hit? I've entered a few screens and bump-bump-bump-dead.

 

In any case, this is a very cool adventure game.

[KevinMos3]

How about just making the game end when you finish? I still haven't beaten the game. I'm gonna go play again now.

The system he has in place now is very nice. If you finish the game, but haven't collected everything, you can continue to play and finish collecting items. If you finish with everything already collected, the game starts again from scratch. This way of handling an ending is pretty unique, especially compared to other 2600 games... and IMO more interesting than a simple hard ending. The only problem is the bug I mentioned, which was there before his changes to how the ending behaves.

 

I still can't figure out how to get any items or defeat any of the big bosses.

You have to hit the enemies. I'm funnin' ya, but seriously, it helps to have your sword held out when approaching the enemy. Then keep hitting the button to keep striking, but DON'T move forward unless you need to reposition. If you go at a boss without a good strike plan, you're as good as dead. It also helps to level up a bit before you take on a boss. One of the spots on the upper left side of the river is good for this (I think it's the 3^rd screen from the top). The screen with the river has a fish and the screen to the left has a warrior?. You can go back and forth between the two screens killing those two enemies to level up quickly. I would upload a gameplay video to demonstrate if I had decent internet.

 

 

 

Is there any plans to make it so you become temporary invincible after taking a hit? I've entered a few screens and bump-bump-bump-dead.

Most of the time, you should enter a new screen with your sword drawn. That will avoid the quick death, especially once you level up enough to kill most enemies with a single hit. The most dangerous enemy (other than the bosses) is the one on the beach hut screen (the one with the hut and two palm trees). He comes at you fast and can kill you very quickly if you're not careful. I only enter this screen from the sides or bottom; never from the top.

 

 

edit: this board doesn't work right with my slow dialup anymore so I can't upload anything... but I'll be going to the library later and I'll upload a picture of the level-up strategy I described above.

 

edit again: so I finally made it to the library. Here is the image I said I'd upload:

Don't click the button if you don't want to know how to level up quickly!

 

These are screens C3 & D3 from the map posted here.

Additional warning!!! The map linked above contains some spoilers. Beoran wisely covered over some areas in the version of the map included in the manual.

 

Edited August 12, 2010 by KevinMos3

[Arjak]

Wow! This is great! Fun, but hard. I kept getting my butt kicked by the boss on the beach, but that might be because I didn't level up enough.

 

Anyways, keep up the great work!

[beoran]

Dear Arjak,

 

Glad to hear you're enjoying. The boss on the beach is and optional and difficult to beat one, you can figure out other ways to beat it too. Anyway, if you like the game, please share it and spread the word. I think many more people would enjoy this game if only they knew about it.

[Atari_afternoon]

Have you also posted about it on other public domain + homebrew boards? Not the discussion, just about its existence and where to reach you for questions etc.

I know I found your game (and this forum!) from a Germany PD Roms-Forum, so a short summary on other fora will certainly do some good

Just my idea.

[beoran]

Dear Atari_afternoon,

 

It would indeed be a good idea to publicize my game a bit more, but I have no clue which forums or web sites might be best for me to publish such a summary at.

So if you or anyone else could please suggest the best avenues for letting other people know about my game, it would be most welcome.

[Atari_afternoon]

I was regularly looking for new homebrews just on www.pdroms.de only (hope linking is allowed in this case...); this post http://www.pdroms.de/news/23021/ had actually led me to here! ^^No doubt there are other forums and non-English places that I might not know but that have an even higher Google rating.

 

Do you have a personal Myspace/Facebook etc? A blog? It would give Ature a better Google exposure. And with Windows Movie Maker, you could do a short video with text over, for youtube or possibly archive.org; YouTube is accessed by many many people and "bypassers"...it likely would bring more people to here

Edited August 8, 2010 by Atari_afternoon

[beoran]

Some good ideas there. So, I already started a tiny wordpress blog abut Ature here:

 

http://ature.wordpress.com/

 

Perhaps the next step would be to release a trailer of Ature, on Youtube, when I have the time to make a video of it.

[Atari_afternoon]

Nice Maybe add a link to PC emulators like Stella?

 

- The Youtube idea I have come across because for an unrelated-to-Atari project we have tried the same, and a few short "educational" 60-90 seconds videos with text-over do indeed contribute to solve a few FAQs there. So I thought it might work here, too kind of the advanced version to screenshots, which is always asked for it seems

[KevinMos3]

I finally made it to the library and edited my earlier post to include the picture I said I'd add.