Dedalus

[+Vorticon]

OK, here's what I was able to come up in a short programming sprint.

 

You are being punished by the Gods, and so you have been thrown in a maze armed only with a feeble torch that will light up your way for a short distance. Find your way out using the arrow keys, and while you are at it a fierce Minotaur is hunting you down. It can hear your footsteps and sometimes even pick up your scent. Your only clue is the beast's breathing which gets louder the closer it is to you. If it gets very close, you might be able to pick up a quick trace of it, maybe... Don't take too long finding the exit or you will die of exhaustion!

The maze will be drawn at the beginning of the game, so try to memorize it before you are plunged in the dark.

Dedalus.zip

[unhuman]

Awesome! Gotta play with this.

[sometimes99er]

A lot in common with, was it Dark Maze !?

 

Very nice implementation. Fine graphics. Good effects. Lovely maze drawing. Slow or very slow player movement. Areas you have visited become dark again. I quickly became frustrated. Concentrated more on moving than exploring. Second through fifth play had the Minotaur very close and I was killed almost instantly. Appears to be too many dead ends. Sixth play went better, but only had one way to go (no turn points/intersections before getting killed). Seventh play. Was in a dead end, moved 4 squares and was killed.

 

Put it on CPU Overdrive. Better movement - which is nice. Same gameplay. Killed almost instantly. Ninth play. Hey, I died of exhaustion. Couldn't remember the maze or anything, but apparently chose the wrong way - opposite way out ? - well, I guess the minotaur can be set anywhere to begin with ?

 

Nice one. Good work.

[+Vorticon]

Awesome! Gotta play with this.

This game looks much better on real hardware. The edges are softer and the colors warmer... Maybe I've been staring at an NTSC monitor for too long

[+Vorticon]

A lot in common with, was it Dark Maze !?

 

Very nice implementation. Fine graphics. Good effects. Lovely maze drawing. Slow or very slow player movement. Areas you have visited become dark again. I quickly became frustrated. Concentrated more on moving than exploring. Second through fifth play had the Minotaur very close and I was killed almost instantly. Appears to be too many dead ends. Sixth play went better, but only had one way to go (no turn points/intersections before getting killed). Seventh play. Was in a dead end, moved 4 squares and was killed.

 

Put it on CPU Overdrive. Better movement - which is nice. Same gameplay. Killed almost instantly. Ninth play. Hey, I died of exhaustion. Couldn't remember the maze or anything, but apparently chose the wrong way - opposite way out ? - well, I guess the minotaur can be set anywhere to begin with ?

 

Nice one. Good work.

Yes, Dark Maze certainly comes to mind, although it's not quite the same take. Movement is slow because a lot of GCHAR checks are happening for both the player and the Minotaur, with updating the timer slowing things further. This is the first iteration though, and I have an idea or two that may speed up movement a little bit. I place the Minotaur randomly within 4 rows of the player's initial position to increase pressure, but maybe I'll play with different settings to decreased the difficulty level.

Thanks for the feedback More to come.

Edited December 16, 2010 by Vorticon

[kl99]

... Movement is slow because a lot of GCHAR checks are happening for both the player and the Minotaur, with updating the timer slowing things further. ...

 

Try building a two dimensional matrix with numeric values where you save your maze. You will no longer need those GCHARs. For me it gained a lot of speed, especially in TI Basic.

[+Vorticon]

... Movement is slow because a lot of GCHAR checks are happening for both the player and the Minotaur, with updating the timer slowing things further. ...

 

Try building a two dimensional matrix with numeric values where you save your maze. You will no longer need those GCHARs. For me it gained a lot of speed, especially in TI Basic.

Exactly my thoughts, although I don't have enough memory left for another matrix. What I will do is creatively reuse the matrix used to created the maze.

[+Vorticon]

OK, finally got the chance to work on it today. I unfortunately could not scrounge up enough memory to create another matrix to replace the GCHAR calls, so the best I could do was update the countdown timer by 10 instead of by 1, which ends up speeding the game enough to make it more playable. I think this is as far as I'm going to get with this, so here is the final version.

dedalus.zip

[+Vorticon]

Well this is interesting... I tried playing the game under Classic 99 and I got a memory full error. This does not happen on real hardware even when loading the game from cassette without memory expansion. What gives?

Edited January 9, 2011 by Vorticon

[lucien2]

Your file has been damaged during transmission. Try to list the line 1450.

[Tursi]

Well this is interesting... I tried playing the game under Classic 99 and I got a memory full error. This does not happen on real hardware even when loading the game from cassette without memory expansion. What gives?

 

Remember that in TI BASIC, you have MORE memory if you load from cassette without the floppy controller attached, and the presence or absence of memory expansion has no effect. The reason is that the disk controller uses some of the VRAM (and this VRAM is taken at powerup, so even if you load from cassette later, it's too late), and TI BASIC can't use the 32k memory expansion at all. So usually the memory issue is the other way - a program that loads from tape can't load on a disk system.

 

Looks like Lucien has worked out the issue for you here.. corruption can cause all kinds of issues.

 

(I took a look at it and confirmed his results, line 1450 is corrupt. It's also corrupt when I view the file under TI99Dir. There are other corrupt lines too.)

Edited January 9, 2011 by Tursi

[unhuman]

Oh it's interesting... 1450 is corrupt, but lines before and after it are not. There are a few other corrupted lines.

 

If you're trying to save memory, definitely shorten your variable names. Especially ones you use a lot (like "index", "timer", etc) - every char in a variable name uses a byte for every mention, so it does add up.

 

I do all my coding in a windows-based text editor so I can keep my rem statements in line with my code (but without line numbers) so they are available to me during dev, but then don't exist in my real code. Of course, when I shortened all my var names - it does make updating code much harder.

[+Vorticon]

 

 

Remember that in TI BASIC, you have MORE memory if you load from cassette without the floppy controller attached, and the presence or absence of memory expansion has no effect. The reason is that the disk controller uses some of the VRAM (and this VRAM is taken at powerup, so even if you load from cassette later, it's too late), and TI BASIC can't use the 32k memory expansion at all. So usually the memory issue is the other way - a program that loads from tape can't load on a disk system.

 

I knew that, except the program loaded and ran fine from disk as well By the way, is there a way to load programs as cassette files in Classic 99 like Win994a?

[+Vorticon]

Your file has been damaged during transmission. Try to list the line 1450.

 

Indeed it appears that it was... Should have thought of checking, but then it was getting late Thanks for the head's up. I'll upload a fresh version later today.

[+Vorticon]

Oh it's interesting... 1450 is corrupt, but lines before and after it are not. There are a few other corrupted lines.

 

If you're trying to save memory, definitely shorten your variable names. Especially ones you use a lot (like "index", "timer", etc) - every char in a variable name uses a byte for every mention, so it does add up.

 

I do all my coding in a windows-based text editor so I can keep my rem statements in line with my code (but without line numbers) so they are available to me during dev, but then don't exist in my real code. Of course, when I shortened all my var names - it does make updating code much harder.

Worth looking into. I'll see if it makes any difference. As for using Windows, I'm still a real hardware guy and I try to do most of my programming on the TI if possible. However, with the hardware becoming flakier with time, I know I'm setting myself up for a lot of frustration

[Tursi]

I knew that, except the program loaded and ran fine from disk as well By the way, is there a way to load programs as cassette files in Classic 99 like Win994a?

 

No, but what are you trying to gain in that case? Classic99 doesn't use any of the traditional disk controllers so its disk system does not consume any VRAM.

[+Vorticon]

I knew that, except the program loaded and ran fine from disk as well By the way, is there a way to load programs as cassette files in Classic 99 like Win994a?

 

No, but what are you trying to gain in that case? Classic99 doesn't use any of the traditional disk controllers so its disk system does not consume any VRAM.

Ah! I did not know that. In that case, nothing

[+Vorticon]

I swear the hardware Gods must be banding against me! The serial ports on my PC starting acting up today and all of a sudden I couldn't connect with it. The funny part is that I am still able to log on to Linux on that same PC using a serial connection session. Weird! After some serious head scratching, I gave up and used an old laptop instead. The PC holds all my website files, so I guess I'd better back up everything before something else happens

Worse, my IDE card in the PEB has been flaky ever since the Flexcard went bad, and now it started freezing up on me after a few minutes of use. I think the SRAM is going bad because the IDEDIAG test is giving me some errors. Reloading the DSR did not help. Oh well... I'll see if I can replace the SRAM sometime. For now, I reverted back to 3 floppy drives and a 512K RAM disk. I'm seriously thinking however to migrate to my CF7 system although if that is not 100% reliable.

In any case, I was finally able to transfer a fresh copy of Dedalus to the PC, so here it is. Whew!

Dedalus.zip

[Astharot]

Well this is interesting... I tried playing the game under Classic 99 and I got a memory full error. This does not happen on real hardware even when loading the game from cassette without memory expansion. What gives?

 

warning: version of dedalus on BOCC entries is broken!

Oh no, it's ok,I charged a older version... sorry!!!

Edited February 10, 2011 by Astharot

[Opry99er]

Hey Walid--- any thoughts about compiling this? It's a fantastic game and I would love to see it at assembly speed.

 

I know you're working on Ultimate Planet--- and Dedalus might not be on the top of your list.... But I'd love to see this game rolling at some speed.

[+Vorticon]

Hey Walid--- any thoughts about compiling this? It's a fantastic game and I would love to see it at assembly speed.

 

I know you're working on Ultimate Planet--- and Dedalus might not be on the top of your list.... But I'd love to see this game rolling at some speed.

Sure, when I get some free time :)By the way, I plan on posting the BOCC contest entries on the Gameshelf site, unless I hear any objections from the authors. I think it will beef up the TI BASIC section nicely with some quality games. I can also post any compiled versions if available.

[Opry99er]

Great news all around!