Games that should have been made for Intellivision

[First Spear]

The best hope that most of us that are new to creating for the Intellivision is IntyBASIC. Throw Nanochess a PayPal donation when you can.

 

Anyway, the hard constraints on Intellivision sprites and the tile/character base of the graphics engine makes an interesting challenge in many cases, and in other cases makes quality games impossible. I would have said that Missile Domination was impossible last year; the release shows it's possible but the constraints do show. I do think that something like Robotron past level 2 still creeps into "impossible" though.... But then again, there is nothing stopping someone from developing a game that is a lot like Robotron but fits the hardware constraints. I will butcher a past Keith Robinson quote that went something like "programming easy, making a new game is hard" - instead of trying to shove Robotron into the Intellivision, design a title that has similar play semantics but is original.

 

Come on over to the Programming Forum, advancements are made every other day it seems like. The more people that actually try something, the better the community will be for it.

 

How was the Missile Domination voices done? That's not the proprietary system DZ-jay is referring to, is it? They are nothing like the Mattel voices from the 1982 games that originated from voice actors. The screen text supported voice BladeJunker mentioned must be the "yerrrout" in Baseball which isn't voice at all.

 

Synthesized voices like those in Missile Domination sound fine for a Berzerk game. Voices aren't even necessary for gameplay here, but would be nice. I'd rather see a Robotron game with dual disc and 16 direction fire than a Berzerk game with voice. Voice is good when used to enhance Intellivision gameplay, for example when the game uses lots of screen scrolling and providing text information is difficult.

[+Tarzilla]

Glad you're here, I enjoy all kinds of feedback, not just the positive stuff. Did someone say Intellivoice was easy, did I say that?

Not negative or positive, but realistic based on experience.

 

I heard about the whole Space Cunt origin, the auditions for the right kind of voice, telling that actor to talk a certain way, testing that voice through a screening process of review, cutting full scripts down to 20 words, then still needing on screen text to imply what is being said, and finally how much space it takes IE. equal or greater than the game ROM alone.

As far as there is no tool, I'm sad to hear that, what has it been, 30 odd years and nobody has looked into that, never ever?

 

I didn't say there was no tool, I said "no readily available tool"

 

If there are any tools for the Intellivoice I'd be totally surprised if the voice source files wouldn't have to be recorded again to be optimal rather than using the originals.

 

And are you talking about arcade perfection recreated on an INTV, how often do any ports of the past match the arcade exactly? Even if a programmer tries their best it will still only be an approximation but that doesn't mean it won't still be a fun game to play. All those methods you mention are true for what it would take to get a lot of activity on screen but you make it sound like a bad thing if the INTV doesn't have the exact number of sprites as the arcade our whole universe will implode or something.

 

No, I'm talking about lazy programmers that make games that are a poor approximation of what the arcade game is, without putting effort into it (See: Coleco Donkey Kong vs Missile Domination for contrast)

 

Let's get real this thread is for wishes and whimsy, not pragmatic conclusions.

Let's get real, the title of the thread is "Games that SHOULD have been made for the Intellivision," It is perfectly acceptable to counterpoint when "games SHOULDN'T be made for the Intellivision"

 

I mean "logically" for most people no home brews should exist, Christmas Carol, DK2, Space Patrol, and so on, and so on.

The difference is Carol was designed by a person that knew the limitations and designed accordingly. DK2 has way fewer moving objects than Frenzy and still has to use flicker. Space Patrol is based off of a game that is also more in line with the Intellivisions capabilities.

 

I feel for you if you've been talking about Frenzy on INTV for 10-20-30 years without progress but to me it's just a little fun tinkering with these hardware properties. The legality of license seem like the greatest obstacle, not how many Ottos are on screen.

 

I feel for you that your doodling fantasies can't be debated with technical experience. And in case you haven't noticed, the possession of a legal license has not stopped programmers from porting games in the homebrew world.

[+Tarzilla]

How was the Missile Domination voices done? That's not the proprietary system DZ-jay is referring to, is it? They are nothing like the Mattel voices from the 1982 games that originated from voice actors. The screen text supported voice BladeJunker mentioned must be the "yerrrout" in Baseball which isn't voice at all.

 

Synthesized voices like those in Missile Domination sound fine for a Berzerk game. Voices aren't even necessary for gameplay here, but would be nice. I'd rather see a Robotron game with dual disc and 16 direction fire than a Berzerk game with voice. Voice is good when used to enhance Intellivision gameplay, for example when the game uses lots of screen scrolling and providing text information is difficult.

 

Voice IH,NN1,TT1,RR1,UW2,DD1,ER2,PA3,AE1,LL,ER1,TT1,PA4

 

Recreated with phonemes (parts of words for the layman)

No ability for intonation, pitch change, male vs female etc.

This sounds sort of like "Intruder Alert" but not like the arcade game enough for my tastes since the original Berzerk/Frenzy sound clips could be converted and played by the Intellivoice hardware as a sample and sound very close. A lot of people would say that the Berzerk speech done via Intellivoice phonemes would be good enough, I say it would be a half assed, "it-is-good-enough-ship-it"

waste of time as doesn't show respect for the place Berzerk's voice has in arcade history, especially since the Intellivoice can replicate the word sample based original.

[+DZ-Jay]

How was the Missile Domination voices done? That's not the proprietary system DZ-jay is referring to, is it? They are nothing like the Mattel voices from the 1982 games that originated from voice actors. The screen text supported voice BladeJunker mentioned must be the "yerrrout" in Baseball which isn't voice at all.

 

Missile Domination uses a very generic library of allophones, taken with permission from the General Instruments technical documentation.

 

It is not sampled speech. It is indeed speech synthesis, albeit using some very rudimentary parameters that make it barely intelligible.

 

There are no tools publicly available to reproduce sampled sounds, and there is no "text-to-speech" software like SAM to generate naturally-sounding speech.

 

That's the state of the art right now: the buzzy, robotic, tinny, almost unintelligible speech in Missile Domination.

 

Synthesized voices like those in Missile Domination sound fine for a Berzerk game.

I disagree. The speech in Missile Domination is distracting at best, annoying at worst. It's hard to understand, grating, and the pace and cadence is very off, completely unnatural.

 

Don't get me wrong, I appreciate that someone spent several hours of their time to put those sentences together, built by hand using arcane symbolic allophones; but the results are not yet ready for prime-time.

 

dZ.

Edited March 25, 2016 by DZ-Jay

[+DZ-Jay]

 

Voice IH,NN1,TT1,RR1,UW2,DD1,ER2,PA3,AE1,LL,ER1,TT1,PA4

 

Recreated with phonemes (parts of words for the layman)

 

Actually, allophones. The phonemes are the distinct sounds we hear, the allophones are the realizations of each phoneme that are produced in language.

 

In other words: phonemes = what; allophones = how.

 

For instance, consider the "p" sound. We distinctly perceive it regardless of where in a word it is located, or which other sounds surround it.

 

However, it is formed differently in your mouth when you say "pin" (aspirated) versus when you say "spin" (unaspirated).

 

These are two allophones that make up the phoneme "p".

 

The Intellivoice works the same way: you must tell it which individual allophones to string together in order to reproduce the phonemes that make up intelligible speech.

Edited March 25, 2016 by DZ-Jay

[BladeJunker]

 

 

I don't know any Intellivoice game that has on screen text for the spoken words (maybe Magic Carousel).

I think it was the sports games mostly. With all those voice units it is more like "Does this sound like I think it does?", so you throw up some text to fill in the perception blanks. Voice technology was pretty good considering the time that happened but some words didn't come great despite tons of work. I kind of wish they had continued with the tech through all 8-bit and 16-bit but voice didn't really come back till CDs arrived, 16-bit had more like short statements rather than language which were hard to fit on carts and disks EG. "Hadoken".

[BladeJunker]

 

There are no tools available. There is at least one person that I know of that did the reverse engineering of the Intellivoice machinery and created a mechanism to convert sampled wave files into a format supported by the Intellivoice, but he has been reluctant or unwilling to share this tool, preferring to keep it proprietary for his own purposes.

 

Keep in mind that many programmers are still wrangling with the intricacies of the Intellivision just to get a simple game going. The community is still in its infancy, especially now when there is a resurgence of interest due to IntyBASIC. There isn't much maturity in the collective knowledge yet to reach the point where the Intellivoice becomes the focus. Hopefully that will happen, but it hasn't.

 

You are indeed welcomed to take on the effort.

 

-dZ.

Really, well that is just awful of him to keep it to himself, he's hindering an entire global community doing that.

 

I didn't realize how young this community was and how much IntyBASIC was as an influence for more INTV programming. I just assumed it was easier than the 2600 so there would be less obstacles to learning it's intricacies for most tech savy people. I'll adjust my thinking on the matter, how old roughly is the resurgence in interest?

 

If I had the forte I would take it on, it's a shame so many people have lives to take care of.

[BladeJunker]

 

Given that people shamelessly sell original Mattel property as their own 'round these parts, licensing isn't exactly a huge obstacle. If someone wanted to make a Berzerk/Frenzy clone/port, that certainly wouldn't stop them.

 

But to answer your earlier question about this: yes, the rights are held by someone and yes, it would cost a small fortune to get a legit license for it.

 

The real reason these games don't exist on the Intellivision is simply that you only have so many people that are both capable and interested in programming for the console, and thousands of game ideas. And it takes months if not years to make a decent game, given that most people have day jobs.

 

I could whip you up a crappy Frenzy clone in a few hours, if you didn't care too much about details such as how many Ottos are on screen, how accurate the graphics are, how accurate the control is, how accurate the voice samples sound, how good the computer AI is, how much vertical resolution there is... you get the idea

It's weird when you think about how much money companies want for these things. Keith couldn't get anywhere with Tron because of Disney, I mean it has a fanbase but the original film is pretty long in the tooth which most of the games are based on.

Then take something like Frenzy, not nearly as popular as Berzerk was, 1982 arcade game on few platforms, and you're right they probably want a lot of money. Except who other than homebrew developers would ask them for that particular license, if I were Stern a little money is better than none at all which an old obscure license tends to gather.

 

I am probably overestimating the number of people making these homebrews. Listening to the Intellivisionaries I wasn't too surprised that pretty much most of the original programmers have no interest in making more games. That is what it is like on every platform, just a job and next to no nostalgia other than the people they worked with but not the console in question. It's sad really to hear them talk about never playing other video games or never playing their own video game or never making games ever again afterwards.

 

Well somebody is out there willing to make it and that is what these topics are about. Just based on your time estimates for a crappy version gives me hope for a proper one.

[+DZ-Jay]

Really, well that is just awful of him to keep it to himself, he's hindering an entire global community doing that.

 

I didn't realize how young this community was and how much IntyBASIC was as an influence for more INTV programming. I just assumed it was easier than the 2600 so there would be less obstacles to learning it's intricacies for most tech savy people. I'll adjust my thinking on the matter, how old roughly is the resurgence in interest?

 

If I had the forte I would take it on, it's a shame so many people have lives to take care of.

IntyBASIC came out just a couple of years ago, and it's been rapidly maturing to the very versatile level it is today. Before that, it was all hardcore Assembly Language.

 

Although it was never as hardcore as Atari VCS programming, it was still hard and arcane. The community was very small, and although everybody was willing to help each other, the tools were very immature, requiring a very high level of sophistication, which kept the barriers to entry rather high.

 

People shared code, sure, but most games were still hand-crafted artisan works, requiring everyone to re-invent the wheel for most mundane things like keeping score or moving sprites.

 

To some extent, there is still a bit of that, but IntyBASIC has provided a versatile platform for people to experiment and have fun without having to spend their energy piercing through the inscrutable texts of highly technical information, attempting to elucidate the dark and arcane mysteries that heretofore only Wizards learned through sheer pain of experience.

 

And here we are. So, now we have a growing community of enthusiastic programmers, bringing much needed fresh blood into the scene.

 

The tools will get better, the documentation and the collective knowledge will grow, and we will all be richer for it. In the meantime, lets all clamour for new and creative ideas and fresh approaches, rather than continuously asking for bad rehashes of old stuff.

 

dZ.

[BladeJunker]

How was the Missile Domination voices done? That's not the proprietary system DZ-jay is referring to, is it? They are nothing like the Mattel voices from the 1982 games that originated from voice actors. The screen text supported voice BladeJunker mentioned must be the "yerrrout" in Baseball which isn't voice at all.

 

Synthesized voices like those in Missile Domination sound fine for a Berzerk game. Voices aren't even necessary for gameplay here, but would be nice. I'd rather see a Robotron game with dual disc and 16 direction fire than a Berzerk game with voice. Voice is good when used to enhance Intellivision gameplay, for example when the game uses lots of screen scrolling and providing text information is difficult.

Yeah that's my mistake, forgot some voice like sounds were done the harder way without added hardware. Listening to these games I think I was struggling to understand it sometimes that maybe I wished more games had subtitles to assist it.

 

I think that is kind of what killed voice technology, no titles truly dependent on voice audio, as an enhancement it was kind of expensive in terms of bang for buck which is probably why fewer Intellivoice games exist. Like I was surprised Magic Carousel got a retroactive release based on the content but considering the lack of tools right now I guess it was that or nothing new for Intellivoice.

[+DZ-Jay]

Well somebody is out there willing to make it and that is what these topics are about. Just based on your time estimates for a crappy version gives me hope for a proper one.

I rather we focus and celebrate original works.

[BladeJunker]

The best hope that most of us that are new to creating for the Intellivision is IntyBASIC. Throw Nanochess a PayPal donation when you can.

 

Anyway, the hard constraints on Intellivision sprites and the tile/character base of the graphics engine makes an interesting challenge in many cases, and in other cases makes quality games impossible. I would have said that Missile Domination was impossible last year; the release shows it's possible but the constraints do show. I do think that something like Robotron past level 2 still creeps into "impossible" though.... But then again, there is nothing stopping someone from developing a game that is a lot like Robotron but fits the hardware constraints. I will butcher a past Keith Robinson quote that went something like "programming easy, making a new game is hard" - instead of trying to shove Robotron into the Intellivision, design a title that has similar play semantics but is original.

 

Come on over to the Programming Forum, advancements are made every other day it seems like. The more people that actually try something, the better the community will be for it.

 

Hearing about the lack of arcade games compared to Atari I definitely think the original nature of INTV titles even with clones of other titles is definitely to its benefit, an arcade port can only be compromised in ports on lesser hardware while original titles can stand on there own legs.

 

Maybe my perspective is unique with ports since I had hours of fun with the original 2600 Pac Man so to me compromises don't hurt my enjoyment. So statements of Robotron as impossible on INTV falls on deaf ears not out of ignorance but preferences.

[+DZ-Jay]

Hearing about the lack of arcade games compared to Atari I definitely think the original nature of INTV titles even with clones of other titles is definitely to its benefit, an arcade port can only be compromised in ports on lesser hardware while original titles can stand on there own legs.

 

Maybe my perspective is unique with ports since I had hours of fun with the original 2600 Pac Man so to me compromises don't hurt my enjoyment. So statements of Robotron as impossible on INTV falls on deaf ears not out of ignorance but preferences.

Lets get something straight: porting Robotron to the Intellivision is impossible. Full stop. The hardware is much to limited to support the original code.

 

Converting the game to something sorta kinda like Robotron is certainly possible. However, at that point you have to start making compromising decisions on trade-offs. It is no longer the original game, it is some sort of limited facsimile. Where do you stop? Which features are most important? How do you engender the essence of Robotron in a game that will probably look and feel rather differently. How much of it can you retain?

 

Why go through that at all? If you happen to distill that essence, why not apply it to a brand new game and play to the strengths of the Intellivision?

[BladeJunker]

Not negative or positive, but realistic based on experience.

Well it sounded rather negative when nothing constructive was included, it's very easy to say what is hard about something EG. cancer is hard to cure, war is hard to prevent.

 

I didn't say there was no tool, I said "no readily available tool"

Sorry just flabbergasted nothing or so little existed on the matter, here's to hope for the future.

 

No, I'm talking about lazy programmers that make games that are a poor approximation of what the arcade game is, without putting effort into it (See: Coleco Donkey Kong vs Missile Domination for contrast)

I just think that sounds like a paranoid fantasy like widespread altruism, if you're lazy you don't make a retro game, you go straight to the latest greatest language on the newest hardware. If anybody anywhere wants to make INTV homebrew you welcome them with open arms sir.

 

Let's get real, the title of the thread is "Games that SHOULD have been made for the Intellivision," It is perfectly acceptable to counterpoint when "games SHOULDN'T be made for the Intellivision"

But we're screaming into the wind here by and large so saying something shouldn't exist on a topic of what should seems odd. This is no democracy, we aren't voting on what gets made, if anybody tries any of these games on INTV we're lucky so no sense crapping on any suggestion. If you want to start a Shouldn't topic I'll gladly contribute, Doom4 isn't likely to work on INTV.

 

The difference is Carol was designed by a person that knew the limitations and designed accordingly. DK2 has way fewer moving objects than Frenzy and still has to use flicker. Space Patrol is based off of a game that is also more in line with the Intellivisions capabilities.

I wish every person on this forum knew everything there is to know about Intellivision on the inside but that is never going to happen. I don't think ignorance is virtue but then again I expect tons and tons of ignorance so I'm never let down by it or think I need to snuff it out, that would be exhausting.

 

I feel for you that your doodling fantasies can't be debated with technical experience. And in case you haven't noticed, the possession of a legal license has not stopped programmers from porting games in the homebrew world.

Well it sure did bitd when it came to the EXEC, that was a carefully navigated path towards 3rd party development. Thank you for the compassion, some of us are just mere mortals. I don't mind asking dumb questions, how else will I learn.

Edited March 25, 2016 by BladeJunker

[BladeJunker]

Lets get something straight: porting Robotron to the Intellivision is impossible. Full stop. The hardware is much to limited to support the original code.

 

Converting the game to something sorta kinda like Robotron is certainly possible. However, at that point you have to start making compromising decisions on trade-offs. It is no longer the original game, it is some sort of limited facsimile. Where do you stop? Which features are most important? How do you engender the essence of Robotron in a game that will probably look and feel rather differently. How much of it can you retain?

 

Why go through that at all? If you happen to distill that essence, why not apply it to a brand new game and play to the strengths of the Intellivision?

Et tu, Brute? JK

 

All your questions are valid on the essence of a game but it isn't like that didn't happen for every single port ever made dude, it is a daunting task always to take a bigger thing and put into a smaller thing. Do you think any of those guys thought "This will be easy, I will get everything from the arcade into this version."? What is decided is entirely up to who ever wants to make it. Full stop.

 

Why, well in the old days it was a full payed job so simple answer. To do it now it is to relish the opportunity, thrive on the harsh difficulty of the task, enjoy the challenge. Many of the games still talked about often push things to the limit including most of the better INTV titles. I'm being premature but I think all of you will get to that point eventually DZ.

[+DZ-Jay]

Et tu, Brute? JK

 

All your questions are valid on the essence of a game but it isn't like that didn't happen for every single port ever made dude, it is a daunting task always to take a bigger thing and put into a smaller thing. Do you think any of those guys thought "This will be easy, I will get everything from the arcade into this version."? What is decided is entirely up to who ever wants to make it. Full stop.

 

Why, well in the old days it was a full payed job so simple answer. To do it now it is to relish the opportunity, thrive on the harsh difficulty of the task, enjoy the challenge. Many of the games still talked about often push things to the limit including most of the better INTV titles. I'm being premature but I think all of you will get to that point eventually DZ.

I don't think you got my point. I have zero interest in making lesser versions of old titles. Neither the "challenge" nor the potential for a bigger market attracts me. I don't think I'm the only one here that thinks so, but I don't know.

 

I also wish people stopped pushing for remakes and clamour for more original games. That's where the challenge is.

 

I can play Ms. Pac-Man or Missile Command in any platform I want, even on MAME, so even though I own their conversions for the Intellivision, I have little interest or emotional attachment for their limited qualities. Doubly so for Missile Domination, which utilizes most resources in getting a good simulation of the missile contrails, to the detriment of other features and attributes of the game-play in the original. At least that is my opinion.

 

Reverse engineering an old game is hard, and making it fit on the Intellivision hardware in a way that still is playable, fun, and stands on it's own (rather than relying on its name recognition) is even harder still. Most programmers don't really attain this, whether by laziness, disinterest, or incompetence.

 

On the other hand, a fresh new take on old mechanics and a brand new concept, that's much harder still. I'd like to see more of that.

 

dZ.

[carlsson]

In this respect, I'm very much on the same wavelength as DZ-Jay. In particular when it comes to the blockbuster games, those available on lots of platforms, I see very little point in spending a lot of programming efforts to get a version that at best might be adequate, but most people who are not already big fans of the particular platforms will think is "meh" and ask why you wasted the time when the result is not better than so.

 

Instead, if you can't come up with entirely new games, ports should be done from mostly unknown gems one might find when you go through another system's library. Titles that turn out to have great playability, or can be altered to have it, but up to now very few knew even existed. Those games could often make your system shine, and be reasons why anyone else would like to get a system (in this case Intellivision) in order to play a fun, unusual game that definitely might get ported further, but up to now is one of the only options to play it.

[pimpmaul69]

Im of a different opinion of you guys. I want ports. Sure my favorite game on the system is christmas carol and i love other homebrew originals, i also love playing ports. Sure there is a version here and there and everywhere, but i like to play the different versions. Plus im kinda into the intellivision these days so im all for ports for this system. People think carnival is a bad port yet i still enjoy it. I will take whatever games i can get.

[JoeM_Intellivision]

Hi all,

Just my opinion but I'm more in favor of new unique games & SP versions of existing titles as that was what made the inty so special. That said, of course I don't mind "some" ports as long as they are done well and well thought out. Two games I would like to someday be ported if possible are Archon and Miner2049er just because I liked them so much as a kid on the Commodore 64. Not sure about rights or technical feasibility on these as I have no programming experience at all so appreciate all the efforts made by all programmers.

Happy Easter all!

Joe

[mr_me]

I remember hearing in one of the podcasts that the programmers at Mattel would debate on whether a video game should have an ending. At the time we all wanted to play arcade games at home, so I had Lock'n'chase, Burgertime, Bump'n'jump but I found that once I got a high score that became too difficult to beat, I more or less stopped playing these games (and that goes for Deadly Discs and Shark Shark too). However, I always went back to games like Space Battle, Dungeons and Dragons, Bomb Squad, and even Sub Hunt. I liked games where I either won or lost and scoring was not necessary. I think more games should have been made like this rather than the arcade type games with endless scoring. Unfortunately Mattel ultimately felt that the market wanted the latter.

 

I agree that arcade conversions are unnecessary today. And I use the term conversion because I don't think its possible to port the code of an arcade game to a different machine like the Intellivision. I don't know if the Mattel programmers of Lock'n'chase, Burgertime, and the other licensed games even looked at the code of the original games. I think most people who use the term "port" understand that the game is being rewritten. Having said that I do like seeing games like DK Arcade, Stonix, Missile Domination and comparing them to the originals and other conversions. I'm sure nobody wants to see a bad conversion so considering Intellivision limitations it can be debated.

Edited March 25, 2016 by mr_me

[JoeM_Intellivision]

mr_me,

I completely agree with your post - I also like games that have an ending like the ones you mentioned. Obviously the other 2 AD&D games fit this bill, as well as Swords & Serpents even though you couldn't slay the dragon which was disappointing. I believe Teuckin' has an ending but haven't played in so long so not sure. Also, can someone confirm if Atlantis had an ending after 14 days or something like that?

Thanks.

Joe

[freewheel]

Missile Domination uses a very generic library of allophones, taken with permission from the General Instruments technical documentation.

 

Was it really? I have to admit here that I don't own it yet, and I only listened to the voices once on a Youtube clip - but they didn't sound like the available allophones. I've been meaning to ask for a while. Maybe my hearing was just bad that day.

[+Tarzilla]

Was it really? I have to admit here that I don't own it yet, and I only listened to the voices once on a Youtube clip - but they didn't sound like the available allophones. I've been meaning to ask for a while. Maybe my hearing was just bad that day.

yes, standard IntyBasic available VOICE command code.

[+Tarzilla]

Well it sounded rather negative when nothing constructive was included, it's very easy to say what is hard about something EG. cancer is hard to cure, war is hard to prevent.

 

Sorry just flabbergasted nothing or so little existed on the matter, here's to hope for the future.

 

I just think that sounds like a paranoid fantasy like widespread altruism, if you're lazy you don't make a retro game, you go straight to the latest greatest language on the newest hardware. If anybody anywhere wants to make INTV homebrew you welcome them with open arms sir.

 

But we're screaming into the wind here by and large so saying something shouldn't exist on a topic of what should seems odd. This is no democracy, we aren't voting on what gets made, if anybody tries any of these games on INTV we're lucky so no sense crapping on any suggestion. If you want to start a Shouldn't topic I'll gladly contribute, Doom4 isn't likely to work on INTV.

 

I wish every person on this forum knew everything there is to know about Intellivision on the inside but that is never going to happen. I don't think ignorance is virtue but then again I expect tons and tons of ignorance so I'm never let down by it or think I need to snuff it out, that would be exhausting.

 

Well it sure did bitd when it came to the EXEC, that was a carefully navigated path towards 3rd party development. Thank you for the compassion, some of us are just mere mortals. I don't mind asking dumb questions, how else will I learn.

 

To paraphrase DZjay, you are missing the point. I never said that people shouldn't be welcomed, I couldn't begin to count the hours I've spent helping people join the Intellivision developer ranks; helping them over the same hurdles I faced 3 years ago.

What I said was we shouldn't accept half assed ports. Specifically Berzerk/Frenzy. Notice I didn't comment on Zookeeper (a game you admitted to having little familiarity with and yet you mocked up only the first screen. What about the moving platform level or the levels with the escalators? What about levels later in the game where there are 20 or 30 moving animals?)

 

Making a port of any game, no matter what the target console requires that the developer know the original game at a level deeper than watching a youtube video.

 

It is perfectly fine to wish for a game to be ported, making mockups that fit the rough graphics mode can be fun but when someone that has the ability to actually program the game explains why it should not have resources wasted on programming it, people can't get their shit in a knot because there is a different opinion than "OMG! It looks fantastic! Do it!"

[BladeJunker]

 

To paraphrase DZjay, you are missing the point. I never said that people shouldn't be welcomed, I couldn't begin to count the hours I've spent helping people join the Intellivision developer ranks; helping them over the same hurdles I faced 3 years ago.

What I said was we shouldn't accept half assed ports. Specifically Berzerk/Frenzy. Notice I didn't comment on Zookeeper (a game you admitted to having little familiarity with and yet you mocked up only the first screen. What about the moving platform level or the levels with the escalators? What about levels later in the game where there are 20 or 30 moving animals?)

 

Making a port of any game, no matter what the target console requires that the developer know the original game at a level deeper than watching a youtube video.

 

It is perfectly fine to wish for a game to be ported, making mockups that fit the rough graphics mode can be fun but when someone that has the ability to actually program the game explains why it should not have resources wasted on programming it, people can't get their shit in a knot because there is a different opinion than "OMG! It looks fantastic! Do it!"

That's all well a good but you still think there is a possibility of a slew of INTV shovelware, there are no half assed ports to reject in reality so I ask you to stop worrying about that, I've seen enough of that on the Atari side of things, people worrying about a glut of poor quality homebrew. Typically anyone who steps up to the plate wants to hit a homerun.

 

How on earth would my statements divert resources from real potential homebrews, you give me too much credit. I think anyone with true knowledge on the hardware could happily feel confident in what a giant ass I am rather than pursuing anything they deem a fool's errand.