Goat game

[+DZ-Jay]

And another OOOOLD suggestion. Instead of "1UP:" (which I still adore for its 80s sensibilities), you now have a graphic representation of the # of lives in the game. A small goat head for each. Unfortunately it loses the colors and has to be a bit modified but I think it works as good as it can.

 

And I never realized images could be added this way (thanks intvnut!) so I'm doing so.

 

Thoughts?

 

 

 

Thoughts, you say? *ahem* Well, don't mind if I do!

• I like it! The end-of-level jingle is cute (though it's another rip-off... from the original Mario Brothers, was it?)
• The Nom-o-Meter is exceedingly more appropriate than the old score board. I say it's a keeper.
• The Goat-Head lives meter also works better this way. I like multiple icons like that if you have the space.
• For some reason, I keep missing the intro scene. Your "skip" button seems to be too sensitive. Worse, it skips if I leave the button pressed for too long after selecting a season. I suggest you wait for the controller to be fully released before reading new input. This should always be the case when transitioning between game states.
• The Winter Season is too hard, but not in the "challenging" way--more in the "how can we make the player miserable so that he doesn't win" way. It seems I have to eat all items, even the grenades (which didn't seem to be required before) or my Nom-o-Meter barely moves. Also, once I lost a life and my meter restarted to zero (?). If I'm required to eat every single item in order to win, then you can't throw a slow moving item at the top of the screen and a fast grenade at the bottom, for it is impossible to catch them both. To me it's difficult to the point of annoyance and frustration, rather than fun. This is in contrast to all the other levels. There must be ways to increase the difficulty without resorting to cheap handicaps on the player. I would definitely recommend not changing play mechanics out of whim; if you want to add new mechanics, make it obvious, like on a distinct "Boss" level.
• Once, one of those red telephone-looking banana things crossed the screen and got stuck at the left-most edge. I could see a couple of its red pixels sticking out. After a few seconds, it went away.
• I agree with other's sentiments on the Game Over screen. It looks much too "gansta" for this whimsical game. What about a silhouette of the farmer (one that looks like a farmer, not a thug), with a pitchfork?

Edited November 11, 2014 by DZ-Jay

[intvnut]

c1=CONT1

IF (c1 AND $E0)=0 AND (c1 AND $0F) THEN GOTO init_game

 

Probably a way to condense that but I'm tired and the Flames lost.

 

I'm not sure if the nested AND works. Of course, (c1 > 0) AND (c1 < 32) should also work.

 

 

PS: not that I'm worried about ever using this level of granularity, but does jzintv support all 16 directions? Do I have to define my own keymap to make it happen?

 

It sure does, even on a keyboard, even in the default keymaps. It's tricky to get all 16 directions on the keyboard, though. You're better off with an analog joystick.

 

jzIntv defines the following keys for 16 direction input:

    U   I   O
      \ | /
       \|/
    J --+-- K      Left controller disc
       /|\
      / | \
    N   M   ,

    W   E   R
      \ | /
       \|/
    S --+-- D      Right controller disc
       /|\
      / | \
    Z   X   C

Yes, the left controller is on the right side of the keyboard and the right controller is on the left side... I had reasons. :-)

 

Anyway, you might wonder: "I only see 8 buttons defined for each!" Right. But, if you press pairs of buttons, it will give you the direction between them. So, I + O gives you NNE, Z+X gives you SSW, etc. It also works for 8-way. That is, combinations like I + J give you NW. That's how you get 8 directions out of the four arrow keys on the keyboard.

 

Getting 16 directions on the keyboard I think was more an academic exercise than actually useful. But I did use it to debug my controller decoder code to make sure it could resolve all 16 directions.

[freewheel]

Response to DZ:

 

1. OK, now you're reaching, trying to find any similarity to existing music. The end-of-level jingle is literally 7 notes that I threw together pretty much at random, just to have *something* there. I think you're a bit too intense on your "original music please!" mission Anyway, it's a placeholder at best, I don't even particularly like it. It sounds out of tune to me. And probably should be a touch longer.

 

2. You won't skip the intro scene in the final game, because there won't be a stage select where you're pressing buttons. I've intentionally left the input a bit soft for now, because when I'm coding/testing, I can't stand having to hit 15 buttons just to get to the part I want to see. So it's deliberate that a single long press skips through a bunch of stuff.

 

3. I need a lot more feedback on the difficulty. I want winter to be hard, but not cheap. You do not need to eat/kick everything in order to win, you just need to eat most of it. You need to make decisions as to what is more important to get. And it should be hard and take a while - otherwise people can breeze through this game. BUT - that's why I need feedback I have no idea how hard it actually is. Maybe I'm terrible at games and real gamers will think it's too easy, or maybe I play it way too much and others will find it impossible - hard to say. Oh, and losing points (meter) when you lose a life happens in summer, fall, and winter. Just another way to up the difficulty as the game progresses. I've just tossed some ideas together for now. I don't know what's "good" or not. But there has to be a way to make the play harder per season, and just speeding everything up only goes so far - the INTV has problems with super fast games, as everyone knows. Anyway, this is the hardest part of a game like this, balancing. So it's fantastic that you've been willing to play all the way through to really get sense of how things work

 

4. On the "red thing" - which is a hot dog wiener, by the way, gotta love 8x8 monochrome sprites - that is bizarre in the extreme. I know the behaviour you're talking about, but I spent many hours testing and coding to prevent that. I haven't seen it happen in ages. I just played Summer for an hour and I can't replicate it. Was anything weird going on when it happened? Weird in the sense of uncommon? Like did you just die maybe? I almost wonder if you've stumbled upon a weird emulator bug or something unique to your config? Or is it just that you've played the game the most so you're uncovering these weird bugs in the game itself?

 

5. OK, since seemingly none of you have played NES games - the Game Over screen is an homage (rip-off) of the game over screen from Zelda 2. Modified to be wearing a trucker cap like the farmer does. So yeah, it's a little out of place and was put in more as a joke than anything else. I actually had some ideas for it as I fell asleep last night (yes, I've now spent so many hours on this that I DREAM IntyBASIC code and 160x96 screens). Like all of the title/intro/intermission stuff, screens and music are up for debate. I have no problem whipping up a new one. In fact the game over screen was just my first pass at IntyColor, so it was more of an experiment anyway.

Edited November 11, 2014 by freeweed

[freewheel]

I'm not sure if the nested AND works. Of course, (c1 > 0) AND (c1 < 32) should also work.

 

It absolutely does, fortunately. And of course your suggestion is probably more efficient (damn you for knowing so much about this hardware!).

 

It looks like all 16 directionals fit within the same pattern so I'm all good no matter what.

[freewheel]

For a "free-moving" game like Goat Nom (is that now the official name?), I would highly recommend supporting 16 directions.

 

Just noticed this post now. I think it's the official name, unless people start to riot or something. Can I change thread titles if I started them, by the way?

 

This, by the way, is why *someone* has to release a flash cart, and soon. I have no way to test this on a real unit and see how the control feels with a real controller. Because I agree, it *should* let you roll the disc around like we're all used to. I just have no way of figuring out how it will play. It's quite possible that the mechanism IntyBASIC uses for checking directionals already takes this into account. Right now I just check for the cardinal 4, and yet diagonals work just tickety-boo.

 

I've spent a bunch of time analyzing the values that seem to be spit out when the controller is used, and I think I may be OK, but the proof is in the playing.

Edited November 11, 2014 by freeweed

[intvnut]

 

(damn you for knowing so much about this hardware!).

 

*chuckle*

 

 

It looks like all 16 directionals fit within the same pattern so I'm all good no matter what.

 

Yeah, bit 4 is only really used to distinguish among the diagonals to boost you from 8 directions to 16. If you ignore it, it looks like an 8 direction controller.

 

Here's a crappy diagram I drew up ages ago.

 

 

 

I've spent a bunch of time analyzing the values that seem to be spit out when the controller is used, and I think I may be OK, but the proof is in the playing.

 

The 4 LSBs basically give you the 4 cardinal directions, and pairs of them give you the diagonals. If you look at the diagram above, the center points for the 4 directions and the 4 diagonals are rotated slightly from true N/S/E/W, but not by much (about 11 degrees).

[+DZ-Jay]

Response to DZ:

 

1. OK, now you're reaching, trying to find any similarity to existing music. The end-of-level jingle is literally 7 notes that I threw together pretty much at random, just to have *something* there. I think you're a bit too intense on your "original music please!" mission Anyway, it's a placeholder at best, I don't even particularly like it. It sounds out of tune to me. And probably should be a touch longer.

 

 

Dude, I'm not on any mission. It's not that I want all music to be original, it's that some pieces are a bit overused in some games, and they seem cliché. But, hey, it's your game.

 

I have nothing against the jingle you used for the end of a level, I just thought I recognized it from Mario Bros.

 

Close enough. Check the tune at the beginning of the level, at around 0:23 seconds:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtBkDA5Jot8

 

 

2. You won't skip the intro scene in the final game, because there won't be a stage select where you're pressing buttons. I've intentionally left the input a bit soft for now, because when I'm coding/testing, I can't stand having to hit 15 buttons just to get to the part I want to see. So it's deliberate that a single long press skips through a bunch of stuff.

 

 

Fine. Understand that it's hard to tell what are features, bugs, or just stuff you left intentionally for your own purposes.

 

3. I need a lot more feedback on the difficulty. I want winter to be hard, but not cheap. You do not need to eat/kick everything in order to win, you just need to eat most of it. You need to make decisions as to what is more important to get. And it should be hard and take a while - otherwise people can breeze through this game. BUT - that's why I need feedback I have no idea how hard it actually is. Maybe I'm terrible at games and real gamers will think it's too easy, or maybe I play it way too much and others will find it impossible - hard to say. Oh, and losing points (meter) when you lose a life happens in summer, fall, and winter. Just another way to up the difficulty as the game progresses. I've just tossed some ideas together for now. I don't know what's "good" or not. But there has to be a way to make the play harder per season, and just speeding everything up only goes so far - the INTV has problems with super fast games, as everyone knows. Anyway, this is the hardest part of a game like this, balancing. So it's fantastic that you've been willing to play all the way through to really get sense of how things work

 

I am not a fan of changing the game mechanics just for the sake of making it difficult. I understand that you don't want to rely on just making the level faster, but there has to be a better way than just changing the rules. It feels contrived (and frankly, weird) that all of a sudden my meter doesn't go up, or just resets seemingly at random (I am not paying attention to it constantly, since I'm focused on the action).

 

Personally, I recommend introducing new play mechanics rather than changing the existing ones. How about drifting objects that change lanes?

 

Or bees flying around that sting the goat and paralyze it for a few frames? The player then needs to avoid the bees while still trying to catch food items. Substitute bees for any other nuance.

 

 

4. On the "red thing" - which is a hot dog wiener, by the way, gotta love 8x8 monochrome sprites - that is bizarre in the extreme. I know the behaviour you're talking about, but I spent many hours testing and coding to prevent that. I haven't seen it happen in ages. I just played Summer for an hour and I can't replicate it. Was anything weird going on when it happened? Weird in the sense of uncommon? Like did you just die maybe? I almost wonder if you've stumbled upon a weird emulator bug or something unique to your config? Or is it just that you've played the game the most so you're uncovering these weird bugs in the game itself?

 

Ah! A hot dog! It makes sense now. I only saw the glitch once, so I didn't get to notice the conditions under which it happened. I'll try to pay attention next time.

 

(I just played some more and can't seem to reproduce it. I'll keep checking.)

 

I don't think I have played the game all that much, though.

 

Also, I did noticed that during the Summer season, the speed starts really slow, then goes really fast, then goes a bit slower before going back up. Is this how it should be?

 

 

One more note on the difficulty. Just as a matter of feedback, consider this: I reached the Winter season with five or six goat lives, I played for over five minutes straight on that level until I got bored because I couldn't advance the nom-meter enough, and every time I managed to get it a bit up, it went down faster.

 

I played it a few more times and noticed that there seems to be a critical point where the speed increases. At that moment the game becomes significantly more fun: I get to run around while things are flying faster at me. It is still challenging, but it feels responsive and hectic, plus I managed to beat it.

 

However, if you don't get to that critical point, the game is just frustrating, while things go flying quickly and the goat seems to be too slow for the task of getting almost every item needed to advance the meter.

 

I think the entire Winter season should be like that second part: lots of items, very fast, and the goat moves very fast as well. Part of the challenge is manoœuvering the goat accurately, and part of it is avoiding the rocks and other bad items.

 

-dZ.

Edited November 11, 2014 by DZ-Jay

[freewheel]

DZ, your feedback has been invaluable. And it's interesting to see people noticing the more subtle things as they play it more (and I guess as I add more stuff to keep people's interest).

 

I think you've nailed it with the difficulty - it's too easy early on, then too hard at the end. Obviously this sort of progression is desired, but NOT this steep. I'll juggle a bunch of stuff around. The various speeds are all parameterized so I should be able to tweak a fair bit. Part of what you're seeing is a game that was initially heavily based on Astrosmash, where things speed up at set times, the point value of objects changes at the same time, etc... and I've never once heard someone complain that it's random or arbitrary. However - Astrosmash is basically a single unending stage. Whereas Goatnom is now split up into its seasons. So yeah, I can understand why this overall mechanic no longer works quite as well as I had intended. And without a visible score, I can see why it makes no sense at times.

 

Also, please don't misinterpret my explanations of various things as defensiveness or anything. I LOVE the tiny, nitpicky details people are already noticing. First, because it means people are actually taking an interest which is flattering. But mostly? What I'm hearing is that the game at a macro level is acceptable. When people start getting into the tiny details, it seems to me like things are gelling together well.

 

Right now, the struggle is to address some of the more subtle issues, while there are still major overall problems with the game (the difficulty is a big one). And it's weird, because sometimes what seems like a tiny change really changes the larger game in unexpected ways. So it's a constant iteration. I really appreciate how patient you guys are with this.

[freewheel]

The consensus was a big WTF for the Game Over screen, so here's a new one. And it's animated, so the screenshot doesn't completely do it justice. I'm not 100% sold on the "press any button" - is that sort of text even needed? Is it obvious to people to just press something to continue? And if so - buttons, disc, or both? I could just center the goat at the bottom.

 

Also, there will be some sort of sad song played when the screen comes up. Haven't written that yet.

 

 

goat.rom

[pimpmaul69]

This may not be important enough to fix but when you play with controllers in an emulator it is "odd" to start by pressing the direction pad. Every game that doesnt require number input right away always allows fire button 1 to start the game. If there is any possibility of re-adding that it would cool

[pimpmaul69]

Oh and the zelda II "game over return of ganon" screen wasnt totally lost on everyone.

[freewheel]

This may not be important enough to fix but when you play with controllers in an emulator it is "odd" to start by pressing the direction pad. Every game that doesnt require number input right away always allows fire button 1 to start the game. If there is any possibility of re-adding that it would cool

 

Is that the case? Easy enough to add in then. One thing I'm not 100% sure on is which is "button 1". To me I think of the top action buttons but I don't know if that's what you mean. I do agree with you that doing it in the emulator seems.. clunky.

 

Oh and the zelda II "game over return of ganon" screen wasnt totally lost on everyone.

 

Yay!! But be honest - is the new screen better? I wasn't sure if an "homage" was appropriate, I just did it for fun and to have something to put there.

[pimpmaul69]

 

Is that the case? Easy enough to add in then. One thing I'm not 100% sure on is which is "button 1". To me I think of the top action buttons but I don't know if that's what you mean. I do agree with you that doing it in the emulator seems.. clunky.

 

 

Yay!! But be honest - is the new screen better? I wasn't sure if an "homage" was appropriate, I just did it for fun and to have something to put there.

yes i am talking about the top side buttons. I like the new game over screen. More fitting to the game.

[+DZ-Jay]

 

Is that the case? Easy enough to add in then. One thing I'm not 100% sure on is which is "button 1". To me I think of the top action buttons but I don't know if that's what you mean. I do agree with you that doing it in the emulator seems.. clunky.

 

 

Hmmm... it's fairly typical that pressing the disc starts the game. Perhaps you can make it so that any input starts the game?

[pimpmaul69]

 

Hmmm... it's fairly typical that pressing the disc starts the game. Perhaps you can make it so that any input starts the game?

yes it is. But it also fairly typical to start with the side buttons as well. For me playing it on a wii with the classic controller plus i am so used to using the enter or fire button to start the game as that is how all other intv games that dont start with a number press and any modern game works as well. I would like to see both as he stated it was easy to fix so that no matter how you play it works good. Edited November 12, 2014 by pimpmaul69

[freewheel]

Hmmm... it's fairly typical that pressing the disc starts the game. Perhaps you can make it so that any input starts the game?

 

Sometimes the obvious solution is obvious in hindsight. Consider this me slapping my forehead.

 

Quick enough fix. Anything pressed on controller 1 will start the game. A quick debounce before the stage select (which ultimately will be gone anyway) and it should make everyone happy, no matter what platform you're playing on

 

Here's an interesting one for IntyBASIC developers:

 

IF CONT1 does not work. It will always return true. But this works:

 

c1=CONT1

IF c1 only returns true when there's input.

 

I realize it has to do with how CONT1 is being handled (and in terms of being complemented) but it's still very unintuitive if you're not paying attention.

Edited November 12, 2014 by freeweed

[intvnut]

The consensus was a big WTF for the Game Over screen, so here's a new one. And it's animated, so the screenshot doesn't completely do it justice. I'm not 100% sold on the "press any button" - is that sort of text even needed? Is it obvious to people to just press something to continue? And if so - buttons, disc, or both? I could just center the goat at the bottom.

 

I personally am an "any key" kind of guy. If there's no reason not to accept any input, then just accept any input.

 

But the text doesn't need to be there. That's space that could be used for more graphics, or for centering the goat.

 

If you remove the text and truly allow any input to proceed, then the player will be left with "trying anything," and lo, "anything" works. I don't put any text up in my games when it's at Game Over. I just say "Game Over" and wait for any input. No one's complained in 14 years. I think it's actually pretty intuitive.

 

Indeed, the same feedback was offered for starting the game, and I slap my forehead for not suggesting it.

[intvnut]

 

Here's an interesting one for IntyBASIC developers:

 

It's official: nanochess is running circles around other developers.

 

I'm pretty sure he's the only one actually developing IntyBASIC at the moment, and he's clearly quite talented. Makes me feel slow at times.

[freewheel]

IntyBASIC using developers?

[intvnut]

IntyBASIC using developers?

 

Ah, as in developers using IntyBASIC as opposed to developing IntyBASIC. Gotcha.

 

I still stand by nanochess being quite skilled. He won the IOCCC, what, three times and has developed across how many systems?

[freewheel]

I by no means meant to take anything way from Mr. T. (yes, yes, Senor T. but that would ruin my weak joke). Just clarifying semantics

 

I also didn't know about the IOCCCC wins. I haven't followed it in eons. 3 years, and 5 awards. One of the more prolific people on the list. Impressive, to say the least.

[pimpmaul69]

 

Ah, as in developers using IntyBASIC as opposed to developing IntyBASIC. Gotcha.

 

I still stand by nanochess being quite skilled. He won the IOCCC, what, three times and has developed across how many systems?

5 times

[intvnut]

I by no means meant to take anything way from Mr. T. (yes, yes, Senor T. but that would ruin my weak joke). Just clarifying semantics

 

I also didn't know about the IOCCCC wins. I haven't followed it in eons. 3 years, and 5 awards. One of the more prolific people on the list. Impressive, to say the least.

 

5 times

 

Oops. I confused years with awards. Almost as bad as confusing bytes with words! ;) Or maybe even worse!

Edited November 12, 2014 by intvnut

[+Tarzilla]

My apologies, I just assumed that anyone with more than 5 posts on AA knows how to download files and run an emulator For the record, putting images in posts here is so counter-intuitive compared to just about every other webforum that running an emulator is in fact easier. Maybe I'm missing the button, but it takes me like 5 mins to post an image here.

 

Screenshot of winter goat, in all its glory:

Geez, go offline for a couple a days and I miss an opportunity to make fun of Rev's Snow obsession. Oh, well, another chance coming up this week.

 

Now I have several hours of reading to do to catch up on Atari Age.

 

PS This screen shot makes me think the farmer is filling the bucket, if you know what I mean...

[+Tarzilla]

Next version. I've addressed much (but not all) of DZ's comments:

 

1. The meter was glitchy for a whole HOST of reasons. I appreciate you finding out what you did because it led me down a path where I discovered a bunch of stupid assumptions I made. Hopefully it's now pretty robust. Sadly this is now several hours of coding for what ended up being *a single line of code* (plus some variable setting elsewhere).

 

2. Yup, the idea is to fill up the meter to complete a season.

 

3. You will now see it fill up. I've added some filler music and blinking animation to the meter. Right now I think it's a bit fast but it should give you an idea.

 

4. The mid-flight acceleration is a) exactly how Astrosmash (my muse) works, b) pretty much embedded into the code, and c) part of the challenge That being said, I'm still toying with how to handle this. While it may seem counter intuitive, I like the idea that the player can't just blindly go chomping around. If you have a food item followed by a rock, there is a risk in eating the food. I've been caught myself many times on this and it adds to the difficulty. That being said, it may be a "cheap" death so I'm open to change here.

 

5. You can now skip the cut scene. I am the first person to suggest this - I couldn't stand the Playstation and a lot of games since, for this very reason. Hell, I can't stand firing up 1st party INTV or CV games for this reason. So consider me a bit embarrassed, and thanks for the reminder. The ending credit scene is currently unskippable but I don't think people have problems with those. Open to suggestions though.

 

6. The moon rising animation really slowed down the goat's jumping. The title screen may be rather different in the end so keep the comments and suggestions coming.

 

7. As you play through a season and things get faster, the goat DOES move faster. There is an intersection point where you are faster than some (but not all) of the items. Then towards the very end of the season, the items are as fast as you again. A few people have commented on the speed issue. To me, the whole point is to plan your movements ahead to be able to eat everything. I think the game would be way too easy if you could just fly back to pick up what you've missed. However, this is all part of the game balancing that is slowly happening, and will really take shape towards the end of development. So again, comments and suggestions please

 

 

Oh - and I changed the lives counter. At one point it was a blatant Astrosmash ripoff (extra life every X thousand points) but now it just doesn't make any sense. So, you start with 3 and get an extra life when you complete a season. Whether that's too many or too few will only come out once the final difficulty is adjusted and I get a lot more feedback.

 

And with that, here's the latest ROM.

 

 

Haven't had a chance to test yet, but I really like the Nom-o-meter and the goat skull Lives Meater.