A8 Donkey Kong Jr. Arcade HACK

[+darryl1970]

I always thought the A8 version of Donkey Kong Jr. would look more arcade-like if the brick patterns were removed from the screens.

After the Popeye Arcade conversion, I decided to show Donkey Kong Jr. some love.

 

I also saw a thread comparing the A8 to the 7800 Dk Jr. The A8 version does have some control issues, but I wanted to give it a little boost.

Playsoft generously made some time to help out with this effort and make it possible.

 

 

 

dkjr_A8_V7.zip

 

I still have a few more tweaks to go, but I thought I'd get some feedback. Please keep in mind that this version uses character tiles for all enemies. Donkey Kong Jr is the only sprite on the the screen, so there is no way to keep the enemies, fruits, etc from temporarily overwriting the screen slot.

[Jinroh]

Man this hack is so rad! Can't wait to play it when I get home. Glad you got rid of the awful brick patterns on the first screen. DK looks hairier as well

Edited December 8, 2015 by Jinroh

[Aking]

I always thought the A8 version of Donkey Kong Jr. would look more arcade-like if the brick patterns were removed from the screens.

After the Popeye Arcade conversion, I decided to show Donkey Kong Jr. some love.

 

I also saw a thread comparing the A8 to the 7800 Dk Jr. The A8 version does have some control issues, but I wanted to give it a little boost.

Playsoft generously made some time to help out with this effort and make it possible.

 

DK_V7-1.PNG DK_V7.PNG

 

DkJrV7.PNG MarioHideout.PNG

 

dkjr_A8_V7.zip

 

I still have a few more tweaks to go, but I thought I'd get some feedback. Please keep in mind that this version uses character tiles for all enemies. Donkey Kong Jr is the only sprite on the the screen, so there is no way to keep the enemies, fruits, etc from temporarily overwriting the screen slot.

5200 ?

[MARIO130XE]

YEAHHH you did it again. Can't wait to test it on my real hardware.

 

Thanks!!!

[doctorclu]

Played this on Altirra. Nice game! Thanks for this!

[+darryl1970]

5200 ?

I don't know how to convert to 5200, but I would sure hope it can be converted once complete. I figure there's no need to bother anybody until we have a complete product, and I just started tweaking the sprites.

[Tempest]

Awesome! Any way to get rid of that nasty yellow on the first board? Also, I've always wondered why DK and Mario are that red-brown rather than the normal brown that Jr. is?

[+darryl1970]

Awesome! Any way to get rid of that nasty yellow on the first board? Also, I've always wondered why DK and Mario are that red-brown rather than the normal brown that Jr. is?

Playsoft set me up with the ability to change some of the colors. The problem is that Atari A8 only allows 5 colors in character graphics, One of the 5 is a background color; the other color is toggled as one or the other, per 8x8 block. Display list interrupts can change the color registers per scan line I believe, but this would require deeper programming knowledge; plus I don't know what the programmers are already doing during the interrupts.

 

So, if I make Donkey Kong more brown, the "red" snapjaws become more brown. If I make the floors a darker brown, then Donkey Kong's face looks too dark; this also would make the snapjaws teeth a darker brown.

 

I may still play with the colors a bit, but it seems that the programmers found a decent compromise. Likewise, I wanted to use blue and red on Mario, but the way the colors are mapped, every character can have white, yellow and (blue or red). So, it's one or the other. That's why Mario is made up of weird colors too!

 

I did notice they made the island pads green on the Spring screen. I am not familiar enough with the display list interrupts to work that kind of magic.

 

It is on my list of things to check out.

[+therealbountybob]

You guys are great

 

Again we've just played DK Jr in the HSC, there were no real issues - apart from the game being so darn hard! I'd challenge anyone to beat McKong's HSC record

[Jinroh]

You guys are great

 

Again we've just played DK Jr in the HSC, there were no real issues - apart from the game being so darn hard! I'd challenge anyone to beat McKong's HSC record

 

Yeah honestly it takes me forever and a half just to beat the first screen. It's a tough one.

[+Cafeman]

Here is the Display List for screen 1. I see there are several DLI's going down the screen.

If we could find them - we could experiment with adding 2 stmts before the "RTS" stmt which ends each DLI block of code.

Then if that worked, we could add a new VBI at Kong's feet to change to more red. And set the original color to more brown.

lda newcolor

sta COLPFx

[bfollett]

Looks like the original colors may have been chosen under NTSC. At least the colors look better to me if switched to NTSC under Altirra.

 

Bob

[+darryl1970]

Update to version 8

 

Please note: Some color changes were made with other issues in mind. For example, Donkey Kong's color sets the color of the pillars. Donkey Kong and Jr cannot be the same color, because Jr. stand in front of the pillar on the Spring level. Also,Donkey Kong and Jr overlap in the intermission.

 

The snapjaws inherit the color of DK. I tried green floors. The pillars looked great, but Mario's arm looked horrible.

 

If somebody can help with display list interrupts as mentioned previously, there may be some hope for better colors.

 

Changes:

1. Color changes
2. Redraw of Mario step
3. Edits to Donkey Kong
4. Spring Redraw
5. Tweak NitPickers (The birds, not critiques)
6. Redraw ALL of Junior's frames, compared to the arcade

 

 

 

DKJr_Arcade_V8.xex

 

Enjoy!

[Tempest]

Make Mario green and say it's Luigi. He seems like the type who would cage DK.

[+darryl1970]

Make Mario green and say it's Luigi. He seems like the type who would cage DK.

It's the wrong color. lol. He gets green arms. Either way, he'd look like a Christmas tree.

Merry Mario Christmas!!!

(Actual Updated Graphic!)

 

 

I would bet somebody can figure out the interrupt. Cafeman seems to have some ideas.

 

The color doesn't need shifted until after the last vine!

Edited December 10, 2015 by darryl1970

[+darryl1970]

Original Update

 

Be nice to slow the animation down a little.

[Jinroh]

That'll look pretty good once the DLIs are sorted out. Your death animation looks loads better too than the original.

Edited December 10, 2015 by Jinroh

[José Pereira]

Hi guys.

Did a break last night to see what i could came up for DK jr. and here it is:

-> The gfxs that I could get from you are also changed like the terrain pillars, red fruit and platforms (now fruits seem more like the reality as we can: banana is more yellowish, apple more redish,...);

-> The PFs are the same as on the original game file (that's why and because iof the enemys teeth that on level/screen _1 we can't have the platforms in green (unless you want/think is not all that bad that on the scanlibe where these platforms starts we change yellow->green and enemys teeth turn also to gree);

-> The DLIs follows the same DLIs, I think, that are on the original (only new one at the top for DK jr. face);

-> re-done some gfxs like Mario (now face is more a skin colour and has a blue shirt (yeah, it's light but it's the possible we have), some pixels on the fruits and on the side's chains at screen _3);

-> The same colours are also on Credits (screen _0) and I also add some variants white&grays for the hi-res text that seems not so monotonous and was also a little too darker if same luminance for all the text lines;

_> DK jr. has the same design (I am not good in sprites and animals/humans movement but if think yours late one from what I saw in the .gif seem good ). He is:

P0&P2-[4,A];

P1&P3-[1,4];

Oring-[5,E];

(if you think P1&P3 are too dark then change them to [1,6] that still gets the Oring as [5,E])

 

 

Here the screens (left the original 80s and on the right my proposal):

 

Here's the files (.col, .g2f and .xex):

DONKEY KONG JR A8 New 11_12_2015 _1.zip

 

Anything you want more or if you wanna say something or change ideas you can always post here or send me a message.

Thanks.

 

 

P.s.- Ah! forgot to say that my screens are one or twoscan lines more to the bottom because in G2F if I would have them at the same position I couldn't/will get PF2&PF3 all messed.

 

 

[bfollett]

Have you considered releasing an NTSC version as well as a PAL version because your fixed colors for PAL look horrible for NTSC (at least using Altirra's default palettes.)

 

Bob

[José Pereira]

Ok will try next NTSC.

Indeed I never did anything on it but it will be just a case of loading the right pallete into G2F and Altirra and change the colours.

[+darryl1970]

Ok will try next NTSC.

Indeed I never did anything on it but it will be just a case of loading the right pallete into G2F and Altirra and change the colours.

I really like the Blue-Red Mario on the screens that allow it. Paul and I have a new version with color hacks. They are NTSC, and the graphics are a couple version past the ones you were using. I have redrawn the birds, all of Juniors frames, along with a few others.

 

That will be up soon, if you want to check it out.

[+darryl1970]

Here's version 9. Colors are tweaked. Playsoft helped with some DLI's and color suggestions, so the island pads are all green. Blue snapjaws better match the arcade. Nitpicker hybrid birds have been redrawn from scratch, to take advantage of the new colors. They are also drawn to compensate for some limitations of the software sprites.

 

These are NTSC color schemes. The snapshots are form Altirra 2.5. Colors are more vibrant in 2.6.

 

 

 

 

I still haven't made any changes to Mario's Hideout, nor have I made changes to the intermission DK & Mario.

 

DkJrArcade_V9.zip

 

--Darryl

[Tempest]

When you get to the intermission can you PLEASE fix Mario? He always looked so stupid when he falls. It looks like they replaced him with a dummy like they do in bad movies.

 

EDIT: Aww you got rid of Junior's 'Derp' face when gets the key. I always thought it was funny.

[+darryl1970]

When you get to the intermission can you PLEASE fix Mario? He always looked so stupid when he falls. It looks like they replaced him with a dummy like they do in bad movies.

Yes, and his colors are inverted now, because I switched them on the regular Mario. I'll probably try to mock the arcade look. Shouldn't be a problem.

I need Playsoft to grab those graphics for me.

 

Also, I am not sure what I might be able to do with Donkey Kong's profile. Might not bother, but I'm pretty sure I won't be able to resist.

[Jinroh]

Man this latest update looks phenomenal!! Amazing what a difference even just the green tree tops on the first screen do.

 

Can't wait to get some time to properly play it later.