peteym5 Posted December 29, 2016 Author Share Posted December 29, 2016 Those are mixed random screen shots. Some Standard Hardware, some VBXE. Level18.jpg (Red Bowl), Level69.jpg (Leaf) and Level90.jpg (Oval Flat Sides) are standard Antic/GTIA graphics. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ransom Posted December 29, 2016 Share Posted December 29, 2016 Ah, OK. Very nicely done! I think this will be worth buying, even though I have the earlier one. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteym5 Posted December 31, 2016 Author Share Posted December 31, 2016 Happy New Year everyone. I am happy to announce that I had an independent beta tester check the Driving Controller and Trackball, they both work great. I had to do some last minute changes to the Paddle Controller read section to get it work better. Well here some more screen shots for everyone to gaze at. 9 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteym5 Posted January 3, 2017 Author Share Posted January 3, 2017 I apologize for any delays in getting this game on the market. We had been testing the game to use the Joystick and will remain its default controller. We only recently been able to obtain Driving Controllers and TrackBall. Also with the recent news that the trackball does not use "grey code" meant I had to rewrite a section of the program so it now works with a trackball. Everything else works great with the game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Alexander Posted January 3, 2017 Share Posted January 3, 2017 I apologize for any delays in getting this game on the market. We had been testing the game to use the Joystick and will remain its default controller. We only recently been able to obtain Driving Controllers and TrackBall. Also with the recent news that the trackball does not use "grey code" meant I had to rewrite a section of the program so it now works with a trackball. Everything else works great with the game. Please take your time as I really want to be able to play this game with the driving controller. Once I get this game we will talk about it on the Xegs Podcast to get the word out. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteym5 Posted January 3, 2017 Author Share Posted January 3, 2017 I am not sure how fast the Indy 500 controller updates the output to the computer or what the threshold on what you need to turn the knob before the computer reads a change, but seems like you need to turn the knob some distance before the value in PORTA changes. Trackball updates a little faster. It still works with its default device, the joystick. I did an update with the controller read code and now waiting report back from some beta testers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Posted January 3, 2017 Share Posted January 3, 2017 On what Cart type will Tempest Elite come? It's important for me to know, since I will dump the cart for my own use, and then I'll store that cart. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteym5 Posted January 3, 2017 Author Share Posted January 3, 2017 Everyone will have wait and see with what cartridge type will be used. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andromeda Stardust Posted January 4, 2017 Share Posted January 4, 2017 On what Cart type will Tempest Elite come? It's important for me to know, since I will dump the cart for my own use, and then I'll store that cart. Just play it like it was meant to be played... Everyone will have wait and see with what cartridge type will be used. You know, if more people keep making games for the Atari 8-bit, I may have to pick up an XEGS. Does this game require keyboard input? Also one more question. I have a CX-80 that functions identical to the CX-22. CX-22 does not put out "gray code" but rather one of the bits signifies direction of last movement while the other toggles on and off. Other trackballs do use actual gray code, like some late run factory modded CX-80s, and the ST Mouse. I've been drooling over the possibility to play Tempest on a home console, but a 5200 and the accompanying trackball are massive, and nobody has attempted a port for the 7800. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZylonBane Posted January 4, 2017 Share Posted January 4, 2017 grey code gray code It's "Gray code", named after the inventor, Frank Gray. Not the color. 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andromeda Stardust Posted January 4, 2017 Share Posted January 4, 2017 It's "Gray code", named after the inventor, Frank Gray. Not the color. Well at least I spelled it right! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Posted January 4, 2017 Share Posted January 4, 2017 Just play it like it was meant to be played... I will, I have all my games on one single 128MB cartridge called The!Cart. That satisfies for all games, and it is amazing how cool it is to have all the fun in one single cart. So when I can dump the new Tempest Elite cart, I can add it to that game collection. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Posted January 4, 2017 Share Posted January 4, 2017 Everyone will have wait and see with what cartridge type will be used. Fine! As long as it is known at the moment I might make the purchase. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteym5 Posted January 4, 2017 Author Share Posted January 4, 2017 The Game needs a keyboard for pause or superzapper if the controller is other than the joystick. The space bar becomes the superzapper button. Escape also always functions for pause. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andromeda Stardust Posted January 5, 2017 Share Posted January 5, 2017 The Game needs a keyboard for pause or superzapper if the controller is other than the joystick. The space bar becomes the superzapper button. Escape also always functions for pause. What about detecting button C on Genesis controllers? Or is this possible on an Atari 8-bit? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteym5 Posted January 5, 2017 Author Share Posted January 5, 2017 I see someone else is playing with the Genesis 3 button and 6 button controllers and someone is working on a way to sequence the joystick buttons into the trig register with some sort of circuit. I would imagine doing something similar to "Multijoy8" that can read multiple joysticks connected to the joystick ports. It does something by sending a value to PORTA to read the next joystick. However, this is a device that is still in development and may be on the market at some future date and Tempest Elite is almost ready to go. The other issue to handle more and more controllers, you start boggling down your program by using more memory space and cpu time. I know the subroutines to read a controller are a few bytes, but Tempest Elite was originally a 256K XEGS game now being packed into a 128K XEGS cartridge with the help of compression. I also look at how many people will actually buy and play the game with these different controllers. Many people come back and still say the joystick/joypad type controllers work the best. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteym5 Posted January 5, 2017 Author Share Posted January 5, 2017 (edited) Hey everyone I should state I finally got word back from KJMANN12 after 2 years on Facebook. I can tell you he is doing well and moved onto doing projects with the Amiga. "That was a Nice Compliment you made about my Atari music in the Antic podcast Interview. Thank You." That made me feel good that he is still active. We both put a lot of work into making Tempest Xtreme and was there for most of the development of Tempest Elite. I will like to keep everything in a positive light on this thread. We know some people had past differences with KJMANN12 and there is no need to carry that on any further here. Edited January 5, 2017 by peteym5 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteym5 Posted January 9, 2017 Author Share Posted January 9, 2017 (edited) I received some reports from my beta testers over the weekend. The Joystick (Default), Trackball, and Driving Controller Options are a go. However using the paddle has given us a problem, stating it was too sensitive. One of the things I tried is enabling "Fast Pot Scan", bit 2 in SKCTL register, to get better response. Made no difference in the Altirra Emulator, but on real hardware, the POT0 value read from the paddle port came back as 0 making the ship get stuck in one lane. If that is the cause, I will disable this "Fast Pot Scan". I recall people were doing something with that function to know if their program is running in emulation or from a real Atari Computer. This could be another way to know if the game is running on real hardware or on Altirra, useful to me. One problem I had to work around these alternate controllers are left/right movement only so they will not be able to play the bonus round which requires a 4 directional joystick. So collecting 3 warp keys just causes some bonus points to be added and warp ahead a few levels. Edited January 9, 2017 by peteym5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brentarian Posted January 9, 2017 Share Posted January 9, 2017 The Game needs a keyboard for pause or superzapper if the controller is other than the joystick. The space bar becomes the superzapper button. Escape also always functions for pause. Since the keyboard is needed for pause/superzapper if using a controller other than joystick, could you make the entire game playable from the keyboard as well? Either as a controller option itself, or having it accessible regardless of what controller is used would be cool. I played Tempest 2000 (PC version) back in the day with a keyboard and preferred it over a joystick. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteym5 Posted January 10, 2017 Author Share Posted January 10, 2017 At this point, it would be difficult to squeeze in any more controller options. We are in the final stages of making the labels and manuals for the game. I know many people were requesting the Indy 500 Driving Controller, and going with that I am trying Trackball and Paddle. My Megaoids does have the Keyboard as an optional controller. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brentarian Posted January 10, 2017 Share Posted January 10, 2017 No worries - I will still be buying one. Looks great! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vazquezrick Posted January 10, 2017 Share Posted January 10, 2017 I'll buy one as well Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteym5 Posted January 10, 2017 Author Share Posted January 10, 2017 (edited) Thankyou for your interest and support. I am waiting for a report on the last build and if everything works, I can work on releasing the game. Here are some new screen shots of some randomly selected levels from Tempest Elite. Most of them are with standard hardware. I am probably not going to post any more screen shots and videos until the game has been released/ Edited January 10, 2017 by peteym5 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ransom Posted January 10, 2017 Share Posted January 10, 2017 Looks fantastic! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+davidcalgary29 Posted January 10, 2017 Share Posted January 10, 2017 Any chance of a box and manual for this release? I'm in for two! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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