1942 - It needs a thread...

[Beeblebrox]

Thanks. I'll try another controller just in case. 

 

Cool re firmware, I did recall reading it somewhere re future support. I'll keep an eye out. 

[Trebor]

Let's centralize all the different builds to hopefully clear up any confusion:

 

1.  Standard - Final Build:

1942 (20221005).a78

 

2.  Concerto - Small ROM Build | Single Background | No Music:

1942 (Concerto - Small ROM Build) (Single Background) (No Music) (20221011).a78

 

3.  Concerto - Small ROM Build | Single Background | POKEY:

1942 (Concerto - Small ROM Build) (Single Background) (POKEY) (20221018).a78

 

4.  DragonFly - Extended Build | YM or POKEY (If YM not present):

1942 (DragonFly - Extended Build) (YM or POKEY) (20221018).a78

 

5.  Cuttle Cart II | No Music:

(HOME: 1942    1942-78        256R32        78BIOS)

1942 (Cuttle Cart II - No Music) (20221008).bin

 

6.  Cuttle Cart II - Small ROM Build | Single Background | POKEY:

(HOME: 1942-128k    1942-SR        128R16PK    78BIOS)

1942 (Cuttle Cart II - Small ROM Build) (Single Background) (POKEY) (20221018).bin

 

7.  Cuttle Cart II - Extended Build | BankRAM and POKEY:

(HOME: 1942-256R32PK    1942exb        256R32PK    78BIOS)

1942 (Cuttle Cart II - Extended Build) (BankRAM and POKEY) (20221020).bin

 

8.  JS7800 Build:

1942 (JS7800 Build) (20221005).a78

 

The above should cover all the publicly released builds.

[Giles N]

With so much work put into such efforts, I feel perhaps I shouldn’t have opinions on the following.

But I only air some loose thoughts here, and its only thinking out-loud.

And such thoughts aren’t even suggestions, more like my own likings or what could seem good to me … and I know very well that there may be ever-so-many factors I just never considered.

I open this post, so to make sure I’m not writing to offend, or that I feel entitlement to tell anyone anything.

But, as this game is brilliantly made - so good that, if produced in 1989 someone here should contact DataEast just have it released, and since its 2023 and the 7800 is a retro-console, it could perhaps be a conceivable idea to have a game made from this, which cannot be held to a direct port of 1942.

As the gaming-houses have officially competee against each other, creating almost-similar games, I guess there are more top-down shooters with P-38s out there from 1984 and up to IOS/Android ‘faux’-retro-games.

With a game implementing factors from a wide spectrum of such P-38 shooters, one could, using the engines/the build for this game - come up with something that could be its own 7800 ‘P-38’ vertical shooter with enough variety in it, to be a title that AtariAge could sell and produce without any problems of questions of ownership.

I don’t know if making such a second game out of this build would be all the world of work, - but work sure -, and if a handful of good ideas came up which easily could make it distinct using the main-categories of the build/engines, perhaps there could be a unique satisfaction to be had in the 7800 having its own P-38 shooter, just assimilating the best parts from others, include some simple new ones, and then for the 7800 to have a continous stream of high-quality unique homebrew-titles in the open.

I wonder how many other arcade-companies already made their own WW2 of P-38 vertical shooters? How similar many games are to each other anyway when it comes to certain genres that were set during the 80ies and 90ies…

Isn’t King of Dragons just Golden Axe++ in levels and characters while also being Golden Axe - as to attacks and game-mechanics.

 

—-

Now, if what I say here is just annoying/been discussed already on a thread I happened not to read, or just too much work, or no-one wants it, or  anyone other reason - as long as it causes more irritation than fun-time - feel free to just forget-it-all and enjoy the summer and some retro-gaming.

 

—-

But, heck, man - some show-off of coding and production skill…!!! As a purely nostalgic note of Atari-hardware-history etc, this is exactly the kind of stuff the 7800 should have been steeped in from 1986-1991.

 

 

[Silver Back]

I agree that this game is excellent and it would be great if they could make changes to throw on a cart.  However that has been addressed and especially given what's happened lately, it's not something I think we'll see anytime soon.  

 

This game was a gift from the developers who gave us something that plays and looks fantastic, sounds incredible (on the right hardware) and works on most flash carts to one degree or another.   

 

As much as I would enjoy seeing it available on cartridge, this is one game where I would count your blessings that it was made available and free to all.  The developer community on the 7800 has cut their teeth on some of the greatest ports I've seen, now I'd love to see what original games they can think of!

[Giles N]

13 hours ago, Silver Back said:

The developer community on the 7800 has cut their teeth on some of the greatest ports I've seen, now I'd love to see what original games they can think of!

Yeah - me too. 
I think the skill is out there now as to coding, music, sound etc.

Will be interesting to see if games having the professional build and full-on design of Crystal Quest and Rikki and Rikki and Vikki, will appear… 

 

[Greg2600]

Question....I tried the POKEY build on my Concerto (Pokey installed), and couple issues.  First, the title screen text is garbled a bit.  Second, got Game Over, and the music got stuck in a loop, and only power off stopped it.

[+x=usr(1536)]

3 hours ago, Greg2600 said:

First, the title screen text is garbled a bit.

Known Concerto issue; it'll be fixed in a future firmware revision.

3 hours ago, Greg2600 said:

Second, got Game Over, and the music got stuck in a loop, and only power off stopped it.

Weird - that's one i haven't seen.  Which version of the Concerto firmware are you running?

[Greg2600]

4 hours ago, x=usr(1536) said:

Known Concerto issue; it'll be fixed in a future firmware revision.

Weird - that's one i haven't seen.  Which version of the Concerto firmware are you running?

I was on 0.96 build 21523, then went to 30723, and back down to 30323 after reading about HOKEY changes that were removed.  Oops, meant to say I had a HOKEY not POKEY.  What I observe is that every time you die, the screen freezes and the music does as well, then it restarts the screen with wherever the game left off, and the music has restarted.  When you get Game Over, it sits there on the Continue screen but the last musical note is hanging.  If you do Continue, the music restarts.  However, if you choose EXIT, you're left with that last note hung still. 

[+x=usr(1536)]

1 hour ago, Greg2600 said:

Oops, meant to say I had a HOKEY not POKEY.

Ah.  Fair enough.  That one I have no idea about as I don't have anything with a HOKEY in it at this time.

[+playsoft]

On 7/2/2023 at 6:47 PM, Greg2600 said:

Question....I tried the POKEY build on my Concerto (Pokey installed), and couple issues.  First, the title screen text is garbled a bit.  Second, got Game Over, and the music got stuck in a loop, and only power off stopped it.

I think both of these issues are down to Concerto. I have a POKEY in mine and while I don't get notes stuck on game over I often get them during pause. Hopefully firmware updates/CEM#0 will fix them!

[NIKON]

is there a game manual for this game anywhere...specifically for the 7800 version

 

[Rick Dangerous]

Oh man...can't wait to pick up a cart release of this one! 

[+DrVenkman]

1 hour ago, Rick Dangerous said:

Oh man...can't wait to pick up a cart release of this one! 

From @playsofthimself over a year ago in this very thread:

 

Quote

No, it will just be a free ROM release.

 

[Rick Dangerous]

Oh man...pure bliss.  

 

There were some graphical glitches in the menu (Concerto, Small ROM with Pokey), but the game itself was flawless.  This needs to be an AA store full boxed release with manual.  It's literally one of the best games on 7800.