Low Memory Loading Woes

[Cheung]

1 hour ago, Retrospect said:

Hey @Cheung I've downloaded the binary image of Warlords of the Rings and later on I'm gonna be having a play with it
 

During my coding break I'll be doing a lot more playing.  I'll let ya know how I get on with it.  The graphics look awesome.  

I'm working on my Star Wars shooter now and it is being a pain. I was trying to get the first stage to have an asteroid field where you avoid or shoot the asteroids, when large asteroids are shot, they break off into two smaller ones which can then be destroyed.

Needless to say this is asking too much of the TI, if you want to have any where near a decent number (5 large or up to 10 total) of asteroids on screen (too many collisions to detect) and want to be able to have two shots on screen at a time.

  So I have to rethink my goals for this level. Probably making all asteroids single shot kill, and keeping them in Vertical lanes, therefore reducing the number of collision detections needed.

   Let me know if you have any tips.

Edited February 27, 2023 by Cheung

[retrodroid]

2 hours ago, Cheung said:

I'm working on my Star Wars shooter now and it is being a pain. I was trying to get the first stage to have an asteroid field where you avoid or shoot the asteroids, when large asteroids are shot, they break off into two smaller ones which can then be destroyed.

Needless to say this is asking too much of the TI, if you want to have any where near a decent number (5 large or up to 10 total) of asteroids on screen (too many collisions to detect) and want to be able to have two shots on screen at a time.

  So I have to rethink my goals for this level. Probably making all asteroids single shot kill, and keeping them in Vertical lanes, therefore reducing the number of collision detections needed.

   Let me know if you have any tips.

Making the leap to pure Assembly Language was a complete game-changer for my project. So many more things become possible on the TI in AL. Maybe it's time for a change?

 

[Cheung]

1 hour ago, retrodroid said:

Making the leap to pure Assembly Language was a complete game-changer for my project. So many more things become possible on the TI in AL. Maybe it's time for a change?

 

What's the best book on TI assembly programming? One geared towards games would be preferable if it exists.

[+TheBF]

1 hour ago, retrodroid said:

Making the leap to pure Assembly Language was a complete game-changer for my project. So many more things become possible on the TI in AL. Maybe it's time for a change?

 

OR... If you want a change that includes an Assembler, multi-tasking and lets you keep an interpreter there is always the "F" word language.

(sorry, I couldn't resist)

[+OLD CS1]

6 minutes ago, TheBF said:

there is always the "F" word language.

Not in polite company, mister!

[Retrospect]

5 hours ago, Cheung said:

Let me know if you have any tips.

If there's lots of sprites it's pretty hard to register a hit really.  The game would have to running quite steady in order to register both sprite collisions with player missile, and detect and sprites that leaving the screen's edges (if that's an issue, really with asteroids/meteors we could allow those to wrap?)

[retrodroid]

2 hours ago, Cheung said:

What's the best book on TI assembly programming? One geared towards games would be preferable if it exists.

I'm sure others with more experience on the matter will have suggestions, this is the one I've used:

 

 

Plus the examples in the first 10 pages or so of the 

...thread. 

 

I've also found these webpages very handy and informative:

 

https://www.unige.ch/medecine/nouspikel/ti99/architec.htm

https://www.unige.ch/medecine/nouspikel/ti99/assembly.htm

 

 

[Retrospect]

@Cheung I played Warlords, great game.  I won the round which is surprising as I kept hitting the ball backwards into my own space lol

The title screen is very impressive too.

[Cheung]

10 hours ago, Retrospect said:

@Cheung I played Warlords, great game.  I won the round which is surprising as I kept hitting the ball backwards into my own space lol

The title screen is very impressive too.

Thanks, I was thinking about updating it to give it an elimination option, so that after you defeat the first round of opponents, you go on to the next round until you've defeated them all.

Edited February 28, 2023 by Cheung

[Cheung]

17 hours ago, Retrospect said:

If there's lots of sprites it's pretty hard to register a hit really.  The game would have to running quite steady in order to register both sprite collisions with player missile, and detect and sprites that leaving the screen's edges (if that's an issue, really with asteroids/meteors we could allow those to wrap?)

Yeah, I decided to let them wrap. They get a delayed return if you destroy them and their speed and size is random. I call

 

CALL COINC(ALL,R)

 

Once during the game loop and if it returns a hit, I then do 

 

CALL COINC(#LANE,#LASER,20,R)

 

For the two lasers and then finally 

 

CALL COINC(#LANE,#SHIP,20,R)

 

The lane is determined by the X position of the ship and lasers.

 

This was a lot faster than checking for the ALL COINC and cycling through all the asteroids against the two lasers and one ship.

 

I also skip the CALL COINC if that LANE's asteroid isn't alive.

 

This helped a lot, but still not quite where I want it. Might have to go down to a single laser...or cut down on the animations.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 28, 2023 by Cheung

[Retrospect]

8 hours ago, Cheung said:

This was a lot faster than checking for the ALL COINC and cycling through all the asteroids against the two lasers and one ship.

100 percent correct.  I did a similar approach in one of my games / experiments where it called an initial COINC(ALL) and THEN and only then, checked a quick loop to see which sprite had hit.

[Retrospect]

8 hours ago, Cheung said:

I also skip the CALL COINC if that LANE's asteroid isn't alive.

Another good method.