DEBRO Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 I remember having this game back in the '80s. I loved it and I'd play it constantly. Now some 20+ years later I plugged the ROM into my favorite 2600 emulator (Z26Win) and it gives he the biggest headache! All of the flicker drives me crazy. I never noticed that the main player sprite flickered too. If you couldn't play Pac-man you probably couldn't play Frogger either. BTW, I'm talking about the Parker Bros. version and not the Supercharger version. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
adams_ale Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 I don't notice any flicker with Frogger himself. There is flicker with the logs and the frogs up at the top. I'm playing the cartridge format and not the emulator. Frogger has good intro music and nice graphics. IMHO Frogger is far above comparison to the original Atari Pac Man. Though as a kid I didn't have many qualms with the Atari Pac Man. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NE146 Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 Oooh! Frogger! One of my all time 2600 favorites A great translation however you slice it. However.. flicker? I only know of flicker when the frog goes on the same line as the snake or the lady frog for example.. But my memory might be fading. Or perhaps the emulator just recreates the flicker a bit more annoyingly than say a tv would? Now you made me want to try this game again.. it's been a couple of years oddly enough Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bivotar Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 I like how the default game variation (1) lets your Frogger wrap off the screen without dying! Makes it a lot simpler. Freaks me out though when I switch back to the arcade version and try to go off the screen on a log. I never was bothered with the flicker. I thought it was very playable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DEBRO Posted June 9, 2004 Author Share Posted June 9, 2004 However.. flicker? I only know of flicker when the frog goes on the same line as the snake or the lady frog for example.. But my memory might be fading. I was the same way. That's how I remembered it too. If you run it in the emulator you can see it better. It might not have been noticable then because of the black background of the road or something. Run your frog in the same line as a car and you'll see them flickering. I haven't spent a lot of time in the code yet but it looks as if Ed is using both sprites in the kernel. But if that's the case then why do we have flicker Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oesii Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 I've played it recently and a few logs and such flicker but nothing that bothers me at all. I think since your frog doesn't flicker it's not that annoying. You modern homebrewers are a spoiled bunch these days and I'm glad because your games are better for it Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tempest Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 Try the Supercharger version of Frogger. It's so much better... Tempest Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 Due to the phosphoric effect flicker is much less obvious on TVs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ATARIPITBULL Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 Frogger is also on my top 10 list of all time Atari games. I also have the Supercharger game, but its still sealed and I have never played it yet! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bjk7382 Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 I always prefered the supercharger frogger to the parker brothers one. But even the superior SC frogger has flicker in it (although a lot less than the PB version) I am sure some homebrewer could come up with a frogger with no flicker. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DEBRO Posted June 9, 2004 Author Share Posted June 9, 2004 Run your frog in the same line as a car and you'll see them flickering. I haven't spent a lot of time in the code yet but it looks as if Ed is using both sprites in the kernel. But if that's the case then why do we have flicker I think I see why he's doing the flicker for the cars now. There is a point where the cars aren't spaced evenly. Using 2 sprites for this would save him the headache of knowing when to hit RESPx I guess. Then again if the frog didn't flicker he could position him outside the kernel and had more time in the kernel to do the positioning. Either way it is still a good game. I just won't be able to play it via emulataion. You modern homebrewers are a spoiled bunch these days and I'm glad because your games are better for it The other thing I have to remember is I don't think Ed English came from the same Atari pool of programmers like the Activision and Imagic guys. So his coding style and technique will be a little different. For example, look at a lot of recent homebrew source files and you can probably tell we share ideas, coding style, and techniques. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DEBRO Posted June 9, 2004 Author Share Posted June 9, 2004 I am sure some homebrewer could come up with a frogger with no flicker. Maybe less flicker. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NE146 Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 I dunno.. I still prefer PB Frogger to the Starpath version. The Starpath version is awesome.. but maybe it's because I don't have nostalgia for it that I tend to lean towards the quirky unique feel of PB frogger. (as opposed to of course, the arcade version) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HawgWyld Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 I absolutely love Parker Brothers' "Frogger." Too much flicker? Sure, there's some, but not enough to be really troublesome. Perhaps, as others have stated, it has something to do with playing it on an emulator. Give up the emulator, man! It's just not the same as the real thing Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Osbo Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 Frogger is also on my top 10 list of all time Atari games. I also have the Supercharger game' date=' but its still sealed and I have never played it yet! [/quote'] You know, a while ago I was looking for the star path frogger, and I found a .wav file that u can burn into a cd and play the game with the supercharger ... just to let u know Osbo Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NovaXpress Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 Both 2600 versions of Frogger were fantastic achievements. You can't bitch about a little flicker in a 2600 game, that's just part of the deal. Ed English astonished everyone with his version, it went beyond what anyone expected from the 2600. The music in particular was unprecedented. The Starpath version was even better, as expected. But Parker had their cart out first. Did the Starpath programmers have time to tear apart English's code and build prettier graphics upon it? The 2600 version of Frogger II is my favorite. That Coleco edition is really miserable. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big Player Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 The Starpath version was even better' date=' as expected. But Parker had their cart out first. Did the Starpath programmers have time to tear apart English's code and build prettier graphics upon it?[/quote'] I would guess they coded from scratch, since you can do a hell of a lot with screen displays on the 2600 if you have 6k of RAM. The Starpath Frogger looks like it's on a completely different system. Amazing. Maybe Clonespy can tell if they shared any code at all, though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NovaXpress Posted June 9, 2004 Share Posted June 9, 2004 Yeah, they probably don't shar code. But it's always harder being the first one to crack a new type of game. We saw how much the dot-eaters improved over time. When were the two Froggers released? I remember that the Parker edition hit the shelves a month or two after Empire Strikes Back, which appeared in the summer of 82. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tsukasa Posted June 10, 2004 Share Posted June 10, 2004 The PB version of frogger doesn't even have flicker, compared to Pac Man. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MK ATARI Posted June 10, 2004 Share Posted June 10, 2004 The PB version of frogger doesn't even have flicker' date=' compared to Pac Man. [/quote'] Just thinking of those ghosts gives me a headache. MK Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
atari_wizard Posted June 10, 2004 Share Posted June 10, 2004 great game. one of the best ever. the flicker doesn't bother me, nor have i noticed it yet. i've yet to try it on the emulator, cuz i have the cart. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MK ATARI Posted June 10, 2004 Share Posted June 10, 2004 yet to try it on the emulator' date=' cuz i have the cart. [/quote'] Me too. I just hooked up my new Atari 2600 last night and that was the first game I played. MK Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tsukasa Posted June 10, 2004 Share Posted June 10, 2004 I guess the flicker doesn't bother me as much because I'm still young. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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