Beef Drop work in progress

[kenfused]

Creating a new thread with a better title. Changes for this version include a sound labotomy. Sound is now using TIA sound (Oh the horror!). Still may need some work yet though.

bd7800.zip

[CPUWIZ]

Sound is now using TIA sound (Oh the horror!).

 

[kenfused]

 

Don't worry too much yet, Pokey support can still be conditionally compiled in (I didn't blow it all away), so I may start building two versions.

[+Mitch]

TIA sound is definitely not up to Pokey standards but would probably be cheaper to make carts of. If you can make two versions, one with TIA sound and one with Pokey sound that would be great!

 

Mitch

[Mayhem]

Gimme Pokey or gimme death

 

Now, if Paul Slocum can work his magic doing a tune for it...

[Ferris]

if you could get paul and pokey together in on this thing i wouldnt mind paying the 50 bucks for it. this is going to be the first new 7800 title in years, i'd like to see it done right and have some real difference between this and your 5200 version. lookin great so far!

[Goochman]

You are the BD king kenfused - love the color and the score additions to the playfield (if only the 5200 version...... ) - Sound is tinny but good for TIA IMHO.

[Gregory DG]

Don't worry too much yet, Pokey support can still be conditionally compiled in (I didn't blow it all away), so I may start building two versions.

Hey, that makes me happy. I'm much too scared to install a Pokey in my CC2 for fear of damaging it (think Jerry Lewis with a soldering iron.)

 

Is there a way to have both? Maybe with a selectable option before the game starts?

[+-^CrossBow^-]

Yeap the TIA sound is pretty decent on this. Does this save any CPU cycles using TIA instead of the POKEY? I wouldn't know but if it does, I would assume this will help with the slowdown issue when too many enemy condiments are on the screen trying to get poor ole chef Pete.

 

On MESS the TIA will distort and almost sound like static on some notes, but overall it sounds better than the sound on the 2600 version if I am not mistaken?

 

I also am torn between whether the POKEY should be used or not. If there were a renewable source for POKEYs I would say use it instead. But I also don't want to see a ton of ball blazers get gutted for their Pokey chips.

 

I don't know how Ken can made the music selectable since the sound and such would have to be initialized before the game starts, so you couldn't really make it a user selectable option. Is there a way for the 7800 to read the difficulty switches as the BIOS boots up? If you could, it might be possible to select between POKEY and TIA that way. If you accidently put it to the POKEY setting and didn't have a POKEY for it to work from, then you wouldn't get sound. It is a tough call. I like the POKEY and the idea of it, but just don't like the idea of having to use a chip that isn't unlimited in supply to do it. Afterall, not all the 7800 homebrews can use a pokey, there aren't enough of them for that in the long run...

 

Still, if Paul could get involved I am sure that between he and Ken, they can create BD on the 7800 using a TIA and we might not even notice the POKEY missing...it sounds really good already.

 

Just a suggestion for the difficulty selection, and I am sure you already have something worked out. But you should set it up like the other 7800 games in that you simply move the joystick up or down to select difficulty and left or right to select number of players. Unless this remains a one player only game...

 

And the 7800 version needs to have a killer title screen. That was always my favorite thing about 7800 games, was the cool title screens. Rampage, Double Dragon, F-14, Desert Falcon, Ms. Pac-man...

 

The 7800 really can do some decent graphics when in the hands of the right programmer it appears...

[+Mitch]

For that matter, you could just have two version. Beef Drop with TIA sound and a limited version Beef Drop Deluxe with Pokey sound.

 

Mitch

[kenfused]

Yeap the TIA sound is pretty decent on this. Does this save any CPU cycles using TIA instead of the POKEY? I wouldn't know but if it does, I would assume this will help with the slowdown issue when too many enemy condiments are on the screen trying to get poor ole chef Pete.

Actually I have a delay in there, it is just a matter of getting the speed to be always consistant and varying with the number of objects. I actually added the TIA support such that TIA&POKEY could both be used in Pokey mode if I want to do that..it probably uses more cycles (and RAM) now.

But I also don't want to see a ton of ball blazers get gutted for their Pokey chips.

We need a passthru cart where you plug a ballblazer on top of cartridge for pokey sound, or RAM :-)

 

I don't know how Ken can made the music selectable since the sound and such would have to be initialized before the game starts, so you couldn't really make it a user selectable option. Is there a way for the 7800 to read the difficulty switches as the BIOS boots up? If you could, it might be possible to select between POKEY and TIA that way. If you accidently put it to the POKEY setting and didn't have a POKEY for it to work from, then you wouldn't get sound. It is a tough call. I like the POKEY and the idea of it, but just don't like the idea of having to use a chip that isn't unlimited in supply to do it. Afterall, not all the 7800 homebrews can use a pokey, there aren't enough of them for that in the long run...

I could make the sound selectable at run time, or maybe try to auto-detect a pokey. Dont know if the data bus gives a good solid value when nothing is connected where I could read POKEY's RANDOM register to detect it?

Just a suggestion for the difficulty selection, and I am sure you already have something worked out. But you should set it up like the other 7800 games in that you simply move the joystick up or down to select difficulty and left or right to select number of players. Unless this remains a one player only game...

One extra option I have been considering is two player simultaneous play. Maybe you could pepper or crush the other chef??

[Mayhem]

Had a chance to try this out on a real 7800 last night. Looking pretty good so far! TIA sound is okay, but Pokey is better by far. Just needs some graphical tweaks and dealing with the extra PAL lines and it should run okay on my 7800

[Bruce Tomlin]

I could make the sound selectable at run time, or maybe try to auto-detect a pokey.  Dont know if the data bus gives a good solid value when nothing is connected where I could read POKEY's RANDOM register to detect it?

I looked at the pokey detect code that was in my cartridge dumper, then at some pokey register docs. It seems I really didn't know what I was doing, and was probably looking mostly to see that it wasn't bus float, and that it wasn't just a $FF left behind in a RAM chip from a previous RAM detect. About the only interesting thing was that I was looking for a $F7 from $400E, which is the pokey interrupt status register.

 

Probably the best thing to do is to confirm that the RANDOM register is always changing. Since this is part of but not the complete shift register, there's always a chance that you'll read the same value twice in a row. So maybe you can do a loop of "LDA $400A / CMP $400A / BNE $+3 / INY" that runs 256 times and counts how many times the value is different. If it's more than 128 times (TYA/BMI), you probably have a pokey.

[Rob Mitchell]

I tried out BD earlier .. and today I got the BD (TIA) version going on my CC2. Initially I had no sound from the BD (POKEY). I thought I had a bad POKEY inside my CC2. After opening the CC2 I just reseated the chip and all is well again! BD (POKEY) sure sounds great! Neither version preserves the high score currently. Great achievement porting this from the 5200! Which game is next? Many thanks!

 

Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA

[kenfused]

Added:

High score survives new game.

 

select and start can be used to abort/restart a game.

 

Temporary boring placeholder title screen.

 

Demonstration mode.

 

Improved into and endgame music (I think). Note: make any sound like

using pepper or walking accross a piece will kill one of the voices though. Maybe intro music should take priority? On rare occasions the two voices seem to get slightly out of sync.

bd7800.zip

[SS]

I tried out BD earlier .. and today I got the BD (TIA) version going on my CC2.

 

What settings do I need to use to run the game on my CC2 (no POKEY installed)? I tried :

 

7800: Beef Drop (WIP) BD7800 7800_32K 78BIOS

 

I get the title screen but then only a black screen afterward.

 

Thanks,

SS

[kenfused]

I tried out BD earlier .. and today I got the BD (TIA) version going on my CC2.

 

What settings do I need to use to run the game on my CC2 (no POKEY installed)? I tried :

 

7800: Beef Drop (WIP) BD7800 7800_32K 78BIOS

 

I get the title screen but then only a black screen afterward.

 

Thanks,

SS

Goes blank when you press the button or Reset? Does it play the demo mode if you let it set? I have tried both 78BIOS and 78QUICK both with 7800_32K and have to problems but I am using the serial downloader vs. loading it onto the MMC card.

[SS]

Goes blank when you press the button or Reset?  Does it play the demo mode if you let it set?

 

Both. It is also going black when the game tries to go into demo mode.

[SS]

Just tried 78QUICK and it's still doing the same.

[+Mitch]

It loads OK, but the first game I tried, it wouldn't drop any of the burger parts. I tried resetting it a couple of times and it worked but one time it crashed to a black screen for me as well.

 

Mitch

[Mayhem]

Will see if I can try this tonight (very busy preparing for the weekend). If I get it to work, something screwy with the encryption. Not had a problem running either TIA or Pokey versions so far...

[PacManPlus]

I am using Mess 0.85, and everything seems to work ok (the demo mode, the title screen and the gameplay itself). Only two things I noticed:

 

1) It plays *very* fast (this was brought up before)

2) Collision detection is very strict (One of the hotdogs barely touched my foot and I died)

 

Kenfused, you do awesome work!

 

Any chance of your next project creating a standard Pac-Man from the existing Ms. Pac on the 7800?

[Rob Mitchell]

Just tried the latest version on my CC2.

 

The intro screen loads properly .. looks like little burgers! The O in DROP has an extra burger in the upper right.

 

If left alone after about 30 sec .. it goes into demo mode .. but the playfield is distorted into the left 1/2 of the screen .. and all the graphics are messed up.. Messed up sprites move across the top of the screen.

 

Pressing Select brings up the intro again .. but it is compressed into the left 1/2 screen

 

Pressing Start brings up the game again distorted as above.

 

Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, Ga

[Goochman]

In MESS it ran fast and the collision detection was picky - I think an older version of the 5200 one had this problem also.

[Mayhem]

Results of the PAL jury on the latest build:

 

Level 1 plays fine. Can complete that okay.

Level 2 plays fine until the coffee cup appears. Then at some point shortly afterwards, the music speeds up but the gameplay stays the same speed.

Level 3 starts with fast music and at some point the graphics glitch totally.

 

Maybe there's a leak somewhere causing the gradual downfall of the game heh...

 

But it's pretty much there appearance wise apart from tweaking colours for the PAL palette and eliminating a bit of crap at the bottom from having more scanlines.