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Superbug


batari

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I am working on an adaption of the obscure 1977 Kee/Atari game Super Bug. Not a direct port - in the original game you just drove until time ran out. I plan to add some features, like powerups, obstacles and maybe a multiplayer option.

 

Right now I am using the car sprite from Indy 500. This will be replaced by a VW bug sprite eventually.

 

Right now this a playable demo. A little buggy but it works mostly. If you try it, I recommend messing with the console switches:

 

Left difficulty: A=ice, B=asphalt

Right difficulty: A=fast car, B=slow car

COLOR/BW: BW=driving controller, COLOR=joystick

 

I recommend both switches on 'A' then try to keep the car on the road!

 

This is the current track (created with Windows Paintbrush):

post-5792-1139990483.png

 

There will be several tracks in the game. Also, the way I set it up, the track is 128x128 graphic saved as a monochrome .bmp file, then I manually stripped off the headers. Eventually I might include a program to allow you to insert your own tracks into the binary.

superbug.bin

 

EDIT: Nathan Strum designed a nifty VW Bug sprite for the game... updated binary below.

superbug2.bin

Edited by batari
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I am working on an adaption of the obscure 1977 Kee/Atari game Super Bug.  Not a direct port - in the original game you just drove until time ran out.  I plan to add some features, like powerups, obstacles and maybe a multiplayer option.

 

Right now I am using the car sprite from Indy 500.  This will be replaced by a VW bug sprite eventually.

 

Right now this a playable demo.  A little buggy but it works mostly.  If you try it, I recommend messing with the console switches:

 

Left difficulty: A=ice, B=asphalt

Right difficulty: A=fast car, B=slow car

COLOR/BW: BW=driving controller, COLOR=joystick

 

I recommend both switches on 'A' then try to keep the car on the road!

 

This is the current track (created with Windows Paintbrush):

post-5792-1139990483.png

 

There will be several tracks in the game.  Also, the way I set it up, the track is 128x128 graphic saved as a monochrome .bmp file, then I manually stripped off the headers.  Eventually I might include a program to allow you to insert your own tracks into the binary.

1018686[/snapback]

 

 

WOW its just like the arcade game that I played at Coney island's arcade place :D If this was in Black & White then it will be a great old arcade port :cool:

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Eventually I might include a program to allow you to insert your own tracks into the binary.

 

That would be very cool. I could imagine spending hours coming up with all sorts of different tracks, and trying them out.

 

I wonder (not having any technical knowledge whatsoever...) if there would be a way to load tracks in via either the AtariVox or a memcard? So if you bought a Superbug cart from AA, you could load custom tracks onto a real 2600 without a Kroko Cart. :ponder:

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I wonder (not having any technical knowledge whatsoever...) if there would be a way to load tracks in via either the AtariVox or a memcard? So if you bought a Superbug cart from AA, you could load custom tracks onto a real 2600 without a Kroko Cart. :ponder:

1020028[/snapback]

As the game is right now, it never needs to access more than 15 bytes of track data per frame. Or with additional processing (and wasteful data storage) as little as 6 bytes per frame may be possible. I admit that I haven't played with the memcard yet so I don't know how fast you can get data from it.

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I admit that I haven't played with the memcard yet so I don't know how fast you can get data from it.

1020075[/snapback]

 

If I recall correctly, Strat-O-Gems does a maximum of five bytes' worth of transactions per half-frame. A write operation counts as four transactions plus the number of bytes written; a read counts as six plus the number of bytes read. Since bB doesn't divide non-kernel time into half-frames, you'd probably be limited to around five or six sequential bytes per frame, with a one-frame penalty for random access.

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Since bB doesn't divide non-kernel time into half-frames,

It can now. I recently added the ability to put code into vblank as well as overscan. I did so just for this game, as all that scrolling took too much time.

you'd probably be limited to around five or six sequential bytes per frame, with a one-frame penalty for random access.

1020115[/snapback]

Random access would be required regularly. Does this in itself make memcard use impossible?

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Random access would be required regularly.  Does this in itself make memcard use impossible?

1020121[/snapback]

 

It would probably necessitate having two copies of the data in the memcard, one row-oriented and one column-oriented. If each bit of data represents two playfield pixels horizontally (so as to produce less non-square pixels than if it only represented one) and the player can move at a maximum speed of two horizontal pixels and/or two double vertical pixels per frame, then your worst-case time would be having to pull up five bytes worth of horizontal data and three bytes worth of vertical data every fourth frame, i.e. four frames' worth of accessing, every fourth frame.

 

If you can take care of the scrolling during the overscan, and if you don't have too many gameplay-related computations to do, I would think the necessary accesses would be feasible.

 

If you needed to make things a little more time-efficient, you could "pair" the rows and columns. If you did this, you would need six bytes of vertical data and ten bytes of horizontal data, every eighth frame. So you'd have eight frames to grab data that would take six frames to fetch.

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Wow! I can't wait to play this game! All the arcade driving games of 1976-77 made me want the Indy 500 cart so badly!

 

Just realized a problem with my CC2 on the 7800. The pause button will not allow me to play with the driving controller! :|

 

Would you consider flipping the settings on the Color / BW switch?

 

Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA

Edited by Rob Mitchell
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  • 2 months later...
Just realized a problem with my CC2 on the 7800. The pause button will not allow me to play with the driving controller! :| Would you consider flipping the settings on the Color / BW switch?

 

I just tried your updated version for the 7800 which allows for the select of the driving controller with the right difficulty switch. Works great on the CC2/7800! I was using the driving controller!

 

Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA

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Just realized a problem with my CC2 on the 7800. The pause button will not allow me to play with the driving controller! :| Would you consider flipping the settings on the Color / BW switch?

 

I just tried your updated version for the 7800 which allows for the select of the driving controller with the right difficulty switch. Works great on the CC2/7800! I was using the driving controller!

 

Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA

:cool: Good to know it works... I've yet to test it myself.

 

BTW, for others, you can get the latest version here.

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  • 4 years later...

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