C64 :: Sidetracked... again!

i'm rather good at sidetracking myself these days... i spent most of the day working on graphics but not for Ax 2189... and, after a little late night wandering around i returned invigorated (well, partially awake at least and that's better going than most days) and for reasons i might never be able to explain decided to convert the code for my first PET game Blok Copy to run on the C64. Actually, i can explain the reasoning... i think. i wanted to strip the code back to it's absolute basics (there were a lot of PET-specific hardware detections and work-arounds for frame sync or control in there because it runs on just about any 40 column machine) with the intention being to then convert it over to a number of other 6502-based platforms.

This has been on the cards for a while to be honest (and one day i'll retrofit the new title into the Atari 2600 version of the code and perhaps the music driver too) but there were issues that had previously prevented things from progressing from the theoretical stages (in particular the number of colours per line on some of the potential targets) which have now been pretty much sussed during that walk to Asda and back... i haven't decided yet if Blok Copy - C64 ROM Font Edition (snappy title... but accurate since it uses all the PET screen data) will "escape" yet, it depends on if the design work-arounds i came up with can be applied to a full-blown C64 version or not really.

C64 :: Some progress at last!

Things have been a little quiet of late because, despite my "best" efforts, i've been utterly unable to get a fourth level for Co-Axis 2189 started; finally that deadlock was broken today and i seem to have the beginnings of a tile set for it although if i'm honest i've deviated a little from what i originally intended - but that's fine because the various attempts at what i had in mind to begin with were stalling the bloody project! So now i've got that going there will hopefully be some screenshots of the new level to look at in the (relatively) near future [Crosses fingers and looks hopeful!

C64 :: Armour Storm video

Since i'm going to try breaking the "block" and start working on Co-Axis 2189 again, my thoughts have of course drifted to the next project; ironically, it's going to see me restarting work on a previous project, a sci-fi themed platformer called Armour Storm. What makes it rather special is the graphics, the majority are taken from Cyberdyne Systems' unreleased game Deadlock with full permission from Robin Levy and Dan Phillips themselves - what is far more exciting (well, for me at least) is that Robin also drew the player sprite especially for Armour Storm!



What has been holding it up (for several years in fact, the last build was in 2005 according to the change log i kept at the start of the source code) was the issue of guns; i had always planned to allow Martin (the player's walker droid... Martin Walker, get it? Please y'selves...) but at the same time it does have some quite complex issues such as what happens to shot nasties, do they respawn and how or just frozen or how often should there be guns in operation. That needs a fair bit of thought, discussion and indeed experimentation before its worked out and hopefully i'll be able to find a little more time now.

But anyway, enjoy the video because those graphics are pretty friggin' stunning...

PC :: Wire Fighter released

Although the Bullet Mechanics website hasn't been updated to reflect it yet (that'll happen on Wednesday) yesterday saw the release of the now christened Wire Fighter over on the ShmupDev forums.

The game itself is quite simple to get into, the player has two energy bars for the ship itself and the "laser wire" grappling system (above and below the score respectively); along with the ship, there is also the laser wire's cursor, when the system is charged, it will lock onto attackers (the usually red cursor will turn green if there is power for it or orange if not) and a swift right click will take control of the enemy and see it tethered to the ship as a support weapon. It is possible to play the game without using the laser wire but it's difficult and the best scores will be achieved by constantly grappling new support craft.

PC :: Grappling with spaceships

The new rapid prototype has been receiving a little care and attention yesterday and as far as the code is concerned it's pretty much complete now; i want to spend some time getting the graphics and sound up to spec, there need to be attack waves created and probably couple more nasty types and at this point i haven't actually settled on a [i]name[/i] but the progress is good and i'm happy with the way it feels to play so hopefully it'll be well received on the ShmupDev forum when i'm done.

PC :: More rapid prototyping

i haven't actually given the thing a name yet and it didn't end up using the OpenGL rendering code i was talking about previously... but after a day and a bit of slaving away i've got something together for the fourth ShmupDev competition! The idea is quite simple, the player has the option to lock onto attackers and take over their ships, slaving the craft itself and the weapons for their own use. There are some restrictions placed on the use of course (otherwise it'd be way too easy) such as the enslaved craft not moving as fast as they would otherwise and the bullets taking between two and eight hits to destroy attackers depending on the weapon grabbed, but generally it works pretty well.

All it really needs to "complete" it for the competition is some movement code for the nasties, a bigger selection of attackers with their own weapons that can be taken control of, a proper attack wave initialisation system (it's currently just slinging nasties in at random once every sixty or so refreshes) and then some pretties like a title page, a few more sprite designs, sound effects and so forth.

PC :: Shiny, happy spaceships

i've had a weekend of getting my head around the basics behind OpenGL; my programming language of choice, the rather spiffy Blitz Max, is essentially a 2D language (which was one of the main reasons i leant towards it in the first place, having previously used Blitz BASIC 2D to the point i was trying to simulate some of the more rudimentary lighting effects that Max can handle by rendering objects manually) but there is support included for rendering with OpenGL and, theoretically at least, that means i could build a 2.5D shooter of some kind. So far i've managed to position, plot, scale and rotate some vertexes and then some low poly shapes, although i suspect that a lot of my code so far is somewhat fudged...

As to what i'll actually do with this test code i haven't decided yet, but the idea of stylised, untextured shoot 'em up is rather appealing right now and, assuming the theme doesn't preclude it in some way, might be my "look" for the next ShmupDev rapid prototyping session since i really enjoyed the last one and the next one starts on Monday. Certainly one of my thrown together test objects will look quite good tumbling onto screen, disgorging some bullets and then spinning away again (or being blown to smithereens - that does raise a question of how to blow up a 3D object but i've just had a thought as i was writing this so i'll have to give that a little more consideration) and with a bit of modification will make the basis for a nice player ship as well. Strapping the Alien Release Scheduling Engine into this environment should prove quite... interesting though, the co-ordinates are based on 0,0 (thinking in two dimensions and ignoring Z) being the centre of the play area!