RealSports RACING

[toymailman]

Hi everybody! I have been a long time reader and this is my first post. I got back into collecting Atari 2600 in April (or so) and was pleased to see such a huge following alive in the on-line community.

 

I am an Electrical Engineer and have had some programming experience. As I played some of my favorite games again I began to wonder if I could create such things. After reading some of the great tutorials people have made I thought it might be possible. After a while, I was able to draw stuff on the screen (using Stella emulator), but actually coding a game, whew. It feels like an enormous leap from where I am currently at.

 

I see a HUGE learning curve to realize my goal, so I thought if I really thought my idea had merit I would ask all of you here; the experts! Mainly, I am wondering if someone here might like to take this project on who has already reached the top of the learning curve and could do an infinitely better job than me. I have read the “idea peddlers” topic and agree with it. Therefore, I have put a lot of work into this proposal and hope someone will take it on.

 

My idea is for a RealSports RACING game. I don't think it would be a "hack" of INDY 500 and that is why I am bringing it up in this forum rather than the hack forum. I think the graphics may have to be similar (??), but probably everything else would be redone from scratch. I think this fills a hole in the RealSports line up as a revised/enhanced racing game was not developed along with Football, Soccer, Tennis, etc.

 

I have a full write-up attached below with some worked up screen shots. I have tried to flesh out the ideas as best I can to see if people here think this project is worthwhile. A small listing of some basic enhancements are the following.

1) 4-player competition by use of paddle controllers

2) Lap Times and Race Results screen

3) Pit Stops / Refueling

4) Long races

5) Different tracks

6) Night driving

 

Full write-up (have a prettier version in Word, but could only post txt files)

RealSports_RACING.txt

 

Some example screen shots are next.

Original INDY 500 track

Same track in RealSports RACING

Race Results Screen

New Possible Track

New Possible Track (with better car and track graphics)

NewTrack_Better.bmp

 

Player #1 (P1) is supposed to be a light green color, but it looks more blue here for some reason.

 

If people feel this is more of a hack than a homebrew then please feel free to move this topic on over where it belongs. Let me know what you think, and thanks to everyone here for keeping the 2600 going!

[+batari]

I do agree that a new version if Indy 500 should be written. One reason is because of Indy 500 XE (I think it was called) wasn't ever released due to copyright issues, and a new version written from scratch would allow all of those new tracks to be released once and for all. Also, the 2600 is sorely lacking in racing titles anyway. Moreover, a new version could also likely use an asymmetric playfield, giving rise to many new tracks that were not possible by simply hacking Indy 500.

 

One thing you should remember about paddles is that they take valuable kernel time to read, and this limits what you can put on the screen. Also, the text you have shown isn't possible without massive flicker and probably lots of ROM and RAM space, and 4 cars also aren't possible without flicker. I think that the joystick and/or driving controller is still a much better choice than paddles for this kind of game.

 

Still, I think it's unlikely that someone will take on your idea. You will probably need to learn to program the 2600 yourself. You can start with batari Basic if assembly is overwhelming at first. That said, I released an Indy 500 demo some time ago in bB - posted here w/source. Difficulty switches control speed of car and track (ice or pavement) and color/BW selects controller (joystick or driving controller.) It certainly needs a lot of work to be turned into a playable game. If you want, you can use this as a start or for ideas.

bBi500.zip

[toymailman]

Thank you very much for the reply batari. That was exactly the kind of input I needed from someone of your knowledge and experience. At least now I can save myself several months (years?) of learning/coding and not pursue the project as described.

 

What parts of my ideas do you think are possible? I could live without 4-player action barely, but if that was stricken do you think the rest could be implemented? (Items 2-6 in the original post) If not all, how many?

 

I agree that the racing genre is not well represented on the 2600. It is one of my favorite as well and so far on the 2600 Indy 500 is still tops for me.

 

I also wish that the XE project was completed. As I put in the more detailed write-up, the track designs would be a great part of RealSports RACING. Thank you for any and all feedback.

[jpfalcon2003]

What about Super Racing, as in reference to Super Football and baseball. Sprintmaster was a decent game that came out in 1988 that was similar, wasn't it?

[Thomas Jentzsch]

Sprintmaster was a decent game that came out in 1988 that was similar, wasn't it?

Yes, Sprintmaster seems very close to the idea already. And with the driving controller hack, you are about as close as possible.

[+batari]

Sprintmaster was a decent game that came out in 1988 that was similar, wasn't it?

Yes, Sprintmaster seems very close to the idea already. And with the driving controller hack, you are about as close as possible.

Except that the physics/handling in that game leave a lot to be desired. If nothing else, hacking in some more realistic physics would be a good improvement.

[toymailman]

I think you guys are right. I just plugged in my sprintmaster game and played it a bit. Hacking this game would be a lot closer to what I am after. Changes I would make would be the following.

 

1) Modify the handling (like batari said). Personally, I liked the feel of INDY 500 a little better.

2) Remove the power-ups, speed boosters and so forth on the track. (I don't remember things like this on the track for the last F1 race I watched )

3) Add the pit stops / refueling idea

4) If a 4-player game is impossible, then by using the joystick controllers a manual transmission could be implemented. Up/down could be shift-up/down. This could be selected with difficulty switches. The automatic transmission would be slower shifting (acceleration/deceleration), but of course easier to use.

 

Sprintmaster does already have quite a few track designs and driving surfaces to choose from. The number of laps can be set at the start and it does have timing implemented (although not individual lap times only total race time). Also, no race results screen, but this is probably not needed for only a 2-player game. The ROM looks like it is 16K, 8 times the size of INDY 500.

 

Hacking this game looks like the best option now. Thank you all very much.

 

I guess I also could just play my TOCA Race Driver or GTR games on the PC, but why would anyone want to play PC games when they have a perfectly good Atari 2600!

[Thomas Jentzsch]

Except that the physics/handling in that game leave a lot to be desired. If nothing else, hacking in some more realistic physics would be a good improvement.

After spending some time with the game again, I have to agree. The physics are really lame.

 

There is no (varying) friction, no inertia at all. Instead the different surfaces just influence how fast the game responses to the steering. And the result is very unsatisfying.

[Cybergoth]

I think a "RealSports Racing" game would probably best be some hot splitscreen racer like Pitstop 2 or similar

[HammR25]

I guess I also could just play my TOCA Race Driver or GTR games on the PC, but why would anyone want to play PC games when they have a perfectly good Atari 2600!

 

GTR certainly is a wee bit more complicated than 2600 racing games.

[toymailman]

Hi all, sorry to bring back this idea again. However, I played my Atari 800 recently and forgot that it has 4 joystick ports. Would a 4-player Indy 500 game be possible on this system? You could actually use 4 driving controllers then. Graphics could be updated, and some of my other thoughts could probably make it in the game as well.

 

That would be too cool!