176 replies to this topic

[atari2600land]

Nothing much, just fixed the demo so it works the way I want it to again.

Attached Files

•  2600tris_020110.bas.bin   32K   79 downloads
•  2600tris_020110.bas   35.38K   62 downloads

[atari2600land]

major update: I've added a B-Type to the game. For those who don't know, B-Type is where you can freely set the level and the height of garbage blocks and the goal is to complete 25 lines. B-Type is one player only and you press the select switch until one joystick appears with a playfield pixel on the left side. Once pressing fire, you can then select level (speed) and height, and then try to get 25 lines.

Attached Files

•  2600tris_020210.bas.bin   32K   71 downloads
•  2600tris_020210.bas   39.5K   59 downloads

[atari2600land]

Fixed the bug having to do with levels with the B-Type.
EDIT: Fixed another bug having to do with B-Type. All bugs should be fixed now (hopefully.)

Attached Files

•  2600tris_020210.bas   39.62K   63 downloads
•  2600tris_020210.bas.bin   32K   80 downloads

Edited by atari2600land, Wed Feb 3, 2010 3:25 AM.

[atari2600land]

This version moves much more smoothly as the blocks fall down. I discovered I had enough cycles to make the block not blink so much. I also discovered that sometimes the title screen displays a red 0 when I put in "set debug cyclescore" in, so if anyone can test this on real hardware, pay special attention to the title screen and see if it rolls or acts weird.

Attached Files

•  2600tris_020410.bas.bin   32K   79 downloads
•  2600tris_020410.bas   39.62K   62 downloads

Edited by atari2600land, Thu Feb 4, 2010 6:36 AM.

[Devin]

atari2600land, on Thu Feb 4, 2010 6:07 AM, said:

This version moves much more smoothly as the blocks fall down. I discovered I had enough cycles to make the block not blink so much. I also discovered that sometimes the title screen displays a red 0 when I put in "set debug cyclescore" in, so if anyone can test this on real hardware, pay special attention to the title screen and see if it rolls or acts weird.

Really exceptional work. The animation is smooth now - which makes the game even more enjoyable! I like the Tetris music as well. Is there anyway to make it play by default?

[atari2600land]

About the music: I guess I could change it so B turns it on and A turns it off. After posting this, I noticed a few bugs having to do with the shapes getting stuck in the walls. I fixed those and will release a new version later tonight.

[atari2600land]

Here's the latest binary. Any changes I should make?

Attached Files

•  2600tris_020510.bas.bin   32K   86 downloads
•  2600tris_020510.bas   40.14K   67 downloads

[seanhq]

atari2600land, on Thu Feb 4, 2010 9:30 PM, said:

Here's the latest binary. Any changes I should make?

When the game is over, the music hangs on the "Game Over" screen. This is coming along nicely. Great work.

[atari2600land]

seanhq, on Thu Feb 4, 2010 9:38 PM, said:

atari2600land, on Thu Feb 4, 2010 9:30 PM, said:

Here's the latest binary. Any changes I should make?

When the game is over, the music hangs on the "Game Over" screen.

Fixed. thanks for reporting. Any other bugs to report or changes i should make?

Attached Files

•  2600tris_020510a.bas.bin   32K   77 downloads
•  2600tris_020510a.bas   40.22K   69 downloads

[Albert]

atari2600land, on Fri Feb 5, 2010 12:08 AM, said:

Fixed. thanks for reporting. Any other bugs to report or changes i should make?

I haven't checked this out since my last post in this thread where I made some comments (many of which you appear to have addressed). Will check out this latest version and report back here once I've done so.

..Al

[atari2600land]

Was test-playing this and kept finding a bug which made the game freeze sometimes if you're on level 9. So I just removed level 9 altogether. Now if you get 80 blocks, that's the fastest speed there is. And it's still pretty hard on that speed (at least for me.)

Attached Files

•  2600tris_020610.bas.bin   32K   123 downloads
•  2600tris_020610.bas   40.4K   66 downloads

[tetrode kink]

I'm not the biggest fan of Tetris (probably because I suck at it) but your implementation for the 2600 is nice. I luuuv the ploddy title music!

If it's not too late, a few suggestions:

• I was going to suggest changing the name to "VCStris" because it rolls off the tongue so much better, but now that I've seen your title screen, "2600tris" makes sense visually. Although you could do something similar with "VCStris," such as have some letters two "pieces" high, i.e. first the bottom piece of a letter falls, then the top piece lands on top of it.
  
  
• About the title screen, the color combination between the blocks and background kind of drives my eyes buggy, but that could just be me. It just looks like you picked two different colors with the same luma level and sometimes that can get a little funky on-screen. It could also be I'm playing it on my computer, maybe it looks better on Hardware. Maybe you could do a brighter blue for the blocks and a slightly darker red for background (don't want to lose those joysticks in the dark!)? At least brighten the blocks. This would tend to enhance the objects over the background, which is always sound graphics practice.
  
  
• I know someone suggested lowering the volume of the sound effects, but now they get lost behind the music if you've chosen to have music in-game. Maybe lower the effects volume w/no music, and raise the effects volume w/music? Or just lower the in-game music volume?
  
  
• How about a "baby" version (slower falling, longer lock-in delay)? Like I said, I really suck at Tetris, so a child's version might help me get better at this game. I find myself hitting the "Pause" key sometimes just so my brain can catch up to the action! Also, I find it hard to control so a longer lock-in delay would really help. This also could be a problem related to emulation, since keyboard response time seems to be inconsistent in all games I play in Stella.

I applaud your efforts so far. If you can make me want to play just... one... more... game... of Tetris, you've really done something!

-tet

[Buck]

That's pretty cool! I like what you have done!

[atari2600land]

OK, I really want your honest and truth-filled opinions on this: Would you buy this if it was in the AA store? If not, what changes would you suggest? Here's a little run-down of the options that you can choose from the title screen:

next piece - right switch B
no next piece - right switch A
select - Type A (no block to the left)
select - Type B (a block to the right)
select a third time - two player game
color/B&W - works (there is a b&w mode)

in-game: left A on - no music / left switch A
music - left switch B

Keep in mind that if this was in the store, it would probably be $30 because it uses the Superchip.

Attached Files

•  2600tris20110113.bas.bin   32K   38 downloads

[Nathan Strum]

While I think it's a really good start at a Tetris clone, there are still a few shortcomings with it:

• There's no score - only a line counter. So removing multiple lines or advancing to higher levels doesn't net you any extra points.
  
• The controls are a bit twitchy: When I press down to rapidly drop a piece (which is frequently), sometimes the piece will move to the right or left one column by itself (this isn't a joystick problem - I'm using a keyboard). Also, the pieces will rotate too far/too fast at times, making it difficult to place a piece properly.
  
• There's no "fast drop" option. Pressing down helps, but I'd like to be able to drop a piece immediately.
  
• The long "I" piece rotates around it's top corner, and should rotate around one of its middle blocks.

[lapetino]

Nathan Strum, on Thu Jan 13, 2011 10:01 PM, said:

While I think it's a really good start at a Tetris clone, there are still a few shortcomings with it:

[list=1]
[*]The controls are a bit twitchy: When I press down to rapidly drop a piece (which is frequently), sometimes the piece will move to the right or left one column by itself (this isn't a joystick problem - I'm using a keyboard). Also, the pieces will rotate too far/too fast at times, making it difficult to place a piece properly.

Exactly what I was going to say. Good call, Nathan. This particular part of the gameplay made it hard to play well and enjoy.

[atari2600land]

Thanks, this is just the kind of criticism I need in order to make the game better. I've worked a little bit on the stuff you said. But there are two things that aren't possible, unfortunately. The first one being an automatic drop. To compensate for that, I made pressing down faster (and I think I might have gotten rid of a little twitchiness) and the second thing is that unless there is a way to put three scores in bB, it will just have to stay with just the line counter. Keep the comments coming!

Attached Files

•  2600tris20110114.bas.bin   32K   38 downloads

[lapetino]

atari2600land, on Thu Jan 13, 2011 11:41 PM, said:

Thanks, this is just the kind of criticism I need in order to make the game better. I've worked a little bit on the stuff you said. But there are two things that aren't possible, unfortunately. The first one being an automatic drop. To compensate for that, I made pressing down faster (and I think I might have gotten rid of a little twitchiness) and the second thing is that unless there is a way to put three scores in bB, it will just have to stay with just the line counter. Keep the comments coming!

Controls are a bit better and less twitchy, but it seems like I can't rotate the pieces fast enough when the speed gets going. Is there a way to make it so the piece rotating can be quicker and more responsive? And the music isn't bad at all, but sounds a little tinny. Would love to get a little more backbeat into it -- not sure if that's possible with the 2600, or if it would take help from one of the music experts around here. Very good effort and this is coming along well. Keep up the good work!

[atari2600land]

I've made the rotating more responsive as time goes on. Maybe this will help.

Attached Files

•  2600tris20110114_v3.bas.bin   32K   33 downloads
•  2600tris20110114_v3.bas   40.98K   23 downloads

[atari2600land]

Found (and fixed) a bug in the 2-player version. If the two-player version had the next block option disabled, player 2 would start with a game over. This has been fixed. And also, please tell me how I'm doing with this.

Attached Files

•  2600tris20110115.bas.bin   32K   24 downloads
•  2600tris20110115.bas   41.01K   24 downloads

[atari2600land]

You like the old title screen or the new one? Also, I put the level 9 back, it was causing me problems earlier with the game freezing, so if you see that problem, please tell me.

Attached Thumbnails

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Attached Files

•  2600tris20110116_v2.bas.bin   32K   27 downloads

[lapetino]

atari2600land, on Sun Jan 16, 2011 1:57 PM, said:

You like the old title screen or the new one? Also, I put the level 9 back, it was causing me problems earlier with the game freezing, so if you see that problem, please tell me.

Getting much better. The piece rotation still feels a bit on the slow side to me. Would like to be able to have it be much faster and responsive. But the side to side movement is far better -- I'm able to put pieces where I want them much more easily. Good work on that.

The much seems to stall and hang a bit on a single note when you fit a piece in, and it's a little distracting. Could there be a sound effect there instead?

Keep up the good work!

[atari2600land]

lapetino, on Sun Jan 16, 2011 3:01 PM, said:

The much seems to stall and hang a bit on a single note when you fit a piece in, and it's a little distracting. Could there be a sound effect there instead?

Gee, I don't really hear that at all. There is a "thud" sound effect once the piece locks in place, but I don't hear the music stopping for even a tiny bit when it does. You did mean "music" right? There is a way to turn the music off (left difficulty switch to A).

[atari2600land]

Worked on the 2-player mode some more. Now there is only a slight pause when a new shape for either player is being conjured up. I also tried to work on the thing lapetino said, but since I had no idea what was happening, I don't know if I succeeded fixing it or not.

Attached Files

•  2600tris20110117.bas.bin   32K   51 downloads

[e1will]

Well, you're probably not going to like this... but I think it would be much better in color than monochrome.