25 replies to this topic

[pseudografx]

Hi, as I can see that the Atari scene somehow returned from the world of the dead , I decide to help with my bit.
My plan is to make a port of the PC Game Marbles DeLuxe (which is a port of another game :-). So far I have the ingame graphics almost finished so I wanted to let you see it and make some comments/suggestions. My first thought was to use interlaced mode ANTIC4 for that, but then Raster persuaded me that interlacing is not good for ingame graphics. Well, I have not rejected that way completely yet, but now I'm focusing on non-interlaced version.
The tiles in the game will be 3x3 characters wide and mostly animated.
Please let me know how you like that.
Btw. the picture has both phases of the interlaced tiles just in case :-)

Edited by pseudografx, Fri Jun 24, 2005 6:02 AM.

[CharlieChaplin]

Well,
interlace means flickering. For fast action games (like e.g. Space Harrier) this does not matter very much, since you almost have no time to look at the gfx - you have to act/react. But afaik for Marble Madness you do not need these very fast reflexes, do you ?!? And as a result you have more time to look at the gfx and thus you will notice the flickering and most probably you will not like it...

Anyway, would like to see a good port of Marble Madness and/or Marble Madness Deluxe... But with good controls please! The joystick should react normally and not like "in sleep mode". Next, don`t change the joystick directions (like some MM clones did - afaik 90, 180 or 270 degrees clockwise), instead left, right, up and down should still be left, right, up and down... -Andreas.

[Gunstar]

Definately include an Atari Trackball option if you can. This will make it just like the arcade in control. The next best thing would be Amiga/ST mouse compatible. I never really liked playing Marble Madness on the C64 or Spindizzy on the A8/C64 with joystick controls, it kind of ruined the experience since it's too hard to simulate the trackball controls with a joystick.

[pseudografx]

My idea of joystick control is like this:
left/right/up/down - controls as one would expect :-)
fire - come here, ball
fire+down - put this tile into pocket
fire+up - exchange tile that is in the pocket with this one

I have never experimented with coding mouse/trackball drivers, so as soon as I start developing the controls system I hope you will be here to help Anyway, these options mean that there will also have to be different cursor shapes - somehow I think that for joystick control, the cursor should be in shape of a frame around a tile (and should not stop in between tiles), but for mouse control an arrow would fit better, and it is more natural to be able to stop it anywhere you want.

Regarding the interlacing - I will try it just to see what does it look like and post some binaries then.
Thanks for the suggestions so far.

Now some animated gifs to see the tiles in move:
Coins:


Diamond:


Ball falling to teleport/end of level:


Ball jumping (may need some improvements yet):


Skull:

[Heaven/TQA]

oh... another ball jumping...

[pseudografx]

Heaven/TQA, on Mon Jun 27, 2005 11:00 AM, said:

oh... another ball jumping...

Yeah, now the ones who always complain about too many jumping games, will have another topic to attack :-)
Anyway, your ball jumps better - perhaps because it's bigger :-)

[Goochman]

Very cool - Another classic I wanted to see how well could be done on the 8bit series - I vote for trackball support also.

[pseudografx]

Is there any graphics artist who could draw a nicer ball than the one on the screenshots?

The limitations are:
Size 9*18 pixels in high PMG resolution.
3 colours + transparent background (the colours used must respect the sprite overlapping limits)

If you think that you could do a much better ball with a resolution of 11*22 pixels, it would also be possible, but please make sure that only one of the colours (and only the middle shade) uses all 11 pixels of width. The other two colours (the darker and the brighter one) can only use 10 pixels of width. In other words, the ball must not use more than 2 players and 3 missiles.

You don't have to draw the animated version, first just send the biggest phase. If you decide to do the animated version, your animation may consist of as many frames as you need.

Thanks for any help :-)

[Kr0tki]

Charlie and all of you who voted for trackball control - I believe you have mistaken the famous arcade Marble Madness with Marbles DeLuxe, which pseudografx is talking about

[Goochman]

Kr0tki, on Mon Jun 27, 2005 2:40 PM, said:

Charlie and all of you who voted for trackball control - I believe you have mistaken the famous arcade Marble Madness with Marbles DeLuxe, which pseudografx is talking about

Please inform me on the difference - obviously sounds like 2 different games and not a hack of the original?

[Kr0tki]

Answer

[pseudografx]

Kr0tki, on Mon Jun 27, 2005 6:38 PM, said:

Answer

Thanks for noticing Kr0tki, I wasn't aware of that and thought we all talk about the same game :-) I've never seen Marble Madness before and Marbles DeLuxe are a completely different puzzle game.

[Gunstar]

I can see that it's a different type of "marble" game, but there isn't much information on how you move the marble around, if it is still the player controlled sprite(s) in the game, and it rolls around to get somewhere, then a trackball would be perfect for control, even if the original game wasn't designed with this type of control. With the trackball, you really are rolling around a big "marble" with the palm of your hand and fingers, so it would be the most realistic control feature, and movement can be directly translated in analog. it's basically just x/y direction input using the 'paddle' options for input, a bit of inertia could be cool too, assuming this program would benefit from it. I'm not a programmer, but I suspect that a small sensitivity "module" could be in the controls that could even be user adjustable, with calibration. That way, you don't have a trackball to do testing, the user can adjust it to their liking. As for the ST mouse, it is compatible with the atari trackball, I'm pretty sure, it works with the trackball mode in missle Command, and with most/all desktop graphic interfaces that exost for the 8-bit. I know there is a slight, modifiable incompatiblity with the Amiga mouse when use on the ST, IIRC, and i did try it once a while ago, it was a button configureation problem similiar to the 7800 controller on an ST, it conflicts with the ST mouse button inputs I believe 9educated guess), but I think, like the 7800 controller, it is also compatible with the 8-bit and with Atari's trackball/paddle inputs.

I will download the PC version and check out the game, this is just my initial reaction to the limited information and screenshots I just browsed.

Edited by Gunstar, Mon Jun 27, 2005 11:11 AM.

[Heaven/TQA]

but make trackball optional... how many have a tb at home???

[Kr0tki]

Actually, Marbles DeLuxe is a logic game, in which you do not even control your marble - instead you move a cursor and point it to the place you want to move. Because of that, any ideas of implementing inertia are irrelevant. Also, the game is tile-based, and doesn't include any fast-paced action, so it doesn't make much difference whether it's controlled by joystick or mouse.

Gunstar, on Mon Jun 27, 2005 6:57 PM, said:

As for the ST mouse, it is compatible with the atari trackball, I'm pretty sure, it works with the trackball mode in missle Command (...)

ST mouse isn't compatible with the TrakBall - they produce different signal sequences. The fact that ST mice work with Missile Command is just a coincidence.

[CharlieChaplin]

Oh,
stupid me - I thought Marbles Deluxe was just another version of Marble Madness. Now I see, it is not... So, if the game does not require a certain controller or if none of the available controllers do have big advantages, I would choose joystick control. Think 100% of Atarians do have a joystick, not so with the TB or ST mouse... But if you can make an option available to choose controler type (joy, TB, mouse) and it is not too much work or costs too much CPU time, give it a try... Anyway, keep up your good work and please finish it !!

There is still too much talking around here, about what could be done better in game x, y or z (graphics, sounds, sprites/players, etc.) - but alas a lot of these games are still unfinished. That`s why I belong to the group who says, better to have a finished game with standard gfx and sfx than a game-demo with extra ordinary or outstanding gfx and sfx that is unfinished... -Andreas.

[TMR]

pseudografx, on Mon Jun 27, 2005 1:06 PM, said:

Is there any graphics artist who could draw a nicer ball than the one on the screenshots?

We-ell, i don't know if it's nicer but it's 2:30 in the morning and i'm quite pleased with this 'un... it's five frames of 11 by 21 pixels (the space within the purple frame is 11 by 22 and i didn't use anything bar the darkest colour on the far right pixel column as per your specs) and three colours not including the black background...



...and here's a movement test...



...all yours if y'want it. =-)

Edited by TMR, Mon Jun 27, 2005 7:44 PM.

[pseudografx]

TMR, on Tue Jun 28, 2005 3:44 AM, said:

We-ell, i don't know if it's nicer but it's 2:30 in the morning and i'm quite pleased with this 'un...  it's five frames of 11 by 21 pixels (the space within the purple frame is 11 by 22 and i didn't use anything bar the darkest colour on the far right pixel column as per your specs) and three colours not including the black background...

Thanks, TMR, this one definitely looks better than mine. I'll make some computations to find out whether what I have allowed will actually be possible, but so far it seems to me that it will :-)

[emkay]

Smelling some Games with a circle based protagonist and to prevent someone from missing emkay's comments about MCS usage , or just for some impression ...
Here a picture of a game I had planned back in 1991

[carmel_andrews]

emkay, on Tue Jun 28, 2005 8:01 AM, said:

Smelling some Games with a circle based protagonist and to prevent someone from missing emkay's comments about MCS usage ,  or just for some impression  ...
Here a picture of a game I had planned back in 1991

_________________________________________________________________

Is this marble game similar to 'quedex' on the c64 or a bit like bounder/rebounder (c64) or it's A8 equiv. Jump (a german title) and boing/boing 2 (UK)

Unfortunately i'm not much into pc games (although i do have Tomb raider 3 and AOD installed), so I don't think I've come accross this PC game

[emkay]

carmel_andrews, on Tue Jun 28, 2005 11:53 AM, said:

Is this marble game similar to 'quedex' on the c64 or a bit like bounder/rebounder (c64) or it's A8 equiv. Jump (a german title) and boing/boing 2 (UK)

Indeed it looks a bit like "quedex". It was intended as a puzzling game.
Always two balls fall down from the pipes... You would have to bring all (4)colours
in a row, by exchanging them. You would have to pay attention to the dark balls which are not allowed to be together... a.s.o.

[Heaven/TQA]

any progress?

[_Fandal_]

Heaven/TQA, on Wed Oct 5, 2005 11:03 AM, said:

any progress?

Any progress in Boinxx?

F.

[Chrodegang]

_Fandal_, on Wed Oct 5, 2005 11:58 AM, said:

Any progress in Boinxx? 

We still hold breath ...

[Heaven/TQA]

...re: boinxx...watch homebrew forum...