Unfinished platform game

Shiru · Post by **Shiru** » Mon May 05, 2008 8:53 am

Because this project seems to be about cancelled, I decided to show it. This is demo of unfinished platform game, which I together with other guy started about half year ago.

Actually, this project stated few years ago, when we got idea to 'make something for old console'. Very wrong start, you know. We started on SMS - I as programmer of anything, music and some other things, and my partner as game designer and artist. General concept of game was simple platformer, with few levels of horizontal scroll only, something between Contra and Megamen. I made unplayable demo with BG scrolling and music, and because partner wasn't able to give me any graphics at moment, made some BG graphics - 1, 2 (though I'm not skilled pixel artist). That first attempt stopped on this stage.

Second attempt was started on SMD, because it's much easier to program for, and has less graphic and sound limitations. This time my partner made some test graphics (see in demo), and I made this playable demo. Though partner made some more 'actual' graphics (mockup and some half-finished sprites), by some reasons he was not able to finish actual game design (there was not even list of levels) and produce enough graphics even for single level (so I can't use it in demo). I also got problems with SGCC which I used initially - this demo compiled with it and has bug with enemy/background collision detection because of this problems. I also tried to move project to GCC, but failed (problem with % operation, still unsolved).

Code of demo is unoptimized (no reason to do it because problems with compilers); music and sound code written in C too, so you'll see slowdowns. Music in demo actually composed by my partner in MPT and covered for SMD by me. Size of C sources of demo is about 40KB (just to make you know when problems with C compilers begins).

Current state of project: no finished design and no pixel artist which able to make graphics. So I doubt it will be finished. It can be continued, if somebody can help, though.

Download demo

Pascal · Post by **Pascal** » Mon May 05, 2008 11:24 am

nice demo, congrats, i always loved valis & contra, so a mix of both can only be gud ^^

too bad you can not continue, the mockups are awesome :s
It's the problem of the scene , we need graphics artists, most of them are after money (damn greedy bastards ^^).

regards

pascal

Sik · Post by **Sik** » Mon May 05, 2008 11:36 am

Definitely you should give it a second try. And to be honest, in my opinion the actual demo looks better than the mock-up. At least the level. Sure, maybe not the most complex thing ever, but it looks weird, and definitely looks good. And somewhat reminds me of Pulseman's first stage, just that even more virtual-looking.

I think the only thing I may be able to complain now for is the fact that A is for shoot and B and C is for jump. Due to the shape of the joystick C is more used, then B and then A, so I would assing B to shoot. The A button... well, leave it whatever way you want. Also I would make the jump button to work only at press and not at hold. Doesn't really bother for jumping, but it does when falling off from a platform (down + jump), because if there are several and you don't manage to release the button in time you fall from the next platform too.

EDIT: make sure the final version has a sound test, the music there rocks

TmEE co.(TM) · Post by **TmEE co.(TM)** » Mon May 05, 2008 3:43 pm

Looks very nice. Needs a bit more animation though and better GFX... I'd help with GFX, but I'm pretty busy ATM... also, you need to tell me what you need (you'll be the game designer not me) when I have time to help (which is by the end of this month, when I have no more exams).

Some features that caught my eye on my MD2 :

This game finishes its VDP business on the next frame, about on 4th line... but in NTSC, in PAL its fine and absolutely no slowdowns (which are too small to notice anyway, at least for now). Also, I like to listen game musics and I did so for 15mins I guess, and I noticed that some garbage was on screen (top tile row as garbage, and some missing tiles on clouds...)

Sik · Post by **Sik** » Mon May 05, 2008 4:16 pm

TmEE co.(TM) wrote:Looks very nice. Needs a bit more animation though and better GFX... I'd help with GFX, but I'm pretty busy ATM... also, you need to tell me what you need (you'll be the game designer not me) when I have time to help (which is by the end of this month, when I have no more exams).

Not sure he can do much, all sprites are uploaded into VRAM at once

(there's plenty available still, but probably more stuff will be added). It's fine for me.

Also, I just noticed this:

Shiru wrote:Code of demo is unoptimized (no reason to do it because problems with compilers); music and sound code written in C too, so you'll see slowdowns. Music in demo actually composed by my partner in MPT and covered for SMD by me. Size of C sources of demo is about 40KB (just to make you know when problems with C compilers begins).

If this is the same SGCC I think it is, it works with files up to 32KB only (both for C and ASM code). After this the compiler may fail and stop working.

Shiru · Post by **Shiru** » Mon May 05, 2008 5:11 pm

About buttons mapping, it can be changed easily. Actually, I thought to make control method selection, and yes, sound test too.

TmEE co.(TM) wrote:Needs a bit more animation though and better GFX... I'd help with GFX, but I'm pretty busy ATM... also, you need to tell me what you need (you'll be the game designer not me) when I have time to help (which is by the end of this month, when I have no more exams).

It needs not just better GFX, it needs GFX in general. Thanks for offer, but currently there is no design, and I can't make it. So I need to find someone who can make design first.

About problems on hardware, I actually don't even expected that it can run there. It all can be fixed later, when things will be stable (very much can be changed before final version).

Sik wrote:Not sure he can do much, all sprites are uploaded into VRAM at once :) (there's plenty available still, but probably more stuff will be added).

I had no need for on-fly VRAM upload for this demo. That not means that I can't do it if it will needed.

Sik wrote:If this is the same SGCC I think it is, it works with files up to 32KB only (both for C and ASM code). After this the compiler may fail and stop working.

Besides actual source code there is also about 80KB of source which contains graphics and music/sound data, so that's not problem. Compiler don't fail, it just generate wrong code (sometimes some functions can't get variable as parameter, though constants works fine).

Sik · Post by **Sik** » Mon May 05, 2008 5:18 pm

Shiru wrote:
Sik wrote:If this is the same SGCC I think it is, it works with files up to 32KB only (both for C and ASM code). After this the compiler may fail and stop working.
Besides actual source code there is also about 80KB of source which contains graphics and music/sound data, so that's not problem. Compiler don't fail, it just generate wrong code (sometimes some functions can't get variable as parameter, though constants works fine).

It's a DOS-related problem. It's simple: too much data is allocated, the stack overflows and output is wrong or program crashes. Hardware limitation really (unless SGCC is a protected mode program, then I'm going to blow up).

EDIT: a typical stack for real mode programs is 64KB maximum.

Shiru · Post by **Shiru** » Mon May 05, 2008 5:35 pm

I said, total size of source code is >128K, some files >32K too, and size of output asm file is 339K, so it's not problem which you talking about.

And please, visit my homepage, look into 'About me' section and not teach me for basic things anymore.

Sik · Post by **Sik** » Mon May 05, 2008 5:41 pm

Unless there's a newer version of SGCC that the one I've experimenting with, it's like I said :/ Through I must admit I got it from an old ZIP...

Chilly Willy · Post by **Chilly Willy** » Mon May 05, 2008 8:21 pm

Why don't you use a newer gcc? I'm using gcc 4.1 cross-compiler from uClinux for the 68K as my compiler. As long as you remember to use the proper libgcc (the one for the 68000), it works fine with the devkit (I recompiled the devkit files to make sure they were all compiled by the same version of gcc).

Shiru · Post by **Shiru** » Mon May 05, 2008 8:23 pm

I said that in first post:

Shiru wrote:I also tried to move project to GCC, but failed (problem with % operation, still unsolved).

Sik · Post by **Sik** » Mon May 05, 2008 8:25 pm

Maybe it's already fixed in the newest libgcc?

Anyways, where do you use the % operation? If it's only in the scroll counter, you could remove it because obviously the scroll is working

Shiru · Post by **Shiru** » Mon May 05, 2008 8:29 pm

I use this operation anywhere, as well as any other operations. Why I must not use it?

Btw, not only % not works, but also /n*n not works too.

For example:

a=(a+1)%10; //this one I use quite often
a=(a+1)/10*10;

Using of any of those string (I know they doing not same, this is just example) make code hangs.

And we already discussed that, this sometimes helps, but sometimes not:

a++; a%=10; //instead of a=(a+1)%10;

Sik · Post by **Sik** » Mon May 05, 2008 9:01 pm

Shiru wrote:I use this operation anywhere, as well as any other operations. Why I must not use it?

Incomplete libgcc?

Shiru wrote:Btw, not only % not works, but also /n*n not works too.

For example:

a=(a+1)%10; //this one I use quite often
a=(a+1)/10*10;

Using of any of those string (I know they doing not same, this is just example) make code hangs.

And we already discussed that, this sometimes helps, but sometimes not:

a++; a%=10; //instead of a=(a+1)%10;

Seems like a problem with the RTL generation code. This is a quite technical explanation, RTL is GCC's own "assembly" language, all programs get compiled to it and then to the native assembly of the processor. This allows to implement some common optimizations easier, through at the expense of internal complexity and missing the chance to do processor-specific optimizations. If some RTL template is wrong, you may get such a weird error :/

Try to get another GCC version, either newer or older, to see if that fixes it.

Shiru · Post by **Shiru** » Mon May 05, 2008 10:21 pm

Sik wrote:
Shiru wrote:Why I must not use it?
Incomplete libgcc?

Strange logic. If compiler has bug and some standart operation does not work properly, it means only that this compiler can't be trusted and thus can't be used, not operation which not works.

Sik wrote:Try to get another GCC version, either newer or older, to see if that fixes it.

I'm sure I can solve this issue, but I have no reason to do it right now. I just explained why I didn't used gcc to compile this demo.