New game in developement... CA the Meowian

TmEE co.(TM) · Post by **TmEE co.(TM)** » Tue Jan 30, 2007 6:42 am

After I finish GBMD (it needs some work) I'm going to write a action game which is pretty much like Contra or Metal Slug (NeoGeo). Main character:

I made this decision yesterday, originally I planned to make a PC version in QB (or FB) but then again, MD is little easier to program (most of the time).

Note: That small image is 100% MS-PAINT (tell me if I did too much "anti aliasing")
Note: Don't ask why I named that cat CA, I come up with him like, I dunno, 6 years (?) ago when I was 11 (or 10).

Post by **KanedaFr** » Tue Jan 30, 2007 8:45 am

go go go, I hope you'll still find valuable information here to finish your project

TmEE co.(TM) · Post by **TmEE co.(TM)** » Tue Jan 30, 2007 10:30 am

You all are very helpful and I don't hesitate to ask if I'm in trouble. I will ask stuff for sure, because I started MD programming last year in september and there's much for me to learn about that magnificent machine.

cdoty · Post by **cdoty** » Tue Jan 30, 2007 5:37 pm

Well....

Here's a perfect opportunity to discuss methods for developing a game like this.

How would you handle the scrolling of a background?

It would seem easiest to upload all of the tiles to VRAM, and just update the edges of the tilemap, as the screen scrolled.

Is the Genesis DMA fast enough to update tiles quick enough to allow the tiles to be swapped out? It would seem to need some very careful design to work correctly.

What about sprite animations?

From what I've seen and heard it would be best to dedicate a piece of the VRAM to each sprite, and update the VRAM tile data to do animation. I don't think VRAM is big enough to handle a scrolling background and many detailed sprite animations.

Ketsuban · Post by **Ketsuban** » Tue Jan 30, 2007 6:33 pm

cdoty wrote:How would you handle the scrolling of a background?

It would seem easiest to upload all of the tiles to VRAM, and just update the edges of the tilemap, as the screen scrolled.

This is the only viable method I've seen of doing it.

cdoty wrote:Is the Genesis DMA fast enough to update tiles quick enough to allow the tiles to be swapped out? It would seem to need some very careful design to work correctly.

I'm guessing not - if it was then it would be being used, but I don't see any games using it.

cdoty wrote:What about sprite animations?

From what I've seen and heard it would be best to dedicate a piece of the VRAM to each sprite, and update the VRAM tile data to do animation. I don't think VRAM is big enough to handle a scrolling background and many detailed sprite animations.

It isn't, for the most part, though I know Sonic 1 uses some dynamically-reloaded things (all of Sonic's art is dynamically loaded from ROM, as is the giant ring which appears at the end of a level).

Stef · Post by **Stef** » Tue Jan 30, 2007 7:05 pm

Almost games work in this way, they update the invisible part of the scroll layer datas and use DMA to upload sprite pattern at each frame. It's probably the easiest way of doing a classic scrolling game.

TmEE co.(TM) · Post by **TmEE co.(TM)** » Wed Jan 31, 2007 6:24 am

It will use similiar techniques found in Sonic with my own quirks. For sprites, I probably update sprite patterns in VRAM or do like I did with GBMD, load all graphics into VRAM and don't do any updates during the game. I don't actually know how much tiles I would need for one stage, if there's not much I'll use static tile system, if not, dynamic.
Scrolls will be 64x64 in size and it will use 320x240 resolution (so no NTSC, maybe later). If you need to know more, just ask.

elan · Post by **elan** » Wed Oct 03, 2007 1:30 pm

Metal Slug Series is one of my favourite game any news in this project???

BTW You can use Tile Studio too.It si free and it can export tiles to BMP too...Or save as tiles to native format *.TSP /but it is not very useful for genny... but supports c++ so there is possibility to port it.../.
It is very fine PC tool /sprites+map/.Concept is close to Mappy Map Editor...

Here is Link -> http://tilestudio.sourceforge.net/
Tutorial -> http://tilestudio.sourceforge.net/drawing.html

PS -> Hihi. It can have name "STEEL SLUG WARRIOR" or something...

TmEE co.(TM) · Post by **TmEE co.(TM)** » Wed Oct 03, 2007 4:20 pm

Any news... nothing interesting... I've not messed with this for almost 2 months now, I'm working on my tracker and the sound engine...
I got little frustrated... I have to draw lots of animations and well, I'm good at it, BUT it takes hell of a time and effort to get things look correctly... it has ULTRA SMOOTH animation, running takes 16 frames !!!
There's a huge story (which gives me headaches, I must fit everything into 4MB !!!)... nice set of weapons, lots of GIBs, GORE n' BLOOD... LOTS of them !!! If anyone wants, I can let you read the log file of the games progress...

The name of the game is "CA the Meowian"... written in 100% 68K and Z80 assembly.

TmEE co.(TM) · Post by **TmEE co.(TM)** » Tue Oct 16, 2007 5:35 am

Title screen of the game if anyone's interested...

Fonzie · Post by **Fonzie** » Tue Oct 16, 2007 8:04 am

Crazy!!!

Man, you rox

I can't wait to play it ^^

elan · Post by **elan** » Tue Oct 16, 2007 8:59 am

This HERO absolutly ROCKS!!!

TmEE co.(TM) · Post by **TmEE co.(TM)** » Tue Oct 16, 2007 9:32 am

First playable demo was planned to be released at the 1st September, BUT during the Summer, real life got in the way (and also a Dreamcast) so things got slowed down a lot... if I draw few hundred(actually not that much, but it seems so) more frames of CA and add some scroller, then it can be made playable very easily. MD tracker and Z80 driver are priorities at the moment... a game with good music is always better than one without any

Few days ago I noticed that I haven't touched it for 2 months

!!!

Chilly Willy · Post by **Chilly Willy** » Tue Oct 16, 2007 5:16 pm

Looking good. Now the easy part - the rest of the game.

TmEE co.(TM) · Post by **TmEE co.(TM)** » Tue Oct 16, 2007 5:25 pm

First, I have to get CA animated... and it takes hell of a time... lots of pixel art, lost of LUT editing... total headache...