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It’s too early to congratulate, but this sounds very promising. My fingers are still crossed and I much hope that you, Chris, can solve this unwanted, mysterious, and exhausting riddle, soon.
We have to be careful, but i am confident. You found “something” and you can reproduce it now. This is the most important. Fingers crossed for me too!
Congratulations!!! No matter what the outcome, this is great!!!
Level 474? I take a deep bow to your persistence in hunting down this bug. And after all the attempts of the past weeks I am soooo curious now what the reason of the crash is…
Eagerly looking forward to your next post!
Many cheery Cheers,
PeerOk.
The thing I found could definitly result in something that looks like a crash. Whether it is “the only” thing – I don’t know.
I still have to fix it though – which might be more complicated than it sounds.What could happen is an endless loop while removing a player shot. The removal routine looks in the linked list where the object to be deleted is located – and fixes the pointers on both sides to exclude the element that is to be removed.
In this special case I try to remove an element which is no “active” element – and thus cannot be found -> endless loop.
This special case was introduced with some kind of optimization not too long ago. Usually I only test 2 player-shots for collision detection – and that is ok.
But if there are very few “aliens” and very many player shots – this can lead to shots going thru aliens without hurting them. So I changed (optimized) the collision detection to know when there are few aliens (than I also have more time at hand) – and than it tests ALL player-shots with all aliens.
Since I also reuse part of the code – this looks programming wise very … hm … “involved” (confusing) – and at some point it can happen that after a shot “hit” an enemy (and after its removal from the active list) it still can linger in some sort of testShot buffer.
And THAT one (under certain conditions) can be “retested” with an alien – and if it “hits” it will be removed again – and than an endless loop occurs.
I have to clean up that code now – and cleverly devise new plans to insert bugs.
Perhaps I find time tonight… Than there will be another test round… for how many games/levels?
For the last crash to find I played about 1000 levels… How many levels are necessary for me to say there is no crash?Chris
hey all, wishing luck Chris, i know its been a long rough road on this game so thanks for never giving up on this! 🙂
on the next build you release i think i should be able to get back to testing (sorry for not being so active recently, i just got really sidetracked with other things)
@Chris:
When you say “This special case was introduced with some kind of optimization not too long ago”: do you have an idea of the beta version ? Because i already got crashes with the b40 version several months ago. If the optimization was introduced after this version, we have to investigate more…
But 1 problem at a time (if there is no link between them of course)! 😉
But doesn’t this perfectly match the symptoms? Bank screen, cut-off sound continuing to play ever on? Remember, we had this “endless loop theory”, but did not know any possible cause. Judging from what Chris wrote, this piece would fit and complete the puzzle. Or at least one part of the puzzle.
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Not to long ago is “relative” – it was introduced with Vectorblade Beta 34 – around 24th of August last year.
…
Yes – most symptoms fit. There was one reported crash in the intro screen of the minestorm event – that does not fit.
But I corrected quite a few bugs in the last months – so “perhaps” this was fixed too.
I think (*cough*) I fixed it – but will do some testing before I let it run free again.
I’ll be back…
Chris
In the hope of nearly finishing Vectorblade and that perhaps the crash bug might be gone… I am programming happily a little bit…
Following “new” things are set (and partially done):
- game over sequence will get some graphics enhancement (partially done)
- the new fighters will stay (done)
- the shop will get some changes (lock and power e.g. will cost much, much more) (done)
- a save game will be done (with high score disabled) (partially done)
- higher difficulties get some more thoughts
– while in the intro phase the aliens can also directly switch to attack phase (more, the more difficult) (done)
– I will revisit each boss, and higher difficulties will introduce some changes
boss 1 already has some attacking drones, (done)
thoughts for the others:
– different movement patterns for boss 2
– different intervals (more than 3) for the shots of the 3rd boss
– different shot intervals – more/shorter times “seeking” missiles for boss 4 - fixes already implemented:
fixed: noise button 2 exit on “settings”
fixed: noise when collecting shot1/2 with immunity enabled
fixed: lock gives sound even if not buyable (to many)
changed: promotion above 3 gold star gives now a cash/score bonus (and tells you so – you get a “raise” 🙂 )
fixed: ignoring perfect bonus – in bonus display collect “bomb” (or dollar) than the display changes to “xx bonus collected)
fixed: money collect resets vecVox output - I could NOT verify that VecVox “switches off” at some point – so there nothing changed!
Further thoughts:
I will try to move the complete “flash” communication to bank 0, this will give me about 5kb more in bank 2. This will give me space for 1 or two more “bonus”. I don’t know if you played Warblade… if you did – one of the most iconic bonus drops I have as yet not implemented is “drunken” (which reverses left/right steering for some time).
With the drunken bonus an original Warblade achievment might be introduced: “drunken Minefield”.I would like to “honor” my dear beta testers a bit more than just a mention in the scrolltext and manual – but I have not found the “right” thing yet.
If you have any ideas for that – or any other “small” stuff that can/might be implemented…
now is the last time for a (smallish) wish list!Thx
Chris
Wow! It is incredible… All you are doing to improve and polish the game!
it is already Vectorblade II 😉
If you send me the cartridge back – I can update it to the newest version.
The mailing cost is probably higher than the chip cost – but I haven’t gotten so many of them…Cheers
Chris
Sorry for being silent for a while. I was occupied by another Vectrex-related project which is currently being done by four of my students. I like the “drunken steering”, I think that would be a nice and mean little addition to VB 🙂 No particular things on my wish list right now, but I could certainly think up some. Do you still want new ideas?
Cheers,
PeerYou know what is great!
When I don’t play Vectorblade for a few days – for whatever reason.
…
And I come back to do some test or whatever and “force” myself to play it…
I always think… “Gee what a great game”.Being able to say that about something you programmed yourself is fantastic :-).
I am still “updating” Vectorblade.
- I did the new “game over” sequence
- I implemented save game feature for Flash ROM AND for VecFever!
(later caused some problems until I understood the mechanics) - I did some of Helmuts suggestions
- I implemented the drunken bonus (well half of it…), the graphics are in and it drops – but nothing happens yet if you collect it 🙂
- I started to implement the “beta tester” scene!
- I will implement at least 3 new achievements (todo with minestorm and perhaps drunken)
If all of that has been implemented I will release a new beta. But I only have 4 days left…
Than I again go up to the baltic sea and start renovating our house there – that mean at least 2-3 weeks no Vectrex at all.
Actually I sort of doubt I will be able to finish the beta.You can decide:
- do you want a beta by the end of the week – possibly with more or less completely untested “features”
- or do you want to wait till in about 3 weeks – when I can finish everything and at least playtest a bit?
Cheers
Chris
Click image…
Thank you for the update, Chris.
> Being able to say that about something you programmed yourself is fantastic :-).
Yes, Vectorblade is indeed a master-piece. But “Release!” and Frogger aren’t bad either. 😉
I like the new “Drunken bonus” graphics. But I dislike the game over sequence – personally I think it doesn’t fit to the rest of the game.
> You can decide:
- do you want a beta by the end of the week – possibly with more or less completely untested “features”
- or do you want to wait till in about 3 weeks – when I can finish everything and at least playtest a bit?
I’d say: “We want it all! And we want it now!”
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