Malban
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Noted:
I see what I can do. Those routines were more “tricky” than they look.
a) it raster font
b) its smooth scroll – the raster font is only partially displayed
c) it uses a “sync” mechanism
d) the lines you see are all “singular” lines – with different lengths which none the less must be printed one after another
e) it must be fast enough to display 5 or 6 (how many lines is it at the time) AND the rest of the screen (and raster display is always stupidly slow to begin with)
f) the “spacing” in between must scroll too, which gave me already a headache when I implemented it…
g) etc etc etcBut – yes – I’ll look at it again…
“medium boss”!
Hehe the UFO that appears is now pretty proud to be called boss (chest swelling).The UFO “feature” starts at level 5 (I think) and from than on there is a timing.
Thing is
a) The timing is always the same (so no real surprise there)
b) It appears in a decreasing timeframe, so each next UFO you get will appear sooner – also no surpriseThe other “super aliens” appear at random – so there is no warning whatsoever.
The least “cycle” intensive would be a warning jingle…
That is no problem to implement – but keeping the above said in mind – do you really think it would add much?
Thoughts?
Beta 19/20 lights more… still not enough?
The lighting went up from $5f to $7f – if that is not enough I have to increase the “lightning” timer…
Well – yes.
This has technical reasons. During “intermissions” (even if it is only the text, but especially during warp/minestorm) the memory management differs from “in game”.
I only remember in a save location that I have scoopies, and which race… all other information is lost and not available.
The enemy “structures” are rebuilt after the intermission.So actually from a technical point of view there are no scoopies during these times.
And you also know what? The original Warblade does exactly the same (I don’t know if with the same background though).
ROFL – it’s nice to say “no”… Keep trying you might get me on the right foot and I’ll say yes to something again…
šVectorblade_Beta20.bin – 8rd June 2019
Ooops Minestorm bonus was dropping always!
Vectorblade_Beta19.bin – 8rd June 2019
done: Peer: buzz/no buzz selection: text āButton 4 to confirmā is not horizontally centered
done: Peer: the calibration sub menus all use a different brightness
done: Peer: help text of the first boss calibration step, missing letter: āā¦ align the(m) as good as possibleā
done: Nico: crash in Pause+Help
done: bonus waves on more difficult no restriction on bonus random
done: double Geo: When on āMineStormā stage, after pressing PAUSE and back, in game sound effects get severely distorted
done: lower super diamond from 100 to – say 50
done: helmut: pause status: Suggestion: Scrolling could be page wise
done: helmut: The scroll indicators should be positioned one at the top and one at the bottom
done: Highscore: āMALā-> is now last initials in that “space”
done: helmut: Desktop Intros
Suggestion A:
1.) Octagonal screen is blank
2.) Transition effect (the same transition effect that is shown right before the descriptions of the power-ups are shown) is shown on the screen and then āVector bladeā and the other stuff appears and scrolls down.
3.) After a while the astronout appears for a second time.
4.) Transition effect is shown on the screen and then the description of the power-ups is shown.The Desktop stuff drove me mad – did work on it for a couple of hours, changed the whole system.
Hope it works now again.Also boss 4 has a preliminry new intro… final graphics will be done by Jacek, the current ones use to many vectors… wobbling…
Tomorrow I will have less time for Vectorblade!
Hi…
I am in the middle of implementing the thingy Helmut wanted (different title “scenes”) – which is a hassle… so only a “short” answer.
I feel the downgrade upon a death is necessary for the overall game balance I will keep it.
There are situations that when once died – you enter a sprial – I get that.
We already “smoothed” one spiral – The Warp Failure…I don’t like the idea of giving “free” bonuses – after you died and “rightfully” were robbed of your previous abilities, if I do that – than dying in that situation ment nothing.
Idea:
What – if you die during a boss fight – the boss pushes you an random (1-5) levels back in your progress?
That way you get a chance to replanish your “goods” and you ARE punished.Other testers – what do you think?
Explosion stays.
I explained the explosions a long time ago on my blog. The current implementation is absolutly “cheap” cycle wise. The little small explosions you talk about will rob me cycles big time :-).You haven’t read much here lately – have you :-). Major Havoc part is (more or less the only) unfinished part of the game, you can look at it – but do “nothing worthwhile”…
The bug (sound you mentioned – “noted”) – will look into it after the things I’m doing right now…
Thanks for your reports!
Malban
No haven’t sounds cool -> marked for “Vectorblade Mark II”.
THIS Vectorblade has a feature freeze :-).
(probably)Gees – don’t you guys find enough bugs anymore? Now you want to add something new?
Hi,
while this is a good and professional idea – I will not implement it – or at least not now. I will probably have months left until I burn “final” cartridges – so I don’t say I won’t do it, since it is a very good idea.
But right now I want to get Vectorblade “finished” or get to a state where I can say – “soo,Ā that is it”.
The current system is working and at least “ok”. For the moment I do not want to change a “running system”, for the moment I want to get everything in a state where it works as intended.
I hope I will be able to do that in the next couple of weeks. After that when I am “content” with the game – I can add flowers and do beautifying.
—
Well I did a lot of beautifying the last weeks – but most of that was
a) either unfinished and on my schedule anyway
b) or really “small” stuff, which I could do in a matter of minutesThe thing you suggests, is somewhat bigger. I’ll need days for that, there are a couple of not obvious reasons why it is a bit more complicated. Mostly it has to do with having four banks and the data for Vectorblade is distributed amongst all four banks.
And for the banks 0+1 every VIA access is “different” from normal. Therefor all sound/draw/joystick routines are different.
A widget you suggests must either be implemented at least twice, or all data that the widget is supposed to use must be in the same bank – and that would mean a rearranging of all (or at least much) data.Both alternatives are not really appealing – it’s certainly not unsolvable… and yes I might do it – later – when nothing else is in the queue…
Thanks for all the thoughts you put into this.
Malban
Seems to… yes – but only I as adminstrator can do this.
If you want a subject to be “closed” and moved to “solved” – please post a message accordingly, than I can move the topic.
Thx, but don’t test the “help” until the next beta any more.
There is a bug and it will be fixed (actually is already). Any other crashes you might find are proably related.Sound – yes the sound might be distorted – I can’t really help that.
When I enter the help, I switch off all sound – otherwise one would here the last played tone constantly. After the help the sounds resumes where it left of. But all sound routines (BIOS and mine…) are programmed such that only the known “differences” from the last played sound are updated.
Since some registered were “forced” to 0 (null) by telling it to be quiet – the playing song/noise things the register contains still the old value, and will only ever “correct” the value when it thinks it changed.
Only thing I could do – is to start the music all over again, when exiting the help – would that be better?
