Fredrik the Ball is Back: Spider Maze 2 in progress

 11th January 2026

First of all, a belated Happy New Year to all C64 and retro kind. At last, a new blog update and a new C64 project is in the making. Please read on to find out what is happening :)

Back in November 2018, I launched a public domain game called "Spider Maze" for the Commodore 64. It was a game I originally wrote in KickAssembler as part of a hobby based tutorial for Scene World. The game got finished off into a full game and got released on my T.N.D website. You can find it here.

Thinking about it, this game was launched just under 8 years ago, and I had so much enjoyment developing it. Now, partially during the winter of 2026, I am currently making a sequel. Once again, I am back in full swing coding with KickAssembler and CBMPRGStudio V4.7.0 once again. As usual, the graphics, and level design are being implemented using Charpad V2.7.6 and the game sprites are being created using Sprite Pad V2.0. The game will be crunched with Exomizer V2.0.11, especially the level data. Music aims to be made in either Goat Tracker Ultra V1.5.5 or Electronic Music System V7.03, but I have not decided which one to use yet.

Fredrick the Ball is returning on another adventure. This time not in a quest for greed, but on a rescue mission. His girlfriend Ruby has been kidnapped and is imprisoned inside the dungeon which is inside the lair of the spiders. In order to rescue her, Fredrik must pick up all the diamonds spread around 16 different zones. If he collects them all, Ruby will be free. Otherwise, if not then she will be sacrificed to the evil spiders.

The concept and old features

The game idea aims to similar to the original Spider Maze, but if you take a look at the snapshot below, you will notice that I made some improvements to the look and feel of the game. I also added a challenge to the game concept as well. There are the regular old features, where the player has to collect all the diamonds, whilst avoiding getting killed by the deadly spiders. The player can also pickup items to help or hinder. The bulb will charge the player up and make Fredrik invulnerable for a short period of time. However, he is not invulnerable against obstacles such as skulls. There is also the extra life heart, which can be collected on every 4th level. (Below you can see level 3's design)

New game features

There are also some new features blended into the game as well. The first are two collectibles. The first one represents the letter "B", which does nothing spectacular, it gives the player bonus points (Well 500 points to be honest). Also the second collectible implemented is a clock, which will either add or deduct time from the clock. This will remain a mystery to help or hinder Fredrik the Ball. Also if you take a look above, the score panel has a border around it. However the border will be animated and scroll around in order to make the panel more interesting. The panel has no flashing effects this time.

New deadly features for Poor Fredrick

There are some new deadly surprises implemented into the game as well. The first is that you have to race against the clock to complete each level. If the time runs out, the game ends. The second new surprise is that, not only will the player have to race against the clock and avoid the deadly skulls. The player also must make a safe path away from the deadly spikes (which starts on level 5) - even when invulnerable. This game is very cruel, but challenging, but the player will be starting with 5 lives.

If you take a look below, I have designed the first level (level 05 - not level 01), which features the deadly spikes. The spikes animate by rising and falling. The player can pass the spikes easily if a blank path is available.

My quick plan for Spider Maze 2

My plan for Spider Maze 2 is to feature 16 levels (I think the game perhaps could be hard enough with 16 levels). As you start each level, less time is available to complete it (by 200). The first 8 levels start with slow spiders, then levels 9-16 removes the drag rate of the spiders, forcing them to move the same speed as the player. The game aims to be more colourful and even more frantic compared to the previous Spider Maze.  

Other plans include making music and mixing sound effects with the in game music. I have not decided which music composer I will be using to make this new game, but it is likely that I could be using either GT Ultra V1.5.5 with SFX support or Electronic Music System V7.03 and code my customise sound effects. It is likely to be the first option, depending on time.


Target release date of the game

The release date aims to be some time in February 2026. This is not going to be a long game project, since the code from the first Spider Maze (Tutorial test version) is being adapted to this new game. Although I cannot give you a full date release when the game will be launched. The game will feature on my itch.io showcase when it is ready for release. Like all T.N.D games, Spider Maze 2 will be free to download and also an online web player version will be featured on my itch.io page.

Cruiser-X 79 - Ultra Violet

 Wow, there has been quite a delay since I last did my last level design on Cruiser-X 79. Well, it was due to working between other game projects. I had the PONG jam, also Alf Yngve's Captain Ishtar project (Which is nearing to completion). Finally a secret game project I was working on for an upcoming covermount for Zzap! 64. Unfortunately the game project has been very problematic so close to the deadline. 

Anyway, moving on forward to Cruiser-X 79. This time it is level 12. It is also the return of the vegetation zone, but this time, I called it "Ultra Violet". This is because the game uses an ultra violet blue scheme instead of green. The idea sounds quite weird but the colour scheme has actually turned out quite good. Also yet again, the music for the game is trance music, similar to the style of level 5. I have added less walls for this level, as the enemies for this stage are getting quite harder and faster.

Cruiser-X 79 - April Update #1

14th April 2021  

Previous update was deleted along with the Para Lander DX blog entry. This entry from 3rd April  is what has been remembered from that day.

3rd April 2021

Last time I was dealing with alien patterns. The next task was to put these into levels. I also was setting up the colour settings for each level table. Of course, last time all aliens were put into order of sequence and were being tested.

That week (for this part in the development) I mainly focused on the level alien attack patterns. Instead of all aliens being in sequence 0-40. I setup alien selection tables for each level. The idea was to ensure that each table has a specific level of difficulty. There are 40 different alien tables (some of which are duplicated enemies doing different things). The idea is that the harder faster enemies get used after a few levels. There are 16 levels in total.

Now that all the alien patterns are in place for each level. There is not really much I can do to the game right now. Although I will need to work on doing different tunes for each level of the game. 16 different tunes might be too many to compose, so maybe I do a few tunes and then create a table to load specific music files. Still, that will do for now :)

 

 

theC64 Challenege #6 Para Lander DX - Part 2/3

 1st April - 13th April 2021 (Continued)

Last time in my blog I mentioned about the Para Lander Mini, and also how I thought the game was finished. Things did not really go according to plan. In this next part, this is where I decided to stick to 64tass instead of using Turbo Macro Pro. 

 

Last time

I prepared, designed and developed an enhanced edition of Para Lander DX on theC64 with aid of an Action Replay cartridge plugin, some C64 applications, including Turbo Macro Pro. I worked my socks off on the game project and finally came out with a working game. However things did not turn out how I expected. Although I had a fully working title screen, hi-score table and game. There were some elements missing in the game. So here is what happened.

A new intro - Nice

Friday last week I ended up with a new picture for a TND intro by Hugues. I worked on programming it, added a Future Composer soundtrack, and the result turned out great. I then packed and crunched the game with the Sledge Hammer II and Cruel Cruncher V2.5+ to continue with the old-school theme. Then I wrote the game documentation. Unfortunately however the game was still not ready to release. So it was back to the game code once more.

Random situation

The game was working out quite well, but the main problem was the game play. The zeppelins were moving slow across the screen but the game was just too easy to play. I decided to create a random table of speed and I set random speed timers and pointers to the zeppelins. Unfortunately however I was unable to continue using Turbo Macro Pro as once again, the bottom area of the screen messed up and this time it crashed. This de-motivated me more from using Turbo Macro Pro for this game. I must have used all the memory perhaps?

As a drastic measure I decided to from now with the project use the 64tass on my PC. I created the random tables, generated them and compiled the game (and crunched it with Exomizer) and run the game in VICE. It was working quite nicely. After I completed the first round, Zeppelins randomly changed their speed. I came across another issue. The zeppelins were going past too fast. 

This resulted to only setting the speed of the zeppelin to the slowest speed, and play with the drag rates, between 0 and 3. After compiling and sharing the build with Hugues and another tester. They felt that the game would be better off using levels. So ...

Rank up

I felt there was something missing in the hi-score display. The title and game have music, but the hi-score display re-uses the title music. I felt that there should be at least one more tune for the game. For this, I decided to browse through the HVSC under my name, and I found a tune I feel that would have been great for the high score table. Feel Great. As a bonus this tune was also composed in DMC V4.0. I relocated the music to $8000, and placed it into the game project c64 folder and re-built the source. It worked. Excellent.

Level up

Random zeppelins in the game code didn't really work out, so it was time to make levels. Actually that was pretty much simple. I deleted all of the random tables and I entered the drag speed value for each level. The table for each zeppelin's drag rate was 16 bytes. The drag rate was still set between 0-3. Although setting the drag rate of 3 to 2 sort of looks as if the zeppelins are moving at the same speed, but in fact the speed is actually set to faster. After setting up the last level the game should loop. I then re-linked the game to the TND intro and prepared for a release candidate on my Ultimate 64. Yet again I used the native C64 tools to pack and crunch the game, like it would have been back in the 1990's. I then sent the game to testers. Some bad news - there were still bugs.

Stop bugging me

I decided at the end that I'll just stick to using 64TASS and Exomizer for all the packing and linking of this project, but I can disguise it to look like some of the old memorable packers . This saves me having to mess about all the time using old packers and crunchers just for the sake of old-school - then finding out something else gone wrong with this project.

The bugs in the game were that the hi score name entry routine allowed unwanted characters, which made a mess in the name entry. This was supposed to allow alpha-numeric characters, delete, space bar and return keys only It turned out I had set an incorrect range value (perhaps a typo) that read from number 0 and all the PETSCII character code before shift+A. Pah!

The second bug was that the total number of levels = 15 instead of 16 before looping back to 01. I set an incorrect value in the level compare code. It should have read 17 as the max value instead of 16, otherwise it would have been 15 levels. I re-compiled the source and fed the project through Exomizer, and after a few seconds, the game was working. The game has now been sent to the testers. Hopefully this could be a better result. We'll have to wait and see.

Update: Still not ready yet, but nearly there. Fingers crossed ;)

March 2021 Cruiser-X Progress Update #2

 27th March 2021

A couple of weeks ago I had left you with where I last left off. It was mainly based on the power ups based system. Now 2 weeks later, more work gets done. Last week, I finished off fixing the SEUCK Title Screen Maker disk, by fixing a bug in one of the example games (Which wasn't the fault of the title screen maker).

This session was mainly based on level setup. Of course I may not have the level graphics yet for level packing, etc. First I have to set up different sound effects for each bullet type the player carries.

I can still start on setting up the level scheme and enemy selection. Last time I managed to get all enemies to appear in order of sequence. Today I have been making a sequence for level 1 of the game. This is now based on the colour scheme table read, and also the alien selection table (based on levels).

After setting up the level routines, the enemies are able to fire bullets but the bullets do not collide into the player. So in order to fix this, a subroutine is programmed in to read the X, Y co-ordinate range of both sprites, and if inside the collision area. The player will die, unless a shield is in place. Then the player respawns.

Well, that looks good, but not really good enough. When shooting at aliens or shooting destructable background characters, The player should score points. A subroutine reads pointers for the player's score, lives and level. Then it copies it to the score panel on screen. I decided to do it this way this time round, because it is a way to prevent the player cheating by freezing the game with the Action Replay cartridge and editing the score/lives value with the screen editor. I cannot code protection routines, plus I cannot be bothered with those anyway :)

The enemy scoring should be based on the enemy sequence value that is used. I set a new table which creates the new score values for each alien, after it has been shot. The values are based as 1-5. Where 500 points is the maximum score which the player can score. Shooting background and collecting power ups also gives the player some points.So can the activation of the player's smart bomb (Which is triggered with the fire button).

The player's lives indicator also needed to be updated to decrement, and when lives have reached 00, the player will lose the game, and GAME OVER commences. Of course even if I was updating score, lives and level pointers (or restarting the game) I would need to update the score panel via a subroutine.  I am happy that it all seems to be working.

Now on to one final problem. The alien spawn sequence is set based on the chosen level, the enemy bullet can now kill the player, the score panel is working. The final problem for today - the aliens are firing too rapidly. How can that be solved? Simple, before randomly selecting the enemy to shoot a bullet. A delay pointer, and delay expiry counter should be set. Adding one of those makes the enemy fire bullets less rapidly. There is a chance I could make a table like with the scoring table, where I could base the enemy firing rate. That might be some time next weekend. We will have to wait and see. But for now, here's an updated video of my work in progress.

Lockdown and Loaded

13th March - 6th May 2020

Like many of you, I have been stuck indoors in lockdown. While this lock down has been in place I have been very busy on various C64 game projects. I managed to complete a few over the past 2 or 3 months. Since 15th March 2020. Since I suspect you probably be interested in reading about the game projects, rather than lockdown and all of this. Here is the line up.

Nucleo 448

I teamed up with Leonardo Vettori, to help him improve his game Nucleo 447, by giving it a set of in game enhancements. The game was of course renamed Nucleo 448. This game was originally an entry from last year's Official C64 SEUCK Compo 2019 compo. I helped Leonardo ramp this game up to be more playable and fun. With aid of Martin Piper's framework for SEUCK (SEUCK Redux). Nucleo 448 had a new front end presentation power ups (which allowed the player's bullet to fire faster), in game trance music and also enemy fire AI.

Toilet Paper Stacker

I launched a Lockdown fun compo 2020 on CSDB, in which people could enter the compo and submit either a game, demo or graphics. Music was ruled out of the compo, because there was already a music compo in place. Toilet Paper Stacker was one of these stacker type of games, with a funny theme based on past events. The idea of the game was to stack over sized toilet roll on to a cabinet so that it breaks and kill the virus.

Zzapped in the Butt

Craptastic 2020 was launched earlier on this year. Zzapped in the Butt (Guess where the name ZZapped came from ;)) is a retro style space shoot 'em up. A mother ship is waiting to invade planet Earth, but cannot enter the Earth's atmosphere. So instead, it sends out various aliens to help invade the planet. The ship has to defend its military cities from aliens. The mother ship also decides to attempt to zap your ship in the butt. The game consists of more than 30 levels. Everything crammed into 4K. Expect to see that appear on your C64 in June. :)

Cruiser X-79 (Still in progress)

The vertical scrolling shoot 'em up game project was delayed for some time, but now it has come back in action. New alien movement patterns have been added to the game's code. Not all of the aliens have been put in place, as there are still some more movements in operation. A lot more work has been put into the game project today. Where, I try and restore the alien sprite/sprite collision and do a bit more debugging. Hopefully some time later on this week (or perhaps next week) I should be able to try and restore the game's main game play and get those aliens happy blasting.

All of these games can be found and downloaded from THE NEW DIMENSION for your C64, Ultimate, or theC64

(Except for the latest Cruiser-X 79 preview and Zzapped in the Butt)

theC64 Mini Weekend dev challenge #1

20th-21st April 2018

A couple of weeks ago, I bought myself a theC64 mini console, and I loved it. The built in games were cool. However I needed to purchase a USB keyboard, so this week I did exactly that. Set up a multi-USB adapter with the C64Mini (An old one) and everything was working. I was able to play multiple games from a .D64 (D82 image renamed to .d64). Now I realized. Wouldn't it be cool if I set myself a Dev challenge. Announced on theC64 Mini Users Group. I decided to set myself an assembly programming challenge.

CHALLENGE #1 - OLDSCHOOL INTRO

20th April 2018

I set myself a challenge, which was to create and develop my very own oldschool cracktro style intro using theC64 Mini. I was able to select some of the classic public domain utilities, that were released by the C64 demoscene back in the good old C64 scene days, and get those on to a D82 image (via dir master). Then I renamed the .D82 to 'theC64-drive8.d64' using my 1541Ultimate 2. Now it was time for me to get to work.

The Logo:

In order for me to design the logo. I went for a very classic utility from the 1980's called Centauri Logo Editor (Pictured below). I wanted to draw my own logo for this challenge. I went for an oldschool design idea. The idea was simply to draw a logo that was embossed inside a plaque. I got a bit carried away with the logo design, and pixed inside the words TND some stars and basic shading. Of course the logo was limited to 3 colours. After finishing the logo, I converted the Hires/Multicolour bitmap into a Font+Screen matrix format and the saved the font+screen files separately.

The Charset:

I wanted to create two character sets for the intro. They were 1x1 hires and 2x2 multicolour. I loaded in Shape's Font Editor V3.0. There was no joystick function for designing the font, so I used the USB keyboard to pixel the correct colours into the correct position in the grid. I was very happy with the 2x2 charset, the same for the 1x1 charset. Not a bad result.

The Music:

Now that I was 100% happy with the graphics. I got started on composing some music. For this I used Graffity's DMC V4.0 (Pictured below). I found it quite awkward to work out the key-mapping on the USB keyboard at first, but managed to get around it afterwards. The tune was to sound oldschool in a sort of Future Composer kind of way. I decided not to use FC, due to the possibility of the program crashing should DUR/SND be in the wrong place. I would not have been able to get back to the music editor if it did crash. I created some oldschool instruments using DMC's sound and filter editor. A little further experimenting came out before coming out with a final piece of music, called Laser Light. I was very pleased with the result.

The Sprites: I originally chose Shape's Sprite Editor V1.7, but after creating some star sprites for the intro. I realised it was just impossible for me to save the sprites. There was no save option implemented. So I decided to use  Graphic Editor, also by Shape. I created a series of sprite frames for the animated stars. Then saved everything

Coding/Linking:

Before I was able to do some programming. I needed to work out where I should place data and code. In order for me to complete my task. First however, I needed to use a M/C monitor, for loading/saving data during the coding process. I loaded up Black/Angel's improved version of Omicron's Turbo Assembler from the filebrowser menu then added a JMP $FCE2. This forced the C64 to do a soft reset. I was then able to load in the Code Suck Monitor into $5000 (Since my intro was intended to be only use data+code from $0c00-$4500 - where $4500 is where linked programs will go). I set CSM to load the following data to the following addresses in memory:

- Music: $1000-$1fff
- Logo Charset: $2000-$2800
- Logo Matrix: $0C00-$0e00
- 1x1 Charset: $2800-$2a00 ($2a00-$2c00 reserved for the star field source)
- Sprite anim frames: $2c00-$2fff
- 2x2 Charset: $3000-$3800



I went back to the turbo assembler by calling J 9000 in CSM. Then I programmed my own text routine, for writing the intro text, and also the scroll text. The intro text was placed at $3c00, and the scroll text was placed at $3800. Now it was time to code the main intro.

So then what was done in the main intro code. Well, for a start off, I needed to program an IRQ interrupt to ensure that music was okay and in working order. Then, I started to add more and pieces of code, and placing those together with the assembler. Basically, create a subroutine that displayed the text, logo and scroller charset using the default PETSCII. After I was happy with the result. Some more raster splits were added inside the code. One of which was to display the logo charset+screen, the presentation lines charset, and the 2x2 scroll text - and get everything smooth running. A good result.

Although everything displayed nicely. I felt that the intro looked too plan. So I decided to code a few raster colour bars. They got displayed, but the rasters needed timing out. Although I always had difficulties with raster timing, when coding intros/demos - I had no problem with this one. All 3 rasters were nicely timed out on PAL machines. It was getting late, so I decided to create a save state of the intro (as well as save the intro data + code done so far).

21st April 2018

More coding:

Last night I was very happy with the result of the intro, so far made on my theC64 Mini. Now it was time for me to add a bit of code to the intro. I felt that the presentation lines were just too plain. There needed to be something behind the text. So I decided to create an additional table which produced 6 characters for a flying star field. I put the star field into place. Added a little more code that could flash the text, and avoid the starfield from also flashing. Then I added the flying sprites and code. A final result. Finally the main code has finished. It was time to code a relocator subroutine then put everything together using the save option in CSM. (s "introfinal",8,0c00,4500)


Compression:

The intro (pictured) was complete, but there was one more thing I needed to do. Compile and compress the final intro, so that it was runnable from BASIC. Since I wanted to do things sort of late 1980's/Early 1990's style. I loaded up Compactor/Linker V4S by E.C.A Industries, a very old packer/linker, which did its job fine on my intro. Then to finish it off. S&T's 2mhz Time Crunch V5.0. The final intro was made and it all worked out quite nicely.

My weekend challenge of programming on theC64 Mini was very successful. :) I was very pleases with my result.

Want to see the intro? Download it from here, and place on to a USB Stick on your theC64 Mini and enjoy. I have also provided the Public Domain utilities that helped support me producing this production so you can see how the intro was made and put together. This intro can also be run on WinVice, and CCS64. Enjoy :)

Cruiser X-79 Update #9

13th - 18th August 2017

Not much happened on the game programming front, but at least I made an effort to do something for the production. While I was away from this project for a few weeks or so, I recently received some new graphics for the game. It wasn't more levels, but graphics for a new front end. Saul Cross designed a great new logo for the title screen. So what happened this week? I programmed a front end and bolted it to the game, itself. Hope you like the result.

While I am waiting for the new level maps, I will be working on the order of alien attack patterns according to levels, and of course re-use the test level's map and setup different colour schemes for each level. Each alien attack pattern consists of 26 bytes, so hopefully I should have enough memory to store compressed levels of each map, then extract each level to address $4800-$5800 (since $5800 is the start address of the game's code). Each level should not exceed 320 4x4 blocks in height, as at the end of the 320th block row a level complete is automatically detected. :)

For now, here's the result of the title screen - although it is not official at the moment :) Enjoy the video.

Cruiser X-79 - Update #8

20th-24th June 2017

It has been too hot this week, apart from yesterday and today. Despite the really hot UK weather I had recently, still that hasn't stopped  me from doing more on this game project. Quite a big update as well.

So then what has been happening this time round. For a start off I continued from a couple of weeks ago. This was where code was based on sprite / background collision. I originally worked on a subroutine where the player crashed should it hit a deadly character. Now this time I focused on the player bullet shooting to deadly background. I tried doing the bullet/background table read method, but that didn't quite work out. There were times where the player bullet kept on missing the deadly background and the bullet just flew over. A bit of additional hard work was required to this. I created a large listing to compare to a certain character to the bullet object position. If the central bullet reaches the deadly background, the bullet will disappear. Thus allowing the player to fire again. After testing this phase, things looked much better.

The next step was to do a little something different. I worked on the new title music for the game, using GoatTracker. I was unable to combine the title music with the other sounds, as there was a memory overlap. So I trimmed out the title music and placed it into a separate position and put it in the temporary preview title screen. I also programmed built in option where using a joystick in port 2 selects the sound mode (Music + SFX, Music Only, SFX Only, Silence).

Today I have been working on fixing some of the bugs in the game, and also adding some additional sprites. The sprites which represented Game Over and Stage Complete. In the stage complete phase, the player ship is automatically central before the Level Complete message appears on screen. During the player moving or the game over scene, all sprites get switched off, then after fitting the Game Over, Well Done screen, only 2 sprites are switched on.

The main game had some problems with the alien formation test. There were aliens that appeared incorrectly on screen while moving. I had forgotten to update offset code to reset the formation counter, so that aliens started in the correct position. After trying the game out, things looked very promising indeed. That was until, I came across the camel head aliens. They were flickering everywhere instead of using a proper formation. I managed to fix this problem by updating the low+hi byte tables for alien formation and properties. I tested the whole thing again and things looked a whole lot better.

As my final task today. I took a look at IRQ source code and tried to implement some subroutines. Reason being - The aliens and laser sprites were still visible over the black raster, that covers the scrolling background. In order to fix this problem, I altered the background colour to black (So no grey raster line could be seen). Then after that, a new subroutine was added to mask existing sprites as blank sprites. The trick worked, and the result was pretty good - although there is a minor glitch inside the score panel raster. It flickers for a split millisecond, but all in all, the game is playable.

Still no selected alien formation for each level yet, but that will be happening some time soon. Enjoy the latest video of what has been resulted this week.

Zenox Attack is now Cruiser X-79

25th March 2017

It has been a very long time since the last time I was working on this space shoot 'em up. Probably due to the long term lack in motivation to code a new game. Also due to getting sidetracked with other tasks as well. Not, to mention the organizing of the SEUCK Compo 2016/17, and getting the prizes done quickly before my holiday ended last week.


Now finally I have returned to this game project. Also I have migrated this game project over to Arthur Jordison's CBMPRGStudio V3.10.0, a great C64 programming suite on the PC. Come BASIC or assembly. :). I have renamed the game project Cruiser X-79.

A lot of changes to the code and also music has been made, although I don't really have anything specifically new to show you at the moment. The same graphics, and also the same sprites are currently used. However the game features new music, which I think works quite well with this game project so far.

So then, what things have been going on this week. Well, for a start off, after the migration of the code and data into CBMPRGSTUDIO V3.10.0 (As I promised Arthur, I create something using his C64 development suite). I created some subroutines, which perform a check when is the best time to spawn aliens. Only a small simple test has been made to test the alien spawning. Basically, check to see if any aliens are offset in the game. If so, then wait until all aliens are out of the screen (or dead). Then set the timer to wait for new aliens to spawn.

Another subroutine created, linked to enemies, are based on enemy movement. I created some checks to see which direction the last alien movement should be, and also which part of the screen should the alien exit. Should an alien leave the screen going a certain direction, the subroutine automatically kills that particular alien.

The video below shows the latest ongoing progress of this game project, which will be released at The New Dimension games division on the downloads page - for absolutely nothing. The game design isn't all that exciting at the moment. No change to graphics or sprites at the moment, but eventually it will happen. Aliens only move straight formation, but I will do better ones in the future. Enjoy the video of the preview and expect to see more progress during the times ahead :)

And the name of the game is ... Zenox Attack

27th - 28th January 2017

My week's holiday has come to an end, and things are back to normal once again. Most of the holiday was mainly composing music, and also starting on a C64 game project, formerly known as an unnamed shoot 'em up. Well,guess what? The game now has a name. I have decided to call it Zenox Attack.

Yesterday I made a start on the new in game graphics, which gives a sort of a Denarius feeling to it. If you look at the video carefully, you'll notice how much hard work I spent on creating the very first level.

On the alien sprites front. I designed some test alien sprites, which haven't been animated. Also I programmed in some in game sound effects, which could be used when mixed with in game music through my GoatTracker tunes. The player can play sounds when firing lasers. The aliens now have a box sprite/sprite collision detection. The enemy movement isn't very exciting, and the aliens cannot fire. This will be changed next time I work on this project, sometime next week (As well as Precinct 20 - Dead Strange, a SEUCK Redux creation by Alf Yngve). For now, enjoy this second WIP video with remnants of the game in action.

Scrolling without S.E.U.C.K

25th January 2016

 Flipping heck. This week has been a SEUCK marathon. Anyway, time for a little change. Back in 2015, I mentioned to some people in the past that I'd love to attempt to create a vertical scrolling shoot 'em up game, without the aid of SEUCK. I examined the code in Codebase64 and I managed to get a rough map scroller. However getting a soft scroll to work right was a plain in the backside. So I left the code for a couple of years or so backed up.

However last week, I attempted to continue achieve my goal. Basically by getting the soft scroll to work much better. There were a few mistakes left in the scrolling code last time. It turned out that I wasn't copying the last row, and pasting it inside a subroutine. Also the score panel at the bottom of the screen was flickering like hell. In order to solve the problem, I examined some code in an old TND Contributor's C64 game, to see how the status panel stayed static while a vertical scrolling map was scrolling down. I noticed something very interesting. A stack inside an interrupt, had a control over the VIC2 Screen vertical position, which made the status panel more still. I attempted to place a similar routine, and that trick worked. The VSP scroll worked a treat.

This week, I have been making some more alterations to the scroller framework, and started a little game project. At the moment it is an Unnamed Shoot Em Up, (which the video below will show you). However I'm feeling ambitious to make a sort of a onward scrolling Denarius/Warhawk style futuristic shoot 'em up, without the aid of SEUCK. I created some test sprites and a little test panel in order to get the player moving and blasting. The asteroids that move constantly cannot be shot, and will not be the only thing in the game. This is just the start of a fresh new C64 game project I am willing to produce this year :)

RUN - RUN - THE INVASION HAS STARTED

28th October 2016

It is currently my second, but last day of my holiday, and things will start to quieten down even more from next week, due to even less free time. Although C64 activities will occasionally continue. Now today, you had better run (To the TND web site) as the invasion has just started.

Yes, indeed. The New Dimension finally launches 'Let's Invade'. A souped up Space Invaders style game with a major twist of audio and psychedelic visual. If you would like to check the full game out, in VICE, CCS64, Micro64 or your own C64 with 1541Ultimate, SDIEC or whatever. The game is best played on a CRT monitor, rather than an LED TV. Although I use an LED TV to save space, and no longer use a CRT. I set my C64 to a HDMI S-Video to HDMI convertor, and set my 19" TV to PC mode. That's where the best picture comes from my TV SET.

In this game, you have been transported into a vortex, where you will encounter some of the meanest invaders. In order to save planet Earth, you have to battle over 40 different waves of alien invasion. Luckily for you, you can pick up power ups, simply by blasting the orange aliens. However, power ups are timed, unless you have picked up a speed / firepower speed power up. Those of which only get lost if a mischievous invader gives you DEFAULT or you lose a life, by hitting their bomb, or an Invade occurs.

The game consists of psychedelic void scrolling visual effects, with strobe flashing and optional thumping in game trance SID music. The strobe effects also be disabled on the red startup screen. There's also assorted level setup, where more aliens will require more than 1 hit to be destroyed. The game is based on shaded colour, where the dark coloured aliens are weaker, compared to their counterparts. The brightest aliens will require even more hits before they can be eliminated. Alien behaviour is also different. The more aliens shot, the aliens will move a different way. Making this game slightly more original.

Full documentation on the game has also been included in the zip archive.

Should you wish to save the world from alien invasion, then why not DOWNLOAD "Let's Invade" for absolutely nothing, and then install it on your Commodore 64, VICE or whatever.

Let's Invade at The New Dimension


The game is produced on disk and tape.

Sadly there is no 16KB cartridge version of the game, due to the size of the overall production exceeding it.

Let The Invasion Commence [Part 10]

1st October - 8th October

The week was really quiet on the Let's Invade, project. Apart from the weekend, where a lot of activity has been made in this game. I was pondering for some handy information on generating random bullet firing for the aliens. Well, it turned out very bad last week, where I really got stuck. This week however was a completely different kettle of fish ... for better it was too :)

I was thinking in my head that the way I did the alien bullet random position subroutine shouldn't be based on wrapping in memory the low and hi-bytes of the alien colour, position, and sprite X position. Instead, it would have been better to generate a 256 byte table of values ranging from 1 to 25. So I generated a simple BASIC listing, to place a series of random tables in memory $1000-$1100. Then saved the table and then I extracted the random generated table file to the KickAssembler project folder. Next I created a command to open C64 the file (RandTable.PRG) for assembling.

The file imported into the source okay, however I needed to generate some more code, to set a looping value of 1 to 25. So a couple of subroutines were called in. One for moving to the NEXT value read from the random pointers (RandTable.PRG). Then store to the value of the actual pointer. Then a subroutine that calls the fetch table and check for which alien the bullet should be placed on. I also created a check in which commands an alien to not drop a bullet, if it is dead. I had a better result, but for some strange reason, the bullets appeared from the upper border. I played around with the subroutine, to work out what was causing this problem. Then set up a boundary for the bullet. Basically if the bullet tries to leave the top border and enter the screen, zero position the X + Y value of it. That helped me solve the problem.

Another small bug occurred in the game. After finishing playing the first game. I tested the pause/quit function to ensure the game works as it should. Unfortunately the game didn't quit, but made a CPU JAM in vice (A crash). So I did a little bug fix to sort out the problem. The game then seems to have been working okay. It looks as if now, the game could be finished. But I'll see what the testers find, that will cause problems to the game.

While I'm was waiting for a result. I have been composing some loading music for the game's tape loader system (Thunderload). Since the theme of the game is a 'Trance' based theme. The loading music ended up with pumping speed. The drums however didn't use the filtered kick and snare. Instead I set a different waveform to use a filter. The result turned out quite nicely. I have been working on making a tape master for the game. I am hoping that the result will turn out pretty good at the end. There was a slight error with the tape mastering, where I placed the loading text in the wrong place, but everything else worked quite nicely. That bug can easily be fixed no problem. :)

I'm not ready to release the game just yet. Hopefully SOON!

Let the Invasion Commence [Part 8]

18th - 24th September 2016

Earlier on this week, I did an upscroll for the high score table and also the end sequence. This time I wanted to add a little more code to make a much better ending. After all, I don't want the gamers to play the game to the end and be rewarded just an upward scrolling message, saying well done. Instead I wanted a scenario for the ending. So I drew two single screens, using CharPad, and then setup the attributes.I also drew some new sprites for the ending as well.

After the 2 screens were finished, it was time to code an ending, as a reward for the player to finish the game. I programmed the first scene, and set an interval before the next scene went on to the game. After the second scene was drawn on to the screen, I worked on getting the sprites animated and leave the screen, when required to do so. Then linked the overall thing before the end scroll.

I was very happy with the result so far, but noticed that the upscroll didn't work 100% on NTSC, although it worked will with PAL. After a quick fix, the game got submitted to two of my testers who tested and helped me with Honey Bee. :) One of the testers emailed me about the in game flashing feature. He suggested I should add a health and safety notice, like I did with Sheepoid. Also add an option to the notice to be able to disable the strobe effects. The front end also had a minor adjustment, where the squares around the logo was replaced by Asterisk stars, and flash. Apart from that, the game is now being tested.

Let's Invade is planned to be released in Autumn 2016, but not until it is 100% ready. The BETA testing is now in session. :)

Let the Invasion Commence [Part 7] - Are we there yet?

12th - 17th September 2016

Last week ended in disaster. It was time to pick up the pieces and continue from the previous source which was backed up. If you may have remembered, I managed to get the aliens move the full screen, like normal space invaders would, using sprites. Unfortunately that also caused major problems with the movement of the player.The code then got unstable. Since I had major difficulties with this last week. I decided to roll back to the previous source code and have aliens moving their limited position. This actually makes this Space Invaders style game unique. Get yourself for a bumpy ride as it is episode 7 of:

Let's Invade!

Earlier on this week, I had a bit of a surprise from Errazking. He worked on a loading picture for the game. I didn't really expect to have a loading picture, since I was originally going to create a unique tape loader system which animated aliens and had both border and background loading stripes using the EOR 2-coloured loader with loading noise. Although a loading picture was done. It doesn't mean I cannot use the loading picture, for the sake of the tape loader idea. I can easily implement a subroutine to blank out the flashing $D021 stripes then play loading music. The disk loader will just be what I usually do. Display a picture, load via IRQ turbo or non IRQ kernal loader and display the 'Press Space' flashing sprites. ... but I'm not quite ready for that part of the project yet :)

This week however, after restoring a previous save of the game (before the mess was made last week). I had to re-copy/paste the rest of the levels into the source code. I was very lucky to have had the new source with the 40 levels also stored on the hard disk drive. As soon as this was done, I decided to work on something else... Power Ups. Yes, most of this week was based on in game power ups.Before I did that however, I created a subroutine that morphed the player bullet into an explosion for every alien killed.

I started creating and testing power ups manually. The power ups should take place when an alien has been shot. The power ups should also be random. This took me a few days to sort out some power ups for the game, but it sure was worth the effort. I made some power ups to be quite special, and some power ups timed. I implemented subroutines that gave the player ability to fire faster bullets, or move at a faster pace. Unless a life was lost.There's also a feature called DEFAULT, which the player loses all power ups.

Orange aliens could also award the player SPECIAL limited features, such as:

- Alien Trance - Freezes the aliens for a short period of time - except for their bombs, they can still drop those respectably.

- Super Shield - Protects the player from alien bullets for a short period of time. Although the player can be protected from bullets, it should not be protected from the aliens themselves.

- Smart Bomb - Allows the player to destroy the whole group of aliens, by pressing DOWN on the joystick. It fades out all of the aliens and moves on to the next level. Just like with the Super Shield. I have decided to make this power up very limited against time.

- Blackout - Sometimes having a rotating grid behind the aliens can be quite distracting, so as a special power up (like with the smart bomb feature), a timed Blackout feature removes the rotating background and makes the screen black. It also removes the trance beats from the score panel at times.

When I tried out the power ups, and set their timers, they all worked a treat and the result was quite rewarding. However, the player would have needed to know which power up is carried. In order to solve this issue. I created a timed text display over the score panel. Should an event occur, the text should display a message. As soon as this was working well, I worked on some extra tunes for the hi-score table and game ending.

After being very happy with the result with the music. I worked on the high score table. Unlike a normal 5 list high score table. I decided to use a list of 20 names. I had this idea in my head, which was to generate a 2x2 char upscroller for displaying the list. I programmed a new routine that would do exactly that job. I also added the hi-score trance music into the code, and tested it. Looks great, but wouldn't it be better if I actually added the invaders going down on the hi-score list?. This now got implemented.

The next task was to actually getting the high-score position detected. In the hi-score listing source file. I added some more code, in which allows the user to enter his/her initials for a place in the high score table, and then get the score and name placed into the hi-score hall of fame. Finally, I implemented a hi-score saver subroutine, in order to write the high scores on to a .d64 should the game be running through a disk image. A hi-score loader on boot-up also got implemented.

Next I wasn't too happy with some of the in game sound effects, so I made some major tweaks to the sound effects to make then sound more 8-bit Commodore 64 arcade style. Although I was happy with alien movement sound. Which of course that stays. Some new sound effects were created for alien destroyed, alien hit (and changes colour), and also the player death.

Finally to end the day with the project. I created an ending. Once again an up scroll with well done text. There is still room for some more sprites and code for the ending, so maybe next week I could implement something quite special.

Overall this week was probably the BEST week for me on this project so far. A lot of work has been done on the game. I have been really impressed with the results of the game so far. I look forward to next week to create an additional ending to accompany the end up scroll. After all I don't think people would want just a simple up scroll for an ending, straight after completing the game. There should be a scenario for the end after all. Besides I don't think I'd want a very low score for a game ending. Heheheheh. :)

You won't be able to play the game yet. However to tease you, here's a video of the latest progress (minus the end screen) - Well, I am not that good at playing C64 games, never mind programming them. :D

Let the Invasion commence [Part 3]

20th August 2016 - 27th August 2016

You may have remembered that back in July 2016, I had started on a few games, and ended up releasing a playable preview of Let's Invade. Well good news is that, although I am still at the early stages of the game project, things are starting to shape up quite nicely. THIS WEEK in fact. 11 levels have been placed into the game code, a couple of extra alien colours have been added. A built in 'transparent and solid' mode option also got built into the code. Finally animated background replaces the background scheme (due to colour clashing - aliens were too hard to see at times). Each level should have a different background tile scheme in the near future.

Most of this week's session was basically working on getting each level set up. 11 levels have been done so far. Early levels have a few aliens, then as each level advances, more aliens will appear on to the screen. After five levels, Aliens appear in lighter colours. Those aliens will require more than just one hit. Levels 5 - 10 use this method, and the game sorts of intensifies a little. Should I get round to adding more levels to the game, the plans are that levels 11 - 15 will require aliens that need 3 hits to kill ... 16-20 is planned to intensify the game even more where the 1x,2x,3x aliens to hit are mixed. Later levels will lower the position of the aliens, and probably speed them up. I added couple of extra colours (purple and orange) in the macro source, where a purple alien will give the player an extra life, and the orange gives a power up or a power down. (Not implemented yet, only changes the border colour for the timebeing).

After the levels are complete, I aim to focus on the 2x2 scrolling tile graphics, and make the scrolling of each tile move according to a timer (Remember the TND Intro 2014 intro I did for Dark Force, during February 2014?). Also there's in game trance music, power ups and presentation to focus on.

Keep an eye on my next blog to find out the next update with this project. :)



Looks a bit like something in the early 1980's with that border eh? Well, things will be modern in this game project sooner or later :)

Let the INVASION commence [PART 1]

4th July 2016 - 9th July 2016

This week, has been quite an active week. Especially after wondering what to do for a small future game project. During my childhood, through to now. I always enjoyed Retro Games, and 'Space Invaders' was one of my all time favourite games in the arcades. Well, that's it. I'll code my own 'Space Invaders' type of game. ... BUT WITH A DIFFERENCE. :).

Many C64 Space invaders games used either 1X2 or 2X2 char sets.  There were some great classic remakes of this game. Take for example 'Invaders 64' by LiveWire, for example. It used 1x2 char sets for the invaders, but the game was pretty much slow and too easy. There was also Firebird Software's "Arcade Classics". Another stunning collection of simple arcade classics, by Ubik. The Space Invaders game was great. It used 3x2 charsets (if I worked that out right). What about my Space Invaders? ... I always hated coding charset movements and got into loads of scrapes with it. So, as an alternative. I decided to go with SPRITES.

Behold the beginning of a new C64 project called:

LET'S INVADE

First steps: Sprites

For the first part of the little project, I booted up Sprite Pad. I drew some sprites for the player ship, the player's bullet, 2 frames for the aliens and also the player and alien explosion sprites. I also created the GAME OVER text using sprites as well. I generated .PRG files for the game project.

Next step: Charsets

For the main game, I want to be able to use a 2x2 charset for the text and scoring panel. So, I loaded up Cuneiform, and designed a hires-character set.




Big leap: Coding

The next step was to program the game. For this little project, I decided to use Notepad++ with KickAssembler and Exomizer plugins. This would make my game development a whole lot easier. The user of MACRO commands inside KickAssembler, also makes my C64 coding life a whole lot better as well. I programmed the game by generating multiple interrupts that can display 1 sprite for the player, bullet and alien bullets. As you know the Commodore 64 can limit itself to 8 sprites by default. If I had just 8 sprites in this game, it would have been too boring :). I wanted 25 sprites for the aliens. In order to do this, I had to use multiple rasters through an interrupt. Basically the so-called 'Fake-Multiplexor'.

After getting all of the sprites to display, the next task was to get the aliens moving. In order to get the aliens moving, I created a timer in which controls a delay of the alien movement. Then after the delay timer has reached a set interval, a subroutine is called to flip the alien sprite animation. Once an alien reaches the end of the screen area, a raster position moves down 8 pixels, forcing the aliens to move down. Then alien movement swaps direction.

Now aliens were able to move left/right and drop down a row, etc. The next step was to have an active player and bullet moving. The player gets controlled using a joystick plugged into port 2. Eventually, I might also add a keyboard control for player controls. Pressing fire tests the player's bullet. If the player bullet is still active, then another bullet cannot be shot until after the bullet has left the screen.

The tricky bit was setting up the collision for aliens to player bullet. I needed to set the sprite/alien collision, according to the sprite position, raster position, and check whether or not the alien is dead or not. I didn't want to type in the same code for collision checks 25 times (1 listing per object). So in order to solve this problem, I generated a macro command. After assembling, and running the collision code, it did sort of work, but for some strange reason I had two rows of aliens hit at the same time. It turned out to be a problem with the raster position, and wrong rows set. This problem eventually got solved and the bullets hit the aliens respectively.

The next step was to set the alien bullet drop. For the aliens to be able to drop the bullets, we don't want the aliens to be dead. That would be silly. To solve this problem a small routine was generated in order to check whether or not the alien on a certain raster line is dead. If it is, then keep on randomizing the timer until an active alien is available to drop a bullet.

Nearly getting the main engine of the game sorted out. The aliens need to be able to hit the player ship. Should the aliens hit the player, a life should be lost. At the moment, I just set an infinite loop to completely flash the border while destroying the aliens. There's a bit more work to be done, but here's the first video of the work done so far on this little summer game project.

Note: This version of the game test has player/alien collision disabled. The music featured in this game isn't the final tune either. Since I originally wrote it for the ending of a previous game. The game will have music of the the same style. As well as a charset background behind the aliens in the near future. I think a shadowed city background might be quite nice. Or perhaps a 2x2 tiled style animation? ... Since the game is using 2x2 charsets for text. There should be enough space for some additional characters not needed.

Other things intended for the game and ideas how it could be implemented?

-The player death sequence needs to be implemented into the code.

-Alien death (Remove visible alien sprite). Use bullet sprite for the SPLAT animation, to destroy the alien

- Active scoring and lives system. Aliens should give out different scores, according to the type. (Ranging from 100 - 500 points). Lives should be lost per player hit by alien or bullet

- Levels and variety. Each level will use the standard alien formations, but each level should differ. The concept will be quite different to a standard Space Invaders game. I intend to have aliens use colours in order from LIGHT (Strong aliens) to DARK (Weak Aliens). If an alien turns into a darker colour, it will get destroyed.

- A nice backdrop or animation. It would be nice to add some in game graphics, which could represent a city or maybe some cool effects behind the aliens (2x2 moving tile background animation).


- New music and SFX. Could be trance music. Who knows?

Watch this space for more progress updates and videos.

When is the final game intended to be release?

Since KickAssembler really helps me well with a lot of the code (Generating macros, etc) then it could be possible that this game could be finished BEFORE the end of August. It will be available FREE from the TND web site as soon as the program is finished.

2016, into The future of THE NEW DIMENSION and C64 productions

22nd January 2016

Over the past 25 years or so. I have been a very keen Commodore 64 user. I liked to play many Commodore 64 games,  played quite well in some as a teen. I also enjoyed watching C64 demos, and checking out the classic C64 utilities. I also ended up composing music for myself - then did tunes for other people in the C64 community as well as for just myself. In the past you saw many games from my C64 label 'THE NEW DIMENSION'. Many of my worthy titles were:

* Sub Hunter
* Bionik Granny Returns
* Sheepoid DX
* X-Force
* Blap 'n Bash
* Invert
* Woolly Jumper
* Tape Master Pro V1.0
* Tape Master Pro V2.0
* Loadergame Tape Master Kit
* Loadergame Tape Master Kit 2

Also was involved with SEUCK enhancements to many SEUCK Compo winners of the past.

2015 saw the launch of a new special feature on the TND web site called "SEUCK School", in which gives the BASICS on how to enhance your own SEUCK games, by giving it some features of your own. There are some explanations on how to do certain features. A framework for use with ACME cross assembler has also been provided.

http://tnd64.unikat.sk/Seuck_School.html


Are there any more C64 releases coming in to the future?

YES


Although my motivation was quite low during the busy productive era in my job. Now things have gone quiet, and some more holidays have been booked. (Currently one the last day of one right now) motivation has been pretty strong to get projects out the way. There will be some more new Commodore 64 games coming in the future. There is to be the launch of the long awaited Honey Bee (Full game), soon to be available on the TND web site for you to download. The game is finished and has been fixed to work on NTSC versions of the C64 as well as PAL.


Commodore 64 Utilities

Soon to be released will be a TAPE MASTER PRO 3.  A fun tape mastering tool. A tool which will allow you to create loading scroll text with picture and music and run programs that use a BASIC SYS start address. The loader system's turbo was made by Martin Piper. However it features additional programming, which I implemented into the loader. So it is a mixture of both Martin and my own piece of work.

I cannot get it to work on BASIC programs on the fly, but it seems to work great on programs that use BASIC SYS addresses (without having to type in any hex addresses), and not screw up zeropages, with thanks to Martin's zeropage, INIT and stack destroyer routine (Will clear the tape loader from memory after loading).

Due to the extra features implemented into the loader system size is slightly bigger, compared to the previous TMP builds.Other new features implemented in the latest loader (NEW: Loading stripes cycle table feature), a choice to whether or not draw the picture like the old ocean loader, or wait until the full picture has loaded.  There is also the all new Loading 1-liner bar. The Press SPACEBAR to exit loader (So you can listen to music featured in the loader). In V2.1 The LOAD ERROR feature didn't display a red border in the IRQ tape loader, prompting the user to REWIND tape, any time an error occurs. Maybe some other things in the future as well :)

 Another plan is that It should still feature the loading stripes selector, featured from V2.1, should the cycle table option not be selected.. . No editor has been made yet, but I will be working on this soon. This version was tested on Retro Reto Pan :)

A brand new TND loader tune has also been composed. You'll be hearing this tune in ALL 3 of the enhanced Sideways SEUCK compo entries of yesteryear. A really powerful tune it is as well :)

Commodore 64 Games

In February 2016 will be the launch of the Sideways SEUCK Compo 2015 prizes (New front ends and enhancements) of Retro Reto Pan, Eidothea, and Edge of Time. Here's a preview snapshot of one of the 3 compo entries new front ends to look forward to. :)

Also in April 2016, you should hopefully see two 16KB cartridge compo entries from me. Vortex Crystals and Blap 'n Bash Revisted.

Vortex Crystals 
 
Vortex Crystals is a fun platform game, in which was inspired by some of the classic single screen platform shoot 'em ups. I also liked 'Impossible Mission', but this is NOT another Impossible Mission style game. You play the role of a hero, who must collect all of the crystals from each storage facility. Shoot aliens, pick up the exit card and get out of each zone alive. The 16KB is missing features, such as warp gate animation (Where aliens appear on to the screen). Also some other additional features I would have loved to have added, but due to the 16KB limitation for the compo. I couldn't add these ideas. Good news however is that AFTER the cartridge compo. I will be implementing more features into the game. Including a new front end, an intro sequence, hi-score table, warp gates, maybe smoother animations for some of the aliens.

Blap 'n Bash - Revisited

Blap 'n Bash Revisited is a (and will only be) special 16KB cartridge version of the original 'Blap 'n Bash'. It features 16 brand new re-designed levels. Smart graphics and brand new music. The power up features are exactly the same as they were before, including the 'Trance Feature'. There is a new feature implemented 'today' into the barrier power up. Should the ball hit it once. The barrier will disappear straight away. Like with Vortex Crystals, this game is currently getting NTSC fixed by probably one of the best C64 NTSC fixers around today, Dirk :)

Shoot Em Up Destruction Set 4 - The final edition

Alf Yngve has been making many great SEUCK games in the past, and he is still going strong with those today, with fresh new ideas. He's been sending me some demos of some of the games.  There is a 4th SEUDS still under development, for Psytronik which features some great new games. Tau Zero Reloaded, a stunning vertical scrolling futuristic blaster. Spy Rider 2, a SEUCK Overlander style game, with a bit of Operation Wolf . Big Gun No. 1 (One of my favorites in this compilation), a colossal robot style game, featuring HUGE GAME GRAPHICS. Two games (Streets of Fury and Operation Metal Storm) had to be replaced, due to problematic issues. So as an alternative, Edge of Time (Final non compo version - which is under development) and a really nice commando style game called  'Unexpanded Army', a game which wears the shades of cops. 3 games will be SEUCK  redux titles. The other two won't be able to fit into this category.

... that's a taster of games... Now ...

Music and the demo scene.

I also have some music projects in the pipeline. Quite recently I composed a brand new TND loader tune. This will be featured on many TND productions / contributors releases, which consist of a taape loading picture. I also intend to restart the in game music for Aviator arcade from scratch. So that the music would suit the game. Not too sure when that will be.

A room infested with aliens

21st October 2015

There's been a whole lot of work being put into my C64 16KB Game Cartridge compo entry. ... and that is just only the beginning, and progress is looking pretty good.... or is it? ...

Alf Yngve has got back to me with a couple of test levels he which built using SEUCK's background editor. A slight alteration was needed to the ladders, as the shadows underneath the ladders were too big. I only wanted 1 row of the bottom ladder to be shadowed - but on a temporary basis. This is because the shadow will be replaced with a duplicate ladder char, later on. I want levels put in place first :)

After the ladders got fixed. It was time for me to re-capture the screen and colour data using a M/C monitor in VICE. Then save each screen separately, and compress both screens with the Exomizer. I imported the new level data into the source code, and tested both screens. They work quite nicely. The player's behavior was a whole lot better. This is definitely turning into a decent platform game already :) ... Fantastic!!!

After several attempts at playing around with the platform game framework, I built. My next task was to get the alien robots, and walkers on to the screen. So a new set of pointers were required. Basically I'm asking the program, which direction should each alien move, has it reached its limit to where it should change direction? Is the alien dead? What animation should the alien be. I also set pointers to setup the starting position of aliens, for the start of the level. I set up the alien speed, so that for the first level, aliens can only move left/right, up/down at the slowest speed. Although there are 5 aliens on screen. This was only done to test the alien movement. The game shouldn't have too many aliens. After putting aliens in place. I re-enabled the player's Sprite/Sprite collision pointers, where aliens can kill the player if it touches them.

The next task later on this week, will be 'shooting', 'destroying' and re-spawning the aliens after the death sequence for them is complete.