Games we want to see

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Mayhem
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Post by Mayhem »

I've played Berzerk a lot... ideal playtester here should it come to pass ;)
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Iltanen
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Post by Iltanen »

I'd really like to see a 21th-century version of Conway's Game of life. The old version is great too but..
carlsson
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Post by carlsson »

As a source of inspiration for developers, I thought we may continue this thread. I made it sticky too so it doesn't get lost.

Perhaps we can limit ourselves to suggestions and describe ideas rather than lengthy discussions how a game may be implemented. As soon as some people take on a task to make a game, they can start a new thread and run the discussion. Call it WIP if you like, often it may be more of a PIP (preparation in progress).
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Post by carlsson »

carlsson wrote:game idea [..] involve quite a bit of SIN and COS
It turns out I never got to do anything about this.

My idea was the player controls a spiral in the middle of the screen. Call it a spidersnake or whatever. Along it, various bugs show up. You hold down fire to charge the spiral, and when you let go it springs up, catching the bugs as it runs over them. Obviously there got to be some foes too, perhaps poisonous bugs you must avoid. The thing is you must keep track of how long you held the fire button down to know how long the spiral will extend. Perhaps there should be certain bugs that will make it extend further than planned and vice versa. Possibly the center of the spiral should also be somewhat moveable.

To draw the spiral, I figured one would use SIN and COS but I never made a routine to draw a nice spiral.

If anyone thinks this may turn into a playable game, go ahead and borrow my idea. If anyone has pointers to similar games, perhaps on other platforms, go ahead and point to those as well. Although I wrote separate threads may be opened, singular responses should be OK within this thread.
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Post by carlsson »

Another game idea I came up with the other day is some RISK-like game. I'm not sure what the VIC-20 has to offer on that kind of strategy games, but it doesn't seem too graphically advanced, which usually is a limiting factor.

Here are some ideas of a map. As you can see, I used square blocks quite similar to Tetris... hm, would it make this TetRISK? :lol:

Code: Select all

    ___________________________________
   |   |       |           |       |   |
   |   |   4/4 |    5/3    | 4/4   |   |
   |   |___    |    ___    |    ___|   |
   |       |   |   |   |   |   |       |
   |4/3  A | B | C | F |   | D | E  4/3|
   |    ___|   |___|   |___|   |___    |
   |   |   |   |           |   |   |   |
   |   |   |   |    4/6    |   |   |   |
   |___|   |___|___________|___|   |___|
   |   |           |   |           |   |
   |   | 4/5 G     |   |     H  4/5|   |
   |   |___________|   |___________|   |
   |           |           |           |
   | 5/5 I     | J   5/8   |     K  5/5|
   |    _______|___     ___|_______    |
   |   |           |   |           |   |
   |   | 4/5 L     |   |     M  4/5|   |
   |___|    _______|___|_______    |___|
   |   |   |   |           |   |   |   |
   |   |   |   |     N     |   |   |   |
   |   |___|   |___     ___|   |___|   |
   |       |   |   |   |   |   |       |
   |4/3  O | P |   |4/6|   | R | S  4/3|
   |    ___|   |   |___|   |   |___    |
   |   |       |           |       |   |
   |   |   4/4 | Q   5/3   | 4/4   |   |
   |___|_______|___________|_______|___|

    ___________________________________
   |   |           |   |           |   |
   |   |    4/3    |   |    4/3    |   |
   |   |___     ___|   |___     ___|   |
   |       |   |           |   |       |
   |4/2  A | B |    4/5    | D | E  4/2|
   |    ___|___|___________|___|___    |
   |   |   |       |   |       |   |   |
   |   |   |   3/5 |   |3/5    |   |   |
   |___|   |___    |   |    ___|   |___|
   |           |   |   |   |           |
   |    4/3  G |   |   |   | H  4/3    |
   |___________|___|   |___|___________|
   |               |   |               |
   |     4/5     J |5/8|        4/5    |
   |___________ ___|   |___ ___________|
   |           |   |   |   |           |
   |     4/3 L |   |   |   | M   4/3   |
   |___     ___|   |   |   |___     ___|
   |   |   |       |   |       |   |   |
   |   |   |   3/5 | N | 3/5   |   |   |
   |   |___|___ ___|___|___ ___|___|   |
   |       |   |           |   |       |
   | 4/2 O | P |    4/5    | R | S  4/2|
   |    ___|   |___     ___|   |___    |
   |   |           |   |           |   |
   |   |    4/3  Q | 5 |    4/3    |   |
   |___|___________|___|___ _______|___|
The maps are oversized, every square should possibly be displayed as 2x2 characters on the VIC-20 to fill 18x18 character positions. I'm not sure if multicolour and/or custom characters are required to fit both name of the block and how many armies it currently has. The numbers 4/5 refer to a block that is four squares big and has five neighbours.

I jotted down some comments about possible rules too. The references to blocks relate to the top map of the two.
Choose winning percentage

1. 70% = 56 squares
2. 80% = 65 squares
3. 90% = 73 squares
4. 100% = 81 squares

Start with 2 armies per player.

Player 1 may place 1-2 armies in blocks B, C or D
Player 2 may place 1-2 armies in blocks P, Q or R

Every block with 2 or more armies gains 1 army every round.

A block with only 1 army gains 1 more army if:

1. It borders to a block with 2+ armies

2. It borders to a block with 1 army, and that block itself can't gain a army. In that case player chooses which block to populate.

Surplus troops must be moved out of the block or lost. No block may be left empty on purpose, only through defeat.

An attack may be planned using any number of armies from adjacent
blocks. For every defending army, an attacking + defending dice is
rolled. If the attacking dice is greater, the defender is defeated.
Well.. anyone? Perhaps it can be made even more Tetris like in that way the blocks drop down one by one, and players take turns to decide where to place it, rotate it etc. I don't think lines should be eliminated though, only blocks/areas added to the game as it plays.
Anders Carlsson

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carlsson
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Post by carlsson »

Quadruple post.. yay!

Anyway, I just wanted to add one C64 game that I've been itching to remake or improve for a couple of years but has done nothing to. I just think it is a nice example of those few game concepts not done over and over.

So without further ado, I present Bath Time by PSS. I even own this one on original tape. I don't remember much, but it clearly is a two player game in which you can both cooperate to survive as long as possible or work against eachother causing flooding or dry out. I like the boy who fills up the pool and the elephant drinking from it.

I can probably list a handful more games that seem unique to me and may deserve better destinies than being mostly forgotten. On the MiniGame Compo forum, I mentioned Kaktus which is a bit of a shoot-em-up but with a twist and different setting than usually. I do however realize there already exists a VIC-20 version of this particular game, but it has not prevented people from doing improved and follow-up versions of those games.
Anders Carlsson

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Post by English Invader »

Lozza
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Post by Lozza »

there is a game on the atari 800 XL called 'the last starfighter'. i totally love it

gyruss on the vic would indeed be fab, as would moon cresta

spellbound would be great ! using the graphics from the atari xl version and the sound from the commodore 64 version - it would be definitive

skool daze ! a fab speccy game

and my fave 2 adventures.. heroes of karn and empire of karn from the 64.. there was due to be a 3rd.. return to karn.. would be great to see this one day, the story telling of the other 2 was the business
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Post by Lozza »

MacbthPSW wrote:
carlsson wrote:Yesterday when I went to the toilet (?TOO MUCH INFORMATION ERROR) another totally unrelated game idea came to my mind.
That's okay, I find the toilet a great place for ideas, second only to walking. I'm serious!


the lead singer of XTC, Andy Partridge (making plans for nigel, sgt rock), has been quoted as saying his best songs were written whilst curling one out. apparently some kind of creatively inspiring chemical is released in to the brain whilst doing so.
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Pedro Lambrini
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Post by Pedro Lambrini »

I would dearly love to see an Alien Breed game. I absolutely love those games and to see the universe expaned on my favourite machine would be great. Something along the lines of the DooM roguelike would be cool. In fact, the DooM RL ported over would be great too! :)
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carlsson
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Post by carlsson »

carlsson wrote:Another game idea I came up with the other day is some RISK-like game.
I had another go at this, simplifying the board to a pseudo hexagonal one.
Image
1 square = room for 1 army
2 adjacent squares = 3 armies
3 adj. sq. = 5 armies
4 adj. sq. = 8 armies
5 adj. sq. = 13 armies (max?)

Of course you would be able to have several clusters of squares.
Anders Carlsson

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Post by IsaacKuo »

How about a simplified variant of Lemmings?

I call it "Fleas". To minimize the animation and drawing requirements, each Flea is a single pixel. The great thing about Fleas is that they're easy to animate--only one Flea moves at a time; it makes a "jump".

A "jump" is simply a semicircle 8 pixels wide and 6 pixels tall:

Code: Select all

..****..
.*....*.
*......*
*......*
*......*
*......*
If the Flea collides with something during the horizontal leg, it bounces off and reverses direction.

Rather than turning Fleas into various kinds of workers, as in Lemmings, the player drops items from above. These items include:

1) Vertical wall

2) Bomb (Either destroys an item or explodes on contact with a Flea).

3) Trampoline (causes a Flea to bounce up high).

The result is something like a "flea circus".

Compared to the original Lemmings, Fleas is not very demanding in animation graphics or CPU usage. Only one Flea moves at a time, and it's only a single pixel. The player may control some sort of "crane" at the top of the screen, moving left and right. There may be a restriction that only one item may be dropping at a time. This means that it takes longer to place an item if the ground is low.

Also, there are challenges in placing an item on a low level if it's obscured by land above it. This gives the level designer a lot of flexibility in designing challenges, I think.

The controls are simple--move left, move right, switch item, drop item.
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Pedro Lambrini
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Post by Pedro Lambrini »

^
That actually sounds like a brilliant idea. I can see it being quite a dynamic game and certainly quite quirky... So, who's going to make it?! :P
"...That of the Eastern tribe being like a multitude of colours as if a rainbow had settled upon its brow..." Daniels 1:3
IsaacKuo
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Post by IsaacKuo »

I may use it to learn 6502 assembly and some dynamic hires graphics allocation techniques. The real challenge is level design, though. Some more ideas:

------------------------------

The horizontal length of the jumps should be randomized between 6-8 pixels, so the fleas don't just jump on top of each other perfectly.
The fleas will jump on top of each other to an extent, however.

------------------------------

To keep the algorithms simple, fleas can land/bounce off of each other. Movement is simply by erasing the pixel in the current position and drawing the pixel in the new position. The basic way to calculate a jump is:

1 ) Move up,
2 ) Move up,
3 ) Move up,
4 ) Move up,
5 ) Move up, Move horizontal
6 ) Move up, Move horizontal
7 ) Move horizontal
8 ) Move horizontal (optional)
9 ) Move horizontal (optional)
10 ) Move horizontal
11 ) Move horizontal, Move down
12 ) Move horizontal, Move down
13 ) Move down, repeat

During a Move UP, any obstacles are ignored. This means a Flea can jump upward through other Fleas as well as through excessively low ceilings. Note that the Flea will leave blank pixels in its wake.

During a horizontal move, the flea moves horizontally if it's not blocked. Otherwise, it inverts horizontal velocity while not moving.

During a move DOWN, the flea moves downward if it's not blocked. If it is blocked, then the flea lands. When it lands, a collision is checked against water/lava (death), a land mine (explosion/death), or a trampoline (jump high).

------------------------------

One other idea I had is that the Fleas should simply take turns jumping, with the next flea jumping as soon as the previous flea is done moving. Thus, fleas move faster when there are fewer fleas on the screen. This may get frantic!

------------------------------

It may be cute to have the source and destination for the fleas be a cute napping kitten. The kittens may have an animation of scratching whenever a flea hops on/off.

The kitten's color may be different for each level. When a level is finished, the kitten yawns, wakes up, and walks off the right side of the screen. At the start of the next level, the last level's kitten walks in from the left side of the screen, yawns, and takes a nap.

------------------------------

Rather than use a straight bitmap, dynamically allocated character graphics may be used. This may allow more complex levels...maybe even scrolling levels. The allocation may be:

0-31: Dynamic bitmap pool (mostly for items)
32-35: Kittens
36-37: Player crane
38-254: Level graphics
255: Currently moving flea

For the most part, fleas should be able to live on the "crust" of the Level graphics characters, unless they are stacked high.
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Post by IsaacKuo »

On the other hand, programming for a plain bitmap may make cross-platform level design simpler. You can have, say, a standard level resolution of 128x128. This way, levels designed for more powerful platforms can be used in the original Vic version.

What I'm worried about is the following scenario:

1) VIC version with 176x184 level graphics, but requires careful level design to fit in 256 characters

2) Other versions developed (for C64, cell phones, whatever), without such restrictions

3) More complex levels designed for other versions can't be ported back to the VIC version

With simple 128x128 pixel graphics, levels will work with any platform.

[edit added:]

My wife tells me that it makes more sense to use a puppy than a kitten. People associate fleas with dogs more than cats.

But I like kitties more than dogs. Dogs are filthy. :P
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