Finished: THEATER OF WAR ww2 strategy game.

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Mayhem
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Post by Mayhem »

No PRG for the second version?
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Ghislain
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Post by Ghislain »

Mayhem wrote:No PRG for the second version?
Are you able to run it? It was created as a result of a bug fix and me "SAVEing" it in VICE.

If you really really need the prg, I think you should be able to extract it by using Star Commander.
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Mayhem
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Post by Mayhem »

I'll need it for Gamebase20 and beyond mate ;)
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Ghislain
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Post by Ghislain »

Mayhem wrote:I'll need it for Gamebase20 and beyond mate ;)
Game is not completely finished yet--I'm still thinking of ways to balance the game, especially with air units. I don't think the player should have to build a huge wall of anti-aircraft guns to form a viable defense against air superiority (which has become a default strategy which gets boring). I might limit this the number of air units that can be built.
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Ghislain
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Post by Ghislain »

Beta 3 is out:

https://sites.google.com/site/gdbsite5000/main (download theater3.P00)

I've changed the reserve/supply bonus system (see the modified instructions) and I've limited the computer player to how many air units he can deploy. I did this in part to not overwhelm the player with extreme air superiority as well as to force the player to use alternate strategies other than building too many anti-aircraft guns.

I also improved the way the computer player deploys units.
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Ghislain
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Post by Ghislain »

I just finished playtesting my latest version (theater4.p00 in the download site). It was a pretty exciting battle at level 2. A lot of bad luck came my way, and I had to hunker down with only a few units. I came pretty close near the end to break through and capture the enemy flag, but the computer's soldier captured mine first:

Image

The session was fairly suspenseful and exciting. Although it is mostly done in BASIC, I was really able to speed up the gameplay with embedded ML routines so that things are sped up as much as possible.
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orion70
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Post by orion70 »

Ghislain, thank you so much for this game. It's a game genre very neglected on the VIC, and I think that the final version will fill a gap.
I just tried it - will spend more time on it in the next days. Drop me a line if you want a disk/tape cover and some graphics for the instructions :P .
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Ghislain
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Post by Ghislain »

orion70 wrote:Ghislain, thank you so much for this game. It's a game genre very neglected on the VIC, and I think that the final version will fill a gap.
I just tried it - will spend more time on it in the next days. Drop me a line if you want a disk/tape cover and some graphics for the instructions :P .
Thank you. I think the latest beta is going to be as close to the "final" version I submit to the minigame contest. After it's submitted, I will proceed to work on a hi-res splash screen (quite similar to the ones on side 2 of my "Realms of Quest" Psytronik disk game) and an instructions screen. So the non-minigame version will be a multi-loader.

I'm not sure if I'll commission any art work for specifically this one (thanks for the offer, though! much appreciated), it wasn't something that took up much of my time and effort (although I did work on it quite a bit last weekend). What I envision is creating a new collection of VIC-20 games on a disk (kind of like Jeff Daniels' "Denial Collections").

But there has been one other tactical war game made for the VIC-20: Tuntematon Sotilas. It was after I downloaded it a short while ago (and seeing Jeff Daniels' screen shot of his "war" game that is in progress) that became the catalyst for finally making this thing. I had attempted to make it in 1996, but I quickly gave up on it. Progress was quite slow at the beginning, because I had to think of how best to work in the confines of an unexpanded VIC-20. How will air combat work? If I move a tank over water or soldier through forest, how will the program 'remember' what is 'under' those units?

Even though it's for the unexpanded VIC-20, the game can handle hundreds of units placed on the screen (because that's where ultimately the map + unit information is physically stored). If a unit moves over rough terrain, there is an ML routine to store that information in the cassette buffer. Once the unit moves away from water or forest area, the game will look at the cassette buffer and 'poke' that information back on the screen.

The game plays a bit like Tuntematon Sotilas except that it has more variety of units (7 units for Theater of War, 3 types of units for Tuntematon). One thing that Tuntematon does better is the "fog of war" concept.

If you look at the units' strengths and weaknesses (see instructions posted on the previous page), it's clear to see that there's a bit of "rock-paper-scissors" element. Tanks can go roughshod against soldiers and trucks. But an anti-tank gun can stop a tank dead in it's tracks (but the ATG is vulnerable to trucks, and especially soldiers).
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Post by Kweepa »

Ghislain wrote:If a unit moves over rough terrain, there is an ML routine to store that information in the cassette buffer.
You could store that info in the upper four bits of the colour buffer (unless you're using that for something else)... might simplify the code a bit.
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Post by Kananga »

Kweepa wrote:You could store that info in the upper four bits of the colour buffer.
Doesn't work, color memory has only 4 bits.

Edit:
Nice game! :-D
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Ghislain
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Post by Ghislain »

Kananga wrote:
Kweepa wrote:You could store that info in the upper four bits of the colour buffer.
Doesn't work, color memory has only 4 bits.

Edit:
Nice game! :-D
Thanks. Have you made it far in the game? Is it too easy, too difficult?

I think what Kweepa was alluding to was using the unused portion of the unexpanded VIC-20's color memory between 37888 and 38399 (using the lower 4 bits there). In retrospect, it would have been a bit easier to do it that way, but I think the game is fine as is--I'm only fine tuning the aspect of game balance at this point.

But using the unused 512 color memory nibbles between 37888-38399 might be useful for a future project, especially if there are only 16 custom char types being used.
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ral-clan
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Post by ral-clan »

This looks great! Like an SSI game for the VIC!
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Ghislain
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Post by Ghislain »

ral-clan wrote:This looks great! Like an SSI game for the VIC!
Thanks. I'm still making updates. The latest iteration (which I just uploaded) has changed it so that bombers and anti-aircraft guns don't score automatic hits anymore. I think this will be better for providing balance.
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orion70
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Post by orion70 »

Excellent gameplay so far.
It would be even a nicer game, if the map was more similar to real world, i.e. with mountains, lakes and forests, instead of single one-character blocks of rocks, water and tree(s) spread all around. This would encourage even more sophisticated tactics, e.g. to avoid a mountain range with your infantry; and the map would be prettier to see :wink: . I hope this is feasible without eating up too much RAM.

I would not allow wrong moves (like trying to move a soldier unit onto a rock) to "eat" the movement. If you try to move a unit where it can't be placed, you still should have all your movements available.

As for difficulty, I think the forces are well balanced, but the step between the levels is too big: IMO, the enemy should have 100 reserve + 10 supply at level 1, then 150 and 15, 200 and 20, and so on. This would encourage people to play "one more time" (I felt lost at the beginning of level 3).

Also, it would be great if one could somehow save the game to play it later (on a real machine, of course). Don't know if maybe a future improved disk version could handle this.

As a final note, I like the hidden fighters/bombers thing, but you should specify that their starting position is random in the instructions.

Thanks again for this little gem :D .
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ral-clan
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Post by ral-clan »

orion70 wrote:Excellent gameplay so far.
It would be even a nicer game, if the map was more similar to real world, i.e. with mountains, lakes and forests, instead of single one-character blocks of rocks, water and tree(s) spread all around. This would encourage even more sophisticated tactics, e.g. to avoid a mountain range with your infantry; and the map would be prettier to see :wink: . I hope this is feasible without eating up too much RAM.
I agree....it would be neat if forest squares, mountains or water squares would naturally bunch up (with some sort of dispersal algorythm) in order to mimic large forests, mountain ranges or lakes.

I am assuming that different terrain will give different advantes/disadvantages in terms of attack or defense?
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