Spectrum Computing

Since our world was rocked by the revelation that Horace's 'appendage' is not an arm, but a rat-tail of hair, I started playing with some ideas in AGD.



Here's a snapshot just to get an idea of what I had in mind. It's using the adventure specialisation, so I could try out the DIG command, but I was thinking of a regular platform game.

It may never get finished, but it could be fun to brainstorm ideas. If anyone has suggestions for screens, wants to contribute graphics, music, anything (for example the sprite could be better) please chip in here.

R-Tape wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2019 4:19 pm ...
It may never get finished, but it could be fun to brainstorm ideas. If anyone has suggestions for screens, wants to contribute graphics, music, anything (for example the sprite could be better) please chip in here.

For someone to help you out on the graphics, you should define what is your target : sprite dimensions, number of frames for each animation, etc...
Looks like 16x16, but number of frames, I'm not sure, maybe 4 ?

How many animations ?
Walk/Jump and idle ?

Having this defined, will help anyone available to participate.

I never liked the Horace look, always looked weird to me. And it wasn't only the arm versus hair thing
Having said that, I'm not the right person, to take a stab at it, unfortunately.

Anyway, the scissors look great

RMartins wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2019 4:56 pm Looks like 16x16, but number of frames, I'm not sure, maybe 4 ?

How many animations ?
Walk/Jump and idle ?

Yep 16 x 16 sprites, preferably 4 frames or less (can be more if absolutely necessary). I think it needs ideas and scenery most. I think my Horace sprite is wonky but useable, but if anyone can improve on it please have a go (yep walk, jump & idle, but the rat-tail needs to be clear).

Anyway, the scissors look great

Cheers! I like when it jumps from frame 4 back to frame 1, it's an abrupt 'snap'. I think it looks much better than a gradual closing, and it's nice when these happy accidents work in your favour!

The Urban Dictionary shows a proper definition of rattail:

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define. ... RAT%20TAIL

'These people are often responsible for bright lighting on-goers with their lawn tractor in the middle of the night.'

' often spotted on young ratty looking children whose parents don't know any better than to get them a decent haircut
That redneck over there has a nasty rat tail.'

So I come to the conclusion that Horace is a REDNECK!

So the screens must be full of tractors, Alabama State flags and banjos. He drives an old truck and loves eating squirrels. His dad is in preventive detention and he frequent the local KKK youth center.

Things has changed a lot since that facebook post...

Hehe. Other terrible haircuts could be involved somehow, like the mullet, also known as a 'Canadian passport' or 'Kentucky waterfall'.

We are entering a dark and dangerous universe...

I guess the animation when the hero gets caught by the scissors will be funny.
The walking makes him look like an animal, a chicken or a lizard. The true humanesque Horace walks on stilts or high heels.

Eh, Dave! You new project is in El Mundo del Spectrum, the main spanish Spectrum blog/podcast: (regarding the infamous last weekend affair)

http://www.elmundodelspectrum.com/conte ... enzado

hikoki wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2019 8:49 pm I guess the animation when the hero gets caught by the scissors will be funny.

Good thinking. Maybe something like Miner Willy and the crushing boot, but a 'snip snip' in this case.

Juan F. Ramirez wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2019 9:18 pm Eh, Dave! You new project is in El Mundo del Spectrum, the main spanish Spectrum blog/podcast: (regarding the infamous last weekend affair)

http://www.elmundodelspectrum.com/conte ... enzado

Heh. Brill. We'd better make it now...

If this thing gets made will it get its own custom built engine, or will you stick with AGD?

Spud wrote: ↑Fri Jul 19, 2019 3:42 pm If this thing gets made will it get its own custom built engine, or will you stick with AGD?

I'm not sure yet. It depends how many ideas get chucked in. If it stays the way it is, I'd probably stick with AGD and get it finished. I'm messing around with too many different ideas at the moment, and AGD is such an addictive tool that yields quick, high quality results.

I am still coding though - honest!

If anyone knows anything about the Horace copyright strikes (just against Octavius it seems) could they PM me? Please no open unfounded speculation here tho

#notontwitterbutilookatit
#veryordinarybehaviour
#notcricket
#we_cant_be_avvin_this

I guess no Horace andthe Scissors on this year's woot then?

Horace and the Censors.

Aye it's not looking good. Are we even allowed to use the word ******?

Bloody miserable state of affairs innit?

(Sorry my responses so far don't really do this ridiculous situation justice. I need to gather my thoughts a bit.)

You should stream it over a 10mbit video link. That'd be far more efficient than simply downloading 16K or so.

Horace & the lawyers: in this new game, Horace is in a (legal) maze full of lawyers that chase you shooting copyright claims.

prolly the veto doesn't apply to the spanish name of the game Horacio

I won't go into details but just wanted to say that Spectrum scene has taken a very bad and wrong turn in last few years.

Lots of bad emotions, hate, cyberbulling, trolling, lawyers, copyrights and much less enthusiasm and funny talk that
we used to have so much before.

Are people becoming bitter and toxic when they cross 40 years of age or what?

Hmmm this bullsh*t about long braids plus the strange walking..why not make him like Braveheart. Call him McHorace and you are sorted! dont forget his red hair and kilt

[mention]Ralf[/mention] , I believe it's the consequence of the social network takeover of the last few years. It seems they are able to bring the worst out of people, encouraging precisely what you wrote. That's one of the reasons why I am not on them - except for my You Tube channel and Whatsapp -, and do not want to. Like Goethe said, life is too short to drink bad wine - and, I would add, to lose time behind other people's frustrations, egotism, anger and fixations.

When discussions had to pass through some sort of moderation, be them newsgroups or forums, there were the occasional trolls and flame wars, it's true. But social media seem to me like the public loo's wall - everyone (well, almost) thinks to be authorized to write the worst kind of abuse on them.

Anyway: I met Andrews in London in July 2015 when I attended the presentation of the ZX Vega in Highgate. I contributed the initial game pack with Cousin Horace, which at the time was my most recent title. To this day, I did not receive any royalty for it, despite a RCL representative repeatedly asking me through email for my bank account number - which I promptly gave each time. With RCL's demise, I think I will hardly receive any.

I confirm that he his fine with free-of-charge distribution of games for which his company Subvert Ltd claims intellectual property (listed here) but will ask for a copyright notice and a donation to a charity organization if they are commercially distributed.

What I do not yet understand, though, is how easy it is to acquire intellectual property rights over such a wide range of contents in a relatively short span of time. What if I buy the rights to some old series of 8-bit games and then declare them free for all?

Am tempted to try to get the IP for this brick, it's in about 80% of early Speccy games...



Being a clever sort, I'd of course also make sure I got the upside down version...

Ahem... anyway, on the subject of Horace, I'm afraid I'm still a rat-tail denier...

What does the f*ck IP stand for?

I've read it several times about this affair...

What does the f*ck IP stand for?

I guess in this case it's not Internet Protocol but Intellectual Property

Alessandro wrote: ↑Fri Oct 18, 2019 8:28 am What if I buy the rights to some old series of 8-bit games and then declare them free for all?

Why not ? Actually that would be a great crowdfunding project....