Spectrum Computing

Posted: **Thu Apr 04, 2024 3:36 pm**

Having been reminded of it today when I thought it was the Guess the Screen$ game, I decided to fire up Chronos but this time not just listen to the music. I never much rated it as a kid but I thought I'd give it a go and, you know what?, it's still GASH!

Ugh! It's about the most dull shoot 'em up since Space Invaders. But I guess it's more of a Scramble sort of game, albeit it about a tenth as good. The boring visuals, the jerky scrolling, the tap-tap-tap-squish-tap-tap-squish-tap sound effects and the useless enemies are all bad but the worst thing is maybe the boss.

Honestly, is there a less interesting, less inspiring, less challenging boss than the floating diamond thing that harmless bounces near you for that whole battle? Absolute cack.

Posted: **Fri Apr 05, 2024 2:01 am**

blucey wrote: ↑Thu Apr 04, 2024 3:36 pm I decided to fire up Chronos […] Absolute cack.

LOL. It seems Mr Follin's musical talents were wasted on that game.

Posted: **Fri Apr 05, 2024 7:40 am**

Heh you're playing it wrong @blucey - think of it as relaxing car journey, with explosions.

I definitely get why it's a marmite game though. Some will like the atmosphere and that it's not too difficult, but I can see why some would see it as a slog.

Contrary to most - I like the game but not the music! I'm not a fan of squelchy beeper.

Posted: **Fri Apr 05, 2024 9:33 am**

blucey wrote: ↑Thu Apr 04, 2024 3:36 pm Having been reminded of it today when I thought it was the Guess the Screen$ game, I decided to fire up Chronos but this time not just listen to the music. I never much rated it as a kid but I thought I'd give it a go and, you know what?, it's still GASH!

Ugh! It's about the most dull shoot 'em up since Space Invaders. But I guess it's more of a Scramble sort of game, albeit it about a tenth as good. The boring visuals, the jerky scrolling, the tap-tap-tap-squish-tap-tap-squish-tap sound effects and the useless enemies are all bad but the worst thing is maybe the boss.

Honestly, is there a less interesting, less inspiring, less challenging boss than the floating diamond thing that harmless bounces near you for that whole battle? Absolute cack.

Bit harsh, but it was two quid - worth it just for the tune and the high score table

There's a lump of concrete in my folks back garden that's holding up a washing line post - it's inscribed with "JING IT BABY"

Posted: **Mon Apr 08, 2024 8:31 pm**

I always return to Maglaxians. It just cheers me up, and reminds me that I may never tire of platform games. You probably couldn't get more 'oldschool' and 'bedroom' if you tried. 23 lives, I reached level 10... of 128!

(Keys QW and Cshift if you fancy a go)

Posted: **Mon Apr 08, 2024 8:44 pm**

@R-Tape, wow! a nice platformer i never knew about! despite… let's say, not the best graphics, it is suprisingly fun to play. thank you!

Posted: **Mon Apr 08, 2024 8:58 pm**

R-Tape wrote: ↑Mon Apr 08, 2024 8:31 pm

I always return to Maglaxians. It just cheers me up, and reminds me that I may never tire of platform games. You probably couldn't get more 'oldschool' and 'bedroom' if you tried. 23 lives, I reached level 10... of 128!

(Keys QW and Cshift if you fancy a go)

This is BRILLIANT! Love the level design in this.

Posted: **Mon Apr 08, 2024 9:38 pm**

Glad you both like it! I think this user review by @Digital Prawn sums it up really well. Having level names, whether in Czech or English would add to the fun, though coming up with 128 of them could be a stretch...

Posted: **Mon Apr 08, 2024 11:09 pm**

I was thinking 23 lives was too generous, until I reached level 3 and that bloody trident thing at the bottom left. Argh!

Posted: **Tue Apr 09, 2024 5:30 am**

First time I'm hearing about Maglaxians too. What a name! I gave it a go and was pleasantly surprised! Very playable and I like the simplicity of the levels even though they still present a challenge. Thanks for the suggestion, @R-Tape.

A game that I've been going back to a lot lately is Wild West Hero. Also an early title which I discovered recently in Pete's voting poll on Paul Holmes games.
It's a Robotron 2084 clone with the usual hoards of enemies and frantic action. The attribute and sound effects that happen every time you lose a life do get a bit old after a while. My high score is somewhere around 65 000 and I keep going back to try beat it.

Posted: **Tue Apr 09, 2024 7:36 am**

Lee P wrote: ↑Mon Apr 08, 2024 11:09 pm I was thinking 23 lives was too generous, until I reached level 3 and that bloody trident thing at the bottom left. Argh!

I called it a wobbly candlestick, but my experience of it was much the same! In the end I had to do it from stationery, and mark where my feet needed to be and what stance.

Posted: **Tue Apr 09, 2024 8:54 am**

I am confuzzled...

I agree Maglaxians play very well, but when I play it i have totally different graphics ? I have tried the one from the archive , and a couple of other copies in my trusty Fuse emulator - the main sprite especially is some wobbly legged alien creature for me... and no candlesticks in sight, just a round wobbly head??

Posted: **Tue Apr 09, 2024 8:56 am**

and found out why - different graphics set if you load in 128k mode... never even knew this was possible.... ?

Posted: **Tue Apr 09, 2024 2:03 pm**

R-Tape wrote: ↑Mon Feb 05, 2024 8:20 pm Rick Dangerous.

There are some visibility issues and poor colour choices—this is a game that would benefit from the @Ralf treatment.

Personally I've always really loved the colours in Rick Dangerous.

Posted: **Tue Apr 09, 2024 6:21 pm**

Robbeasy wrote: ↑Tue Apr 09, 2024 8:56 am and found out why - different graphics set if you load in 128k mode... never even knew this was possible.... ?

They're not different graphics, well they are, but not intentionally. The program uses memory location 23300, which needs to be zero so the program can find the graphics correctly. This location is zero on a 48K, but not a 128K, and the game was not made with a 128K in mind. So it tries to find the graphics, but it finds the wrong place.

POKE 23300,0 on loading fixes it. You can try poking it with different values to see all kinds of weird combinations!

Posted: **Tue Apr 09, 2024 8:58 pm**

Lee Bee wrote: ↑Tue Apr 09, 2024 2:03 pm Personally I've always really loved the colours in Rick Dangerous.

oh, memories… when i first played R.D., i had b/w display. yay, no color problems at all! i still can't convince myself that this colorful Rick is the same i played. because i spent literally monthes playing, i learned everything, and i finished it! without any cheat pokes.

Posted: **Tue Apr 09, 2024 9:15 pm**

At my first job I had a B&W monitor for a while. I got all the Saturn graphics displaying on the PS1.

Imagine my surprise when they got me a colour telly and the grass was pink and the sky was orange or something lol

Had to endian correct all the graphics after that

Posted: **Tue Apr 09, 2024 9:21 pm**

the best thing with Speccy b/w is that it is a nice shade of gray, ideal to implement fadeins and fadeouts: just inc/dec. which i did a lot in my programs with small z80 code snippets… and then i saw it on a color tv. had to remove all fades. ;-)

Posted: **Tue Apr 09, 2024 9:28 pm**

Another game I worked on for the Wii (what a terrible debugger that had lol) was about 6 months in progress at least when one day the boss had a look and said "Why is that roof red instead of blue?". No one had compared it to the PS2 version before and it looked fine anyway.

Turns out it was the only model in the entire game which used vertex colour attributes to tint a mesh and we had forgotten to endian reverse that (from PS2 format), had remembered it for everything else.

EDIT: Either that or we had endian reversed it but Wii and PS2 may have used opposite RGB (BGR) order instead, can't remember...

Posted: **Sat Apr 13, 2024 8:14 pm**

Mushroom Soup. I heard the review on Crash radio this week and it reminded me how much I liked this little game. I noticed little extras like you actually bend down to pick up the mushrooms - not many games have that much attention to detail! It's only ten levels too, so I play it 'on bread and water' like we used to, rather than relying on snapshots.

Posted: **Sun Apr 14, 2024 8:43 am**

R-Tape wrote: ↑Sat Apr 13, 2024 8:14 pm Mushroom Soup.

I'm reassured by it only having ten levels, perhaps I'm less rubbish than I thought. (Got as far as The Pits)

Posted: **Sun Apr 14, 2024 9:51 am**

Lee P wrote: ↑Sun Apr 14, 2024 8:43 am I'm reassured by it only having ten levels, perhaps I'm less rubbish than I thought. (Got as far as The Pits)

First attempt, level one was a nightmare for me. I needed to get used to the strict collision and most importantly not be so bloody eager.

There's a trick with The Pits: it's easy with it, and very hard without it.

Posted: **Sun Apr 14, 2024 10:26 am**

I got past that bit (assuming you mean trapping the knights in the pits), but then stupidly died at the top.

As you say, the collision takes some getting used to. I'm pleased there's ten lives!

Posted: **Sat Apr 20, 2024 8:55 pm**

Been playing Catwalk today, a game I've never played from a software house I'd never heard of (Power Software).

It's rather frustrating and has an incredibly annoying death sequence, but your character Snooky the cat does get nine lives and it is quite addictive.

Posted: **Sun Apr 21, 2024 1:49 pm**

Lee P wrote: ↑Sat Apr 20, 2024 8:55 pm Been playing Catwalk today

I'm pretty fond of this game. Just had a blast myself - and thoroughly failed to reach the catfood on screen 4. I don't think it's possible to represent a Jackdaw better in as many pixels.

Looking at the map, the penultimate screen features JSW, Horace and Kong. Maybe I shouldn't be surprised as they were massive hits from the off, but it seems a bit weird to be giving nods to its peers in 1984. I would have thought it more of a homebrew thing, way after the event.

Spectrum Computing

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