Bubble Bobble remake? (BB4CPC)

[Metr]

Btw, maybe a 2 hours 30 mins longplay is a bit too much, isn't it? 

[TFM]

Btw, maybe a 2 hours 30 mins longplay is a bit too much, isn't it? 

Yes, but especially it's 6-9 months too early. The game was just released. If I can watch your longplay. why should I play it by myself then??? You are right in taking time. Don't be rushed by others ;-)

btw: You got so much great videos, pleople can watch them meanwhile. However :-D

[Metr]

Hehe, I usually don't expect anyone watch a full longplay without comments, specially the ones >1h unless they serve as guide and/or you are stuck or who knows, interested in watching it.

I understand the point and that's usually why I wait until I have the proper permission to upload them. I dont want to ruin the hard work and effort putting on them. Also if the game has a story to follow or the developer is trying to earn actual money with them I have even more respect about uploading any kind of video.
Apart from that, I want to think they help promoting them and/or spread the news, I mean, if I'm really interested in a game, maybe I watch a couple of minutes to have a peek, but unless I feel is not worth for me to play it, I can't wait to play it myself, and more in a game like this one.
Also it can help to make people become interested if they are not Amstrad users. They will see in that couple of minutes that the graphics are awesome, the playability is far beyond great, and if the video is 2h 30mins long means you have fun and game for really a lot of time, and more if you can play it with another player. The video shouldn't have more interest that just watch some tips on how to play or maybe helping how to play on a screen you are having difficulties, it won't take long until the codes and the pokes will be written in any random web and the rest of it it's just a guy playing it, and for that I'm sure everyone prefer to actually play it. Also for the experience of the videos I've uploaded, people prefer to see a short video than a long one, but it should not be called a longplay if I don't play it until I feel is completed
In this one, we all now the story, and we all now the game is addictive and fun like hell, so the actual fun is playing it, and if you are lucky to play with anyone as a second player, you get x3 fun bonus combo or more !
When I put the screen with the super mode the other day I didnt share the code for the same reason, but I think just telling it exists helps to tell the people at what point the conversion is great or just to make them become interested in finding them.
To resume, maybe a video is good to make comparations or for easy argument of any feature, to serve as a guide or just to have a look at the game, and if it helps to generate interest on the game I'm so glad on doing them. In any case I hope not to replace any the fun of actually playing the games. I expect anyone that feels they won't play a game because they see a video or longplay, or if it's evident it contains a spoiler that can ruin the fun, please just use the option of not watching them and/or skip the spoilers until they have played it or is stuck!

Anyways just wanted to state an opinion about this, as I usually wonder about the same and the topic appeared. If uploading them helps or not and if you think if the effect is negative, I'd like to know it! As I say, I usually create them asap and more if I have the free time (something I was lacking these last months) and wait until I have an OK from the owner of the game. Just wanted to say with the other post that 2h 30m is a lot! the video is in the HOLD queue until its time arrives!

PS: Sorry for the long(play) post !

[TFM]

Î got an idea   Well, it's late in the night, so this may not as practiacabel... But.... for BB4CPC you could upload 20 levels each every 1-2 months. So first level 1-20, some 1-2 month later then levels 20-40 and so on... So people could ... do a kind of ... co-evolvement ;-)

Just an idea :-D

[Xifos]

I played a lot to this new cpc version of bubble bobble (managed to reach level 50) !

I wanted to correct my opinion about this remake.
Only spoke about flickering ; stupid i was !
There is just some flicker, but it does not affect the gameplay at all.
A lot of sprites on screen, all the game logic, sound and music, and the frame rate is good, almost no slowdowns !
The gameplay is almost arcade perfect ; my problems of control were caused by bad choice for jumping key/joystick direction.
To me the best 8 bit conversion, better than rainbow island (which was good on the cpc) !

[Nich]

Thank goodness it is available on CPC- Power now, rather than that other awkward setup.

It's now available at NVG as well, in ZIP format.

[Metr]

The only problem with rainbow island is the control, it's hard to jump over rainbows and that monsters in world 4 always die dunno why to the right, so it's hard to get the diamonds on the left
For everything else, it's a nice conversion also !

[cngsoft]

Well, first of all, happy New Year everyone! :-)

but Applebloom is just an underaged filly... why not Fluttershy or Rarity instead ?   

Oh, you bronies and your innuendos! This is what _SHE_ thinks of you! (welcome new icon!)

Anyway, will you get it into a 128K RAM version too ?

Why? Bill Gates said back in 1981 that 640K should be enough for everyone, and he wasn't totally wrong on that one. Besides, I don't have anything to fill the remaining 64K with... unless people start drawing sprites and writing songs...

[cngsoft]

It's now available at NVG as well, in ZIP format.

Watch out, Nich, BB4CPC isn't Public Domain but Freeware: I have no rights over the original Bubble Bobble, so I'm not allowed to tag as public domain a derivative fan work either, and I don't want to get in legal trouble! I'll have to say the same to Kukulcan, who also labelled BB4CPC as PD in CPC Power... and failed to replace the old, buggy version there with the new, patched one!

[Xyphoe]

Firstly a big THANK YOU and well done to César for his long hard work on this remake! It's simply stunning and amazing to see in action - espeically in 64k of memory!!! I know the time and dedication César has put into this to get it just right and as close to the arcade original as possible, there's so many little touches and tweaks in there I'm not sure most will realise - especially people like me who never really played the arcade original much. I know he long studied how the arcade version produces it's powerups and how items appear and work, which is very complex (see here - http://tjasink.com/games/bb/bb-stuff.txt) ... I guess I just wanted to stress and emphasise this as initially when I first started play testing I wasn't aware of all this. Then you add in all the special modes that have also been implemented!!!

Secondly, sorry for not replying sooner, I've been extremely busy over the Xmas and New Years period.

Thirdly I will be doing a video of this shortly, mostly to help 'promote' this release for César and the Amstrad/retro gaming community. I was working on a longplay but as Metr has already recorded this and found the modes I will leave this for him. So it will be a short review.

Also I hope Jason/TMR is reading this topic and will get this into Retro Gamer magazine as soon as possible

Once again ... an amazing effort and acheivement ... all hail César! 

[Axelino]

Hello Folks,
i would like to thank (a big thanks!!!) Mighty Mr.Gonzalez for this awesome gift,
in 1987 "Bubble Bobble" was (with Double Dragon) my favourite arcade game and i was very disappointed when buying the amstrad version i realized how awful was that game compared to the original; when i discovered M.A.M.E. "BBobble" was the first rom that i've downloaded, but now (after 24 years) my loved cpc464 owns the best version of all 8-bit systems, and not only for the graphics or the musics, but for the gameplay, the secrets, the score system!

Only hardcore players of "Bubble Bobble" could understand how faithful is BB4cpc !
Thanks, thanks, thanks!
there are no words to describe how happy i am !

A little hint to make the game more faithful to the original:

In the arcade game when every level starts Bub & Bob can move a few seconds before the other enemies,
same in the original amstrad version but not in BB4cpc, well this thing is very important for the gameplay (at least to me  ), can you add this in the future ?

[Nich]

Watch out, Nich, BB4CPC isn't Public Domain but Freeware: I have no rights over the original Bubble Bobble, so I'm not allowed to tag as public domain a derivative fan work either, and I don't want to get in legal trouble!

I have now changed the publication status to "Freeware". I keep using the "CPC" meaning of the term "public domain" to classify programs on NVG, but the modern usage of the term is rather different!

[Rhino]

Great job cng! Gameplay and graphics are very good. If we had CPC conversions like this one, we would have been happier in our childhood

[jbaudrand]

:/ I have two pb with the game:
-My Archer joystick (a clone of a quickshot II) don't allow me to jump  (and it work perfectly with other game or under basic)
-If I press esc for redefine key, it stay block on the first key to define and the game freeze.

any idea?
I have other joystick to test, but i have to return at my parent house this week end, I will made more test later

[TFM]

Does your joystick set the signal Fire 3 (spare) on?

Please do the following in BASIC

10 MODE 1
20 PRINT BIN$(JOY(0))
30 GOTO 20

When starting the programm you shall get a "0" on the screen. Now press all four directions and the fire keys.

What you you get?

For up, down, lift, right, fire 2, fire 1 I would expect: 1, 10, 100, 1000, 10000 and 100000. Using fire 3 brings your 1000000.

[jbaudrand]

  yes.... I get 1000000
:? where is located this 3 fire button?

How can I desactivate?

[TotO]

Strange to see your Joystick sending Fire 3 (pin 5 on cpc only).
Most joysticks use pin6 for FIRE (was Fire 2 on CPC and pin7 for Fire 1).

[jbaudrand]

can anybody explain me why, under basic, or old game nothing occurs, and when I run the program of TFM/FS it detecdt this fire 3?

for solving this issue, did i need to cut the cable from pin 5?

[TotO]

Because FIRE3 is not handled by common CPC programs.
But, it's wired on the CPC 464/664 and 6128... So reading the joystick port, the program return the corresponding bit.

Strange joystick you got here, because I don't know micro-computers using pin 5 as first fire button.
You may connect it to the pin 6 instead. (if already used for a fire button, connect it to the pin 7)

[TFM]

yes.... I get 1000000
:? where is located this 3 fire button?

How can I desactivate?

Ok, that's what I expected. So you have to cut one wire (see CPCWike Pheriphery for right signal), but please be very careful to get the righ one.

Personally I would add a switch, so you can still use Fire 3. That makes sense for some AMX / OCP applications. (See Bryce mouse topic).

Good luck :-D

EDIT: Toto suggested to reconnect, I would not suggest that, for obvious reasons! (Except you want to have fire 1 activated all the time, without being able to switch if off).

Now, let me explain the nature of the problem. Your Joystick sets fire 3 constantly to active, this actually makes sense for some non-CPC computers.
Now, why do you get software problems? Well, some programs just ckeck the joy-port not properly, that kind of software assumes that fire 3 is always set to inactive - which is not true for some joysticks - obviously.

[TotO]

I may have misunderstand the problem ?

If you already got fire button (1 or 1+2) working but fire 3 always "ON", it's only because your joystick send +5V on the pin5. So, yes, you have to desoldering it if you are in this case.

[jbaudrand]

Ok, and more strange thing is that the joystick only have two fire buttons and an autofire, so I really wonder why there's a fire 3 always set to  ON.
As far as I can remember these kind of joystick were sold by Tandy in France.

TFM/TS: Is there a special reason why programmer doens't use the same joystick detection code? for example, is bubble Bobble or Star sabre (cos a got strange result too) code save more cycle why the old fashion way of coding, or is it.. ^^ laziness?

[ukmarkh]

After playing for a fair few hours, I've finally finished my BB4CPC review 

http://classicreplay.blogspot.com/


Guys, if you like my reviews and articles, could you please click on some of the Ads on my blog...

[TFM]

Ok, and more strange thing is that the joystick only have two fire buttons and an autofire, so I really wonder why there's a fire 3 always set to  ON.
As far as I can remember these kind of joystick were sold by Tandy in France.

IMO, they didn't care about fire 3, since it's a CPC specifing thing.

TFM/TS: Is there a special reason why programmer doens't use the same joystick detection code? for example, is bubble Bobble or Star sabre (cos a got strange result too) code save more cycle why the old fashion way of coding, or is it.. ^^ laziness?

You are right of course! Just sloppy coding. And to be honest, only very few devices activate / provide Fire 3 at all. So actually I wouldn't blame the coders, they probably just don't know it. However some companies like AMX are using Fire 3 (and it's a gain to have it).

Maybe I shall support it in my next game, just to fool people a bit 

After playing for a fair few hours, I've finally finished my BB4CPC review 

http://classicreplay.blogspot.com/

Thanks for the link!

[yannis_uno]

Hello,

in your bb4cpc site (http://cngsoft.no-ip.org/cng_bb4cpc.htm) you mention "This candy extends the player's bubble shooting range." next to the pink candy & "This item lets the player shoot faster-flying bubbles." next to the blue candy. If I remember correctly from the arcade version, this should be the other way around (pink=speed, blue=extra distance). Maybe I am wrong?

Thank you for this great remake!