CPC Doom they can do it on the spectrum why not the CPC?

[dcdrac]

http://www.worldofspectrum.org/infoseekid.cgi?id=0012817

[MacDeath]

1°) it looks like doom but is far from being really as good as on a 486 DX PC at 66Mhz super VGA and Soundblaster Pro... on a stock speccy48K.


2°) on CPC such game needs like 2x times the work for the Z80 as on a speccy.


++Speccy :
=fast character system
=really "cheap" graphic mode in 1bpp


==CPC
=none of the aboves




Sure on CPC if would look good because it would be in colours...
But it would need shittons of RAM and be sluggish as hell.


But yeah, can be doable.


anyway :
http://www.cpc-power.com/index.php?page=detail&num=9247



Wolfenstrad by Dirty Minds

[Devilmarkus]

Isn't it possible to create fast ASCII screen drawing, too, for the CPC?
Just by quick re-defining chars on the fly and then show them each frame?

I wonder if thats possible, and if someone could code that.

Check the "ASCII Art" demos here:
http://amstrad.cpc.free.fr/download.php?dcategory=D%E9mos

And perhaps with a few bits&bytes tricks in the chars, even coloured GFX would be possible...

[fano]

Isn't it possible to create fast ASCII screen drawing, too, for the CPC?
Just by quick re-defining chars on the fly and then show them each frame?

That does not change anything to the problem as you still need to draw theses 16 bytes on screen to show a character.On Spectrum , it is only 8 bytes or less (1 or 2?) if you use twice or more the same char...

[Devilmarkus]

So, how do the ASCII demos then work so fast?
Looks like they use 50fps or 25...

[andycadley]

That does not change anything to the problem as you still need to draw theses 16 bytes on screen to show a character.On Spectrum , it is only 8 bytes or less (1 or 2?) if you use twice or more the same char...

No it isn't, the Speccy display is always a bitmap so changing a character requires re-drawing every instance in exactly the same way it would on the CPC. The big advantage of the speccy is that it's a much lower res bitmap (due to the attribute colour system) so it's only 1 byte to change 8 pixels, where it would be 2 bytes on an equivalent CPC display (i.e. Mode 1).

[Bryce]

I'll take two bytes any day instead of colour clash.

Bryce.

[fano]

No it isn't, the Speccy display is always a bitmap so changing a character requires re-drawing every instance in exactly the same way it would on the CPC. The big advantage of the speccy is that it's a much lower res bitmap (due to the attribute colour system) so it's only 1 byte to change 8 pixels, where it would be 2 bytes on an equivalent CPC display (i.e. Mode 1).

Autant pour moi, you're right , characters are not vectorized.


The main advantage of character rendering is it allows a lot of optimisations so that can be fast in some cases.For raycast like DooM or Wolf, i do not see advantage to render in character map before rendering characters on screen.As it is 'pseudo' 3D , changes are more global than 2D games so saved time in not rendering changed chars may be not important.

[arnoldemu]

So, how do the ASCII demos then work so fast?
Looks like they use 50fps or 25...

if it's on the pc or c64, then it has native char modes where you poke the char code to update the screen.

If it's on speccy or cpc then you have to redraw the character bitmap each time.

Ok, so they could be quicker to do because of no overlap and no need to mask compared to other methods.

[arnoldemu]

http://www.worldofspectrum.org/infoseekid.cgi?id=0012817

this can be done on the cpc - don't know how fast though.

Look at the size of the playfield on spectrum.

Making this kind of game is technically challenging, but would be good to see it done one day.

[dcdrac]

maybe a 128K Plus version

[Sykobee (Briggsy)]

maybe a 128K Plus version

Well yeah, it would need a double buffered screen, because it will take several frames to calculate and redraw, even with a relatively small game window and optimisations. You might also want mip-maps for your wall tiles to prevent a horrible mess. Floor and ceiling would not be textured sadly, that's a whole lot more calculation than a basic left-to-right raycast wall renderer implementation.  A plus palette would be best, and you could use plus sprites for in-game enemies (although updating sprite data is annoying).


IMO using it for a first person dungeon crawling role playing game would be best - that doesn't need a high frame rate but benefits a lot from that view style.

[TotO]

maybe a 128K Plus version

The CPC Plus is not magic. (but sure, the colours palette may help to look better)

[Bryce]

The CPC Plus is not magic. (but sure, the colours palette may help to look better)

All CPCs are magic, especially when I think back to my first encounters with the 464 in the 80's

Bryce.

[TotO]

Sure... CPC (464/664/6128) are "magics". 
The Plus series was released to late to be too. But I have intended that it can't do miracles.

[arnoldemu]

maybe a 128K Plus version

the colours would be good, potentially the sprites, but you'd need to clip them against the walls if you wanted them to to go behind them.

[arnoldemu]

All CPCs are magic, especially when I think back to my first encounters with the 464 in the 80's

Bryce.

If they are magic then why are the keyboards failing on mine?

It'll be something about feeding the hardware pixies with gold dust won't it? (I haven't done that).

[Sykobee (Briggsy)]

the colours would be good, potentially the sprites, but you'd need to clip them against the walls if you wanted them to to go behind them.

Yeah, I think the sprites might be better used for in-game effects rather than in-game entities because of the clipping (a pain with Plus sprites).


Effects like being stabbed/shot (blood over viewport), casting magic, victim of magic (obscured viewport effects), weapon held in hand (fist, crowbar, chainsaw, gun, etc), other HUD stuff.

[TotO]

The sprites had been nice to be used for the player weapons over the screen... (if enough)