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New game: Dead on Time

Started by Axelay, 09:27, 27 February 10

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Gryzor

No.

Yes!

Or... erm, wait, was that in my sleep?

khisanth

axelay this game is GREAT!   The music is superb and the gameplay is excellent. Love it when i find a retro game that keeps me playing like this one.

regarding the music , i thnk the c64 remixers would do this justice with a superb remix

Targhan

The music is made for the CPC, adding SID sound won't, I think, improve it in any ways, but you might disagree :).

About the music :
- The ingame music is only 2 channels, because there is constant firing and explosions, so I decided to reserve one channel for the SFX. Composing on 2 channels was quite a challenge :).
- But as the SFX uses a lot of "noise", I decided not to use drums in the music (as the noise would have mixed, which the PSG isn't capable of doing properly). An action music with no drums ! Even harder to compose.
- Last but not least, I decided to use hard sound for the shield SFX. Here again, the PSG isn't able to mix hard sounds, so I was forced not to use hard sound in the music.

So as you can see, there were a lot of limitations, but ultimately I think it sounds really good for such raw sounds. This was certainly interesting to do. The main lesson to retain is that SFXs aren't just "things" to be added to the game and music, but must be included carefully, and can have an incidence on the whole gameplay.

I remember playing an early version of the game without music and sfx. I thought it was ok, but I wasn't very fond of it. Once we added the music and the SFX, it became really thrilling and addictive. Both I and Axelay burst our highscore when playing along the whole soundtrack. Funny how music and SFX can improve the gaming experience :).

Trg.Aks
Targhan/Arkos

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Gryzor

I think I didn't stress it enough: the music is just GREAT! Wish it was longer, but it really is very very nice...

khisanth

Very interesting! You are right, us mere mortals do not really consider how sound is used in a game, we just think you add sound effects in and thats it!!

I did not mean convert the tune into a SID file (though it would sound a little "warmer" i think), the guys over at Remix64.com who remix SID tunes and Amiga tracks with modern instruments and software would do a superb job with this tune. They either simply recreate the tune on synths, guitar, piano etc or they jazz it up a bit, adding a few improvised bits here and there and often blend it with a song from the 80s.  For example one guy did the Rambo loading music blended with New Order's Blue Monday and it works really well.


mr_lou

Quote from: mr_lou on 09:08, 08 March 10
Did you beat my record then? 4 minute 40 seconds now.  8)
Quote from: Gryzor on 09:10, 08 March 10
No.

Shape up. My record is 6:39 now! And the score is 142 million!
Dead on Time is indeed one addictive game.  8)

Xifos

Quote from: mr_lou on 16:02, 09 March 10


Shape up. My record is 6:39 now! And the score is 142 million!
Dead on Time is indeed one addictive game.  8)

How is it possible ?
My best is 2:03 !
I am too old for this kind of game :/
Nooooooo ! (but i 'am not giving up)

I was wondering if there are much games showing so many sprites at the screen at 50 fps ?
(even if there's no background to save)

mr_lou

Quote from: Xifos on 19:00, 09 March 10
How is it possible ?
My best is 2:03 !
I am too old for this kind of game :/
Nooooooo ! (but i 'am not giving up)

Well, at this point I'm not sure I can do it again either. :)
But I'll surely try.  :D

redbox

Quote from: Gryzor on 11:11, 09 March 10
I think I didn't stress it enough: the music is just GREAT! Wish it was longer, but it really is very very nice...

I forgot to say this too; you did a great job Targhan and the sound really adds to the game.

My C64 centric friend even mentioned it when I showed him (and you know how prickly those SID fiends are  :) ).

MacDeath

Music :
are the SoundFX in synchronized in rythm with the music ?

Yet it is a great tune, sounds quite speedMetal indeed...sweet basses and "tapping/hammer/pullingoff" pseudo guitar solos...sort of.

I should give it a try on my guitar.

Your strategy was good.

"Drum" part is quite useless in a shooter as lots of explosions and fires sounds...it really better to have both sounds FX and music than only on of those.

Xifos

(french voice of homer simpson)
Youhou !
I did 2:31 !


Gryzor

Damn I must practice...

nurgle

#87
Quote from: mr_lou on 17:48, 27 February 10
However, I can't get it running on neither my CPC464 or my CPC6128. Tried writing the dsk 3 times, but it just stops with a black screen and red border.

Ok, you beat me to it. Attached is a version of dsktools that can write 10 sectors per track correctly. I will upload this version to the dsktools project page as soon as I find the password.  ;)

Quote from: mr_lou on 17:48, 27 February 10
The Arnold emulator on Linux won't run it either. Stops with a black screen.
I tried download the dsk again, but same result.

Hmmm, works for me. Did you try the latest version of Arnold/Linux? I really suggest Arnold TNG currently, as I did not get time to put all these great enhancements into the main version.

http://www.yasara.org/cpc/index.html

Still, it plays better on a real machine.  ;D

regards,
nurgle

nurgle

P.s. with dsktools you might need to write the image twice. The error checks in dsktools are really lousy, so my CPC would only read the disc after writing it a second time.

MacDeath

Just a question : is there a MP3 sound signal version of the game (for 464...) ?
Perhaps with improuved loading speed of course...



Also, this game's music would be great if done with electric guitar wityh a heavy metal sound...

mr_lou

Quote from: nurgle on 00:01, 14 March 10
Attached is a version of dsktools that can write 10 sectors per track correctly.

Thanks a lot! It seems to be a lot different from the version I had. This one has dskread and dskwrite tools. The version I had already contained a dsktrans and dskform (and some other). I had to format the disk using dskform before using dsktrans. But this new version seems to work without formatting, which is great. :)
First write worked fine when testing with Dead on Time.

Quote from: nurgle on 00:01, 14 March 10
Hmmm, works for me. Did you try the latest version of Arnold/Linux? I really suggest Arnold TNG currently, as I did not get time to put all these great enhancements into the main version.

Thanks, I will check it out later. I rarely use an emulator to be honest. I prefer my real CPC464 with 128k :) I'm only using my CPC6128 when stuff don't work on my CPC464.

ukmarkh

Guys, my Mac Mini arrives tomorrow, what CPC emulator is best for it???

nurgle

Quote from: mr_lou on 19:00, 17 March 10
Thanks a lot! It seems to be a lot different from the version I had.

It's not a different version, but a complete different tool. You had libdsk before, my stuff is named dsktools. libdsk is much more flexible, but requires some configuration, special command line options, etc. to make it do what you want. dsktools was intended to be a linux drop-in-replacement for the old DOS cpdread and cpdwrite tools. Most disc format parameters should be choosen automatically. Unfortunately I never got around supporting all those weird copy protection schemes. Also dskread is not very good, as I wrote those tools primarily for me, and my main objective was to get those DSKs from FTP to my real CPC without leaving linux.

Quote from: mr_lou on 19:00, 17 March 10
First write worked fine when testing with Dead on Time.

Thanks for feedback! Have been playing Dead on Time a lot myself lately. Very entertaining, when you need a short break from work and have a CPC at hand.

regards,
nurgle

nurgle

To get a little ontopic again: This games is simply brilliant. I was a bit sceptical at first, but the more I play it, the more I am hooked. This has not happened with such a simple retro game in a long, long time.  :D Thx Paul for coding such a great game!  :-*

norecess

Quote from: ukmarkh on 21:29, 17 March 10
Guys, my Mac Mini arrives tomorrow, what CPC emulator is best for it???

I also have a Mac mini (old one, core duo 1.6Ghz) since 2006... and very happy owner. :) I did a great thing at the time by upgrading to the max the internal memory (2Gb at the time, which is still OK nowadays for home usage). I also bought 2 external drive fitting below the Mac mini, these drives really worth it (especially since they also provide more USB ports).

Back to the CPC stuff, I ended with WinXP virtualization through VirtualBox, running WinAPE.

villain

Quote from: norecess on 20:03, 18 March 10
I also have a Mac mini (old one, core duo 1.6Ghz) since 2006... and very happy owner. :) I did a great thing at the time by upgrading to the max the internal memory (2Gb at the time, which is still OK nowadays for home usage). I also bought 2 external drive fitting below the Mac mini, these drives really worth it (especially since they also provide more USB ports).

Back to the CPC stuff, I ended with WinXP virtualization through VirtualBox, running WinAPE.

Exactly the same here. Very happy with this little machine, but emulating a CPC is not very funny. Would have to try Flynn´s MacCPC, but I still use OS-X 10.4. So I would have to upgrade the whole shit first...

mr_lou

Where's the competition? It's lonely here at the top of the highscores.  8)

ukmarkh

The problem is, that's a bloody good score... i'm getting closer though.

Is there someway to have this game update via an on line leaderboard, especially if playing through emulation.

Gryzor

Quote from: ukmarkh on 11:12, 19 March 10
The problem is, that's a bloody good score... i'm getting closer though.

Is there someway to have this game update via an on line leaderboard, especially if playing through emulation.

This would probably need a new emulator feature? :D

nurgle

Quote from: mr_lou on 07:32, 19 March 10
Where's the competition? It's lonely here at the top of the highscores.  8)

I won't get near your lowest entry anytime soon. I'm damn proud having achieved 4:23.12  :'(

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