New Tetris game released!

[nippur72]

I've finished my new Tetris game for the VIC 20 !

It's available for download at:

http://xoomer.virgilio.it/aporcino/Vic20

It's all written in machine language, source code also available.

It's also my first VIC 20 program since I was a child, so please be gentle with criticisms

If you try it out, please report to me your impressions... is it too slow or too fast? Also I am curious to know how it behaves on NTSC machines because I use overscan screen lines (18x26).

Keyboard is redefinable so you can play the game with plain cursor keys on the emulator. Default keys are L P : ; and spacebar. Joystick can also be used but has to be defined as if it was an extra keyboard.

I hope you like it.


P.S. despite the free bytes left, I've saved you from the notorious tetris tune, so don't worry, you won't hear it

[6502dude]

Very cool .

I don't miss Tetris music as it gets annoying / tiresome very quickly.

I played a couple of rounds in Vice and noticed aspect ratio of rotated blocks changes a bit.

I transfer to real hardware later this weekend and play some more.

Thanks for a great game.

[Thomas Hechelhammer]

Nice game.

Level 5, score 1252.

I'm not good in Tetris.

-- Thomas

[nippur72]

I played a couple of rounds in Vice and noticed aspect ratio of rotated blocks changes a bit.

BTW, talking of VICE's aspect ratio, last week I wrote an email to Vice developers asking to add a 3x2 pixel rendering. They did not reply but I hope someone in the developer team will add that feature. I am afraid this is not going to be on top of their TODO list, because VIC20 is the only machine that needs this feature (there is a such comment in the VICE source code indeed).

Currently VICE has only 2x1 and 4x2 (double size option) pixel rendering, that's why screen looks so streteched horizontally in VIC20 emulation. A 3x2 would be very close to the real aspect ratio, providing also a BIG screen for modern displays.

In the desperate attempt to fix aspect ratio, I downloaded the VICE source code and located that small part that is be modified. Unfortunately I spent all the afternoon trying to making it compile, but I get lost between libraries, cygwin, mingw, directx and win32, so at the end I had to give up.

A good compromise for aspect ratio is to run VICE in full screen at the resolution of 640x400 (not 640x480). This is very close to the original with nice "scanlines" effect, but the major drawback is that you can't see other windows (useful if you are cross compiling). Anyway it is very good for playing games and using VIC20 as single task.

[Thomas Hechelhammer]

On my PAL VIC20 connected to a 1084-monitor the aspect-ratio is 103mm / 60mm on a 10x10 grid (1.71 / 1).

On VICE I have 118mm / 62mm on a 10x10 grid (1.9 / 1).

I can live with that ...

-- Thomas

[Mikam73]

Looks really cool..

[eslapion]

BTW, talking of VICE's aspect ratio, last week I wrote an email to Vice developers asking to add a 3x2 pixel rendering. They did not reply but I hope someone in the developer team will add that feature. I am afraid this is not going to be on top of their TODO list, because VIC20 is the only machine that needs this feature (there is a such comment in the VICE source code indeed).

...

A good compromise for aspect ratio is to run VICE in full screen at the resolution of 640x400 (not 640x480). This is very close to the original with nice "scanlines" effect, but the major drawback is that you can't see other windows (useful if you are cross compiling). Anyway it is very good for playing games and using VIC20 as single task.

Since I live in NTSC world, my aspect ratio with the VIC is different from yours (PAL). Personnally, I have a Radeon 9800 card and I use Rage 3D tweak to enable a resolution of 856x480. This provides EXACTLY the same ratio as on a real VIC with a TV set.

[Jeff-20]

856x480? Great tip! I'll have to give it a try soon.

[carlsson]

Generally a good game. I'm a bit annoyed that some pieces share the same colour (you don't use blue on black background?) as it confuses me when I check the colour in the "Next" box and sometimes get a different piece than I expected.

Back in 2002, I got some strange and undeserved comments about the odd VIC-20 character ratio, and that it doesn't work for a Tetris game. Personally, I like the ratio more than the tall, narrow characters on some other 40 column systems. Perhaps the custom characters you use disguise a bit of the character ratio compared to use completely filled blocks.

[nippur72]

you don't use blue on black background?

oh, yes I've avoided blue on black because too dark, so the piece that had to be blue is white instead.

I remember the comments about the aspect ratio in Zapactris and I think they are because of VICE wrong aspect ratio (2:1 instead of 1.7:1); on a real VIC-20 aspect ratio is acceptable IMHO.

[Boray]

On the contrary, Basic programs are eagerly slow and I don't think there is even a playable game written entirely in Basic.

What??? The vic-20 is one of few 8-bit computers where playable basic games are possible to make... Take a look at Jeff's stuff for example... or my stuff...

[Schema]

I agree, in particular some of the 20-line BASIC games from that contest we did a couple of years ago were quite fun.

Here are many, many fun games for the VIC written in BASIC:
http://www.zimmers.net/anonftp/pub/cbm/ ... index.html

I was amazed to find that Jeff's games were written in BASIC, since the game play was so smooth.

[nbla000]

Tetris it's a very great works!!!! my compliments.
Personally i prefer a level selector and not the random wall at the bottom but in any case it's incredible to see a new quality Vic games in 2006!!!

[orion70]

Agree. It's great. Too bad we didn't have such good programmers back then in Italy!
Nippur, why don't you focus on the Archon conversion now? (see the post http://sleepingelephant.com/ipw-web/bul ... php?t=1388 )

[hawk]

Thanks Nippur72, I really enjoyed playing this game. I've yet to try it on real hardware, but I'm sure it will be better.

The keyboard response is very smooth.