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using Manic Miner and Jet Set Willy game engines
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Message: 5788
Author: Daniel
Date: 08/04/2006
Subject: In response to some points from Andrew
Thanks a lot, Andrew, for all your answers and explanations :-) .
I am glad that you have included many of my suggestions in the
Advanced MM/JSW Trainer (AMJT) project :-) .
1.
Andrew wrote:
> April promises me more time for MM/JSW after the tennis-That's very good news for the MM/JSW community :-) And you've done a
> distractions of March. :-)
lot for "the cause" in March anyway, IMHO :-)
2.
Andrew wrote (concerning the right-guardian problem in the
room "Whintstanley's crevice" [32] in "Willy vs. the Vampire Lord"):
> (...) Willy's rightmost left-facing sprite-frame is wider than oneThis makes me think of what may be - or perhaps not really - a
> cell-column in this game!
related phenomenon.
While designing rooms, on various occasions I had to push up the
lower boundary of a vertical guardian, by 2 or even 4 (e.g. from 208
to 206 or 204), because the guardian would collide with the floor.
Sometimes not the first time it went down, but the second time,
perhaps. This suggests to me that at this particular moment some
pixels from the guardian's sprite went beyond where they normally
should be and collided with the floor.
An interesting thing is that in some cases the occurrence of the
problem or lack thereof depended on the speed of the guardian. For
example, I had a perfectly-functioning VG moving at the speed of 04.
I increased the speed to 06 (or perhaps 08), and suddenly the
collision appeared.
3.
BTW, all this makes me think of another suggestion for the AMJT.
If a horizontal guardian's right boundary is set to 31, when it
reaches its right boundary, it will appear momentarily at the left
edge of the screen, then turn back and start its way back to the
left from the right edge of the screen. The interesting thing is
that at the left edge of the screen the guardian appears ONE CELL
ROW BELOW its normal horizontal level. Therefore you cannot have any
cells in the row below the guardian's normal level at the left edge,
or else there will be a collision.
I think it's a cool effect. Has it ever been applied in any game? (I
toyed with the idea of using it in the room "The Bar" [84] in "JSW:
The 2005 Megamix", but then I desisted).
4.
Andrew wrote (concerning the right-guardian problem in the
room "Whintstanley's crevice" [32] in "Willy vs. the Vampire Lord"):
> A true expert might observe the phase of animation before his/herThis makes me a lay player, unfortunately... At least in this case
> first attempt at collecting that item, a good player will learn
> from his/her first failed attempt and get it right next time, and
> a lay player may be content with random attempts - or just to
> kamikaze that item and move on.
:-)
Andrew wrote (concerning the problem of the timing of Kari's passing
through an arrow - or the other way round - safely in "We Pretty"):
> So it's always possible to solve a problem by pausing the game,The difference between "Whintstanley's crevice" issue and Kari's
> observing the precise positions of the player and the guardians,
> (saving a snapshot), trying the required manoeuvre, and (after
> reloading the snapshot) trying it again in the next time-frame, or
> after walking one step, until you get it right.
issue is that in "Wc" the player can observe the guardian movement
safely, and then make his/her move when he/she knows exactly when to
do it (as you said a true expert would).
In "We Pretty" this is impossible, because you have no safe position
when facing an incoming arrow. You have to experiment and if you
fail, you try the manoeuvre again after reloading the snapshot. And
if you are playing on a real Spectrum, or never saving/reloading
snapshots as a matter of principle?
So the problem is that unlike in "Wc", in "We Pretty" you cannot
test the ground first and then expose yourself to danger. You have
to expose yourself to danger while experimenting in order to
establish the proper position. That's why I would say you have
random chance of success on the first attempt, because you try a
position and you don't know whether it will be safe or not. You only
know it later on, after you have experimented.
Now, I'm not saying this as criticism of the game at all, I think
it's very cool to be able to pass through an arrow; I'm just
defending my opinion as to the "blind luck" in this case.
5.
Andrew wrote:
> There's no such thing as luck in JSW. The game-engine is aIn such case, the rope-teleport phenomenon (messages # 5387, 5390,
> discrete system which is 100% deterministic - there aren't even
> any pseudorandom elements.
5391 and 5396) should be repeatable. I have a snapshot of the game
before it happened, and another one right after it happened (see the
file RT.zip in my folder in the Files section). If I did not do
anything in the meantime (did not press any keys), the phenomenon
should happen EVERY TIME after I load the first snapshot, shouldn't
it? And if I did something in the meantime (pressed a key or two),
the phenomenon should happen EVERY TIME after I load the first
snapshot and repeat the original action exactly (also in the sense
of timing), shouldn't it? And yet it doesn't seem to be the case, or
at least that's the subjective feeling I have: sometimes it happens,
and sometimes it doesn't. How about that?
(I'm not really pressing to have the phenomenon explained, I know
it's a difficult issue, I'm just wondering about the possible random
elements in the game).
6.
Andrew wrote (concerning the player's progress in the room "Towards
Your Destiny" [103] of "JSW: Mind Control"):
> Not to mention ` in RealSpectrum to speed up the emulation,A true JSW expert must have:
> otherwise it's incredibly tedious! ;-)
- advanced jumping skills;
- perfect precision and timing;
- knowledge of the quirky features and other tricks;
- ability of lateral thinking;
- sense of dedication;
- infinite patience.
:-) :-) :-)
Incidentally, I have tried Real Spectrum while testing the conveyors-
during-the-toilet-run problem, and I find it's a nice emulator. I
haven't explored its many functions, I only had a very superficial
look at it, but I like its display. However, I have grown so used to
the ZX32 display that I will most probably stick to it for the time
being.
7.
Andrew wrote (concerning the expression "snapshot-type game" used
about my possible future game):
> Meaning that you'd have to save a lot of snapshots, rather thanYes, you are exactly right. In fact, Sendy used this expression in
> being distributed in SNA or Z80 format?
one of her private messages to me (when we were working on "JSW:
Mind Control"), and I thought it was cool, so I tried using it :-) .
8.
Andrew wrote: (concerning the screenshot "nowa.jpg" found in my
folder in the Files section)):
> I take it the white 'X' cells are Earth, the blue 'X' cells areYes, you are exactly right again.
> Water, and the red & white 'CI' cells are Fire?
9.
Andrew wrote:
> Perhaps one day we'll have a program to reverse-engineer roomsThat would be nice. A relatively "easy" task for a JSW48 game, but
> from screenshots using AI techniques! ;-)
what about JSW64 with a lot more cell-types?
10.
A message to DrUnKeN mAsTeR:
Andrew wrote (concerning DrUnKeN mAsTeR's planned release of the "10
of the best" boxsat):
> This will create an ontological headache, as I'll have to have a(snip)
> separate entry on my List for _10 of the best_, since it goes
> beyond the existing entries but without really /meriting/ a new
> entry because it's essentially just a compilation of existing
> games.
> Why not just reissue each of the games that needs bugs fixing,I think this is a very good suggestion, DrUnKeN mAsTeR. I would have
> individually, including the SEs? It would keep things simpler and
> much more elegant.
expressed it myself, but I was afraid I had pestered you enough
already with various questions and suggestions :-) .
Daniel
P.S. Two "o" words I learned from Dr. Broad's recent
messages: "ontological" and "orthogonal" :-)
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