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Message: 6370
Author: Daniel
Date: 23/02/2008
Subject: Flash Manic Miner / JSW64: Flash Manic Miner
My MM/JSW-related activities have been "abducted" since the end of
December by the urge to prove myself in the online Flash Manic Miner
(http://www.darnkitty.com/manic/index.php). I have just done it, I
believe - I have passed the second set of MM caverns, reaching
Cavern 43 (the third in the third set of rooms) and achieving a
result of over 80000 points, which may be an historic record (I
can't know that for sure, since I haven't followed the high-score
table since the introduction of new Caverns in December 2005).
Please bear in mind that in FMM, contrary to the Spectrum original,
you don't get any extra lives, so all you have is the two spare
lives you start with. So the slightest mistake can cost you dearly.
I hope that this success will now allow me to go back to MM/JSW-for-
ZX_Spectrum-related activities, even though obviously I will need to
devote some time to satisfying my curiosity of whether the third set
of rooms in FMM is the final one, or whether there are more caverns
afterwards. And it's very time consuming - it takes probably around
45 minutes or more to get to the place I have reached, and with so
few lives you don't get many chances of investigating how to pass
the new caverns if they present particular difficulties.
--- In manicminerandjetsetwilly@yahoogroups.com, andrewbroad
>
Well, what can I say? Great minds think alike, evidently :-) . I am
> Daniel wrote:
> >
> > It would nice to one day (in a hypothetical future when one is
> > not SO busy...) convert, with Matt Gordon's kind permission, the
> > levels from Flash Manic Miner "back" to ZX Spectrum.
>
> I've kept this to myself up until now, but I started doing exactly
> that in 2006! I have converted Caverns 21 to 25 of Flash Manic
> Miner to a JSW64:Z game, by taking a screenshot of each new room
> as I reached it, and writing the corresponding JSW64 room using
> JSWED.
really glad you have taken on this job, Andrew, and have Matthew
Gordon's kind permission for it :-) . It will be a nice JSW64 game
when it's done! :-)
> > How many new levels are there, does anyone know?
Well, he either didn't tell you the whole truth, or he has added new
>
> Matthew Gordon told me in an email that there are 20 new levels.
> They are based on the original Manic Miner caverns, with extra
> items, guardians, and minor changes to the cell-layout.
levels since. My question now is whether the /third/ set of caverns
is finally the last one...
I haven't counted, but this might actually present a challenge for
the conversion, since I have a feeling there are more than 256 items
altogether in FMM. Many of the new caverns in the second set have 10
items each. The first three caverns of the third set probably have
another 30 items altogether. Yeah, there will certainly be more than
256 items in the 60 caverns. Is there any way to satisfy that in
JSW64? Would it be possible to modify the game engine to have 512
items to collect?
Another interesting technical challenge will be Caverns 29 and 31 of
the second set of FMM: they have guardians passing through "inkful"
Fire-cells. This could not currently be done in JSW64, could it?
The downside of FMM is certainly the fact that a significant number
of caverns in the second set (namely, Caverns 32 to 40) are
identical to their counterparts in the first set, except for the
differences in the room names and a number of additional items in
Cavern 34. And then the first two caverns in the third set are
identical to the first two caverns in the second set (however, the
third one is different again). This makes the conversion less
attractive (although simpler to do).
So, I look forward to the continuation of your conversion job,
Andrew, and to playing a finished product one day! :-)
Daniel
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