I'm not big on social media, but one of the reasons I remain on Twitter is to follow people like Jonathan Thomas. Yep,
that same dodgy fella who developed
Pole Position
for the Atari STe and then dared to update
Lotus Turbo II
in ways we never thought possible back in the day. Okay, I guess he's not a
bad lad...
His tweets are often fascinating because he pokes deep within the
depths of ST code. It's here that weird techniques are discovered or he
experiments with probable improvements. He also enhances code by utilising the Atari STe hardware. All this coding talk is way
over my head, but intriguing nonetheless.
So, onto his latest 'project', a horizontally-scrolling shooter for the Atari
STe, not too dissimilar to Menace, R-Type, etc. Jon’s using hardware scrolling while the sprites and particle effects are handled by the Blitter. There are no DMA sound effects, but I cannot complain as he was
generous in sending me an early beta lol
I asked Jon for his thoughts and prospects for what might eventually be an Atari STe game. Although he replied that he had no concrete plans, he did hint toward several promising short-term goals:
A title screen (we will need a name for this!).
16x16
sprites for a selection of individual enemies.
Each sprite will use
10-15 predefined attack moves.
A couple of (2-3 minute) stages with
increasing difficulty.
A "game completion" screen.
Multiple DMA
sound effects.
Chipmusic hopefully by (fingers crossed)
Dma_Sc.
Having "played" the beta, I must say it's impressive, along with the
prospect of what's already been achieved in a short time. I liked the
feel of the joystick controls, and collision detection is spot-on. Border
rasters indicate the remaining CPU time for future additions and demonstrate the potential. You might say, I'm excited!
If, like me, you love hearing what other people are doing with their Atari
STs, then take a look at Jon's
Twitter stream. It's amock with weird programming gizmos (that I shall never understand) as he enjoys dismantling ST games. I can imagine the
dorky entertainment Jon has with his Atari STe!! I hope that continues.
Update: Jon has started a source
repository
for those interested in helping him out.
Sophelie was once a goddess of heaven, but has since been vanquished and left to roam the lands searching for her body. What? Why? Well, some kind soul has turned her into an albatross, so she now spends time flying through worlds looking to find her original appearance. As storylines go, this is silly, to say the least!
This is a horizontally scrolling shooter, not too dissimilar to Menace. This time, we're not killing monsters or aliens, but some of the weirdest things you might never have expected: planets, snowmen, wolf heads, eyeballs, and even trees. The landscapes are lush with colour, and even angels will regularly appear to help.
Sounds great, right? Well, let's take a look at some screenshots from the first level...
Yep, giant eyeballs are coming for you and are actually tough to kill, too!
Now, this is getting silly! What have the trees ever done to you?
Let's kill the planet? No, literally by shooting down the rotating planet Earth!!
Spit, don't shoot!
We begin with the hand of God safely delivering us, ready for battle. The levels are split into segments, with each having its own brand of baddies all too eager to see you dead. The controls are fast and responsive, and a joy to control without any lag. The gameplay is fast and exciting as each enemy will swarm onto the screen using its unique attack pattern. Some shoot at you, like the Earth enemies firing mini-planets. Cool.
Some of the nasties are easy to kill, whereas others are impossible, thanks to the slow rate at which we can shoot. This makes killing certain enemies tough because they move too quickly in comparison to our fire rate. Dying can be a bit troublesome, especially when you materialise close to an enemy and therefore instantly die once again. A simple invulnerability effect could have been utilised for a second or two!!
Angels visit after each segment with power-ups, which are essential from the start. Miss them, and the following swarm of enemies is quite impossible to defeat. Also, dying baddies might sometimes throw out an extra power-up, but these fall off the screen before you've had a chance to even think about collecting them. Finally, there is a time limit ticking down to kill each wave of baddies. Very peculiar, to say the least.
Let's end the whining and take a look at some screenshots from the second world...
Some of the sprites are freaky... freaky-cool!
I can't make out whether these are balloons or floating severed heads!
Damn snowmen, they all deserve to die!! O_o
Aesthetics?
Visually, I like the colourful palettes, funky sprites racing across the screen, and smooth parallax scrolling running at a brisk pace. I love the level of detail that's gone into the sprite's artwork. Sophelie's animation is superb, and never have I played a game with such a wacky variety of different enemies. They're quite insane!!
Sadly, the audio is disappointing with a fuzzy tune and near-silent gameplay. Well, apart from the death-killing sound effect and a strange background whistle. It's shocking because the YM is far more capable.
Well, that was a mixed bag, alright, so let's take a peep at the third world...
These are insanely difficult to kill, if not impossible, without losing all your lives!
He's big. He's bad. He's about to be brown bread!!
Hey, a power-up appears from a dying beast, yet you have no chance of collecting it!
The CryptO'pinion?
This isn’t a terrible shoot 'em up. The colourful levels and impressive baddies zipping across the screen create a constant action-packed experience. Plus, the occasional appearance of angels with gifts to boost your chances of victory adds a nice touch. Sadly, it’s also one of the most boring shooters I’ve played. While the graphics might change, the gameplay constantly remains the same. And then there's the audio... Ugh, terrible!
Technically superb, but it’s an understatement to say there are better Atari ST shooters. Sophelie looks nice, but sounds awful and is very repetitive. While there are boobies, I’m not convinced it’s worth playing.
If you're curious, then grab the floppy disk at Atari Legend. Enjoy...
Oh no, another grisly death beautifully laid out. Interesting artwork!
Let's go back to the days of Starsky & Hutch and Asteroids!
Most people might think it's stupid to emulate a retro computer using a retro computer. Thankfully, not me, as I've found something rather incredible called 2nd Life. It's a TRS-80 Model III emulator by Sander Berents and is something I stumbled on purely by chance. So, I figured I should give it a good playtest.
I've never used a TRS-80, and I imagine few made it outside the US. Anyhow, Tandy and RadioShack released the first model in 1977; it was a hit for those wealthy enough to have lots of spare cash burning a hole in their pockets. Back then, I would have been six and too young to care about something like this :-)
Let's begin with a screenshot of the credits. Oh yeah, it's screenshot time...
It's sad that something this good wasn't released earlier in the ST's life.
What's a RadioShack?
Like you, I love my Atari ST, even when it pretends to be something else - a Sinclair, Commodore, or even a peculiar clunk of hardware by RadioShack (I used to love the Tandy stores). Anyhow, a TRS-80 emulator sounded too tempting not to try! I read the docs and hit the web to learn how to operate this ancient beast.
First things first, read the docs and look at the FAQ text file to understand which options to enable/disable for the best performance and compatibility settings. You will also find two more disk images with compiled and BASIC games, but you'll be best with a 16MHz computer to enjoy something close to native speeds.
2nd Life requires ST High resolution and is very easy to use. Along the bottom of the screen are four floppy disk drive icons - click to highlight Drive 0 and use that as the TRS operating system boot drive. The second drive icon can be used for anything, like games or other images that you may have downloaded.
Lots of features and is versatile. Plus, it can play many different games too, which matters more...
One of the first things I booted up was Donkey Kong. It looks terrible, but it plays well.
Old but not that much different
Using the TRS-80's DOS commands feels a little quirky, but is fairly easy to learn. For example, DIR will display the directory of a disk, and it can be expanded with extra options and filters, as you'll see in the video:
DIR 0 - will produce the contents of Drive 0
DIR 1 - will produce the contents of Drive 1. Easy, right?
DIR 1,/BAS - this displays the same list but filters for BAS files. CAT 1 - this provides an alternative way to load programs!
We're gonna get a little more complex now, but it's worth it to watch the dancing alien:
BASIC RUN "DANCING/BAS,1"
The command looks worse than it actually is. Breaking it down, it simply instructs the computer to load up the BASIC program. Then that will load/run the file "DANCING/BAS" which is stored on Drive 1. Easy!
This is starting to be fun, so I went searching for a game like Menace or R-Type. Ahem, screenshot time...
Sea Dragon is a terrible mess of ZX81 blockiness, but it is a brilliant shoot 'em up!
Get to the games already!
Ultimately, we're here to play some TRS-80 games, and I gotta tip my hat to this old piece of 70s kit. There are some great games in its library, and there's a good reason I chose Sea Dragon as the video thumbnail. Like any old computer, there's a wealth of vintage games from the era: Pac-Man, Invaders, Frogger, etc. I'm a geek, so I enjoyed the thrill of playing with something that's almost as old as me. No rude comments, please!
Performance-wise, the humble 8MHZ Atari ST will successfully emulate and run everything you throw at it. It will struggle with the games as it's simply not fast enough. Personally, my Mega STe is the essential, minimum requirement and produces near-perfect speeds, generally speaking. So, 8MHz will be fine, but 16MHz will get you gaming. Hardly a shock and just the same as with other emulators we have within our library...
Don't forget to read the docs as README.TXT is there for a reason... Okay, I'll nag no more!
Yes, this really is Frogger. Hopper has awful collision detection, but it's a good game.
Games! Give me games!
One of the best games is Sea Dragon, which is a fantastic scramble through watery canyons. Sadly, I wasn't impressed with Penetrator. I struggled with jerky graphics and twitchy controls. It was a shock to see a chunky version of Donkey Kong with huge black and white blocks, but the gameplay is superb, and that's what matters. However, the blocks worked great for Armoured Patrol and the wealth of Pac-Man games!
There are a few games bundled with 2nd Life, and sooner or later, you will want more. Thankfully, there are some great websites with disk images stuffed full of games, and I managed to find racers, lots of different Space Invaders, Zork, and even Temple of Apshai - which is nothing at all like the Atari ST version. Its "turn-based" element caught me off guard, in a nice way. But boy, is it slow - even on a real TRS-80. Yikes!
Most (all?) disk images found on the internet won't be compatible with the Atari ST. Thankfully, Sander has a utility to convert these for 2nd Life and it works a treat from what I've seen so far. Hence, how I got to play Hamburger Sam, Berserk, erm Robot Attack and the sluggish Temple of Apshai.
He might not be yellow, but he's on the TRS-80 as Gobbler!
The CryptO'pinion?
I initially expected the TRS-80 to be nothing more than a cumbersome piece of ancient hardware that I wouldn't particularly enjoy. I couldn't be more wrong. This machine appears to have more power and versatility than I would ever imagine. It's a great computer, and it's no wonder those plucky Americans snapped it up!
2nd Life is an equally fantastic piece of software! I'm impressed with how well it runs in terms of speed, ease of use, and compatibility. The inclusion of a utility to convert disk images into a format that 2nd Life can recognise is wonderful. That opens up the possibility of playing everything there is. Techies can go further: font editor, keyboard alteration, linking computers, and even tinkering with a disassembler debugger...
The TRS-80 is great, and it's impressive to see the Atari ST flip back in time so easily and reliably. I have really enjoyed using 2nd Life, and I'd love to hear what hardware you guys are using to run this software.
GitHub has the download, which includes the source code for those uber-geeks amongst us :-)
- MORE SCREENSHOTS -
Look what I found!! It's different to the Atari ST game. Quick, kill the Ant Man!!
This is Astro, and it's a BASIC game. No, I mean it's written in BASIC, and it's good.
Hamburger Sam, based on BurgerTime, but felt more like Mr Wimpy to me. Love it.
This is Speedway, and it's kinda like an early Spy Hunter or Major Motion. Hmm...
Runner demands quick control action - you'll regret not reading the FAQ text file!
I only ever played Penetrator on the ZX Spectrum... and this isn't as good!
Hang on, is that Berserk? No, it's Robot Attack and completely different. Honest.
Limit Zero is absolutely superb and something you should play!!
ScarfMan? Okay, it's getting silly now...
Lunar Lander is a cracking conversion, but too slow for an 8MHz ST to handle.
Recovery is a shooter by New Deal Productions that takes us on a *Fantastic Voyage* through the lower parts of some poor soul in need of medical assistance. I presume we're trying to help him recover from something nasty as we begin at the bottom, working our way up through the liver (I think), and then onto the heart before finally smashing through the old grey matter. Yeah, we get to rock through the human body!
This game is very similar to Menace or R-Type, but at a faster pace. The whizzing body parts make dodging almost impossible. Our ship is agile and armed with a laser, so don't think - shoot first and never ask dumb questions. I love finding something 'new' to play, and this is an exciting shooter.
Let's take a break and see some screenshots...
I got AGT vibes from this screenshot, which pleased and depressed me equally.
It's a shooter, so shoot!
Each body part represents a distinct stage and is incredibly long, almost making you think it will never end. Trust me, these levels are lonnnnnng. Despite this, they all feel similar, presenting a vast array of "aliens" to avoid or eliminate. These employ various attack patterns, but touching them depletes energy levels. Consequently, poorly skilled pilots ultimately lose yet another life. Interestingly, there’s no end-of-level boss. A monstrous tumour would have been a fitting final boss - now that’s a sentence I never thought I’d say!
The joystick controls are excellent - swift and responsive without any lag. Our main weapon is an effective laser beam - pressing and holding fire shoots this laser and kills anything in front of you. It's wicked!! Sadly, there are no other types of upgrades or special weapons, so all we have is one laser and nothing more.
Thankfully, our sleeping patient has popped many pills, which you'll see floating through his body just waiting to be collected. These can boost your weapon's rate of fire, energy and shields, which are all displayed in the status bar. I never figured out what "LIGH" is for - I tried hitting every key, but nothing, nada, zip.
Let's take a break from the boring reading and view another lovely screenshot...
A menacing screenshot with the colour scheme. This game is fast, so shoot and move quick!
Aesthetics?
Visually, this is a mixed-body bag that isn't as healthy as you would hope. Don't get me wrong, a scrolling shooter needs to scroll. And this game scrolls smoothly with parallax layers. Sadly, the backgrounds are sometimes bare-bones. Although there are tons of sprites zooming around at impressive rates!
Hitting F4 flips between 50/60Hz to speed things up even more - if you can handle it?
Sonically, this is outstanding and foot-tappingly awesome - makes you realise just how cool your Atari ST is. However, any insane people might wish to turn it off for the sound effects. No problem, just hit F2/F3, but why would you ever wanna do that? Wait, I think that I know the answer, it's because you're stupid.
Okay, you've guessed it - stop reading and enjoy another gorgeous screenshot...
Come on, you cannot deny the style of this game? It looks the business with a style I love.
The CryptO'pinion?
Recovery is technically impressive and a damn good shooter. It slaps the faces of those lazy programmers who said the ST cannot scroll. Sadly, the gameplay could be better, as each stage feels excessively long, and that static style lacks progression and becomes monotonous after a while. Furthermore, the inability to upgrade our weapons is a significant disappointment, but not as much as the absence of bosses to fight.
I've enjoyed blasting through some fella's intimate body parts all in the name of science fiction. Recovery is definitely worth booting up for a quick game or two - especially to see who can survive the longest!!
Check out my screenshots before deciding whether to download for hard disk or floppy...
Firebird released Return To Genesis the same year I got my Atari ST, and it was developed by the "ST Dream Team": Steve Bak, Pete Lyons, and David Whittaker. Three masters in their fields, who aimed for quality and always pushed our computer without ever resorting to excuses or using a lame Amiga port. #respect
RTG is a spin on Defender, where Mechanauts have forced scientists into slavery. We've gotta rescue each of these guys, which means jumping into a spaceship to skim the surface of 50 psychedelic worlds.
Wanna see the first bunch of screenshots? Then wait no longer because here they are...
Weeeee..... swooooosh..... ZOOOOM......... dead!
Can you see the Mechanauts? Not easy, is it?
I'm getting too old and slow
If you've ever played Defender, then you should be right at home with RTG. It only has a tiny learning curve. Fire and kill everything? But it's worth slowing down to pick up the scientists rather than killing them: once onboard, hit the HELP key to see what power-ups they might provide. These guys are useful and could improve weaponry, shields, invisibility, etc. However, Festus might be less than fun as the master of self-destruction?
A scanner shows the location of each scientist, but this falls short of detailing the level layout. I don't know why, but this doesn't work well for me. Sigh... how many more times must I be rebounded back and forth like a yo-yo? Yes, you're on the edge of your seat for this incredibly FAST shooter. Blink, and you're dead!!
Screenshot time, and here are twelve scary-looking people from the future...
This is an incredible idea that uses who you rescue in a positive way for the next level. It's superb!
Aesthetics
Pete Lyon designed everything you see, but I'd be lying if I said this was his best work (I personally think Zynaps won that accolade). It's pretty gorky, so I often found it difficult to distinguish the aliens against those funky backgrounds. The scrolling is smooth to prove, once again, that the Atari ST needed no custom chips when in the hands of talented people who care about the product they're working on.
Audio is such a treat. Dave Whittaker sure knew how to get the best heard from our computer - proving that "chipmusic" will last forever. Yes, it sounds <cough> familiar, but it suits the gameplay. Heck, our ST talks to us, which is a zillion times better than Gold Runner. Dave certainly gets the YM processor rocking.
It looks, moves, and sounds superb! Definitely a dream team production, so let's see screenshots...
A weapons upgrade. I knew it was better to rescue these guys rather than blasting 'em!
Shall we rescue him or not? Erm, I shall.... try....!!
The CryptO'pinion?
Return to Genesis is one of those games that seems to have it all - brilliant visuals, smooth scrolling, immersive sound effects, and classic chip tunes. However, I’m left feeling unsure if it’s the game itself or just me. I love a good Defender-inspired shooter, but this one’s way too fast. After a few pointless games, I’m exhausted from hitting objects and dying repeatedly. Thankfully, the scientists have some great power-ups. These are a wonderful idea that somewhat alleviates the frustrating gameplay, albeit just a tiny bit.
This sure is an iconic shoot ‘em up for Atari ST gamers, truly representing the ST’s capabilities. Unfortunately, it’s far too fast for me, and I’d much rather play Zynaps or Menace. I wanted to love this game, but it just wasn’t for me. It’s brilliant, but sadly, not for this gamer. I guess I’m just too old and slow?
Everyone knows Peter Putnik has adapted hundreds of games for hard disk installation. These include extras, like bug fixes, TOS compatibility, 4MB patching, Mega STe/Falcon support, etc. However, some are also super-charged with cool coding that utilises the Blitter coprocessor and DMA for audio that will blow your mind.
Are you interested in games being better on your Atari STe? You should be!
I thought it would be a nice idea to compile a brief overview of his enhanced games here on AtariCrypt. Oids and Uridium are particularly impressive as they significantly improve on their original versions. I also enjoyed playing my own music during a game of Xenon 2 (you can convert your own music).
There is something here for everyone, and I hope you find this useful. Let me know what you think.
Let's play.
Let's take a look at some of these enhanced games that you can download and play right now...
Xenon II - updated for the Atari STe and features DMA-streamed music. Turn up the volume!
Cannon Fodder - enhance this lame port with your own DMA-streamed music.
Prince of Persia - the DMA hardware is used to replay the game's sound effects.
Did you enjoy that? Well, here are three enhanced FTL games that are nicely improved...
Dungeon Master - far cleaner samples are heard thanks to the DMA hardware.
Chaos Strikes Back - again, the DMA hardware allows cleaner sample playback!
Oids - double framerates deliver a smoother experience when rescuing the stickmen.
Let's take a peek at three more that aren't exactly favoured well by the average ST gamer...
Jinks - this jerky game is weird, but at least it now uses the smoother STe scrolling.
Menace - I cannot thank Peter enough for replacing that horrendous yellow ship!
Uridium - Blitter-boost that sluggish ship and add DMA-streamed background music while you're at it!
Now let's take a little run-around with these three you might never have expected to boot up...
Giana Sisters - this Zamuel_a enhanced game now comes with optional DMA streamed music!!
Hard 'n' Heavy - gone is that embarrassing flip-screen, thanks to the Blitter.
Road Runner - Improved and Blitterized for faster scrolling for this funny game.
Okay, let's end in style! Here are two ST classics and a PC classic, too! Ooh, nice...
Goldrunner - Some might not like this, but I hit the F3 key to disable the fuzzy speech!
Gauntlet - this sluggish hack 'n slasher gets big improvements, but still needs extra CPU grunt.
Wolfenstein 3D - Ray's jaw-dropping FPS now has bugs removed with decent save game support.
