I'm not big on social media, as you know, but one of the reasons I remain on the cesspool that is 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 I never thought possible. Okay, I guess he's not a bad lad...
Anyhow, his tweets are often fascinating because he pokes within the depths of ST games. It's here that weird techniques are discovered or he experiments with probable improvements. He also playtests enhancing performance 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. Although it's early days, Jon is using the hardware scrolling with the sprites/particle effects handled by the Blitter. There's no DMA sound but I cannot complain as he was generous in sending me an early beta lol
I asked Jon for his thoughts and ideas for what might eventually be a new Atari STe game. Although he replied having no concrete plans for a full game, he did hint toward several extremely promising 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" this beta, I must say it's impressive along with the prospect of what's already been achieved in a short time. I really liked the feel of the joystick controls and collision detection is spot-on. Border rasters indicate the remaining CPU time for future development opportunities so demonstrate great potential. Yes, 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 many Atari ST games. I can only imagine the dorky fun Jon has with his Atari STe and I hope that continues.
Update: Jon has started a source repository for those interested in helping out.
Sophelie was once a goddess of heaven but has since been vanquished and left to roam the lands searching for her body. Why do I hear you cry? Well, some kind soul has turned her into an albatross so she now spends her 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. However, this time we're not killing monsters or aliens but instead some of the weirdest things that you might never have expected; planets, snowmen, wolf heads, giant eyeballs and even trees. The landscapes are lush with colourful and angels will appear to help at regular intervals.
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 (ugly?) hand of God safely delivering us to each world ready for battle. These worlds are split into several segments with each having its own brand of baddies all too eager to see you dead. Each will swarm onto the screen using its own style of attack pattern and might even shoot at you - the Earth enemies fire mini-planets!
Some of the nasties are far too easy to kill whereas others are quite impossible thanks to the rate at which we can shoot - it's too low. So this makes killing certain enemies quite impossible because they move too quickly in comparison to our fire rate. Dying can be a bit troublesome especially when you materialise too close to an enemy and therefore instantly die once again. A simple invulnerability effect could easily have been utilised for a second or two. Quite unfair!
Angels visit after each of the segments to offer a power-up and these are pretty much 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. Which is very peculiar, to say the least.
Let's now take a peep 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, this isn't too bad with colourful palettes, funky sprites racing across the screen and smooth parallax scrolling running at a brisk pace. In fact, I love the level of detail that's gone into the sprite's artwork the most: Sophelie's animation is superb and never have I played a game with such a large whacky variety of different enemies.
Sadly, the audio is disappointing with a fuzzy theme tune and near-silent gameplay. Well, apart from the death kill sound effect and a strange background whistle. Overall, 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?
On a basic level, this isn't a terrible shoot 'em up. The levels are colourful, the baddies look great zipping across the screen and the action is constant. Also, I like how angels regularly appear with a gift to improve your chances of winning. However, this is also one of the most boring games I've ever booted up. The graphics might change but the gameplay is bland and very repetitive so becomes tiresome. And then there's the audio... Or lack of... Ugh, terrible!
It's an understatement to say that there are better Atari ST shooters. Sophélie looks nice, sounds awful and doesn't bring anything new to the table but there are boobies so perhaps it's worth playing? Nah, I'll leave it thanks.
Let's go back to the days of Starsky & Hutch and Asteroids!
Most people might think it's pretty stupid to emulate a retro computer - using a retro computer? Thankfully, not me because I have 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. What luck! So, I figured I should give it a good playtesting.
I've never actually owned/used a TRS-80 and I imagine few made it outside of the US? Anyhow, Tandy and RadioShack released the first model in 1977 and it was a huge hit for those wealthy enough to have lots of spare cash burning a hole in their pockets. Back then, I would have been six years old and too young to care about something like this :-)
Okay, let's begin with a screenshot of the credits. Oh yeah, it's screenshot time...
It's sadly impressive 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, be that 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 far too tempting not to boot up so I read the docs and hit the web to learn how to operate this ancient beast.
First things first do read the docs and take a 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 from the net.
Lots of features and is very versatile. Plus it can play many different games too which matters more...
One of the first things I booted up was Donkey Kong. Okay, it looks terrible but 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: Pacman, Invaders, Frogger, and so on. 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. However, it's going to struggle with the games as it's simply not fast enough. Personally, my Mega STe is the basic and 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 is a pretty good game.
Games! Give me games!
One of the best games I played was 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 Armored Patrol and the wealth of PacMan games!
There are a few games bundled with 2nd Life and many are great but 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 and 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 is a machine that 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 and I'm impressed with how well it runs in terms of its speed and compatibility. The inclusion of a utility to convert disk images into a format that 2nd Life can recognise is a wonderful addition and opens up the possibility of playing everything there is. Techies can go further: font editor, altering the keyboard layout, linking computers via parallel ports and even tinkering with a disassembler debugger...
The TRS-80 is a great machine and it is so impressive to see the Atari ST flip back in time so easily and reliably. This is a fantastic emulator - however - you will need a >16Mhz computer to start gaming like it's 1977 and my Mega STe felt close to the speed of a real TRS-80 (from what I've seen online). I have really enjoyed using 2nd Life and I'd love to hear what hardware and performance you guys are getting, so let me know in the comments below.
GitHub has the download which includes the source code for those uber-geeks amongst us :-)
- MORE SCREENSHOTS -
Look what I found and it's quite 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.
Well, don't be so quick because here is Recovery, a shoot 'em up by New Deal Productions. Oddly, it's something I've not heard of until the other day! It takes us on a *Fantastic Voyage* through the lower bits of some poor soul in need of medical assistance. I assume we're trying to help him recover from something nasty as we begin at the bottom and work our way up through the liver (I think), and then onto the heart before finally smashing through the old grey matter.
Recovery is much in the vein of something like Menace or R-Type but runs at a far quicker pace with many of the patient's body parts whizzing around the screen. It's like Anarchy and just as tough - almost nigh on impossible when trying to dodge everything. But our ship is spritely and we're armed with a laser so shoot first and never ask dumb questions.
I love finding something 'new' to play and this is an exciting shoot'em up...
It's a shooter. So, shoot everything!
Each part of the body is a separate stage and also incredibly long, almost to the point where you think it will never end! However, they all feel much the same with a vast array of different "aliens" to avoid or kill. These use a variety of attack patterns but touching any reduces energy levels, so bad pilots ultimately end up losing yet another life. Strangely, there is no end-of-level boss. A beastly tumour would have been nice to destroy - a sentence I thought I would never say!
The joystick controls are excellent - very fast and responsive without any sluggishness. Our main weapon is a laser beam and quite effective too - pressing and holding fire shoots this laser and kills anything in front of you. 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 appears to have 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 hit every key but nothing, nada, zip. Does anyone know?
Okay, let's take a break from reading and view another lovely screenshot...
Aesthetics?
Visually, this is a mixed-body bag that isn't quite as healthy as you would hope. Don't get me wrong, a scroller needs to scroll and each parallax layer moves very smoothly. However, the backgrounds can be quite bare-bones, but there are tons of funky sprites which only goes to prove how weirdly wonderful we are on the inside. Maybe!
Hitting F4 flips between 50/60Hz which speeds things up even more - if you can handle it?
Sonically, this is going to appeal to lovers of chip music. To be blunt, it's quite simply fantastic and foot-tappingly awesome so makes you realise just how cool your ST is. However, those insane people amongst us might wish to turn it off and hear sound effects. No problem, just hit F2/F3 but why would you ever wanna do that? I know, because you're stupid.
Okay, you've guessed it - stop reading and enjoy another gorgeous screenshot...
The CryptO'pinion?
Recovery is a damn good shoot 'em up and also technically impressive. It slaps the faces of all those lazy programmers that said the ST cannot scroll. However, gameplay could be better as each stage feels overly long with zillions of frantic 'aliens' constantly buzzing about. This static style doesn't seem to go anywhere, so it gets samey after a while. Also, our weapons cannot be upgraded which is a massive disappointment but not as much as having no bosses to fight.
Okay, I'm sure you can tell that this isn't the greatest shoot 'em up but it's far from being the worst. 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. If only to see who can survive the longest, good luck with that because you'll need it.
Check out these 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 incredible "ST Dream Team". Yup, Steve Bak, Pete Lyons and David Whittaker: three masters in their own field. These guys aimed for quality and always pushed our computer without ever resorting to excuses or using a lame Amiga port. #respect
RTG is basically a funky take 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. At great speed!!
Wanna see the first bunch of screenshots? Then wait no longer because here they are...
Can you see the Mechanauts? Not easy, is it? Wait, now I see a scientist waiting to be picked up!
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 - hold fire and kill everything. But let's play properly? It's worth slowing down to pick up the scientists rather than killing them: once onboard, hit the HELP key to see what cool power-ups they might provide. These guys are useful and could improve weaponry, shields, invisibility, and so much more. However, Festus might be less than fun as the master of self-destruction!!
A scanner shows the location of each scientist but this sadly 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 yoyo. Yes, this is one incredibly FAST shoot 'em up that has you on the edge of your seat. 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). Don't get me wrong, RTG looks lovely but it's also pretty gorky and I sometimes 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 that 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 - his work proves "chip" will last forever. Okay, it does sound <cough> familiar but it suits the gameplay perfectly. Heck, our ST talks to us which is a zillion times better than Gold Runner. Dave certainly gets the YM processor rocking in ways only he could achieve!
It looks, moves, and sounds superb so certainly a dream team production! Here are a couple more screenshots...
Oh, look, a weapons upgrade. I knew it was better to rescue these guys rather than blasting 'em!
The CryptO'pinion?
RTG is one of those games that has it all - it looks, scrolls and sounds absolutely brilliant yet I'm still unsure. I love a good Defender but this is too difficult thanks to its blistering speeds which means hitting lots of objects and suffering humiliating deaths. However, the scientist's power-ups are a wonderful idea that compensates for the difficult gameplay.
Return To Genesis is an iconic shoot 'em up for most Atari ST gamers! But, it's way too furious for me and thus another Anarchy. Sorry, but give me Xenon or Menace any day of the week. Overall, I like it but, I don't love it.
Return To Genesis is available on floppy or a hard drive device.
Everyone knows that Peter Putnik has adapted hundreds of games for hard disk installation. These often include extras like bug fixes, TOS compatibility, 4MB patching, and so on. However, some are also super-charged with cool coding that utilises the Blitter coprocessor and other hidden chips lurking inside the Atari STe.
I thought it would be nice to offer a brief round-up of these enhanced games as a compilation here on AtariCrypt. Oids and Uridium are particularly impressive as both updates improve tremendously upon their original counterparts. I also enjoyed playing my own music during a game of Xenon 2 (read the docs and convert music from your library). There's something here for everyone and I hope you find this useful. Let me know what you think!
Let's play...
Okay, 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 chosen DMA streamed music. + Prince Of Persia - allow the DMA hardware lurking inside the Atari STe to replay the game's sounds.
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 within the Atari STe. + Chaos Strikes Back - Again, the DMA hardware allows cleaner sample playback for this awesome sequel. + Oids - the potential for double framerates deliver a smoother experience when rescuing the stickmen.
Right, let's take a peek at three more which 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 [original disks still required] + Menace - I cannot thank Peter enough for replacing that horrendous yellow ship with a white one! + 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 also comes with optional DMA streamed music!! + Hard 'n' Heavy - gone is that embarrassing flip-screen gameplay, all thanks to cool Blitter programming. + Road Runner - Improved and also Blitterized for faster scrolling - but it's still a rubbish game (sorry!)
Okay, let's end in style! Here are two ST classics and (wait for it) a PC classic too! Ooh, nice...
+ Goldrunner - Some might not like this, but I love hitting the F3 key to disable that fuzzy speech! + Gauntlet - this sluggish hack 'n slash arcade game 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.
