I seem to have come to a pothole with this :/ It sometimes creates an endless loop, and it clearly doesn't check correctly. I'll have to try and fix this later, but if I can't get it, I'll post here. I think I'm still checking from the enemy rendering code :/

Is it possible you're running into a stack level problem? Please feel free to post code for me/us to examine if you want.

Haven't tested it yet, but figured I'd go ahead and post it to see if I need to totally redo my thinking on it. Testing it now btw

Edit: Didn't work, it just ran really slowly for a second, giving me enough time to exit with Clear. Any ideas? Btw, if you already saw that, my add statements were broken, fixing them now.

Edit2: Calc84 helped with a bunch of the code, and reminded me that I can do collision by subtracting the two widths of the sprites, and checking the absolute value of the two is greater than their combined total. Kinda like this: http://www.cemetech.net/forum/viewtopic.php?p=130182#130182

Edit3: Double check for Calc84 about seeing if I can reduce all my 16 bit register inc/dec into 8 bit inc/dec. I'll have to check if it stays in one 256 byte area and won't overflow.

Code:
Edit: Take 2
Code:

Sorry to be obtuse; should I be checking your code to see if your 16-bit dec/incs can be switched to 8-bit dec/incs?

Oh, no. Not yet, I'm was making a note to myself to check when all the code is finished. That way I already have the code in place, so the positions won't change too much. And then I can go back and choose to use some saferam if I want to.

Edit: Hm, crashed the calculator after shooting two bullets, debug mode!

Edit2: I got it to work! Turns out I was "inc hl"ing once too many times, among a few other bugs. Here's a new screenie:


Edit3: I got bullets shooting from the enemies Another screenie:

Now, a question, how should I do health? Should I have a line, or use numbers, and if a line, what side?

Do a line, and make it run horizontally at the bottom of the screen.

Dots, everytime you get hit, a dot, or half a dot goes bye bye

Half a pixel... How would I do that >.> Is a line the best way to tell? I was trying to shy away from that because it is exactly what Phoenix did iirc. Another idea would be to show you ship deteriorating as you got hit, so maybe there would be 6 sprites and as your health gets closer to zero, it would change the sprite again. I could also do what Galaxian did, which was to have a menu show up that had your lives left, but with the speed of this game, I'm not sure how well that would fly.

Edit: After rethinking what Qazz42 said, I kinda get what he means, like little circles somewhere that show up depending on how much life you have left. Kinda like Zelda hearts, I'll think about it. Note to future self: Make it switch sides depending on where you are.

I initially was thinking a line, similar to what Phoenix does, but now that you explained what Qazz was saying, I quite like the Zelda-hearts-esque idea! That would be fairly unique.

Woo! 2:27 AM and I got the hearts finished So glad I got out of bed
Edit: Added a way to show if you have more hearts than can be displayed. Also, if you think of another sprite, or another "Moar hearts!" sprite, could you post it The hearts are 4x4, and the "Moar hearts!" sprite can be between 8x8 and 4x4 (Though I'd like the X to match, so 8x4 is better)

To be honest, I find the side-switching to be slightly distracting, but that's just me. What do other people feel about that?

Yeah, I agree that it is kinda distracting. I had an idea on the way back home, I could change sides only if you are within, say, 10 pixels from the far sides. Then it won't be so suddenly changing. Any ideas?

I think that would be a lot better; can you give it a try and see how it feels?

Yup, I'll implement in a second

That's great, I think that's much better and much less distracting. Kudos for thinking up an amenable solution. I see that you have enemy removal working, which is spiffy; what's next?

Hmm, I'm thinking power-ups. Kinda like the old one, where they looked somewhat like:

Edit: Pardon the obnoxious slowness x.x

Double Edit: Can you all help me think of powerups? I'm thinking about doing: Speed++, health++, Bombs, Invincibility, more? The bombs would go up into the enemies, and "explode" when you press a button (Alpha? Second again?)

*bump* I got powerups to be added (in a single test run, after killing all enemies, it didn't crash >.>), I still need ideas for what powerups to add. I'm also about to work on displaying the powerups (It's freaking cold, so it's hard to type this...). I also had a question, in brass, can I have functions split up on multiple lines? ie:
Code:

That looks great tanner, keep up the good work.

What about "bad" powerups too? I feel like that always helps keep it interesting.

Haha, exactly In the old version of Raven that I included a screenshot of, I got hit by one of my "bad" powerups, which keeps you in one place for a little while. So, a "stop" powerup, maybe a "slower shooting" powerup?