Robot War Being Finalized

[DigiTan]

I'm happy to announce that after 21 months of developement, the final quest in the Robot War RPG was completed today. For the first time ever, it's possible to play the whole game beginning to end without any bugs or missing features. The game will undergo 4 to 6 more weeks of balancing and optimization until it is released in mid March.

If you saw the demo, there have been some nice changes to the mechanics of the game. The "alloy" currency has been replaced with a player ranking system. Now, you start at the lowest rank (alpha) and build you way up to the highest rank (ohmega). Upgrading is optional, but it enhances your team's strenght and gives you access to tougher enemies and secret abilities after you beat the game. Also, some characters will refuse to talk to you if your rank is still low.



Weather is a recurring theme in the game. Rainstorms can appear in battles and make things difficult for the unprepared. Dr. Edmund's Darkstar bases are littered with all-new traps. He will even randomly taunt you over a PA system while you're trying to avoid deadly objects and alarm switches.



Some strings have been changed for broader appeal. For example: "Solder Kit" has become "Repair," and "Weld kit" has become "Repair DX." The wordier dialogs were made more terse to reduce game size by 100's of bytes. The greek lettering system system was re-done to resemble the Earthbound (Nintendo SNES) format and the cursor doesn't flicker anymore. Also, rain falls diagnally now, not straight down.

But the coolest feature of all is the game importing/exporting. Even after you've beaten the game, you can trade saved games through the web and unlock rare or hidden features. Some items are so rare, the internet is the only place to get them. Plus, because of the linking feature, players will want to create the strongest teams possible --so in a way, the game never ends. The game will come out in three flavors: Darkstar (Standard), Linked (Full), and Lite.



Anyway, now I'm looking for anyone might be able to help port the game to any other TI model or shell. If anyone can contribute, please let me know.

Graphical Features:
* Scrolling title screen
* Graphical user interface for game loading, help, and info
* Graphics powered by Crash_Man's notoriously-fast tilemap and sprite suites
* Smooth-scrolling maps
* 7 Fight Settings (including the Kennedy Space Center, and the White House lawn)
* Interrupt-driven graphics during battle for smooth animation
* Flicker-less menus

Gameplay Features:
* In-game clock shows hours/minutes of gameplay (estimates)
* Large 32x32 "overworld" map contains homes, office towers, lakes, and hills
* System can manage up to 3 saved games
* Simple controls; Arrows, 2ND, ALPHA, (and MODE for multiplayer disconnect)
* Robot-Builder lets you customize your robot's name, stats, and image
* Sigma-mode lets you replay the game with greater difficulty and unlocked features
* Players' Guide included with the file

Battle Features:
* Shops for items, weapons, and armor
* 10 Battle Items (including "Repair" "Rebuild" and "Clone")
* 4 Item-Enhancers ("Add" "Negate" "Multiply" "Divide"--hey, it's a calculator, right?)
* 8 Weapons with unique properties
* 6 Armors to provide special damage immunities
* 4 Hidden attacks (including teleportation and stasis)
* 21 Enemy types with unique abilities ranging from self-cloning to invisibility

Advanced Features:
* Linked 2-Player battle support!
* Tradable Saved-Game files
* ZCP-Compressed icons, sprites, backgrounds, and levels (saved 2,130 bytes)
* Port-based key detection for better speed and responsivness
* Morphic code reduces size and boosts speed
* Error containment rejects corrupt files to prevent crashes
* Source code included with commenting

[AlienCC]

This is looking really Great!

If I can find the time, I may be able to help with a Ti-85/86 port...Although its been a while since I've done any assembler coding.

--AlienCC

[koolmansam375]

i beleive at Maxcoderz there was a guy who created a Unification FAQ and there was a link to a file (an include file) so you could compile for the 82, 83, and 83+ simultaneously. Its just a matter of changing some memory references and header then. GuillameH had it in his sig. I dunno if he does now. Probably

You also might wanna read up on the faq before you use it. It explains a little about the different architectures.

[CoBB]

http://etrange.paxl.org/?path=ti83/unification.html

[DigiTan]

Thanks! I'll take all the porting help I can get. Guillaume Hoffmann sent me an email about TI unification, so I made special note in the source code when using ROM CALLs. Unfortuantly, I only have the outdated ROMS for 82, 83, and 83+ so I'll need someone to test the ports for me.

And I could definately use help with a TI-86 port because of the different screen size.

As far as the source goes, I'll probably release it along with the program. It's a really elaborate program (21 sourcefiles), but I'm certain it can ported!

[AlienCC]

[DigiTan]

That's true. Basically, I've got things organized by role (rules.asm, battle.asm, text.asm, etc) and everything is well-documented too.

About how much RAM does a TI-86 have? I heard you get something like 60,000 bytes!

[AlienCC]

The Ti-86 has about 96,000 bytes total, and the Ti-85 (which is the one I've done some asm programming for in the past) has around 28,000 bytes. Rumor has it since I've programmed for one, the other should be somewhat easy, but it has been quite a while since I've done any assembler programming.

Obviously the TI-86 is more popular these days, but both were great in their day, and still are. Its too bad TI never came out with a version of the Ti-86 with additional Flash memory.

--AlienCC

[DigiTan]

Man, I've got to get one of those! I'm betting TI-86 will be the toughest port (other than 68k) because of the different screen size. Unless we added larger graphics, objects might be tough to make out. A TI-85 for ZShell or Usgard would be a great help, plus it would go alot more smoothly!

[AlienCC]

Actually the screensize is exactly the same between the Ti-85 and Ti-86, the main difference is the Ti-86 has built-in asm like the Ti-83, and a lot more memory then the Ti-85. I've programmed for Usgard before, so I'd probably be better off to start with that port, then move it to the Ti-86 from there.

--AlienCC

[DigiTan]

Yeah, I think Usgard would be the best one afterall because they told me it doesnt' relocate the prog for you. It would be torture to do it all 'manually.'

[DigiTan]

Okay, I finally put things into overdrive and wrote an ending for the final battle scene last night. This makes it my first game ever to have a proper ending. The game took 7 hours to complete and I want to shorten that to about 6 hours because of battery limits.

Anyway, now that the last quest has been programmed, the next step will be to optimize the game any way possible. The current size is 26,200 + 296 per saved game. I want to drop that to 25,000 + 200 per game for the full edition; and 24,100 for the standard edition. No release date yet.

Stuff to go:
* Object Placement <done>
* Robot Builder <done>
* Dialogs <done>
* Linking System <done>
* Optimization 0 of 21 files
* Debugging (Final inspection) 0 of 21 files

[the_unknown_one]

I could help with porting to 83/+/se/84+/se

[DigiTan]

Cool! I'll need all the help I can get. Actually I was thinking of publishing the Lite Edition code before the game comes out. I might end up waiting though.

[Brazucs]

wow!! The walking looks wicked awesome!!
Nice game, man...

[Lunar Wolf Demon]

Good job on robot wars! Its the best!

[Lunar Wolf Demon]

I'm angry that alienCC is warning me because i talk about mooses.People Curse and he doesn't attack them!

[AlienCC]

Out of 10 posts, 4 are not spam. I did not warn you until I saw your 3rd post which fits in the category of spamming the forums.

Additionally I own the hardware this website runs on, and pay for the internet connection which its connected to, and the regular members expect me as an Admin to put my foot down and stop abuse of these forums when I see it.

We are starting with warning and hope that you will change your ways and become a great addition to our members.

--AlienCC

[Lunar Wolf Demon]

I'm sorry.

[DigiTan]

Well, not that it needs to be said, but I'm a bit behind on my March debut date.

There are two major reasons behind this. (1) I'm trying to optimize the prog by another 1K. Since compression and code tricks were used since the beginning, it's tough to find anything left to minimise. (2) Also, I'm trying to impliment something called Σ mode that lets you beat the game and replay it with higher difficulty and a top-secret bot class.

School finals are starting in 2 weeks, so I need to start studying now. Most likely things will resume around May.