Portland Retro Game Expo

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Sumez
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Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by Sumez »

Didn't think of posting here, but then I saw that their schedule actually has an NES Homebrew panel!
Are anyone from this forum thinking of going? Maybe even showcase some games?

I'm going, my second trip to the US ever, and I have absolutely no idea what to expect.
And if anyone knows of anything else to see and do in Portland, I'm all ears.
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by gauauu »

Sumez wrote:Didn't think of posting here, but then I saw that their schedule actually has an NES Homebrew panel!
Are anyone from this forum thinking of going? Maybe even showcase some games?

I'm going, my second trip to the US ever, and I have absolutely no idea what to expect.
And if anyone knows of anything else to see and do in Portland, I'm all ears.
Dang, I've gone the past few years (it's usually a great time), but it wasn't in my budget for the year this time. There's usually a RetroUSB and NintendoAge booth where a number of NES homebrew folk hang out and showcase/sell games. Pretty sure Brian from RetroUSB (who made the AVS) is planning to be there, Paul from INL is doing a talk, usually Beau (from the Assembly Line podcast) is around. Not sure who else is going.

Also stop by the AtariAge booth, Al (who runs it) is a great guy, and I'm pretty sure will have my Atari port of last year's nesdev competition game, Robo-Ninja Climb, on display.

In general, it's a great time to meet other homebrewers, meet the developers who made old classic Atari games, and (if you have some games out there) meet people that enjoy playing your games. I'm bummed I'm missing it this year.
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infiniteneslives
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by infiniteneslives »

Yeah I'm giving those NES homebrew development talks. The first session will cover the CPU architecture and put up some C code for a simple game demo. I'll be using a simplified version of the NES starter kit. I'm hoping this will be somewhat understandable by non-programmers. The second session will briefly cover the PPU & APU, with a demo on how to create and integrate graphic/audio assets into the demo from the first session. I'm hoping this session will be interesting to artistic people even if they have no interest in programming the NES, but would like to create graphic/audio on a team. Doubt I'll be anywhere near as prepared as I would like to be, but not going to let it stop me. I think the talks will end up on youtube.

So the basic goal is to give a quick and dirty intro to NES development, hopefully making it look more approachable than they may have imagined. I'll give some pointers to where they may want to look next ranging from NESmaker, nerdy nights, NES starter kit, etc. If there's time I'll try to cover some existing homebrew games.

Would be happy to see anyone from the community at the talks, I'll also have a small booth in the back corner. Be sure to say hi!
If you're gonna play the Game Boy, you gotta learn to play it right. -Kenny Rogers
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Sumez
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by Sumez »

Wow, that sounds really cool :) Hope it gets a lot of attention! I'll definitely check out your booth.

Since I'm hardly the target audience, it sounds like there's not a lot I could learn from your talk, but I'm definitely curious to see it, so if I get the chance I will check it out!
I'm there mostly for the Tetris championships, so it's hard for me to say when I won't be busy with that.
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by gauauu »

Sumez wrote:I'm there mostly for the Tetris championships, so it's hard for me to say when I won't be busy with that.
Oh yeah, Frank who made the NES homebrew Armed for Battle told me he was going this year also....he usually competes and does relatively well in the Tetris championships as well. He's worth hunting down and meeting if you get the chance.
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toggle switch
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by toggle switch »

I'll be there. Hopefully I'll have a few Project Blue demo cartridges to hand out.

Tried to get some booth space, but doesn't look like it's going to work out :( I really want a place where I can show off our game, but not sure if it'll happen.

Anyway, I'm from Portland, it's a pretty great city. There is a Vektroid concert on Saturday, if you're into vaporwave. There's legal marijuana, if you're into that sort of thing. Tons of great shops for records, games, comics, etc.

I'm pretty much a homebody, but happy to give advice about cool things happening around town. What're you into?
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by dullahan »

I will be there wandering around. :)
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by Memblers »

toggle switch wrote:Tried to get some booth space, but doesn't look like it's going to work out :( I really want a place where I can show off our game, but not sure if it'll happen.
I might have to ask around to find out who is in charge of the NintendoAge booth, but I'm certain they will help you out.
http://nintendoage.com/index.cfm?FuseAc ... =1&Id=1761
http://nintendoage.com/forum/messagevie ... did=184287

Wish I was going, sounds like a good time.
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toggle switch
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by toggle switch »

i asked those guys but didn't hear back.

however, it's been worked out - project blue will be over with the infiniteNESLives booth! if anybody wants to come check out a rough draft of level 2 (and if I'm feeling generous, a quick sneak peak at level 3) come find us.
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by infiniteneslives »

My small booth will be in the back corner #508 (see pic), looking forward to meeting everyone from the community that's attending! Both of my talks are the first talks of the day in Auditorium B: 10:30am Sat, 11am Sun.

I'm not bringing much for product, just want to have a booth as a home base and showcase some homebrew games. At a minimum I'll have an AVS & SuperNT hooked up to a small projector, and a couple handheld clones. I'm planning to bring a small library of homebrew carts hopefully including some early previews that aren't yet released.

If anyone has a build of something they would like me to include in the library of games to play let me know! Regardless of whether you'll be there in person or not, your work can be. Hit me up with details and I can whip up a cart that'll be available for people to play. PM works, but email is best paul@infiniteneslives.com
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Myask
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by Myask »

missing info: date (apparently October 19-21, 2018) link to website of expo, etc.
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Sumez
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by Sumez »

Sorry. I just assumed at this point that people who were going to attend had already planned it. :)
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by FrankenGraphics »

I just sent the latest version of the 2nd level for project blue over to patched and put onto cart. I'd say it is functionally 95% where it should be, and maybe 80% visually. I won't be able to attend but hope people will enjoy it. :)

As with level 1, we've split the functional design duty between us, one section each. Level 3 is looking nice already, but i know for sure that some of my rooms are still nonfunctional. If toggleswitch decides to put them on the showcase, be prepared to run into a dead end :twisted:
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by infiniteneslives »

Portland was a great time, fun to meet people for the first time and showcase some of the work being done by so many people in the community. We're looking forward to making the trip more regularly in the future.

I was pretty happy with how the panels went. Was surprised to learn the majority of people in attendance were programmers. Had ~50 people attend the first day, and ~30 the second. Certainly was interesting experience to code live with a crowd. I made plenty of dumb errors but got some help from the crowd when I needed it. Part of me wonders if the inclusion of mistakes and subsequent correction may have actually added some value. Anyway you'll get a chance to watch and laugh.. They were video taped and I was told they'll be up on the PRGE youtube channel in ~2 weeks.

I'm putting the project up on gitlab/github this week, along with all the sites I called out during the talks. I'll tease the final rom we created over the course of ~95min attached in this post. Quite a few people came by the booth to chat after the talks and were very interested in joining the community. After talking with them, it made a lot more sense as to why the majority of attendees were programmers. So it will be interesting to see what results from the panels, not sure if it's something I'll do again or not right now.
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Re: Portland Retro Game Expo

Post by infiniteneslives »

Awesome music. What is the track?
I borrowed the audio, tileset, and much of the project structure from NES-starter-kit, the audio is by Wolfgang.
If you're gonna play the Game Boy, you gotta learn to play it right. -Kenny Rogers
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