copyright plant zone
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Re: copyright plant zone
Seems like something that would be better solved from hardware, either MMC2-style (CHR-bank-on-X-tile) or MMC5-style (vertical scroll split...but requiring two).
You could just do it with a scanline-counter and banking, provided you don't mind going eight pixels up at a time. It's not like the game's running most of the physics while you're running on that spiral....though I suppose you might want to spoof the BG by the sides with sprites so you DON'T have to update attribute tables either...
You could just do it with a scanline-counter and banking, provided you don't mind going eight pixels up at a time. It's not like the game's running most of the physics while you're running on that spiral....though I suppose you might want to spoof the BG by the sides with sprites so you DON'T have to update attribute tables either...
Re: copyright plant zone
An alternative to that ugly brown attribute clash would be just using black in that palette entry. There would be little/no loss of detail. Plus then you've have an empty color for something else. Possibly sky color for the loops in that stage.
Re: copyright plant zone
That's too much trouble for one little stupid gimmick, IMO.
Depending on the angle and thickness of the platform, it could possibly be made with sprites without going over the sprite limit. Honestly though, if we're going by Team Somari's standards, they'd probably just make those stationary, or replace the whole thing with zig-zag ramps or something.
It is a stupid gimmick that doesn't add much to the gameplay anyway, there's no point in jumping through hoops to get it implemented exactly like the original.
Depending on the angle and thickness of the platform, it could possibly be made with sprites without going over the sprite limit. Honestly though, if we're going by Team Somari's standards, they'd probably just make those stationary, or replace the whole thing with zig-zag ramps or something.
It is a stupid gimmick that doesn't add much to the gameplay anyway, there's no point in jumping through hoops to get it implemented exactly like the original.
- rainwarrior
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Re: copyright plant zone
Rather than having attribute blocks in conflict with your slopes, maybe you can find a convenient way to make space around it in the background?
Re: copyright plant zone
I'd make the platform thinner and use sprites, arranged like this:
The sprites are arranged so that at most 8 of them will share the same scanlines. There will be some flicker when the player is standing beside the platforms, but little to none when standing on them.
With this you won't have to worry about color clashes, empty backgrounds or gigantic VRAM updates. I'd say a little flickering and thinner platforms are a small price to pay to keep things simple and functional.
If you reeeeally want to keep the original dimensions, at least make the sides using sprites, so you don't have to blank out the background, and there are less background tiles to animate. You'd need compatible palettes for this, though.
The sprites are arranged so that at most 8 of them will share the same scanlines. There will be some flicker when the player is standing beside the platforms, but little to none when standing on them.
With this you won't have to worry about color clashes, empty backgrounds or gigantic VRAM updates. I'd say a little flickering and thinner platforms are a small price to pay to keep things simple and functional.
If you reeeeally want to keep the original dimensions, at least make the sides using sprites, so you don't have to blank out the background, and there are less background tiles to animate. You'd need compatible palettes for this, though.
Re: copyright plant zone
That wasn't my point. All the slanted surfaces would be easier to implement that way, with less clashing. The loops would just be a nice bonus.tokumaru wrote:That's too much trouble for one little stupid gimmick, IMO..
That's not a bad suggestion! But, charting it out better, would be more helpful:tokumaru wrote:I'd make the platform thinner and use sprites, arranged like this:
The sprites are arranged so that at most 8 of them will share the same scanlines. There will be some flicker when the player is standing beside the platforms, but little to none when standing on them.
With this you won't have to worry about color clashes, empty backgrounds or gigantic VRAM updates. I'd say a little flickering and thinner platforms are a small price to pay to keep things simple and functional.
If you reeeeally want to keep the original dimensions, at least make the sides using sprites, so you don't have to blank out the background, and there are less background tiles to animate. You'd need compatible palettes for this, though.
Re: copyright plant zone
Holy-Moly! I go to sleep for 15 hours and then this happens! Yikes.
What i was originally thinking of, when i made that image, was bankswitching.
edit: if the black bars arent too distracting, then this might be one option aswell...
What i was originally thinking of, when i made that image, was bankswitching.
edit: if the black bars arent too distracting, then this might be one option aswell...
NOPE.
- rainwarrior
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Re: copyright plant zone
Ah, I just realized that these things move in the original game. Yeah, I would do it with sprites too, then.tokumaru wrote:I'd make the platform thinner and use sprites... keep things simple and functional.
That has a few caveats, like depending on how you do flicker, you may need to break it into multiple metasprites so that the flicker isn't always knocking out the same sprite tiles. Personally I'd probably give up on the original thickness, and just do a platform 7-pixels thick, which at the given slope of 1/4 pixels would have a lot of headroom against flickering.tokumaru wrote:The sprites are arranged so that at most 8 of them will share the same scanlines. There will be some flicker when the player is standing beside the platforms, but little to none when standing on them.
Re: copyright plant zone
Gave it a shot. Also edited quite a few other things, some of which save tiles, some which add some new ones, and things like moving the bolts to get rid of that ugly char clash in the bottom right. Also on the background tiles there was one colour too many, a very dark teal.
And I switched to the Joel Y NTSC palette.
And I switched to the Joel Y NTSC palette.
Re: copyright plant zone
Looks great, ptoing, but it's still not very "animatable".
Re: copyright plant zone
Oh, derp. How is this supposed to animate? they go up and down when you run?
Re: copyright plant zone
This would be doable with CHRAM and a very clever programming. I wouldn't want to program it. Basically, you'd have to recreate every tile as a combination of background and foreground tiles, every frame, on the fly.
Also, would be 1000x easier, if done on SNES.
Also, would be 1000x easier, if done on SNES.
nesdoug.com -- blog/tutorial on programming for the NES
Re: copyright plant zone
Haha, I see what you did there
And yeah, would be trivial on the SNES, what with multiple background layers.
And yeah, would be trivial on the SNES, what with multiple background layers.
Re: copyright plant zone
It's always moving: https://youtu.be/qN3V-dlF36o?t=2m39sptoing wrote:Oh, derp. How is this supposed to animate? they go up and down when you run?