Robin Hood like game for SNES

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Drew Sebastino
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by Drew Sebastino »

I'm really not aware of any other SNES homebrewers getting stuck, or even any SNES homebrewers who have gotten to the point where they're really showing off their game, aside from you maybe. You seem to have made considerable progress. I've restarted more times than I'd like to admit, and I don't see myself going anywhere soon. I think I might try a basic vram system first, where 8x8's and 16x16's are being used and objects use slots of only 16x16 instead of 32x32. I still plan on implementing a linked list and everything for redundancy, because I don't actually want to use all 16KB. What I'm planning on doing now is a lot less sprite heavy than a run and gun like I was originally planning. (I came to the realization that that's a hell of a lot of fancy programming and especially artwork to be drawn for just me.)
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FrankenGraphics
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by FrankenGraphics »

SNES homebrewers, i take it SNES graphics take more effort to complete?
calima
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by calima »

Also, everyone seems to be writing asm for SNES. I haven't looked in depth, is there really no decent C toolchain and a library for the native functionality?

Gen has good docs and good tools, NES has good docs and mediocre tools, GBA has terrible docs and average tools. Is SNES at "bad docs and no/bad tools"?
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FrankenGraphics
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by FrankenGraphics »

well, asm seems simpler for snes than nes. you can branch always without double checking conditions, for one thing. With some of the naughtyness of 6502 asm improved, one could argue a higher level is a little less warranted. Comparing whith x86 asm where you have JZ and other jump-on-conditions and all sorts of shortcutting luxuries which is very high level-like.
93143
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by 93143 »

There's at least one C toolchain: http://www.portabledev.com/wiki/doku.php?id=start

But I imagine most developers use assembly for the same reason graphics take a long time to make - the SNES is capable of a lot, and they want their games to be good. C can be compiled into serviceable 68000 code, but I'm given to understand it's a poor match for 65xx. Which is why NES programmers who care about performance code in assembly too...

I find SNES documentation is adequate if you know where to look:

http://wiki.superfamicom.org/snes/show/HomePage
http://problemkaputt.de/fullsnes.htm (or http://problemkaputt.de/fullsnes.txt for a more recent version)
http://wiki.nesdev.com/w/images/7/76/Programmanual.pdf
http://fdwr.tripod.com/docs/65c816.txt
Not to mention the actual official SNES manuals (which are admittedly not great)...

But then I haven't ever programmed any other game machines...
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Drew Sebastino
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by Drew Sebastino »

WheelInventor wrote:SNES homebrewers, i take it SNES graphics take more effort to complete?
Relative to NES graphics? Definitely. 4x the colors to worry about and larger sprites and more BG layers will do that.
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koitsu
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by koitsu »

Didn't know about this one -- it even has the T-state breakdowns for all addressing modes. Beautiful!
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dougeff
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by dougeff »

calima wrote:is there really no decent C toolchain and a library for the native functionality?

I'm quoting Shiru from a recent NintendoAge post...
There is 2-3 C compilers (tcc-816, snesc, and the elusive WDCTools), there is a strong-ish library (PVSnesLib), there is all-in-one game-targeted music editor (SNESGSS),
Link to quote...
http://nintendoage.com/forum/messagevie ... did=162880
nesdoug.com -- blog/tutorial on programming for the NES
Sik
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by Sik »

koitsu wrote:
Didn't know about this one -- it even has the T-state breakdowns for all addressing modes. Beautiful!
It looks like a transcription from a datasheet. But I'll give it to you, that sure is quite complete.

EDIT: "looks like" more like it is:
G65SC802 / G65SC816 Data Sheets
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koitsu
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by koitsu »

Sik wrote:EDIT: "looks like" more like it is:
G65SC802 / G65SC816 Data Sheets
Yeah, the data sheet it's transcribed from is for the 65802 and 65816 CPUs that CMD/GTE made. I think it's possible to find data sheets for the CMD G65SC816P?
calima
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by calima »

dougeff wrote:I'm quoting Shiru from a recent NintendoAge post...
There is 2-3 C compilers (tcc-816, snesc, and the elusive WDCTools), there is a strong-ish library (PVSnesLib), there is all-in-one game-targeted music editor (SNESGSS),
I'm afraid that's a "no, there is no decent toolchain". WDC's is proprietary, Windows-only and $$$, snesc is even less C compliant than cc65, and tcc code quality is just bad even on x86.
Erockbrox
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by Erockbrox »

Espozo wrote:
WheelInventor wrote:SNES homebrewers, i take it SNES graphics take more effort to complete?
Relative to NES graphics? Definitely. 4x the colors to worry about and larger sprites and more BG layers will do that.
One thing that I've never understood is that people who make a homebrew snes game, you dont have to use all the colors available. You could make it look like an NES game if you wanted to or an atari 2600 game.

So graphics wise an snes game doesn't have to be superior to that of older consoles.
calima
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by calima »

Erockbrox wrote:One thing that I've never understood is that people who make a homebrew snes game, you dont have to use all the colors available. You could make it look like an NES game if you wanted to or an atari 2600 game.

So graphics wise an snes game doesn't have to be superior to that of older consoles.
The response will be overwhelmingly negative, "why did you bother, that's clearly a NES game". Kind of like the faux-8bit graphics on PC, except without hipsters supporting them.
KungFuFurby
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by KungFuFurby »

Erockbrox wrote:
Espozo wrote:
WheelInventor wrote:SNES homebrewers, i take it SNES graphics take more effort to complete?
Relative to NES graphics? Definitely. 4x the colors to worry about and larger sprites and more BG layers will do that.
One thing that I've never understood is that people who make a homebrew snes game, you dont have to use all the colors available. You could make it look like an NES game if you wanted to or an atari 2600 game.

So graphics wise an snes game doesn't have to be superior to that of older consoles.
I actually had an idea that relied on such low color counts so that I could use all eight palettes for color variations of the player characters, then use the remaining colors in the sprite palette for something else.
Sik
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Re: Robin Hood like game for SNES

Post by Sik »

calima wrote:The response will be overwhelmingly negative, "why did you bother, that's clearly a NES game". Kind of like the faux-8bit graphics on PC, except without hipsters supporting them.
Yeah, if my experience with homebrew is anything to go by, people don't just want you to make the game look good, they want you to make a game that goes beyond whatever the best licensed games ever did. And then later people wonder why I insist in comparing my stuff against the classics, that's the bare minimum bar to aim for if you don't want to get swarmed down in everybody and their dog throwing endless suggestions at you =/
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