Scramble (arcade game remake)

[madscijr]

Well, there were a handful of caveats to dance around but it's up and running with hardware sprites now. I've set your x8 detail sprites as the default. Try setting $LET HARDWARE_SPRITES = 0 and you'll see the difference that it makes!

I've totally disabled the palette switching code when $LET HI_RES = 1 is set. You'll need different batches of sprites for different colours if you want to re-implement that. As you hated the garish colours, you could just repaint the default grey sprites with colours that you like.

Give me a shout if you run across any problems or have any questions.

I gave "scramble-with-options.bas" a try, but it's running absurdly slow - it displays 1 frame maybe every 10 seconds.
However, the display I'm using is only 1370x768, so it might be causing problems?
I can try it with a more capable display later in the week...
Are there any options in the game that might need changing for a smaller display?

[RokCoder]

Well, there were a handful of caveats to dance around but it's up and running with hardware sprites now. I've set your x8 detail sprites as the default. Try setting $LET HARDWARE_SPRITES = 0 and you'll see the difference that it makes!

I've totally disabled the palette switching code when $LET HI_RES = 1 is set. You'll need different batches of sprites for different colours if you want to re-implement that. As you hated the garish colours, you could just repaint the default grey sprites with colours that you like.

Give me a shout if you run across any problems or have any questions.

I gave "scramble-with-options.bas" a try, but it's running absurdly slow - it displays 1 frame maybe every 10 seconds.
However, the display I'm using is only 1370x768, so it might be causing problems?
I can try it with a more capable display later in the week...
Are there any options in the game that might need changing for a smaller display?

Sounds like it's not using hardware sprites for some reason. After the _COPYIMAGE I'm only checking for -1 for an error. Reading the WIKI it sounds like I should be checking for a zero as well. The only thing that comes to mind off the top of my head is that maybe your graphics card doesn't have enough storage for a 1584x2800 sprite sheet (plus the other sprites that are being pushed to it). Maybe try a smaller sheet - x4 the default size rather than x8.

Failing that, maybe one of the other guys on the forum is more familiar with using hardware sprites in qb64. The zip I've uploaded runs smoothly here but crawls like a slug when hardwares_sprites is set to zero.

[madscijr]

Well, there were a handful of caveats to dance around but it's up and running with hardware sprites now. I've set your x8 detail sprites as the default. Try setting $LET HARDWARE_SPRITES = 0 and you'll see the difference that it makes!

I've totally disabled the palette switching code when $LET HI_RES = 1 is set. You'll need different batches of sprites for different colours if you want to re-implement that. As you hated the garish colours, you could just repaint the default grey sprites with colours that you like.

Give me a shout if you run across any problems or have any questions.

I gave "scramble-with-options.bas" a try, but it's running absurdly slow - it displays 1 frame maybe every 10 seconds.
However, the display I'm using is only 1370x768, so it might be causing problems?
I can try it with a more capable display later in the week...
Are there any options in the game that might need changing for a smaller display?

Sounds like it's not using hardware sprites for some reason. After the _COPYIMAGE I'm only checking for -1 for an error. Reading the WIKI it sounds like I should be checking for a zero as well. The only thing that comes to mind off the top of my head is that maybe your graphics card doesn't have enough storage for a 1584x2800 sprite sheet (plus the other sprites that are being pushed to it). Maybe try a smaller sheet - x4 the default size rather than x8.

Failing that, maybe one of the other guys on the forum is more familiar with using hardware sprites in qb64. The zip I've uploaded runs smoothly here but crawls like a slug when hardwares_sprites is set to zero.

I can also give it a try on computer with a better graphics card, it might take a couple of days. 
Thanks!

[RokCoder]

I can also give it a try on computer with a better graphics card, it might take a couple of days. 

Did you have any luck with that in the end?

[madscijr]

I can also give it a try on computer with a better graphics card, it might take a couple of days. 

Did you have any luck with that in the end?

Thanks for following up - I haven't gotten around to installing QB64PE on the PC with the good graphics card. I'll try to carve out some time this week to do that, and let you know how it went...

[grymmjack]

Here is a video review on RokCoder awesome project. 

https://youtu.be/JGCCx20WI58

[bplus]

Man 4 mins into that review, and that guy, you @grymmjack ? has a very interesting tool for looking at QB64pe code, wow!

Heck of a review too!

[grymmjack]

Man 4 mins into that review, and that guy, you @grymmjack ? has a very interesting tool for looking at QB64pe code, wow!

Heck of a review too!

Thanks! It's Visual Studio Code which is free @bplus -- this will be the last time I post a video not related to scramble in this thread! I am only doing this because of the relevance to the answers of your questions and curiosities @bplus

I would love to show you around more if you are interested, but first check out the other videos here if you are curious:
This playlist has a lot of topics you might like and definitely 2 related to VScode.

It's More Fun to Compute YouTube Playlist

This is an overview of how it works:



This one shows how to import the profile ( a new feature Microsoft added into VSCode that lets us share "setups"):



Hope this helps, and also happy to screen share, and explain deeply any thing you might have interest in.

It is a super good way to work. We have a few bugs still and @Durus is still working on the Language Server (which adds native debugging), but it's coming along and is fully usable IMO!

Take care, @bplus !

[bplus]

Thankyou @grymmjack your project(s) look very interesting. Alas, I have attention span of gnat but you are bookmarked! 

[grymmjack]

@RokCoder

What is spriteUV - what does the U and V stand for?

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Thankyou @grymmjack your project(s) look very interesting. Alas, I have attention span of gnat but you are bookmarked! 

All good man, LOL.

How can you be such a guru programmer with a small attention span ?