some suggestions / requests for anyone looking to port a classic game to QB64PE

[madscijr]

Hey all!

After Terry's killer version of Pac Man and RokCoder's Galaga, I'm compelled to list a few that may be beyond my current skillset, patience level, and/or free time, but which would make the world a better place if they existed... 

• Pinball Construction Set
  
• Zaxxon / Super Zaxxon - except let the player have full freedom of motion to fly in any direction (i.e. the plane can turn 360 degrees like in Time Pilot or Asteroids) and maybe even land and the player can get out and run around isometrically (like Realm of Impossibility), and maybe pilot other vehicles (like Frontline)! And a level editor!
  
• Gravitar - the vector game, but maybe with multiplayer (split screen or quad split screen) options and a level editor of course.
  
• Cliff Hanger - the C64 game which is basically like the old Road Runner cartoon
  
• Sprint 8 / Super Sprint - top down racing fun
  
• Jumpman / Jumpman Jr. / Ultimate Wizard - with level editor
  
• Tempest with level editor
  
• Defender / Stargate
  
• Mr. Do! / Dig Dug or maybe a combination of the 2
  
• Lode Runner (the 8-bit C64 or IBM version) with editor
  
• Racing Destruction Set
  
• Spy vs Spy
  
• Ultima III Construction Set
  
• a Zork game construction set
  
• Berzerk / Outlaw / Gunfighter but for 2-4 players with an editor
  
• Atari Adventure Construction Set (maybe multiplayer option too)
  
• Pitfall! and/or Pitfall II (with editor)
  
• Mail Order Monsters
  

(I would happily program all of the above but I'm still working on Spacewar! and maybe a Lunar Lander / Asteroids mashup, and a Pong Construction Set, maybe eventually one for multiplayer controllable with multiple USB mice plugged into a single PC!)

That's all I got for now -
Cheers

[PhilOfPerth]

Some oldys but goodies in there, madskijnr!
One that I would love to see resurrected is The Incredible Machines. There were two or three follow-ups to this, and they were all intriguing and enjoyable, to me and to my young'uns.

[madscijr]

Some oldys but goodies in there, madskijnr!
One that I would love to see resurrected is The Incredible Machines. There were two or three follow-ups to this, and they were all intriguing and enjoyable, to me and to my young'uns.

I almost mentioned the Incredible Machine games, but decided to keep it to 8-bit and early arcade games, but heck yes, those games are very very cool. It would be neat to recreate those in BASIC (or even invent some kind of editor to be able to create new puzzles in the game). Good call!

[mnrvovrfc]

LOL you require too many editors, that's really not fun playing some of the games. That would have ruined the fun for sure in Arkanoid. One could spend more time creating levels than playing the original ones. For Zork? One controls what levels are created while the others have to play... back to the cavemen of networking, tumble back to Unix... pffft!

ROFL Jumpman, they almost had to ban that one from the Tandy1000's when I went to eighth grade. That game was pretty amazing back then in the mid-1980's IMHO. I spent like five minutes with it. I don't remember but I think I was able to choose "random level" mode, took me to one where the protagonist doesn't jump, just hurls a spear. Has to "run the gauntlet".

I made a Breakout/Arkanoid clone, in Freebasic aided by Windows MCI for sound and music, which is rough around the edges because the ball could be hit from any of four sides and could be lost from any side. Only the first level looks anything like Breakout but the twelveth and last level has no walls, just paddle, ball and bricks at the center. Also created a game which is my clone of Metal Hearts from the Troika series by one of the original Russian programmers of Tetris, but it has a serious bug and is a bit boring to play...

Finally in Freebasic also, I devised the "futuristic Arrow-Shoot" series, not quite like those programs which were lame but were a lot of fun on my Color Computer, from a book of game programs meant for an IBM PC and compatibles. "Ouch! You shot another hunter! Report to the local sheriff!" My answer: "So stop getting in my darned way!" LOL. Eh... it's just a game where a player is an archer, could move up and down on one side of the screen, while the target moves non-chalantly up and down the other side of the screen. My version has graphics. Instead of snotty messages, it has mirrors to break and other wacky stuff. Maybe I could post this program but somebody else would have to convert it to QB64. It uses one external BMP file to import the graphics.

EDIT: Was it MCI or MMC? Don't remember. "Windows Media extensions" or something like that (Win API) which allowed commands to play back MP3 and OGG Vorbis.

[RokCoder]

Excellent selection of games on that list! I'm going to make one or two more repros now I've been bitten by the QB64 bug (unfortunately only one of which is on your list). Sadly I have a massive backlog of non-QB64 tasks that I need to get back to at some point soon so that will probably be it for a while.

It's nice to see the Galaga game mentioned as there was little reaction in the forum post. I saw it being downloaded but the lack of comments made me wonder if it was lacking some aspect of the accuracy or fun factor of the original. Having seen your post I'm re-enthused about it again

Also, nice to see Terry's Pac Man mentioned of course because that looks like a pure labour of leave and is an absolute masterpiece!

Also, nice to see The Incredible Machine mentioned as I loved that as a kid! Ah, good times...

[mnrvovrfc]

It's nice to see the Galaga game mentioned as there was little reaction in the forum post. I saw it being downloaded but the lack of comments made me wonder if it was lacking some aspect of the accuracy or fun factor of the original.

This forum has a lot of lurkers. Not just the G-site, the Russian one and M$'s one. Those three are usually my companions if I'm the only one logged in early morning hours of Eastern Standard Time. Github also has a lot of lurkers. IJS.

The majority is that if it's freeware, there's no need to respond to the creator. But if it was payware and one pays one penny or more then 20 years could pass they're banging the table for support... crazy mad wacky world the Internet.

---

I had forgotten to mention I also created a game in Freebasic which is like "Snake" (or one-player "Nibbles"), which comes with 40 levels and the last ten are made even harder by something, and a few other gimmicks I'm not going to reveal here! It doesn't come with a program to design new levels but it's easy to export to BMP if the user knows the dimensions and other things about the game board.

I had created those games while I was off Internet for many years.

[RokCoder]

I had forgotten to mention I also created a game in Freebasic which is like "Snake" (or one-player "Nibbles"), which comes with 40 levels and the last ten are made even harder by something, and a few other gimmicks I'm not going to reveal here!

I'd like to give that a go. Where can I find it? And did you consider porting over to QB64? I've not used FreeBasic. In fact I've not used any basic other then QB64 since my 8-bit days and I only jumped onto this a month ago for a bit of fun and nostalgia. And it really is a lot of fun (so there I go getting side-tracked from things I should really be doing again).

[mnrvovrfc]

The thing is that it wouldn't add to one of the games, other than being able to compile it with a different programming system. Each game has bugs. Especially the "Metal Hearts"-like one, I tried to fix ten times an inconsistency with "delivery": cannot explain further without actually offering the source code plus BMP sprite sheet and hoping somebody with Freebasic compiles it successfully. The Breakout clone has a problem sometimes tracking a side wall so the ball could get stuck in it and therefore the ball rebounds in an unnatural way.

The games have very basic user input functionality, mostly rely on INKEY$. The Breakout-like one uses the mouse. It would be even better if it could use a trackball or something like that, or a controller like that for Super NES. The games assume _RGB(255, 0, 255) "magenta" is the transparent color out of the sprite sheets.

Another thing is that only the Breakout-like program has music and sound which was not easily portable to Linux and MacOS (no problem if it were QB64PE program now). Another program only came with music (MP3 files) but then somebody could decide to post them on his/her music-sharing site claiming them as his/her own. Other games that I've written have no sound -- it wasn't a priority if I couldn't have something at least like "_SNDPLAYFILE".

I could present the programs as they are and leave it to somebody else to port them to QB64. But I have to dig into my backups, start spring cleaning a bit early this year.

[RokCoder]

Everything always comes down to "there are lots of things I'd like to do but never enough hours in the day to do them all". I totally feel your pain on this 

[madscijr]

LOL you require too many editors, that's really not fun playing some of the games.

If you don't like it, then don't use it.

As a programmer, I often find the additional benefit of having an editor is it helps you create content more quickly.

That would have ruined the fun for sure in Arkanoid.

How? By having the option? Are you saying that you would not be able to resist creating new levels, even if you don't like doing that? If that's the case, I'd say you have other issues, lol. That's like saying you like chocolate and not vanilla, and even having vanilla on the menu would make ice cream not fun for you. That is ridiculous. Do you really want to take away other people's options for things you don't like?

One could spend more time creating levels than playing the original ones.

This may come as a shock, but some of us enjoy creating games as much as, if not more than, playing them. And those that don't can ignore the editor and just play the game the way it is out of the box.

For Zork? One controls what levels are created while the others have to play... back to the cavemen of networking, tumble back to Unix... pffft!

You are making no sense at all. Have you ever played a classic Infocom game or text adventure? These are local games that run on your PC. There is no networking, and your input does not affect others. An editor simply lets someone make their own game (to play themself or share with others) without having to be a programmer.

I made a Breakout/Arkanoid clone, in Freebasic
...
also, I devised the "futuristic Arrow-Shoot" series
...
Maybe I could post this program but somebody else would have to convert it to QB64.

Maybe someone would be interested, only one way to find out!

Cheers