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Carnivius — C.P.C. screens
Published: 2008-12-28 19:00:07 +0000 UTC; Views: 5889; Favourites: 61; Downloads: 114
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Description
More shots of Cosmic Prison Commando, the platform shooter using the palette and colors per screen of the 1984 Amstrad CPC range of 8 bit computers.Yeah I think the angle of some of the gun in the loading screen image is a bit off and I'll fix that once I figure out how. The loading image will also have a background eventually. I started one but removed it for the demo.
16 colors in the shots (same 16 color palette all through the game, just used differently) plus 1 transparent seperating the screens.
There is a demo available though it's a bit buggy currently. Was done for the Retro Remakes contest 'We Like It Retro' category and I had flu on the last few days of the deadlines and broke some bits. Will continue on the game in the new year.
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Comments: 44
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Thanks, though these are ancient screenshots from 2008. Have uploaded newer ones in the last month or so.
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Seen them too, they are awesome!
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WOW... what exactly are the tools you used to do this project?
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pro motion 6 for pixelling, famitracker for music and game maker to make it a game.
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A lot of big info in this comment! Thanks!
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just noticed what I said wasn't strictly correct. Famitracker was used to make the music in my other game. I haven't got anyone to make music for this one so used AY tunes from 8 bit computer games I loved playing as a kid that I felt fitted this.
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Would be awesome to see this on the actual CPC hardware 
god I miss my Amstrad
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It may happen though I'm not sure what cutbacks would need to be made. I was mainly going for the palette and resolution and not the actual cpu limitations. CPC coders are welcome to try port it on the original hardware if they want. If they can make it work on my 464 I'd be very impressed.
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I'm not very used to programming amstrad machines ,
So I don't think I can do that ...
Don't know if there's much of a homebrew community for amstrads
...Should be one though ,
since amstrad usually gives away the structure for their machines so people can develop products for it
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I know of a couple as I've been to CPC forums a few times. When I've got the game complete in it's PC runnable version then I'll email this guy I know and see if he wants to try it. I've got a couple other much simpler CPC things I can finish off and give to him to have a go at to even just as practice.
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Oh snap! That palette just zaps ya right back to the 90's man. I can totally picture this game sitting on the shelf next to Ristar and Bloodlines at my rental store!
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Heh, I think those were later than I intended with this. This game is based on the tech of a 1984 8-bit computer. I still have the real machine and it still works flawlessly 25 years on.
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Wow, they really don't make 'em like they used to do they?!
Yeah, I figured with such a cap on the colors and res you were going for something a bit older, but really, your stuff fits right in with that early 90's era if you ask me. I mean shoot, growing up, my bro and I only ever saw stuff that looked close to this good when we went to the arcades. Back home it was still Pitfall and Combat, man!
But y'know, I think it's in retrospect that we realize how much some of these developers coulda pushed their hardware if they had the time, and you prove that by rocking out what coulda been a graphical standard back in the 80's. Think of how games like Phantasy Star, Street Fighter, and Cabal coulda looked when they came out if you had been leadin' 'em on!
Of course, I guess we should also remember that the graphics tools available were different then too.
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Thanks, I was just replaying the latest WIP version and it still feels pretty cool to play. Once I've got Hero - CF's demo out I'll return to this for a bit. Especially now I've learnt plenty more tricks (both games share a lot of code being platform shooters and all that)
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the world really needs more sidescrolling platform shooters. everything is so overdone and complicated with all their fancy plots and sophisticated arguments when all we want is to kill bad guys and save the girl(wich hopefully is not an ilusion created by satan)
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'save the girl'
ah I knew something was missing from this. There is no girl.
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please, make her all 80's as posible. nothing encourages an hero to face unlimited dangers and innecesary risks than a girl cosplaying cindy lauper -but way more pretty and with some pretty cherry lips asking to be kissed-.
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ok that just caused a flashback of a horrible memory. Working in a bar years ago while some tuneless bint screeches 'girls just wanna have fun' on the karaoke...
I'll see what I can do anyways. Play about with the chunky pixels and see if I can get something good. Have to try and work her into the plot somehow. But yer right, the hero needs a lady to save.
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or even be saved by a girl.
you know how girls are taking stuff on their own hands nowdays being independient and badass.
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If you reallign the magazine to be the same angle as the shaft of the gun, I think it will look fine.
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Love the visuals, even better when moving.
On the game I'd like to see slightly bigger hit-detection boxes. And when I die while jumping on the blue guys, I get stuck in nothingness when respawning
Apart from that, the game is ace... oldschool hard, but ace
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Yeah I know about the buy when dying when jumping on the enemies.
Bigger hit detection boxes? On what? In most cases they're the same size as the sprites, except for rare exceptions. The shots use a small hitbox when checking the walls so that a large shot isn't stopped by clipping a wall. When checking for enemies the shots use their full size. When the player crouches, his hitbox is a lot smaller than normal. This is mainly done so you can properly duck certain shots.
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Bigger hit boxes on the enemies of course ;D
They are hard to hit at times, and I am kinda used to stuff like Metal Slug these days where you don't have to aim as good as in CPC. Another fix might be reducing enemy hit-points, 2-3 shots for the first level enemies is a bit too much for my taste and gets boring fast. You see, all "classics" like Turrican, Contra or Metal Slug have the lesser gribblies die pretty quickly when blasterized.
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I won't be making the enemy hitboxes any bigger. They are as big as the enemies themselves at present and the enemies ain't exactly small so I don't see why there's any problem actually hitting them. No one else seems to have had any trouble, and especially as you power up your gun, the blaster gets much bigger and the multiple has a wide spread there shouldn't be any trouble at all.
I toughened up the enemies mainly for the demo just to make it last a bit longer. In the full version the different colors of each enemies mean different levels of energy and abilitles.
I actually kinda detest the Metal Slug series. I find them pretty tedious with sluggish movement and extremely dull levels. Wins the award for most regurgitated graphics in sequels too.
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It's not the big guys that are troublesome, but the small drones or whatever they are. I am not saying it's bad or anything, I wouldn't mind it being a bit more easy going on the player... then again, if you detest Metal Slug we are coming from two very different positions ;D
Still, it's awesome and feels very much like the stuff from back in the good old days
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gamepad doesn't work?
I thought I'd fixed all of that. If the ini file says it's 1 then it should work. I've tested it with playstation joypads, and pc joypads and a friend apparently tested it with an xbox360 pad.
ugh i hate making games. i just like doing the graphics.
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Maybe I am just stupid, it's been a while since I had to fiddle with PC stuff. There are no INI-files on Amiga 500, you know ;D
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Yeah well the options menu was supposed to work (and thus the ini file itself wouldn't have to be fiddled with manually) but I ran out of time for the deadline and it was a bitch to code it. It'll be working in the full game.
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It's all cool, I love it anyways. I am thinking of plugging my computer to my TV, that should make for a pretty cool experience, along with good old MOD-music that should feel like the early 90ies
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Yeah my PC is connected to my big tv. use it mainly for emulation purposes (I don't generally play pc games apart from indie stuff). I have dual x-arcade joysticks too for the extra arcade feel.
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I mostly play oldschool stuff (DOS), and still trying to find time to complete the Witcher... I usually prefer sharp and pixelperfect screens to TV sets that somewhat blur the experience.
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That loading screen ranks up there with some of the most sexiest things I've ever seen.
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Man, it's looking so good - you can push 16 colors like no other.
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