|
|
Post by robertb on Nov 3, 2017 22:13:00 GMT
After being shown many years ago at CommVEx, I put this 80-column C128 game away and essentially forgot about it. I had bought Cloneimals from John Brown who sold it commercially. Its software sprites moved slowly across the screen and because of its slowness, collision detection was flaky. Not an enjoyable experience. Well, after cleaning the house, I found it again, the disk and its printed instructions in a plastic baggie. I should show it off again at our next FCUG and/or SCCAN meeting. Truly, Robert Bernardo Fresno Commodore User Group www.dickestel.com/fcug.htmSouthern California Commodore & Amiga Network www.portcommodore.com/sccan |
|
|
|
Post by hydrophilic on Nov 5, 2017 4:56:10 GMT
The name sounds vaguely familiar. Maybe you can grab a screenshot at your meeting to share with us? It might job my old memory  |
|
|
|
Post by robertb on Nov 7, 2017 3:20:47 GMT
|
|
ox
Windows User
Posts: 15
|
Post by ox on Apr 1, 2019 21:09:34 GMT
Hi Robert, would it be possible to upload a disk image of this rare and little known C128 game? I remember it for sale on Ebay a long time ago but fear it will disappear into obscurity, I would like to add it to the C128 Gamebase if you the get the chance to recover it again.
Regards, Neil.
|
|
|
|
Post by robertb on Apr 2, 2019 4:32:37 GMT
|
|
sales@cloneimals.com
Guest
|
Post by sales@cloneimals.com on Apr 14, 2019 0:34:27 GMT
Hi Robert, would it be possible to upload a disk image of this rare and little known C128 game? I remember it for sale on Ebay a long time ago but fear it will disappear into obscurity, I would like to add it to the C128 Gamebase if you the get the chance to recover it again. Regards, Neil. Robert, it worked fine on a real C-128D. I played it many times, as did customers. I even played it on an emulator (running under Windoze NT4.0 and Ubuntu 12?) a few times. If any owner of a copy had contacted me with a problem, I could have fixed it back then. I had heard about a few problems from people with the color not keeping up (flashing), but, NOT from customers. Since the only place to buy it was from E-Bay, it is not like I was hard to find for a customer since the username has stayed the same since about 2004. I only had later versions of the VDC, so, someone that upgraded to 64K from 16k from a 8.# VDC might have had problems. I did get it a little while full scrolling, but, it was minimal. It was tested on both the flat C-128 with 64K VDC and C-128D. I never saw problems on an emulator, but, the colors use to be off on that, so, who knows.
My only regret with cloneimals was I never got a copy into the hands of Bill Herd, one of the few people I respected besides Mr. Jarvis, I thought Bill would appreciate how I implemented the software sprites. It remains the ONLY color side scroller game for the C-128D. That is why I wrote it, I knew it could be done. I had given up on the C-128 because of the nasty lies and pirating of my software (losing my database and my mother did not help), threw everything into storage as I moved about (six places in two years). Then before I sold all my Commodore stuff on EBay about 2002, I determined to write the game, just because I could, and wanted to prove at least to myself, I was a better programmer then the accusing lying pirating lamers.
Since the sprite collision was entirely software based. looking for certain characters, did not use IRQ, and happened before VDC register writes, I can only assume the problem might have cropped up on an accelerator. I did try to write it to work on anything, even if I did not have the hardware.
Please note originally it was stereo and covered (5) 1541 disks, it barely fit on a 1581 (it's default format), but, after people complained about the $35 price, I basically cut everything down to a 1541 disk, ditched the stereo sound effects files, extra levels, C-1750 support, printed manual, etc. Then sold it for about $14.95 on one 1541. I suppose the reduction could have produced a bug. The only thing in BASIC was the loader so people could modify it to work with hard drives or virtual REU drives.
FWIW: It was written in about 16,000 lines of assembly and compiled on the PC under my CS-DOS (I STILL own the rights, source, and customer list to .arc from Chris Smeets despite what the loser pirates think) 6502 cross compiler.
I am running Ubuntu 18.04. If you wanted to make it easy on me, by stepping me through on how to un .arc it under Linux, I would release the source code under freeware. How you compile it is up to you. I would have to think about if I wanted to release my 6502 MS-DOS based cross compiler, as it is written in C+++. There are other better )point and click) ones out there anyway.
cloneimals actually has a nice scene designer (complied basic 128 and ML) so you can modify the character set, make scenes, new cloneimals, and make your own levels.
In the FWIW department, I released Power C64 and Power C128 (I owned the rights) to freeware a long time ago (sent to a customer Howie someone if I remember correctly...) and Compute! Sidplayer Book to freeware (which I did on E-Bay). The author gave me permission (I asked as a common courtesy) and my Compute! magazine contract gave me the ability to do whatever I wanted with it.
I am selling the website cloneimals (which is the only reason I found the post) since I do not expect to ever write another computer game (I became a baptized Christian and new ones are too violent for me) , so, I do not mind releasing the source code for people to enjoy and modify,
If you look in the code, the hooks for adding the stereo files should still be in the source. It was heavily commented so others in the future, including me, could pick up the software and write something for it. I was waiting for an Android C-128 emulator ...
|
|
ox
Windows User
Posts: 15
|
Post by ox on Apr 14, 2019 18:28:51 GMT
Hi sales@cloneimals.com, Iv'e never actually seen Clonimals running just what I remember from pictures and that it was the only side scroller for the C128, never knew there was an original 5 disk version in stereo, I'd love to see it running someday.
|
|
|
|
Post by robertb on Apr 16, 2019 1:13:45 GMT
I played it many times, as did customers. John? Is that you? It's good to hear from you again! Heh, I remember from back in the day that I wrote to you about the sprite collision detection. IIRC, I presented the game at one of the early Commodore Vegas Expos. Well, there's still a chance! I'm friendly with Bil. Right. I've never seen another one done in that manner for the C128D. Interesting info! More interesting trivia! I was wondering how you got here. Thank you for your generous offer. Truly, Robert Bernardo April 27-28 Commodore Los Angeles Super Show - www.portcommodore.com/classJune 8-9 Pacific Commodore Expo NW - www.portcommodore.com/pacommexAugust 10-11 Commodore Vegas Expo v15 - www.portcommodore.com/commvex[/quote] |
|
|
|
Post by hydrophilic on Apr 17, 2019 23:39:38 GMT
I have also heard about Cloneimals but never seen it in action... I sure would like to! Offering the source code is a very generous offer! I've hacked/ported many CBM programs by reverse-engineering, but there is nothing like reading the original author(s)' comments! It provides DEEP insight... in particular, understanding the source allows "easy" and "reliable" conversion to other hardware... like you mentioned Stereo SID and REU, but there are more possibilities... and they become easy & reliable to implement with source code.
Sorry to hear Bil Herd hasn't recognized your achievement! I've never played any scrolling game on the C128 VDC... so it sounds like quite an achievement! And having programmed VDC apps myself, I understand the technical challenges.
Perhaps if programmers as talented as yourself worked on C128 VDC back in the day, the C128 would have had a bigger impact on the marketplace... I guess that makes you 1-in-a-million? Bravo!!
|
|
ox
Windows User
Posts: 15
|
Post by ox on Apr 19, 2019 18:52:52 GMT
Is there a download link for the game?
|
|
