On Tue, 26 Aug 1997, Greg Troutman wrote:
> nice, but that will definitely go as well. I'd hope this effort would
> not result in a merit-less turd. Thanks.
I've spoken at length with the best programmers for the 2600 and the big
thing they said about successful Atari 2600 game development is that it
should be a team effort.
That can mean constructive criticism.
I'm speaking now in general terms, not necessarily regarding Greg...
I encourage everyone not to _expect_ universal praise for your games
simply due to the number of hours spent coding them. We are all grateful
for doing this without any profit motive (although I have attempted to
make it more worth your while with the contest) but in the end it has to
withstand the rigors of playtesting and the programmers who succeed are
those who can listen to constructive criticism. Those who do not listen
often wind up with games that only they enjoy.
Getting a working skeleton of a game going is actually the easy part. The
longest phase of the programming is in tuning the gameplay. Well, back
then it was also a case of crunching the code into 4K but these days we
have an extra 2K of breathing room available (depending on where you fall
on the cart vs. .BIN debate.)
> I'll experiment. I kinda like the asteroids ghostly white. When I
So do I. It's the mothership, the humans, and the lander that could
become multicolored. Despite the fact that the humans outstretch their
arms above their heads, you could probably use the two missiles and the
ball to give them a flesh-colored head as well as split the rest of them
in half.
> things: A) it no longer fits in the allowed memory space, and/or timing
> constraints, and is relunctantly disgarded, or B) the fancy new
> algorithm that makes it fit took an extra month or two to write and
> debug.
There is still is an extra 2K at least if you go for the Supercharger
environment.
As for the time, there is plenty of it even if you are shooting for the
prize. The joy of the 2600 is finding ways to do the impossible.
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