Re: [stella] Try this demo, please.

Subject: Re: [stella] Try this demo, please.
From: kurt.woloch@xxxxxxxxx
Date: Thu, 30 Mar 2000 12:14:35 +0200
>>At 14.19 19/03/00 -0800, you wrote:
>>It has to be something like that. I tried it on PCAE, but on a real 2600
>>the effect might be even worse.
>>You'll have to count all those cycles again.. and be very careful if you
do
>>some conditional jump inside the kernel.
>
>Do you know if any games purposefully use "bad cycle counting" to generate 
>interesting erratic effects on the 2600?  Doesn't the cosmic ark stars 
>thing have to do with that?  And the extra digit on Commie Mutants has to 
>do with generating a clone at the end of a scanline that actually generates

>the sprite on the next?  Plus Video Chess that just generates colors on a 
>rolling screen (to save time for game calculation) which looks fine other 
>than that the color changes produce a tear at arbitrary point on the
screen.
>
>Also, doesn't Robot Tank do something like create a glitchy kernel 
>intentionally when you get hit in order to generate a tearing and rolling 
>display with diagonal lines?
>
>I'm interested in knowing whether this sort of thing could be used as a 
>feature...

Well... I remember when writing the "Jim's heart will go on" demo two years
ago (didn't have time for more yet... sorry...), someone complained that
when uncommenting a write to the outer playfield register (outer in this
case, because the PF's reflected), the additional time causes the playfield
to be updated at mid-scanline... I thought of leaving this in
intentionally... because why should a sinking ship be absolutely straight
horizontally? I also thought of intentionally updating PF0, PF1 and PF2 in
CONSECUTIVE scanline, giving the effect of the ship being "bent down" a
little in the middle... ;-)

With love from Austria (and many bends to make)
Kurt Woloch

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