[stella] The Worm Returns

Subject: [stella] The Worm Returns
From: Billy Eno <ceno@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Mon, 16 May 2005 23:40:35 -0400
Hi All,

In the long, proud tradition of Atari 2600 homebrew authors, I have a
new version of my of my game, Warring Worms.  You may have already seen
it at AtariAge:
http://www.atariage.com/development_page.html?InDevelopmentID=87

The new features are:
- Tank Mode - In this mode, the head no longer leaves a trail.
(different from the original idea)
- Solid Arena Mode - The starting arena cannot be destroyed by the cannon
- Unbreakable Mode - Nothing can be destroyed by the cannons. In this
mode, the only thing the cannon can hurt is your opponent!
- First To: - Tony Morse once said something to the effect of "Who wants
to play best of 198?" This feature lets you chose the ending score, and
bring "full" games down to a playable time
- Sudden Death Mode - This feature changes the winning condition to be
that you must beat your opponent by at least 2 points.
- Select Game/Random Game - Selecting Random game changes most of the
game options to be selected randomly before each round. This provides a
new challenge every round.

I think they add a lot to the game.  I am especially proud of the select
screen, considering it took almost as much time to program as the rest
of the new features combined :-p .  Don't miss the snazzy new title
screen.  I love 8K games, you can be sooo abusive of ROM space.

It is now a standard 8K game, so I haven't been able to try it on a real
TV, lacking a CuttleCart or Krocodile Cart.  If someone can give me a
go/no go on a real TV, I would appreciate it.

Try the one-player random game and let me know if  you think any of the
new or existing features need to be reduced in frequency to make sure
that is fun.  I have already limited tank mode to 1 in 8 and unbreakable
mode to 1 in 8.

I also improved the random number generator and made it a proper LFSR,
which takes some of the twitchyness of the computer player away.
(Xilinx appnote #52).

Enjoy, I look forward to any and all feedback.

If anyone wants to brave my source code and think about a PAL
conversion, I would be happy to send it to you to look at.  (Manuel?)
In any case, I will release the full source code eventually anyway.

Thanks,
Billy

P.S. I am also looking for a different name for "Sudden Death" scoring
which really means "you must beat your opponent by at least two points."



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