Nerd Mentality

comatose

Sweet! My gba flashcart should come in any day now, then I just need to get a passme or find someone with the right wireless card.

The Lumines clone is for the GBA. No PassMe/wireless card required.

Since the PassMe and RT2560 wireless card will both be $20 or less, I recommend you get both

WiFiMe is more convenient -- no PCB sticking out the back of your DS -- but PassMe allows you to play/show off your DS stuff away from your computer.
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OrR

You can always flash your firmware so that you never need a PassMe or WifiMe again.

Really? Link?

Also, such a firmware modification would break commercial DS games, so that's not a very attractive option.
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Maxwell

Really? Link?

Also, such a firmware modification would break commercial DS games, so that's not a very attractive option.

That is not what I've heard about the firmware hack. http://forum.gbadev.org/viewtopic.php?t=5419 -skip through that.
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comatose

That is not what I've heard about the firmware hack. http://forum.gbadev.org/viewtopic.php?t=5419 -skip through that.

I stand corrected. I haven't been following the firmware very closely, and they've made serious progress.

With the new firmware installed,

• The button combination A+B+X+Y, gamecode "PASS" or title "DSBooter" on the GBA cartridge automatically starts program from GBA cartridge (starting from offset 0xC0).
  
To convert an .nds file into a FlashMe/PassMe binary, you need to append it to an nds loader

• backlight fades in
  
• the health screen is removed [Yay! -Ed.]
  
• RSA signature check for uploading and running NDS files is removed [You can directly download homebrew programs over the wireless! -Ed.]

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NinjaChief

"I hope they get freaking sued!"

WTF...


Whoa, hey there, tepples. I'll be sure to try that, but I'm looking forward to the other part, since I'm not really a fan of minesweeper. And I don't really have a flash cart yet, so no trying it on hardware for now...

Also, I had no idea there was a Lumines clone for Windows, I'll try that one too.

EDIT: Tried it, it works fine on VBA. It kind of played itself after I clicked somewhere... I don't get it. But it worked flawlessly either way. Keep it up!

Koji

Ooh, that was awesome! I've never played Lumines, though it looked pretty easy, and I now realized that it's not. Cool. A bit like Tetris.

I ought to create a vmv (VisualBoyAdvance recorded gameplay file) showing my own play.

Say, if I wanted to create alternate graphics for it, would you consider adding them in, tepples?

If you want to supply original graphics and/or original music (in s3m format or even in mono mp3 format), please do so. I'll start work on a skin template for game left. Until then, here are some design constraints to play with:

• A background image is 240x160 pixels and 16 colors. [*](THIS NO LONGER APPLIES) The game engine will draw the border around the playfield and automatically darken/lighten the background inside the playfield by duplicating the palette. [*]Music needs to run at a constant BPM and 4/4 time, as each pass of the sweeper is intended to represent sixteen 8th notes. [*]Music should loop after about 2 minutes, either to the beginning (da capo) or from some other point in the recording (dal segno).

[*]Tiles are 12x12 pixels. [*]All dark (currently orange) tiles share a 15-color palette; all light (currently light gray) tiles share a separate 15-color palette. I say "15" because the 16th color index is transparent. [*](THIS HAS BEEN CHANGED) The playfield is 192x120 pixels in size and its upper left corner is (32, 36) (32, 32).

[*]Tiles are 8x8 pixels. [*]All tiles currently share one 15-color palette; this is subject to change once I learn how much VRAM and palette memory the skin system will need. [*](THIS HAD A TYPO) The expert playfield is 240x128 pixels in size and its upper left corner is (32, 36) (0, 32). However, allow for smaller playfields if the player chooses beginner or intermediate level.

Tshroom

This might be a commercial quality game when its done.. too bad its a clone... otherwise you could have tried to market it.

Linus Torvalds made a clone of the UNIX system and gave it to the public as free software. One point of this exercise is to have something to put on my resume. We won't be trying to market the game per se but rather trying to market our future labor to employers.

Another business model is give the game away for free and sell the skins.

Koji

But please reconsider that about automatically darkening the background of the playfield. It'd really give me a lot more space to work with if you just left it up to me (or ayone who decides to contribute). Besides, the end result would look crappy like a Winamp skin made with a skinner.

I can reconsider, but if a skin included its own frame, then it wouldn't work with both game left and (the four different known board sizes of) game right. I guess I'll let each skin specify 15 colors for the inside of the playfield and 15 colors for the outside.

From some videos I've watched, in Lumines, blocks don't fall by themselves.

They don't here either. I've added a delay of 1.0 second, and I can make it longer.

tepples

I can reconsider, but if a skin included its own frame, then it wouldn't work with both game left and (the four different known board sizes of) game right. I guess I'll let each skin specify 15 colors for the inside of the playfield and 15 colors for the outside.

Both games are too different to use the same skin. I mean, I could create a version of a left game skin for the right game, but why would the background have to be the same for both? A different solution has to be implemented for each game.

tepples

They don't here either. I've added a delay of 1.0 second, and I can make it longer.

They do. Within a second.

Tshroom

if you dont have it I can send it to you.. its the best song ever..

Was that for me?

tepples

If you want to supply original graphics and/or original music (in s3m format or even in mono mp3 format), please do so.

I whipped that up in about 5 minutes... if you like it, use it. If you want more, let me know.

tepples

A background consists of two images: an outer background (240x160 pixels) and an inner background (192x120 pixels, same size as the playfield).

What's the need to make two separate backgrounds, if its size or placement is not variable? A single background should do for that matter.

tepples

Digits image, 80x8 pixels, should contain the glyphs 0-9. You get 15 colors plus transparency. Digits can be drawn condensed (6 or 7 pixel tracking), normal (8 pixel tracking), or extended (9 or 10 pixel tracking).

This is monospaced, right?

Koji

What's the need to make two separate backgrounds, if its size or placement is not variable? A single background should do for that matter.

My guess is that you can use two seperate palettes for the BG if you use two different images.


Consider this Version 2 of the BG posted above.

jmr

My guess is that you can use two seperate palettes for the BG if you use two different images.

Sure, but couldn't you just double the palette for the single BG picture to achieve the same results?

Koji

Sure, but couldn't you just double the palette for the single BG picture to achieve the same results?

No, because most PC image editing programs (Photoshop, PSP, GIMP, etc) don't understand how 16-bit game consoles treat indexed color.

A console typically has a small number of 15-color palettes available to backgrounds. (The Genesis has 4, the Super NES has 8, and the GBA has 16. Many games don't use all of them; in fact Sonic Advance uses only the first 4 because it was probably made with graphic assets from a canceled Genesis game.) A background layer can choose one of the palettes for each 8x8 tile, and unless you use multiple layers, the pixels of a single tile can use colors from only one palette.

However, most paint programs assume that every pixel in the image has access to all the colors in the palette. If you tell the paint program to "convert this image to indexed color, constructing an optimal 30-color palette", then it won't know that you can only use up to 15 in this region and up to 15 in that region. But if you know that one region will use one palette and another region will use another palette, you can split the image into two and tell the paint program to construct a 16-color palette for each separate image. That's why I split the background into outer and inner sections. If your paint program supports separate palettes per layer (many animated GIF construction programs do), then tell it to use 15 colors per layer.

But if you want to use only 16 colors for the whole screen, or if you have an image editor that understands console graphics, then tell the skin compiler to use the same file for the inner and outer background, and the skin compiler will do the right thing if possible.

EDIT: This is what jmr's background would look like (using the default skin for blocks):



And yes, digits are monospaced. I thought everyone knew that digits are monospaced in most fonts because that helps numbers line up better in spreadsheet programs. There's no real reason to require that they be monospaced, as each digit is drawn with a separate sprite, but it just looks tidier with monospaced digits.

Speaking of mono, how much should the "monochrome" (all blocks on playfield are one color) and "empty" (no blocks on playfield) bonuses be worth?

tepples

Sonic Advance uses only the first 4 because it was probably made with graphic assets from a canceled Genesis game.

Heh, that's a fun fact.

OK, I get your point, thanks for clearing it up for me.

And I figured digits would be monospaced, but your talk about different widths confused me a bit, that's all.

I've no idea how to properly handle scoring in a game, so I won't make a comment on the mono and clear bonuses. I wish I knew someone who had a PSP and Lumines, though.

jmr, you shouldn't have dithered the colors, just scale down the palette again but with no dither or difussion and it should look good.

Koji

And I figured digits would be monospaced, but your talk about different widths confused me a bit, that's all.

Does this make it any clearer?

tepples

Does this make it any clearer?

It was clear before that, but thanks.

Koji

- Sound effects not only change per skin, they adjust to the beat (so if you, for instance, move the falling block halfway through a beat, the sound will actually play half a beat later.)

I noticed something similar, but it just felt like mixer lag to me. You're not supposed to have mixer lag on a console.

- Music changes dinamically depending on how well you're doing.

In what way? Is it anything like the music in Super Mario 64's water levels, which add a consonant harmony layer or a percussion layer depending on what sector of the map the camera is in? Or did "how well you're doing" in the video just correspond to how far along the the song was?

- As you progress, the game does not speed up. I mean, the sweeper doesn't cycle faster, nor do the blocks drop faster. Actually, both variables are independent, and their different values make for different play styles for each skin.

From what I've read in GameFAQs, the speed of the blocks increases more or less monotonously as the game progresses (as in almost any puzzle game), but the sweeper always cycles once every 16 eighth notes of the music.

So, what game did you get?

My 10-year-old cousin got a Game Boy Camera for $20.

Anyway, new build 20050701 incorporates a few changes to behavior, and now I'm keeping a log of changes to the behavior of corner cases.

tepples

In what way? Is it anything like the music in Super Mario 64's water levels, which add a consonant harmony layer or a percussion layer depending on what sector of the map the camera is in? Or did "how well you're doing" in the video just correspond to how far along the the song was?

I have no idea. I don't base that from videos, but from some impressions somewhere. I'll go look at some videos to check, though.

*Goes.*

Hmm, nope, I can't see any changes, though that might be because whomever is playing in them pretty much sucks. Or maybe the comment was just regarding the sound effects (since there are special SFX when you get some bonus or things of the sort.)

Oh, what I did hear is a loop fade in. I don't know if that's how the original song is, though (it was Shinin' by Mondo Grosso.)

tepples

From what I've read in GameFAQs, the speed of the blocks increases more or less monotonously as the game progresses (as in almost any puzzle game), but the sweeper always cycles once every 16 eighth notes of the music.

Hmm, but since songs have different tempos, maybe that's where that came from. At least from some videos, the sweeper does move at different speeds, though I've yet to see the blocks fall down by themselves, so I can't comment on that.

tepples

My 10-year-old cousin got a Game Boy Camera for $20.

Hot. I love the GB Camera.

EDIT: Ooh, I played the latest build, and it was great. Gameplay feels very polished right now. Good work!

though that might be because whomever is playing in them pretty much sucks.

Once I get game left to a certain level of Luminesimiltude, I'm going to have to include a VBA movie file of my gameplay in order to diminish the general "all lumines videos on the intarweb are of poor players" factor.