Mfa for revision included! who loves to simplify things?

[Aloan]

screen2.jpg
(Graphics are far away from final, there will be lots of shades, better animation and early 90's 16 bit style arcade graphics added)

If you've played Superman for the Atari 2600 before, this will be a piece of cake for you!

I've been working on this Superman remake/revamp which is still a 45% work in progress (the crooks disappear, they don't scatter through the city yet, neither does "Louis Lane" and the famous annoying chopper).
So I am thinking...: if someone else can have a look at it, he/she might know easier ways I could have coded it.
You will notice, I've used several (to be invisible) actives to serve as the "magic trick" to get certain jobs done, such as allowing Superman to fly and when he is supposed to walk on the ground. I had to invent these things off the top of my head, because I feel I am know too little still about the marvelous and powerful event editor.
So take a look, and see what you think... maybe you will see that I've gone a bit too far to accomplish something you might think would have been done with just a couple of codes
You may want (at a given point) have a broad look at what's going on in the game by matching the window's size to the playfield size. But remember, the "magical" actives won't work if you do so. I guess they are supposed to work while the window is within 320 x 224 (because that's the res I coded it in).
You will see funny things like Superman being stuck inside a kryptonite jail, where he is forced to wait until clark enters the phone booth, so he can be free, then Clark switches with him being himself stuck inside the wall and can't go anywhere!
There is an error in the counter, it becomes scrambled after a while, lol.
I might have too many frames unnecessarily (well 4): Title, Begin, Fall (which are intro screens) and Metropolis which is where all the action takes place
Feel free to change it to your liking (delete unnecessary actives, switch to easier coding, etc) and post back so I can see and learn from the differences! Well appreciated!
But if you think I'm on the right path and that this mfa couldn't be simpler, just let me know and I'll be happy!
here's the mfa: http://sdrv.ms/11NoUVV (only 885kb)
mfa features: awesome "magical" full screen, mame arcade style resolution: 320 x 224
it is supposed to be used with Walrus ultimate full screen object which (if you don't have) can be downloaded here: http://ultimatewalrus.com/mmf.php
(resizes the screen keeping the aspect ratio and without changing your native resolution) the ultimate answer to having your games full screen!
I don't know if the mfa encapsules/embeds the object or not. I know it shows up in my MMF2's frame editor.
If this post fits better else where, feel free to move it. Cheers!

[gkinfinity]

The walking movement is kind of glitchy so I'd try to improve that a bit. You've also got a ton of events but there doesn't seem to be much going on in the game. It can definitely be simplified a lot (I'm thinking 20 events tops). The graphics are also REALLY basic to the point where it's hard to tell what anything is, and although you are trying to remake the game I would definitely work on improving the graphics.

[Aloan]

Thanks for the feedback. The walking movement seems glitchy (I believe) because it is mimicking the Atari 2600 version: (that is) the character is forced up to align with either the bridge passage (Clark) or the phone booth (Spman) it's there to capture the same feel as the old did. As for the graphics, (maybe you might not have read, or I must have updated my topic after you had already downloaded it) as I have written up top, are basically a test bed for me to start coding the events. They are early designs as the buildings are still straight from the original Atari 2600 game. Same with the animation. I was wondering if there's another way to switch between Clark and Superman using the same active (not 2 as is the case here) bearing in mind that (obviously) each have different abilities.

[gkinfinity]

Okay, well I haven't played the original so I don't know what it used to look like. Although I realize that you are trying to replicate the original, I don't think anyone would mind if you fixed any of the glitchiness that was present in it. I can understand why you would have something that aided the player in lining up with the phonebooth, but it could probably be done a little smoother. The bridge, on the other hand, doesn't really seem necessary to me. As is you get some weird teleporting stuff that happens when you're in that area.

I didn't read the part you wrote earlier about the graphics, sorry about that. That's totally fine.

I would probably use different actives for Superman and Clark actually -- it's just easier that way.

Most of your events have to do with scrolling in the game, which can actually be done with only a few events. You would have to that the layout of the levels moved around a bit, but it'd save you from having so many lines of code in the event editor and make changes to the game much easier. I'll try to make an example for you when I have time.

[Aloan]

Okay, well I haven't played the original so I don't know what it used to look like. Although I realize that you are trying to replicate the original, I don't think anyone would mind if you fixed any of the glitchiness that was present in it. I can understand why you would have something that aided the player in lining up with the phonebooth, but it could probably be done a little smoother. The bridge, on the other hand, doesn't really seem necessary to me. As is you get some weird teleporting stuff that happens when you're in that area.

I didn't read the part you wrote earlier about the graphics, sorry about that. That's totally fine.

I would probably use different actives for Superman and Clark actually -- it's just easier that way.

Most of your events have to do with scrolling in the game, which can actually be done with only a few events. You would have to that the layout of the levels moved around a bit, but it'd save you from having so many lines of code in the event editor and make changes to the game much easier. I'll try to make an example for you when I have time.

I understand. My bad, I wasn't clear. Let me clarify: This "glitch" is actually real original gameplay behavior which I purposely am replicating from the Atari 2600 version of Superman. My intention is not to improve the gameplay upon the original, but to make it prettier looking. The only things I will be improving are the graphics and animation. So it feels like you're playing the original old version with it's primitive gameplay but with 80's arcade quality resolution instead (with of course some nice 16 bit style color shading), and a couple more frames of animation (which I am intentionally "as well" leaving for last).
It follows this thought: What if " this game" where made for the arcades instead! in other words what if the same programmer when he was writing the code (same gameplay code) had more colors and animation to play with. But yes, I will appreciate the simplified events for the split screen coding. - Like it will happen for example: you're Superman flying high on the screen when suddenly you collide with the kryptonite, and what it did in the original is all of a sudden you are clark and are "teleported" straight to a standing position on the floor. And Louis would show up like a geenie on the screen (all of a sudden too) You have to play it to see how it goes!
I like the old gameplay. It added to the game's speed and crazyness. I just wanted to see how it would feel to have the same crazy gameplay, but in a prettier package.

[Aloan]

my gosh, I can't believe I've been a member for 7 years now! (was looking at my profile)
I don't know how the link got to be broken and when it happened. Since I was traveling around here and saw it broken (even though this tread is about 2 years old), here is the updated link: http://1drv.ms/1JRqwkR
and here is another link for more goodies and mfas I don't have time to continue on or are just test beds: http://aloan.site90.net/projetos.html