#102698 - Dark Knight ez - Sat Sep 16, 2006 8:37 am
Hey all.
AmplituDS is my first real project for the NDS, and it being one of the first homebrew games to feature (IT) music and not only that, but on top of that it's actually also used as gameplay element.
It's based on the gameplay of Amplitude for the PlayStation 2. From the people who also created Guitar Hero.
http://amplituds.drunkencoders.com/
The current release only uses SRAM to save one's highscores and options.
Support for FAT and thus allowing people to create (and insert) their own game stages will follow shortly, also including the ability to write the savefile as a file to the inserted FAT card.
Other than that... It should be noted that the game is not the easiest game out there. For beginners, I recommend starting out by choosing Close View as camera mode and using the Turrican version. The SMB remix stage is harder but more fun if you get it right due to the high recognisability factor of the song. :)
So, have fun!
Slightly updated versions online now. Music/stage synchronisation is now greatly improved and thus should provide a better gameplay experience.
Last edited by Dark Knight ez on Sun Sep 17, 2006 2:25 pm; edited 1 time in total
#102717 - arctic_flame - Sat Sep 16, 2006 11:49 am
Wow!
I tried the SMB version, and it was awesome, although I only got half the song due to my poor reflexes and timing.
Keep up the good work!
#102719 - Lick - Sat Sep 16, 2006 12:12 pm
A quick question about SRAM: if you save highscores while I have a real game in my NDS slot, will it corrupt its saved data?
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#102722 - Dark Knight ez - Sat Sep 16, 2006 12:31 pm
SRAM is saved on your GBA card...
That is, if it has a header of a homebrew NDS game. (It shouldn't overwrite saves on commercial GBA cards.)
#102725 - Lick - Sat Sep 16, 2006 12:51 pm
Oh how stupid of me! Anyway, so the data is saved on the Supercard I guess. So it will require a .sav file, "QPC" or something? (I always think of QPC as QueryPerformanceCounter, hehe.)
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#102728 - Dark Knight ez - Sat Sep 16, 2006 2:22 pm
It should create a GBA save.
If the SuperCard stores GBA saves as .sav files, then yes: AmplituDS will create a .sav file on your SuperCard.
When a FAT version is released, media-cards which can be written to with the FAT library will have a save stored as a regular file in a specific AmplituDS folder on your media card.
Already got such versions sort of working, but I can not test the loading in of different stages from the media-card myself... I do not own a media-card, just a regular flashcard.
I did win the EZ-Flash forum competition with AmplituDS though... meaning I'll receive an EZ-Flash 4 and will be able to test such things out properly in the nearby future.
#102729 - Malc` - Sat Sep 16, 2006 2:27 pm
OMG!!!
Frequency is one of my all time favourite PS2 games, I completed EVERY stage on hard. Wasnt as much of a fan of amplitude because I preferred frequency's soundtrack, but this is AMAZING on the DS!!!! You sir, are a hero.
I love the menu music too!!!! PLZ make it playable :)
I cant wait for more songs (already completed the 2 up) :D:D:D
<3 <3
x
#102731 - Dark Knight ez - Sat Sep 16, 2006 2:33 pm
Then get me some. :p
Actually, all stages consist out of three files:
- An IT (Impulse Tracker) music file. These music files usually have the .it extension.
- A textfile which specifies who created it, what instruments are assigned to what lane, and some other details.
- A textfile with the colours and places of the targets.
Once I'll release FAT support, you'll be able to insert game stages you've created yourself into the game with ease. (Basicly by copying the three files into a specific AmplituDS folder on the media card.)
Still, if you can find a great IT music file which really appeals to me, I might be willing to spend a day myself to make an AmplituDS stage out of it.
And glad you all like it. :)
It means a lot to me, since a lot of effort went into this.
edit:
The menu music playable... I don't know... Don't think I'll put effort into that myself, but like I said, you'll be able to make it into a stage yourself soon enough.
#102755 - tepples - Sat Sep 16, 2006 6:33 pm
There's a lot of lag on the Turrican song.
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-- I think he moved to Tilwick.
#102758 - Dark Knight ez - Sat Sep 16, 2006 8:01 pm
Could you be more specific?
As in: which way are tracks (targets) and music desynchronised according to you? Is the music played ahead of the targets?
Also, is it only at the beginning, and gradually lessening... or the other way around... or just overall lagging?
And the SMB version does not have this lag you speak of, right?
edit:
Hmm... my debug, with slight dynamic synchronisation* keeps saying the tracks needed to speed up (be placed more towards the user) with the Turrican version. I don't have the feeling it lags (greatly) though. I'd really like more information on this, Tepples.
* Once a track-part has passed, this synching function is called and only slightly adjusts the tracks if needed (not much, since then the user would perceive the game as being jerky(?)).
#102764 - tepples - Sat Sep 16, 2006 9:12 pm
| Dark Knight ez wrote: |
Could you be more specific?
As in: which way are tracks (targets) and music desynchronised according to you? Is the music played ahead of the targets? |
Music in Turrican is consistently a quarter note ahead of the targets.
And it'd be wise to stretch the track by a factor of 2. You currently aren't using the top half of the touch screen for anything.
| Quote: |
| And the SMB version does not have this lag you speak of, right? |
SMB is about one sixteenth note ahead.
_________________
-- Where is he?
-- Who?
-- You know, the human.
-- I think he moved to Tilwick.
#102774 - Dark Knight ez - Sat Sep 16, 2006 10:46 pm
I see... I might know the reason to that. I'll look into it.
And about the stretching...
I have not taken any classes yet concerning 3D, and figured all this out by just looking at code. I couldn't get camera to work (so I just changed every object around the camera) and changing perspective wasn't a real success...
If you could help out in any way with that, I'd appreciate it.
I'm unsure as to how helpful it will be though (would it really be easier for the user to see what the layout is of the track-part?)... plus, I might add environment objects and shooting stars, also taking up space.
Thank you for your feedback.
#102778 - tepples - Sat Sep 16, 2006 10:55 pm
None of what you've done so far needs 3D hardware of any sort. It looks like Super NES mode 7 (rot/scale backgrounds).
It should be easier to see the note marks if you use scaled sprites and if you draw lines from one note mark to the next. If I had a decent music playback library for GBA, I'd make something myself.
"Taking up space" for its own sake is generally frowned upon if you can put playfield into that space.
_________________
-- Where is he?
-- Who?
-- You know, the human.
-- I think he moved to Tilwick.
#102783 - kvnchg - Sat Sep 16, 2006 11:07 pm
Sorry if this sounds noob but, I am guessing supercard lite is a media-card because it uses a SD card that is FAT format, right? I tried running the "All-User" version of the game on it anyways.. and I just get 2 black screen. Is there a way to get it running now for my supercard lite or do I have to wait for the media-card version to come out. XD sorry if I sound impatient cause well I am I loved Amplitude!
kvnchg
Thanks all!
#102786 - Dark Knight ez - Sat Sep 16, 2006 11:21 pm
Kvnchg:
As far as I know, it should work on all cards which support homebrew NDS creations. I can't tell you how to get it working on your card because I don't have experiences with that card.
Tepples:
I guess you're right. It could be done with mode 7. I'd rather stick to 3D for learning experience and that it seems to be more useful for future development.
Actually, you're right on the mark with every point you've made so far. Like I said, I'm reluctant to go with mode 7 and sprites though. The lines being drawn from one note to the next is also present in Amplitude (as you might know), and I have thought about it but rejected it due to me not knowing a way to making the line vibrate when a target is hit. I could just leave that part out though, and put in lines anyway. I should be able to manage that.
And if someone is willing to give me pointers (or help out with the code) on the 3D side as to enhance the engine, changing perspective, scaling things up, vibrating lines and such, let me know. ;) I'll try to learn on these things on my own, but I can't guarantee things as I failed before to get all that to work properly.
edit:
| Quote: |
| If I had a decent music playback library for GBA, I'd make something myself. |
The source code to AmplituDS is available online. If you want to work on it, or just use the music engine, you are able to. I'm using a modified libmikmod to allow the different instruments of IT files to be played at different volumes percentages of the original (of which I'm only using 0% and 100%). I am aware it can't be used for GBA, but as I recall, you have also worked with DS before.
#102792 - tepples - Sat Sep 16, 2006 11:50 pm
| Dark Knight ez wrote: |
| The lines being drawn from one note to the next is also present in Amplitude (as you might know), and I have thought about it but rejected it due to me not knowing a way to making the line vibrate when a target is hit. |
You could just light up the line for a few frames.
| Quote: |
| And if someone is willing to give me pointers (or help out with the code) on the 3D side as to enhance the engine, changing perspective, scaling things up, vibrating lines and such, let me know. |
In line 323, you do this:
| Code: |
glScalef(100.0f, 100.0f, 100.0f);
|
Have you tried some sort of glRotate in there, where you pitch the camera down by a few degrees?
_________________
-- Where is he?
-- Who?
-- You know, the human.
-- I think he moved to Tilwick.
#102794 - gladius - Sat Sep 16, 2006 11:53 pm
Very nice work! Quite a fun game, and very well presented.
#102806 - mr_cow - Sun Sep 17, 2006 3:14 am
Has anyone gotten this to work on the Supercard Mini-SD?
#102807 - retrohead - Sun Sep 17, 2006 3:56 am
turrican version works on supercard lite after patching with the supercard magic homebrew patcher or applying a nds loader. The menu is a bt glitchy though for some reason. It loaded the menu on my old gba flash cart but got stuck on the loading music screen, so i know what it should look like really ;)
Great game by the way but some bits are extremely impossible to be in 2 places an the same time so it makes the music get a little annoying because you can't quite get it so you can hear the whole song. Maybe once you have completed a row of notes it should keep playing that sound for longer, like the drums and keep the more technical gameplay to the strings.
It's probably the best homebrew game ive played to be honest though, its the one ive played for longest so far. I must go to sleep now and i will be sure to post this on my website in the morning.
Incidentally i tried the smb version using the same method and i got one black and one white screen followed by 3 bass drum kicks then it froze. Was quite amusing actually :P
#102809 - tepples - Sun Sep 17, 2006 4:05 am
| retrohead wrote: |
| Great game by the way but some bits are extremely impossible to be in 2 places an the same time so it makes the music get a little annoying because you can't quite get it so you can hear the whole song. Maybe once you have completed a row of notes it should keep playing that sound for longer |
For example, in Amplitude (PS2), after you complete 2 consecutive measures, it autoplays the next 11 measures in that track. Perhaps because you only have 3 tracks, knock that down to 5.
_________________
-- Where is he?
-- Who?
-- You know, the human.
-- I think he moved to Tilwick.
#102832 - Dark Knight ez - Sun Sep 17, 2006 9:12 am
First of all, thanks for the compliments. :)
Tepples:
Lighting up is certainly doable. Good suggestion. :)
And yes, I did try pitching the camera there, but could not get it to work. I thought I understood the principle of cameras but was apparently wrong. And glRotate alone would not cut it.
Retrohead:
Weird that the SMB version didn't work. The only difference which might cause this is the size of the .nds file (the SMB song is larger in size). If you want, I could create a test version with the intro song cut out of the SMB version to see if that makes a difference.
Retrohead & Tepples:
I did that on purpose, so that you can stack up the multiplier to 10x. (Each consecutive track-piece shot down properly increases the multiplier.) And yes, that can be done. I did it a couple of times myself.
Also, it makes sure the player has something to do instead of to just wait.
If you both prefer the continuation of music over that though, I'll rethink that through.
And tepples, by a measure do you mean a track-part? Like one small piece of a lane? I'm not sure if you're right then... I thought (note the thought part) that when I played it and got all 6 lanes completed (without messing up) I needed to get back to the left lane again which had appeared again.
I do know that Amplitude has checkpoints... places where the music keeps playing and your energy recharges (not present in AmplituDS). Were you talking about that?
edit:
Tepples, I made new versions with better start of the tracks, and dynamic synchronisation disabled. It seems to be (near) perfect now with synchronization. Would you be willing to test them out and give me your opinion? The downloads at the website are updated with these new versions.
#102862 - tepples - Sun Sep 17, 2006 3:00 pm
| Dark Knight ez wrote: |
Retrohead & Tepples:
I did that on purpose, so that you can stack up the multiplier to 10x. |
Frequency allows 4x, and Amplitude allows 8x.
| Quote: |
Also, it makes sure the player has something to do instead of to just wait.
If you both prefer the continuation of music over that though, I'll rethink that through. |
In Amplitude, some parts of songs don't have all the instruments, and I have to wait a few measures, but the multiplier doesn't disappear unless I fail to play a given measure. What you could do is open up the touch screen for something like my AXE demo when the player has a "freestyle" powerup (as in Amplitude) or when the player plays all tracks (as in Frequency).
| Quote: |
| And tepples, by a measure do you mean a track-part? Like one small piece of a lane? |
Yes. A measure is four quarter notes of a track.
| Quote: |
| I'm not sure if you're right then... I thought (note the thought part) that when I played it and got all 6 lanes completed (without messing up) I needed to get back to the left lane again which had appeared again. |
True, which is why Amplitude erases 11 measures for you: two for each other track and one to get back to the other side. But advanced players play the tracks in order 1, 2, 4, 6, 5, 3, so as not to need to zoom back to the other side. Frequency, on the other hand, erases only up to the next checkpoint (which are spaced much closer than in Amplitude, usually one every 8 to 12 measures), so the pattern is typically 1, 2, 3, 4, 4, 3, 2, 1, or 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 5, 4, 3, or the like.
| Quote: |
| Tepples, I made new versions with better start of the tracks, and dynamic synchronisation disabled. It seems to be (near) perfect now with synchronization. Would you be willing to test them out and give me your opinion? The downloads at the website are updated with these new versions. |
Will do.
_________________
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I wanna know what you're thinking
There are some things you can't hide
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_________________
-- Where is he?
-- Who?
-- You know, the human.
-- I think he moved to Tilwick.
#102866 - retrohead - Sun Sep 17, 2006 3:25 pm
Ok i just tried the new versions and now the SMB version works aswell. Using the SC homebrew patcher neither work though so you need to apply a ds loader yourself but the menus are still garbled a little bit for some strange reason.
The game seems much more playable now you have tweaked the synch a bit so well done with that. It still is annoying me that as soon as i do a perfect run, i go to start on another track and straight away the track i just completed is coming back again.
I have never played the PS2 version by the way so all my ideas are purely from playing your game. I would also like to see a video of someone with all 3 tracks playing because as far as i can see, it is impossible to do.
Good luck with this, i will follow your progress tightly.
#102867 - tepples - Sun Sep 17, 2006 3:30 pm
Now SMB starts on-beat but gets to where the targets are a sixteenth note ahead of the music by the end.
Turrican drifts slowly from the beat in the same manner, but having owned a cartridge of SMB for NES and not Turrican, I'm not familiar enough with the Turrican music to be able to describe it better.
Amplitude for PS2 does not work by turning volume on and off. It works by actually playing the sound when you press the key. And even if you screw up a measure (symbolized by a darkened track piece in your game), the player can still continue playing notes in the measure, although it won't count for anything.
_________________
-- Where is he?
-- Who?
-- You know, the human.
-- I think he moved to Tilwick.
#102871 - Dark Knight ez - Sun Sep 17, 2006 4:37 pm
Tepples (first post):
I know Amplitude has a maximum multiplier of 8. I could alter it, I guess, but I am in no way fixated on recreating the Amplitude gameplay in an exact way.
I've been thinking on freestyle mode... basicly thinking I could use a looping sample and let the user adjust its playback speed (and thus 'scratching'). I tried out your AXE demo quite some time ago. I'll try it out again and see if that would fit better. Great suggestion.
Anyway, you basicly request one track-piece of room/nothingness when the player accomplished to let all lanes play (without failing once). So that would come down to... erm... letting the next <amount-of-lanes> track-parts be destroyed as well, and decreasing that by 1 when a track-part passed.
Retrohead:
The menu being garbled... I'm assuming you mean the background of the menus. It's a known problem on M3 and it's apparently also present on SC. I'm not doing anything wrong though. It does work on my flashcard and on EZ-Flash 4. If someone knows a solution, I'd be more than happy to make some alterations.
Tepples (second post):
Alright. I'll adjust the timing of both once more. It's gotten pretty close. Thankfully it's just adjusting one variable (the length of a track-part in seconds).
Also, I know Amplitude does not work by turning volume on and off. However, me using libmikmod does not (easily) allow such custom tasks... it was not designed for such things. Volume alteration was "easy" enough for me to hack in and I'm quite pleased with the result as it is. I won't be altering libmikmod to do things in a totally different fashion.
The player being able to continue the music even if the user failed a track-piece... It would have benefits. Also some disadvantages. I do think the benefits outweigh the disadvantages. I'll need to think on how I'll handle this, I have some ideas. Again, a good suggestion.
So basicly, my to-do list:
- Slightly adjust synching both stages (longer track-parts).
- Let completed lanes stay gone for a to be calculated time instead of a now in textfiles specified one (specified for each track-part seperately) and make sure the multiplier does not dissapear when there are no track-parts for the user to shoot down.
- Let the player be able to continue the music of a track-part even if he failed that track-part.
- Check out AXE again. Think about implementation for freestyle.
And on (slightly) longer term:
- FAT support. So people can create stages themselves. (Start looking for great IT music files, people. ;p)
- Adding lines between notes/targets.
- Better utilization of the bottom screen, more filled with the lanes.
- Better graphics. Contact me if you can help out 3D or 2D wise.
Am I missing anything?
Oh, we touched the subject of power-ups with freestyle. I want to let you guys already know that the power-up slow-down is probably not going to happen. I might be able to pull off doubling the playback of the buffer, slowing things down times 2, but that would not be a real gradual transition to it... It's not high on my priority list.
#102872 - tepples - Sun Sep 17, 2006 4:47 pm
| Dark Knight ez wrote: |
I've been thinking on freestyle mode... basicly thinking I could use a looping sample and let the user adjust its playback speed (and thus 'scratching'). I tried out your AXE demo quite some time ago. I'll try it out again and see if that would fit better. Great suggestion.
Anyway, you basicly request one track-piece of room/nothingness when the player accomplished to let all lanes play (without failing once). So that would come down to... erm... letting the next <amount-of-lanes> track-parts be destroyed as well, and decreasing that by 1 when a track-part passed. |
What you describe would be a hybrid of Frequency (dedicated freestyle track) and Amplitude (destroying track pieces).
Frequency: When all parts are played, the freestyle track opens up from here to the end of the section. The player must put something in the freestyle track each measure in order to keep the multiplier from disappearing.
Amplitude: When all parts are played, the player can move about the tracks without losing multiplier. A powerup is needed to enter this freestyle mode, and it automatically destroys track pieces until it expires.
| Quote: |
Tepples (second post):
Alright. I'll adjust the timing of both once more. It's gotten pretty close. Thankfully it's just adjusting one variable (the length of a track-part in seconds). |
Based on my experience on bemanistyle forums, BPM sync has shown itself to be one of the biggest barriers to StepMania content development.
| Quote: |
| Oh, we touched the subject of power-ups with freestyle. I want to let you guys already know that the power-up slow-down is probably not going to happen. I might be able to pull off doubling the playback of the buffer, slowing things down times 2, but that would not be a real gradual transition to it... It's not high on my priority list. |
I don't care. It wasn't in Frequency anyway, and I hardly ever use that powerup anyway.
_________________
-- Where is he?
-- Who?
-- You know, the human.
-- I think he moved to Tilwick.
#102879 - retrohead - Sun Sep 17, 2006 5:49 pm
That power up idea doesn't sounds like it will be missed that much so i would say forget it aswell :P
I just had a brain wave about what you said with the user being able to play the track if they fail. Perhaps you could create a different music track that would play in a slightly distorted manner making it sound like you have messed it up, therefore not making the song sound empty at the same time with some indication that you had gone wrong.
I have seen this done in several music games, notably um jammer lammy for the psx so maybe if you have enough room you could do it for this.
The frequency idea sounds good having a freestyle track once you have the main song playing which could progressively get harder. Of course you would need a break in this though else the player would get worn out. Perhaps the song could then reach a checkpoint or something and go into a break then require you to start the main song tracks again ableit harder now of course :P
#102881 - Dark Knight ez - Sun Sep 17, 2006 6:07 pm
I'm unsure as how to implement it different sounding. I'm not even sure it would be desirable. (Isn't the darkened track-part enough of an indication?)
Also, freestyle is not what you think it is.
In Amplitude (and apparently Frequency as well) the space ship would fly to the center of the screen... and the user could then move the ship to the left, right, top, bottom of the screen... wherever. Freely moving the ship.
A scratch noise is played in Freestyle mode, and by moving the ship, the scratch noise sounds different. (I suggest you try out AXE. Search the forum. It's quite similiar in concept.)
Tepples, I've checked out AXE once more. I see that you've (slightly) improved it visually since first I tried it out. Real nice.
There are a few ways possible to implement that in AmplituDS. Will the music continue playing and should the AXE drums not play? Or should it 'completely' switch to AXE? I would prefer the former, I guess. I'm not sure how good the two would match though (AXE tones and AmplituDS music for the stages).
Also... should one be able to move the space ship instantly when a press is done in another position (as with AXE is the case), or should it move to the new pressed point in a certain speed?
Your thoughts?
#102883 - tepples - Sun Sep 17, 2006 6:32 pm
| Dark Knight ez wrote: |
Tepples, I've checked out AXE once more. I see that you've (slightly) improved it visually since first I tried it out. Real nice.
There are a few ways possible to implement that in AmplituDS. Will the music continue playing and should the AXE drums not play? |
This is what I envisioned. The backing beat was just a placeholder, which months later I realized was similar to the one from "What's On Your Mind" by Information Society or a slowed-down version of the one from "Butterfly" by smile.dk.
| Quote: |
| Also... should one be able to move the space ship instantly when a press is done in another position (as with AXE is the case), or should it move to the new pressed point in a certain speed? |
Make it how you want. The PS2 didn't have a touch screen, so there isn't really any player expectation to keep.
_________________
-- Where is he?
-- Who?
-- You know, the human.
-- I think he moved to Tilwick.
#102906 - Dark Knight ez - Sun Sep 17, 2006 9:12 pm
The first two items on the to-do list are now done. (Not uploaded though.)
Getting a full multiplier and letting it remain that way is now almost laughable easy. Where I would usually get a 3 to 6 multiplier, I'm now stuck with a multiplier of 10 almost the entire stage.
If I'd auto-enable freestyle after one enables the entire music (all lanes gone temporarily), that could make sure the multiplier is not that easy to retain... but people would get frustrated by how much times it's activated in just one stage.
Any ideas?
#102908 - retrohead - Sun Sep 17, 2006 9:31 pm
| Dark Knight ez wrote: |
If I'd auto-enable freestyle after one enables the entire music (all lanes gone temporarily), that could make sure the multiplier is not that easy to retain... but people would get frustrated by how much times it's activated in just one stage.
Any ideas? |
I'd need to see your freestyle mode to comment on it. Can you implement it then upload a version for playtest? I know this could mean alot of wasted work though!
My immediate thoughts is to make the freestyle mode easy to start with but with a sharp difficulty curve that way you would not be in freestyle mode for too long until you have mastered the game. By this i mean you need some kind of way to fail whilst in freestyle mode say if you have not hit a single note in one bar or something, that is if i have grasped the concept correctly?
#102912 - Dark Knight ez - Sun Sep 17, 2006 11:11 pm
You've got the wrong idea on freestyle.
Check out Tepples' creation called AXE, and imagine the dot you're moving with your stylus is actually the space ship of AmplituDS.
http://forum.gbadev.org/viewtopic.php?t=9451
I've been looking for a video with freestyle in Amplitude on gamespot and youtube without succes. I did find a video on youtube of AmplituDS to my surprise though: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IhZO1JPQKo
Too bad his top screen also has the messed up background. Bah.
#102913 - tepples - Sun Sep 17, 2006 11:12 pm
| Dark Knight ez wrote: |
| Getting a full multiplier and letting it remain that way is now almost laughable easy. |
Then you need to make "brutal" or "insane" modes where almost every separate note has a gem on it.
_________________
-- Where is he?
-- Who?
-- You know, the human.
-- I think he moved to Tilwick.
#102914 - Dark Knight ez - Sun Sep 17, 2006 11:18 pm
That's pure madness, Tepples. Needless to say, I like it.
I guess I need to alter some stuff as to let AmplituDS be able to select different layout files for the same stage.
Normal, brutal and insane layouts should be enough, right?
edit:
I made it an option in a settings file to let AmplituDS determine if it should calculate what track-parts need to be destroyed... or if that should be read out from the layout textfile.
That way, you have an option to make things either easy (if you let AmplituDS calculate it for you) or "hard" on you (like the versions now online).
#102917 - tepples - Sun Sep 17, 2006 11:40 pm
| Dark Knight ez wrote: |
I guess I need to alter some stuff as to let AmplituDS be able to select different layout files for the same stage.
Normal, brutal and insane layouts should be enough, right? |
You have the right idea. Frequency has easy, normal, expert, and edit; Amplitude has mellow, normal, brutal, insane, and edit.
Na na, na na na na na na na na Katamari Frequency!
_________________
-- Where is he?
-- Who?
-- You know, the human.
-- I think he moved to Tilwick.
#102990 - Dark Knight ez - Mon Sep 18, 2006 2:30 pm
In recent news:
I found out that memcpy-ing a background and/or its palette into the appropriate background memory is not a good thing to do. I found this out when I tried to alter my palette some time after the initialization process. A lot of tutorials use memcpy for this, but it seems it can mess up. Might be the cause for the corrupted / not-showing backgrounds on M3 and SC and such. I would not be surprised. I fixed that up. :)
I also now made it possible to choose difficulty level. The user can specify a default difficulty in options, as you're accustomed to do with view and controls already.
And the border of the background changes to a different colour when a different difficulty level is selected. Thought it'd be a nice visual thing.
Editing the new 3 layouts for each of the stages (so 6 in total) will be a pain in the ass and will take me probably two days of full-time working on them.* If someone is willing to help out with this job, let me know. If you have a FAT card, I'll give you a special build of AmplituDS to aid you in this (with the inclusion of the new changes I made). The job would mostly consist out of deleting targets out of already existing layouts, as to make them easier. That way, I'll "only" have to create 2 new layouts (1 for each stage) by adding targets. That would save me a lot of time, allowing me to concentrate on other aspects.
*So that might take a week, or two, as I do have classes and such at university to attend to, and I'll also need breaks from coding.
#102993 - Lick - Mon Sep 18, 2006 2:43 pm
I use memcpy all the time, no (graphical) errors, what's wrong with it?
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#103000 - Dark Knight ez - Mon Sep 18, 2006 3:07 pm
I tried to use memcpy to do the following (a long time after setting the NDS environment up, so to speak):
| Code: |
| memcpy(BG_PALETTE_SUB, bg_pal_bin + index*2, 1*2); |
That should effectively replace the first index in the (NDS bg) palette with entry #index in the included file bg_pal_bin. It did not work, however. I had to change it to the following:
| Code: |
| *((uint16*)BG_PALETTE_SUB) = *((uint16*)(bg_pal_bin + index*2)); |
In retrospect, I'm amazed that the memcpy at setting the NDS environment up did do its job with my homebrew setup. I changed that to be similiar to the code above, and that _might_ fix the background issues which were present on M3 and SC.
#103008 - tssf - Mon Sep 18, 2006 6:08 pm
Anyone interested in the soundtrack? Visit here:
http://tssf.i-web.net/amplituds
You'll need an IT player to listen to the music. WinAmp does come with a mod plugin.
Credits:
1-1.it
Original: Koji Kondo
Remix: beek
puzzle13.it (made for a home-made puyo-puyo-esue puzzle game called "Chicken Little)
Original: Isamu
turittl.it
Original: Chris Huelsbeck (used with permission from Chris himself)
This version: Mathew Valente [TSSF] <- me :)
Hopefully I will get some time to make Turrican Title Medley longer, and I'm also hoping to actually write some new songs for use in this game.
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------
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#103035 - josath - Mon Sep 18, 2006 8:50 pm
hehe, never heard of the 'frequency' or 'amplitude' games before (i'm not a PS/PS2 owner), but I've played Marfitude, which is quite fun.
Some of the text on that page is classic:
| Quote: |
Q: The sound works, but there's no music. I thought you said this game was about music?
A: You have to shoot the grey dots with your lasers to make music, just like in real life.
|
This game looks great so far, I can't wait for the version with many songs, different diffuculty levels, etc.
#103054 - Dark Knight ez - Mon Sep 18, 2006 11:03 pm
Thank you for the compliment. :)
The website you linked to was quite fun to read through... it mentioned Amplitude in the first line, so I guess you did hear about it before. ;p
I don't own a Playstation, or a Playstation 2, by the way. I played Amplitude at a friend's house like 5 times and loved it. Wanted to get it on a system I owned... and since that wasn't likely to happen, I just started coding it myself. Heh.
On to the check-list...
Check. - Slightly adjust synching both stages (longer track-parts).
Check. - Made it possible to let completed lanes stay gone for a to be calculated time instead of a in textfiles specified one and made sure the multiplier does not dissapear when there are no track-parts for the user to shoot down.
Check. - Let the player be able to continue the music of a track-part even if he failed that track-part.
Check. - Make it possible to switch difficulties, and save highscores seperately for each difficulty. (Haven't created the actual new layouts for the other difficulties yet though.)
That's like everything on short-term that I wanted to happen. Once I've got the new layouts done for the other difficulties (hopefully soon, if anybody is willing to help out with it, I'd really appreciate it... see 5 replies up) and maybe proper FAT support, I'll release the new version.
I also need someone to test out the current version (not uploaded). The new features need to be tested out properly. Contact me if you're willing to.
#103073 - josath - Tue Sep 19, 2006 1:23 am
| Dark Knight ez wrote: |
That's like everything on short-term that I wanted to happen. Once I've got the new layouts done for the other difficulties (hopefully soon, if anybody is willing to help out with it, I'd really appreciate it... see 5 replies up) and maybe proper FAT support, I'll release the new version.
I also need someone to test out the current version (not uploaded). The new features need to be tested out properly. Contact me if you're willing to. |
Wait, are you creating the location of the gem/beat things by hand? I thought it was automatic, at least that's how Marfitude works...you just give it any random .MOD file, and then pick a difficulty (from 0-3), and it generates the layouts automatically.
Though, I can see how it would be more difficult to do it automatically instead of by hand, because this means you will need lower-level access to the MOD file, which may not be easy with whichever library you are using.
#103102 - Dark Knight ez - Tue Sep 19, 2006 7:06 am
Yes. Unfortunately, this all needs to be done by hand.
I did create an automatic layout creation program (which I called Amplitrack), but it had several drawbacks. Patterns aren't easily recognisable, and the same patterns but with slightly adjusted note heights is even harder. The best results are had if one creates a layout by hand.
Takes like half a day to a days work for one single track layout.
Attempting it in AmplituDS itself would be disastrous, by the way. I'm using a slightly modified version of libmikmod and I'd need to let the entire music play once to know where all the notes lay. Kind of a pain if you have to wait an entire song before you can play the stage with that song.
If someone could prove me wrong and create an automatic layout creation program which actually works like a charm, I'd welcome it. :)
#103130 - chrisluu - Tue Sep 19, 2006 1:55 pm
Hello!
You totally beat me to a release... ahh well, I've been too busy to work on the project as much as I've liked to. So I've been working on a port of Frequency to the DS, aptly called FrequenDS. I've been having various problems and it seems like you may be too, so maybe we could collaborate a bit or something (although you're probably a good bit better than me).
Here's the link to my project:
http://nuudles.googlepages.com/frequends
My project has FAT support and uses WAM files from the Marfitude project, which generates them automatically. I've also used 8 tracks. My biggest problem right now is that the whole thing gets out of sync. I haven't looked at your source yet, but good job on your project so far!
#103142 - tepples - Tue Sep 19, 2006 3:10 pm
| Dark Knight ez wrote: |
I did create an automatic layout creation program (which I called Amplitrack), but it had several drawbacks. Patterns aren't easily recognisable, and the same patterns but with slightly adjusted note heights is even harder. The best results are had if one creates a layout by hand.
Takes like half a day to a days work for one single track layout. |
DDR tracking takes similar amounts of time, even with the graphical editor in StepMania.
| Quote: |
| Attempting it in AmplituDS itself would be disastrous, by the way. I'm using a slightly modified version of libmikmod and I'd need to let the entire music play once to know where all the notes lay. Kind of a pain if you have to wait an entire song before you can play the stage with that song. |
Or it could play the song once at high speed, make the layout, and cache it to the CF card.
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#103146 - Dark Knight ez - Tue Sep 19, 2006 3:37 pm
| Quote: |
| Or it could play the song once at high speed, make the layout, and cache it to the CF card. |
Yes, but like I said, I couldn't get a good layout out of it. I tried to use a textfile which mapped notes to targets, but that wasn't such a good idea. (When the same pattern is played two notes lower for example, you'd want the same pattern... which my implementation failed at.)
I might rethink all that through, and adjust Amplitrack to analyze series of notes instead of immediately mapping each note to a target. Not real high on my priority list, since it's definitely not a fun thing to work on. Maybe the WAM files Chrisluu mentioned could help out in some way.
Chrisluu:
I couldn't test out FrequenDS due to it needing a FAT card, which I don't own unfortunately. From the looks of the video, the visuals are quite nice. I totally liked the target range graphics (the three blue circles). I tried something similiar at first, but in Distance View (camera view in which you also see the entire ship) it would get really ugly and unclear.
I've PMed you my msn address, so we can discuss things further.
#103405 - josath - Thu Sep 21, 2006 4:54 pm
Here's a test version of frequenDS which should work on flashcards without FAT support:
frequends_fcsr.zip
essentially I'm using fat image which takes advantage of FCSR support in fatlib, thus i don't even need the source code, or to recompile.
#103409 - Dark Knight ez - Thu Sep 21, 2006 5:26 pm
It's looking quite good. I'm impressed.
Thanks for this version, josath. I knew about the possibility of using an image, but never got around to fiddling with such things.