HAM game existing ? possible ?

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by thellier

>only two pixels [...] if the previous two pixels set the other two gun colors
You talk about a special case : a picture made like this hamr,hamg,hamb,hamr,hamg,hamb,hamr,hamg,hamb,...

No, I'm not talking about that, I'm talking about regular images. You need a maximum of three pixels to get from one color to another, completely different color. When fixing fringing, you're basically aiming to get the right color for the third pixel, so that you can guarantee that the background doesn't get messed up. Because this third pixel already sets a gun color (or all of them if it's a palette color), you only need to set the other two gun colors to correct the fringing. The only thing you need to know is which color the third pixel has to do this.

Originally Posted by hooverphonique

An idea might be to have the background only use 15 palette colors and then reserve the last for the first fringe pixel, calculating and setting this palette color each scanline.. that way, you can restore the color of the first fringe pixel to the exact same color it had originally, and then you don't even have to modify the right edge pixel data dynamically. This solution only works for 1 sprite per scanline, of course, but you could reserve more colors or modify the reserved color several times per scanline (presuming non-overlapping sprites).

That will work great in HAM8 Alternatively, for HAM6, you can use hardware sprites to mask the two fringing pixels, and just set those sprite's colors in the border to be the same as what the fringing pixels are supposed to be.

Edit:

To thellier: You weren't talking about hardware sprites, were you?

[thellier]

@hooverphonique
>first fringing pixel with the "nearest" palette color, the rest of the scanline will be slightly off
I agree
But the method may be raffined : if the second fringing pixel did a (say) ham-blue-change then the first fringing pixel must just approximate the nearer red and green values with a palette color : looks better
In fact in this case if missing color is R G B then may use n=max(R,G); firstfringepixel=greyscalepalette[n];

Of course this raffined "correction map" for the background is precalculated :-) and the game will works with a fixed background (like street fighter) not a "tiles based" one

>reserve the last palette color for the first fringe pixel
Look a smart idea :-) but that will works only in special case/special games
I mean for a StreetFighter game a single sprite "sprite" may have several "right edges" per line: one for his left harm, one for his body, one for his right arm...
Here too must have a precalculated list of x y pixels that define the sprite right edge(s)

>You weren't talking about hardware sprites, were you?
No never. Only sofware "sprites" drawn with the CPU

>only thing you need to know is which color the third pixel has
In fact i was focusing on the "missing pixel" = the one that was replaced with the sprite-right-outline-black-border (right B here) this "missing pixel" had a screen-color (maded from several hold and modify changes that occured in this line) that I want to approximate with a palette color for the first pixel f

bbbbbbbbbbbBssssssBfffbbbbb

b = background
B = sprite black outlining
s = sprite pixels
f = "right edge fringing"

Alain

[Pyromania]

Knights Of The Crystallion was a fun HAM game. I played it way back when.

[demoniac]

I think Heart of the Dragon is a HAM game. The advertisements mentioned 4096 colors. I never played it though. http://hol.abime.net/680

[s2325]

I think you're right, Irfan View see 111 colors on title screen and 127 in game. In other game by same coder (Championship Wrestling) there are 237 colors on title screen but only 32 in game.

[lilalurl]

This post by mr_a500 seems to suggest so too:

http://eab.abime.net/nostalgia-memor...tml#post235327

That's the most relevant result I got from a search online .

The reviews that are listed on AMR for the game don't seem to mention HAM:
http://amr.abime.net/amr_search.php?...=0&action=Find


I'd grateful if some coder/cracker/whatever could take a look and see if there are some instructions that would serve as clear proofs of the game using HAM mode.

This way we would be sure and could list it accordingly in HOL.

An interview on the matter with one of the developer would do too I guess.

[Codetapper]

Some small parts of Heart of the Dragon are in HAM mode, but the game itself definitely is not HAM:

 00065130: 2c01 fffe            ; Wait for vpos >= 0x2c and hpos >= 0x00
                                ; VP 2c, VE 7f; HP 00, HE fe; BFD 1
 00065134: 0100 6200            ; BPLCON0 := 0x6200
 00065138: 2c01 fffe            ; Wait for vpos >= 0x2c and hpos >= 0x00
                                ; VP 2c, VE 7f; HP 00, HE fe; BFD 1

For HAM mode, BPLCon0 would have to be set to $6a00, and it isn't. As a test, I hardcoded the HAM mode bit for the game and have a look at what it would be if it were HAM!

[lilalurl]

Thanks [waiting for people to comment that it would look like a CPC game... ]


So what do you think about the entry in HOL?

Should we add the HAM quickmatch and/or notes?


Setting the quickmatch could lead to mistaking the game as being HAM, but that can be rectified to a certain extent with a note.

On the other hand, if we do not set the quickmatch but put a note about some sections being in HAM, someone searching for games which at least have a part in HAM would miss the entry.

[Codetapper]

The game part is actually Extra Half-brite mode which we don't seem to catalogue either. Other games in that mode (off the top of my head) are Super Cars 1 and 2 and Abandoned Places.

As for HAM mode, where do you draw the line? BMX Simulator and Licence to Kill have HAM mode title screens, so would they get a HAM quickmatch aswell?

[lilalurl]

For Extra-Half Brite it won't be a problem to create a new quickmatch I guess.

Originally Posted by Codetapper

As for HAM mode, where do you draw the line? BMX Simulator and Licence to Kill have HAM mode title screens, so would they get a HAM quickmatch aswell?

Well, I don't know at all. Cody is probably the one who knows best what is the line between applying a quickmatch or not.

I do not have the technical skills to check if a game is indeed HAM or not (there is probably only you in the HOL team who can. Maybe Joe but I am not sure), so I am not very competent on the matter anyway.

[TCD]

Originally Posted by lilalurl

For Extra-Half Brite it won't be a problem to create a new quickmatch I guess.

We already have/had that quickmatch: http://hol.abime.net/hol_search.php?..._quickmatch=80

[thellier]

>have HAM mode title screens
There are lots of games with HAM mode title screen (I remember Great Giana Sister was)
What is interesting is "Game play in HAM" not having some standalone HAM pictures : everyone can display a picture on an Amiga ;-)

Alain Thellier

[s2325]

Some PC VGA platform games lost retro feeling because of 256 colors, it may be similar case with HAM mode.

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by s2325

Some PC VGA platform games lost retro feeling because of 256 colors, it may be similar case with HAM mode.

Is that a problem with new games? New games aren't retro after all

[Thcm]

If I remember correctly E-Motion used HAM mode: http://hol.abime.net/2849/screenshot

[Codetapper]

Originally Posted by Thcm

If I remember correctly E-Motion used HAM mode: http://hol.abime.net/2849/screenshot

I'm afraid not. Plain old 32 colour mode.

[Galahad/FLT]

RoboCop 2 used ham mode for intermission screens, Phantom Fighter used it for a loading screen.

[mc6809e]

Originally Posted by thellier

>have HAM mode title screens
There are lots of games with HAM mode title screen (I remember Great Giana Sister was)
What is interesting is "Game play in HAM" not having some standalone HAM pictures : everyone can display a picture on an Amiga ;-)

Alain Thellier

Any chance we can get you to use

[QUOTE] and [/QUOTE]

in your replies?

[Mrs Beanbag]

Was watching Chuck Rock and Wonderdog longplays the other day. The interesting thing about those games is that the bobs are drawn behind the scrolling graphics, rather than in front, as usual.

One could render a HAM screen that always had palette entries as the left-edge of all the graphics, and draw bobs that used only palette colours, if masked to be drawn only on "transparent" parts of the HAM screen. That way they would not produce any fringes.

[s2325]

Rocko - boxing game in HAM mode [ Show youtube player ]
exciting