Karateka (ST Port)

[Shatterhand]

I really don't want to sound ungrateful ... is there anyway to make this work at a decent speed in a normal 68k?

I would love to play this on my A600, but I don't have any accelerators to it, just plan old 68k.

Of course, this is Meynaf's work, many people are able to use it, and he can do whatever he wants with it

[ReadOnlyCat]

Originally Posted by Shatterhand

I really don't want to sound ungrateful ... is there anyway to make this work at a decent speed in a normal 68k?

I would love to play this on my A600, but I don't have any accelerators to it, just plan old 68k.

Of course, this is Meynaf's work, many people are able to use it, and he can do whatever he wants with it

As Meynaf as explained in another thread, the game is actually producing original ST graphic data (in chunky format) which are converted in real time to Amiga bitplane format. This conversion layer requires quite a bit of resources to run which is why a 68020 or better is needed to run at a smooth framerate.

Why did he do that? Well, because the alternative would be to:
- modify all graphic data so that it is in bitplane format
- rewrite all graphical routines to operate on bitplane data (and possibly to use the Blitter)

And that is easily double or triple the work already done.
It is hard to blame him.

Note that Stingray has used this approach as well for a few of the ST games he converted with similar results. Some games still run ok on an A500 because they do not refresh the whole screen at every frame so the realtime conversion layer has very little work to do but this highly depends on the game graphical needs and on how well it was written.

[meynaf]

Originally Posted by ReadOnlyCat

As Meynaf as explained in another thread, the game is actually producing original ST graphic data (in chunky format) which are converted in real time to Amiga bitplane format. This conversion layer requires quite a bit of resources to run which is why a 68020 or better is needed to run at a smooth framerate.

Why did he do that? Well, because the alternative would be to:
- modify all graphic data so that it is in bitplane format
- rewrite all graphical routines to operate on bitplane data (and possibly to use the Blitter)

And that is easily double or triple the work already done.
It is hard to blame him.

Note that Stingray has used this approach as well for a few of the ST games he converted with similar results. Some games still run ok on an A500 because they do not refresh the whole screen at every frame so the realtime conversion layer has very little work to do but this highly depends on the game graphical needs and on how well it was written.

Apart that the ST graphic format isn't chunky but just another bitplane format, this explanation is right.
If it were chunky it wouldn't even work on plain A1200...

This game is a complete mess and it's quite a miracle it just works.

[TjLaZer]

Tested it on my ACA620 '020/16Mhz and it was having issues. The intro did not run (stuck on title screen). Pressed some keys, maybe 1 or F1? Game starts and is barely playable. I'd say this needs 20Mhz to run right.

[earok]

I added this to the mostly PD collection on cd32.co.uk, works fine on emulator but doesn't appear to work on a real CD32 (won't progress past the title)

One thing I did that might be interferring is I'm running a background process (JOY2KEY2) to map keyboard to CD32 pad, so you can theoretically play it without a keyboard.

http://unofficial-cd32-ports.blogspo...mpilation.html

Any help/suggestions for this would be gratefully appreciated!

[meynaf]

Originally Posted by earok

I added this to the mostly PD collection on cd32.co.uk, works fine on emulator but doesn't appear to work on a real CD32 (won't progress past the title)

One thing I did that might be interferring is I'm running a background process (JOY2KEY2) to map keyboard to CD32 pad, so you can theoretically play it without a keyboard.

http://unofficial-cd32-ports.blogspo...mpilation.html

Any help/suggestions for this would be gratefully appreciated!

This game is very keyboard dependent. The keyboard is read with intuition messages (normal window events). However it uses RAWKEY events and keymap.library.
If that JOY2KEY2 mapping program works fine with programs under OS then it should be fine here as well ; however as it uses lowlevel.library i have some doubts...


While i'm here.

Originally Posted by TjLaZer

Tested it on my ACA620 '020/16Mhz and it was having issues. The intro did not run (stuck on title screen). Pressed some keys, maybe 1 or F1? Game starts and is barely playable. I'd say this needs 20Mhz to run right.

The game works on unexpanded A1200 '020/14Mhz, but my screen conversion routine uses 32bit chipmem accesses. So it needs more horsepower on ECS than on AGA.

[earok]

Joy2Key2 works brilliantly with all of your ST ports from my testing, with Gauntlet it's especially neat to have all of the keyboard functions (magic, select players etc) on the pad.

Also Karateka runs perfectly with Joy2Key2 under emulation, it just seems that the entire game freezes up on a real CD32 for me :/ I could do more testing to see if I can pin down the issue.

[meynaf]

How do the other ports behave on the real CD32 ?
They are all using the same input code, btw.

[earok]

From memory just fine, I'll do another play test on my real CD32 sometime in the next couple of days.


So far as performance goes, probably not a surprise to you but Joust and Gauntlet are perfectly smooth, Back to the Golden Age is fine, Oids, IK and Super Sprint aren't really playable (CD32 has 68020 and 2mb Chipram only)

[meynaf]

I admit i target the high end rather than the low end...
All my ports should work fine even on winuae jit set to maximum speed
(and Karateka has a few additionnal WaitTOF() calls to prevent the cpu from going 100% on very fast machines, which is useful on laptops)

[earok]

Posted an experimental CD32 build to the zone. It loads from RAM: (I've had trouble in the past running from pure CD), and uses a third party driver for full CD32 pad support. From limited testing it seems OK on a real CD32.

[Pyromania]

Nice porting and coding job! What language was it written in after all?

[Pyromania]

I wonder how this version compares to the iOS version which is just a port of the Apple II version. I'm betting the Amiga port from the ST is better plus you can use a proper joystick with it.

[s2325]

Apple II is not designed for action games.

[matthey]

Originally Posted by earok

Joy2Key2 works brilliantly with all of your ST ports from my testing, with Gauntlet it's especially neat to have all of the keyboard functions (magic, select players etc) on the pad.

It would be nice if Gauntlet used the 2nd controller button for magic without remapping. There are plenty of 2 button capable controllers for Amigas these days and it is very inconvenient to reach for the keyboard.

[meynaf]

Originally Posted by matthey

It would be nice if Gauntlet used the 2nd controller button for magic without remapping. There are plenty of 2 button capable controllers for Amigas these days and it is very inconvenient to reach for the keyboard.

Try again then. It should already work with current version

[matthey]

Originally Posted by meynaf

Try again then. It should already work with current version

Ok. Thanks. I must have an old version and will try a newer version. Two button support where it makes sense is much appreciated in all the games you port .

Edit: The 2nd button doesn't seem to be working with version 2 of Gauntlet from your web site. Karateka seems to be working fine though.

[meynaf]

Originally Posted by matthey

Edit: The 2nd button doesn't seem to be working with version 2 of Gauntlet from your web site. Karateka seems to be working fine though.

Oh no, silly me... A guy asked for 2 button support long ago, i did it, gave him the new version but never updated the one on my site...
Now it's done.

[DamienD]

Nice, cheers meynaf

[DamienD]

@meynaf; just out of interest. What is the "magic" key if only using the 1 button version; couldn't see anything in the "gauntlet.readme" file?