Supercars 2 AGA

[ExiE]

It's a pity that you didn't get your hands on Supercars International DOS sources too
The movement of the cars, including drifting, look really cool in that version.

[modrobert]

Originally Posted by jotd

did you try CACHE on the normal ECS install to compare to? I'd be interested.

I did now, slight improvement, but what really makes scrolling smother/faster is adding 'NTSC' tool type (and setting 'CUSTOM3=1' to adjust score panel with + and - keys).

[saimon69]

I did check my archive and so will need to retouch some of the tunes but will put those in the zone once ready - which channels you might need free? 0 and 1 (first left and first right) or 2 and 3 (second left and second right)?

[saimon69]

@Jotd - you have a PM

[jotd]

thanks. I haven't checked the tunes or the channels that need to be free. I checked and of course ptreplay cannot reserve channels and play music tracks somewhere else. It probably is possible (swapping channels) but it could kill stereo effects so better change the sfx so they're played on the free channels that the module leaves.

I think a 3-channel would be possible too. But ATM working on AGA comm screens. Doing well. Going to replace the mod replay routine after that.

Originally Posted by ExiE

It's a pity that you didn't get your hands on Supercars International DOS sources too
The movement of the cars, including drifting, look really cool in that version.

well, a x86 asm source isn't going to help a lot. I can read it (well, I used to crack DOS games in the 90's does that count?) but transposing it to the SC2 code is another story

Besides I don't like what they did to the gameplay very much. The graphics are better for the static screens (well more colors, a bit flashy but it shows a lot of colors) but for the in-game part I prefer Supercars 2. Controls & graphics... The only cool & cheap thing they did is to make the race go backwards on the same track. Easy reuse, and the race can be VERY different for some tracks.

Maybe I'll try to add some more blue to those green waters. Things like that. But not much. The backgrounds are beautiful specially the "grass" ones.

[saimon69]

As far as i know Amos reserve what i call Channel 0 (first left) for sound effects, second might be channel 1 (first right) and so i made the tunes fit channels 2 and 3.
Those were made couple years ago so if you want three channel might need to do something from scratch or readapt things

[jotd]

okay, new version in the zone.

communication screens are now AGA

traffic department is glitchy because I didn't handle the signs and all (well, apparently it can crash the game too...). The rest is working and colorful (and overscan )

[mojox]

Amazing work! Thank you for sharing your efforts @jotd

[jotd]

another update in the zone. Commscreens update. Now signs displayed by the inspectors have been AGA-ized (a lot of gimp work ) and works fine.

Ransom1122 reported crashes after that particular commscreen. I hope it's gone, but I don't know, really...

Been replacing module player (will work at proper speed in NTSC) so soon there will be in-game music with 2-track songs composed by J.M.D aka saimon69.

Then we'll tackle the colored cars.

[ascaaear]

Wow. Its great to see someone is doing new stuff with SuperCars. Its one of my favorite games that I used to play all the time. Cant wait to see more from you JOTD.

I used to dream of making new tracks for this game to drive on. Perhaps thats beside your goal for this project - but is it even achiveable? I would be happy to try make one as a test if it sounds interesting to implement it.

[jotd]

hi

made good progress with in-game AGA display. Original games uses EHB for shadows which means 32 colors + 32 same but dimmed colors for shadows.

I added one extra plane, which allows me 64 colors and I "emulated" EHB by choosing 64 same colors, but dimmed.

A lot of changes were necessary to make that work but it's pretty neat already. I changed opponent car colors (all the same for now, but pink, I know...) and changed water too. I tried to use modern brush but that would have used way too many colors. I only have 64 unique colors. Well it's nice enough

Also optimized for 68020 and all. Game is pretty well coded and clear, that helped.



About adding new tracks: I still have to figure out some stuff but yes, it's definitely very possible and planned. I already have 2 custom created tracks from my old SC3 remake.

[ransom1122]

Excellent progress jotd. Custom tracks would be a game changer.

[fgh]

Great work, jotd!

It’s been a while, but I’ve finished hard levels a few times, and the AI has some glitches on one of the later levels (last one?), where AI cars often skip the lower part of the track and their laps are still counted.

Also the roundabout AI is not perfect. If the AI cars collide with other cars, they sometimes end up making shortcuts and they still get the lap counted. (ideally they’d have to turn around and try the roundabout again, like the player)

Also, I’d love an option to retract by 1px the collision detection on the track. (Every time I get back to the game I have to ‘relearn’ how aggressive the track collision detection is)

Not sure that kind of changes are planned, but anyway - keep up the great work!

[jotd]

Yeah the AI has some glitches. Because it's not AI. Cars follow the circuit and aren't supposed to cheat. Sometimes on collisions, they can make one more run in the roundabout, or just skip it

Fixing this would require a lot of rework. It's simpler that way. The average speed of the cars have been tuned so the level is still doable with those quirks.

Changing collision detection is problably not a big deal once I understood how the logic maps work. But not sure I'm going to change that either. It's a classic game. I'm going to try to enhance the visuals & sounds if I can but that's it.

[alain.treesong]

The same game with AGA graphics is already a big challenge and a great thing.
Thanks for the work jotd !

[nikosidis]

Originally Posted by jotd

hi

made good progress with in-game AGA display. Original games uses EHB for shadows which means 32 colors + 32 same but dimmed colors for shadows.

I added one extra plane, which allows me 64 colors and I "emulated" EHB by choosing 64 same colors, but dimmed.

A lot of changes were necessary to make that work but it's pretty neat already. I changed opponent car colors (all the same for now, but pink, I know...) and changed water too. I tried to use modern brush but that would have used way too many colors. I only have 64 unique colors. Well it's nice enough

Also optimized for 68020 and all. Game is pretty well coded and clear, that helped.

Attachment 72094

About adding new tracks: I still have to figure out some stuff but yes, it's definitely very possible and planned. I already have 2 custom created tracks from my old SC3 remake.

I played this game a lot back in the day. I have to give this AGA version a try on my A1200. Thanks for doing this

[Piramania]

Thanks for the great work, jotd!
Super Cars II was one of my favourite Amiga games, so an enhanced version is something I have dreamed of since the 90'ies

[jotd]

update: figured out a way to get different colors cars for enemies. It's not as easy as it could be even with 64 colors (128 with EHB) because you have to reuse the same set of BOBs for each color.

Original game uses the same set for red, green and gray car with some clever palette ordering & bitplane mask trick. I adapted this trick for one extra plane, providing 6 different colors for cars instead of 3. Plus the fact that gray isn't mandatory now (not shared with the road)

Also changed the dull green ponds by a simple 4 color water texture.

Small screenshot (I'm very happy about this!!)

[kriz]

Really nice work here jotd!!

[rare_j]

The car colours are really nice.
The blue for the water is a bit too bright (in my opinion) - perhaps thats just because I'm used to all the water being dull green!! Probably could do with being toned back just a little though.

I wonder if you're considering switches for these enhancements? Maybe command line options or icon tooltypes to turn various features off or on?

Really, this project is looking great.