[lmimmfn]

Just seeing this now.

Originally Posted by LongLifeA1200

How many games on the Amstrad CPC could potentially be improved and what is that potential. You've helped answered some of those questions.

Quite a lot of games could be improved, i dont think there is any comprehensive list of CPC games using hardware scroll, but basically any game which scrolls but the scroll is happening in the centre of the screen with static gfx(maybe with non static score/lives) surrounding the scroll area e.g. Super Stunt Car - [ Show youtube player ]
Note: having a panel on the top of the screen or the bottom of the screen can support hardware scroll by splitting the screen into the vertical positions of the interrupt, like Mission Genocide - [ Show youtube player ]

Originally Posted by LongLifeA1200

I read a quote recently from a game developer, Nick, for 8 bit computers (which included the ZX Spectrum) mention "A lot of the games Dave and I made were fast paced so we could get away with scrolling the screen or moving sprites at 8 pixels at a time".

If a game is fast, it can use 8 pixel scrolls no problem, but that would mean it scrolls 25 or 50 characters per second horizontally or vertically which is a lot but it would be smooth as tied to the 50Hz display, i.e. full/half frame rate.

Originally Posted by LongLifeA1200

Hmm. The Amstrad CPC scrolls vertically a little easier than horizontally. I had wondered if the choice of porting Pinball Dreams was because so it could fit nicely into the machine's limitations. Their next project doesn't seem to involve horizontal scrolling either.

Possibly, im not sure, maybe they just liked the game , theyre doing some amazing stuff with Vespertino - [ Show youtube player ]

Originally Posted by LongLifeA1200

So if a horizontal moving game were designed to move 2 pixels at a time, it could get smooth scrolling in 16 color.

They did implement a per pixel scroll mode 0 16 colour demo of mario
[ Show youtube player ]
But im 99.99% sure it was using preshifted assets, i.e. as CPC horizontal scroll is 2 pixels having double buffer with back buffer having the offset applied and switching buffers and scrolling with hardware every 2 frames.