Trojan arcade Amiga port

[acidbottle]

@Reynolds

In an ideal world I think it would be great if all Amiga games hit full screen. In Scorpion it is probably best to stick with the game's native resolution though.

Nevertheless, sounding great there Skyzoo, definitely keeping an eye on this one.

[skyzoo73]

Originally Posted by Reynolds

Just a question, but could be the visible area wider than in the original? Just to fill out better the available space on the screen...

Trojan has a 256x240 pixel game resolution,
taking the screen width to 320 would distort it,
I don't see the Amiga allowing a stretch of the
image, which by the way would ruin its proportions.
The only way if you have a crt tv, to act on the trims
so as to expand the image proportionally as much as
possible, if you want to have an arcade feel.
I on my commodore crts, I did that, precisely because
this is something that bothered me as well.

p.s.
However in the case of my Trojan in the video I initially
shared, the vertical appearance was excessive, due to the
top panel being larger than necessary, now I have proportioned it
a little better it should turn out more like the proportions of the
original game, although it will never look exactly like that.

[skyzoo73]

April 2023 update

Given the continuous updates to the scorpion engine,
I have decided to set aside logic momentarily and make
work on all the graphical assets of the game and implement
the basics of all levels and all enemies:

- introductory screen
- demo mechanics-cycle
- highscore (it's there but not functional)
- game over and continue page (they are barely sketched, I will work on them eventually)
- Level 1 + parallax background done
- Level 2 + parallax background done
- Level 3 ( it works, but there is still a lot of work to be done )
- Level 4 + parallax background done
- Level 5 + parallax background done
- Level 6 + parallax background(s) done
- "Armadillon" boss graphics 100% done
- "muscular" boss 70%
- boss Goblin 50%
- final boss 50%
- everything I had done before that I don't remember now

the musician has also been busy
and currently the complete musics are:

- music (pre level) - 100%
- music (end level) - 100%
- music 1 level - 100%
- music 2 level - 100%
- music 3 level - 100%
- the sounds are many, but they are all there already, except for 2-3 left over.


by the way the music is made by my friend IM76,
who is doing a great job.


I would like to reiterate that this is an ARCADE/Amiga passion project only,
to me the fun part is really being able to metabolize every aspect that
needs to be faced and mastered to get the result. Sometimes it seems impossible,
and frustrating, but it can also be a huge satisfaction
when I succeed in realizing something in the way that I hoped for.

Greetings folks

[vulture]

Dude, that's great progress already! If you would find time to release some short video on youtube it'd be very nice, but only if it doesn't steal time off the development!

[Reynolds]

Originally Posted by skyzoo73

Trojan has a 256x240 pixel game resolution,
taking the screen width to 320 would distort it,
I don't see the Amiga allowing a stretch of the
image, which by the way would ruin its proportions.
The only way if you have a crt tv, to act on the trims
so as to expand the image proportionally as much as
possible, if you want to have an arcade feel.
I on my commodore crts, I did that, precisely because
this is something that bothered me as well.

p.s.
However in the case of my Trojan in the video I initially
shared, the vertical appearance was excessive, due to the
top panel being larger than necessary, now I have proportioned it
a little better it should turn out more like the proportions of the
original game, although it will never look exactly like that.

I meant not to stretch it but putting more gfx elements out to fill the visible area more. That would be more cool than adjusting manually the screen for the game. I can understand if it's not feasible for any technical reason, though.

[acidbottle]

Nice progress there Skyzoo.

IM76 is a talented guy, has helped me on 1 or 2 projects before, so will sound great am sure of that.

Doing arcade ports by hand is an utter utter pain in the rear quarters, but as you say, immensely satisfying when a game mechanic is Amigafield!

[skyzoo73]

Originally Posted by Reynolds

I meant not to stretch it but putting more gfx elements out to fill the visible area more. That would be more cool than adjusting manually the screen for the game. I can understand if it's not feasible for any technical reason, though.

If you meant like widening the horizontal resolution so you can see more of the game map: it would disrupt the game mechanics, all the enemies are positioned and attack at certain times based on how fast they move.


If, on the other hand, you meant to fill the space that would be there with a higher horizontal resolution, like with Emulator-type game arts, that would be nice.


But either way it's technically not possible, to have the parallax background done with all the aga sprites, the max resolution is set at 256px.

[skyzoo73]

Originally Posted by vulture

Dude, that's great progress already! If you would find time to release some short video on youtube it'd be very nice, but only if it doesn't steal time off the development!

I would love to make a video to show progress but I prefer to wait until I implement certain things properly. Showing the levels and the various enemies would be easy, but I want to work so that the main mechanics are much more solid, so as to avoid premature judgments on a partial work. Actually the graphics part is almost complete for the whole game, but I was not very satisfied with the player's movements that using the normal scorpion settings remained different from the original game. So I decided to rewrite the logics for this aspect for the umpteenth time I hope to get them equal to the arcade, after all in my opinion this is the MOST IMPORTANT aspect for a conversion. And thanks to the help of a great friend of mine ( Griffon ) it looks like I will be able to solve this difficulty as well, however it will take me some more effort. I have already implemented the "supejumps" of different types on levels 1-2, the checkpoints are working at least partially, although it will take some testing work to copy it exactly, another addition is in the main hud now I have the Player and Enemy tags animated, with the latter appearing and disappearing in the presence of the mid-bosses and bosses. I am also rewriting the codeblocks of enemy spawning as well as the behavior of enemies again with a view to making them look as much like the arcade as possible, in fact it is more complicated than expected since the positions change from level to level being horizontal and vertical levels. On the 3rd level there is an additional complication: "the elevators," but I managed to do them with some effort. It still remains a mountain of work in "populating" all the levels with all the aforementioned mechanics, but step by step it's satisfying to see the game grow. side note: for now I'm stuck with the stable build (March) and if no particular issues are apparent I'll continue with it, maybe at the next stable I'll try to use it but I'm reluctant because there's always the possibility that so much of the work done will be undone by changes in the engine.

[skyzoo73]

Originally Posted by acidbottle

Nice progress there Skyzoo.

IM76 is a talented guy, has helped me on 1 or 2 projects before, so will sound great am sure of that.

Doing arcade ports by hand is an utter utter pain in the rear quarters, but as you say, immensely satisfying when a game mechanic is Amigafield!

Thanks Acidbottle, I confirm trying to recreate all aspects of a game as faithfully as possible is my goal, and trying to understand it through gameplay or playing directly from the mame is not always so easy. I usually play it, record the video and then frame by frame I try to understand something. Sometimes successful, sometimes not. IM76 has created really perfect mods for Trojan, and it's comforting to have such a talented musician willing to help me. Multichannel music from (5-6 channels or more) has been converted with maximum quality to the Amiga format, and takes up a lot of chipram, but it's worth it given the fantastic result. Of course in the case of 4-channel music tracks when the game sounds are played something is momentarily lost, but I think you can't expect more than that. If then in the future the S.E. will support a routine with more than 4 channels, it will be possible to improve the audio more, but for now that's okay.

[Darkhelmet]

Hi do you have ane news/update about this great looking port?

[skyzoo73]

Hello,
I don't have very much to show, in recent months unfortunately due to work and family I haven't devoted much time to it. However, a little something to show is there. The title screens are there, including the little animation, and the levels are all there in various states of completion. The most important thing that I have not been able to perfect are the behaviors of the enemies and especially those of the various bosses will still require a lot of work. They are currently quite buggy.
In the video I did not show it, but the mechanics by which the player can lose his shield and sword if he parries an orb of the "slashers" is there and it works. Music is present for the early levels and transitions between levels. The interface at the top includes the energy bar, energy bar for bosses, and related markings that come and go according to the moment and also have color cycling.
Additional note, the video I grabbed from winuae due to some winuae setting comes out slightly stretched.


[ Show youtube player ]

[jurassicman]

That's great, thanks for sharing the video!
Please, keep up the good work, this game looks very promising!

[vulture]

that's some nice progress m8! well done!

[Toni Galvez]

Originally Posted by skyzoo73

Hello,
I don't have very much to show, in recent months unfortunately due to work and family I haven't devoted much time to it. However, a little something to show is there. The title screens are there, including the little animation, and the levels are all there in various states of completion. The most important thing that I have not been able to perfect are the behaviors of the enemies and especially those of the various bosses will still require a lot of work. They are currently quite buggy.
In the video I did not show it, but the mechanics by which the player can lose his shield and sword if he parries an orb of the "slashers" is there and it works. Music is present for the early levels and transitions between levels. The interface at the top includes the energy bar, energy bar for bosses, and related markings that come and go according to the moment and also have color cycling.
Additional note, the video I grabbed from winuae due to some winuae setting comes out slightly stretched.


[ Show youtube player ]

Amazing work!!! I love this game.

I always wanted good Capcom conversions for our Amigas, well done.

The sound is very faithfully translated to Paula, good work.

I hope you can finish the game sometime in the future.

[malko]

Between the video in the 1st post and this new one, this is not what I consider as "not very much to show"
It looks really good. Thanks for the news and keep up the excellent work

[saimon69]

I hope to get them equal to the arcade, after all in my opinion this is the MOST IMPORTANT aspect for a conversion.

This for me is a YMMV (your miles may vary) case: japanese ports in several cases tend to create alternate versions of the games to take advantage of the machine rather than imitate the more powerful arcade, or tend to create alternate versions - see Shadow Dancer and Eswat in the Megadrive/Genesis; the latter one in particular is a far experience from the arcade!

Considered you have now scorpion engine maybe you could create a Troyan 2 so to address the shortcomings of the arcade or to expand in the post-atomic universe

[skyzoo73]

Originally Posted by saimon69

This for me is a YMMV (your miles may vary) case: japanese ports in several cases tend to create alternate versions of the games to take advantage of the machine rather than imitate the more powerful arcade, or tend to create alternate versions - see Shadow Dancer and Eswat in the Megadrive/Genesis; the latter one in particular is a far experience from the arcade!

Considered you have now scorpion engine maybe you could create a Troyan 2 so to address the shortcomings of the arcade or to expand in the post-atomic universe

To create a sequel that lives up to the original or imagine expanding it, you would need to have the talent of the original graphic designers and the vision of the game designers. As well as a lot of time to devote to it, and I think it would need the work of more people as well. Definitely too much, to me it is enough to bring in the original, which is already a definitely complicated job. I remember that this is just a hobby,a fun, if it becomes frustrating for one reason or another, you may lose interest.

[Amigajay]

Looks and sounds great! Hope you continue the momentum to finish it!

[albino]

Even a 1986 game cannot get an ocs port rather than a 1992 aga hardware?!
Anyway great to see people develloping on amiga nowadays, good job.

[jotd]

In 1986, arcade machines were really beginning to be monsters. Remember: A500 was made in 1987.

Remember Outrun... So AGA is the best choice for those. The conversion looks great.