Project Ideas - Share them!

[NanoWar]

I also like limited systems. I mean black and white on 768 pixel, wtf is that? You can always make 8 bit games for PC, too. Everybody likes retro.

Yeah, it's a bit (pun intended) more confusing to code for bigger platforms sometimes though.
Maybe we should make a "limited" (edition? Ok sorry, I'll stop ) cross-platform game, that could be cool too.
I mean, is Revolution Software *only* z80?
If so, then I won't nag more about it, but if that's not the case, I would think it'd be a great idea to expand on our repository (what we have to offer or make) to more than just z80 games
Like, we could make retro stuff, set up our own rules for how big a project gets to be and so forth, it could be awesome and fun!

[NanoWar]

I guess that would be called “Indie“ nowadays. You got some big ideas there. Very punny btw.

True, but isn't indie just "independent developers"?
Which while we are just that, it doesn't really define what we do.
Just a thought.

[NanoWar]

If I look outside the calculator realm, I find Android pretty cool... might make a hmm yeah card game for mobile?

I'm gonna look up resources on android to see if it's possible to use anything other than javascript to program for it.
I'm very unfamiliar with programming for the android platform.
A card game, like wizards? Or did you have something particular in mind?

[NanoWar]

Hearthstone spin off ?

Ah, that could be fun

And so I read that Java(tm) is the official language to develop in for Android..
As I'm keen on avoiding java as much as I can, I can't say I look forward to using it :-/
On the other hand, there is a NDK, but Google doesn't "promote" that apparently (I guess they don't think it's a good idea to use C/C++?)..

[NanoWar]

Maybe Unity?

Unity? Except the game-engine and the graphical shell thingy (both which feel bloated to me...) I didn't know there was something called unity for Android?
Apparently Kawa (a scheme implementation) works well for android too, but I don't think you guys would like to code in scheme so I'd take a guess that's a pass too.

Ooooh, I did a search for "android unity" and found what I guess you meant, the unity engine for creating android games..
Sorry, I'm stupid

Also, apparently it's free:

If your organisation’s annual turnover is less than USD100,000, you can download and keep the free perpetual license version of our software, use it to develop your content and pitch a prototype to investors or publish a commercial product to Android, iOS and Windows devices without it ever costing you a dime

- unity-3d multiplatform

[NanoWar]

I like C#. Unity is not open source and its integrated marketplace is high quality but expensive. I would like to try it out some day!

On certain platforms, like say z80 or GBA, I'd go asm if at all possible.
C (or I guess lisp really, but I've stopped messing around with that family of languages) on basically everything else mostly because I'm not too comfortable with the x86/_64 asm. xD
But I guess since Microsoft is opening up their dot net platform it might be worth a try to learn C#.
I guess if I only had one programming language I could avoid, it'd be Java (not necessarily jvm).
Still, unity IS proprietary, which I know you don't really care about much, but me and chickendude are less comfortable with it not being FOSS, also it's windows/mac only..
But maybe we can make compromises, maybe we can make our own engine, although I highly doubt that we will do THAT, but we'll see, we have to consider the possibilities!

Game Programming Patterns - A book about... game programming patterns.
It's a good resource, will add this to the first page I guess.

I've been looking around for resources and ideas, and I keep bumping into the lisp world, and what can I say, I guess it still has a place in my cold dead machinery programmers heart (not overly positive here are you, me?).
So, I thought of this..
Why don't we make our own programming language, compiled or interpreted.
Could be fun!
.. And maybe also hard.

We don't need to do it for x86/_64 if we don't want to, we could basically do whatever we wanted!

I know you, chickendude love/prefer assembly language to any other language so maybe it'd be a good idea to stick to a simple/minimalist design.
I don't know about you though NanoWar, what do you prefer in a language?

Maybe it's not a good idea at all.
:-/
Oh well..

[NanoWar]

There is always this guy: https://code.google.com/p/antelope/
also here: http://www.cemetech.net/forum/viewtopic ... &start=400

But yeah, I think a small clean language that compiles to z80 asm would be very nice.

That'd be nice yeah.
Like a HLASM or High Level Assembler.

La-Mulana. Now this is an awesome indie game! It sadly requires Windows to be played though.

This really is a good couple of games, one is free (as in beer), one is paid for, and there is a sequel coming (which you also have to pay for if you want it)!
This type of game is probably the ideal thing to do IMO.
I'll write the entire description of the programmers from the group (NIGORO) that made the game from their kickstarter:

NIGORO
The name "NIGORO" comes from the words for 2, 5 and 6 in Japanese. We chose that name because we adore 8-bit games!

However, that doesn't mean we are trying to create a game that would fit into that era. Instead, we want to take what was so great about those titles and combine it with modern elements to move the genre forward.

Takumi Naramura
Takumi Naramura is the director of NIGORO, and also has a hand in graphics music and level design.
In 2001 he assembled a group of people interested in the MSX coding architecture to produce La-Mulana, which recieved rave reviews. From this, NIGORO was born.
La-Mulana was totally remade in 2011 for a WiiWare and PC release, and came to Steam in April 2013. In December 2012 Naramura attended the "Taipei Game App Developers Conference" as a lecturer, and in March 2013, gave another lecture at GDC.

Takayuki Ebihara / Duplex
Takayuki Ebihara is the lead programmer for NIGORO.
He began programming by making adventure games in MSX Basic, but the programming language often drove him crazy. A friend later introduced him to machine language, and he was won over by it's simplicity.
As an adult, he taught himself Java and began making games again. He has been with NIGORO since 2001.

Houryuu Samejima / Samieru
Houryuu Samejima is a programmer and sound designer for NIGORO.
He first began programming in MSX Basic when he was in elementary school, but grew to hate it over time.
He has used a variety of game development tools to create games, and uses systems like the Sharp X68000 to make MIDI music.

IMO, Duplex's description is the most interesting, I mean, "A friend later introduced him to machine language, and he was won over by it's simplicity."
Wow, just wow.

I added a "construct a toolchain to make making games easier", not sure if the toolchain itself should be crossplatform, but I figure that would be the way to go.
I've been thinking about C/C++, and while I have a not-so-secret hate for C++, I don't think it's a bad idea to actually use it for making these tools..
I think it might be more practical or easier than using C at least (which I normally would use over C++ any day)..
But I don't know, any ideas?

Libraries aren't really a problem, we can just use SDL2 and whatever other cross-compatible libs there are.

[NanoWar]

I'm all for HILZasm high level z80 assembler .

What do you need a toolchain for?

Right now I "need" it for famwars and possibly future games on the ti-83+/84+.

Yeah, HLAsm is a nice idea, I think it actually exists for some platforms already.

Actually, I was thinking of using that as a building block for games on PC too, I just forgot to write that.. Oops.

EDIT: Maybe we could use something like this?
http://www.plantation-productions.com/W ... _hla2.html
The site isn't beautiful, but it's the content that is important
I haven't really looked at the code yet, but I'm hoping it's promising.
I know that "their"(?) earlier work (HLA 1x) has been good so it's worth hoping for.

NOTE: This is meant as inspiration, not a blatant theft of the code (*mumbles something about it not being compatible with the z80 anyway*)