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Graphical enhancements revisited

#1 User is offline   Exophase 

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Posted 04 February 2015 - 07:16 PM

So a while ago (holy crap, can't believe it was nearly 2 years!) I mentioned some "easy" optional enhancements to MZX's graphics. This was the post: http://www.digitalmz...74

I'm not sure why, but for some reason I've been thinking about it again. So I figured I'd make a thread to kick around some ideas to see if this is anything people actually want, and for the people familiar with MZX's code these days to comment on how much work it'd be.

What I have in mind is:
- No longer combine the main layer, sprites, and overlays into one 80x25 buffer that's passed to the renderers, instead passing separate layers for main, overlay, and sprites, which would be composited by the renderer
- Help/F2 box, * message, and [ message would have to be sent separately too, probably as special sprites
- Legacy mode would still render everything to main layer first and omit overlay and sprites
- Add sprite flag and overlay option to render w/true transparency
- Maybe add an option to render sprites with an outline color applied, if transparency is used, to make the graphics less clashy
- Internally multiply the sprite coordinates by char size, and add new counters that let you modify the sprite position with fine units
- Make main and overlay passed as 81x26 with and with fine scrolling parameters
- Make overlay and vlayer, and by extension sprites, use the 64K char/256 color format that the renderer already uses, and add some tweaks to make this accessible for games. I think this is a good idea mainly because of how much easier it'll make resource management.
- Probably keep editor using legacy mode, meaning you'd have to use your imagination for what overlay w/transparency looks like

All this would make it more like a retro console and less like text mode, and I don't think any of the features really raise the bar for design expectations. Although you might see people layering sprites to increase color density.

I haven't looked at MZX's code in years so I might be out of touch with what the workload would be like, but it seems like a few day task, unless I'm overlooking some obstacles. Thoughts?
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#2 User is offline   Graham 

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Posted 04 February 2015 - 08:10 PM

View PostExophase, on 04 February 2015 - 11:16 AM, said:

So a while ago (holy crap, can't believe it was nearly 2 years!) I mentioned some "easy" optional enhancements to MZX's graphics. This was the post: http://www.digitalmz...74


I can't believe it's been two years either! I'm sitting here working on level design for level 17 and thinking back to when I joined the community and announced I was working on this project. I knew it was gonna take time, as my time is quite limited with family/kids/work/etc.

Anyway I like the ideas you've laid out as they sound more evolutionary rather than revolutionary. I didn't understand what you were proposing the first time around and I think my reaction was like, I like MegaZeux the way it is. But these are solid enhancements that are optional and would really help churn out cleaner more professional looking games so I like it a lot. I don't have much to add because I'm not familiar with C or software development.
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#3 User is offline   Lachesis 

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Posted 04 February 2015 - 08:50 PM

View PostExophase, on 04 February 2015 - 12:16 PM, said:

- No longer combine the main layer, sprites, and overlays into one 80x25 buffer that's passed to the renderers, instead passing separate layers for main, overlay, and sprites, which would be composited by the renderer
- Help/F2 box, * message, and [ message would have to be sent separately too, probably as special sprites

Good idea. The UI needs fixing for SMZX mode anyhow

Quote

- Add sprite flag and overlay option to render w/true transparency

yes

Quote

- Maybe add an option to render sprites with an outline color applied, if transparency is used, to make the graphics less clashy

sounds gross

Quote

- Internally multiply the sprite coordinates by char size, and add new counters that let you modify the sprite position with fine units
- Make main and overlay passed as 81x26 with and with fine scrolling parameters

if this happens my current project will be a lot less impressive =(

Quote

- Make overlay and vlayer, and by extension sprites, use the 64K char/256 color format that the renderer already uses, and add some tweaks to make this accessible for games. I think this is a good idea mainly because of how much easier it'll make resource management.

dirty, disgusting hack. i guess i don't mind for chars, actually

for colors I'd prefer an SMZX mode 4 with 256 palettes/1024 colors instead of mode 3's ?????????????

Quote

- Probably keep editor using legacy mode, meaning you'd have to use your imagination for what overlay w/transparency looks like

ew
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#4 User is offline   Dr Lancer-X 

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Posted 04 February 2015 - 09:57 PM

View PostLachesis, on 05 February 2015 - 06:50 AM, said:

Quote

- Internally multiply the sprite coordinates by char size, and add new counters that let you modify the sprite position with fine units
- Make main and overlay passed as 81x26 with and with fine scrolling parameters

if this happens my current project will be a lot less impressive =(


exophase just wants to obsolete sprender.txt (the modern robotic.png)

i'm mostly kidding; actually, because of the aforementioned sprite layering, it sounds like it will encourage more graphical hacks, not less. i stillll think we should have an smzx mode that's basically just a 256-col 640x350 framebuffer though.
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#5 User is offline   Lachesis 

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Posted 05 February 2015 - 03:31 AM

now that I have more time, I guess I should give my two cents on 8-bit color mode

Fuck it.

it's pretty much the sole reason SMZX Mode 3's UI looks like a baboon's ass and it only exists to support esoteric platform ports no one uses. also, they've fallen so far out of maintenance they don't work anyway

best case it should be a compatibility mode limited to those systems alone

i mean if it wasn't obvious from my SMZX Mode 4 suggestion I keep throwing out every time the topic comes up

lancer's suggestion isn't bad either but it's the hack of all hacks and probably above the heads of a lot of users
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#6 User is offline   Dr Lancer-X 

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Posted 05 February 2015 - 03:45 AM

yeah, I agree, get rid of 8 bit, it's a massive dumb headache. what systems require it anyway? and is it just for performance reasons on those systems?
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#7 User is offline   Exophase 

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Posted 05 February 2015 - 05:39 AM

Okay, I'll try to address the comments now.

View PostLachesis, on 04 February 2015 - 03:50 PM, said:

Good idea. The UI needs fixing for SMZX mode anyhow


Everything I described was supposed to be agnostic to SMZX mode. I suppose you could add a flag per-layer for which SMZX mode to render in. Would this be worth exposing to the game too?


View PostLachesis, on 04 February 2015 - 03:50 PM, said:

sounds gross


I was thinking that with just 1-bit color it's too easy for sprites to merge with things of the same color behind them, but on second thought this is an even worse problem right now (where the entire char gets merged into the color), so probably a non-issue.


View PostLachesis, on 04 February 2015 - 03:50 PM, said:

if this happens my current project will be a lot less impressive =(


I'm sure people will still be impressed :(


View PostLachesis, on 04 February 2015 - 03:50 PM, said:

dirty, disgusting hack. i guess i don't mind for chars, actually


Wait, why are you okay with this for chars and not colors? Do you have an alternative in mind, or do you just think it should be left alone?

This expansion actually doesn't really belong with the others, since it does kind of change the way you make games and it does kind of fit badly with MZX's exposed design. So maybe if it's considered at all it should be as some other effort. I just feel like these are the most limiting and frustrating aspects of MZX's graphics, especially the char limit. A 12.8% screen coverage for unique chars is really low.

View PostLachesis, on 04 February 2015 - 03:50 PM, said:

for colors I'd prefer an SMZX mode 4 with 256 palettes/1024 colors instead of mode 3's ?????????????


No reason why that couldn't be added too. I agree that the palette sharing in mode 3 isn't really that useful.

View PostLachesis, on 04 February 2015 - 03:50 PM, said:

ew


To make this clearer, I'm not saying don't do it. Just that it's a pretty major overhaul for a pretty minor benefit and so probably not something worth holding up a first release over.

Lancer-X said:

because of the aforementioned sprite layering, it sounds like it will encourage more graphical hacks, not less.


Not sure if you're saying that's a good thing or a bad thing.

I think if the char increase doesn't come with it people won't be very encouraged to do it, since those high color sprites will eat the already limited chars.

Lancer-X said:

i stillll think we should have an smzx mode that's basically just a 256-col 640x350 framebuffer though.


Go ahead, I guess?

I mean, we could make 640x350 versions of the current SMZX modes and so on and so forth.. But right now I'm just thinking of things that current games could benefit from with only very minor modifications.

Lancer-X said:

yeah, I agree, get rid of 8 bit, it's a massive dumb headache. what systems require it anyway? and is it just for performance reasons on those systems?


I don't know if MZX actually supports anything that doesn't have non-paletted graphics. It was done for performance reasons originally, but that was 11 years (!) ago so even if it were maybe plausibly relevant then (for people using machines that were already old at the time) it isn't really now.
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Exophase can what Rubi-cant.
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#8 User is offline   Dr Lancer-X 

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Posted 05 February 2015 - 05:48 AM

View PostExophase, on 05 February 2015 - 03:39 PM, said:

It was done for performance reasons originally, but that was 11 years (!) ago so even if it were maybe plausibly relevant then (for people using machines that were already old at the time) it isn't really now.


and I definitely appreciated it at the time, as I was able to run the port on my 233mhz laptop.
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#9 User is offline   Lachesis 

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Posted 05 February 2015 - 06:19 AM

View PostExophase, on 04 February 2015 - 10:39 PM, said:

Everything I described was supposed to be agnostic to SMZX mode. I suppose you could add a flag per-layer for which SMZX mode to render in. Would this be worth exposing to the game too?

Yeah, but (the way I understood it) it would mean rendering the UI through different paths and therefore be far simpler to render as non-SMZX and with a non-garbled palette.

Quote

I'm sure people will still be impressed :(

actually i'm pretty sure it will be overlooked regardless, like the last two games i worked on

Quote

Wait, why are you okay with this for chars and not colors? Do you have an alternative in mind, or do you just think it should be left alone?

I doubt I reflect everyone's experiences, but 16 colors has always been enough for non-SMZX for me. It might be because the constraints are so tight they force me to take certain approaches I wouldn't otherwise.

Only now that I'm starting to work with SMZX and converted graphics I'm feeling the palette burn, but 256 unique palettes would fix essentially all of the issues I've had (in other words, char limitations would be my main problem again, not colors).

Quote

This expansion actually doesn't really belong with the others, since it does kind of change the way you make games and it does kind of fit badly with MZX's exposed design. So maybe if it's considered at all it should be as some other effort. I just feel like these are the most limiting and frustrating aspects of MZX's graphics, especially the char limit. A 12.8% screen coverage for unique chars is really low.

I think that's my main problem here, yeah—it's really hackish, even compared to the sub-char movement hacks you mentioned. it seems like it could have accessibility issues, too

Quote

I don't know if MZX actually supports anything that doesn't have non-paletted graphics. It was done for performance reasons originally, but that was 11 years (!) ago so even if it were maybe plausibly relevant then (for people using machines that were already old at the time) it isn't really now.

makes sense, but yeah, i don't think that's much of an issue now. also, i think a couple of supported systems actually did require 8 bit color (NDS? GP2X?) but i could be wrong.

my main issue is mainly that it's making my UIs look really bad while testing my game =(
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#10 User is offline   smilymzx 

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Posted 06 February 2015 - 10:16 PM

This would be okay, if no-one constantly removes the approval at this rate by rejecting ideas like this!

BTW: This should've been under discussion on the Requests tracker, unless otherwise specified, no offence I hope!

I unofficially did this to my fork version(s), although no-one should care anyways:

Removed the Energizer and Life color animations (Allows plain color types, removes parameter from energizer)
The Default color flash from Messages start as range 9-15 instead of range 7-15
Revamped Character Editor to include Thin and Thick Lines (Webs)
Editor Dialogs are much better
** Removed random invincibility color animation, now can use robotics for the energizer animation using the "INVINCO" counter (ruins vanilla MZX games a bit)
** "SMILYFORK" Detection Counter set to 1 (Not enabled on vanilla MZX)

** = In the next build of my fork, currently unreleased due to stuff!

This post has been edited by smilymzx: 06 February 2015 - 10:19 PM

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#11 User is offline   Exophase 

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Posted 06 February 2015 - 11:40 PM

It shouldn't be in requests if I were planning to do it myself. I mean, no telling if that will actually happen, but I wasn't asking for anyone else to do it. At the same time, I didn't want to provide code for something without first making sure there were demands.

Some of those changes actually seem reasonable, others seem really single purpose. Unfortunately, it's hard to get people to care about a fork if it doesn't come with a must play game. On the other hand, it's hard to get the features mainlined if they seem too single purpose, since that encourages adding everyone's random features (although maybe not a lot of people would actually want such a thing)

That said, I'm guilty of adding at least a few things that I don't think anyone actually wanted. Biggest misjudgement was the macro editor.
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#12 User is offline   Graham 

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Posted 07 February 2015 - 02:24 AM

View PostExophase, on 06 February 2015 - 03:40 PM, said:

Biggest misjudgement was the macro editor.


Do you mean alt-O in the robotic editor or something else? I use that like daily. I use the shit outta macros!
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#13 User is offline   Dr Lancer-X 

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Posted 07 February 2015 - 02:41 AM

View PostGraham, on 07 February 2015 - 12:24 PM, said:

Do you mean alt-O in the robotic editor or something else? I use that like daily. I use the shit outta macros!

to be fair, the fact that you don't know kinda makes exo's point for him =P

read 'macro.txt' in the docs directory. it is cool but in practice you don't tend to copypaste enough to make templating worthwhile, especially when compared to architecting your game to avoid the necessity. i've got an atan2 somewhere from before lachesis added the arctan#,# function and a crappy line drawing thing from whenever but in practice i never really used them. the problem is that the main place you want to use stuff like that (e.g. in a doz) is exactly when you're not supposed to.

something like extended macros but realtime would be nice though. i can't remember if debytecode had some functionality for user-defined function counters or not..
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#14 User is offline   Graham 

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Posted 07 February 2015 - 03:07 AM

I don't think there is anything about it in the help file.
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#15 User is offline   Exophase 

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Posted 07 February 2015 - 03:38 AM

View PostLancer-X, on 06 February 2015 - 09:41 PM, said:

to be fair, the fact that you don't know kinda makes exo's point for him =P

read 'macro.txt' in the docs directory. it is cool but in practice you don't tend to copypaste enough to make templating worthwhile, especially when compared to architecting your game to avoid the necessity. i've got an atan2 somewhere from before lachesis added the arctan#,# function and a crappy line drawing thing from whenever but in practice i never really used them. the problem is that the main place you want to use stuff like that (e.g. in a doz) is exactly when you're not supposed to.


You're talking about extended macros in general, which I'm at least aware of someone (you) actually using at some point. I mean the extended macro editor which lets you input the macro parameters in a dialog window. I'm not sure anyone even knew it existed, let alone used it. What I am sure of is that it took a lot more time to implement than the plain old text entry version, especially since I don't even think I made proper use of C string functions. I think I somehow thought it was the logical extension of the original macro system. Even I never used it.

I actually did tell you about it once but I don't blame you for forgetting them ;p macro.txt does describe it. Name the macro macro_5 and press F5.

There's also that function I added specifically for Graham when he was talking to me on AIM, which lets you save then recall a position in the editor. Not sure anyone else really knew that existed either.

Lancer-X said:

something like extended macros but realtime would be nice though. i can't remember if debytecode had some functionality for user-defined function counters or not..


Debytecode didn't have anything yet, that was supposed to be a later step in the "make Robotic suck less" plan. I think macros were supposed to be most of the language improvements would be implemented.
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#16 User is offline   Dr Lancer-X 

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Posted 07 February 2015 - 05:16 AM

View PostExophase, on 07 February 2015 - 01:38 PM, said:

I actually did tell you about it once but I don't blame you for forgetting them ;p macro.txt does describe it. Name the macro macro_5 and press F5


actually i did remember that, although i was more thinking of it in conjunction with the rest of the extended macro system. i think the problem is that the text version was just quicker to use in most cases, but yeah, niche feature component of a niche feature
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#17 User is offline   asiekierka 

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Posted 07 February 2015 - 09:33 AM

Eh. I'm not sure how many of these would take away from the MZX limitations we all grew to love xor hate.
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#18 User is offline   CJA 

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Posted 08 February 2015 - 03:28 AM

View PostExophase, on 04 February 2015 - 02:16 PM, said:

All this would make it more like a retro console and less like text mode, and I don't think any of the features really raise the bar for design expectations. Although you might see people layering sprites to increase color density.

For anyone that has argued that MZX is too archaic of a platform for people to appreciate because it requires that nostalgic text mode tinge to really bring the games to life... This is pretty much the solution, and it's something I tried to base a new GCS around. I imagined an environment with an 8-bit graphics format with a Robotic-ish underlying scripting language and robust library of builtins. Not at all too far from what MZX does, but embracing an aesthetic that seems to have captured a wide swath of the market right now. I actually was mulling over this and made some blueprints, but just didn't have enough grit and attention to make it into anything.

Anyway I am all up on any sort of support of more layers and transparency. And um... while we're speaking of things like this... one thing I really would want is a "write vlayer" command to easily throw strings to the vlayer. Most likely this would be a hack where the coords are in the "#x" "#y" format. That would be killer.

edit: removed some ambiguous things that increased ambiguity

This post has been edited by CJA: 21 February 2015 - 03:49 AM

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Posted 20 February 2015 - 10:49 PM

I say yes to all these great ideas :(

Are we talking about true transparency? For instance a blue circle moves on top of a red square... would the blue circle have red corners of the square visible?
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Posted 21 February 2015 - 10:04 AM

Just wanted to say I'm totally down with these ideas and they're making me excited about MegaZeux again :(
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#21 User is offline   Graham 

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Posted 23 February 2015 - 01:40 AM

So how much work are we taking here? Is it a matter of hours or what? Anyone have a rough estimate? I mean how long did it take you, Exo, to port to windows? I understand that was probably a much bigger project because it was a complete overhaul and upgrade. I'm just curious because the time factor hasn't been discussed too much yet.

If it was 25-30 hrs. of work would it be worth the time? Considering how much of a graphical improvement it would be, how much time would be too much to make it not worth the effort?
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#22 User is offline   Exophase 

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Posted 23 February 2015 - 04:08 PM

View PostT-Bone, on 20 February 2015 - 05:49 PM, said:

I say yes to all these great ideas :(

Are we talking about true transparency? For instance a blue circle moves on top of a red square... would the blue circle have red corners of the square visible?


That's the idea, yeah.

View PostGraham, on 22 February 2015 - 08:40 PM, said:

So how much work are we taking here? Is it a matter of hours or what? Anyone have a rough estimate? I mean how long did it take you, Exo, to port to windows? I understand that was probably a much bigger project because it was a complete overhaul and upgrade. I'm just curious because the time factor hasn't been discussed too much yet.

If it was 25-30 hrs. of work would it be worth the time? Considering how much of a graphical improvement it would be, how much time would be too much to make it not worth the effort?


My memory is hazy since it was over 10 years ago, but I'd estimate that the port needed over 500 hours of work just to reach the first version. I was spending whole days working on it. For some weeks there my internet connection was even only working for a few minutes a day, so I had to do something.. The effort was kind of a big deal, hence why no one had really done anything similar yet, and not without quite a bit of planning and trying from others.

This is nothing remotely like that. Probably just a few hour job to get the subset of items from my post that there's any actual consensus of interest in. But it's been so long since I've worked with MZX's code that I could be underestimating it, and I'm still relatively busy with various other things and not really sure I'll actually get around to doing it in the first place.
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#23 User is offline   T-Bone 

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Posted 23 February 2015 - 09:05 PM

I think what would really make things worth while is the combined afford to make MegaZeux an online application. Web based but then again thats even more work...

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Posted 23 February 2015 - 09:45 PM

View PostT-Bone, on 23 February 2015 - 04:05 PM, said:

I think what would really make things worth while is the combined afford to make MegaZeux an online application. Web based but then again thats even more work...

http://www.digitalmz...=0


I think this thread was already going off the rails a bit but you've just thrown it into a canyon :(

I stand by what advice I gave there but that's about it.. if Why-Fi and/or anyone else gets a dev cycle going for such a thing that's a great, but I don't think I'd be able to help very much.
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#25 User is offline   T-Bone 

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Posted 23 February 2015 - 10:00 PM

No problem just sounded like an interesting idea but a behemoth of a workload to do by the sounds of it.
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Posted 23 February 2015 - 10:21 PM

View PostExophase, on 24 February 2015 - 02:08 AM, said:

500 hours of work


and that's just for GAME2.ASM!

although, at least that one had source code
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Posted 23 February 2015 - 10:33 PM

View PostLancer-X, on 23 February 2015 - 05:21 PM, said:

and that's just for GAME2.ASM!

although, at least that one had source code


:(
~ ex0 has a kickass battle engine, without it you sux0rz! without it you sux0rz! ~

"The fact that I say I've one of the best, is called honesty." -Akwende
"Megazeux is not ment to be just ASCII, it is ANSI!" - T-bone6
"I hate it when you get all exo on me." - emalkay

Exophase can what Rubi-cant.
exoware is ware ur ware is exoware
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Posted 19 March 2015 - 04:27 AM

I seem to have missed this thread, probably because I haven't been around as much in recent months. It seems like mzx development is about to pick up again, so I'm wondering what the plans on this are.
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Posted 19 March 2015 - 05:53 AM

My biggest question is who's going to do it? Exo seems to be expressing interest but he's pretty busy these days.
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#30 User is offline   Exophase 

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Posted 19 March 2015 - 06:11 AM

Yeah, I'm kind of waiting to see if anyone else is interested in doing it before thinking of taking the plunge.. especially since there are others here who haven't forgotten MZX's codebase as much as I have.
~ ex0 has a kickass battle engine, without it you sux0rz! without it you sux0rz! ~

"The fact that I say I've one of the best, is called honesty." -Akwende
"Megazeux is not ment to be just ASCII, it is ANSI!" - T-bone6
"I hate it when you get all exo on me." - emalkay

Exophase can what Rubi-cant.
exoware is ware ur ware is exoware
ps. not loking 4 new membrs kthx
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