[Spectere]

Note: Before I begin, I would just like to say that the reason I created a new thread for this rather than adding to the already-bloated feature request thread is because this subject is platform-specific (i.e. only affects the DS, GP2x, and PSP ports) and the limitations of the said platforms require some special treatment to ensure good playability and usability. Feel free to merge this if that is preferred.

I've had a bit of a fondness for the PSP port of MegaZeux as of late. I've been in the mood to play Zeux 2-5 and, well, what better way to do them? The problem with the port is that it doesn't really feel like a portable game -- rather, it feels like a PC game that was hacked to run on a portable system. This thread's intent is to collect ideas on how to make the game handle in a way more suitable for portable use and to improve the quality of the ports overall.

Here's a few ideas that I've had:

• Separate in-game button mappings from title screen mappings. The current system allows for a great deal of flexibility but is a bit lacking. In order to actually be able to play a world, it is inevitable that you will have to press the P button. The way the remap system is designed, this will cause you to effectively waste a button that could be used in a game. A few actions (i.e. loading a world, playing a world) are unnecessary in a game yet still take up a valuable button.
  
• Allow per-game mappings. As everyone knows, different games can require different keys. For instance, Caverns requires the S key to cast spells and the F key to change forms at the end, while Catacombs and Forest require the W key to change which staff you are using. If you intend to have multiple MZX files, odds are you're going to need to have a bunch of different key mappings. As it stands, that is not possible to do without either having multiple installations on your memory card (which, in the case of the PSP, would all appear to be named the same -- "MegaZeux PSP"), having a means of renaming/editing files on the system itself, or having access to a computer at all times.
  
• Creating a menu. An in-game pop-up menu with commands such as "load," "save," "options," and "exit to title" would be nice, and allow multiple actions to be condensed into a single button, eliminating waste. Right now, if you wanted to be able to load and save games you'd have to set up two buttons for it. If you wanted to change some of the settings, say to turn off annoying sound effects in a particular game, you'd have to use up another button for F2. If you want to quit a game, you'd need to bind a button to "escape." A menu would help prevent button waste.
  
• Kill the editor. The editor would need to be redesigned to be used on a portable system. I'm not sure how much room in the executable/memory it actually takes up just sitting there, but wiping it out (effectively making a modern MZXRun) might be beneficial to systems with a limited amount of memory; namely the DS.
  
• Allow use of key names in the remap files. The current remap system is a bit unfriendly as it stands right now. It was probably the best and fastest way to get it working, but a lot of users are going to get confused by it. Using a system like what id uses for their games (giving keys real names, such as PGUP, S, ESC, DOWN, etc) would be an elegant solution.

That's all I can think of for now, but I'm sure as I play it more I'll have more things to whine about.

As I've made fairly clear in this post and in the past, I have a PSP with 3.71 M33-3 at my disposal if testing is needed, and I'm more than willing to help out in that regard. As it stands now, MegaZeux is already very high quality compared to most homebrew and, with some changes, it can be even better.

Thanks for reading!

[Exophase]

Spectere said:

Separate in-game button mappings from title screen mappings.  The current system allows for a great deal of flexibility but is a bit lacking.  In order to actually be able to play a world, it is inevitable that you will have to press the P button.  The way the remap system is designed, this will cause you to effectively waste a button that could be used in a game.  A few actions (i.e. loading a world, playing a world) are unnecessary in a game yet still take up a valuable button.

I recall already doing this, for this reason. But I don't remember exactly how it worked.

Spectere said:

Allow per-game mappings.  As everyone knows, different games can require different keys.  For instance, Caverns requires the S key to cast spells and the F key to change forms at the end, while Catacombs and Forest require the W key to change which staff you are using.  If you intend to have multiple MZX files, odds are you're going to need to have a bunch of different key mappings.  As it stands, that is not possible to do without either having multiple installations on your memory card (which, in the case of the PSP, would all appear to be named the same -- "MegaZeux PSP"), having a means of renaming/editing files on the system itself, or having access to a computer at all times.

Already has this, has been like this for many versions. Name it game.cnf.

Spectere said:

Creating a menu.  An in-game pop-up menu with commands such as "load," "save," "options," and "exit to title" would be nice, and allow multiple actions to be condensed into a single button, eliminating waste.  Right now, if you wanted to be able to load and save games you'd have to set up two buttons for it.  If you wanted to change some of the settings, say to turn off annoying sound effects in a particular game, you'd have to use up another button for F2.  If you want to quit a game, you'd need to bind a button to "escape."  A menu would help prevent button waste.

Was going to do this, but my life kinda fell apart while I was in the middle of working on the PSP port and then I never went back to it, so it didn't get these kinds of features ;P It should be easy to add though.

Spectere said:

Kill the editor.  The editor would need to be redesigned to be used on a portable system.  I'm not sure how much room in the executable/memory it actually takes up just sitting there, but wiping it out (effectively making a modern MZXRun) might be beneficial to systems with a limited amount of memory; namely the DS.

Already planned by the people who care about that.

Spectere said:

Allow use of key names in the remap files.  The current remap system is a bit unfriendly as it stands right now.  It was probably the best and fastest way to get it working, but a lot of users are going to get confused by it.  Using a system like what id uses for their games (giving keys real names, such as PGUP, S, ESC, DOWN, etc) would be an elegant solution.

Let's be a little more honest here, there aren't ever going to be "a lot of users", if you get it then that's pretty much all that matters. Seriously though, there's a list there of what corresponds to what, it's just not really worth it.

[Spectere]

[quote name='Exophase' date='Nov 15 2007, 03:03 AM']Already has this, has been like this for many versions. Name it game.cnf.[/quote]
Ooo, awesome.

Thanks for the tip. =)

[quote name='Exophase' date='Nov 15 2007, 03:03 AM'][quote name='Spectere']Creating a menu.[/quote]

Was going to do this, but my life kinda fell apart while I was in the middle of working on the PSP port and then I never went back to it, so it didn't get these kinds of features ;P It should be easy to add though.[/quote]

S'okay -- there are more important things in life than developing MegaZeux.

I'm working on compiling the toolchain...we'll see if my laughably laughable C experience will enable me to do anything to make something like that work.

[quote name='Exophase' date='Nov 15 2007, 03:03 AM']Let's be a little more honest here, there aren't ever going to be "a lot of users", if you get it then that's pretty much all that matters. Seriously though, there's a list there of what corresponds to what, it's just not really worth it.[/quote]

That said, bear in mind that MegaZeux's reception among certain circles could very well be directly related to how easy it is to get running.

And who knows, the PSP homebrew community might really like something like this. As it stands right now, the PSP's library mainly consists of emulators (gpSP ) and ports of id Software games of varying quality. Granted, MegaZeux would essentially be a port, but a lot of MegaZeux games really lend themselves well to a portable system, especially compared to games like Doom and Quake which, IMO, are a pain to play on it.

I might be a bit overoptimistic about this, but you never know 'till you try, right?

[Exophase]

I don't think the general PSP homebrew using crowd are really going to go for MZX, but I guess it's possible.

[Pyro1588]

if we had a bundle with mzx and several classics that really shine in mzx (btb, demon earth, etc.) along with premade .cnf files, i could see mzx catching on in the psp community.
i think spectere's right that it will definitely depend on how simple it is to install, though. that's why i advocate having a couple of games and .cnf files come with it.

also pardon my lack of understanding, but is mzx based on the 1.5 firmware? if so, how much work is necessary to get it running on a slim?

[T-Bone]

Quote

(Spectere)
Kill the editor.  The editor would need to be redesigned to be used on a portable system.  I'm not sure how much room in the executable/memory it actually takes up just sitting there, but wiping it out (effectively making a modern MZXRun) might be beneficial to systems with a limited amount of memory; namely the DS.

Quote

Already planned by the people who care about that.

awww... my dreams of having a portable MZX editor are gone... gone i say! Guess I'll have to stick with using laptops.

[Terryn]

It wouldn't be forced off for portable builds, just likely off by default. If you insist, you could build with the editor. It's your choice when you compile what to include and what to leave out.

Right now, you can disable renderers, music (modplug or mikmod), libpng, and all audio as a whole. Ability to disable the editor and help system are forthcoming.

[LogiCow]

Just make a button layout that works for everything, and that can be mapped to:
1) the keyboard, with arrow keys and Z, X, C, A, S, Space, Enter
2) A nintendo DS, with D-Pad, A, B, X, Y, L, R, Start
3) A PSP, similar to the nintendo DS

And while configurable, the default keyboard layout would be like this:
Keyboard "Z" = DS "B" = PSP "X"
Keyboard "X" = DS "Y" = PSP "Square"
Keyboard "C" = DS "X" = PSP "Triangle"
Keyboard "Space" = DS "A" = PSP "Circle"
Keyboard "A" = DS "L" = PSP "L"
Keyboard "S" = DS "R" = PSP "R"
Keyboard "Enter" = DS "Start" = PSP "Start"

Except enter has a stupid menu in MZX so maybe start would be something other than enter. But Start really should be enter. It's main purpose is to pause the game anyways.

And make it easily accessible through counters in robotic, so that future games have no reason not to use them.
Like "Joy1" "Joy2" "Joy3" up to "Joy7"
Or since everyone ever has played SNES, make it more visual:
"JoyA" "JoyB" "JoyX" "JoyY" "JoyL" "JoyR" "JoyStart"

And heck, maybe even remap the player movement to that, so that you can play through caverns without having to reconfigure stuff. But that's entirely optional.
The focus is on new games, since it's hard to make the broad range of previous games work without custom layout for every game.



To recap: When making your future MZX game, you use the "JoyB" counter to detect if the player jumps and "JoyY" to detect if the player attacks. That way it also works on nintendo DS and on PSP. And on a computer, it'll be Z to jump and X to attack. Which is perfectly fine and pretty much the modern standard.

In fact I'll also copy this whole post and paste it in MZX suggestions.

[ajs]

I can confirm that disabling the editor(s) is planned (indeed, I've almost finished it, I just want to run a few things through Exo first).

--ajs.

[Spectere]

Oh yeah, one idea that I forgot to mention in my previous post: in dialog boxes, the X/O/A/B (B/X on GP2x) buttons should be OK and the tri/sq/X/Y (A/Y on GP2x) should be cancel. This would allow you to set ENTER to an out-of-the-way button like START without having a negative impact on the ability to use dialog boxes.

Another thing that might be something to consider is a revised save system. Since entering filenames isn't practical and a system such a P-Sprint is kind of hard to learn, some sort of on-screen keyboard should be provided or, alternatively, a per-world save slot system can be utilized for games that allow saving. The biggest problem that I can see with per-world save systems (i.e. caverns3.sav would be slot 3 for caverns.mzx) is that world swapping would break it but, aside from that, it is probably the best solution.

[Exophase]

Spectere, on Nov 16 2007, 12:04 AM, said:

Oh yeah, one idea that I forgot to mention in my previous post: in dialog boxes, the X/O/A/B (B/X on GP2x) buttons should be OK and the tri/sq/X/Y (A/Y on GP2x) should be cancel. This would allow you to set ENTER to an out-of-the-way button like START without having a negative impact on the ability to use dialog boxes.

Another thing that might be something to consider is a revised save system. Since entering filenames isn't practical and a system such a P-Sprint is kind of hard to learn, some sort of on-screen keyboard should be provided or, alternatively, a per-world save slot system can be utilized for games that allow saving. The biggest problem that I can see with per-world save systems (i.e. caverns3.sav would be slot 3 for caverns.mzx) is that world swapping would break it but, aside from that, it is probably the best solution.

A good way to use the save system as it is now is to put some dummy .sav files in the directory, then you can just select them when saving.

[Spectere]

Yeah, that's what I've been doing thus far. It gets the job done. Just an idea for the future.

Oh, would a memory dump be of any use for debugging MZX? I've had a few soft locks, sans PSP BSoD, occur from time to time during play. It doesn't happen too often but I can't seem to find a way to reproduce it.

There also seems to be a rare issue that manifests when you move or shoot right (using both the d-pad and analog nub). It will sometimes refuse to hold the direction, moving one or two spaces and stopping until you hit the direction again. It seems to go back to normal on its own when you start spamming the other directions. Weird.

...actually, would you guys rather bugs related to the portable versions be posted here or in the proper thread? None of the issues I've brought up in this post seem to occur in my Linux MZXSVN build.

[Exophase]

Here would be better, I think. Although these sound damn near impossible to debug >_<

[Spectere]

Yeah, exactly. :< There's no rhyme or reason to them whatsoever, from a user's standpoint anyway.

The file browser crash is equally odd, but at least that's somewhat consistent.

Speaking of the file browser bug: open graphics.c, go down to line 693-ish (the graphics.render_cursor call in void update_screen()). Comment it out and it prevents the crash from occurring. Uncomment it and open up render_soft.c. Go to line 110 (the soft_render_cursor function) and comment out the body and, despite it essentially being a no-op, the crash still occurs. It's happening when the call is made, but only in a very specific condition.

Is it possible that this is a bug in the toolchain, or is it more likely related to what you mentioned before about MZX not being alignment safe?

[ajs]

Maybe this is a stack problem?

--ajs.