[Dr Lancer-X]

妹SOFT 2013 presents:



Click to descend into the red (70.7 MB)
Lo-fi version (12.2 MB) - not recommended, it's pretty rough on the ears
Vault link
Readme

Very special thanks to Otto Germain and Lachesis, who did a brilliant job with the enemy sprites they drew and shaped a good portion of the game's visual direction. I probably wouldn't have finished this game without them, and even if I did, it wouldn't look nearly as good.

[Graham]

Well it looks like you found a font that works with SMZXmodes >1. Very beautiful and polished looking. I can't wait to check it out.

[Dr Lancer-X]

Graham, on 27 August 2013 - 12:57 PM, said:

Well it looks like you found a font that works with SMZXmodes >1. Very beautiful and polished looking. I can't wait to check it out.

Yes; actually, I made that font a while ago and it was one impetus for this game, since I was finally able to make a text-heavy game in SMZX without needing multiple chars per letter.

[Lachesis]

[Frankie]

I downloaded this but my puny PC (a 512Mb ARM laptop) is choking on it (vvvvvvery slow).
I am pretty new to mzx, is there a way to disable CPU intense effects?

[Dr Lancer-X]

Hmm... not really, I'm afraid. The most CPU-heavy thing the game does is draw the enemies. I might look into creating a version for you that runs at speed 4-5 during battles instead of 2 with waits divided down to match this (this effectively means battles will run at a lower framerate)

This won't fix things if the game runs more than 3-4 times slower than it should but it should at least make the game playable. I don't think I will be able to do anything similar for the non-battle parts of the game, but I'm guessing those already run quite a bit better?

EDIT: here, give this a shot- http://sho-in.com/z1xxm7Qo/red.mzx
Just overwrite red.mzx in your current version of the game with it. You won't be able to carry over your current save if you have one (loading it will essentially load the old version, since that's how mzx saves work)

[Otto Germain]

I know what I'm playing tonight!

This looks great, I'll let you know what I think. :]

[Graham]

This is amazing! So polished and beautiful it's hard to believe that only a few people contributed to it and not a whole team. Way to go!

I imagined I was playing it on a SNES because frankly it's good enough to be a SNES game. Mind you I'm less than an hour in so that could change, but I somehow doubt it.

If I were you I would send it to some indie games review sites to get it some attention. Heck maybe put it in steam green light. I think you'd recoup the $100 easily.

[Giel]

WHOA! Now THOSE are some supreme graphics for MZX! It's capabilities like THAT that pretty much make ZZT seem obsolete nowadays!

[Maxim]

This type of game is likely what everyone wanted since SMZX mode was added into Megazeux. Damn, this is good. I'm not very far into it yet, but goddamn!

Also, since I'm amused by Giel's suggestion that ZZT, which was written in Pascal and compiled in such a way it won't even run on modern Wintel boxes natively, might not be obsolete yet... here's a few things I learned while messing with some computer hardware from the early-mid 80s. Sorry to go off the subject of the thread. Move it to a separate one if it becomes a problem...

ZZT's Monochrome mode exists for a reason. CGA monitors put out a composite signal. On a composite monochrome monitor, which was common at the time, all colors except gray and white appeared as ugly but consistent vertical banding. Only gray and white appeared as solid blocks. I can't describe it properly, I'll try and take a picture if the CRT doesn't dislike the idea of having its picture taken too much.

I'm sure the reason you're limited to 7 colors in the ZZT editor is because of another oddity of the CGA era. Generic TTL monitors that didn't have an intensity bit could only display 8 colors instead of 16. True CGA monitors had lines to toggle red, green, blue and intensity per pixel, and, well, not having an intensity bit means less possibilities..

On top of this, it doesn't use any sort of protected mode and can fit on a 1.2MB floppy disk. I bet it would run on an XT. Too bad I don't have a working XT to test it on. Hell, there's a chance it'd work on the original PC.

Compare even to the original Janson versions of Megazeux. It ran at 640x350, a standard that came into use in the mid-80s with the creation of EGA, but as of version 2 definitely used a VGA palette. It supported multiple digital sound cards, and Inmate2993 had trouble getting to to run at a decent speed on his 286. It's not hard to make Megazeux 2.51 choke a 66MHz 486. Also it made the best use of extended/expanded memory it could without crashing. Getting DOS Megazeux to run properly was kinda a challenge.

Why even bother saying all this? I worked with a few people who were 6-7 years younger than me and they don't know about *any* of this stuff. The landscape of technology has changed greatly since I first found Megazeux in 1995. Seeing it put into full perspective after messing with a bunch of AT-class machines is a bit of a mind fuck.

[djtiesto]

This is the first MZX game I downloaded since & I think... haven't tried it yet as I'm currently in the middle of cooking and was just dicking around on here

Looks great, reminds me I never quite got the hang of Super MZX mode.

[Graham]

Old man Graham? /:-|

[Dr Lancer-X]

Graham, on 29 August 2013 - 04:25 PM, said:

Old man Graham? /:-|

don't tell me you're not pleased with your cameo

[Graham]

Lancer-X, on 28 August 2013 - 10:45 PM, said:

don't tell me you're not pleased with your cameo

Haha, no I was kidding, I love it in fact! If I was the inspiration for the character's name then I am honored to be a part of your game.

Spoiler

Old man Graham just stomped that first boss. I'm 70 minutes in and just got 4 people in my party. I really like the pace of the game. It's nice to have a full party already, makes me feel powerful early on which is a nice feeling. Though I'm sure I'll be up against some tough foes shortly. I'm liking the heck outta this game.

[Dr Lancer-X]

Graham, on 29 August 2013 - 05:26 PM, said:

Haha, no I was kidding, I love it in fact! If I was the inspiration for the character's name then I am honored to be a part of your game.

Kidding. In truth, that bit of the game predates you joining DMZX, so-- probably not =P (but who knows, maybe I had just played Amnesia again and the name popped into my head)

[Graham]

Lancer-X, on 29 August 2013 - 01:28 AM, said:

Kidding. In truth, that bit of the game predates you joining DMZX, so-- probably not =P (but who knows, maybe I had just played Amnesia again and the name popped into my head)

Oh, well I am old you know? ;-)

[Lachesis]

can i have a cameo

[Frankie]

Lancer-X, on 27 August 2013 - 10:31 PM, said:

EDIT: here, give this a shot- http://sho-in.com/z1xxm7Qo/red.mzx
Just overwrite red.mzx in your current version of the game with it. You won't be able to carry over your current save if you have one (loading it will essentially load the old version, since that's how mzx saves work)

Thanks, but it seems it is the whole thing being slow, not just the battles.
But no worries, soon I will upgrade to a proper machine and will try this game!

This post has been edited by Frankie: 29 August 2013 - 02:49 PM

[Baby Bonnie Hood]

Lachesis, on 29 August 2013 - 01:43 PM, said:

can i have a cameo

What is this, Cans?

[ThDPro]

Man, this is great so far. Up to the huge ass cave with the map now, level 10-ish. Too bad runs for shit on my old ass laptop (x86 2004 Lenovo ThinkPad). It's fine on my 2008 machine, not even a hiccup.

[Dr Lancer-X]

Here is an update: http://sho-in.com/iy...1.01-update.zip
Extract it over your existing copy of 'red' (it contains everything but sfx and music)

I'll update the main zips later when my internet is not terrible.

[Lachesis]

Well I think I have a new favorite MZX game, but

Spoiler

I am 12 hours in and stuck at the start of the dungeon at the bottom of the Subterranean Passage. The first puzzle with the two blocks and three boulders works fine, but all of the NPCs below it do not respond (the chest, the boulders, the pressure plate...). Did I do something wrong? Is this a bug?

Other info: 1.01 patch extracted on top of the hi-fi release, just reached level 17, have the Shimmer Armor and the Evil Sword, can provide a copy of my save file if it's a bug

[Dr Lancer-X]

Here's a new update: http://sho-in.com/i5...1.02-update.zip
Please apply this one, as it is necessary to complete the game, per Lachesis' post above.

[Seventh Shade]

Liking this so far but it would be nice to have fewer but more difficult encounters. Gets just a tad irritating to have to stop every 10 or so steps to mow down some hapless mooks. How long is this game?

[Dr Lancer-X]

Seventh Shade, on 02 September 2013 - 02:56 PM, said:

Liking this so far but it would be nice to have fewer but more difficult encounters. Gets just a tad irritating to have to stop every 10 or so steps to mow down some hapless mooks. How long is this game?

I would be a little surprised if someone beat it in under 15 hours on their first try- 15-20 is probably accurate.

I get what you're saying, although the average encounter rate (once per 100 steps) is actually higher than that of a number of RPGs e.g. Final Fantasy (30 steps)- the encounter rate is higher in towers and on the world map though. Increasing difficulty to compensate and deliver the same level of party 'wear' over a dungeon with a vastly reduced encounter rate is also extremely difficult to balance, which is why it's generally not done. I admit I would like to create an RPG along these lines at some point though.

[Lachesis]

My old save at

Spoiler

the Red Altar

is at 16h. 20h sounds doable on a first-time run if you skip all of the extras, although

Spoiler

the Nexus

did seem to take a while to get through by itself.


Also, the encounter rate does seem too high in places (mostly during puzzles), but overall I found it to work out pretty well in the end. Once you get over the initial slow spot of level progression the game speeds up and you don't notice the encounter rate as much.

[Dr Lancer-X]

Here's another update: http://sho-in.com/io...1.03-update.zip

Bunch of bugfixes as well as numerous interface improvements and the like. Most of the changes here are based on reports or suggestions from Lachesis.

I've also updated the vault zips to 1.03 so if you're newly downloading that you don't need to worry about patching it (yet.)

[Exophase]

Enjoying so far, but stuck at boulder puzzle at entrance of Star Tower

[Lachesis]

hint

Spoiler

[Exophase]

Thanks Lachesis If you saw the post that was here before I deleted it just disregard it