Enterprise Forever
:UK => Enterprise DevCompo => Enterprise DevCompo #2 => Topic started by: geco on 2017.January.13. 14:41:39
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Conversion of ZX Spectrum game Hobbit (https://enterpriseforever.com/letoltesek-downloads/egyeb-misc/?action=dlattach;attach=17080), the program is EXOS compatible, needs at least 128 KB RAM. Music added, it uses 2 character screens and an attribute screen where new pictures are displayed, unfortunately the pictures remained quite big after compression also, this is the reason why only 4-5 could be loaded into the memory in an EP128, if 640KB RAM available then all pictures are loaded into the RAM. I am not satisfied with the pictures, I expected better result.
Controls:
Shift: "
Tab: Repeat last command
Erase/Del: Erase one character
Stop: Erase all
Internal joystick:
up: North
down: South
left: West
right: East
Function Keys:
F1: Music on
F2: Music off
F3: Speaker on
F4: Speaker off
F5: Display graphics
F6: Do not display Graphics
Loading screen:
[attach=1]
Ingame screen:
[attach=2]
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Thanks!
But I can't make it work on the emulator. It hangs shortly after the loading screen.
Which is the better configuration?
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If you tried it with floppy config, it does not works, I did not try it with floppy :oops:
I will fix it. Now the best config TAPE with at least 640KB RAM.
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Problem at floppy config corrected, link updated
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Wonderful! You have made on record time an extraordinary EP version not comparable to other 8 bit computer versions.
Even it has good music, colourful screens and rainbow text with better type-font than of the original game!
I have tested the Save and Load commands, and they work, but then I had to execute a Look command to change the actual room picture.
I like your approach, the game text above, and the input zone down the picture, because on the original game there is only an ornament line dividing them, and it is confusing. I also appreciate the use of small letters.
Thank you.
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Really impressive!, many thanks for this! :smt023
The graphics are from the original movies?, have you found acceptable ones for all the places? :-)
Also IMHO a minor drawback, the upper rainbow effect makes hard to read the description, maybe with a lighter blue?
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Wonderful! You have made on record time an extraordinary EP version not comparable to other 8 bit computer versions.
Thank you, I am happy that you like it :)
Even it has good music, colourful screens and rainbow text with better type-font than of the original game!
Music is a PT3 Hobbit21, I do not remember the composer :( The font is from C64 version of Iron Lord. Rainbow is mine :D
I have tested the Save and Load commands, and they work, but then I had to execute a Look command to change the actual room picture.
Yes, I did not check it in the original version, but probably works in the same way, and on some place where you were earlier the picture is not shown, only if you type the LOOK command, I did not want to touch it. I removed the printer routines from the game.
I like your approach, the game text above, and the input zone down the picture, because on the original game there is only an ornament line dividing them, and it is confusing. I also appreciate the use of small letters.
Thank you.
I worried that this solution will be frustrating, because there is a big gap between the 2 window. I changed to small letters, because it was much harder reading the text in capital letters with this font. :)
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Really impressive!, many thanks for this! :smt023
You are welcome :)
The graphics are from the original movies?, have you found acceptable ones for all the places? :-)
Only some of them is from original movies (about 15-20% ), most of them could not be converted to good quality, there are 79 places, and 62 have graphich.
Also IMHO a minor drawback, the upper rainbow effect makes hard to read the description, maybe with a lighter blue?
The problem is that I started from White, there are 2 solutions use more white, and start later the blues, or the last blue will be changed to the previous lighter blue.
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Upper 2 rows got lighter blue colors for better reading, the link below points to the updated version.
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Endi found a problem, the game freezed at gate of Mirkwood, because all files contains 5 pictures, except SCE, and SCM, SCM contains 3, it was handled, SCE contains 4 it was not handled.
The problem solved, and link updated.
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I understand your hard work converting the graphics and your disappointment about some of the results on dark light, but..... how if you explain the way to pack the files? maybe an artist can retouch some of them. Or you can release the source graphic files to retouch or change them.
The problem with dark scenes, as I see it, is the lack of differentiation of colour zones. The dithering of colours doesn't work on these pictures like on clear and detailed ones like the hobbit's hall.
But an artist can outline the colours with a lighter line before converting the picture and it can work.
Of course, I'm not a painter....
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From the Retrowiki Spanish web, Ron says: Geco, have you ever seen the 128KB Spectrum mod of The Hobbit (https://www.worldofspectrum.org/forums/index.php?p=discussion/50480/the-hobbit-128k-edition)?
It works on your emulator, and also has bitmap screens borrowed from other Hobbit games, C64, BBC, and DOS:
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I understand your hard work converting the graphics and your disappointment about some of the results on dark light, but..... how if you explain the way to pack the files? maybe an artist can retouch some of them. Or you can release the source graphic files to retouch or change them.
I can send you in mail.
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From the Retrowiki Spanish web, Ron says: Geco, have you ever seen the 128KB Spectrum mod of The Hobbit (https://www.worldofspectrum.org/forums/index.php?p=discussion/50480/the-hobbit-128k-edition)?
It works on your emulator, and also has bitmap screens borrowed from other Hobbit games, C64, BBC, and DOS:
Yes, I used it for testing, and check some things in it :)
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I can send you in mail.
Ok, also Jltursan is planning an MSX conversion of The Hobbit, again with colourful images. He likes very much your selection of graphics.
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unfortunately the pictures remained quite big after compression also, this is the reason why only 4-5 could be loaded into the memory in an EP128
The compressed size could be reduced with less dithering or a different mode (attribute with -palres 1 is the mode that compresses the most poorly). According to Endi, less dithering may also improve the quality, but this probably depends on the image. Another idea is to store the pixel bytes in a different order, at least in the case of Spectrum loading screens they can be compressed better if the image data is in the "C64" (character based) order.
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Istvanv, and about quality, I think that a light outline of the darker colour zones can improve the results on some images.
I want to make some tests, but I am not so skilled to draw...
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The compressed size could be reduced with less dithering or a different mode (attribute with -palres 1 is the mode that compresses the most poorly). According to Endi, less dithering may also improve the quality, but this probably depends on the image. Another idea is to store the pixel bytes in a different order, at least in the case of Spectrum loading screens they can be compressed better if the image data is in the "C64" (character based) order.
I tried for some pictures mode 3 (col 16 mode), and for best result i did not try -palres 1.
I tested the pictures with different dither settings, most pictures were converted with dither 1 0.4, it was the most fit setting for most pictures, some of them was converted with lower or higher.
EP style format is not better for compression than C64 order? I used continous EP style.
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EP style format is not better for compression than C64 order? I used continous EP style.
I did not try the C64 order on IVIEW images yet, but it seems to work better on Spectrum graphics. I noticed in Povi's new Squares game that the loading screen is compressed with some specialized method that reorders the pixel data, and that is how it achieves better efficiency. So, I tried the EP style linear order first which slightly reduced the file size, but the C64 addressing (character cells) gave even better results.
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Hm, it is interesting, but I guess it depends on the picture also, how the data is organized on it.
I recognized earlier that compression on CPC and Speccy style is worse than on EP style.
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I did a quick test with ARIZONA.RAW packed in C64 format, but it does not make much difference (see original results here (https://enterpriseforever.com/programozas/fajltomorites-enterprise-on/msg61561/#msg61561)):
uncompressed: 55954 bytes (had to be padded because the height was not a multiple of 8 )
-raw -m3 -9: 44523 bytes
-raw -m2 -9: 43110 bytes
-raw -m0 -8: 40875 bytes
-raw -mz -9 -maxoffs 65536: 40763 bytes
So, it is slightly better, but the improvement is minor and it would need additional code to fix the unpacked data. IVIEW images converted from photos or movies just do not compress well and the pixel data is basically random bytes.
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Istvanv, and about quality, I think that a light outline of the darker colour zones can improve the results on some images.
When converting "dark" images, increasing the contrast/gamma may also help, with only 2-3 bits per channel, low contrast images do not look very good on the Enterprise or other 8-bit computers. :)
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When converting "dark" images, increasing the contrast/gamma may also help, with only 2-3 bits per channel, low contrast images do not look very good on the Enterprise or other 8-bit computers. :)
I did it, I used GIMP to increase brightness and contrast :) , but probably other thing should be used also, what I did not find, because a lot of pictures was very dark with low contrast.
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https://youtu.be/wl1xazdbxrY
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https://youtu.be/wl1xazdbxrY
Thank you very much :)