Asteroids Deluxe updated

[Shockman]

An arcade game. Not a Pinball.

The changes,

-Deluxe background set to default. Changes are still saved though.
-Deluxe ship.
-Shields reworked. Now they are similar to the arcade version. They drain slowly as the key is pressed, I think the arcade version does not, but like the arcade version it now takes big hits from being shot, and collisions. The rate of drain is related to the skill level.
-Shields also emit a sound now.
-Shots move faster.
-The ship now has a max speed.
-Text recolored, and other minor changes.

EDIT.

I found a bug with the shields if entering a new wave with them on. I fixed that.
Also when you lost a ship, UFO's would almost never come again until the next wave. I also rewrote the UFO routines. Now you will see a lot of UFOs. Maybe too many, and their speed, and bullet speed, and frequency of appearing is all based on the skill level, as is their firing rate.

The easy level is only a bit harder due to the UFOs being faster and their bullets being faster, this is incremental per skill level to the point where the hard level is a real challenge now.

It's posted at YoYo now.

http://www.yoyogames.com/games/152029-asteroids_deluxe

 

[Shockman]

I continue.

This is not up yet, but will be after testing.

-ESC now escapes to the demo mode, and ESC only there will exit the game. This so someone that might by habit hit ESC in the operator menu or enter high score screen, two places where ESC does nothing now, will not inadvertently exit the game.
-Alpha transparency for the bezel is now fully adjustable in the operator menu. This setting is also saved in the .ini file. You don't have to delete that, it will update it's self.
-Shields no longer drain at all until contact is made with a 'roid or enemy.
-Shields no longer regenerate between waves. Only with a new ship will you get new shields.

I'm also working on a key and joypad mapper for this game. It may be in the next update.

These later changes are an effort to get behavior closer to the arcade version, and also to deal with some friendly and co-operative not really competition with a member there that has made a very nice Asteroids Deluxe, titled Deluxe Asteroids. Arcade true (at least as much as mine is), but with a windows game presentation.

I'll bump this when it is up at YoYo.

 

[Shockman]

It's up.

 

[LeeVanCleef]

Jesus, Shocky... that thing's hard as hell! Or I suck at Asteroids, which is probably closer to the truth. Otherwise, great version of a classic!

 

[Shockman]

Did you change the skill level to easy?

Normal is hard, and hard is very hard. Easy is normal, but I'm very good at rotate and thrust and play normal or hard, so easy I can make very easy.

I am going to start a rewrite of two major routings tomorrow. I am going to set up the levels proper. Now it has levels, but it's going to have all the waves on one controller.
I am going to rewrite the entire shield routine, as bumping around is screwy.
I will make sure that the easy level is very easy, and have a nice shield cheat back in it. It was lost when I changed the shields to not drain without a collision, but cheat will still give you unlimited shots.

Thanks for the feedback. I'll keep it in mind when setting up the skill levels.

What would be best as far as making it easier? Slower moving rocks and enemies?, or faster moving ship with faster rate of fire and faster moving bullets? Bigger enemies? Is the difficulty in moving, aiming, rate of fire, avoiding incoming, or something else? or all of the above? If it's all of the above it will need a fourth difficulty level, 'Vary Easy'. I do want to keep close to the original, which I find the hardest part, in MAME at least is first the aiming, and then the rate of fire.

If someday computers and monitors are capable of displaying 360 frames per second, it will still take a second to do a full rotation. Today it takes 6 seconds with 60 redraws per second, so rotation below 3 degree increments is too slow. 5 or 6 degrees is good speed, but too much of a gap.

Some people think that the easiest way to play asteroids is to just stay in the middle and rotate and shoot, but that is no fun, and makes the game very hard. As far as hitting a target it is so much easier when in motion.

Thanks again, ruby

 

[LeeVanCleef]

LOL! When I started playing Asteroids, I was one of those "stay in the middle and everything will be fine" idiots. I quickly learned the errors of my ways. I think in the opening stages, the smallest rocks move a little too quickly. And the... whaddya call it?... triangles space ship are no longer strolling after you to kill you, but seemed to have taken a "that spaceship just raped my sister" mentality of hunting you down. But really, minor differences on a real well-designed game. I especially liked the way the colors changed subtly, just like on the real vector game. If you like Asteroids, I urge those reading this to give it a spin (as long as you move while you're spinning).

 

[Shockman]

I continue.

Remember it starts off on the normal difficulty which is hard. Press f2 to enter the operator menu. I designed it to work with a coffee table unit I am building and that is why the keys are named for the function and not a keyboard, so keep that in mind.

There is so much new in the version that it's hard to start and I fear I might leave something out.

- The UFO's and the motherships, or you can call them snowflakes, will keep coming now. This makes the game harder, but more fun. This was one of the hardest bugs to fix.

- The rocks are slowed down a little, but this is both skill level, as well as wave dependent. The speed up variable was dropped, so the increase in speed on the next wave is not as much.

- You can map keys now. There is only one key for each function now.

right arrow to rotate right
left arrow to the left
up to thrust
down for shield
space to fire

but you can remap those keys to.

You can set every function of controlling the ship to any key you want as long as it has a character to display.

- The doubles and swarmers are slowed down. This makes that part of the game easier. You will keep getting snowflakes now, even on the same level after you kill all the sections, up until you have only one rock left.

- sound in attract mode added.

- all the waves are on one object instead of separate objects, so transition between waves is smooth.

-2 1/2 D. This means that objects move along what would be the z axis had this been 3D. The rocks will enter not from the edges, but anywhere, but they come in from far Z and can not hurt you until they are on your Z plane. You can however kill them at that time, but that will probably change. Snowflakes do the same, and also leave the same way, as does the swarmers.
This all means that you have a brief safe period without using shields. At a new wave you are there, and the rocks 'come', when you are destroyed in a level you blow up and your new ship 'comes' from the far z plane and you can still rotate, thrust, and fire during that time, and you are going to need to. After you and an enemy or a rock is on the same plane you can destroy each other.

ASTEROIDS DELUXE II now up at YoYo, in the beta section.

http://www.yoyogames.com/games/161763-asteroids-deluxe-ii

 

[Shockman]

Asteroids Deluxe (not 2) has been updated.

-Key mapper. It is saved and all keys can be redefined. You must set all the keys you want to redefine that are not the defaults each time you enter the configure screen though.
-Cheat mode is back. Now unlimited lives. You will have to ESC. to end the game.
-The mothership will wrap the screen and will continue to appear until the wave is completed. After it and all the swarmers are killed it will reappear, given time. A mothership will continue to reappear as long as a few, but more than one asteroid remains (arcade behavior). A wave with no rocks but a mothership will end when the mothership is hit and all swarmers are destroyed, or the mothership leaves the screen.
-The swarmers will be faster each time on the same wave, and start faster each wave (arcade behavior). You can kill a few sets before they become too fast to handle, but the next wave they will start slow again, but not as slow as the wave before. With no rocks left in the wave, but swarmers present, swarmers will have to be destroyed for the next wave to start.
-Some of the smaller rocks were indeed too fast, that is now fixed. The rate of speed and the speed increase per wave have all been reworked.
-Free play only now. Sound in attract mode can be set to on or off.
-Cropped Asteroids Deluxe backdrop now used.
-Bug fixes and behavior changes to make it more like the arcade version.

http://www.yoyogames.com/games/152029-asteroids_deluxe

 

[faralos]

wow! I just got it and will play it soon! I didn't know you were a game programmer too! looks like the real deal, just gotta' relearn the movements with my leyboard!
very kewl!!

 

[faralos]

um having a wee bit of a problem seems my ship likes to just spin to the left without me touching it at all. if I hit the right key it stops but does not turn right taking my finger off the key just sets it spinning again. everything else works ok though

 

[Shockman]

Sorry to read that faralos

I have never had or heard of that with this game.
It sounds like an uncalibrated joystick to me.

When using analog sticks for digital function like this will, you have to have a dead zone as well.

Try it with nothing plugged in to joyport, or USB just to check this out.

If I need to I can reprogram the joy support to analog with a deadzone... Pretty much the same effect.

I use the keyboard, but have no problem with my joypad plugged in and play using it sometimes.

To choose keys, press F2 and scroll down to the keyboard mapper and press right. Click on the arrows to redefine all keys you want to change. I changed only UP to Z and SPACE to C.

It's like Asteroids Deluxe, but as you probably know Asteroids has different shapes of rocks with no rotation and Asteroids Deluxe uses one shape for every asteroid regardless of size but has rotation. This version has different shapes and rotation. It has also spinning UFOs. But it plays pretty much the same. It started as Asteroids and still has, and will keep the Asteroids interface. I made this because I like Asteroids but wanted smoother animation than MAME provides, at least on my system.

 

[faralos]

I was using my keys but I did not map them out That may be the problem as it is defaulting to a j stick and not the Unmapped keys, guess i should read directions first huh> thanks for the reminder of mapping the keys out i forgot that part!

 

[Shockman]

The joystick is not flagged. If it is plugged in, it is active for this game. you could actually use both joystick and keys at the same time, not that there is a reason to do that.

The keys only have to be mapped if you want to use other keys than what is used for default. cursors to rotate, down for shield up for thrust and space to fire.

My version of Lunar Lander does the same thing. It does default to joystick and the ship will rotate to the left and right stick will stop the rotation but not rotate the ship right. All it takes to use the stick if this happens is to press the mode button that most dual analog controllers have, that changes the axis label for the stick axis'. It uses the dual analog sticks. One for thrust lever in analog mode, and one for the rotation buttons.

Also, make sure you let the AsteroidsDX.ini file reside in the same place as the game file. It saves the backdrop selected and it's alpha settings, the bezel alpha setting, skill level, key mappings, and other settings. High scores are saved in the Windows registery.

I think I need to write a flag for key / joy input just to avoid this problem though and document the need to check the mode button.

 

[faralos]

I am not using a joystick, just my keyboard but the ship still does not turn to the right at all...

 

[Shockman]

Ok. Sorry.

I assume you mean that you do not have one plugged in, but to be sure, because the only thing that I know that has ever caused this is a controller, and this issue has came up. I can reproduce it at will, and it is the same (spin left and right is only enough to stop it, but not enough to go right) and it has always been caused by the joystick until now.

However it is not unimaginable that something else could cause it, including a keyboard.

I will think about it, and ask around YoYo. I have a couple of friends there that are excellent game programmers. It is obviously something about your platform, but usually these things are not totally unique.

 

[Shockman]

Try this version.

It has no joystick code. Just the virtual key routine which is a single sub routine that check keyboard input using variables instead of direct key polling.

It includes the .ini file which otherwise would be created with any setting change.

This should work if any part of your system, besides the keyboard, is conflicting.

I suggest something like this for arcade type control (though your hands will be reversed because rotate was left hand and thrust and fire was right, middle or ring (whichever fit best) and index, with right thumb for shield

Z ... thrust
C ... fire
and the defaults...
cursor down ... shield
cursor left and right to rotate

It's just a game, but it's a puzzle too now. I hope this works for you.

 

[yukiko1701d]

Thank you !!!:)
I love this game!!!:hearteyes:
Now, I want to play missile command.:)
And grant me my wish, I am happy...:)

 

[Shockman]

The reason I made this is because i was unhappy with the MAME emulation of Asteroids and Asteroids Deluxe. Missile Command emulation in MAME is fine.

You will find a few Missile Command type games at YoYo though. I downloaded one myself.

Asteroids Deluxe II will be my next release. Still a pseudo vector game, It has new graphics with more detail, multi-colors, and new sounds, as well as swarmers that speed up as they are chasing you, crystal collection for power-ups, and will have bonus levels and other differences.

 

[yukiko1701d]

Roger that!!!:)
I'll look now. @Missile Command.:)

I look forward to the release of Asteroid　Deluxe II.

 

[yukiko1701d]

I found Missile Command type game!!!

Thank you!!!@Shockman.:)

 

[Shockman]

RTyp06 made that one. He is a friend of mine. He also made an Asteroids Deluxe called Deluxe Asteroids that you can find there at YoYo.

I am attaching my WIP of Asteroids Deluxe II. WIP, but all that is included so far is working.

It adds to Asteroids Deluxe...

- Multi-color

- The swarmers speed up as they chase you. They will start faster each time a group is destroyed. They will star slow again on the next wave, but not as slow as the last wave. They will get too fast to kill them all, but not as soon as you might think. You have to decide if you will risk another go, or let the mothership leave and advance to the next wave of asteroids.

- Shield regenerating crystals. Sometimes appear when a medium size asteroid is destroyed. Adds 10 units to your shield. A word about shields. You can take a clean hit, a few of them even, but if you get slapped around by the rocks or take a bad hit while rotating, you could loose all your shield.

- FIRE POWER crystals. When you start, you will have to hit the big asteroids 4 times to destroy them. One hit will crack them, and another crack it more. Medium takes 3 hits. Small rocks always take just one. So, when you have three crystals (the maximum) everything takes just one hit. When your ship is destroyed, you will regenerate (spawn) with one less fire power crystal.

Crystals must be collected to be used. Collect them by making contact with your unshielded ship.

I am no graphic artist, but the graphics will be improved on. The ship is kind of lame. I want to make one that looks like the one on the Asteroids Deluxe backdrop (not used in this game, there is the classic one and a new one, and the classic bezel is used for now)

 

[Shockman]

I updated the file in the post above. The cheat mode was broken. I also worked on the shield reaction, and they are more durable maybe too durable, but they do drain just from use now. I put in a ship I have used in the past, added a life crystal (yellow), and increased shield sound volume.

I also did not mention that you can remap the start key too now. Default is the 1 key. Other numbers are not mappable for any function except for the key pad.

F1 for the user manual.
F2 for the operator menu.