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Text File | 1989-12-31 | 14KB | 403 lines

---------------------------------------------------------------------------- T H E <<<<<>>>>> <<<<<>>>>> <<<<<>>>>> <<<<<>>>>> <<<<< <<>> <<< >>> <<<<< <<<<<>>>>> <<>> <<< >>> <<<<<>>>>> >>>>> <<>> <<< >>> >>>>> <<<<<>>>>> <<>> <<<<<>>>>> <<<<<>>>>> A D V I C E B U R E A U ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- YOUR STOS-RELATED PROBLEMS ANSWERED BY CHRIS SHARP OF SUPREME SOFTWARE AND DEANO OF SILLY SOFTWARE ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Due to a corrupt disk (thanks Mr. ROYAL MAIL!) we are unable to print Chris Sharp's answers to this months STOS problems but he IS still on the team ready to answer your questions so if you have a STOS query and you would like to send it to Chris Sharp of SUPREME SOFTWARE then write to the following address: CHRIS SHARP SUPREME SOFTWARE 4 SUNNYCROFT LANE DINAS POWYS SOUTH GLAMORGAN SOUTH WALES CF64 4QQ Or write to Deano of SILLY SOFTWARE at this address: DEANO SILLY SOFTWARE 27 TURBARY WALK MILNROW ROCHDALE OL16 4JN Or if the worst comes to the worst you can send your STOS problems to me at the normal POWER address. Either way, your question(s) will be answered by both Chris and Deano. Okay, here are this months questions... **************************************************************************** Dear POWER, I have a 520 STE upgraded to 1 meg and the following STOS extensions: BLITTER STE MISTY QUICK CONTROL TRACKER 1. I am currently trying to code a RPG (captive style) but I am having trouble. Please could you tell me the fastest way to do the following: - Read the maze position and walls, door and baddies. - Update position and bung it on the screen. 2. Is it possible to poke scores or graphics into the overscan area and if so, how? 3. With a game like Space Invaders and Galaxians, what would be the best way to check collisions? 4. How the hell do I get hold of the EXTRA Extension? 5. A friend of mine (the only other person in Thetford with a ST) just bought the STOS compiler from a car bootsale and it doesn't have instructions (no it's not a copy, I can prove it!) and I can't figure out the following things: - I can compile to basic and save it as a .CMP file how do you execute it? - When compiling to GEM how do you load external datafiles (i.e. MBK's) without it automatically adding them to the compiled .PRG? 6. In Pacman-type games, how do you give the ghosts intelligence to roam the maze on their own? 7. What is your opinion of the 3D extension as I have been thinking about getting it but I don't know how good it is? 8. When I registered the Misty Extension the registration disk had a routine to display fullscreen pictures, I have corrupted my registration disk and didn't make a backup, so could you please tell me how to do it? Cheers. From Lee Ashmore DEANO OF SILLY SOFTWARE REPLIES: Answer One... The quickest way of reading things like exits and such in a maze of rooms is to store all the info in arrays, then check which room the player is in and set zones in that room. For example, the following routine shows us how to set up zones in each room and set them up when the player enters it. 10 key off : curs off : mode 0 20 dim MAP(5,4) : dim XZ1(5,4),YZ1(5,4),XZ2(5,4),YZ2(5,4) : ROOM=1 25 rem SET UP MAP EXIT VALUES 30 for X=1 to 5 : for Y=1 to 4 40 read MAP(X,Y) 50 next Y : next X 52 rem SET UP ZONE CO-ORDINATES FOR EACH ROOM 55 for X=1 to 5 : for Y=1 to 4 66 read A,B,C,D 70 XZ1(X,Y)=A : YZ1(X,Y)=B : XZ2(X,Y)=C : YZ2(X,Y)=D 75 next Y : next X 76 rem DRAW EXIT BOXES AND INFO OF WHERE EACH ONE GOES 80 home : print "ROOM";ROOM : locate 0,6 90 for X=1 to 4 100 box XZ1(ROOM,X),YZ1(ROOM,X) to XZ2(ROOM,X),YZ2(ROOM,X) 110 set zone X,XZ1(ROOM,X),YZ1(ROOM,X) to XZ2(ROOM,X),YZ2(ROOM,X) 115 print "EXIT";X;" GOES TO ROOM";MAP(ROOM,X) 120 next X 125 rem WAIT FOR PLAYER TO CHOOSE A ZONE 130 repeat 140 EXIT=zone(0) 150 until EXIT<>0 and mouse key=1 155 rem SET ROOM VALUE TO NEW ROOM 160 ROOM=MAP(ROOM,EXIT) : goto 80 1000 rem EXIT VALUES FOR EACH OF THE FIVE ROOMS IN MAZE 1010 data 2,3,4,5 1020 data 1,2,3,4 1030 data 2,1,3,4 1040 data 3,2,1,5 1050 data 1,2,3,4 2000 rem ZONE CO-ORDINATES FOR ROOM ONE 2010 data 10,20,20,40 2020 data 30,20,40,40 2030 data 50,20,60,40 2040 data 70,20,80,40 2060 rem ZONE CO-ORDINATES FOR ROOM TWO 2070 data 10,20,20,40 2080 data 30,20,40,40 2090 data 50,20,60,40 2100 data 70,20,80,40 2120 rem ZONE CO-ORDINATES FOR ROOM THREE 2130 data 10,20,20,40 2140 data 30,20,40,40 2150 data 50,20,60,40 2160 data 70,20,80,40 2170 rem ZONE CO-ORDINATES FOR ROOM FOUR 2180 data 10,20,20,40 2190 data 30,20,40,40 2200 data 50,20,60,40 2210 data 70,20,80,40 2220 rem ZONE CO-ORDINATES FOR ROOM FIVE 2230 data 10,20,20,40 2240 data 30,20,40,40 2250 data 50,20,60,40 2260 data 70,20,80,40 In this routine we have five rooms in the maze, each with four exits which all lead to other parts of the maze. The MAP array works like this, the varible ROOM holds the number of the players position in the maze, in other words the room number. The first set of data statements allow us to specify which exit leads to which room. For example.... 10 read MAP(1,1),MAP(1,2),MAP(1,3),MAP(1,4) 20 data 2,3,4,5 This means that exit one leads to room two, exit two leads to room three and so on. When you run this routine you will see four boxes on screen, representing four zones, or exits in this case. Clicking the left mouse key in a zone will set the varible ROOM to the new destination room. With this method you can easily tell where you are by just reading the ROOM varible. With this you can then call up the part of the maze you want. 100 screen$(logic,16,0)=R$(ROOM) The arrays XZ1, YZ1, XZ2, and YZ2 hold the co-ordinates of the exit boxes on screen. The format goes..... XZ1(ROOM,EXIT) So we can set up four zones in the present room using the SET ZONE command then check which zone the player chooses. The exit zones could be four arrows pointing in four directions. Using this method you can check whats on screen in this method. For example, if the player clicked on a baddie in order to fight him, then you could say that the baddie is in room three and is in zone two, and check like this. 10 repeat 20 CH=zone(0) : wait vbl 30 until CH<>0 and mouse key=1 40 if ROOM=3 and CH=2 then gosub 1000 Where line 1000 onwards holds the routine for fighting the baddie. Answer Two.... I've never used any overscanning methods so I can't help you there. Maybe Chris has the answer.....he's very clever you know. Answer Three.... The best and fastest way of checking colisions would proberly be to use the missing link MANY BOB and MANY OVERLAP commands. This allows you to have a fair few bobs (preshifted sprites) flying around with fast checking. Answer Four.... The EXTRA extension can be obtained by sending a disk of P.D. and return postage to the author himself. Martin Cubbit 14 Deepdene Avenue Rayleigh Essex SS6 9LG Its currently at version 2.10. Answer Five.... A CMP file saved by the compiler can be treated the same as a BAS file. Just load and run it as you would a BAS file. The only difference is that you can't see the basic listing in a CMP file. Errm, ho hum, well the compiler only loads the files it needs. If you don't use sprites then it will ignore the SPRITE.BIN file, only adding the machine code routines it needs to run sprites, windows, and so on. If you wanted to load other files when the program is running from GEM then you just use the LOAD command in the normal way. For example... 100 load"picture.mbk",5 If you don't want to keep this file in memory then you can simply erase the bank with the ERASE command. Answer Six.... It depends on what your using, either sprites or ML bobs. The thing I would suggest (and hope it works), is to define your ghost sprite and place the hot spot in the top left hand corner. Lets look at the sprite method. Draw your maze using the MAP accessory and make note of the colour of the background that the ghost moves over. This of course would be colour nought. We can use a routine that tells the sprite to only move along that colour. 10 key off : hide on : flash off : curs off : mode 0 20 ROOM=1 : gosub 5000 : rem DRAW ROOM ONE OF THE MAP 30 sprite 1,40,72,1 : rem SPRITE STARTING POSITION 40 if movon(1)=0 then gosub 1000 50 gosub 2000 60 goto 40 1000 rem MOVE SPRITE IN CERTAIN DIRECTION 1010 if D=1 then move X 1,"(2,-1,1)" 1020 if D=2 then move X 1,"(2,1,1)" 1030 if D=3 then move Y 1,"(2,-1,1)" 1040 if D=4 then move Y 1,"(2,1,1)" 1050 move on 1 : return 2000 rem CHECK IF SPRITE AT DEAD END, IF SO, MOVE IT ANOTHER WAY 2010 X=xsprite(1) : y=ysprite(1) : S1=point(X,Y+8) : S2=point(X+16,Y+8) : S3=point(X+8,Y) : S4=point(X+8,Y+8) 2020 if S1<>0 and D=1 then D=2 2030 if S2<>0 and D=2 then D=1 2040 if S3<>0 and D=3 then D=4 2050 if S4<>0 and D=4 then D=3 2060 return As this routine has just come from a few guesses, I'm not sure if it will actually work properly. However, with a bit of messing about it should be okay. The routine works by checking the colour in front of the sprite, if its different from the background colour then we use the varible D to change direction. Unlike the DETECT command the POINT command allows us to check any part of the sprite, so we can check all sides. I think Chris would proberly give a better working routine of this anyway as I've just not add time to work such a routine out. Answer Seven.... STOS 3D is a pretty powerful package, but its down side is speed. Its also not very easy to use. But I think its worth a try if you want to make your own STOS 3D games. Answer Eight.... I have sent you the MISTY registration disk to replace the copy you lost. You'll have to get the routine from that as this kind of routine is beyond me. Might you, I'll get there one day. **************************************************************************** Dear POWER, I have recently found out how limiting 15 banks in STOS can be but I've heard of a method called 'stacking' which apparently lets you have as many banks as you want in theory. How do I stack a bank and is there any kind of limit or rules that have to be followed? From Neil Simons DEANO OF SILLY SOFTWARE REPLIES: Think of a large box, this allows us to put more than one item in it. Its the same with banks, we can actually set the size of it then load the files into it one after another. This method with stack PAC pictures. First make a note of the length of each PAC file then add them all together, then add about twenty bytes and make it an even number. You then choose a bank and reserve it to this size. 10 reserve as data 5,80000 Note reserving a work bank makes it a tempory bank while reserving a data bank means it can be saved along with your program. Load the first file in like this. 20 load"pic1.pac",start(5) Now the next thing to do is load the next picture into the position where the last picture ends. So, get the length of the first file and make it into an even number. For example, if the file is 1787 bytes long then call it 1790 bytes long. We can now load the second file in, in front of the first file just like this. 30 load"pic2.pac",start(5)+1790 After this we just take the length of the pictures already loaded and load the next picture in. For example, lets say our pictures are like this. PIC1.PAC LENGTH 1787 ROUNDED TO EVEN 1790 PIC2.PAC LENGTH 2136 ROUNDED TO EVEN 2140 We take these two values and add them together, which makes 3930. If the value is an odd number then you must make it even. We can then load this file in. 30 load "pic3.pac",start(5)+3930 Do the same with the other files already loaded, add them together and round them up to even numbers to find where to load the next picture in. To get at them, all you have to do is this. 40 unpack 5 : rem unpack the first picture 50 unpack start(5)+3930 : rem unpack picture three There is an easier method if you have the missing link extension. This has two commands called BANK LOAD and BANK COPY. Use the MAKEBANK program on the source disk to load all files and save them as an FBANK with the extension BNK. You can then load and use them like this. 10 mode 0 : key off : flash off : curs off 20 PICNO=1 30 reserve as work 5,80000 40 bload"pics.bnk",5 50 reserve as work 6,9000 60 bank copy start(5),start(6),PICNO 70 unpack 6 This copies the specified picture from the stacked bank into bank six and unpacks it to the screen. You can use this method with the smaller files but it tends to corrupt some larger ones. The first method however should work with all files. In case you were wondering, the BANK LOAD command allows you to load a file from a stacked bank on disk. ******************************************************************************