Anyone still plays "the amazing adventures of Echo" on Wiz?

[drumpi]

Hello, everyone:

It's time to start thinking in closing "the amazing adventures of Echo" and start new projects (like it's sequel, "Doggy!!!", an RPG or a 3D racing game).
But, when I tested the game on Wiz, it was having hard times to maintain a good speed. I try to replace the Tiled Scroll Engine, because I was thinking it was the problem. It wasn't. If I want to make it run faster, I have to rewrite a big part of the code (about 2000 lines, sared between almost all sprites of the game). It's too hard to do, and I don't know if it will works.
So I'm thinking about stop coding the Wiz/Caanoo version.

I don't want to cancel the first platform that Echo put a foot in, but it's hard to do and I don't know if someone is still playing it. It has almost 2000 downloads in the previous versions, and only 40 in the last one.

So, I need to know what do you think. Should I stop the Wiz branch completely? Should I release the last complete version and continue only on PC with a "season 2" version? Maybe I can continue, trying my best to have the Wiz version running*? or do you really like the game so much that you need a full speed version for Wiz? (this last option means that I have to spend a month or so after continuing the developement, so be REALLY sure you want it!). Your opinion also will affect other ports, like Dreamcast (I'm trying to port, but I'm having troubles).

* Trying my best means that I will have to make some tweaks on the maps for Wiz/Caanoo, to reduce the ammount of enemies on certain areas (called "recharge areas", because is the only way to replenish your life and weapons exp points, unless you die), and avoid some issues that will be solved with a two layers map. Still will slow down sometimes, but the game will be as playable as before. I think I fixed the "chopiness" with some frameskip with the new engine, but it is faster with few enemies and slower with lots of them :S

Thank you.

 

[Wrath Of Khan]

Do you have a video of echo somewhere, a link? Dreamcast ports are usually received with enthusiam in the dc community. Evildragon has even published a few dc titles too. Is a pyra port under consideration?
A 3d racing game sounds like a good idea but a lot of work I guess.

From what I hear, the wiz and cannoo are kind of dead... but good luck with your game.
[doublepost=1485269742,1485269478][/doublepost]Edit. Found it via forum search. Looks like a nice platformer. And I see its on pandora already.

 

[FBnil]

For the ones that do not remember:

You will get a much bigger userbase on PC of course. But much more helpful comments here (as we tend to be a more adult userbase).

Also don't do it for us, do it for yourself: You either stick to the old game to learn optimization. Or you move on to a new title, with new level maps, where you can pour your creativity in, this time with all the know-how of the old title.
Having a DC title IS pretty cool (Although I do not own a DC).

Wait a little for the poll results, so you can decide better.

 

[Eight Bit]

Sold my Wiz some time ago... I could play it on my Pandora I guess but never have

 

[ptitSeb]

Sold my Wiz some time ago... I could play it on my Pandora I guess but never have

Yes you can. Go there: https://pyra-handheld.com/boards/threads/new-versions-of-echo-for-wiz-and-caanoo-and-pc.78245/ then grab the PND.

 

[EvilDragon]

I'd be happy to produce and publish the game on the Dreamcast.

 

[Wally]

I feel you're probably wasting your time with the Wiz version as many people have moved on to other platforms.

I'd suggest you try for PC and modern devices such as the Pyra Looks like a fun game, I would play it!

 

[drumpi]

Thaks a lot for your answer!! I really appreciate them. I'm going to listen for more opinions for some days, I really need to be sure what to do.

I'm going to use the same code to continue the project, so it's not written from scratch for the "season 2" (maybe for "Doggy!!!", who is a platform-adventure game)... But don't worry, there will be new gameplay styles on the new levels (a platform-sandbox/mission based is confirmed for one of the new levels).
BTW, that screenshot is for the older version. Look for the improved 1.3.2 official version in openhandhelds:

I can't do a port for Pandora or Pyra because I don't have none of them. This game is made in BennuGD, so a port is easy to do, but it's not in my hands (without help).
And this apply to the DC port. I'm talking with Ryo_Suzuki, an active member of BennuGD port on Dreamcast, and indirectly with Indiket, who is doing the latest port of BennuGD to Dreamcast. The game crashes in the title screen, and I'm trying to know why, but I don't own a console, the emulator is not helping, and having feedback by forum isn't the best way to debug. So again, it's not in my hands unless we can find the source of crashes.
I did a partial port to Wii, it works but it randomly crashes (I think is because the music format, at 44100MHz), and a kind of port to GP2X (yes, the old black big screen two processor stick console) that works at half of speed... So I don't understand why it doesn't work on DC.

So, still listening... And thanks again!!!
PD: EvilDragon, good luck with Pyra project!!! I would like to see it working!

 

[kuru]

Why is this not on the repo?

 

[ptitSeb]

bah, I can push my pnd to the repo yes.
[doublepost=1485340054,1485335990][/doublepost]Mmmm, I have pushed it but the PXML has a wrong http site address (copypasta issue). I'll fix that tonight and upload a newer version of the PND.

 

[kuru]

Thanks for uploading!

Wow, this is a very polished CaveStory-like. Isn't there more than the first level though? It just quits after you walk through the door at the end of the level.

Edit:
out file says

ALSA lib pcm.c:7843:(snd_pcm_recover) underrun occured
ALSA lib pcm.c:7843:(snd_pcm_recover) underrun occured
./runscript.sh: line 35: 3108 Segmentation fault                  bgdi echo.dcb

 

[ingoreis]

I'd be happy to produce and publish the game on the Dreamcast.

Yeah nice Idea..i love Dreamcast Homebrewgames

Will try the Pandora Version soon

 

[drumpi]

Thanks for uploading!

Wow, this is a very polished CaveStory-like. Isn't there more than the first level though? It just quits after you walk through the door at the end of the level.

Edit:
out file says

ALSA lib pcm.c:7843:(snd_pcm_recover) underrun occured
ALSA lib pcm.c:7843:(snd_pcm_recover) underrun occured
./runscript.sh: line 35: 3108 Segmentation fault                  bgdi echo.dcb

As far as I know, there aren't any issues with the game. Looks like there is an error with ALSA lib, but I don't know why. I don't know if I can check it, but it seems to be an issue of the Pandora port (oh, my God! I talked like comercial developers! ).

By the way, you didn't reach the end of the level, just the end of the first screen. You still need to go through three more screens to end the first level ^^U
Also, you can check the game on PC from:
http://gamejolt.com/games/the-amazing-adventures-of-echo/170481
For Linux, you can use Windows files, but you need to have installed BennuGD, and make a call to "bgdi echo.dcb".

 

[ptitSeb]

I'll debug that to see why I have segfault on the Pandora port.

 

[Klumpen]

This needs to be on the Debian/Mint/Ubuntu repos, unfortunately I have no idea how stuff ends up in there (and a lot of stuff is totally out of date, like Scorched3D and pcsxr which still can't even read eboots in that version).

 

[Ziz]

This needs to be on the Debian/Mint/Ubuntu repos, unfortunately I have no idea how stuff ends up in there (and a lot of stuff is totally out of date, like Scorched3D and pcsxr which still can't even read eboots in that version).

Easy. Find a Maintainer, which is interested in having the package in debian. E.g. a maintainer once found a project of mine at github, found it useful and added it to the debian repository. I needed to improve some things, but this helped my project a lot. For outdated games, ask the maintainer, why it is so old. Scorched3D e.g. is available at the most recent version in debian stretch / testing. Same for pcsxr. So maybe just your distribution is outdated? Ubuntu LTS distributions only get every 2 years major updates.

 

[drumpi]

This needs to be on the Debian/Mint/Ubuntu repos, unfortunately I have no idea how stuff ends up in there (and a lot of stuff is totally out of date, like Scorched3D and pcsxr which still can't even read eboots in that version).

What? This game? ^^U
It's harder than Ziz says. In our community we wanted to have BennuGD in Linux repos, but we can't because they said than every program uploaded in repos must have, at least, a 64bit version, and BennuGD was programmed in 32bits. We had an unnoficial repo for BennuGD, but that's it.
If Bennu can't, my projects can't too

 

[Ziz]

Well, of course projects need some standards for repositories. I needed to change my project a bit too to get it to debian. However BennuGD really should work on 64 Bit support anyway. Being able to be in debian is a good motivation beside not being stuck in 1999.

 

[Nintastic]

Vita would be good