Release Spheres of Chaos

[ZXDunny]

Hi folks -


We're at it again, with another classic shooter for you. Less mazey than FMN, but so much more shooty. It's Spheres of Chaos!


Sebt3 did the hard work on this one, as I have very little time for porting or developing these days so many, many thanks for his hard work! All I had to do was sort the controls and fix a couple of graphical issues.


So, what to do with this then?


Well, it's asteroids. On steroids. Rotate, thrust and shoot the shit out of stuff and hope you don't get lost in all the effects. It's massive. The controls are set up for the Pandora, but I'm not overly happy with them yet - suggestions would be welcome. Note that I'll be very reluctant to change any game mechanics.


On the menus:


Use the nubs to move the mouse pointer (touchscreen will NOT work) and L/R trigger to select an option. Alternatively, use the space key to get to the shooting.


In-game:


Use nubs to rotate, UP/Y to thrust, DOWN/X to brake, and L/R triggers to fire. H Hyperspaces!


You have to press ESC twice to exit, both in game and in the menu. This will be fixed, and is a precaution against hitting the key accidentally - which won't happen on the Pandora. Bear in mind that some of the controls are hard-coded, such as the triggers, so redefining the controls may not work. Let me know what you would find more comfortable and I'll get cracking.


The sound is 8bit, just like the original game. However, where old PCs/Archimedes and Windows will make those sounds smooth, the Pandora does not and it sounds quite scratchy in places. I'm working on that.


Get it here:


http://repo.openpandora.org/?page=detail&app=SpheresOfChaos.zxdunny.0312


And feedback to the usual place (here, for example).


Enjoy!


D.

 

[gruso]

Preview shots are only in 4:3, so I have given this a one star rating.


Just kidding. You might be merciless when it comes to other releases, but you do tend to put your money where your mouth is. Look forward to trying this after work.

 

[sebt3]

Preview shots are only in 4:3, so I have given this a one star rating.

The game on pandora is 800x480 dont worry 'bout that

 

[kuru]

I tried this and it looks great, yet another reason to curse my broken nubs.

 

[gruso]

Preview shots are only in 4:3, so I have given this a one star rating.

The game on pandora is 800x480 dont worry 'bout that

Good stuff I figured it would be.

 

[BaDToaD]

Great game but I'm crap at it.


Would it be possible to slow the rotation down on the nubs. I find it difficult to be gentle on the nubs when there's a huge sphere hurtling towards me and then I rotate too far and end up flying into something. Failing that an dpad fixed speed rotate would be great, especially for Asteroids vets like myself who sunk a fortune into the aracde machine in their youth and are not used to analogue rotation. A dpad rotate would also allow those without nubs to play too

 

[ZXDunny]

Thanks folks -


I'll get the screenshots sorted. Unfortunately I cannot seem to get any of the game itself - the hotkey in snapsnap doesn't appear to work, so I've lazily snaffled screengrabs from the web. This is quite a long way off my usual standards, so will be getting updated soon.


And yes, I'll look at adding DPad left/right rotation too!


You can change the sensitivity of the nub rotations in the controls menu.


D.

 

[mcobit]

Take screenshots over ssh

 

[Link]

I had a little go at this before bed, my nubs stopped working during the game and I had to reset them in nub configurator.


Looking forward to playing more.


Thanks Dunny & Sebt3!

 

[pmprog]

The cursor doesn't match where I touch the screen. It's very awkward navigating the menus.


Otherwise, looks quite fun

 

[Mr_Loon]

Great stuff Dunny / sebt3, just my cup of tea.


On the subject of controls :


+1 for the option of DPad rotation


Have you considered using the analog nature of the nubs to aid precision in rotation : small press - rotate slowly, big press - rotate quickly (+ appropriate speed in between)?


Could hyperspace be mapped to the A/B buttons?


Great to see another quality shooter on Pandora.

 

[ZXDunny]

The cursor doesn't match where I touch the screen. It's very awkward navigating the menus.


Otherwise, looks quite fun

Use the nubs to move the mouse pointer (touchscreen will NOT work) and L/R trigger to select an option. Alternatively, use the space key to get to the shooting.

Touchscreen will never work without some serious re-coding being done. Sorry.


D.

 

[pmprog]

Touchscreen will never work without some serious re-coding being done. Sorry.

Ah, sorry, I kind of played it and commented before reading your post. My nubs aren't set to move the mouse, but it's possible to navigate with touchscreen, if not a bit awkward. Will give this a bit more of a play tonight


Thanks

 

[ZXDunny]

Touchscreen will never work without some serious re-coding being done. Sorry.

Ah, sorry, I kind of played it and commented before reading your post. My nubs aren't set to move the mouse, but it's possible to navigate with touchscreen, if not a bit awkward. Will give this a bit more of a play tonight


Thanks

That's odd - I specifically set both nubs to mouse mode in the startup script. The way the mouse is used in this is that it's constrained to a small rectangle in the middle of the screen and the deltas on mouse movement are used to move the ship pointer. To get it to use the touchscreen properly would take a major rewrite of the menu system. I do plan to do that, but only to allow you to use up/down and A/B to navigate the menus - I have no interest in making use of the touchscreen.


I'll also look at getting more/better control systems in there hopefully tonight (if the baby lets me!)


D.

 

[pmprog]

That's odd - I specifically set both nubs to mouse mode in the startup script.

You're absolutely right. Wonder why I didn't notice that before. Anyway, all seems to work well, and it's a pretty neat game. Thanks!

 

[ZXDunny]

Just had a play with the controls menu.


You can set it to Keyboard by hovering over the word "mouse" to the right of the ship. Press a trigger button to change it to Keyboard. From there, I defined left/right as left/right on the dpad, and fire as left trigger with thrust on A. You can define it how you like, however. Bear in mind:


Y and X are mapped by the game as Up/Down for left/right handed issues in mouse control, and this will carry through onto keyboard games. There's nothing stopping you from using these keys, but their assigned functions will be duplicated on the Up/Down dpad directions.


D.

 

[EvilDragon]

That game looks totally insane


I like that, need to try it

 

[levi]

Awesome news! I think I still have a boxed RISC OS edition of this somewhere. Class game and last time I saw a lot of stuff had been added since the last version I played.


Oddly enough, it originally supported both digital key rotation (with configurable speed) and analogue mouse rotation. I always played it on keyboards, as an Asteroids veteran.

 

[ZXDunny]

Awesome news! I think I still have a boxed RISC OS edition of this somewhere. Class game and last time I saw a lot of stuff had been added since the last version I played.


Oddly enough, it originally supported both digital key rotation (with configurable speed) and analogue mouse rotation. I always played it on keyboards, as an Asteroids veteran.

As I said, I've been playing with the controls menu, and it's surprisingly easy to play with DPad and face buttons! This has been a favourite of mine for many, many years and I'm just stoked to get a Pandora handheld version


For those of you on the fence about this one, just play up a few levels - you'll soon be dragged in as it gets unbelievably manic!


D.

 

[Stainy]

This is a mental game talk about visual overload love it